“Consider it a belated birthday present.”
I grip the book. This gift is better than anything she could’ve bought, and she knows that. It’s just one more way to understand, to know her inside out, the love of my life. Maybe her obsession with me has quelled, I’m afraid to ask, but mine with her is strong as ever.
“Speaking of coffee. Are you still drinking it?”
“In moderation.” She holds up the cup to make a point. “I still have my urges, but now I try to write about it instead of act on it. It doesn’t always work, but it helps. And I’m back on antidepressants, just a different brand and a lower dosage. We’re experimenting. Cindy promises it isn’t forever.”
“Yeah,” I nearly whisper. “Can’t have my girl losing her fire.”
She chews the inside of her cheek, glancing at my lips. “Do you miss it? Us together?”
I make a fist around the leather in my hand. “I thought it couldn’t get any worse than when Sadie left, but this feels like sleeping on a bed knives and waking up every morning with re-opened wounds. You know what it’s like for me to live where you’ve slept, eaten, come?”
She blushes. “I wouldn’t be able to do it. I’d have moved out.”
I can hear the pain in her voice. I didn’t think I could be any more miserable, but seeing her miserable too makes it worse. I know going back to therapy was no easier than leaving her stable relationship with Rich. She could’ve gotten back together with him, gone back to that easy life. Instead, she went outside her comfort zone, made new friends, continued to follow her passion. I tuck the journal under one arm and finally reach out for that lock of hair. It feels like the softest, finest silk between my fingers. I move it behind her ear, grazing the tattoo. “I have Marissa this weekend, but why don’t we get dinner next week? See how it is?”
She takes my wrist. It’s cold, her hand that isn’t holding the coffee, and I want to warm it with my lips. But she pulls my hand away from her face. “No.”
No. Did I misread her just now? Did I imagine everything backward these past weeks, assuming she was as broken up about this as I was? I make a fist and put it in my lap. “Why not, Hals?”
“Because I still have work to do on myself. And so do you.”
“I know I do. I’ve been taking on more commercial work, trying to see it in a more positive way. Just because it’s not art, doesn’t mean it’s not valuable.” I pause. “And just because something’s right doesn’t mean it’ll come together effortlessly. Like with you. We have to work at it.”
“You’re right, but it’s not enough. I need you to let me into all parts of your life. I want to meet Marissa and maybe even Kendra. If we’re going to do this for real.”
I try not to look as frightened as I feel hearing that. My relationship with Halston is a breeze compared to the mess that is my other life. Just one mess after another, I suppose. Maybe it’s time to meld them all. “I’ll work on it,” I say. “Not this month, and maybe not next, but I’ll start the conversation with Kendra.”
She smiles a little and stands. “I have to go, or I’m afraid I’ll change my mind. I want to meet you again when I’m a better version of myself—my real self.”
“How long?” I ask. “Maybe we can just start now, but take it slow.”
She kisses the tips of her fingers and presses them to my cheek. “Not yet.”
33
When I come out of my room, Benny’s sprawled out on the couch in front of the TV. “Have you watched this show, The Real World?” she asks.
“Um, yes,” I say, “everybody has.”
“No, I mean like the real Real World, back from the nineties, before reality TV. MTV’s doing a special on it. It’s so dope, I can’t believe I never saw it.”
I sigh. “Let’s trade places. Please.”
She sucks Cheetos dust off her index finger. “Nope.”
“But I said please.”
“You’ve been looking forward to this for weeks.”
“Oh, you mean the pacing, nail-biting, and extra-long bathroom breaks? You took that as anticipation?”
“TMI.” She finally glances at me. “You look hot, by the way. Red is a good choice.”
“Thanks.” I know I do. I have to. I spent too much time and money picking out this summer dress, but it’ll only be the second time I’ve seen Finn in two months, and I need everything to go well. If he’s changed his mind about me, I’ll be forced to find a way to move on, and I’m not sure I can.
Benny pauses the DVR. “Don’t be nervous.”
I wonder how she can tell. I’ve been to a dermatologist about my itchy elbow, and she gave me a cream, but recommended I discuss it with my therapist. Cindy and I are working through it. I still get the urge to scratch it, but I’m way better at recognizing and identifying what’s behind the impulse.
“He’ll lose his shit,” Benny says. “Just hope it stays gone long enough for him to forgive you.”
I smirk. Benny knows all the dirty details of my relationship with Finn. It’s how we bonded the first few nights I stayed with her. It feels really good to have it all out there and accepted. “What if he doesn’t show up?” I ask, widening my eyes. “Or worse, what if he’s met someone else? Or fallen out of love with me?”
“He hasn’t.”
“How do you know?”
She hesitates. “I didn’t say anything earlier because you’ve been avoiding it so well, but since you’re going to see him, I’ll tell you. I follow your guys’ Instagram, and girl . . . it’s depressing as fuck. That man has no love in his life.”
My eyes fill with unexpected tears even as my heart soars. I don’t want Finn to be depressed. When he hurts I hurt. But I also don’t want him to not love me anymore. “What does he post?”
“Really sad-looking shit, like old churches, park benches, a pile of leaves.”
“Me?” I ask.
“Never.”
“How many followers do we—does he have?”
She grimaces. “You don’t want to know. Let’s just say it’s less than it was.”
I take a deep breath. It’s okay. There are more important things than being admired by strangers. I pick up my bag of goodies from the dining room table. “Wish me luck.”
“One more thing,” she says as I turn to leave.
I look over my shoulder. “What?”
“Tell him about the offer. Even though you’re not doing it, I think he’d like to know. That’s all. Have fun. If you can’t help fucking his brains out tonight, don’t bring it back here.” She salutes me and returns to her TV show.
I get an Uber to the gallery. There’s one detail I’ve tried hard to overlook, and that’s whether or not Finn actually knows we have a date tonight. I have to believe he does. If he read my journal in its entirety, then he would’ve found the entry dated six days before I gave it to him.
April 12th
I have this idea to show Finn what he means to me, but I’m not sure if it will work. Or if he’ll even want me to do it. Or if I have the guts to do it.
Then, I waited. I staked out Lait Noir for days. On the verge of calling it quits, he finally came in. I left the journal on the ledge after scribbling a note in red pen next to the entry.
Vee Gallery, 8pm, May 4th
Three times, I almost e-mailed Finn to cancel. Once, because the gallery owner tried to tell me he could no longer accommodate that date. And twice because those guts I was hoping to have? They went missing.
The car drops me off on the sidewalk in front of Vee Gallery. It looks all wrong. Through the windows, I see nothing but light and white. Too-bright, empty walls. No person should pass by a gallery and see this, and I remind myself to thank the owner again for letting me do this, even if it’ll be the fiftieth time.
I let myself in and get to work. I have about an hour before Finn—hopefully—arrives. It’s a lot to hang on hopefully, but he’s worth it. When I finish, I dim the lights just a touch so he won’t see what’s inside befo
re I’m ready to show him. After some debate, I decide to wait for him outside on this perfect May night.
And wait . . . and wait.
Twenty minutes past eight, my nerves have the best of me. He isn’t coming. What do I do? If I call him and he saw the note, I’ll look desperate. But if he didn’t, he’ll miss all this. And I don’t want that.
I was so sure he’d come.
I inhale and exhale deeply. I’ve started yoga aimed at people recovering from addiction. The teacher says when we crave something, one of the ways to combat it is to breathe through it. I crave. If I can’t have Finn, I crave something to make me forget him.
I close my eyes and breathe.
I’m watching the street, expecting a car. So when I open my eyes and realize someone’s standing next to me, I nearly jump out of my skin.
Finn looks down at me. “This dress can only mean one thing,” he says. “You brought me here to reconcile. If you break up with me for good in that dress, that’s just the cruelest thing I can think of.”
My laugh is nervous, but his directness helps break the ice. Right off the bat I understand that he’s here to make things work, not let me down easy. Benny was right. The red dress was a good choice.
“Sorry I’m late,” he says. “I was going to catch a cab, but it’s such a nice night and I needed the extra time to . . . prepare.” He squints behind me. “I assumed this was a show or something, so I didn’t think I had to be here right at eight.”
I take his hand, and he looks back at me. “Is this okay?” I ask.
He tucks some of my hair behind my ear. “You tell me.”
I close my eyes a split second to relish the feel of his palm to mine, the brush of his fingers in my hair. Over my feather. “Come on,” I say, pulling him behind me into the gallery.
He steps inside and immediately drops my hand. I watch with bated breath as he takes in the scene around him. “What is this?”
I survey the space with him. This in and of itself could be an installation, but it’s not. It’s just a sketch of one. I’ve strung Christmas lights along each wall. Taped underneath are small five-by-five prints, ten to a wall. Benny printed them all off for me, and I chose thirty I thought showed Finn’s best work.
“It’s not much,” I say. “I just wanted to show you how it could look.”
He walks along the nearest wall, taking in each print. “How what could look?”
“I know the owner through the agency. I wore him down until he finally agreed to look at your work. He loved it, Finn, and I swear, he’s a hard ass about these things. It’s no favor.”
“What isn’t? I don’t understand.”
“He wants you to have your debut show here. I explained to him the kind of following we had, and after seeing your work, he’s convinced you’re the next big thing. That’s why he let me do this tonight. We want to show you how amazing it could be.”
He runs a hand through his hair, spun gold sprouting from his fingers. “Are you serious?”
I nod. “He’s between shows tonight, so I did some begging to get the space.”
“What about you?” Finn asks. “This is your body. Your boyfriend’s work. Some people will know it’s you.”
I take a breath. The thought of having my dad here makes my heart palpitate. But we’ve been working with Cindy too, and he needs to know this side of me for us to have an honest relationship. He has to meet Finn. “I’m good with it if you are.”
“Will he let us put your captions up next to the photos?”
“I want this to be about your work, not me.”
“They belong together,” he says. “Don’t you think?”
I swallow through the lump in my throat. They do belong together, yes. “I’m sure it could be arranged, but only your name goes on the promotional material. I have something else going.”
He comes over and takes my hand to kiss my knuckle. “Tell me all about it.”
“I’ve put together some of my favorite passages from my journals and submitted them to agents as a book of poetry. It’s a long shot, but—”
“No it’s not.”
“It is.” I nod. “But that’s okay. Rejection will happen, and it’s healthy and normal, Cindy says.”
“Have you heard back from any of the agents?”
“No.” I take my hand back and wipe my palms on my dress. “Well, kind of.”
He brightens up. “Already?”
“I turned it down. One guy said he had a publisher interested, but not in my writing, per se. They wanted our story. Sort of like a memoir, I guess, with a social media spin.” I’m no longer looking at Finn, so I can’t read his reaction.
“Why’d you turn it down?”
“It’s not my story to tell. I’m not even sure I want to try.”
“You should.”
I look up at him. “It was exposing ourselves that caused problems in the first place. I don’t want to put you or myself through that again.”
He makes a point of looking around the room, at the myriad photos of me on the wall.
“Touché,” I say, “but this is your art.”
“And that’s yours. Write the memoir, Hals. I’ll be by your side through the whole thing. This is who we are, these pictures, your words—isn’t it? I don’t want to be ashamed of that.”
I release a breath I didn’t realize I was holding. “Neither do I. I’d like it if we could even . . . keep posting?” It’s a bold suggestion after the last six months, but like Finn said—it’s who we are.
“Me too,” he says, to my relief. “I’ve tried to maintain the account, but I’m having some trouble finding subjects as interesting as you.”
I smile. “I deleted the app from my phone the day I left, but Benny told me. We’ll figure it out. Maybe we can try food porn instead?”
He laughs. “We don’t have to change the kinds of photos we take. It’s how we dealt with stuff that was the problem. I can’t protect you from everything. We have to work through the shitty stuff—together—and then move on. No running away.”
I nod. “We have to be partners in everything. A team.”
“Yeah. We’ve always made a really good team.” He puts an arm around my neck, drawing me in for a kiss. Finally, I get what I really did all this work for—those to-die-for, pillowy lips of his. “I love you,” he murmurs. “I don’t have a single doubt about that or about us. One day soon, we’ll make our team official. If you’ll have me.”
My cheeks heat. “No doubts here, either. I love you. And I’ll have you.”
I think Finn just proposed to me in some untraditional, roundabout way.
And I think I just accepted.
Who needs traditional anyway?
Show Me the Way by A.L. Jackson
Copyright © 2017 A.L. Jackson Books Inc.
First Edition
All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without prior permission of the publisher.
Please protect this art form by not pirating.
A.L. Jackson
www.aljacksonauthor.com
Cover Design by RBA Designs
Photo by Predrag Popovski
Editing by AW Editing
Formatting by Mesquite Business Services
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Names, characters, places, and plots are a product of the author’s imagination. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Print ISBN: 978-1-946420-04-6
eBook ISBN: 978-1-946420-03-9
Prologue
Alabama - Eleven Years Ago
Rain pelted from the angry sky, and heavy gusts of wind howled through the trees, which thrashed in the blackened night. In agony, I ran, sure my heart had to be beating as loud as the thunder that cracked through the heavens ab
ove.
I gasped when my foot slipped on the slick, muddy ground, and I stumbled forward, landing hard on my hands and knees. I cried out, unsure where the pain was coming from—my mind or my heart or my torn flesh.
Why would they do this to me?
I wept toward the ground, stricken with grief, with betrayal, before I heaved myself back onto my feet, trying to find traction. I staggered toward the house, which was lit up like warmth and light just off the road. Clutching the wooden railing, I propelled myself forward and then flung open the door and fumbled inside.
I whimpered in misery when I paused to look around the room. Loss hit me as hard as the storm that raged outside.
Why would they do this to me? How could they be so cruel?
It took about all I had, but I forced myself to move, knowing I couldn’t stay. I had to leave. I had to get away. Choking back sobs, I clung to the banister and hauled myself upstairs and to my room. Knees caked in mud and blood, I dropped to the floor and dug out the suitcase from beneath the bed. I staggered to my feet and headed for the closet.
Tears clouding my vision, I tore clothes from their hangers and shoved them into the suitcase I’d tossed onto the bed, my movements becoming more frantic with each piece I ripped from its spot. The urge to escape only intensified when I moved to the dresser. Distraught, I ripped the drawers from their rails and tipped them upside down, dumping what would fit into the suitcase.
The whole time, I struggled to restrain the sobs bound in my throat. To keep them quiet. To pretend it hadn’t happened. To pretend I didn’t have to do this.
With shaking fingers, I tugged at the zipper.
“Rynna, what’s going on?” The sleepy voice filled with concern hit me from behind.
Torment lashed like the crack of a whip. My eyes slammed closed, and the words trembled from my mouth. “I’m so sorry, Gramma, but I’ve got to go.”
The floor creaked with my grandmother’s footsteps. She sucked in a breath when she rounded me, shocked by my battered appearance. “Oh my lord, what happened to you?” Her voice quivered. “Who hurt you? Tell me, Rynna. Who hurt you? I won’t stand for it.”
Tempt Me: A First Class Romance Collection Page 32