by Gina Kincade
Hell, I’ve told her things about me. I told her about my grandmother’s weird hyper-religiousness that morphed into crazy from time to time. I told her about starving and then thieving. I told her about Zoe and Neil. I fucking told her about Adam. I told her about war and how I couldn’t sleep. Doesn’t she realize I can sleep with her? Doesn’t she think about that?
I’m giving her my heart, my fucking heart, and she wants my dick.
Fuck.
I’m so pissed that for a few seconds I can hardly think clearly. Then things become transparent, making it real easy to say what I want to.
She’s smiling and so relaxed and leaning against me, her breasts warm and squished on my chest, her arms wrapping around my neck. I’m somehow still hard, almost never dying down and Steve, fucking Steve, is more than happy to accept her proposal.
But I’m not.
I place my hands on her back, touching her soft skin, wondering if I can possibly ever win her, when I say, “You’ll have to introduce me to Hon, your brother, first.”
Her face falls.
Granted, I thought she’d look surprised, but something else passes through her eyes. Something that looks like pain. That I caused.
I’m about to take it back when she steps away a little, her arms hanging at her sides.
“Why?” Her voice is tiny. A fraction of what it usually is.
I did that to her.
I’m hurting her. And, sure, yeah, I do think talking things out with her brother would be good for her, but what the fuck do I know? I’m not Dr. Drew.
Making things murky again is the one word floating through my mind—love. When I was close to coming, I almost said that to her. It would have been a complete dick move on my part, because the first time you say it is not when you’re about to come. I know at least that much. And I can’t believe I’m thinking it. Love. It’s way too soon. It’s only been a few days. A few intense days.
But I know me. I’ve never fallen before. And I am for her.
Call it just falling or falling in love, it doesn’t matter. My heart’s attached. I’m attached.
I want to ask if all I am to her is my dick. I want to ask about when she says my name while I’m making her come, if it means anything.
No, I want her to ask these kinds of questions.
I want this to be fucking easy. I want there to be some kind of chick-flick movie music floating through, and she asks me what I mean to her. I’ll tell her it’s too soon, but I like her. We’ll keep going on dates, and then I’ll finally tell her I love her a few months from now.
Why can’t she ask me?
“I want to meet your brother,” I say with an edge of tension and anger added. I don’t mean to sound like this. It’s just coming out of me.
She turns her back to me, grabbing the soap, but I’m pretty sure it’s a ploy so I can’t see her face.
What the fuck am I doing, sounding like an asshole and acting like it?
But the fact is, she’s crushing my heart. I’m hurt she only wants me for my cock.
“My brother is…different now.” Her voice is still small, and I can hardly hear her over the shower.
I can’t believe I’m doing this. Her voice is killing me, and I grab her hips and move her into the warm shower spray like that can help. She’s been lathering the soap, making a white bubbly mess in her hands. Her eyes are wide. Scared looking.
“My sister can act a little cold, well that’s nothing compared to my brother. Now.”
I’m outside the spray, feeling a little cold myself. I want to touch her. I want to comfort her.
But I’m not.
I can’t believe I’m not.
Because underneath all the laughing and talking and deals, I wonder if this woman who I adore cares for me at all. That’s what’s keeping me from holding her, consoling her.
She looks up, blinking. “And I don’t know if he’ll even answer my call.”
“If he doesn’t, then we’ll figure something else out.”
She suds her hands even more, looking down at the foam. “Okay.”
We dress in silence. We do everything in silence, a kind of quiet that’s killing me.
I’m about to tell her she doesn’t have to make the call when I find her in my kitchen, her cell already connected to her ear.
She looks even more shocked as she says, “Hey. It’s me.”
She’s quiet for a long time. A really long time. She’s swallowing and tears are forming in her eyes.
“Me too.” Her voice croaks.
There’s another long stretch of silence, but then she says, “I have someone I want you to meet.” She sniffs. “Yeah. Hmm-mmm.” She sniffs again. “Yeah, we can be there.” She turns her back to me once again, and I know what I’ve done is quite possibly the shittiest thing ever.
How the fuck is meeting her brother going to make her fall in love with me?
What the hell was I thinking?
So her sister seemed to like me. So what. Did I really think that if I could get her brother to like me and make up to Asha that she’d fall in love with me?
I’m stupid, aren’t I?
“Yeah, we’ll be there soon.” She pauses then adds, “I love you.” But she looks at the phone. I’m pretty sure he hung up before he heard her, which is probably hurting her even more.
I’m so fucking stupid.
“We don’t—”
“You’re probably wondering what it is that caused us to be this way.” Her voice isn’t small and sad. It’s now icy. She’s chilling me to the bone with the way she’s talking to me.
I shake my head, but without her looking at me, what good is that? “No.”
She finally does glance at me. Her eyes narrowed.
“Okay, yes, but not at that second.”
She squares herself against me. She’s a fighter and I know it. I deserve any kind of wrath aimed at me.
“I’m not going to tell you.”
“You don’t have to tell me.”
Her eyes narrow even more. “What is this to you, Ian? Why do you care about my brother?”
Why can’t she tell what this is to me? Forming the words is almost impossible. I can’t think of them. Or, rather, I can, but I can’t tell her because they’re too much, they give me away.
“I care.” That’s all I can think of to say. But it does convey a little of my truth.
She shakes her head. “He said he’s at his new business. Some place he bought. He’s taking measurements for office furniture. We can meet him down there.”
“Now?”
“Now.”
I nod and turn to collect the helmets. But when I reach out to Asha with hers, she doesn’t take it.
Her lips are pursed and she looks even more angry. I know this is the worst time to think it, but she’s so gorgeous. She’s a warrior and I know she’s going to kill me. I knew it from the beginning. I’ll never be the same again after she’s left me, which will be a kind of death for me. I’ll find a job somewhere else and talk Zoe and Neil into moving there. Or maybe I’ll move closer to them. They need me. I can be Neil’s sad uncle, the one who always talks about the woman who was too good for him. And he, me, couldn’t figure out how to be a better man for her.
She throws her hands into the air. “Just tell me why? Why do you want to meet him? Why are you doing this? You don’t have to do this to appease your conscience.”
“You think I’m doing this to appease my conscience?”
“Aren’t you? You think just because I’m a virgin I can’t handle sex, just sex, so you’re trying to do things to make me feel more comfortable with you. That way, when you do have sex with me it won’t be so hard on you, so you still have honor even though you’re just fucking me.”
I place the helmets back on the table with a thump, my heart bleeding as I turn back to her. “I would never fucking think like that. I’m not built that way. I would never—I’m not trying to—I don’t—”
“Fuck, I
promised him I’d be there soon.”
“I love it when you swear.”
She looks at me shocked, and I’m pretty sure I am too. I’m not thinking straight, can hardly talk, but out comes that.
Something about her so angry with me, realizing she’ll probably leave me, gets me to think. I’m probably thinking crazy or stupidly or maybe I’m giving too much away, but what the hell do I have to lose now? I’ve already lost everything because I’m losing her.
“I want to meet your brother because I fucking care about you. I want to do things with you because I fucking like you. I want to get to know you because I fucking do.” My voice cracks on that last note, making me feel like I’m about thirteen.
She takes a step away. And shit, if that doesn’t hurt even more.
“What?”
“I think you heard me, Asha.” Again, my voice cracks, making me want to wince.
She keeps shaking her head, stopping for a second, looking at me like I’m lying to her, then shaking her head all over again.
She’s breathing really hard when she says, “Why do you like me?”
I fling my hands around, taking a step closer. “What’s not to like? You’re kind and generous, sweet and optimistic. You’re so fucking warm. It comes out of you, this warmth, and I feel better just because I’m near you. You’re wicked smart. I’ve never known anyone so smart. And you’re so sexy. I think about your body and I’m—” I have to lick my lips, “—I go insane. I want you all the fucking time. I will want you after we’ve had sex. That won’t stop. I doubt it will ever stop. I’ll think you’re hot when you’re an old woman with white hair and wrinkles.”
Tears form, making her sparkling eyes shine all the more. She keeps blinking and shaking her head even though somewhere in my stilted speech she started to smile a little. It gave me hope, that grin. I’m holding my breath, praying I didn’t make a complete ass of myself.
She glances at her cell. “Hon’s waiting.”
I lost her. I know it now. I lost her, even when I poured my heart out.
I fucking lost her.
Asha
I’m a horrible person.
I shouldn’t have left Ian hanging like that. I should have told him I felt the same.
But I didn’t.
We drive to my brother’s new business, whatever it is, and I feel like shit. I just couldn’t be as brave as him because…because Ian’s about to meet my brother, Hon. The one person who I’ve been dying to see but simultaneously hoping not to. He’s a reminder of a different time, a time when I trusted people, when I thought friends were friends, when I thought I was safe with people who said they loved me.
But all of that changed one dark, beer-soaked night.
What were you wearing? People asked. Did you hit on him? Did you do something to make him think you wanted him? He was your friend, wasn’t he? He was your best friend since you started college? He was your brother’s roommate and your brother’s best friend too? You can’t remember anything? You have to remember something. Why are you so fucked up if you can’t remember anything?
A tear rolls down my cheek as Ryder finds the address.
I can’t believe my brother answered the phone. He told me he was happy to hear from me. He said he had news, and I told him I wanted him to meet someone. He asked if Ian was the same guy Lona met. When I said, “Yeah,” he sounded happy, like he used to be for me. We used to help each other study, and he’d get so excited when I got the answers right. He was never competitive. He was always encouraging. I hope I was the same for him.
I pray for strength as Ryder parks. I pray that I can make it through this meeting without crying too much. Or at all. I know it’s good for me. But I don’t want my brother to know how hurt I was. Am. But at the same time, I want to scream at him, rake him over the coals for leaving me when I needed him so much.
I sniff and wipe away my tear as I get off Ryder’s bike. I don’t think he caught me, but he is looking at me with a mixture of anger and sorrow. I don’t blame him. I’m crazy right now.
He locks our helmets on the bike in silence. When he straightens, he looks like he’s going to say something but stops himself.
He’s seeing the side of me I hide. The side of me Megan says I don’t need to keep in the dark. She says all of me is perfect. She’s always so great about saying things like that. But society doesn’t like sad girls. Society doesn’t like angry girls. It doesn’t like crazy women, filled with rage. Unadulterated, pure rage.
I’ve thought of killing Anthony. I’ve thought a lot about it. He was out on bail during the trial, and I thought about sneaking into the hotel he was staying at with his parents and slipping him a poisoned beer. I thought it would have been rather poetic.
I hate that I thought that, had it all planned out. I never wanted to be the kind of person who thought of murdering another. I never wanted to think about smashing another human with a crowbar until I broke his skull. Or breaking all his small bones with my bare hands. Did you know there’s two hundred-six bones in the human body, and I was pretty sure I could figure out a way to break forty-eight of them? I never followed through with any of that, obviously. But I thought about it until I found Megan.
And Ian’s seeing all of it right now.
He might not be able to put into words what’s going on with me, but I know he’s feeling it. When I get like this, so scared, so angry, I’m sure it’s palpable to other people. And adding to whatever he might be feeling for me is his righteous anger for leaving him hanging after he told me something so beautiful. He likes me. He cares for me.
I didn’t know how to tell him how much I care for him when I knew he was going to see me like this, when he still didn’t know this part of me existed. And if he would even want me when he saw it.
We make our way to the building. It’s in the same area where Lona works, and I see the small office for the LGBT+ advocate organization on the other side of the street. Hon said his business was within the same building of a big bank. It doesn’t have a sign yet, but he’d leave the door open for me.
As Ian and I walk our way through the threshold, he takes my hand, interlacing his big fingers between mine. And I cry. I don’t mean to, but he’s making me cry by being so kind. I didn’t say what I needed to. He doesn’t know that I think I’m falling for him because I’m too scared of what he’ll think after seeing me like this. And he’s holding my hand anyway. Even though I’m being horrible to him, even though he sees me right now.
“Hon?” I call out.
“Back here.”
That’s my brother’s voice. I try like hell to stop the instant tears. God, I’ve missed his voice. I have to blink a lot, and Ian’s basically guiding me at this point, but I’m not crying by the time I hear the clonk of Hon’s footfalls.
Then I see him. My mouth opens, my heart beating in my throat.
“Oh my god.” I rush to him but I can’t touch him. “Who hurt you? What the hell did you do with your hair?”
He’s shaved off his long black hair, always in a neat braid at the back of his head. In college, girls would gush over him and his hair. It would make me laugh how he’d use his hair to get chicks. It worked a lot.
And he’s beat up. His lip is cut, one black eye.
He looks at me for a long moment, swallowing. He moves a little but then drops his hand.
“You look so pretty, Asha.”
I punch him in the shoulder, trying not to cry. “You—who beat you up? I’m going to seriously kick some ass.”
He smiles. It breaks something in me, but he smiles. It’s big and bright and reminds me of what he used to look like a long time ago. Except now he’s buff. He’s no longer the skinny kid who I would lean my head against when I watched TV. He’s big, like Ian.
“I, ah—” his voice is raw, but he keeps talking. “Don’t tell the folks, but I do some fighting at night. Just amateur stuff.”
“You’re boxing?”
“It’s actuall
y MMA, mixed martial—”
“I know what MMA stands for.”
“Cool,” Ian says, making Hon glance away from me.
My brother steps around me, extending a hand. “Hon, Asha’s brother.”
“Ian.” It looks like Ian is going to add a title to his name too, but he doesn’t. He just stops, sadly glances at me, then plasters a fake grin at Hon. “Good to meet you, man.”
“You too.” They shake, and Ian grabs Hon in one of those manly hug things. Hon’s kind of surprised but slaps Ian on the back, smiling widely as they step away from each other. “You made a hell of an impression on my sister, Lona. She likes you. And other than her girlfriend, she doesn’t like anybody, including me.”
Ian’s smile turns genuine as he chuckles at Hon’s joke. “Yeah, I liked her too. She’s good stuff.”
Hon’s sizing Ian up, and what’s hurting more than I can stand is how Hon think’s Ian’s a good man. He is, I know, and Hon can see it too. God, I’m messing everything up.
But I can’t seem to help it. I’m feeling so…broken. Raw. Hurt. I feel like lashing out and am carefully restraining how crazy I am right now.
“She is.” Hon nods. “She really is. You met Bit too, huh?”
“Yep.”
“She’s really good stuff. She’s made my sister…nice. I mean, Lona was always very kind but never nice.”
Ian smiles wider.
“Hey, man—” Hon claps Ian on the shoulder while he turns to look at me. “Sorry, Ash, but I need to borrow your boyfriend for a sec.” He glances at Ian again, starting to walk backward. “I need someone tall to help me figure out where the sign should go.”
“What sign?” I’m sounding angry.
Hon stops walking and smiles at me. “I couldn’t wait to tell you. I mean, I’ve been waiting until I got everything set up and it’s not quite up and running, but I can’t wait any longer. I have to tell you.”
