Too Good Girl

by Eleanor Lloyd-Jones

  She sat peacefully, edging towards me to stir the food while I stoked the fire. Once it was ready, I spooned the steaming stew into plastic bowls and we settled side by side again.

  “Does my mum know where I am?” Syra spoke around a mouthful of food and I shook my head.

  “I didn’t have time to think about that when everything happened. We can contact her though.”

  “I don’t even know where my phone is. She’s probably going out of her mind.”

  “I’m sorry. It wasn’t at the top of my priority list.”

  “It’s fine. I’m sure I’m not the top of hers. I meant she’ll be out of her mind because I’m not available to feed her habit. She came to see me at work the day I started at The Release, begging me for money in the middle of the day and making a nuisance of herself. That’s what got me sacked. That’s what had me going to Doug.”

  I put my spoon down in my bowl and wiped my mouth. “I had no idea.”

  “She’s toxic.”

  “She’s your mum, though. Don’t feel bad for caring about her.”

  Syra took my empty bowl from me and stacked it on top of hers, standing and walking down to the water’s edge. She crouched, rinsing them and our spoons and then came back to sit next to me. “I’m not sure I do care about her anymore. I guess I love her, but I don’t know if there is anything left to care about.” She turned to me. “And then I have to wonder why you care about me when I sent myself careening down that same path, despite knowing where it led and what was at the end. I’m so fucking stupid.”

  “Hey.” I grabbed her chin, gently forcing her to look at me, and shook my head. “None of that. Okay? You were misguided. Doug is a leech.”

  “But I knew better. I knew better and still let myself be led by him.”

  Another tear fell.

  As much as it broke me to see her cry, it made me smile inside because it was all part of letting me see her a little clearer, letting me climb inside to look at her heartache.

  “And then that night…” She shook her head and turned away from me. “What the hell was I thinking? God I could have fucking died.” Her head dropped back as she looked up at the sky, her arms folded around herself. “It’s me who’s toxic. This is why I push you away. This is why I keep you at a distance, because you deserve so much better than some fucked up junkie who sleeps around.”

  I dipped my head, my forearms resting on top of my knees. “I don’t pretend to understand why you sleep with those men, but you’re not a junkie. You lost your way for a little while, but don’t tar yourself with that brush.”

  “I overdosed, Jack. I overdosed and got myself gang-raped in the process.”

  And there it was, lying at our feet with a heartbeat and a name, pulsing and causing silence to whirl around us.

  My voice came out loud and forceful, causing even me to feel startled. “You did not get yourself gang-raped, Syra. Don’t you dare think this was your fault.”

  She turned on me, more tears ready to fall. “I could have said no to Trent. I could have refused the drugs. I was in control of my choices that night, and I put myself in that position. God, it’s a miracle I haven’t been raped before now due to my fucking stupidity.” She stood quickly, pacing across the blankets, her fists curled and her eyes to the stars. “All because I can’t catch up with my head. I can’t find peace and I can’t battle through the day without some sort of release.”

  I got to my feet and caught hold of her arm that swung by her side, pulling her to face me and grabbing hold of her shoulders. “Tell me why.” I flicked my eyes from one of hers to the other and back again. “Tell me why you need this—why you seek out the shit that tears you apart on the outside. What is it that tears you apart on the inside that means you have to fuck up your life like this?”

  A sob forced its way from her chest as she began to speak. “Because I’m fucked in the head. You know this.”

  “But why? What happened to you? You weren’t born this way. What are you running away from? Why are you so scared to let people in?”

  “Because they leave. Because I need something to control. Because I couldn’t save him.”

  “Who?”

  Her body shook with anger and heartbreak, and she turned her face to mine. “My dad. I couldn’t wake him up. I was too fucking late.”

  A frown twitched at my brow as I tried to understand what she was telling me. I knew lots about her father. Doug had filled me in with details, and she had given me some, but this was different. “You were too late for what, Sy?”

  Her hands reached up and clung to my forearms that still held her steady, and her voice blew out as a whisper across my face. “I went to say goodbye before school, and I found him there. He was already dead, and I couldn’t wake him up. I was too late.”

  My heart cracked in two at the image that painted itself before me—the image of a little girl discovering her father lying cold and lifeless in front of her. I wrapped my arm around her back and pulled her to my chest. She came without resistance, burying herself into my T-shirt and giving me the pieces of her to hold as she mourned her father as if he’d died that very morning.

  She was exhausted.

  Five days of crying and letting out her feelings after bottling them up for so damn long made her weak and fragile. I helped her to the ground, cradling her and trying to make sense of everything.

  This girl had lost her father, found him dead aged thirteen, and watched her mother disappear down the slippery slope of drug use and abuse. She’d had everything she loved taken away from her and so she’d run, spending the rest of her life self-destructing in a bid to have some semblance of control.

  This girl didn’t know who she was. She didn’t have a clue how to live her life or work out what she was put on this planet to do. And, God, that made me angry. Instead of being nurtured and cherished and given the tools to heal, she’d been left to fend for herself through the most difficult experience a child could face.

  “I’m sorry, Sy. I’m so sorry.”

  My words felt weak and immaterial since I’d failed her too. I’d walked away and left her to deal with life by herself when I should have kept on pushing to show her exactly what she was made of.

  She sat up, shoving her hair from her face and rubbing her hands over her cheeks to clear the tears. “It’s not your fault. I made this mess. I need to be left alone to sort it out. You don’t need my shit. We should go home and I’ll find somewhere else to live so you—“

  “No. Like fuck, Syra. I’m not leaving you. Did you hear a word I said to you the other day? Did you listen to my heart?”

  She looked up at me, her face a crumpled mess of confusion and emotion. “I don’t deserve you. Look at me. I’ll fuck you up like I’ve fucked myself up. You’re too good.”

  I shook my head, my hand reaching up and sliding behind her hair to cup the back of her head. “You’re wrong. You’re so fucking wrong. You’re too good, Syra. You’re too good for all of this and it’s about time you saw it. It’s about time someone held your hand and showed you what you’re worth. And I want to be that person. I want to be yours. I want to be there when you realise life is out there for the taking and that you can live it to the full without having to feel guilty or alone.”

  I pressed my forehead to hers, closing my eyes and gritting my teeth against the emotional tornado that was spinning around us. “You are amazing, Syra Johnson. You are so strong and so damn beautiful. You have so much inside of you that you haven’t yet discovered, and I can’t sit back and watch you waste that. I’m your friend, but Goddamnit I’m in love with you, and I will spend the rest of my life by your side helping you to find yourself if you’ll let me.”

  She twisted away from me slowly, her sad eyes connecting with mine as my words filtered through her pain, and I waited with my lungs full of air, not daring to release it, hoping and praying I’d said enough.

  Syra

  We’ll Light
The Sky by Lyonn

  Find Me by Sigma & Birdy

  Man Overboard by

  MY WHOLE LIFE seemed to be defined by one moment—the moment I realised I’d been too late to save my father. I’d spent every moment since then torn up, feeling guilty, grieving for a man I’d worshipped and wishing I could go back in time to fix him. I’d spent all of my time fighting my thoughts and emotions in a bid to feel something other than this desperation that seemed to be a default setting for me.

  I’d immersed myself in mind-numbing activities to block out the constant noise and the constant battering in my head. Despite watching the deterioration of my mother, despite learning that my father was involved in drug trafficking, I’d begun to chase that euphoric high of chemicals and felt more worthless than I’d ever felt in my life.

  Except there was Jack.

  Jack Palmer.

  He’d saved me once—saved me from the streets, from probable death—and then he’d saved me again. He saved my life a second time, pulling me out of a hole that I could very easily have died in.

  But right then, under the stars, wrapped up tightly by the song of the wind and the ocean and basking in the light of the biggest moon I’d ever seen, he was saving me for a third time.

  He was saving me with his words and with his love.

  I realised I’d pushed him away because I was scared to lose him. He was the only good thing left in my life, and I was petrified that if I allowed him into my heart and found a place in his to curl up in, I would wake up one morning and he’d be gone. I’d used the excuse that I would mess him up, cause him pain, but the reality of the situation was that I couldn’t bear the idea of life without him and so I’d distanced myself further and further to the point where I’d lost him anyway.

  But now he was back, giving me yet another chance, saving my life for no other reason than that he loved me, and it was as we sat there, face to face, everything laid out before us, that I realised I loved him too.

  “I’m your friend, but Goddamnit I’m in love with you and I will spend the rest of my life by your side helping you to find yourself if you’ll let me.”

  I pulled my forehead from his slowly, locking onto his ocean eyes, and I nodded. I nodded and I cried—and it felt good to cry—and I nodded again. “Okay.”

  His brows lifted, hope shining from his eyes. “Okay?”

  I nodded some more.

  An unsure laugh floated from his chest. “Okay like you’re going to let me be there for you? Or, okay like you’re going to—”

  “Okay like, I’ll let you love me, and…” I swallowed, pushing the rest of my words out before I had a chance to change my mind. “Okay like… like I love you too.”

  I watched as his eyes narrowed a fraction, realisation dawning like a beacon of light across his face, and within a split second, his mouth was on mine, his arms wrapped up my back and his hands in my hair. We were both on our knees, our chests pressed tightly together, and for the second time in my life, my body woke up with a jolt of electricity, every inch of my skin calling out for his touch. I melted against him, desperate to get closer, my hands jumping to life and curling themselves around his neck and threading through the strands of his dirty-blonde hair.

  I was in his arms, the only place I’d ever felt alive—the only place my senses had ever been awakened from the dormant state of desperation and grief I was constantly consumed by each day. I was wrapped in a blanket of strength and protection, and I knew it was all I’d really ever wanted.

  All I could smell was his skin—his aftershave mixed with diesel fumes and now the sea breeze.

  All I could taste was the warmth of his lips and the needy strokes of his tongue as it danced with mine in a mutual waltz of want and desire.

  All I could hear was the pulsing of our beating hearts as they pounded in unison this time, fast and intense.

  All I could feel was his love as it surrounded me and covered me each time he touched me somewhere new.

  All I could think of was how fucking good it felt to be free of the shackles of my own fear and instead be in his arms, under the touch of his hands and his lips.

  I was lost. Again. But this time, I didn’t want to be found. I was finally where I belonged, and when he lay me down on the blanket—his weight pressing down on me, trapping me under his love where I wanted to stay forever—I gave myself up to him completely, whispering my own declaration in his ear. “I love you, Jack Palmer. I think I’ve loved you forever.”

  We devoured each other with our eyes and hands and mouths and tongues under the supermoon, tugging at clothes, pulling each other impossibly closer and exploring each other’s bodies with a new agenda, one that had me panting and sobbing for so many different reasons.

  He was so fucking beautiful silhouetted against the backdrop of the midnight sky, his broad shoulders holding him steady above me as he moved inside me, taking me higher than any feeling I’d managed before.

  He was my drug now. He was the only place I wanted to be.

  I let him take me there, once again weak and helpless to all he was and everything he was giving me.

  This time I didn’t feel naked or exposed: I felt cherished and worshipped and I wanted to stay like this forever. This time, it didn’t even cross my mind that I might want him to stop, that I might change my mind.

  He knew it was what I needed, because he needed it too.

  Mouths, tongues and fingertips explored as we groaned out loud, inhaled and sucked in cries—cries filled with this brand new feeling of mutual understanding and love.

  Yet again, I let him see me cry, over and over again as he licked and kissed and stroked away everything I had been hiding from him, just like before. And just like before, he kissed my tears, each one accompanied by a whispered ‘I love you’, as if he were telling me he would love my pain away.

  I kept my eyes open the whole time and witnessed first hand the way he was looking at me like I was a precious stone.

  And when he let out his final groan of pleasure and collapsed beside me, wrapping me up in his arms as I sobbed against his chest, I silently asked him to forgive me for everything that had happened prior to this moment.

  ***

  We lay tangled in blankets and each other, the heat from the fire warming our skin and casting a sleepy glow over the paradise we’d created. Our sand-covered clothes were strewn around us, and once my tears had subsided, and I’d allowed the reality of my current situation to seep in and settle itself in my heart, I sat up, pulling him with me and climbing into his lap, wrapping my naked legs around his naked body.

  I shivered in the wind as his hands smoothed up my thighs and splayed out across my back, his head dipping to capture my nipple in his mouth. As I arched my back, my lips parting with a feeling of utter euphoria, he lifted his head to see me grinning. It was a real, heartfelt, happy grin that reached from ear to ear, and I slowly moved in to capture his mouth with mine, leaning back at the last second and earning myself a groan of frustration from him. I felt him harden beneath me and I gently rocked my body and grinned again, this time smugly, as he closed his eyes and clenched his teeth.

  “You fucking little minx.”

  The look in his eyes had me pulsing between my legs, a feeling I had craved for so long but only ever achieved when I was with him. It was a feeling I would never tire of, and my playfulness gave way to a need I’d never experienced before. This was a physical need. It was a heartfelt need, not one born of wanting to feel numb. I needed to feel everything, and I knew he was the only one who could give me what I craved.

  I pressed my mouth against his, my hands dancing over his shoulders and down his back, and pushed my body close to his as I began rocking back and forth again in his lap. “I need you,” I whispered beside his ear before sweeping my tongue against his in an urgent kiss, laced with desire and filled with love. His hands grabbed my hips, lifting me effortlessly before lowering me gently on top of him as h
e slid inside of me for the second time that night. I rocked to the rhythm of the waves, our sweat-slicked skin glistening by the firelight as we once again lost ourselves to one another.

  I wasn’t sure if he knew he was the only one who’d ever taken me as high as the clouds. Did he know that all those other men meant nothing, did nothing other than shut off my mind? I’d wondered for so long what other women got out of sex, and now I knew. I’d carried on thinking I was abnormal, broken, but all I’d needed was the right man.

  Jack.

  All I’d ever needed was what was right under my nose.

  As he rested his forehead against mine, gripping my buttocks, I told him. I whispered against his ear that he was the only one, that he mattered to me more than anyone, and that my body belonged to him.

  I climaxed along with him and we clung to one another, panting and kissing, declaring our love over and over.

  And when our breathing had settled and our hearts were beating more slowly, he wrapped me in a blanket and pulled me to my feet.

  “Dance with me.”

  “What?” I giggled. “I haven’t danced since my dad was alive. I can’t remember how.”

  He lifted my hand and spun me under his arm, guiding me to his chest as I faced him again. “Sure you can. Just move your body to the beat of the music.” Threading his fingers through mine and resting our joined hands over his heart, he placed his other hand in the small of my back and began to sway.

  I looked up at him, to his handsome face that I’d spent so long pretending to ignore: his chiseled jaw and full lips. And to those eyes that had always held me captive, no matter how much I’d tried to tell myself I didn’t care. His ocean eyes: green and blue swirls that looked deep into my soul. “What are we dancing to?”