He reached out and suddenly pulled me into him holding me for the first time. I was fully enveloped in Meekai; arms wound around me with a silent need for me to believe him, to trust him. He smelled like leather and hope; comfort. I couldn’t label it. It was so unique to him, and I clung to it like his arms clung to me. I didn’t flinch, I didn’t feel scared. Yes, he’d kissed me chaste yet intimately, but this was even more so. It was the first time he’d held me. I felt his body sigh into mine. I could feel his truth, that he cared for me. That he wasn’t walking away, and I didn’t want him to.
“I’m so sorry I believed them,” I whispered into his chest. And I was. I was so deeply and profoundly sorry I’d wasted so many years to Adalita, and the people who I knew would never leave it. Cowards. It would take a strength that Hardy’s parents couldn’t pay for to leave behind the control he had in Adalita. Why would you leave a place that made you believe your own lies? They were all sheep and Hardy was the fucking pied piper.
“I’m sorry too, Violet. I’m sorry you were alone with a lie for so long, but I’m here now,” he promised as he gently kissed my head, pulling me into him a little tighter. “I’m gonna show you what it’s like to be lo . . .” he stuttered to a stop, close to tripping over a word that was so big there were no take-backs. It was too early for that, no doubt a slip up.
“I just want you to feel as wanted as you are. I need you, Radley. I’m not backwards in coming forward. I’m sorry if that scares you, but it doesn’t scare me. Just don’t run. Don’t run from me if you get scared of us. Promise you’ll hold on.”
His arms unclasped from around me and he stepped back holding out his hand, asking for mine. I took it as he slowly led me down the hallway and into my bedroom. My heart throbbed, my chest felt like it was full of an energy that knew things were about to change, again. This day had already changed so much. He’d seen me raw. He’d made me his. But this felt bigger.
He closed my bedroom door behind us and directed me to sit on the end of the bed. He stayed standing and took a few steps back as his right hand reached behind him to find his t-shirt, pulling it up and over his head.
I bowed my head, not sure of where to look. I jumped when he tossed his shirt onto my bed, landing square on my lap. The comfort of his smell settled around me, and I grabbed at the soft fabric like it would hold me together, if I just held it tight enough.
“Look up, Radley.” His voice was like molasses, full of thick truths and promises.
I looked up and took him in. My lips parted all on their own. I gripped his shirt tighter, a finger stretching one of the strategically placed holes of the distressed cotton.
He was beautiful. Olive skin, smooth but for a few hairs placed perfectly on his etched-out pecs, his happy trail splashed like purposeful paint that an artist had ached over to perfect. His waist was tapered, his V deep, prominent; loud and unforgiving as I took him in. His shoulders were broad, and he struggled to maintain controlled breaths as he stood before me shirtless and vulnerable.
His body was covered in tattoos. They clung to his skin like art. The tattoo that always poked out from beneath his shirt was finally mine to read as I leaned in unashamedly, making him chuckle. Where words fail, music speaks. A story for another day, another part of him I had yet to learn.
He stood with purpose, implored me with his eyes to hear whatever he needed to say. My gaze moved to his hand, covering a tattoo that crossed his heart. I couldn’t move, but I wasn’t scared, I was curious. Trust already handed over.
I finally spoke the words I had a feeling he was waiting for me to find. “What’s written across your heart, Meekai?”
My voice was controlled. For some reason I felt like I needed to give him my assurance. He had his own fear. I could see it, and it made me feel like he was handing over the control. He was letting me into a place I felt no one had ever truly seen, until now.
He removed his hand slowly, trepidation licking the skin beneath it as it came into view.
Fight. It was placed right over his heart, flanked by two sparrows.
“You. You’re written across my heart, Radley.”
“Fight? I don’t understand.” I waited for him to begin the story of this chapter, one he wanted me to understand.
16
Meekai
“Never give up on your purple-eyed girl. She needs you, Meekai.”
My mamas words ran through my mind as I grazed my fingers over the space that contained my heart. I traced the word fight. A reminder; a contract written in ink.
How did I tell a girl I’ve known almost my entire life that she’s mine? Always had been, always would be. The truth was, I’d only met Radley a few weeks ago, but she’d been with me since I was four. There wasn’t a day I hadn’t thought about the purple-eyed girl. There wasn’t a day I’d forgotten the promise I made to Mama; I would fight for her. Fight.
This was one of those moments that you’d planned, but could never truly prepare for. She’d either run or stay; stay and fight. I stood in the middle of her bedroom, ready to tell her my truth. She’d given enough of her own. It was only fair that I handed myself over to her. The fear was palpable as I stood there, bare, the map of my life imprinted on my skin. This was the most terrified I’d felt since Mama died.
She’d been gone two years. Mimi, my six-year-old little sister, had been gone for just over a year. She lived in Adalita with my father. New wife, new money, new family. Thirteen cursed hours stood between me in Everlee Falls, Georgia, and my father and Mimi, in Adalita, Pennsylvania. The only reprieve that those thirteen hours had brought me over the last year of travelling back and forth, was when I’d discovered a full breath that night, three weeks ago when I’d found Radley.
It was only when Child Protective Services pursued a claim of child neglect against Mama, when she’d turned up drunk for the second time within a month, that she was investigated, and Mimi was handed over to my asshole of a father.
He’d left just over three years ago, Mama completely in love with a man who forgot her; forgot us. One day, he decided not to come home. He just left. The funny thing was, before he left you wouldn’t have heard me say a bad word against him. He was my hero. I loved him like any kid should love their parents, without question; complete trust, safety within the confines of that genetic bond.
I was baffled by the type of man it took to walk away from his family so easily. We were your average, happy American family. He gave no signs that he didn’t love Mama or his life. After that, I’d sworn to myself that when I gave my love away, it would be so obvious, there’d be no question. I’d never make the woman I fell in love with feel the way Mama had felt, when her whole life was thrown back in her face and she had to accept that all those years were a lie.
When Mama found his wardrobe empty and his cell phone disconnected, not even a letter to explain what had happened, she’d started drinking to cope. I supposed that was what happened when you were left with no answers. When you completely gave yourself to a person for twenty years and they disappeared without a trace.
I lost Mama to alcoholism, and in turn, my little sister.
I had contempt for my father and deep impenetrable anger towards Mama. It seemed, even a year after her suicide, I still hadn’t progressed past stage two of the grieving process. I was stuck in the thick quicksand that was hurt and devastation. Until someone brought my sister back and raised Mama from the dead, that was where I’d stay.
Mama never said goodbye. The betrayal that sat within that fact ran deep. After everything Dad had put her through, you’d think she would’ve extended the courtesy to her children when she gave into the pain. She never left us a letter, an explanation. That was what killed me; the fact that she couldn’t leave a fucking note to tell us she loved us.
Before she started drinking, she was the perfect mother. Couldn’t fault her on the love she showed me and my baby sister. She was my world, our world, and then she checked out. Dad had already given up, and eventua
lly Mama did, too.
As she fell further into her addiction, I only got glimpses, mere moments of the mom she once was. I would never understand how I wasn’t worth a goodbye, but worth enough to find her, to call 911; to scream relentlessly that she was okay, she just needed to try and breathe. The louder I’d screamed, the surer I’d become that she had to wake up. The harder I’d shaken her, the more convinced I was that she’d come back to life.
When my screams had stopped, the silence brought clarity. She’d thought enough, to not think of me at all. I would always carry that betrayal, the fact that I wasn’t worth a letter, or a fucking note left on a Post-it, a napkin, anything. Instead, she’d left me with her body, five hours past dead. And I still lived in the house, drowning in the anguish she left behind. But I couldn’t leave. Even though she’d left me, I refused to leave the ghost of her alone.
Everyone thought she’d died of a heart attack. My father at least had the decency to lie; to do the one thing I asked of him. I’d asked him not to humiliate her in death, especially since it was him who’d destroyed her in the first place.
He’d paid off the house we once shared as a family, paid for the utilities and sent a monthly check. Guilt money. Blood money. His new wife’s money. He’d bought me a new Jeep that I resented, but I accepted it so I could visit Mimi in Adalita every few weeks. My car before that was unreliable, and I refused to break the connection between me and my baby sister. She was my world. I gave up on my father the day he decided we weren’t his.
So here I was, bare-chested, heart prepared to bleed. Would she run? I asked her not to and she hadn’t yet promised she wouldn’t. I’d dreamt of this moment relentlessly for years.
“Will you stay with me?” It was always the last question I’d ask her in my dreams before I woke, startled. A chest full of emptiness that ran so deep I’d wished it was just my imagination. I knew if she answered, “No, I won’t stay,” it would end me.
When I’d seen her sitting on that fallen tree at Hardy’s party that first night, I knew. It wasn’t a dream, and the thing I’d feared the most was happening. This was the first time I’d gotten to the end of the dream, except she was really here, and I was about to ask her if she’d stay. I was about to lay it out and ask the purple-eyed girl, will you stay with me? She’d either turn and walk away, or stay and try. I was about to look like a fucking lunatic. The risk high, the reward higher if she’d entertain the notion that she was fated to me, just like I was to her.
She looked at me, big almond-shaped eyes. Innocence, trust, it was all there in the violet pools that surveyed me and the ink which covered my skin. Having her look so intimately at me had me feeling painfully constrained. I wanted her, needed her. When her lips brushed mine earlier, turning away, denying myself, was the most physically painful thing I’d ever done. Her scent, powder and sunshine, her raspberry pout a string that was close to a violent snap, my undoing if she tried to kiss me again. I couldn’t turn her away twice.
I lowered my eyes to meet hers, my hand falling to my side.
“Do you believe in fate, Radley?” I supposed it was as good a place to start as any. Cliché as fuck, but to the point.
She threw me a tilted smile, her brows crinkled inwards as she thought for a minute.
“You mean goodbyes-are-a-second-chance type fate? Us? Are we fated, Meekai?”
I shifted on the spot, her eyes leaving a fire trail as she took me in, visibly trying to work me out. I’d been with plenty of girls. I’d been shirtless, naked, with no end but the need to come; give pleasure and leave. I loved sex, but this was more intimate than sex. Never had one girl ever been able to make me nervous just with her stare alone. Never had one girl ever made me experience a need so deep that forever laid with her, and only her.
She was my end game. Fate seemed so baseless, completely empty in relation to her, to us. She wasn’t just any girl; she was my girl, and I’d hold her until I held her right. Just because I knew she was mine didn’t mean I wouldn’t have to earn her.
“Yeah, Radley. Just like that. When we met, that was the—”
“Beginning,” she finished, completing the sentence. A glint of knowing reflected back at me.
“The beginning, exactly.” I laughed.
“What does that have to do with fight? I don’t understand.” She was genuinely curious, and I couldn’t believe I was standing in the moment I’d been dreaming of for the last fifteen years.
There came a time-this being one of those times-when you had to trust the person your heart fell for. Handing your heart over was never a choice. It just was. There was never a decision. The only thing you could hand over was your vulnerability and trust, and hope it was enough.
“One of my earliest memories was me crying to Mama about a dream I’d had. I was about four and there was no way to calm me. Mama had told me it was just a dream. It wasn’t real, but me? I was inconsolable. It was real. I knew, even then, that it wasn’t a dream. It was as real as you and me sitting here now, in this moment.”
I smiled at the curiosity knitted across her brows and the need that twinkled in her eyes. I moved to where she sat on the bed to collect my shirt, having her eyes on me was intimidating, I wouldn’t get through this if I stayed shirtless. I pulled on my shirt and sat next to her on the end of the bed. She playfully nudged me with her shoulder, the gesture giving me hope; reason. She hadn’t moved to run yet.
“So, what upset you so much?” she asked, her body angling towards mine. The heat of her, the snap of energy that floated and flailed between us made my head spin.
“It was a girl.” I smirked.
“Always is,” she teased, knocking into me again. Powder and sunshine infiltrated every sense I had as she stared intently at me, her lips rolling into one another, shy, flushed . . . perfect.
“Nah, there’s only ever been one,” I confessed, conviction absolute.
There it was, her fucking smile. That smile. Confusion and wonder, disbelief and hope. My little contradiction.
“What upset me so much was a little girl who came to meet me every night in my dreams. She had almond-shaped eyes, electric blue. A blue so bright, it shone violet.”
Her lips parted, a whisper of a smile floated across her lips.
“She was meant for me, you know?”
“Is that right?” she tossed back with a gentle laugh.
“Yep.” I smiled. “Mama told me that I was persistent with the belief that God made the purple-eyed girl just for me.”
“So, what happened?” she pushed, impatience bleeding through as I inwardly laughed at her excitement.
“She always ran from me. Told me she hated me and never wanted to see me again. It started out well. There was a knowing between me and her. She knew as much as I did, that we were made for one another. It was fate. I always told Mama that she was mine, and I was gonna find her and marry her.”
“So, even at four, you were full-throttle? Zero-to-one-hundred Meekai?”
“Even then, Violet. Even when she ran, even when she told me to leave, to go, to give up. I’d stay, follow. Even when my heart ached, when the tears wouldn’t stop. Even when she told me she never wanted to see me again, I came right back to her every single night. Every single time. I’ve been coming back to her every night for the last fifteen years, hoping she’d change her mind. I always left her with one question before she faded away, and I woke up.”
“What did you ask her, Meekai?”
“I always asked her, Will you stay with me? But she’d shake her head, refuse me. To this day, I wonder what was so big . . . What had I done that she could hate me that much and run?” I turned, leaned in closer and took her hand which she easily gave. “I’d feel an emptiness; complete devastation. It got to the point where I hated falling asleep, knowing I’d wake having lost her. But Mama told me I had to fight. That if the purple-eyed girl got mad, fight. If she told me to leave, stay and fight. If she got up to walk away, follow and fight. She told me not to
give up until I’d fought with everything I had. I had to fight, Violet.”
A tear trailed a path down her cheek, silence reverberated as another one fell. I let go of her hands and took her head in both of mine, my thumbs brushing away the evidence that she’d heard me, understood. But I still wasn’t sure where that left us.
I knew I overwhelmed her. I tried not to, but I’d been chasing her for so long that the only way I knew was zero-to-one-hundred Meekai. I’d had fifteen years to come to terms with this, and the older I got, I started to believe that maybe it was just a dream. But here I was, with her head in my hands, proof that it wasn’t.
“You weren’t just a dream, Radley.” She was a dream that had turned into reality and turned out to be exactly what I knew she was . . . mine. “When I found you that night at the party, when I saw your eyes, the nagging feeling that had followed me for so long, the emptiness morning brought and let linger for all those years, it stopped. The morning after I met you, I woke up calm. No more dreams, and there hasn’t been another one since the day we met.”
She raised her hands and took hold of my wrists that held her beautiful face. Her gaze captured mine with an intensity I’d only dreamed of until now. “You make me out to be far more important than I am, Meekai. I don’t know how someone like me could deserve something so big.”
“You make yourself out to be less than I know you are. You’re not broken, you’re hurt. You’re not weak, you’re just hurt, Violet. I’ll never walk away from you. This tattoo is a promise, not just to you, but to myself. I had it tattooed on me the morning after the party. I needed evidence to prove that you existed. It seemed impossible. I mean, we lived thirteen hours apart, but look. We’re here. Complete proof that we’re right where we need to be . . . together.”
Thirteen Hours To You Page 19