Held: A New Adult Romance (4 page)

 "What d'you get?" said a voice at my elbow.

 I turned round, ready to act snotty like you were supposed to when a strange guy hit on you. There hadn't been many boys in my life, save for a mopey, largely platonic affair with the son of a well-known rock star. So maybe that was why he caught me off-guard. Maybe that was why I was like a deer in the headlights the moment I saw his face.

 Somehow I said, "I can get my own drink, thanks," even though he was perfect. His eyes were blue - ice blue - but his hair was black. His eyelashes were longer than any I'd ever seen on a man. High cheekbones, full lips. His nose was wide-bridged and when I saw him side on, a little flattened, giving him a sulky, feline look. His hair was a tangle of curls, falling almost to his shoulders.

 "No," he said, smiling. "Your tatt. What did you get?" He indicated the fresh dressing on the back of my shoulder.

 "Butterfly," I said. "Boring. It's henna anyway."

 He curled his lip. "Pfft. What's the point?" he said, coming very close to make himself heard. He smelled of sweat, leather and something sweet. Or maybe I imagined the last. He was the best looking boy I'd ever seen.

 "Tattoos are permanent for a reason," he said. "They tell you who you were, who you are, what you might regret and what you don't."

 He was wearing a black wife-beater and I couldn't see any tattoos on him beyond the pitchfork of a little devil poking out above his collarbone. "You talk a big game for someone with so little ink," I said.

 He laughed. "Oh baby," he said. "That's where you're wrong. So wrong."

 And right there he peeled off his shirt and turned his back to me. It was a huge piece, and one I recognized - the Tarot card depicting Death.

 “Kind of morbid,” I said, determined not to be impressed, a pose that slipped away from me the moment he turned back around. His chest was sculpted and I was sure my jaw was on the floor. Maybe Rose-Tattoo had it nailed – the death of my childhood. I’d had my crushes and my pin-up boys before, but he was the first man I ever really wanted to fuck.

 "It's not morbid," he said. "In the midst of life we are in death - ain't that what the Good Book says?"

 "I wouldn't know," I said, flipping my hair. Realizing his effect on me had only made me more aloof. "I'm an atheist."

 He smiled. His teeth were white, the eyeteeth a little sharp. My very own vampire - wouldn't Everglade be jealous? "You a freshman or something?" he asked, like my lack of faith was some kind of adolescent pose.

 "No." I was on the defensive and the half-truth just popped out of me before I could help myself. I felt my face turn hot at the thought that he might find out I was still in High School.

 "You ever pray, cher?" he said, his lips hot on my ear as he yelled. Cher - it was then I noticed his accent, even over the blast of the music. Louisiana - a breath of Bourbon Street and Spanish moss, voodoo and Mardi Gras. He was all my Anne Rice novels come to life. "You should pray. It's a big, bad world for a little thing like you."

 I shook my head. It was a good thing he was a kind of a douche otherwise he'd be dangerous. He leaned close and I could see faded freckles on his cheekbones. His hand was on the small of my back and I should have swatted him away, but those freckles did something to me. I saw him as an overconfident kid, someone who still had no idea what his life was going to be. Someone just like me.

 It just happened. That's what I told Everglade after, when she started asking me if I felt weird, if I'd put my drink down anywhere where someone could have spiked it. One minute I was standing there at the bar thinking I should slap his wrist and the next I was kissing him. His tongue was hot and agile and his hands came down hard on my ass. I didn't even know his name and I didn't even care, because he felt so good and he tasted wonderful.

 His hand snaked up under my t-shirt and I could feel his fingers working their way beneath the underwire of my bra, but I still didn't care. I had a tattoo. I was half drunk in a strange town, and kissing a boy whose name I didn't even know. I was so dizzy with the sense of my own new-grown adulthood that he could have stripped me naked right there at the bar and I would have let him.

 I felt a hand on my shoulder, tugging me backwards. Then I turned around to see Everglade standing there, hands on her hips, the world's least likely chaperone. "What the fuck do you think you're doing?" she said to him.

 My lips were wet. I was conscious that my t-shirt was bunched up, caught on the cup of my bra. I pulled it down quickly.

 "None of your damn business," he said.

 "She's in High School, you scumbag," she said, loud enough for the bartender to hear. Oops.

 He laughed. "Come and find me when you graduate," he said, compounding my humiliation. "What's your name, cher?"

 "Ruby," said Everglade. "Her name's Ruby. Now fuck off."

 "Amber," I yelled, as she dragged me away before someone asked to inspect our fake ID's. "It's Amber!"

 Chapter Four

Jaime

My sister is right about one thing - Emily really can dance.

 "You wanna sit this one out?" she says, smiling up at me. I'd like to go again but she's breathing fast and there's a light sheen of sweat on her forehead and upper lip.

 "Yeah, I'm good," I say. "New shoes - I think I'm getting a blister anyway."

 "Do you want a band-aid or something? I think I have some in my purse." One look at her shoes and I don't doubt it - the heels are nearly three inches high and make her shiny, muscled legs look awesome. Rebeca wasn't kidding about her figure either - little waist, flaring hips, firm boobs. All this in a blazing red dress. Her hair is jet black and falls nearly to her waist in natural curls. She looks like a doll but I know, on the strength of Beca's recommendation alone, that Emily is her kind of girl, the kind of capable, Catholic girl who can diaper a baby with one hand, fix a banquet with the other and still somehow find the time and the extra pair of hands to thread the neighbor lady's eyebrows.

 I wonder what it says about me that I can't stop thinking about a white girl who looks like she might shake to pieces in a strong breeze. Nothing good, I'm sure.

 Beca looks way too pleased with herself. "I told you," she said, handing me a cup of the unspecified weak 'tropical fruit punch' that's been a staple of church socials ever since I can remember. Nobody's ever figured out what it is, but most theories involve someone mixing a couple of different flavors of Kool-Aid together then watering it down past the point of confession.

 "You're right," I say, watching Emily rummaging in her purse. "She can dance. And she's hot. Really hot."

 "I didn't say anything about hot."

 "You implied it heavily enough. You did everything but pin up a poster of her saying WANTED: SISTER-IN-LAW."

 Beca shakes her head. "I just think you'd be good together. It's not right for a man to brood like this."

 "Brood?" Oh, here we go. Now I know what this is all about. "Who said anything about brooding? Is this about Melissa, 'cause..."

 "...maybe, yeah. You can't say it ended well."

 I groan and drain my cup. "Of course it didn't end well, Beca. We were like, sixteen. First love, first heartbreak. It's always been like that - for everyone. Forever. You were top of the English class. Romeo and Juliet, remember? It's always like that when you're that young - that stupid, that intense, that messy. At least me and Melissa didn't come with a body count."

 "Okay, okay. I get you. It's just...it's been a few years. Time to get back on the horse, hermano. You know what I'm saying?"

 "Loud and clear." Emily turns back to us and smiles. Damn, she's got some legs on her. I'd love to hit her up for a tango, but that's just a little too much sexy for the CYO.

 She slips my mind too easily, though. I worry I'm giving her the wrong idea. I can't stop thinking about John Gillespie's daughter. I don't know why. That paparazzi photo planted something inside of me. The white of her thigh, the private inside of it that no-one should see - every time I think of it I feel sick with anger that someone could treat her in that way. Like a zoo animal. Like a fucking fish in a tank.

 When I get to work the big house is quiet. John Gillespie is in Prague for a couple of days. Uncle Steve has gone to his new job with the Douglases and there's just us grunts doing the rounds for Amber. Her wing of the house is maybe the best protected, tucked against the hillside and protected by dense woodland. Sometimes I hear helicopters overhead, but she's well sheltered there.

 I don't expect to see her. I've spoken to her maybe six times in all. The first was when she had a panic attack. The second was when I came back to deliver her cigarettes. The rest of the times were pleasantries and for some reason with every passing instance we got stiffer and stranger with one another. Then yesterday when I went back there was no sign of her but a pale pink envelope taped to her closed door. Inside was a twenty and a note saying 'Jimmy - I'm sick today. Please can you leave me some smokes next to the aloe plant by the door?'

 I wouldn't know an aloe plant from a cactus if I was peeing on one.

 The door is closed, but the drapes are open. Maybe I should knock, but then I'm reminded of a fish tank again. Tap on the glass. See what they do. For a moment I hesitate, then make my way carefully around the edge of the pool. Maybe I'll catch her next time round.

 She catches me instead. I didn't even realize I was stealing past like a thief, not until I heard the rasp of the sliding door on its tracks and found my heart in my mouth. "Holy shit."

 "Sorry. I didn't mean to make you jump."

 "I guess you owe me," I say. "I nearly fell in the pool."

 She's wearing loose white linen pants and a little blue top. Her feet are bare and while she's not shifting her light weight enough to actually move her feet, I can see the tension in her hips. It reminds me of the way that just the touch of her toes in the water could make the whole surface tremble. She holds her arms folded, her elbows held still in her hands.

 "It's not cold," she says.

 "I don't care. I can't swim."

 Amber frowns, and then for a second a smile touches the corners of her mouth. Her hair is sloppily tied back with a white ribbon and the wind catches a strand, blows it across her lips. She unsticks it with the nail of her thumb and quickly returns her hand to her elbow. "I thought everyone could swim," she says.

 "Not me." The wind is strong enough to stir the surface of the water today. It's the kind of wind that makes the forest rangers and firefighters super antsy. One dropped cigarette butt and whoosh - wildfire. It flattens the thin linen against her thighs and hips and I can see the pink of her skin and the white of her panties. And then it's like I just light up. Just that one stray thought and I'm gone, thinking about what's under her clothes. I'd learn to walk on water if it meant I could get to her side that much faster.

 "I'm sorry about yesterday," she says. "I hope you don't think I was being rude."

 "No, not at all." Forget it. No way. This is stupid. Rich girl, white girl, crazy girl. Not for you. You don't even know her, dumbass. "I mean, I know you've got that...thing, right?"

 She nods and presses her lips together, making a thin line of her mouth. Her bottom lip is a little thicker than the top, or maybe it's where she's been worrying it with her teeth. "I have some days where I can't even handle talking," she says. "Yesterday was one of those bad days, so..."

 "And today is better?"

 "Today is better, yes." She tilts her head. All her movements are slight and slow, like she's afraid if she moves too quickly she'll go off like she did when I first met her. For a moment I kid myself that she's looking at me with the same interest as I'm looking at her. "Are you serious?" she asks. "You really can't swim?"

 "No. Why are you so surprised? Do I look like a surfer or something?"

 "I don't know," she says. "I just took it for granted, I guess. I thought everyone could swim. Didn't you have lessons?"

 She moves to the side of the pool, to one of the little mosaic edged seats set into the wall. I follow her but I don't sit down - she looks nervous as a bug still.

 "Some," I said. "But I think they got me too late, you know? Like I'd lost the natural instinct or something. You know how they say it is with little babies."

 Amber cups a hand against the wind and lights up a smoke. "What about them?" she says, peering up at me. Her eyes look more green than blue in this light.

 "You know. You know what happens if you throw a newborn baby into a swimming pool?"

 She gives a puzzled look. "What? Somebody calls Child Protective Services?" She makes no attempt to hide the laugh in her voice.

 "Well yeah, you'd hope."

 "I would, definitely."

 "It's a thing," I say, determined to explain. I have no chance with this girl but that doesn't mean I have to be okay with her thinking I'm the kind of weirdo who goes around throwing babies into swimming pools. "My brother probably knows all about it. Swimming is supposed to be a thing we're born knowing how to do, but if you don't get in the water early enough you learn to be afraid of it."

 Amber blows smoke into the wind. It comes back and makes her blink fast. "I don't think that's true," she says. "You hear of little children drowning all the time. Sometimes in like three inches of water. They were going to drain the pool one time and I remember thinking that if you really want to drown yourself, you can easily do it in your own bathtub."

 I feel like I shouldn't be hearing this but I don't know what to say. She curls her feet up on the seat and leans back against the mosaic.

 "Doesn't have to be the Death of Marat," she says. "Just takes a pill. Maybe a drink. Doze off in the water and it's Goodnight Vienna. Wasn't that was how Whitney Houston died?"

 "I think so. I don't really think much about things like that."

 "I know," she says. "I shouldn't either. But then I am crazy. You probably know all about that, right?"