by Ivy Fox
I lean forward, away from his chest, trying hard not to seek out that one spot in the crook of his neck that used to be one of my favorite places to be cuddled in. If he notices my lack of enthusiasm in being near him, he doesn’t say anything about it. Instead, after he’s finished brushing my hair and drying me as best as he can—without touching me—he takes us back to his room and lays me on the bed as if it’s the most mundane thing he’s ever done. It probably is. From the little show he put on tonight, he may have done this very thing too many times to count. Bedding girls left and right. Only this is probably the first time he doesn’t want to touch the half-naked girl on his bed with a ten-foot pole, let alone anything else.
Ash continues on with his newfound muteness, not saying a single word, and turns away from me, going inside another door in the far right corner of the room. He comes back out a few minutes later, no longer sporting wet boxers clinging to his ripped thighs, but dressed in mesh, black shorts and holding a large, gray T-shirt in his hands.
I don’t even wait for him to break his vow of silence and instruct me on what to do next. I just take the shirt from him, dressing as swiftly as I can muster while still keeping the plush towel tightly bound around me. It’s a stupid thing to do since he’s already seen me naked, but if I have to see that same look of disgust in his eyes one more time, I’m going to lose my mind.
I throw him the towel a bit too forcefully, but without missing a beat of this weird dance we’re joined in, he goes back into the bathroom, most likely to put it in the hamper, without saying a word. I turn my back away from him before he returns, covering myself with the navy blue duvet, hoping Ash will take the hint that, for me, this night has officially met its end.
I’m not in the mood for us to have a heart-to-heart. I don’t want to endure whatever Ash considers small talk nor, God forbid, will I go through what happened tonight in elaborate detail. In the bathroom, he said I didn’t have to tell him anything, but the small speck of information I did give him might not be enough to quench his curiosity. I’m just hoping that he is as unwilling to hash anything out tonight as I am. And maybe with his sudden silent treatment, he’s trying to tell me he feels the same, too.
Talking is overrated, after all.
He told me that once. Right before he latched his lips onto mine, promising a future that most would weep to have.
How horribly right he was.
I pull the duvet over my shoulders and use my wet hair to cover most of my face. Usually, I would put it in a bun before bed, but right now, I’m grateful for the curtain of solitude it provides. I don’t know how much time passes, but the minute I feel the bed dip beside me, I know it hasn’t been long enough. Not nearly enough time to prepare myself for having to sleep in the same bed as my ex, who would rather chew his arm off than hold me while I fall apart. My ears perk when I hear him open the drawer from his nightstand and rummage around it, in search of God knows what. Of course, when I hear the flick of a lighter, I should have assumed that Ash would turn to lighting up in order to deal with the shitstorm we’re in.
“Turn around,” he commands, his tone not yet half as mellow as I remember it to be after he’s had a few puffs.
“I don’t want to,” I mumble under my breath indignantly.
Doesn’t he see that I don’t even want to be in this room with him, much less be forced to talk to him?
“I won’t ask again,” he counters between puffs, and this time his voice has some bite to it.
I turn around, aggravated, making enough of a commotion that he has to hold on to his blunt or risk burning the bedspread; or worse, burn his chiseled abs and tarnish his well-maintained physique.
“You didn’t ask the first time,” I grunt unladylike. Who cares for manners right now?
“Lean up,” he orders me again, completely disregarding my remark.
But I do as he says anyway, leaning my back onto the headboard so he can say whatever he needs to, and get this over with already. However, to my surprise, conversation is the last thing on Ash’s mind. A realization that only happens when he hands me the blunt. In a daze, I instinctively take it from his experienced fingers.
“What am I supposed to do with this?”
“You’re going to smoke it, what else?” he counters, placing his hands behind his head, taking away the opportunity to give it back to him.
I look at the joint as if it’s a foreign object. Well, for me, it is. I’ve never smoked a cigarette in my life, much less pot. I have no idea how my body would even react to such a thing. I mean, if soda is bad for me, then I doubt getting high will do my health any good either.
“It won’t bite you, Snow. It’ll help you sleep,” he hushes, revealing his hidden agenda.
So that’s it. This is the only thing he believes he can do to help me with my pain. To give me a way to numb myself out from the world; a few hours’ reprieve where nothing like what transpired tonight could even touch me. He’s offering me a way to anesthetize the pain and dull out the screams in my head. I think numbness has never sounded sweeter to me than this very moment.
“How do I do it?”
He lets out a tiny chuckle, too weak to be one of Asher’s belly laughs. He has such a nice laugh. A laugh that warms your heart and makes your insides flutter away. But he can’t even bring himself to give me one of those. Doesn’t matter. At least he’s found a way to calm my nerves, bringing me a brief moment of peace. That’s more than enough.
“Take one long haul and hold your breath as long as you can. Let the smoke travel through you until you can’t keep it in any longer. Or, better yet, take two small, fast puffs and on the second inhale, keep it all in for ten seconds and then let go. Think you can do that?”
“Doesn’t seem like rocket science. You do it all the time,” I say with a snarky tone, rolling my eyes and placing the warm bud on the tip of my lips, greedy to commence my self-medicated detachment.
“Then what are you waiting for?” he provokes when I pause for a brief second, as years of health scares and fears begin playing tricks on my mind, making me ponder whether I should do this or not. But as fast as those doubts arise, I shrug them off just as quickly, and intake one long haul, burning away at my chest and all the recollections of this night.
Not knowing what to expect, the smoke burns my throat, and my body’s impulse is to expel it. The urge to cough it out is just as relentless as the burning sensation. But my perseverance is stronger, so I hold the fumes as long as my lungs can withstand the feeling of my chest being set on fire. When I can’t endure it any longer, I let the remaining fumes pass my lips, a dreamy gray cloud revolving around me. With just one puff, I realize there is a small tingling rising in my body, making it warm and fuzzy.
“Again,” Ash commands. Under heavy lids, I tilt my head to the side, wishing I could decipher everything his eyes are trying to hide from me.
I bring the joint back to my lips and this time I take two small intakes, hoping the hit will be milder this time. The crushing flame is just as unrelenting as the first, but it also increases the softening of my limbs, and I savor the feeling. My chest, although on fire, seems to simultaneously relax with each puff. My body doesn’t feel as confined, and I no longer feel the hole inside my chest where my heart used to be. I exhale again, and before Ash tells me to take another puff, my lips are already latched on to the miraculous numbing stick. Minutes pass, and I keep at it until I feel the ash-ridden tip reach my fingers. The tension my body had been filled with seems to have evaporated like the gray clouds I huff out. Before I reach the end, Ash takes it away from me, snubbing the bud in the ashtray sitting on his nightstand.
“How do you feel?”
“Sleepy,” I tell him truthfully.
“Lightweight,” he jokes, but there isn’t any humor to his tone. “Lie down.”
Not finding the willingness to fight his bossy behavior for most of the night, I do as he says and lie down beside him.
I’m surprised to find that my eyelids are the only things that feel heavy. My whole body feels light as a feather, threatening to just float away and disappear. What a wonderful concept—to vanish like smoke as if nothing exists, leaving behind just the faint trace of musk and herbal undertone as the only evidence you were ever here. I’m battling with my eyes to stay open when, in reality, all I want to do is succumb to its weight. The small nagging resistance increases just a tad when I hear a lighter flick to life again.
“I don’t think I can smoke anymore,” I tell him truthfully. The haze that I’m being pulled into is strong enough, and I don’t need to add anything else to its force to take me under.
“This one isn’t for you.”
“Oh,” I hush out, embarrassed.
Of course, he’s lighting up his own since I barely let him enjoy the other. But he didn’t seem to mind; not one bit.
I close my eyes and let myself be lulled to sleep with the rise and fall of his chest next to me. I feel his body starting to relax, no longer the icicle it had been since he brought me to his bedroom. If I were brave enough, I’d lean in against his body and use his chest as my pillow, but no amount of pot could summon that level of courage. He wouldn’t like that type of intimacy. Not from me at least.
Not wanting to bum myself out and ruin this buzz, I let myself travel back to a time where Ash would have his arms around me, hushing sweet nothings in my ear, promising to never let me go. I’m instantly wrapped in the blanket of peaceful sleep and only break from its spell sometime during the night to a muffled, vulnerable whimper. It must be a drug-laced dream because Ash is running his fingers through my hair, while gently stroking my cheek with the back of his hand.
“I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry,” he whispers hoarsely, a single tear falling down his face.
But since this is a figment of my imagination, I cuddle in beside him, placing my head in the crook of his neck. His arms hold me closer, tighter, intent in spooking the demons that are all huddled up on the fringes of my mind, making sure they keep themselves at bay or suffer his wrath. I relish his soft touch and let myself be enveloped by the new peace this dream is offering.
“I am too,” I mumble, unsure as to what I’m apologizing for.
But as I fall back into sweet surrender, and feel his salty tears travel down to his neck, a tiny speck of fear makes its way through to my subconscious, warning me that, in the morning, I’ll remember how no one can outrun their nightmares for long. They have knocked on my doorstep, and like a naive fool, I’ve opened the door and invited them in.
And in the daylight, I’ll have to face my demons alone and suffer the consequences.
Chapter 4
Roman
The doctor continues to ramble on about my father’s precarious condition, but I hardly hear a word he says. Not only do I not give a shit, but I’m also too preoccupied watching my younger brother, who is standing just a few feet away from me, having his own dreary conversation. Unfortunately, since I’m too far away to hear the exact words he’s using, all I can do is take stock of Ollie’s body language as he answers probing questions from the inquisitive, no-nonsense detective that showed up about an hour ago. Not intimidated by the cop’s subtle interrogation technique, Ollie responds to her questions without missing a beat, his face looking genuinely grief-stricken—thank fuck—and all too eager to help her any way he can.
As I foresaw, Ollie’s wholesome, boy-next-door, bookworm vibe makes him a more credible witness than Ash or I ever could be. We look like the cocky, entitled assholes we are and, frankly, we own that shit. No way would the off-the-rack pantsuit, ponytail wearing, Rizzoli look-alike be fooled with our crocodile tears.
Ollie, though, looks the part of a distraught son, even if it’s all bullshit. The only reason he’s like that is because he’s here and not where he wants to be—back home with his girl when she needs him most. Still, he doesn’t look one bit flustered as he spews the web of lies I taught him. I made sure we had our stories straight before calling 911, much to his frustration, so I don’t have to hear what he’s saying to know them by heart. All the detective will get out of him is how we both arrived home from a party late last night—an occurrence that should be expected from any teenager on a Saturday night—and found our beloved father lying on the floor, passed out drunk in a pool of his own blood, omitting the presence of his girl altogether.
I want to scoff at the term of endearment I had used to describe the scumbag just a few minutes ago when the detective had cornered me to give her my own statement of last night’s events. But if we are to sell this story right, we need to make it believable.
Judge Grayson, for all intents and purposes, is an esteemed figure in the city of New York, no matter how much of a bastard he’s been to us. Everyone has always been infatuated with him, and never once looked too deeply into the relationship he had with his kids. In fact, most would take his stern, parental demeanor with his family—his elaborate, fabricated illusion that he ruled over us with an iron fist—to be an asset. Just another reflection of what criminals in his courtroom should expect to receive, in abundance. They didn’t know that behind closed doors, he degraded and humiliated us every chance he got. All people knew was the front he showed to the public, of being the strong head of the Grayson family—a stoic widow doing his best at raising four children on his own, while doing his patriotic duty of serving Lady Justice.
What a fucking joke.
Still, people idolized him for it. So much so that, an hour ago, one of the nurses pulled me aside to tell me that a multitude of reporters was gathered outside Liberty General’s front doors. Thankfully, the hospital already has an exit strategy for my family and me so we can come and go as we please without having to pass the vultures bearing cameras and microphones. They are certainly itching for their morbid scoop, waiting on bated breath with their wide-angle lenses to capture our devastation as their prize. If they knew the truth—that any inkling of sadness they might capture on my face falls solely on my disappointment in the fact that I bent to Ollie’s manipulation, rather than letting the asshole die last night as I wanted him to—then instead of their headline reading ‘Distraught Son of New York’s Finest’ it would read ‘Grayson Patricide Leaves City in Shock.’
What’s done is done. No use in crying me a river now.
By the way the doctor is fidgeting, shifting his stance from left to right as he goes on and on about the dangers my father is facing, the end is near for the bastard. Ollie will be happy our father’s blood isn’t on his hands, Elle will continue to remain clueless to the soulless cunt I am, and Ash and I will be ecstatic the fucker is on his way to meet his maker.
Silver linings and all that shit.
The doc clears his throat loudly, a not-so-subtle tactic to bring my attention back to him. I bow my head, seemingly apologetic and overwhelmed from all he’s laid on me about my father’s frail condition.
But I’m far from being apologetic.
I couldn’t give two fucks about what they are going to do to keep the fucker alive. If I had it my way, they would cease and desist now. Still, I give the mournful look that a doctor would expect from a son whose father is on the brink of death.
“I know this must be upsetting, but we will do everything in our power to get your father out of this alive,” he reassures me.
Don’t bother.
“Right now the chances might seem slim, but you and your family shouldn’t lose hope.”
Hope is something we will only get back once the asshole is pronounced dead, doc.
“As I’ve said before, the induced coma Judge Grayson is under will allow the swelling on his brain to reduce, hopefully granting him the necessary time he needs for it to heal so we can operate when he’s stable enough to undergo surgery. Although the next forty-eight hours are critical, brain trauma patients have been known to survive worse injuries,” he explains optimistically.
Hol
d on.
Back up.
The fuck is he saying?
“So you think my father is going to make it?” I ask a bit too harshly, and then back-pedal when Mr. M.D. looks like I’ve just pissed in his cornflakes. I can’t remember the name he introduced himself by since I wasn’t paying him any attention, so I discreetly look at the name tag pinned to his white coat, trying hard to temper my anger and camouflage it to look like concern. “I don’t mean to sound rude, Dr. Nasir, but I don’t want to go back to my brothers and sister and tell them everything will be fine when in reality the chances are slim to none. You can understand that, I’m sure.”
And when I say ‘everything will be fine,’ I mean, the comatose bastard is hours away from being read his last rites.
Dr. Nasir’s posture immediately relaxes, and the pitiful look in his eyes tells me that maybe there is hope on the horizon for us after all.
“I sympathize with what you and your family must be feeling, and I promise not to give you false hope. Your father’s circumstances are dire, but every patient is different. We will keep a close visual on him and update you on his improvements. God willing, we will bring your father home to you soon,” he tells me, placing his hand on my shoulder, trying to console me.
God’s got nothing to do with this. If he had heard any prayer I had made as a child, then my mother would still be alive while my father no longer had any part in our lives. I have to battle every natural instinct not to roll my eyes, shrug his hand off me, and tell him he can keep his compassion to himself and shove it.
“You want to help, doc? Then let the fucker go!” I scream inwardly, but hold my tongue, pinching the bridge of my nose to simmer myself down.
