Chasing the Sun

by Nikki Mathis Thompson

  So that left one person, Trey.

  He’d left her a voice mail asking her to come by one last time, but there’d been radio silence from her end. He assumed that she was still upset and would be skipping the goodbye scene. He should’ve known—known she would be bigger than that. She was not one to wallow or pout. And as she stood on his welcome mat, with a small smile and a bottle of wine, he was impressed at her ability to put her discomfiture aside.

  “I wasn’t sure you’d show.” He backed away and gestured her inside.

  “Oh, you know me. I couldn’t pass up an opportunity to brag with my wine collection.” She handed him the bottle of Mourvèdre and slid herself onto the tall stool by the kitchen.

  “Thank you. I’ve never had this type before.”

  “You’ll love it. That bottle is from the Bandol region. It’s not for the faint of heart, so decant it first and pair it with a spicy meat. It’d go great with short ribs.” She smiled, knowing that was one of his favorite dishes.

  “Well, I don’t know where the fuck Bandol is, but I’m sure it’s great.”

  She laughed. “It’s in the south of France.”

  “You could’ve just said that in the first place,” he teased.

  “I suppose so, but it made me sound a lot more refined, didn’t it?”

  “Yes, it did…Thanks again for this and for coming by. It didn’t seem right leaving without getting one last hug from you.” Ian leaned on the counter in front of her. “And how about I save this for when you come visit me?”

  “You’re giving me that look,” Trey said with a sigh.

  “And what look would that be, Ms. Swartz?”

  “You know the look. The showing me the dimple, swaggery smile look. The one you give me when you want to get your way.”

  He stood straight and tried his best to look taken aback. He hadn’t meant to give her a look. He was just putting the charm on…he guessed that could be construed as intentional.

  “Sorry, I wasn’t trying to manipulate you with my dimple. I don’t even notice I have one. But I guess I’m not sitting in front of the mirror smiling at myself, either.”

  “That’s good to know…that would be weird. As to coming to visit, sure, that would be nice.”

  “Good, that’s settled.” He slapped his hands down onto the counter.

  “Well, I’ll let you get to it. I just wanted to come by, give you the wine and one last hug.” She hopped down and pulled on her white shorts. “I’ll miss you, my friend.” She hugged him around the waist, her cheek resting on his chest.

  “I’ll miss you, too,” Ian said, kissing her head.

  Trey pulled away and sniffed. “Let me know when you get home, okay?”

  “Sure.” His voice was a bit on the froggy side. He was fighting the lump in his throat with everything he had. He didn’t want to cry, not that Trey would have judged him for it. He was surprised that Trey’s eyes were dry. He hadn’t expected her to fall to her knees, begging him to stay with tear-filled eyes. But maybe a couple of drops…

  Trey looked up into his eyes and brushed her hand along his jaw. “See you around, handsome.” She kissed his cheek and walked out the door.

  He’d raised his hand towards her retreating back, warring emotions slamming his chest. He wanted to run after her…hold her, kiss her one last time. Smell the citrus in her soft curls. To bottle her laugh, the one that made her head fall back and her shoulders shake.

  He wanted to feel complacent that he wouldn’t be seeing her tomorrow or the next day…or the next. He wanted his stool at the Royal to remain unoccupied until he graced the entrance once again.

  He wanted…

  Chapter Thirty

  The open road does nothing to ease a troubled mind. The wind in his face, the broken lines that blur into one. These should have been calming. Instead it just brought the quiet insecurities in his heart to a resounding crescendo.

  Ian let out a deep breath and readjusted his cap…Hit the gas and go forward, that was all he could do. That and roll over every detail of his life—what he had in abundance, friendship, fulfilling career, happiness and contentment. What was missing?

  There was only one thing he felt was missing from his life. He was doing okay in its absence, but the glimmer, the glimmer of what his life would be with its presence—that was something he’d only recently touched. It had been a brush of his fingertips, but it was long enough to make a lasting impression.

  Ian believed that when you fell in love, you just knew it. A hammer over the head and a sock in the gut…he didn’t believe that anymore. Sometimes that happens, and sometimes you take the scenic route, but all roads lead back to the same place…the same person. That person is your place, the place that feels like home.

  All his life he’d been waiting for the love that hit him like a bolt of lightning and stop his heart. He was astounded to realize that he’d been going about it all wrong. That type of love never ran the distance, fizzling out along with hormones and better options. He wanted a life with someone he could call a best friend. A best friend that he was attracted to. Because after all, friendship and love is all about chemistry. And isn’t love wanting to spend every day, all your days, with that one person? The person that makes you laugh, challenges you, intrigues you, surprises you, makes you happy. Ian realized that love, the kind that lasts, wasn’t made in sunburst and sweaty sheets, it was forged in the soul. When you feel you are irreversibly connected to another person…that was the love he wanted.

  That’s what he felt for Trey.

  And fuck him if he hadn’t left her behind for some other guy.

  He pulled into his driveway… only to pull right back out.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Trey wiped her forehead with what she hoped was a clean towel. The crowd was rowdier than usual, which was saying something considering it was dollar draft night. This meant six dollar tab dildos with glassy eyes and tight wallets.

  You’ve poured me six beers and waited on me for three hours, but since my tab is only six bucks…here’s a dollar, beer wench…

  Worst night of the week.

  Her regulars still tipped well and she needed all the tips she could get. It was her last push before classes started. When that happened she only worked two to three shifts a week. She saved a lot, that combined with student loans and help from her parents, she’d get by. She always did. She was grateful her parents were able to help out, not as much as they would like, but she refused to take more from them. Her father called it stubborn, she preferred self-reliant.

  Crowded was good, busy was good. That way she didn’t have time to feel the fissure—the one slowly making its way across her aorta. Not to mention the bile that was playing peekaboo with her throat.

  “Prince Charming leave today?” her friend and fellow bartender asked.

  Trey looked up to Megan, literally. She was five-eight compared to Trey’s five-four. She was not only tall, she had the body of a swimsuit model and long flaxen hair. Trey felt like a coal dust Quasimodo around her.

  Okay, that was a bit of an exaggeration. Trey was more than comfortable with her looks. Now at least…but when she was little she always envied the towheaded, blue-eyed girls in her small town. The kind that the guys chased and asked to dances. The kind whose fathers didn’t go around town with a white doctor’s coat and a “scalp condom,” the kids delightful nickname for his yarmulke.

  So different from her…Eyes too green against the backdrop of dark freckles, more almond shaped than round. Hair too thick and too curly…just too…different.

  She’d been vindicated on the balmy night of her tenth reunion. Heads turned and tongues wagged. Ninety-eight percent of the girls she’d envied looked swollen and beaten down. But the coup de gras was when she discovered that Thad Jefferson (object of an obsessive crush, captain of the football team, and particularly harsh with the anti-Semitic remarks) had a very hairy back and was hung like a chicken nugget.

  She’d laughe
d as she left him half naked in his car, which would have been a bitch move if he hadn’t been so mean to her in high school or had he not just left his wife for getting too fat.

  So she walked away…with both middle fingers in the air and her head held high.

  “Go to hell, you redneck motherfuckers.”

  Of course not everyone was mean. She had friends growing up, mostly guys. She’d earned their respect by the dirt on her knees—stealing third and busting noses.

  But when her “mosquito bites” became small C’s and she wanted to go by Trevia, it was too late. She was forever Trey—always the friend, the one the guys came to to talk about the girls they had crushes on. Not that no one noticed, but only by ones who she’d preferred to remain androgynous.

  Trey laughed bitterly to herself…some things never change.

  “Well, did he leave?” Megan asked again.

  “Sorry. Yes, he left this morning…and yes, I’m fine.” Trey pulled the tap with one hand, filling three mugs she held in the other.

  “Trey, you’re a lot of things. A good liar is not one of them.”

  “Not ly-ing,” Trey answered in a sing song voice.

  “What-ever,” Megan sang back.

  She was fine, really she was. Sure she was sad, and sure she missed him like a fledgling vegetarian misses a burger, but she was going to be okay. She didn’t need a man.

  Well, maybe a few times a month just to take the edge off…

  But orgasms aside, she was an independent woman and was doing just fine before Ian Radcliffe walked into the Royal. She tried to wish that’d never happened, but that wouldn’t have been acceptable. She loved his clueless ass, even if he didn’t love her back…at least in the way she wanted him to.

  Bottom line, if he didn’t appreciate her greatness, then his fucking loss…

  She wouldn’t mention that no man should have a tongue with such unparalleled dexterity and a member with such cock-tastic majesty.

  She shook her head.

  If I don’t pass the bar at least I have a future in pornographic poetry.

  Cursing herself for the millionth time she pulled the towel tucked in her back pocket and roughly wiped the puddles from the bar’s worn surface. But seeing her hand make rapid circles just reminded her of his tongue making similar circles on her…

  She had two questions—was it getting hot in here and would anyone notice if she straddled the beer fridge under the counter?

  She hummed to the song playing, cutting limes to the beat. Her night was almost over. Megan was closing, so Trey was going to finish her sides, close up her drawer, and get the hell home. She needed a shower and a Big Gulp sized vino.

  “Hey gorgeous, can I get four Buds? Bottles, please.” Trey glanced at James, one of her regulars, and smiled.

  “Sure thing, handsome. On your tab?” He nodded and she bent to pull some beers from their chilled cavern.

  “So you call everyone handsome, huh? I thought I was special.”

  She stilled, rear end facing the owner of the voice that sent a wave of flutters to her stomach. Trey closed her gaping mouth and schooled her expression as she stood and turned. It took everything she had because every time she took in the depths of those baby blues was like the first time…and be still her throbbing loins, she wanted those baby blues gazing up at her from between her thighs.

  She got it together though. Her face said, “hey, what’s up” even if her insides were doing their best MC Hammer impression.

  She didn’t skip a beat, flinging the tops of the Buds with fluid efficiency.

  “Here ya go.” She handed them off with a large smile, then gave Ian a nonchalant gaze.

  She’d thank God for her acting abilities later.

  “What’re you doing here? Shouldn’t you be balls deep in the Big D by now?” See, she was making jokes, everything was cool. No one wants to jump over the bar and tackle the gorgeous man in the tattered gray t-shirt.

  “Can I talk to you for a minute?” Ian asked. She’d never seen him so tentative before, like he was afraid she’d say no.

  He was clueless as hell.

  “Sure, let me just close out my drawer. Sit tight.” She gave him a smile that she hoped said nice to see you and not maniacal clown.

  She did her best to stroll to the other end of the bar.

  “Megan, can I bounce? I have a visitor.” Megan looked over her shoulder.

  “Holy shit! What’s he doing here?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Go, go! Don’t worry about your drawer I’ll do it.”

  “Aw, thanks, but I’ll do it. It’s almost all cards, anyway.”

  “Trey, if you don’t leave right now I’ll never forgive you!”

  “Okay, okay. I owe you one.”

  “Trey, you’ve done so much for me that’s not even a drop in the bucket,” Megan said.

  Trey squeezed her arm and smiled. “Love you, Megs.”

  “You too. Now go get him.”

  “Nah, it’s his turn to get me.”

  They walked towards her Passat, the muted music from the Royal was the only sound. Trey was waiting for him to speak, but he hadn’t. His face was pensive as he chewed on the lower corner of his lip. The beep of her alarm disengaging sounded. She couldn’t stand it, the silence. It was making her feel antsy.

  “Ian…why are you here? It’s not that I’m not glad to see you or anything, it’s just—”

  She was surprised when he grabbed her shoulders and drew her into him. He just held her, tightly, like he hadn’t seen her in months, not hours.

  “I had to see you,” he said into her hair.

  She let out a short laugh. “You just saw me.”

  He pulled back and cupped her cheek. “No…I know it sounds stupid, but I feel like I’m seeing you for the first time.” Nothing could’ve kept the smile from her face. He’d come back for her…but, why now? And did it really matter?

  “When I was driving home a sick feeling came over me. The thought of not seeing you…the thought of you in the arms of someone else, it made me sick.”

  “Ian, I’m going to say this…I really don’t want to, but it needs to be said. Is it just that you don’t want anyone else to have me? You want me when it suits you or something?”

  “See, that’s what I thought at first. When I saw you kiss that guy at the opening I wanted to put my hand through the glass, but I chalked it up to me just feeling protective over you…but I realized that I don’t want you in anyone’s arms ever, unless they’re mine.”

  When he rested his forehead against hers, she felt the release—the mangled coil that had snaked from her heart to her stomach was there one moment and gone the next. She could breathe, a full breath, the kind that filled her belly and lifted her chest.

  “I’m not sure why I was fighting it so hard. Fear or stupidity…either…both, who knows. But I do know that it took me all of ten seconds to pull out of my driveway and get back to you.”

  “You drove home and came all the way back? Ian! You could have just called me.”

  “There’s no way I could say what I had to say over the phone. And there was no way I could sleep knowing that you were here, not knowing how I felt.”

  “Wow, that’s…just, wow…But how do you feel exactly?”

  “I want to be with you, just you.”

  Ian just pulled her into his chest. Trey inhaled—she loved the way his clothes smelled. Don’t even get her started on his skin. The rhythmic beating of his heart and the sound of his breathing made her lightheaded. She’d fantasized about him saying these kinds of things to her, it didn’t seem real. But did he love her? She loved him, like crazy, every fiber kind of love. If he dropped on one knee she wouldn’t even have to think about it.

  Her life flashed before her eyes, the life she’d yet to have and he filled every frame.

  But she didn’t want to scare him away, so she’d keep that tucked away until the appropriate time. She’d been professing feelings for
months. Now she’d give him the chance.

  Pulling back he said, “Can I stay at your place? I turned in my keys this morning…I didn’t really think this through.”

  “Well, romantic gestures usually don’t include logistics.” They both laughed, then he kissed her softly. Her eyes blinked, fluttered really, at the gentle feel of his lips. When he sighed she pulled away. “Yes. Stay with me.”

  She meant that in every way.

  “I know we live in two different cities and I know you’re going to be busy with school, but we’ll find a way to make it work. Okay?”

  She nodded. The kiss that followed sizzled hotter than the humid air around them. She felt it zing in every part of her body. The urge to jump into his arms and wrap her legs around his waist was overwhelming.

  Ah, what the hell.

  She sprung. Ian barely faltered, grabbed her ass and didn’t let go. As far as kisses went, this one was a religious experience. She threw out a silent prayer of thanks to anyone that could hear…Thank you for Ian’s soft lips, nimble tongue, and delectable breath. A special thanks for the hardness now pressing into her shorts, that was the perfect thickness and length as if it was made just for her.

  Shalom, hallelujah, namaste…

  “I love you,” Ian whispered into her parted lips.

  Could you die from an uttered phrase? Could you die from happiness? The fact that she was still alive and well answered those questions. But she felt as if she was no longer corporeal—her body floating and weightless.

  Trey slid back down to the ground, her gaze naturally went to his face. The street light was blocked by his head, only the peripheral streaks of light were showing…heavenly.

  Standing on her tip-toes she gave him a gentle peck. “Meet me at home.”

  He smiled and kissed her forehead.

  Ian was almost to his car when she called out to him.

  “Thank you for not saying I complete you. I would’ve had to kick you in the balls.”

  She got into her car as his laugh echoed in the dark parking lot. Trey gripped the steering wheel with shaky hands, the gravity of the moment taking it’s toll in the best sense of the word. She looked up at the roof of her car, tears streamed down her face.