Entangled (A Tryst Novel)

by Alex Rosa

  I can’t tell if making her choose is showing her how to love me, or if it’s just me pushing her away now.

  Though, I still have this misplaced need to see what she’ll do. As insane as it sounds, I want to see if she’ll show up. I know it’s childish, and that’s the part that stings, but for some reason I need to see her standing in that airport.

  I push away the mug of coffee and rise from the table, needing to take a breather. I need another walk.

  “Thanks for the chat, Gio.” I try to sound sincere.

  He squints, and pauses a beat before asking, “Did I help?”

  I can’t help the comical chuff that escapes me. “What? Did you help what?”

  “I care about Skye, which subsequently means I also have to care about you. You make her happy, and Skyler deserves happiness. I want you two to work.”

  I release a long sigh, shaking my head. I can’t hate him now. “Dude, Gio—you helped.” It’s the only thing I can think of to say as I run a befuddled hand through my hair. “And uh, thanks for being there, for her, or uh . . . yeah, whatever. You know what I mean.” Do I even know what I mean? I don’t think I do, but I’m thankful for something. I just can’t figure out what it is, but it feels like the right thing to say.

  Gio smiles and nods his good-bye.

  I leave; my feet need to put distance between me and my thoughts, and all I can do is keep walking.

  Each step feels like a second of time, and I can’t tell if it’s counting down to my Armageddon, or to my happily-fucking-ever-after.

  Chapter 20

  Skyler

  “You know what I think?”

  “Gio, I don’t think I want to hear what you think right now,” I grumble. I hold my cellphone between my shoulder and ear as I pull my carry-on from the taxi. I hand the cabby an obscene amount of money: taking a cab in LA is never worth it.

  “I think you’re both being so stupid. Is this an American thing?”

  I roll my eyes, but that does nothing to affect the thrill continuously rolling through my body. I spent days thinking on it all, and although I ripped every detail to shreds, and I’m livid at Blake for making me choose, I realized it’s not about that anymore. This is my problem to solve, and if this is what he wants, it’s what I want.

  “We’re not being stupid.”

  He mutters, “I should have told him he was being stupid when I saw him.”

  I nearly drop my luggage down the escalator. “Gio! We’ve been talking for twenty minutes now. Why are you holding out on me?”

  I stroll from the escalator to the security gate, clutching my plane ticket close. I pause, knowing I can’t walk through security on the phone. My heart is racing, anxious for this to be over. Instead of arguing and explaining, I just want to talk to Blake about everything and nothing at all. Right after I show that I’m here for him.

  “Bella, please.” Gio sighs. “It doesn’t matter. Don’t forget that you’re just now returning my calls. Shouldn’t I be the one mad at you?”

  I laugh, finding comfort in this conversation, and I’m annoyed that we put it off until now.

  “No, you can’t be mad at me. You’re apparently not telling me things, too. You could’ve told me about my photos at the gallery opening, just like telling me you saw Blake.”

  He snorts, and I know he’s laughing, too, smiling that glorious I’m-king-of-the-world smile. “Look at the pot calling the kettle black! This is what got you into this mess.” He pauses, letting out a funny sigh as he thinks for a moment. “I’ll miss you in Milan.”

  I smile. “You’ll live without me. I don’t need to be there.”

  “I know. Milan and fashion will move on, but I’m afraid you’ll never return from, wait, where are you going?”

  “Wisconsin,” I reply.

  “Wisconsin? Where is that?”

  “It’s the Midwest, Gio. Look at a map sometime.”

  “Bella, there are only three cities in America that I care about, and that’s Los Angeles, New York City, and Miami.” I laugh at his ridiculousness. “But tell me you’ll let me take your photo again.”

  The sigh that escapes me is a whimsical one, but there’s a solemn edge to it. “Gio, I can’t promise anything. I told you. I’m getting on this plane to show Blake that I’m ready to be honest. The rest comes after.”

  He grunts. “Whatever you say, bella. I guess I have to be okay with this.”

  Gio and I have never really hugged, but I’d hug him right now if I could. “It’ll be fine.”

  “Will I still get to see you again? And I mean that in a completely platonic way.”

  I giggle, thinking it’s strange I can find so much joy in a morning that felt as if it was haunting me all week. “You’re like my gay best friend who’s not gay.”

  “Is that supposed to be a compliment?”

  “It is. You’ll see me again, I’m sure. I gotta go, though. I have my relationship to save and all.”

  “Yes, yes. Go to your love, and do the right thing.”

  “Thanks, Gio. I’ll talk to you when I’m back, though I know you’ll be in Milan.”

  “Call anyway. Bye, bella.”

  “Bye, Gio.”

  I hang up, swivel around, and try to rush through security, but a burly woman at the podium glares as I frantically approach.

  I pull in a deep breath, knowing that once I’m beyond these barriers I finally get to make things right, and everything will be okay.

  At least, I hope so.

  BLAKE

  Frustrated and exhausted, I run two hands through my hair as I walk into the small corner mart in the waiting area of gate forty-two at LAX. Twenty minutes until boarding, and I haven’t seen a sign of Skyler.

  I told myself that whatever happens happens for a reason, and if that means that Skyler doesn’t show up and choose me, that I’d be okay with it no matter what.

  Who am I kidding?

  The constricting feeling in my chest feels multifaceted now: stress over my relationship, over our argument, over the stupid plane ticket, and on top of everything, the possibility of having to explain to my mother why I showed up girlfriend-less; all the while Gio’s stupid words run rampant in my head.

  I take a deep breath, thinking about home, knowing I’m more than my relationship with Skyler, and I have more than my relationship status to tell my mom. However, I don’t feel whole without it.

  My body releases a tremor of nerves, and I cannot pinpoint its source when the rumble reaches all the way to my fingers and toes. I roll my neck, seeking some sense of calm. I want to blame this all on my lack of sleep.

  Maybe I just need something to wake me up, or help me pass out for the flight. I choose the more caffeinated route.

  Scanning the small mart, I’m about to pull an energy drink from the fridge, but something catches my eye, and I worry that my lack of sleep has me hallucinating. That would be the last thing I need.

  I pause, stopping dead in my tracks, and rub my eyes until I see stars before I stop. My eyes blink open, and even though my vision is still blurry and catching up, I’m drawn to two blue eyes staring at me from the newsstand.

  When I’m able to focus, I’m thrown by how stunning Skyler looks on the cover of Harper’s Bazaar magazine. A few other women accompany her, but with her face in the center, she’s impossible to ignore. She’s the centerpiece for the cover that talks about the upcoming spring fashion season. It’s her that will draw people to this magazine, including me.

  I forget about needing caffeine. Apparently, this is what I need, because my heart is already beating at the speed of light and I’m wide-awake. I grab the magazine, pay for it, and blindly walk back toward the waiting area, staring at the magazine in my hands.

  How could I be so stupid?

  I shake my head. She’s perfect, utterly fucking perfe
ct. It’s undeniable how flawless she looks in this photo, and I feel like an idiot. Not for being angry that she wasn’t honest, but instead, using it as a way to hold her back.

  I could’ve handled this better. I didn’t need to put everything on the line just so I could see that she would put me above everything else.

  “Blake.”

  It’s a whisper, and I’m still staring hard at the magazine in my hands, and I swear I’m losing it because I think the magazine just spoke to me.

  “Blake.”

  I blink furiously, finally lifting my head up to lay my eyes on the one thing I never want to risk losing because of my stupid need for self-affirmation.

  Her eyes are wide, tense, expectant . . . and scared.

  I can’t take it anymore. She’s here.

  “Blake, I—”

  I drop the magazine, take a giant step forward, grabbing her face, and crash my lips to hers. It’s amazing how the tenseness in my chest instantly releases, like an elixir to my existence. I could live forever, powered by her lips alone. You don’t give something like that up.

  She keeps trying to talk, but I won’t stop kissing her. Her lips are soft, making me think she’s been crying, and I hate it. I kiss her harder, forcing her lips open, tasting her, needing to know she’s really here.

  She stops fighting me. Her mouth keeps up with the fervor of mine as her arms wrap around my neck, holding me close. The quiet moan that escapes her short-circuits all the synapses in my brain.

  I pull away, but only to breathe.

  She’s already shaking her head. “I’m so sor—”

  Still holding her face, I shake my head, too. “No, I’m sorry.”

  “No-no, this is me coming to tell you that I was so stupid for not telling you about Gio, Jason, those photos, and the trip. I’ve been horrible. You have to know that it was never about choosing. I would choose you over anything, even if it’s irrational.”

  God, I love her. Irrational. Yep. Two fools totally in love: that’s us. We love even when it doesn’t make sense. We choose without thinking. We react because we care.

  “You should always be honest with me, but it’s not about that anymore. I don’t want to make you choose.” I pause, gritting my teeth to hide my smile, because knowing that she did choose me over everything makes me guiltily ecstatic, but I keep this to myself. I kiss her again, hard, and pull away before I get carried away again. “I never want to make you choose. I don’t want to hold you back.”

  She tries shaking her head in my grasp, her eyes darting all over my face in confusion, even if she’s smiling curiously. I’m guessing she didn’t think this was going to go this way.

  Okay, that makes two of us. I try not to laugh.

  “Hold me back?” she sputters. “You’re not. Don’t say that. This is about me not trusting you enough for me to be honest. It stops now. It stops this instant. I love you.”

  I release her face, scramble to the floor to pick up the magazine, and lift it up to show her the cover.

  “And because I love you, I can’t let you throw this away. Don’t give this up.”

  Shell-shocked, she blinks a few times, staring her magazine-self in the face. A glorious rosy shade of pink rises to her cheeks, and it’s beautiful.

  “Remind me to kill Gio,” she whispers as she goes wide-eyed. Her mouth falls slack, her tongue flicking over her bottom lip, soaking it in, but it’s only a second later that she’s shaking her head again, and then falling to her knees to dig through her backpack.

  I’m confused, wondering what I’m waiting for. She’s scrambling through the mess until she stands holding two very worn-looking but unopened envelopes, and I know exactly what they are. The university emblems give them away. These two envelopes are the ones we were waiting for.

  She waves them at me and smiles, the blush more prominent than before. Skyler is all sorts of things: beautiful, fascinating, smart, but also, utterly adorable.

  I have that urge to cover her mouth with mine greedily, feeling more like an idiot every second for putting such a gap between us, but her voice interrupts my mental wanderings.

  “We choose together.” She sighs, smiling ear to ear, tilting her head to the side as she watches me, and I’m mesmerized by the rapid rise and fall of her chest, though her eyes are a steely calm as they devour me. I love the way she looks at me.

  “I-I—”

  “Listen, I want to say this again.” She interrupts more sternly. “Before we get into the you-forgiving-me-thing, and me jumping on that plane with you.” She lets out a chuff, running her free hand through her long strands of wavy hair, and I don’t try to hide my smug grin. “We’ve already been through so much, from start to finish . . . er, I mean from funny beginnings, to uh, grown-up decisions.” She laughs, rubbing her beet-red face.

  “I’m making a mess of this. What I mean to say is, we have our issues, and I want to work through each one of them. It seems trust isn’t our forte, but”—she pulls in a deep breath, lifting her chin so her eyes meet mine with a determined resolve—“I’m always going to trust you, to have faith in you, with the good and the bad. I want to be able to tell you everything, and I will. I want you to know that I promise to never hold back, not with you. You’re my boyfriend, but you’re also my best friend, and I can’t imagine not telling you things. All of this chaos I made for myself, and it ate me alive because I wasn’t telling the one person I wanted to. At first, I thought it was to protect you, but I was only protecting myself. I never want to be selfish with you.”

  I’m mesmerized, my own eyes stunned as I watch her, but what I love more is that Skye doesn’t cower, or bashfully turn away, or even flinch when I stare at her. She absorbs it. She takes me in with every breath, and through every pore, and it reflects perfectly in the crystal glow of her eyes. I can only recognize it for what it is because I know the feeling. It’s practically my reason for living.

  I take my own healing breath, her jasmine shampoo hitting my senses, and I find my center. I laugh, but it’s only a sound of relief.

  Her face squirms expectantly, and I lean in to kiss her twitching lips, pulling the envelopes from her hands. “Then everything is perfect. We’ll choose together. School, modeling, us, or all of the above. It doesn’t matter, because we’ll figure it out together.”

  “You mean it?” she says against my lips, not wanting to break contact. I can only nod, because of course I feel the same.

  It isn’t until we hear a whistle from across the waiting area that we pull away. I don’t care if we’re making a scene, because I’m too damn proud that she’s mine. However, Skyler is a hilarious scarlet color now, and I can’t hold back my shit-eating grin as I shrug.

  She ignores the whistles, her eyes delicately scanning the airport, which is probably a smart thing to do considering cameras have been a source of a handful of our problems. Thank goodness she’s the cautious one, because I could care less as long as Skyler’s near me.

  I wave the envelopes in my hands, garnering her attention. “How about we start this trip out right?”

  She grins. “You want to open them now?”

  “What I’ve learned in the past few days is it’s better to handle things as they come at you. Why wait and test the situation? Aren’t you curious?”

  “Absolutely. I’m just scared. I can’t tell what I want them to say.”

  The corner of my mouth lifts upward. “It doesn’t matter, does it? We don’t have to make any decisions today. How about you open one, and I’ll open the other?”

  She nods. Her blushing cheeks have me remembering that among her logic and need to analyze, we’re young. These big decisions are the first ones we’ve ever encountered. These are our first what if’s, and I’ve never been more grateful to have her by my side so we can stumble through them together.

  I hand the envelope from UCLA to her a
nd keep the one from UCSD.

  “Let’s just do it.” I exhale, starting our clawing open of each envelope. The ripping of paper suddenly sounds deafening in the airport. I swallow my nerves, wondering where the hell this anxious feeling comes from. I want so much, but above all I want her to succeed, just like she always wanted for me since we first met.

  Her squeal distracts me before I’ve even pulled my letter out.

  “I got in! I got in!” she shouts, jumping up and down. Her excitement has a way of calming me, because if she’s happy, I am, too.

  “Of course you did,” I laugh, heat rising to my own face as the words “Welcome to University of California San Diego . . .” reveals itself as I unfold the letter I hold. “Two for two. You made it in!”

  “Oh my God! I can’t believe it! Can you?! Oh-my-God-oh-my-God.” Her jarring excitement trails off into the empty space between us.

  We just stare at the letters in our outstretched hands, then we grin, laugh, hug, kiss, and then stare some more before the moment devours us.

  “I’m so proud of you,” I tell her. “What do we do now?” My nervous exhale is more drawn out than I intend, even though I’m so happy for her. I find myself at a loss between being proud and hoping I still fit into her life equation.

  She pulls the letter from my hand, stuffing both back into her backpack before turning back to me to place a soft, chaste, almost placating kiss against my lips.

  With a bashful smirk and her hands fiddling in front of her, she says, “Well, now that that’s over with, now I’m going to Wisconsin with you . . .”

  My eyes widen in unison with a newly forming grin. “Yep,” I reply, and just like that, I’m already feeling better. We always manage to find balance among the chaos. From one terrifying life decision to the next nerve-wracking experience, we find a way.

  “. . . to meet your mom . . .” she adds, bobbing on her heels.

  I nod. “Yep.”

  I watch what seems to be the magnitude of our trip finally dawning on her as her hands fly upward to rub at her reddening cheeks. “Um, just your mom? I mean, I love you and all, but is there anyone else I should be aware of? Family? This makes me a terrible girlfriend, doesn’t it? How about your Dad or—?”