Anything Between Us (Starving Artists Book 3)

by Mila Ferrera

  Carrie looks at me, sees the grin on my face, and looks over at Cameron, who is still staring at those fucking batteries like he’s thinking of popping the question. “She’s pretty.”

  “Yep.” I couldn’t stop smiling if I tried.

  “I guess I’d better go help Cam figure out how many C-batteries we actually need,” she says in an annoyed voice.

  “Have fun,” I say. The spot where Sasha kissed me is still warm. I felt that touch through my entire body. I walk away from Carrie and find Sasha at the register. I pay for all of it and float out of the 7-Eleven with her at my side.

  “That was her, wasn’t it?” Sasha says as soon as we’re back in the car.

  “How could you tell?”

  “The look of regret on her face,” she says simply. “And the way she was eyeing you like she wanted to eat you for dinner.” Her face falls. “It suddenly occurs to me that I might have just cockblocked you.”

  The laugh explodes out of me, welcome and wonderful. “Nah. You did me a massive fucking favor. Let’s get out of here.”

  I pull out of the parking lot, leaving a shitty piece of my past behind in the dust. I’m not an idiot; I know Sasha was pretending. Putting on a show. And deep down, I wonder yet again if she did it to protect me—because she sees me as weak. Vulnerable. In my head, I know I need to pull back. Put up a few emotional blast shields. Not be an idiot.

  To my heart, though, it doesn’t seem to matter. With her next to me, fiddling with my radio and singing along off-key to Raspberry Beret, I feel myself falling a little more. And I know: I’m already in trouble. Already doomed.

  In this moment, though, it feels like anything but.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Sasha

  Yelena texts me midmorning, right after I’ve finished up with a class of adorable little monsters who left the classroom a mega-mess I had to spend half an hour cleaning up. Sales are good. We need to talk about Etsy!

  I frown. I’ve got an Etsy shop of my own that brings in a healthy trickle of money, especially in the run-up to the holidays. Now that it’s October, those orders are starting to come in. Does she want to sell my stuff in her Etsy shop? I’m not sure I’m cool with that, unless she’s willing to give me what I’d earn on my own … which is doubtful. I’ll come in tomorrow with the sets you wanted, I reply. Talk then?

  She responds with a thumbs up, and I push away my irritation. It’s a cloudy, gray day, cool enough to remind me that summer is long gone. This morning, Dad nearly fell in the bathroom. He tweaked his knee, and it put him in an awful mood, one where he seemed to think I was my mom, which only made things worse. It took all the patience I had to last until his aide arrived, and then I got a speeding ticket on the way in, which made me late for class.

  I need some throwing time. Although I should really be dipping some of the pieces I’ve already made and baked in the kiln, I use my wire to slice off a healthy lump of clay from my bagged supply. Usually, I weigh each ball of raw clay before I make it so that I can replicate specific designs, but this time, I just need an outlet. I toss the lump onto the table to get rid of any air bubbles. I slam it down over and over again, my hands turning it as my thoughts go blissfully blank.

  I’m settling myself at my wheel with my tools, water jar, and sponge when Nate comes up the stairs, looking like he’s walked over his own grave. His eyes dart to Daniel’s studio space before landing on me, but he quickly looks away. “Hey,” I say. “What’s up?”

  Like a few weeks ago, after he’d first met with the therapist, Nate’s hands are jammed in his pockets, a sign I’ve learned to understand—he doesn’t trust himself. He doesn’t feel steady. His head is down. When he’s close enough so I don’t have to raise my voice, I murmur. “Did you have a session today?”

  His jaw clenches, like it always does when I ask about his therapy. “I was trying to find Daniel. He’s not at his place and not answering his phone. He wanted me to go meet him at my parents’ house for dinner tonight, but I can’t make it.”

  “Because …”

  His blue eyes settle on me. “Because I’m not up for it,” he says in a flat voice.

  “Shitty day? Me, too.”

  The line of his jaw softens. “Yeah?”

  I give him a brief rundown, during which the hard set of his shoulders melts a little. I gesture at my wheel, where the hunk of clay sits waiting in the center. “And I was just getting ready to manhandle this sucker into something pretty. It’s how I keep from jumping out a window.”

  The shadow of a smile crosses his face. “Manhandling?”

  “Best coping mechanism in the world. Want to give it a try?”

  He takes a quick step backward. “I’m not artistic.”

  “You have a pair of hands, and I assume they work properly?” I glance at him from beneath my lashes, unable to forget how he’s touched me with those hands. I know they work properly. “That’s really all you need. Come on. I promise you’ll feel better after.” I give him my best come-hither smile.

  He pulls his hands from his pockets. “Okay. Fine. Just this once.”

  I clap my hands like a freaking child, feeling magnificently triumphant. Then I edge off my stool and push his shoulders down until he sinks onto it. “The first thing you have to do is center the piece so it doesn’t wobble.”

  He pushes up the sleeves of his long-sleeved T-shirt, then picks up the clay and carefully places it in the center of the wheel. “Um. Okay?”

  “It takes a lot more than that—it can take students a year before they’re actually good at it. Get your hands wet.” I point at my water jar, a chipped jug I ruined with too much time in the kiln. “Just dip ‘em in there.” I grab my sponge and wring out some water over the lump, then position myself on the other side of the wheel from Nate. “Now it’s time to get your hands dirty.”

  His fingers dripping, he’s looking at the clay as if it might grow fangs and sink its teeth into his skin. “By doing what, exactly?”

  I grab his hands and place them over the clay, then press my foot on the pedal to start the spin. He flinches as he feels the wet clay moving beneath his palms. Slip oozes between his fingers as he holds on tight.

  “You don’t have to squash it flat,” I tell him. “You’re trying to get it balanced so you can shape it, not strangle it to death.” I pull his hands away. The lump wobbles like it’s about to go flying. “Okay—no strangling, but you don’t have to be gentle, either. It takes muscles to be a potter.” Smiling, I pull his hands back to it and guide them. “Relax, Nate. It’s not your enemy.”

  He mumbles something under his breath but lets me shape his fingers. I show him how to cone the piece and lower it again. After a minute or so, we’ve got the mound centered. When he pulls his hands away, he looks down and laughs. “It looks like a breast.”

  It does, complete with a nipple at the center because of the way he positioned his hands over it.

  “Welp. Now it’s time for the manhandling.”

  He laughs. “But I’m a gentleman!”

  “Not always,” I remind him before I can stop myself. My cheeks grow warm and I avoid eye contact as I take his hands again, moving his long fingers back over the clay “breast.” Great. Now I’m thinking about it. And how his hands look as he touches it.

  “How am I doing?” he asks, busting me out of my inappropriate thoughts. Then he chuckles. “What am I doing?”

  “Just getting the feel for it,” I murmur. “Try pulling up again. Like this.” I tug his hands, and he lets them slide up until he’s got a column. It reminds me of that scene from Ghost, where Demi is making that vase and Patrick Swayze comes up behind her. When I was a teenager and first saw that movie, my pubescent little brain thought it was the sexiest, most mind-blowing thing I’d ever seen.

  And now that I’m an adult, I don’t feel that much differently. “Now push it down again, just like I showed you.”

  Nate’s brow is furrowed as he follows my instructions. He looks so inten
t and serious, like this stuff is life or death. And I can’t help myself. I reach out and boop him on the nose with a fingertip covered in wet clay. His eyes narrow, but he’s fighting a smile. “Do that again,” he says, “and it’s game on.”

  “But you look so cute.” He really does. He’s up to his wrists in clay, with a smudge on that long, straight nose of his, and he still seems to be trying to shape the clay according to my instructions. “So earnest.”

  “Just tell me what I’m doing here,” he says. “You promised this would relax me.”

  I rise and move my stool behind his. Biting my lip, I scoot close and lean in, my breasts against his hard back as he hunches over the wheel. With my chin on his shoulder, I reach under his arms and touch his hands again, moving his thumbs to drill a hole, showing him how to compress the bottom, then helping him create a lip at the rim of the clay cylinder we’ve created. Next, I show him how to push two fingers against the inside of the cup while steadying the outside with his other hand in order to make it bow out at the bottom.

  Nate stares at our hands, working together on the undulating clay until we’ve got a rudimentary bowl. He watches as I sponge more water over it to keep it from sticking. “This is kind of hypnotic,” he murmurs as we work. His shoulders have lost their rigidity. Even his breaths seem to come easier, like we’ve loosened up the invisible ropes of grief and trauma wound around his chest. I don’t know exactly what happened, but I don’t need to. Because I know I’m helping.

  And God, it feels good to me, too.

  “How do we know when it’s done?” he finally asks in a hushed voice. He turns his head so our faces are close, and I don’t move back to give him room. I don’t want to. Tingles of pleasure course through my body as our eyes meet. My heart speeds. His eyes drop to my mouth for a split second before he tears his gaze away. “Is it done?”

  I blink and force myself back to the task at hand, wondering if he would have kissed me, wondering what he might have done if I’d moved a fraction of an inch closer. “We cut a bevel at the bottom—” I slide my fingertip around the bowl’s foot to create a space. “And then we use the wire to slice it off the board, and a scraper to lift it off. The scraper should always be wet for that.”

  The wheel is still turning, and I haven’t reached for my wire or the scraper, because it would mean moving my arms away from his body. It would mean relinquishing this closeness, and it’s so delicious and heady and addicting that I’m not ready to give it up.

  “Should we do it?” he asks, turning to look at me again.

  “Yeah,” I murmur, suddenly breathless. “We definitely should.”

  A devastating half-smile lifts the side of his mouth, and I feel the tiny movement in my bones, turning them soft and melty. All the reasons why I turned him down fly out the window. It feels like someone’s swept my legs out from under me. Like I’m falling. Now I’m staring at his lips.

  Which is when I hear footsteps on the stairs, a blessed few seconds before Caleb and Romy enter the studio space. I scoot away from Nate, moving my foot off the pedal, which brings the spinning wheel to a halt—but I’m still feeling pretty dizzy.

  “Hey, guys,” says Caleb as he approaches. “What are you up to?”

  “Just giving Nate a pottery lesson,” I say breezily, grabbing for my wire tool. “Nate, do you want to go wash up while I finish this?” I gesture at the bowl.

  “I need a minute,” he mumbles. He’s staring hard at the clay bowl. “Let me, um … fix this part.” He pokes at the previously flawless rim, denting it.

  “Oh,” I say, my voice ridiculously loud as I realize why he might not be able to get up yet—desire is still coursing through my body, but I, at least, can hide it. Mostly. I know I’m breathless and flushed. “Let me show you how to use the scraper!”

  Speaking to him like I often do to my elementary-age pottery students, I demonstrate how to remove something from a pottery wheel. By the time I’m done, Caleb’s back in his stall with Romy. “If you want, I could show you how to wax a piece and dip it in the glaze …?” I kick at one of the five-gallon buckets of mixed glaze under my work table.

  “Let me go wash up,” Nate says, giving me a rueful look as he rises from the stool and heads for the giant sink across the room.

  As he’s cleaning off his hands, I tidy my space and wipe off the wheel. Romy sidles over while I work. “You guys looked like you were having fun,” she says in this voice that tells me she noticed way too much. “It’s great to see Nate doing something artistic. Expressing himself. And it’s nice that you took the time away from your own work.”

  “He was tolerating it,” I say. “Letting me give him a lesson.”

  “I’d say he was more than tolerating it,” she says with a sly smile. “Are you guys—”

  “No,” I say. “Not at all. We’re just friends.”

  “Mm-hmm,” says Romy. She gives Nate—still standing at the sink—a sidelong glance. “I was actually thinking you two—”

  “Just. Friends,” I say with a little more volume, almost like I’m trying to convince myself. “I’m not interested in dating anyone! I was only trying to help Nate relax after a rough morning.” Which makes me sound unselfish—when the last half-hour was pure selfishness. Pure pleasure. I wanted any excuse to be close to him.

  In that moment, I turn my head to see Nate standing next to the common table now, only ten or so feet away. He’s drying his hands with a rag and probably heard every word I just said.

  Which is fine. It’s the truth. Right? We’re friends. Just friends.

  Our eyes lock. “Thanks for the lesson,” he says, tossing the rag onto the table. “It was nice of you to take the time.”

  Then he turns on his heel and stalks toward the stairs without looking back.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Nate

  Brushing raindrops off my jacket, I twist my key in the lock and open the door of my new place. Daniel helped me find it—he lives in this building, too, and put in a word with the landlord, who seemed to think he was doing his patriotic duty by not raising the rent from what the previous tenant paid. When Daniel and Caleb helped me move in, both of them complained about the light in the place, or really, the lack thereof. What they don’t understand: that’s a huge plus for me.

  Daniel’s apartment is just one big room on the third floor, and like the co-op, it has huge windows facing the street. I wouldn’t be able to stand that. Every time I’m in there, it feels way too exposed, like someone could watch my every move. Or take a shot. This first-floor apartment is better, for me, at least—there’s a tiny, windowless bedroom, and the rest of the living space has smaller windows, covered with shades. I got myself a couch, a table and two chairs, a mattress, and a laptop. Daniel made fun of me—he said I’m living like some sort of monk—but he’s wrong. I’m living more like a soldier. Able to get up and move on at a moment’s notice.

  I’ve been home for over a month now, but I don’t feel anywhere near settled.

  I pull my phone from my pocket as it chimes. Are you coming by today?

  I sigh and set it on the table. Sasha doesn’t understand what she’s doing to me. I’m like an addict, knowing I should go cold turkey but unable to stop myself from going back for another fix. She just wants to be friends, but I’ve never had a friend like her. Never had a friend who put her hands on me like that. Never had a friend I fantasized about pretty much every goddamn minute of the entire fucking day.

  I’ve gone by her studio for the last few weeks after my sessions with Dr. Harper. He’s a nice guy and has worked with veterans before. He says the treatment he’s giving me has research backing it up. He told me it would be hard, and that turns out to be the only thing he’s said that’s wrong. It’s not hard.

  It’s impossible. We’re four sessions in, and this one was the worst yet.

  I glance at my phone again. Dr. Harper made me talk about what happened in Afghanistan today, and we recorded it on the phone. The whole episo
de, in detail, me telling the story in a shaky voice that doesn’t even sound like mine. For the foreseeable future, I’m supposed to listen to the entire recording every single day until I can tolerate it without my heart rate going through the roof, without throwing up, without shaking or tearing up. I even have to write down a rating of how upset I am each time on a little paper so I can show him every week.

  I can’t do this. Talking about it today was almost too much, and I tried to stay numb, but he kept asking question after question, and he told me that if I don’t let myself feel everything, if I keep trying to avoid the memories, my nightmares are going to get worse. All my symptoms will get worse.

  Apparently, I either have to face this or be broken forever.

  Right now, I’m pretty sure I’ll be broken forever. And that’s why I can’t go see Sasha. It makes me feel pathetic. She was so brave a few weeks ago, putting it all out there, telling me what happened with Ryan. She handed her story to me, hoping I’d hand mine right back to her like some tragic gift exchange.

  It’s not that I don’t want to know stuff about her. I do. I want to know everything, like how she juggles all those things she has to do and whether she’s a morning person. I want to know if she has a sweet tooth and how she comes up with ideas for her next work of art. But I can’t keep up, at least not in this way. Because the only thing that seems to interest her about me is all the stuff that’s messing me up. To her, I’m this big pile of pitiful misery she seems determined to save.

  Pity is the last thing I want from her. That look she gives me sometimes, when her dark eyes fall to my mouth and her cheeks flush—that’s what I want. Last week at her pottery wheel, that’s what I saw. I almost kissed her in that moment. I probably would have, if Romy and Caleb hadn’t showed up. But then I heard what Sasha said—she and I are just friends, and she was just giving me a lesson because I was having a hard day. I couldn’t get out of there fast enough, and it’s been hard to face her ever since. I’m definitely not steady enough today, not after that session, and she’d see that. Pity would win, a confirmation of how bad I look, how obvious it is that I’m flailing.