Goode Vibrations

by Jasinda Wilder

  “You want mine, don’t you.” It was a question, but came out as a statement.

  “Yes.” Flat, declarative, no room for mistaking anything. “I want yours.”

  “I didn’t want yours, Errol. I’m sorry, but I just didn’t.”

  “You think I wanted this?” He flopped down on his butt in the sand. Took my hands. “I didn’t. I don’t. This is scarier than skydiving, scarier than a plane crash. Scarier than war. Scarier than being kidnapped by Somalian pirates.”

  I snickered. “Bullshit.”

  “Spent two and a half weeks in the hold of a ship, surrounded by drugs they were smuggling. They thought I was a spy for some government. Eventually, they realized I really was just a photographer in the wrong place at the wrong time. They smashed my camera—fortunately it was a safe I’d been using and not my good one—and left me just off the coast of Madagascar. Literally, put me in a little rubber Zodiac and set me adrift. I had to hitch a ride on an oil tanker back up the coast to where I’d been taken, where my stuff was. A lot of it had been stolen, and I had to hunt it all down and buy it back.”

  I laughed, shaking my head. “You oughta write a book.”

  “Nobody would believe any of it.” He went serious. “I didn’t want this, Poppy. But here it is.”

  “You just want me to blow you again.” Maybe I could joke my way out of it, and barring that, fuck, suck, and jerk my way out of it.

  He didn’t take the bait. “I’m not going to lie, Pop—yes, the sex with you is a major reason I’m drawn to you. It’s like nothing I’ve ever experienced, and I find myself wanting more. Not just because…how do I put it? It was hot, it was unforgettable. But it was…” He let out a sharp breath. “It was…deep.”

  “Yeah, you got real deep, all right,” I said, snickering.

  “Quit joking, Poppy. You know exactly what the hell I mean.” He sounded angry, and I didn’t dare meet his gaze.

  I ducked my head, his chastisement hitting like a spear to the heart. “Yes, Errol. I do know. I don’t want to, but I do.”

  “You can’t pretend this isn’t happening, Poppy. You can’t act like a blowjob is going to distract me from what this is. You want to suck me off? Go ahead, I’ll enjoy the shit out of it. But it’s not going to change the deeper shit happening, here. You want to get on your hands and knees? I’ll fuck you silly. But when we’re done, this will still be here.”

  I felt my heart cracking. Felt the calcified shell around it spiderwebbing. “Stop, Errol.”

  “Why? So you can go back to acting like this thing with us is just about sex and photos?” He strode to the van. Yanked open the driver’s side door, got in, started the motor. “You want to run? Take it. Take the van. I can hike out with my shit on my back. Wouldn’t be the first time, won’t be the last. So go, Pop. Take it and go, if that’s what you want.”

  “I’m not taking your van, Errol,” I snapped.

  “Fine. I’ll take you to the nearest highway. You can keep walking. Go back to hitching rides from fat old lorry drivers.”

  “Hey, that’s not fair. Marty was nice.”

  “Good on him,” he snarled back. “Not the fucking point.”

  “Then what is your point?” I shouted, leaping to my feet and shoving my face up into his. “What the fuck is your point? What do you want from me?”

  “What I want from you is you.”

  I felt tears jump into my eyes. “Me.”

  “You.”

  I choked on my breath. On my tears. “What does that mean? You want to know about me? You want my sad bits? Fine. My dad gave up on us. He got fat and he got obsessed with work and with money, and he stopped being a dad to me and my sisters, and he stopped being a husband to my mom. He gave the fuck up. He didn’t leave us. That would have been better. I went from being his little girl, his baby, and the youngest, to no one and nothing. I was…I was the apple of his motherfucking eye, and he gave up, and I don’t know why. I’ll never understand what I did wrong. Was he cheating? Did he have another family? I don’t know! I don’t think so, but I’ll never know. My sisters and I…we’re all fucking disasters, and all it’s his fucking fault. He abandoned us without ever leaving. Quite a trick, actually.”

  I sobbed, batted his comforting hand away.

  “No,” I snapped. “You wanted it, well…here it is, asshole.”

  I tried to quit, to stop talking, but like Errol opening the floodgates of music and his own pain, once mine was a trickle, it became a torrent.

  “Mom was busy with work, with Lexie and Charlie. Charlie was a dancer and Lexie took music lessons, and Mom’s time was devoted to them, their lessons, their lives. She had a little she-shed built out back for me, and bought me all the paints and brushes and canvasses I wanted, and left me alone. I didn’t get lessons. I taught myself. I didn’t have friends, I didn’t go to summer camp or to the mall. I painted. Charlie had boyfriends and Lexie was…well, problematic, especially later on, but that’s a different story and one I’m not sure I have all of. Torie was…just Torie. Reclusive. Interior. And I had no one. Dad died and we all turned inward. Mom especially. She lost her husband and a significant portion of income, and had to figure out life and figure out how to take care of five girls, so I guess I don’t really blame her, but…I guess maybe I do blame her even though I intellectually understand. It’s Dad I’m angry at. He had a stroke or a heart attack or something. Just…gone. Bam, alive one day, gone the next. And I think he didn’t care, he knew he was unhealthy. We had family meetings about healthy choices so we could all help Dad. But he wouldn’t help himself. Didn’t care. Kept hitting fast-food drive-thru’s and bringing home donuts and drinking all the time. And I’ll never know what his issue was. What was his pain, Errol? What demons was he fighting? What could have been eating him up so bad that Mom and the five of us girls weren’t enough love for him?”

  I had to stand up to bear up under the burden of it, the weight of everything I’d been burying and ignoring and suppressing and running from. I bent at the waist, arms around my middle, as if to hold my guts in, as if they’d spill out with my words.

  “Why wasn’t I enough? How did I go from his baby girl to fucking…nothing? Not enough to be worth living for? Why didn’t Mom see me? Didn’t she see that I needed her? I’ve never been enough. Or too much. I want attention, Errol. Everything is about that. I know that. Acting out, the men I’ve dated.” I snorted. “Dated. Kind of a strong word for it. They give me attention, but it’s never enough. And then they either leave or want what I don’t know how to give. And I run.”

  “So you learn to leave first and not offer even a hint of anything more than hooking up.”

  I sighed bitterly. “I’m not a slut.”

  “No judgment here, Pop. That accusation could be made of me, and it would probably stick.”

  “Lexie just flat out owns it. I’m not that brave, not that fearless. She gives zero fucks. But I also feel like there are parts of her that no one sees, no one knows. We all had secret lives, I think. Except Charlie. Her life was all about Ivy League universities and top-dollar jobs. Cassie lived only for dance, and that was taken away from her by a car accident. Another whole thing. So I guess it was just me and Lexie with secret lives.”

  “What was your secret life?”

  “That I was hooking up with guys regularly by sophomore year. My whole life was that paint studio in the backyard, and hooking up. And everyone knew it. It was one of those unspoken secrets of the school community, that Poppy Goode was an easy girl.”

  “Poppy—”

  I waved him quiet. “No, don’t. It’s just true. I wanted validation. I wanted fulfillment. I wanted to be the center of someone’s attention. It’s called I have serious daddy issues, Errol. Look it up—abnormal psychology one-oh-one.”

  “Not sure how abnormal that is, though.”

  “And then I met Reed O’Reilly, and I thought he was the one. I thought he would fall in love with me. I thought he could make me feel
whole. I thought I could pour all I was into him and somehow, there’d be this magic moment when I’d get it all back. Where he’d—” My voice broke. “Where he’d love me back.”

  “Instead, you caught him fucking your best friend and roommate.”

  “In my bed.”

  “And you realized no one would ever fulfill you, no amount of sex or alcohol or drugs would ever fill that hole.”

  “So fucking stereotypical, right?”

  “When I was knocking about Europe after the band broke up, I was drunk most of the time. That’s my dirty little secret. I would make myself wait until evening, but I’d buy a bottle and drink the whole thing until I was so pissed I didn’t know who I was. Which was the point, after all, right?”

  “Do you still drink?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “Nah, not much. I got to a point where I realized I’d end up like Dad, just twenty years younger, and went cold turkey for a few years. Now I can have a drink or two, even get a bit pissed, but I don’t let myself go down that hole anymore. It’s dark down there, Poppy. Dark and lonely.”

  “Yeah, it is,” I agreed.

  “I just compensated in other ways.”

  I forced my eyes to his. “Sex.”

  He nodded. “Yeah. You can’t OD on sex, can’t get cirrhosis of the liver from it. It’s never the same twice, even with the same girl. And I realized I get as much fulfillment, if not more, from what I can make my partner feel as what she can do for me. Get by giving, I guess you might call it.”

  I bit my lip. “I noticed.”

  He laughed. “Poppy, you and me? We just barely scratched the surface of how things could be.” His eyes were serious as the laugh faded. “And I think you know it as well as I do.”

  Dawn was breaking gray on the far eastern horizon.

  Errol and I stared at each for a long time, silent now, many things yet unsaid, but so much out there for each of us to chew on.

  “Let’s go to bed,” he said, eventually. “In the van. And, just for tonight…just sleep.”

  I nodded. “Okay.”

  He put out the fire, put up the camper top and made a bed out of his sleeping bag and the blanket, and we climbed in, both fully dressed.

  Apart, at first.

  But then, as we began to drift off to sleep, he turned to face me. Eyes sleepy.

  “Pop?”

  “Mmm?”

  He hesitated. “Come here.” Arm extended, up over my head.

  “I’m scared, too.”

  “Why?”

  I had to keep my eyes closed and let the truth come out in a whisper he must have had to strain to hear, even mere inches away. “I’m afraid to let you close and then…and then lose you.”

  His palms cradled my face. “Poppy.”

  I shook my head, hating the tears, hating even more the awful vulnerability. “You can tell me you won’t. You can say all the right things. You’re a storyteller, Errol. But that doesn’t change how afraid I am of really letting you in. I can tell you my story and I can pick up the weight of yours, we can share pain and fuck like champions, but…the real stuff? The deep stuff? It’s fucking terrifying.”

  “I know,” he whispered. “Just…try? This little step, one little step. Just let me hold you.”

  “I don’t know how to let you hold me.”

  He laughed. “Well, that works out because I’ve got no clue how to hold you. I’m not a cuddler.”

  I snorted, a distinctly undignified splutter. “Well, we’ve got that in common, if nothing else.”

  He slid his arm under my neck, and I went stiff as a board all over. He drew me in, brought me closer. Body to body, and he was as stiff and awkward as I was. But my head was on his chest, and I could hear his heartbeat.

  “Just…breathe with me, Pop,” he said. “Breathe in…”

  We dragged in deep, slow, noisy breaths together.

  “And out…”

  Exhaled together. I felt myself softening.

  “I’ll be here with you when you wake up, Poppy. No expectations of anything. We just wake up together.”

  I felt my heart yearning for him. For what he was offering. For the shelter. The safe harbor of his arms.

  “You can’t take this away from me, Errol,” I whispered, the words wet with tears. “You can’t give this to me and then take it away.”

  “I won’t.”

  “How can you promise that?”

  “I can promise it because I…because I need it from you just as badly, Poppy. I’m just as scared as you are.”

  I nuzzled closer. Burrowed into his hold, my nose against his chest, his heartbeat under my ear. His arms encircled me, strong bands of iron holding me together when everything else inside was threatening to burst open, to fall apart.

  He smelled like comfort. Wood smoke and skin, male scent. His breathing was soft and deep and slow.

  I didn’t have to do anything.

  Be anything, or anyone.

  I didn’t have to perform.

  I didn’t have to talk, or share, or give or take.

  Just…be.

  Letting Errol Sylvain hold me was like coming home.

  Errol

  I woke slowly, and then all at once I was awake.

  Poppy was still in my arms, facing me, nuzzled into me. Her arm was thrown over my ribcage, her thigh over mine, mine over hers, her other arm curled up against my chest, her fingers under my chin.

  Soft. Warm. Comfortable.

  I never wanted to leave this moment.

  I felt her stir. “Errol.”

  “I’m here,” I murmured. I squeezed her gently. “Right here.”

  “Don’t leave?” she whispered, and it was such a small, vulnerable couplet of words that my heart threatened to crumble, break open like a dropped egg.

  My lips touched her forehead, kissed as delicately as I could. “I won’t.”

  She clung to me. Nuzzled closer. Sighed. “Errol?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Can I go back to sleep?”

  “Yes. I’ll be here holding you.”

  A silence, her breathing, closeness, fulfillment.

  “Errol?”

  I sniffed a laugh. “Yeah, Pop?”

  “Would you understand if I said I didn’t want to…to do anything, just for right now?” A fearful pause. “I just want to know what it’s like to just…be held. And nothing else.”

  I kissed her forehead again, her temple. “Just relax, Poppy. I’m not letting go. I’m not going anywhere. I don’t want anything but this.”

  She sighed, reassured. Contented.

  I felt her drift back into sleep, and after a while, I did too.

  When I woke next, it was late in the day, and I didn’t care. Poppy hadn’t moved, was still sleeping. I had to pee like nothing else, but held it. I was hungry. I needed coffee.

  But nothing came close to needing this, holding Poppy.

  Eventually, she stirred, groaning softly. “Mmm.”

  I looked down at her, rolling to my back and bringing her closer, more on top of me. “Hi.”

  Her eyes flickered up, melted milk chocolate and full of warmth and contentment. “Hi,” she whispered, a small smile on her lips.

  “Sleep all right?” I asked.

  She just brightened her smile. “So good.” She clung closer, her arm clutching at my neck, burying her nose in the side of my throat. “Thank you.”

  “For what?”

  “Holding me,” she whispered. “For making me feel…understood.”

  “I should thank you for the same,” I said.

  She gazed at me. Her hand rubbed over my chest. Her grin went crooked, and I knew what she was thinking.

  I caught at her hand. “Poppy?”

  She frowned. “Yeah?”

  “This can just be…this. It doesn’t have to be anything else.”

  She blinked at me. Fearful, worried. Conflicted. “I want you more than ever, Errol.”

  “I know. Me too.” I pressed m
y palm to hers. Threaded my fingers into hers. “That will be there, later. For now? Let’s just…enjoy this for what it is.”

  Her eyes slid closed, and a sigh escaped. Relief. Gratitude. “I was worried you wouldn’t understand.”

  “Poppy. Maybe you’re not understanding me.” I held her hand and palmed her cheek with the other. “I’m saying I want it this way, for now. For me. Not just for you.”

  Her forehead pressed against my breastbone. “I feel like you actually…see me. See me.”

  “Because I do.”

  A peaceful silence, full of warmth and understanding. “Errol, I…I really don’t want to move, but I’ve got to pee so bad.”

  I groaned as I let her go. “Oh thank fuck. I’ve had to pee for at least an hour.”

  She laughed as I slid out of the bed and out of the van, stretching in the afternoon light. This wasn’t really a campsite, more of a picnic spot on the backside of a day park, which meant there wasn’t anything like a loo, so I just went behind a tree and cut loose. When I came back Poppy was looking around, dancing.

  “Um?”

  “Not really anywhere to go but behind a tree, unfortunately,” I said. “But, I do have...this.” I dug in a cabinet in the caravan, came back with a roll of TP and a small folding camp shovel. “You ever pee in the woods?”

  She shook her head. “No.”

  “Well, um. You have to dig a hole and squat over it.”

  “Why dig a hole? Won’t the pee just soak into the ground?”

  I couldn’t help a snicker. “Sure, but um, the hole is so you don’t splatter pee on yourself.”

  She bit her lip and blushed. “Oh. Right.” A louder laugh. “Good thing you know this stuff.” She trotted toward a nearby large tree.

  “Poppy?” I called after her. “From what I’ve been told, you might have the best luck just taking everything off from the waist down.”