by Laura Miller
I cock my head to the side. “I think you did.”
“No,” he says again, shaking his head.
By now, I’m completely and utterly mesmerized by the sea in his eyes and the all-consuming thought of his lips on mine.
“This is a kiss, Miss Cross,” he says, cradling the back of my head in his hand and pulling me closer to his lips.
I search his hooded eyes searching mine until his eyelids close and I can’t see the sea anymore. I don’t move. I just close my eyes and pray for his lips to touch mine. It seems like an eternity waiting, but then I feel him, and I instantly melt. I melt into his soft, tender lips. I melt into the way he tastes, and in this moment, I’m completely his. I move my lips over his, and I feel his hand move across my jaw. He pulls me closer to him, and I let him. I let him control me, and the way he does it is so gentle and strong and sexy and perfect, and yet, I feel a rebellious tear pressing against my eyelid, threatening to escape.
Our lips eventually break, even though I’m not sure I want them to yet. He pulls my body into his and wraps his strong arms around me. I feel his hard muscles press against my soft skin. My heart dances in my chest, and a wide smile scurries to my happy lips, but soon, I’m reminded of the tear in my eye. I’m not sure why it’s there. Maybe it’s because I’m so happy or maybe it’s because I’m a little sad. I push it back, back as far as I can, though, and bury it in the deepest part of my mind. I’m happy tonight.
And suddenly, I sense his lips near my ear, and then, I feel his breaths touch my skin. It gives me goose bumps and sends excited chills down my spine.
“I’m so happy you’re here, Ada.” His voice is a whisper, and the way he says my name makes it sound as if it’s the prettiest name in all the world.
I take a second and let his seductive, soft words soak into my pores.
“I’m happy I’m here too,” I whisper in my next breath.
It’s quiet then, to where all you can here are some tree frogs singing and a couple crickets chirping in the background.
“You know,” he says, softly, breaking the silence, “my mom and dad met here almost thirty years ago.”
“Really?” I ask, snuggling closer to him.
“Yeah, my dad said he took one look at my mom and knew he was gonna spend the rest of his life with her.”
He stops, and I can hear him smile before he continues. “The story goes she was eatin’ a funnel cake with her friends, and my dad marched right up to her and told her he was going to marry her.”
He pauses. “This is the part in the story where my mom takes over. She says the only thing my dad left with that night was the powdered sugar from her funnel cake all over his shirt.”
He squeezes me closer to him. “My dad, however, will tell you a different story.”
I run my finger gently over his chest, making little swirls on his tee shirt. “What does he say?” I ask.
His chest rises slowly and then falls. “He’ll tell you he left that night with my mom’s heart.”
I smile at his words. “Well, what do you think?”
A low, soft chuckle fills the air before he speaks. “Don’t ever tell my mom, but I think my dad’s got the right story.”
My finger stops grazing his chest. “That’s really sweet, Jorgen.”
“Yeah, well, I told you he was a sentimental old fart.”
I laugh softly into his muscles. Something tells me the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree.
I feel Jorgen’s arms wrap tighter around my body then, and he holds me for several perfect moments, until he starts to pull away and then stops.
“What’s that?”
I follow his stare to the top of my hip, and then I see it, staring back at me. A wave of air tunnels through my lungs and then pushes forcefully past my lips. I can’t help but think if it were just a little darker, he might not have ever noticed it.
“Another stupid idea,” I mumble.
“You have a tattoo?”
He finds my eyes and just flashes me a curious, mischievous smile. “Just an A?” he asks.
I glance at the small tattoo. It is just an A—in black ink. No hearts. No frilly flowers. Just the letter A.
“I was just a kid,” I say.
“For Ada?” he asks.
I shake my head, and he cocks his to the side.
“Ant...eater?” he asks again before I can stop him.
“No,” I say, starting to laugh.
“Aardvark?”
I shake my head. “No.”
“Antelope?”
I can’t stop giggling as I bury my head into his hard chest. “No,” I say.
His finger regains my attention when I feel its tip lightly tracing the A, and soon, my laughter fades. I love that little A, but sometimes I wish it weren’t there. I wish it weren’t there to remind me—to make me sad. Without warning, I feel a sigh fall from my lips.
“It used to mean something,” I say. “But now it just stands for always, as in permanent—something I can never wash away.”
He follows a trail with his fingertips from the tattoo to my waist to the side of my ribs, then to my shoulders and finally to my lips.
“I like it,” he says, simply. “It’s part of you.”
I try to smile. He’s right, but what he doesn’t know is that even without the tattoo, the A is still part of me.
“It’s part of you, and that’s why I love it,” he whispers.
He stops in my eyes and just stays there for a while, as if he’s reading my soul.
“I’m glad I found you, Ada,” he says, placing gentle kisses on my lips and forehead, making me feel as if, somehow, I belong here—to this moment, to this new life, to him.
I close my eyes, and I push everything back. I push it all back as I nestle my cheek against his chest and concentrate on his fingertips roaming up and down my arm. He’s tracing little circles on my skin, and it’s making me feel as if I could just melt into him—as if at any moment, I could just awake from this beautiful dream and not be able to tell anymore where he ends and I begin.
Chapter Twenty-One
The Tattoo
I don’t know how long we’ve been lying in the grass when I feel a cool breeze brush over my skin. I reach down and tug at my tank top, and my finger brushes the part of my hip where I know the A eternally rests. I stop, and then I feel Jorgen’s arm pulling me closer into him. I let him pull me, and then I rest my head on his chest again. His body is warm. It’s a sharp contrast to the cool night air that has settled in. I snuggle up to him and then close my eyes. But on the back of my eyelids is the letter A, and before I can stop my mind from wandering, it goes back four long years and stops in a tire swing under a sleepy, old oak...
“Andrew, let’s get tattoos.”
Andrew stops the tire with both hands, forcing my chest to collide softly against the thick, braided rope from which it dangles.
“That’s crazy,” he says, staring straight into my eyes.
I feel my smile starting to fade.
“And you know I love crazy,” he adds. He flashes me a wild grin, then starts to push the tire again. “When do we go?”
“Today,” I say, feeling the life return to my face.
“What do we get?”
I think about it for a second. “What about each other’s names?”
“Perfect,” he says.
***
We walk into the tattoo parlor. It’s not that scary, but I think the image I had in my mind was aimed to prepare me for the worst-case scenario. Even the peach vinyl, dentist-looking chair in the back doesn’t look all that menacing. The place is small, and there are ink designs completely covering the walls, but it’s clean. And after I had dreamed up the spur-of-the-moment idea, I had told myself that that’s all that really mattered—that it was clean.
I let a breath slowly pass through my lips when I feel Andrew squeeze my hand.
“You can change your mind anytime,” he whispers to me.
I shake my h
ead. I’m not changing my mind.
He studies me for an instant, then flashes me a knowing smile and plants a hard kiss on my lips.
***
Andrew doesn’t even flinch as the guy covered from head to toe in tattoos presses Logan into his chest with a huge electric needle.
“Does it hurt?” I ask.
Andrew scrunches up his face a little. “It’s not that bad.”
I’ve heard that tattoos hurt, but maybe it’s all a big ploy to discourage kids from getting them. It seems as though the guy might as well be painting my name into Andrew’s chest with the felt tip of a permanent marker. Andrew’s face is fearless. In fact, I can’t even see an ounce of pain written on it.
I watch the guy covered in tattoos meticulously follow along the letters already outlined on Andrew’s chest with his big needle, until he eventually stops and backs away, allowing Andrew and I to examine the new ink.
“It’s kind of red,” I say.
“It’ll be like that for a little while, but it’ll go away,” the guy with the needle chimes in.
I study the tattoo again and then give the man my seal of approval before he covers it with a big piece of gauze.
“My turn,” I say, all but pushing Andrew out of the big, peach chair and climbing into it myself.
I get comfortable and then look up and catch Andrew hovering ominously above me.
“Now, you sure about this, babe?” he asks. “It won’t wash off.”
I laugh at the seriousness that seems to have devoured his face all of a sudden.
“You mean he’s not using washable markers?”
Andrew pretends to scold me with his eyes.
“I’m ready,” I say then, turning my attention to the needle guy.
The guy walks away and then comes back a minute later and transfers a stencil onto my skin.
“How does that look?” he asks.
I look at my hip. In small, pretty cursive lettering is Andrew’s name.
“Perfect,” I say.
The guy nods his head in satisfaction and then puts the needle to the skin on my hip, and it’s not so bad. I smile wide up at Andrew, and I almost laugh when he takes my hand. Whoever said getting a tattoo was painful was nothing but a...
My train of thought stops the moment I feel a sharp, gigantic needle digging a deep, rugged trench into my skin. I let out a squeal and squeeze Andrew’s hand as if my life depends on it. But the needle keeps tearing a jagged path into my hip. I bite my bottom lip—hard—and silently take everything back about tattoos being painless.
“You tricked me,” I shout. “You acted like this didn’t hurt.”
I try to sound playful, but I’m pretty sure it only comes out pained. Andrew scrunches up his face in pity.
“I’m sorry, babe,” he says, sandwiching my hand in between both of his.
I close my eyes, and I feel warm tears welling up behind my eyelids.
“Okay,” Andrew suddenly rattles off. “A. A looks good. We’re stopping at A.”
The needle guy picks up his torture device.
I look up from my agony and stare down at my hip. “But he’s not finished.”
“Baby, I think the A looks cool by itself. My whole name will be too much.”
I look down at my hip again and then up at the guy holding the needle. He clings to my gaze for a second, seemingly waiting for my permission to proceed. But then, I notice him glance at Andrew and then back at me, and then his mouth opens.
“Just the A looks pretty cool too.”
The needle guy is frozen in his place. His face tells me that Andrew got to him. I sigh and look one last time at the unfinished tattoo before I find Andrew again. He’s smiling; it seems pained, but he is smiling.
I know having Andrew in the little letters would have looked just fine because it looks just fine in the stencil that’s already there. But I’m also kind of happy that Andrew hates watching my pain just as much as I hate going through it.
“The A it is,” I finally say to the man holding the big needle.
***
Jorgen lifts his head, and the old memory vanishes just as quickly as it had appeared.
“You ready to go?” He whispers low and near my ear.
I tighten my arm around his chest. “Do we have to?”
He pauses for a moment.
“No,” he says and then lays his head back down. I feel his hand brush down my body and stop at the small of my back. “I could stay like this forever.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Home
“Are you singing?”
Oh, God, he heard me. How could he have heard me?
“No...” I scrunch up my face and cringe a little—hoping maybe he’ll believe me, even though I know he won’t. I already hear him smiling over there.
“You were.” He looks over at me, flashes me a big, toothy grin and then sets his eyes back on the road.
I try to hide my smile as my own gaze gets stuck too on the solid, white line guiding our way.
The interstate is quiet. It’s dark outside the truck. It’s dark inside too, except for the little blue light coming from the dash. I watch as Jorgen glances over at me again, then switches his hands on the wheel and reaches for my hand. I let him take it and cradle it in his as another song comes on the radio and I turn my attention back to the dark highway. My heart skips a little in my chest. I press my lips together and try not to make it obvious that I’m smiling to myself. I just can’t seem to get over the way my hand feels in his.
A moment goes by, maybe, before I hear Jorgen mumble something, and it forces my eyes back to the driver’s seat. Then, all of a sudden, a string of lyrics rolls off his tongue: “You and me goin’ fishin’ in the dark...”
He says the lyrics more than he sings them, taking every chance he gets to look over at me.
“Lyin’ on our backs and countin’ the stars,” he sings, growing louder as the song goes on.
It’s cute the way he tries to make the words sound like the original singer. He’s no rock star, but then, neither am I. I just look at him and smile. The song is by Nitty Gritty Dirt Band. I don’t know most country songs, but my grandpa used to listen to this one, so I know this one.
“Where the gre-en grass gro-ws,” he continues, dragging out each word.
My eyes dart to his, and I start to laugh. “Those aren’t the words.”
He just flashes me a crooked grin and keeps going, but now, I can’t help but join in. At least I know all the words.
“Stayin’ the whole night through,” we sing together. “Feels so good...to beeee...withhhh...you...”
We sing the rest of the song. He adds his own words at random, and eventually, I do too. And then we laugh until the next one comes pouring through the speakers. It’s a ballad and not nearly as easy to sing to. The cab grows quiet again—but only for a few seconds.
“This was so much fun,” I say, turning so that I can get a good look at him and his dark, wavy hair. He’s got a strong, five-o’clock shadow now, and only one hand is on the wheel. And there’s a blue tint to him because of the lights from the dash, but it only seems to add to his smoldering look.
“Pretending we know how to sing?” He chuckles.
“No, well, yeah, that too,” I say. “But I mean this whole weekend. I had my first funnel cake and went to my first tractor pull, and believe it or not, petted my first sheep.”
He glances over at me and gives me a sexy wink. “You never knew this country boy was so cultured, did ya?”
I squeeze his hand and smile.
“What was your favorite?” he asks.
I think about it for a second. Then, I close my eyes and contemplate it a little bit longer.
“Ol’ Red,” I finally say.
He laughs once, and I watch his eyes venture away from the road and onto me. “Why that old thing?”
“I don’t know. Because I like the way you look in it.”
“What?” He sounds surprise
d.
“I like the way you look in it,” I repeat, with more conviction this time. “You look like you belong, you know?”
“Like I belong in an old truck?”
His scrunched-up face makes me laugh.
“Yeah...no. Well, sort of,” I stumble. “You looked comfortable, like you didn’t have a care in the world—like you were home.”
He takes his eyes off the road and just smiles at me.
“What?” I ask. “That sounds crazy, doesn’t it?”
His face shifts back to the highway, but then I notice his head slowly shaking back and forth.
“It wasn’t the truck, Ada.”
I furrow my eyebrows. “Hmm?”
“It wasn’t the truck that made me feel like I was home,” he says again. “It wasn’t even being home that made me feel like I was home.”
Little wrinkles form at the corners of his eyes as his slow gaze ventures away from the highway and lands on me. And just like that, his eyes are soft again.
“It was you, Ada. Being next to you in Ol’ Red made me feel like I was finally home.”
I take a second and let the moment sink in, and before long, it almost feels as if my heart is shattering into a thousand tiny pieces and just falling to the floorboards at my feet. His words are so raw, so honest. They remind me of a way I used to feel. And without another thought, I unsnap my seatbelt, then slide into the little seat next to him and snap the lap belt over my legs. And suddenly, it’s as if I’m seventeen all over again.
He lifts his arm and wraps it around my shoulders. Then, he pulls me closer, and I rest my head against him and listen to the new song that’s now softly pouring through the speakers.
I don’t tell him—only because I think he already knows—but he’s beginning to feel like home to me too.
Chapter Twenty-Three
The Dream
“You’re so cute when you sleep.”
I turn my head over on my pillow.
“Andrew,” I whisper.
He’s standing in the doorway. His honey-blond hair with its sprinkled russet streaks sweeps across his forehead and covers the tops of his ears.