by K. Bromberg
His explanation blindsides me. The intensity in his eyes now makes perfect sense. I expected some smart-ass answer, some flippant response to skirt the issue and make the situation go away, and yet he did the exact opposite. And now I don’t know how to respond.
“The other morning,” he continues before I can speak, the tension back in his shoulders, “it wasn’t you or your pictures or, fuck . . . Never mind.” He lifts a hand to the back of his neck and pulls down on it as he tilts his head to the ceiling. His audible exhalation fills the room.
“No. Don’t never mind me. Make me understand.”
He slowly brings his chin back down as he takes a step closer to me. “You really want to know why I walked out the other morning?”
His close proximity and the look in his eyes make it difficult for me to think clearly. “Yes.” I can barely hear my own voice.
“This,” he says as he reaches out and puts a hand on the back of my neck. Alarm bells sound in my head and all I can think about is how I want to be running into the fire it’s warning of right now, instead of racing to safety. I can feel his breath on my lips, feel the intention in his touch. “I. Wanted. To. Do. This.”
Within a breath, Zander’s lips are on mine. My head reels as the rush hits me. Heat and warmth and hunger and desire drown me in its libidinous haze as my startled gasp parts my lips, allowing him to slip his tongue between them to dance with mine. He tastes like beer and mint and lust all in one and my head is swimming and heart is pumping and holy shit, he’s kissing me. Tempting me. Awakening me.
It takes me a second to clear the shock from my mind, because I’m stunned motionless, understandably, but when one of his hands moves to hold my jaw still and the other to cup the back of my head, reality hits. His groan fills my ears, low and throaty, and the sound spurs me on. Tells me this is real. My fingers are timid against his chest. My lips move with his, tongue teasing and skin burning for more of his touch. My body switching gears from angered frustration to unexpected desire.
And you’d think that after being with Ethan for so many years, I’d have to remind myself that Zander isn’t him, but there’s no need for that. No way. Because in the few seconds since Zander’s lips have slanted over mine, there’s been more heat, more want, than Ethan ever made me feel.
It’s possibly due to the fact that he’s forbidden. That I know having a man in my life is out of the picture right now. A complication I don’t need. But hell if forbidden doesn’t taste so damn good.
And just as I start to sink into the kiss, a moan on my lips, he abruptly pushes away from me with a measured mixture of aggression and regret.
“Goddammit!” he swears as he scrunches his eyes tight while I’m left with my lips swollen and all the parts of my body still tingling from his kiss. “I was fucking right,” he mutters more to himself than to me as he starts to move again, pace the small confines of the room, an uncharacteristic nervous energy about him.
And I don’t know what to do. Whether I should go, slip out while he does whatever he’s doing, or stay here and silently attempt to recover from what just happened. I choose to stay put because my knees are too wobbly to walk just yet.
“This is all your fault, you know,” he growls, pointing a finger at me.
“Mine?” I laugh, nerves tingeing the edges.
“Yes.” Definitely no indecision in that answer. “I wanted to kiss you that morning. Stood there staring at your lips and wanted to know what you tasted like. Suspected that once I did, I’d only want more. But I’m an asshole, Getty. Moody. Selfish. Have screwed up a lot of things lately and the last thing I want to do is fuck you up, because you . . . there’s something about you that in the short time I’ve known you gets under my skin when I don’t want it to. Makes me wonder why you’re here and what you’re running from, when usually the only person I give a flying fuck about is myself. So yeah . . . I wanted to kiss you but also wanted to stay true to my word and why I came here. I can’t do both. And so . . . fuck.”
I jump when his foot connects with the trash can and it slams against the metal cabinet behind it. But the sound does nothing to my pulse, because it’s already racing out of control from his startling admission. Luckily there is a shelf behind me, because I sag against it for support, my senses completely overwhelmed.
His words run in a loop in my mind as I watch him pace in frustration, anger emanating off him and slamming into me. I should be upset, feel rejected like I did the other day when he waltzed out, but it’s kind of hard to feel that way when someone has just told you what he told me with his taste still on my tongue.
“Complicated,” he murmurs along with something else I can’t hear over a cheer in the bar that seeps through the door at his back.
“Zander.” So many things I want to tell him. So much meaning in my single utterance of his name. It’s okay—I don’t want to want you either. I get everything you’re saying about why you came here. I can’t have any complications right now. Yet not a single one comes out of my mouth. Because while they are all true, right now, in this moment, I’d be lying.
He finally stops pacing and looks over to me with his hands fisted at his side and shakes his head. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that. Kissed you. Shouldn’t have laid my shit on your doorstep and made you feel like it’s your fault. . . . This wasn’t part of the plan when I came here. I was steering clear of women and then, fuck, there you were and now you’re just everywhere.” When he takes a step toward me, I hold my breath, a part of me unsure what I want more: him to kiss me again or to walk away. “I think it’s best if I stay on the boat for a few days, work there on those repairs, clear my head, get back on track. . . .”
Boat? What boat?
“Zander, I—”
“Save yourself, Getty. Let me go. You’ll thank me in the end for it.”
Chapter 7
ZANDER
Iwake with a jolt. My heart racing and face sweaty from the nightmare. From the monsters and bad men who were chasing me. And the screams. They were so loud, so scary—they seemed so real. The last one begging for help was the worst.
I blink my eyes. Over and over. And the nightmare slowly goes away.
The bed creaks when I sit up. My throat is dry and this room is hot. Water. It’s all I want and it’s against my dad’s rules to keep any in my room because of the cockroaches. I think about sneaking to the kitchen to get some from the tap, but I’m not allowed to leave my room after I’ve been put to bed.
Never. My dad’s hand reaching for his looped belt. The sting when it hits my bare bottom. The threat of it keeps me from breaking the rules.
But maybe they’re asleep. Maybe Dad’s put enough of that heaven in his arm that he’s on the couch in that kind of sleep where his eyes are partway open but he’s really not awake. If that’s the case, then Mom will be asleep in her room, because then that will mean the other men who come over will be gone too. The ones who sit with Dad and his lighters and crooked spoons and icky needles, because she’ll only go to sleep after they leave.
Because then she’ll know I’ll be safe.
I cough, try to swallow to wet my throat, but it doesn’t work. And now all of this thinking about water is making me have to go pee.
Like go pee really bad.
With my stuffed doggy tight to my chest, fingers pressing on the lumps in its stuffing, I get out of bed and tiptoe to the door. Right when my hand twists the knob, a scream fills the hallway. It’s loud and horrible and sounds just like my dream did and scares me. I freeze, but it goes on and on and on.
Mommy.
Instantly, she’s all I can think about, the only one I worry about. Tears blur my eyes as I rush down the hall. It’s the smell that hits me first. That strange scent like when I get a nosebleed, but this time it’s not just in my nose—it’s everywhere.
When I enter the family room, my dad i
s standing near the front door. He looks funny, like something is wrong. His hair is in his face and his shirt is dirty with big, dark splotches all over it. He looks up and his face is scary mean, and he’s out of breath like when he gets some of the “bad heaven” that makes him go kind of crazy.
I shrink back. I don’t want to get in trouble for breaking his rules. Especially when he has this look on his face.
“Zander.” My name is a whisper. There’s a gurgle of sound. A whimper in pain.
The fear of my dad is forgotten the minute I notice my mom on the floor at the end of the couch. All I can see is her arm stretched out above her head and her face from the nose up.
“Mom.” I say it once, but her name repeats in my head over and over as I run to her and drop to my knees. There’s blood everywhere. It’s all I can see, all I can think of as I grab her hand and tell her I’m here. My tears fall on her cheek. They wash away a spot of the blood there.
And holes. There are holes everywhere on her. Little holes marked in red. Big holes with even bigger red. On her chest and her tummy and her arms and her throat.
She moves her head to look at me. Her hair falls off her face and I see it. The handle of the scissors looks funny standing up out of the side of her neck.
Her previous warnings not to run with scissors flicker through my mind. Did she run with them? She couldn’t have. She’s lying down.
Something’s not right. Can’t be. My brain isn’t working, my body frozen in fear.
“Dad!” I remember he’s in the room. Look up to get help. But he’s right there. Looming above me. Like the monster in my dream. And I see the spots on his shirt are dark red. Just like the dots of it over the skin of his arms. His hands.
Just like blood all over my mom.
She gasps. I think she says “No,” but I don’t know because it sounds like she’s underwater.
My whole body shakes. My eyes blink over and over, but I can’t make this nightmare go away.
Get up. Call the police. Get help. Save her. Save me. Mom. Oh my God, Mom. I need Band-Aids. Fix her cuts. Stop the bleeding. It will help.
Band-Aids. Go get them to help her.
But I don’t move. Can’t.
“If you tell anyone you saw me, I’ll do the same thing to you.” His words shock me. But I know that tone. Know when he uses it, he means business. The sting of his belt on my bare bottom is a constant reminder to listen to him.
The door shuts with a slam.
I need to help her. Have to. My hand on the scissors.
The blood like a river. The silver stained red.
A gasp of breath. Blank eyes staring up at me. Her hand limp in mine.
If you tell anyone you saw me, I’ll do the same thing to you.
It doesn’t matter.
I won’t tell anyone.
I don’t think I could speak if I wanted to.
“Where the fuck am I?” Something startles me awake as the dream ends, disorients me, confuses me. I take quick stock of things: It’s dark outside now and the towel from my shower earlier is still wrapped around my waist. I shove up out of the bed, swing my legs over the edge, and scrub my hands over my face to give myself a second to deal. And to give me time for a running start to escape if this is the dream and that was my reality.
My pulse pounds. My head is so fucked by the nightmare it’s not even funny. The breath I blow out doesn’t help. The repeated fucks I say out loud to the empty room don’t either.
I’ve dreamed that nightmare so many times I know it by heart. Because it’s not a dream. It’s my memory. My childhood reality. So perfectly clear. Like I’m back there. The smell. The fear. The sound of my mom’s voice. So damn bittersweet. My mom’s last words, my last memory of her . . . is my worst memory of her. Time hasn’t faded any of it. Time hasn’t healed old wounds.
Fuck no.
But why now? Why did the nightmare come back after so many years without it?
And then I remember the one part of the dream that’s new. The scissors. The hilt in her neck. The slippery feel of it beneath my fingers. Her whimper in pain as I pulled on it. The gush of blood. How I tried to save her.
And ended up killing her.
I roll my shoulders. Take in a deep breath. Rationalize in my adult mind that the little boy trying to save her didn’t really kill her. The autopsy may have said that the cause of death was her bleeding out when the scissors lodged in her jugular vein were removed, but I know deep down she was dead before that.
But knowing it and accepting it are two entirely different things. And accepting it and not letting it fuck you up is even harder.
I nod my head and take a deep breath, knowing that’s why I’m here: to deal with the past at last so I can make things right with those who gave me a future.
And it’s all because of the goddamn box.
The one delivered to my house out of the blue weeks ago that stole the peace I’d found years ago. The one I made the mistake of opening. The words on the first packet of paper I picked up knocked me flat on my ass. Causing me to question everything I’ve ever known. About myself. My memories. And the fact that others in my life knew the truth when I didn’t.
That fucking packet of paper: a copy of my mom’s autopsy report. The truths it held shocked the shit out of me. Brought memories and images that I’d repressed as a child to come back with a vengeance and fuck me up. Those truths had been much too harsh for a seven-year-old boy to accept. I’d moved forward never knowing there were blank spots in my memory that needed to be filled: my hands on the scissors and the final sound she made when I pulled on them.
Does it really matter all this time later? Yes, because if I couldn’t remember something so goddamn significant, what else am I not remembering? What else has been kept from me?
Fucking ghosts I thought were dead and buried are now back with a vengeance.
That’s why I shoved the autopsy report in the box, taped the flaps of cardboard back up—to try to pretend like the life I’ve been living isn’t built on a lie.
Like the memories aren’t bullshit.
And now that box sits in the corner over there and taunts me. Makes me wonder if the rest of the stuff in there is just as jarring as the first thing I saw.
Curiosity—it’s more dangerous than fear.
It’s the reason why I’m here.
And while I’d like to be angry at Colton for firing me and forcing me away from the track, this isn’t on him. Not in the least. I’m man enough to admit that.
To myself anyway.
Distance has allowed me to see that. The step back Colton forced me to take, the time to reflect with a clear head without the distractions I was drowning myself in—alcohol, women, adrenaline—allowed me to realize the truth.
And now I’m left not only to deal with the ticking time bomb of a box in the corner, but to figure out how to right the wrong choices I made.
Hell yes, I could take the easy way out—torch the box in a bonfire and choke on my pride and call Colton to apologize. Stifle the curiosity and take back the brutal words I said when I was pissed at the fucking world and just needed an out. Anger is the one emotion that makes your mouth work faster than your mind, and you better bet your ass my mouth was running.
But that wouldn’t solve shit. I’d still be fucked in the head and apologies are just a Band-Aid placed on an open wound when you cut someone as deeply as I cut Colton.
I know from experience—they don’t always stop the bleeding.
“And that’s why you’re here, Donavan,” I mutter to myself as I flop back on the bed, the sight of the ceiling much better for my psyche than the taunting cardboard box. The one I need to man up and open. Prove that without the distractions, I can deal with it. That its contents won’t fuck me up any more than I already am.
Besides, I can’t chase
the ghosts away for good if I don’t face them head-on.
And yet my first week in PineRidge is over and it still sits there. Unopened. Untouched. The question is, what else is in there? My curiosity calls for me to open it. My mental stability tells me to waste a whole roll of duct tape on it and seal it off forever.
Fucking Christ. I’ve dealt with this shit already. Dealt with it as a kid by crawling inside my own mind and not speaking for months. Dealt with it through endless hours of therapy and countless nights curled up in a ball, afraid to go to the bathroom for fear of what I might find again. Leading to a wet bed and a fucked-up head.
And then when my dad did come back for me, I had to deal with the chaos he brought with him again. The gun he held. Rylee, my counselor back then, protecting me at all costs. The taste of fear in my mouth. The tiny bit of desire for him to win so maybe I would die and could see my mom again. Then the gunshot. More blood again. A policeman standing over his body.
And then the freedom in knowing he could never come for me again. The fear that ended.
So yeah, I dealt with it all right. Kind of don’t have a choice when you’re eight and all alone in this big, bad world.
Who am I kidding? I’m still dealing with it every day. And if the first thing I pulled from the box messed me up so much I was willing to throw everything important to me away, what happens when I open it again and discover more things I can’t cope with?
But that’s the point, dumbass. To come here, deal with my shit, and prove to myself I’m the man I know I am—the man that Colton helped make me. Only then can I go back home and redeem myself. To my adoptive parents, to my crew, to the fans.
“Fuck, this is fucked,” I groan as I bring a forearm to cover my eyes when I hear the front door slam. Followed by the pad of footsteps. A giggle that throws me. Then the squeak of that damn bathroom door. And the whole reason I went and slept on Smitty’s boat—the sleepless nights with a beer in hand watching the phosphorus light up the water and the tinkering with mechanical shit I have no business tinkering with—to get some space and perspective on why I’m here in the first place—just flew out the damn window.