One Good Thing (6 page)

“You don’t seem to be in the mood for talking,” he pointed out.

“You’re so considerate,” I said, with more than a little sarcasm. After another pause I broke down. “I’m sorry. I’m not being very nice to you.”

“It’s okay; I don’t get my feelings hurt that easily.”

“So …” I cast around for a topic, but couldn’t think of one. I tapped my fingers along the counter; it
was
sticky. I jerked my hand away, wondering what I’d touched. “What do you want to talk about?”

“So the onus of this conversation is on me?” His mouth curled at the corner as he took a drink of beer.

I blinked, wondering if I’d really just heard him use the word “onus” in conversation or if it was a trick of the Jack.

“Is that from Paris?” he asked, nodding toward my wrist, where I wore a silver-link bracelet that was engraved with different Parisian landmarks, like the Eiffel Tower and the Arc de Triomphe. I’d forgotten I was wearing it.

I nodded. “My uncle bought it for me a long time ago. He was there on a business trip.”

“Have you been there?”

“No, I want to, though.” That was one of those things I probably wouldn’t be doing in the next decade. On my current income, I barely had enough to go on an overnight trip. International travel was out of the question. “I want to visit the Louvre.”

“You like art?”

“I love art,” I said, realizing too late how wistful I sounded. “Where would you go … you know, hypothetically speaking?” I shouldn’t have attempted to say hypothetically … in my current state, I stumbled over it a little.

“I’m going to sound really uncultured for saying this after you threw down Paris, but I’ve always wanted to go to Comic-Con in San Diego.”

“Like where they dress up as Vulcans?”

He laughed. “Some people wear costumes.”

“Would you?”

He sighed heavily. “I guess I might draw the line at a costume, but I would wear a really awesome
Star Trek
T-shirt.”

“Would you do this to people?” I held up my hand and spread my fingers in the symbol for “Live long and prosper.”

“Well, obviously,” he said, which made me smile. “You know, I think you might be a closet dork.”

“No, I’m not,” I answered.

“Which is exactly what you would say if you were in the closet.”

“Shut up,” I said, but it was a little hard to sound like I meant it when I was grinning.

I pushed my glass forward, indicating I wanted a refill.

Evan’s hand closed around the glass, brushing my fingers. My first reaction was to let go, but I didn’t, instead my fingers tightened around the smooth crystal, and I tried not to dwell on how warm his palm felt. My head snapped around to glare at him, but the movement made me dizzy.

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” he asked.

“I’m fine!”

“You know, it’s called sipping whiskey for a reason.”

“What?”

“You’re supposed to sip it, not gulp it.”

My eyes narrowed. “I can drink it however I want to drink it.”

He shook his head, a slight smile curving his lips. “Fine—I won’t stop you.”

“Good.” The bartender refilled my glass, and I pulled it toward me covetously, casting a glance at Evan out of the corner of my eye. I took a tentative sip, but I wasn’t sure I liked the taste when I drank it slow. It was easier to imbibe quickly.

I noticed Evan hadn’t finished his first beer yet. Was I drinking fast or was he drinking like a tortoise?

“Let’s go to the jukebox,” I said, noticing the nearly constant blare of music had just ended.

I grabbed my drink and climbed down from the chair. The crowd in the bar was growing thick, reminding me of a cluster of insects. As I weaved through, a guy jostled into me, beer spilling over the edge of his glass and dripping onto my dress. Evan was immediately at my side, a light touch on my wrist, drawing me to safety.

We managed to get to the jukebox without being knocked over. He stood at the side as I looked down, jabbing at the arrows to move through the selection and chewing on my lower lip.

I glanced up after a few seconds and met his eyes. His mouth was tilted just the slightest bit, like he wanted to smile but wouldn’t. “Are you watching me? You’re supposed to be helping.”

He wordlessly stepped around the neon-red machine to stand at my side. Our arms brushed. And I didn’t move away. There was something about that fragile contact I didn’t want to break.

“Do you like Bruce?” he asked.

My fingers hovered over the screen, over the greatest hits album cover where Springsteen wore faded jeans and a leather jacket. “Everyone likes Bruce.”

My dad had loved Bruce, had played his CDs in the car pretty often. I knew that all those songs would be as familiar to me as my own face; it didn’t matter that I hadn’t heard most of them in years.

I pushed the arrow and moved past. “Something else,” I said, sipping on my drink, squinting down at the albums.

“I’m not very good at making decisions,” I admitted after another few minutes of silence.

“Why?”

Why?
No one had ever asked me that. Dani worried too much. Dani was indecisive. They were personality traits that the people who knew me best seemed to accept, not something I examined. I drummed my fingers against the glass, turning my liquor-soaked mind to the task of self-reflection. It wasn’t something I did very well even when I was sober.

“I don’t know why,” I said slowly. “Decisions seem … intimidating.”

He didn’t respond, just continued to watch me, which wasn’t really helping my decision-making skills.

“Why don’t you pick something out?” It’s what I would have told Drew to do, if we’d been in the same situation.

But Evan surprised me. “Close your eyes,” he said.

I stared. “Close my eyes?” I echoed.

“This might not work for big decisions, but I think its fine for little ones.” I drew in a deep breath and lowered my eyelids. I heard the click of the button being pushed. “Tell me when to stop.”

“But what if it lands on something we don’t like?”

“Then it lands on something we don’t like,” he said.

“That’s not very motivating,” I responded. I wondered what his expression was like, if he wore that half-tilted smile. “Okay, stop.”

“Point to the screen.”

I did. All I heard was silence. “Evan?”

“Hmm.”

I cracked open my eyelids. My fingertip rested over the title of an old Britney Spears song. “You’re kidding me,” I said. “Why do they even have that in there? Do people at bars listen to Britney Spears?”

Evan looked like he wanted to laugh. He dug through his pocket and then pushed some quarters into the machine. “Step two: when you make a bad decision, you can either stick it through or run away.”

“Running away probably isn’t good for my emotional growth,” I pointed out, taking a long drag of whiskey.

He punched the button and bubblegum pop radiated from the jukebox. Some heads turned to look at us when a sixteen-year-old Britney started to sing. There was a group of burly men at the bar; they wore black leather jackets like they were part of a biker gang, and it looked like they could have ripped the jukebox, or me and Evan, to shreds with their bare hands. One of the men scowled at us like we’d poisoned his ears with Britney.

Why hadn’t I noticed them before I’d agreed to close my eyes and pick a song?

“I think I’ve changed my mind,” I said, uncomfortable at the scrutiny. “Let’s go.”

I stepped away from the jukebox. Too quickly. My head swam; the alcohol must have caught up with me because I stumbled, the room spinning. Evan reached out quickly to steady me and I fell against him; his chest was warm and solid against my face. I wanted to wrap my arms around his back and nuzzle into him.

I forgot all about the bikers. The scent I’d noticed the day before drifted to me. Damn, whatever soap he used was fantastic. I was tempted to tilt my head, press my nose to his neck, and just stand there and breathe. “You smell so good,” I murmured.

“Do you want to go home?”

I blinked up at him. Did he mean it in a gentlemanly way or a let’s-go-to-your-place-and-have-hot-sex type of way? It wasn’t that easy to find a rebound, was it? “Sure,” I finally said, “but I need to pay the bartender.”

“I already paid,” he said.

I frowned. “I could have done it.”

“You can pay me back later if it bothers you, but I’d rather get you out of here while you can still walk in a straight line. Relatively,” he added. “Unless you wanted me to carry you.”

I laid my hands on his chest and pushed away from him. “I’m not a child.”

“I know,” he said. “Believe me, I know.”

He tugged gently at my wrist and I followed him out into the cool night, the sounds of voices and Britney Spears mingling to a cacophonic mess. We went back to the SLQ parking garage and Evan helped me into the passenger side of his car before he slid in next to me.

It was a shiny midsize, silver and sleek, serviceable and attractive but not too showy. I wondered if a person’s vehicle reflected their personality.

After I gave him my address and managed to latch my seat belt, we took off, gliding past city lights, the silver car flashing in each large window. I took a deep breath; the car looked new, but it had lost the chemical scent new vehicles usually had; instead it smelled like a perfect tangle of crisp Evan and earthy leather.

When I glanced around, I noticed the inside was almost as clean as the outside, except for a couple of leftover coffee containers in the cup holders. After my inspection, I slid down in the seat and hit the button to roll my window down, feeling strangely overheated. The breeze rustled my hair and my head lolled against the headrest. It felt heavier than usual. “Why is it so hot in here?”

“It’s not,” he said. “You’re drunk.”

“Oh.”

“Do you do this often?” he asked.

“What?” I responded, staring at the tall buildings that swept past us.

“Get hammered.”

“No!” I protested, swinging my head around to look at him, which made my stomach roil. He kept his eyes on the road. “I’ve never been drunk before. Maybe a little buzzed a couple of times … but not drunk.”

“Never?”

“No,” I repeated.

“You’re not going to have a good time tomorrow,” he said.

I saw the red brick of the apartment building up ahead and pointed it out. Evan pulled smoothly into the parking lot. I wasn’t sure if he was going slower than normal because of my drunken state, but it was nice. Drew’s driving was a bit jerky. If I was with him tonight I probably would have thrown up all over his expensive car, and he would have gotten mad at me.

He parked and turned off the engine. And then, with a lot of fumbling and dropping things and stumbling around, we somehow managed to get me unbuckled and past the outer door of the building to the welcome mat of the apartment with my keys in hand.

I hesitated, turning toward him. “Do you want to come in?”

“I don’t think I should.”

My lips worked into a petulant frown. “But I want you to be my rebound.”

His eyebrows lifted. His eyes looked dark in the shadows. “Rebound?” he asked, as though he was making sure he’d heard me correctly. Was that interest I heard in his voice? I nodded, giggling. “I have glow-in-the-dark condoms.”

There was a moment of silence and then suddenly he laughed. “Glow-in-the-dark, huh?”

“Yeah, we can play hide-and-seek. I’ll always find you,” I said, poking at him.

“As enticing as that sounds, I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

“Why not?”

“You’re drunk. I’m not,” he said simply. “I would be taking advantage of you.”

“What if I want to be taken advantage of?” I whispered.

He groaned. “Fuck.”

I blinked. “I wasn’t going to put it that way, but yes, essentially.” “Essentially …”— that was another word that got tangled on my tongue.

A huff of incredulous air expelled from his lips as he lifted the keys from my hand. “That was an expletive, not a verb.”

“Expletive,” I repeated, forming the funny shape with my mouth.

He unlocked the door and pushed it open, then guided me inside with a hand on my elbow. “Where’s your bed?”

“We’re going to do it?”

“
No
,” he said, pulling a hand through his hair so it stuck out at odd angles. “You’re going to go to sleep and I’m going to leave.”

“That’s boring,” I said.

“It’s not exactly my idea of an awesome Friday night either, but you’ll thank me later.”

“No, I won’t,” I said. For once in my life I’d actually made a decision without agonizing over it, and regardless of whether that decision had more to do with inebriation than anything else, I was pissed that he’d taken it out of my hands.

So I threw my arms around his neck, pulled my body flush to his, and dragged his head down to meet my lips.

For a few seconds he didn’t respond, and a sliver of worry worked its way into my chest. But then he made a sound low in his throat and his fingers tightened against my hips and he returned my kiss. I sagged against him in relief.

He pulled my lower lip between his teeth, nipping gently. His tongue eased past my lips. My hands gripped the hair that curled along his nape because I suddenly felt weak-kneed—when Drew had tried to kiss me like that it tended to end up messy—Evan’s kiss was …
definitive
. Yes, that was the word for it.

I sighed as his tongue slipped against mine and then drew back, leaving me wanting more.

His hand slid along the curve of my ass and then he lifted, forcing my hips against his. I rocked against him, ground against him … the force of my desire stunned me—I wanted him hard, fast, slow, easy, or however he would take me.

Was it the alcohol or was it him?

I pulled his lip into my mouth and sucked. His hand, the one that had been cupping my backside, moved lower, sliding underneath my dress from behind. His fingers stroked me through my underwear, where the cloth was damp, and then gently moved aside the fabric. Skin touched skin. The slow slide of his fingertips against overly sensitive flesh.

A noise caught in my throat, emerging as a tiny squeak.