I quickly jerk my eyes towards Mom’s empty seat and Dad’s still occupied one directly across the table from Rome. “Nope. Haven’t talked to him since our meeting.” I attempt to redirect the conversation when I see Mom heading back to the table from the ladies’ room. “Reese said I should take over Seattle’s Lucky after graduation. I can split my time between SMI and Lucky’s. I think it’s a good plan,” I explain to Dad.
Rome isn’t finished yet though. He’s fearless in the face of death today it seems. “Surely the meeting was cordial enough to professionally exchange contact information, though.” He glances at Dad before settling his eyes back on mine, smiling. “Surely?”
I’m tired, I’ve had less than ten hours of sleep in the last week, and I’ve put in six times that at work alone. I’m exhausted. I’m also a bit rusty on my social graces due to the recent lack of social interaction, so that probably doesn’t help curb the outrageous outburst, either. Oh, and have I mentioned, I’m also extremely irritable and short tempered?
I am. Attempted sobriety will do that to you.
“Oh for Christ’s sake, stop beating around the fucking bush and spit it out, Rome!”
You can hear a pin drop after my hands slam against the top of the table, rattling the place settings where they lie. “Just say it!” I bark.
My father eases back in his soft leather seat before settling his left ankle on his right knee, chuckling while my mother is frozen in place with her salad fork halfway to her mouth, possibly counting under her breath…although she could be talking to herself.
And Rome…he’s the carbon-copy of our father, only younger, leaner, a bit more handsome and charismatic, and a fuck ton more aggravating.
“Well, little sister,” he tsks me. “I only ask because I ran into him at the bank yesterday, and he asked if I would give you his number. The poor schmuck, I thought for sure, given the history between you two that he’d be immune to you. Well –“ He slaps a piece of paper on the table before knocking on it twice. “Damn glad you’re my sister. I’ll tell you that. Oh and he said to clean up and give him a call when you’re ready to act like a grown-up.” He smiles for a few beats before standing.
After leaning over and kissing our mother’s cheek, he shakes our father’s hand, “I have tee time in twenty at Sand Point. Dad, you want to meet me on the nine or ten?”
My father goes to stand, “Sure, son. Sounds—“
Oh hell no, little brother.
I jolt to my feet. “Mom.” I follow Rome’s suit out of default, kissing my mother on the cheek before holding my hand out to my father. I had to flip it to auto-pilot back there at, ‘When you’re ready to act like a grown-up.’ And to be honest, I can’t fucking promise I’m going to be able to come back from that.
Who the fuck does Ryker think he is? He’s not allowed in my new life. He’s not easy. He’s not allowed. ‘Act like a grown-up?’ I’ll do one better. Fuck Lucky’s. Fuck Reese. But double fuck Ryker. I don’t have to do this. I don’t. And if he doesn’t get a damn clue, then I fucking won’t.
After our awkward parting, my heels stab the concrete with every step I take as I charge towards Rome’s jeep. As soon as my palm cracks across its silver ass, the brake lights light up, and the window comes down.
“Jesus, Ivy. What the fuck?” He barks as I round the driver’s side of the SUV, running my hand up the side of the sleek metal.
“Exactly, Rome, What. The. Fuck? What the fuck was that?” I gesture towards the country club restaurant. “Oh and he said to clean up and give him a call when you’re ready to act like a grown-up?” I repeat his words to him.
He sighs and jerks his head towards the passenger side of his car, “Get in, little sis. This has been a long time coming. I’ve been waiting for this conversation since the day you and I met. Maybe even before. Let’s take a drive.”
Rome doesn’t hold back. And he doesn’t beat around the bush. Before we can even pull onto the street, he takes the first stab and bleeds out.
“I think I was three when I realized everyone else’s little sister wasn’t a mythical creature whose name you only whispered. I always loved you. Did Delilah tell you that? I asked her to once. Of course we were both so stoned out of our minds, I doubt she remembered. I think I only remembered because I couldn’t believe I finally had the balls to ask her to tell you. Honestly, I think I left it in limbo on purpose. I wanted to think Del was too high to remember, but I hoped she wasn’t, at the same time I wanted to believe she’d told you. I dunno, I’m probably weird. I do only fuck virgins, once. So that isn’t ruled out, obviously.” He chuckles.
The awkward silence that follows his admittance is heart breaking. No fuck that, it’s heart shattering.
It takes me forever to reply, but I do. I accept my brother’s love and I love him so much for his candidness.
I need it.
Right now, I need it more than a hit, and a hell of a lot more than I need a few little cuts.
I don’t hold back. And I don’t beat around the bush. I take the stab and bleed out.
“The guy that took Mom, Sebastian, was a very depraved bastard. When Beth and I stayed with him, he’d invent reasons I needed to go into this thing he called, ‘the box.’ It was so fucking scary at first. I hated it. I think it was like a double outhouse or something. Except it just had one toilet and a sink. I remember looking through the little moon-shape cut out in the locked wood door at night. I’d count as high as I could, then I’d start over and count again until I was sure I’d counted all the stars I could see. I knew it was safe to go to sleep after the moon peeked its way through the little cut out. He never came to the box to hurt me that late. So, I’d say my prayers like my Nana D taught me. I’d pray that if our daddy couldn’t get our momma better, that God would send her and me, a little brother who could do the job.”
I light a cigarette and pull in a deep lung full of smoke before exhaling and looking back at my little brother. “I also prayed that when you finished making our mom better, you’d come and find me. I prayed you’d find me and put me back with our family and make it all better. And you did, Rome. You did.”
“I didn’t do anything you wouldn’t have, little sis.” He plucks the cigarette from my hand and takes a drag. “This is progress, good. Now, I’ll go. Thank you. Thank you for finally coming home, Ivy. We’re a motley crue, and each of us on our own is nowhere near functioning, but since you came back, I’ve,” he coughs and clears his throat, “I’ve never seen Mom and Dad so happy. I remember wondering as a child if our parents would get the chance to know peace or feel contentment again, I remember wondering if we’d always have a missing piece.” He pulls into the driveway, turns off the ignition, and links our fingers, “We’re complete now that you’re home.” He smiles. “Now, I need you to find your missing piece. Find what makes you know peace and contentment. Because you’re threatening mine more and more the longer you hang in the balance, trying to do this shit on your own. This life isn’t a solo act, Ivy. Stop being so selfish and trying to make it one. No one has to do it alone and that includes you.”
His words crawl deeper under my skin in the silence that follows after his departure from the vehicle.
I feel like too much was said but not enough, and I don’t have the slightest idea where to pick it back up.
So, I follow suit and let sleeping dogs do what they do, lie.
After I shower and dress in my pj’s, I make my usual, end of the day social circle to say goodnight to Rome. But as I step from the kitchen into the main area with my glass of water, I’m welcomed with a dark, silent room. Rome is sitting on the couch with his feet propped up on the coffee table and a cold beer in his hand as he watches the news.
We don’t speak another word tonight. I just go to bed where I toss and turn until conceding to another sleepless night.
It takes me a solid week to build up the courage to call Ryker, and even then, I do so because it’s a business necessity. We’re in the process
of tying up the last of the paperwork, and the bank needs some I’s dotted and some T’s crossed on his side when I decide it’s time I start acting like a big girl.
The phone rings three times before I chicken out and hang up, cussing myself because I didn’t at least wait for voicemail to pick up.
I do this three-ring, cross-my-fingers-and-hope-for-a-third-ring-voicemail-pick-up call three more times while I finish up answering the handful of emails at work. It’s Saturday, and I’ve already endured family brunch, so after I finish at work, it’s only late afternoon. I decide to swing by campus to view the final grades that were posted outside the art studio yesterday evening.
I never would have tried Art as my major in Florida. I took general, because that what I was, general. Average. People who majored in Art were people like Delilah, people who made it their mission in life to NOT wake up every morning just to pay the bills. People who know who they are and what they want out of life, those were Art major people.
Not people like me.
So when I see that I passed with a B average and that I got my major in Arts, something swells inside me…and damn it feels good.
I practically skip my way to the car. As The Fray starts singing How to Save a Life, I sing to the top of my lungs, every damn lyric.
Dancing my way up the drive towards mine and Rome’s front door, I don’t have a care in the world.
On top of that, I haven’t used since the business meeting at Where the Ivy Hides a few weeks ago. Not that I didn’t come close, not that I didn’t have to have my sponsor on the phone every other night to walk me through flushing whatever I’d hoarded and accumulated during the day while promising myself if I made it through one more day I could slip a bit.
But I didn’t slip. Not once.
And I fucking passed!
“Ya look good, Ivy, love.” Ryker says behind me as I turn the key in the door, scaring the living shit out of me.
“HOLY FUCK!” I scream, jumping two feet in the air. “Jesus, Ryker. You almost gave me a fucking heart attack!” I breathe, leaning over. Once I’ve gathered some of my composure, I stand, and look up, up, up at him.
Jesus he’s tall.
I don’t remember him being so tall.
“Ryker,” I smile, falling apart and dying a million deaths inside, “How are you this evening. Good, I hope.”
“Ay. Some good. Some bad.” He shrugs.
A minute or an eternity but nowhere in between, must pass before either of us speaks and breaks the calm silence.
When I remember the copious amounts of coke in my purse, I start to fidget then speak to distract from it, “Well, you’re more than welcome to come in. I can make some tea, or—“
He steps towards me until the toe of his boots meet my slippers, then he gently cups my face and runs his lips across my face to settle in a kiss on my forehead. He whispers, “I’ve done ya wrong, haven’t I, me Ivy?”
I couldn’t answer if he let me.
He pulls his face away from mine and smiles as he looks down at me. When his eyes finish scanning my face, they land on mine, and I finally see the pain I haven’t let myself see until now. “Then I went and fucked it all to shit the first chance I got. I’m sorry, love.” He clenches his eyes shut and turns his face away from me. “I’m so sorry.”
After he steps away, I’m left in his wake feeling like a life boat shoved away from the dock with no life out there to save.
Bereft.
Useless.
I don’t like the space he leaves between us. And I doubt I’ll like the envelope he pulls from the inside of his suit jacket either.
“Look, Ivy, we have to find a way to co-exist. With Lucky’s and Reesie…” He clenches his jaw before cutting his eyes back to mine and growling, “I don’t even want to discuss Reesie right now.”
Then he comes at me like a fucking man starved. He’s intense. Chaotic. Fierce.
And Jesus H. Christ, is it easy.
So much fucking easier than I remember.
It’s so easy to forget about the coke in my purse when his teeth nip at my lips seeking entrance into my mouth. It’s so simple to forget the past, to forget what happened at Where the Ivy Hides. It’s fucking effortless.
When his tongue slides and circles mine as a groan leaves his chest and his hard thigh pushes against me between my trembling thighs, it’s thoughtless really, to do anything but let go.
Be the someone who wants to be caught.
But as soon as he’s there, he’s gone again.
On his way down the driveway towards his bike, he calls out over his shoulder, “Read the letter, Ivy love. I jotted me number there at the end. We’ve got business to attend, love.” He straddles his bike and starts it, reeving the engine. After it idles he speaks, “No more of this hiding shit, Ivy. I’m not disappearing and you’re not dying. Everything else, it’s in the letter, love. We’ll talk soon. And remember,” he says sounding just as moronic as the Lucky Charms leprechaun, “We’re both adults. None of this waiting and dialing for three seconds. Thought you’d grown out of that by now, Ivy love.”
My eyes trace the lines he made across the paper writing my name for the hundredth time after listening to his bike drive away.
I know what I’m doing. I know I’m doing exactly what he told me not to. I know I’m procrastinating, but I can’t help it.
I don’t want to know what else he’s scrawled across the pages in this envelope. I don’t like deciding moments.
And that’s exactly what this fucking is.
Another deciding moment.
Chapter 18
Me dearest Ivy,
I’ll never forget the first time I laid me eyes on you. Me and Reese had just finished baseball practice and we were headed home, but instead of keeping right that day, I stayed right along with Reesie and took a left, headed to his house to check out a baseball card he was interested in selling. Bloody bastard, even then he could talk a good sale into a great. Anyway, right as me feet hit the driveway, I seen ya coming out of the house with a backpack on your back that was two sizes too big for ya, a big bright grin across your face, and all that long black hair hangin’ behind your back in curls. You were the sweetest face I’d ever seen. I think it’s safe to tell ya now, that’s about the time I started watching ya. When everyone else wasn’t looking, I was. At the birthday parties, when all the other kids were laughing and playing, I’d see ya off to the side, taking a break from wearing your mask, love. I saw the hurt and the pain. I just wish I’d have seen it sooner. That it wasn’t just being adopted that made you different. And you’ve always been different, only special. You’re a special and vital part of me, Ivy. On a visceral level. And somewhere between finally capturing your attention and creating our daughter together, that was solidified. We were solidified. What happened next and what happens after that, is up to you. Yes, I have someone in my life, someone who isn’t you, someone who will never be you. But if you can find a way to make us happen, hopefully you and I can move forward, then we will. On every level you would like us to, Ivy love, we will. No one’ll ever love you the way I do, me Ivy. I just need you to let me…
I’ll catch what can be caught. ~ Ryker.
I’ll catch what can be caught?
Even for Ryker David Killian that’s a little rich.
And I’ll what? Just find complete and utter happiness being his complacent whore?
Not in this fucking lifetime. Not no, but hell no.
So, for the life of me, I cannot explain why I can be found so frequently over the next few days re-reading his letter, adjusting the flow every which way, just to examine the many different ways his words could be taken.
I take every sentence he spelled out and stretch myself to my own limits, wondering how far gone I will allow myself to become as his whore and side thing. How long can I live like that, I wonder. Many of history’s greatest, most patient women lived years upon years like that. Only to die as just that. A whore.
&nbs
p; I don’t think I really ever fancied being written about, much less becoming a lesson in history. I’ll take my lesson learned.
But what I can provide Mr. Ryker fucking Killian with is a brand of Winter fucking Ivy he’s never seen.
He’s got a little someone at home, okay, that’s fine by me. Merry Christmas and Mazel tov. I can be every bit of everything, she is not. Mark my words.
After a quick call, during which I mention that no matter how skewed his beliefs, I am happy, in a healthy relationship with Bowen, and while I understand that he and I have a history, there’s no reason we can’t personally and separately move forward in business. It’s mostly quiet on his end beside a close-ended answer here and there. It surprises me. He used to do so much better when I showed my confidence back in the day.
I can tell his little someone at home certainly doesn’t keep him on his toes or frequently display any confidence.
When he hangs up after only saying, “I hoped your answer would be different, me Ivy love. I’ll make sure Ellie, my secretary, gets your contact information. She’ll be in touch.” The last hopeful pieces of my soul wither away and dies.
Even if he seems hungry enough to eat you alive, he’ll still just leave you fucked and wasted. A dirty little secret, a piece of his past, and his runner-up whore.
I don’t need things like him bleeding back into my life from my past. I left shit like this when I came home with my family. I left shit like this, like Ryker and our daughter in Holley, Florida.
To never be seen of or heard from again.
Once Livvy thinks whatever tension she imagined my and Bowen’s breakup caused is clear, she starts dropping by my office more and asking to hang out. I let her squirm for almost a month before I commit.
It’s a Friday when she swings by, a quarter past quitting time. “Hey, Ives. Wanna get a drink after work? I’m paying.”
“Why not?” I smile. My quick surrender must have surprised her because she falters and an awkward moment beats by. It’s just long enough for me to grab my purse and keys and head around the desk towards her. “You driving, too?”
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