738 Days: A Novel (25 page)

Chase scowls at me. “What?”

I shake my head, not taking my hand off my mouth. I don’t trust myself not to laugh, and I don’t want him to think I’m laughing at him instead of my own inexperience.

“That’s not it?” he demands.

I lower my hand, but I can’t stop smiling. “Well, not exactly. It’s related, sort of. In a good way.”

“Okay,” he says. “Can you try to—”

Deep breath. Just say it.
“I like you,” I say, turning on the sofa to face him more fully.

“Oh.” He straightens up in surprise. “I … like you, too. What is this about?”

I bite my lip and pull my legs up onto the cushion next to me. “I don’t really know how to bring this up,” I say. “It’s not something that people usually talk about because it just happens. But I don’t have that—” I cut myself off, with a jerk of my head.

“It’s all right,” he says, the traces of frustration and embarrassment gone, replaced by a compassion that makes my chest hurt. He reaches out like he might touch my knee, but stops.

I track the movement of his hand. “I’m not afraid when you touch me.” The words escape in a whisper, but saying them to him changes me, frees me.

I’m close enough to see the heat flicker in his eyes, behind the cool academic frames. “Good,” he says, his voice rougher than it was a moment ago.

“Actually,” I say, “more than that, I like it.”

He draws in a sharp breath, and his gaze is tight on me.

The strength of his response gives me the courage to continue. “I’m going home in a couple of days,” I say. “And I … I don’t want to lose out. I want this part of me back, the chance to feel this way about someone else.” I hesitate, needing that extra second to go for broke. “I want to feel this way about you.”

“What are you asking me, Amanda?” he asks. The sound of my name from his mouth in that taut voice makes me shiver in a good way. “Because my imagination is kind of running away with me.”

I scoot closer to him on the sofa cushion, and he watches with an intensity that makes heat flood through my body.

“I … If you’re … willing to let me, I want to try something,” I say, my throat tight with desire and nerves.

His head moves in a single jerky motion, a rough nod.

Before I lose my courage, I lift up on my knees and, bracing one hand on the back of the couch, brush my mouth over his.

His lips are warm and soft, and that golden stubble that I first noticed yesterday is as rough as I imagined, but it feels good.

His breath flutters against me, and I can feel how still he’s holding himself, letting me explore. Then he touches my cheek, his thumb moving lightly across my skin and guiding me closer.

And when he opens his mouth beneath mine, I’m lost.

18

Chase

Her lips move against mine, tentatively at first.

I tilt my head toward hers, extending the contact, in a mostly chaste kiss. Her scent surrounds me, reminding me of sunny days with the smell of the orange trees in the yard of the house next to my former condo building.

When I dare to sweep my tongue over her lower lip, just where she bit that lip earlier, she makes a soft noise of assent, somewhere between a sigh and moan that goes straight to my dick.

I clutch the cushion beneath me with one hand to keep from pulling her onto my lap. She wants to try and I want to show her, that it feels good, that someone touching you can be the best thing in the world instead of the worst. I want to be that guy.

But you’re not the good guy she thinks you are, remember?
My conscience, long ignored and handicapped by alcohol and ambition, roars back in force.

I could be, though. When her tongue tangles with mine briefly and she clutches my shirt front, inching herself closer to my lap, I think maybe I can ignore the voice in my brain telling me to stop.

You’ll fuck this up. She’s fragile, and she deserves better. If she knew what you were up to, she wouldn’t be here, asking this.

This time, I can’t blow it off. There’s too much at stake. And I meant what I said to Amanda: I like her. I don’t want to hurt her.

“Amanda…” I pull back reluctantly.

She blinks at me, dazed for a moment. Then she withdraws to her side of the couch with a guarded expression. “You don’t want to.” Embarrassment colors her cheeks.

“I do. Believe me. It’s just … I’m not sure it’s a good idea.” I shift uneasily because parts of me are very convinced this is the best idea ever.

Amanda swallows audibly. “I don’t want anything from you,” she says with a quick but uncertain smile that splinters my heart. “If that’s what you’re worried about. I mean, I do, but not like that. Seriously. No strings attached. I’m just talking about for as long as I’m here—”

“I know,” I say before I can cave. Because I want to. I really want to. And then because I’m a coward, I take the easy way out. “I’m just afraid it’s kind of fast,” I say, studying the blank screen of the television to avoid looking at her. “You’re still trying to figure out what you want, what works for you. I don’t want you to regret anything.” That last part, at least, is true.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see her lurch back.

When I dare to glance at her, her expression is cold, remote. “You can say no to me for any reason you want,” she says. “Because you’re not interested or attracted to me.”

We both know that’s not an issue.

“Because you don’t want the hassle or you think it’s creepy or messed up or gross.” Her eyes are shiny with tears, but she blinks rapidly, refusing to let them fall. “Or that I am those things because of what happened.”

My jaw drops. “Amanda, no,” I say. “That’s not—”

“But you don’t get to say no
for
me,” she says, pushing off the couch to stand up, fire in her gaze. “Do you understand that, Chase? I’m my own person. I have enough people telling me what I can’t do, what I should and shouldn’t want, whether it’s too fast or long overdue. Pick any reason you want, but not that one. It’s mine.” She steps around the coffee table, moving rapidly for the door.

“Wait.” I sit forward and reach a hand out to stop her, though I’m not sure what I can say.

But she skirts me without so much as a glance in my direction and stalks to her room, closing the door softly after her.

It would have been better if she slammed it. Anger I could deal with. But that? That was straight-up hurt and disappointment. In me.

I flop back and bang my head against the sofa. Fuck. Could that have gone any worse?

My phone gives a sharp buzz, shivering against the wood of the coffee table.

The gray bubble is easy to read from where I sit.

Elise Prescott: Waiting …

I can hear her impatience in the spaces between the periods. Because I haven’t posted anything yet.

It’s only the knowledge that I can’t afford to be without a phone that keeps me from throwing it against the wall as hard as I can.

Before Amanda knocked, I was looking through the apps Elise added to my phone and the “drafts” she talked about. Elise didn’t miss a trick. She actually staged photos. There was one of my running shoes on the floor, one kicked over next to the other, like I’d just taken them off, which means she went through my closet. The accompanying text:
Nuthin like a good run rite?

Complete with deliberate misspellings. Does she seriously think that was something I would think? Or that I would spell it that way, even if I did? I didn’t go to college like she did—lots of people don’t—but that wasn’t the same thing as being or sounding like an idiot. People hold that shit against you.

The next one was worse. It looked like a misfire at first, focused mostly on the movie selection page on the hotel television in my living room. The text was her suggested,
Quiet nite in is da best.

But then at the edge of the photo, on the corner of the sofa, like it’s been shed casually, is Amanda’s plaid shirt, the one I sent through the laundry.

The shirt is hanging in my closet. I can see the edge of it from here, still in the clear plastic protective bag from the service. Which means Elise borrowed it, set the scene, and returned it.

She really has no boundaries, no lines she won’t cross. I guess I knew that before—it’s one of the reasons I wanted to work with her, besides the fact that no one else would take me on—but this is the first time I’ve been on the receiving end of that pushiness.

And I don’t like it.

However, it does seem to be working.

I drop my glasses on the coffee table and scrub my hands across my face in frustration, hating myself, Elise, Rick, everyone who will read these posts and decide I’m worthy of interest again, regardless of any possible talent.

Damnit. I don’t want to do this. I want my career back, I want to do what I love, but I don’t know if I want to become the person that requires me to be.

Not if it means more of this sneaky, underhanded bullshit. There’s already been enough of that.

I look up and catch a blurry glimpse of my reflection in the television screen in the entertainment center—the first time I’ve been “on” television in a long while. My features are blurred, dark holes where my eyes should be. Haunted, empty, a shell of a person.

I don’t want to be that guy. The one who, like Elise, has no boundaries, who will literally do anything. I’ve been there and it’s not a good place to visit, let alone to live. Half of my issues with alcohol were drowning loneliness and insecurity, but the other part of it was my attempt to choke out the shame from some pretty shady decisions.

But the only way out of that—or past it—is to stop making decisions that make me feel like shit. Or at least stop making them intentionally.

That means I owe Amanda a better explanation, or at least a more honest one.

The thought of facing her, though, tightens my gut. I’m good at fighting, but I suck at confrontation when it comes to feelings. And words. And words about feelings.

Far easier to throw a punch or pretend to be someone else (and read someone else’s words) than it is to open my mouth and tell an unpleasant truth.

Putting my glasses back on, I push myself up from the couch, listening for signs of movement next door.

There’s nothing. Which probably isn’t good. But neither is she throwing things around and yelling.

That doesn’t really seem like Amanda anyway.

Then it hits me: she could be packing. Folding all her clothes and jamming them in her bag, gathering her shampoo and stuff from the bathroom. She could be leaving right now.

I wouldn’t blame her, not after that showing.

The thought of opening the door to find her gone makes me feel panicky, like my last chance has slipped away. I like who I am better when she’s around. So, I don’t want her to go, not just like this, but in general.

I open my door and knock on hers, which is closed. No surprise there, I guess. I find myself hoping it’s not locked, as that would be a true sign of how much I fucked up the last few minutes.

But there’s no scrape of the deadbolt when she pulls open the door a second later.

Hey,” I say with relief. The lights are on in her room, but she’s still in her pajamas, not dressed and ready to walk out.

She doesn’t move, doesn’t say anything, just stands there in the doorway, not quite meeting my eyes.

“I thought maybe you were leaving,” I blurt into the silence.

Her eyebrows shoot up. “Are you asking me to?”

“No!” I say immediately, louder than I meant to, and she jumps a little.

I shake my head, frustrated at myself. “No,” I say in a calmer voice. With my hands on my hips, like I’ve been running some exhausting marathon, I force myself to take a deep breath. “Can I come in?”

She steps back and holds her hand out in a limp gesture of welcome.

I step into the room and turn to face her. “I want to start this conversation over.”

“I’m not sure there’s a point.” Her tone is not cruel or cutting, just matter-of-fact.

I can feel the urge to be defensive rising in me, demanding that I throw something back in her face, something that will make it her fault instead of mine. But I clamp down on that urge, my hands clenched in fists. It’s not her fault. She didn’t do anything wrong. I did.

Accept responsibility for your mistakes promptly.
That was kind of one of the big ones in recovery.

“I’m sorry,” I say. “That’s where I should have started. I’m sorry.”

When I dare to look up at her, she’s watching me with a cautious expression, her arms folded across her chest. “Okay.”

I sit on the edge of the bed closest to the door. “I was wrong to make my answer about you instead of me. That was bullshit.”

She nods slowly and moves to sit next to me, leaving several feet of bed between us. “Thanks.” Her toes poke into the carpet.

“I’m not…” I struggle to find the right words. “I’m not good at this kind of thing, at talking about stuff.”

The edges of her mouth curve up reluctantly. “I’ve noticed.”

“Right?” I say in relief. “So, just, uh, bear with me, okay?” I slide my hand across the comforter and space between us, palm up. And after a second of hesitation, she rests her hand on mine.

I slip my fingers between hers and squeeze gently. “I want to say yes; I
really
want to say yes.”

She blushes, ducking her head, her hair sliding forward to hide her face.

“But I’m not the guy you think I am. I’ve made mistakes, some of which you know. Others you don’t,” I say evenly.

“Calista,” Amanda says.

I jolt. “Did Karen—”

“No,” she admits. “I could just tell there was something when you guys were talking about it earlier.”

I hesitate. I don’t ever talk about this with anyone, but if it makes her understand what I’m trying to save her from, then maybe it’s worth forcing the words out now.

“Eric, Calista, and I spent a lot of time together when the show was filming,” I say slowly. “But Calista was even younger than me. She was the only one playing her character’s age. Her mom was her manager, kept her separate from the rest of us. Bad influences.” I shrug. “She was right about that.”