Anywhere With You

by Stephanie Hoffman McManus

“Hold on,” his words came out rough and forced. He set his hands on my hips, anchoring me to him.

  “No.” I leaned forward and whispered against his cheek and then took his earlobe between my teeth and gave it a tug before releasing it. “No more waiting. We’ve waited long enough.”

  “That’s why we need to put the brakes on for just a minute, babe. I gotta be sure we’re on the same page.”

  “What do you mean?” I pulled back and met his conflicted gaze.

  “You and me, Ci. I need to know that we both understand what this is.”

  My heart stopped and then stuttered inside my chest, my stomach dropped, and all the heat and need I’d felt a moment ago was replaced by a wave of crushing disappointment. I should have known better. I should have listened when he said this was his one night to be selfish. Here I was already thinking about quitting my job, and in his head this was just a one-time deal. A happy birthday to himself. God, it hurt more than I thought it could.

  I settled back on my heels, nearly choking on the words I forced out, hoping like hell he couldn’t hear the utter misery in them. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to fall in love with you, or make things awkward at work. Just one night, right? A chance to get this thing between us out of our systems.”

  A frown marred his brow and his eyes narrowed perceptively. “Is that what you want?”

  Shit. He could probably hear the hurt in my voice. He could tell I wanted more and it would ruin everything.

  “Of course,” I let out a soft chuckle that rang false even to my own ears. “It’s not like I thought you had feelings for me.” Yes, that’s exactly what I thought. How friggin stupid could I be? “It’s not like that between us. This is just sex.” There, I hoped I sounded convincing, and yet, I almost didn’t care if I wasn’t, because I knew I wouldn’t be able to go through with this now. Not when it would mean something so different to us. I couldn’t do that to myself no matter how badly I wanted him. If I thought it hurt now, it would kill me when we were done and he was able to move on like it was nothing.

  He sat up straighter and I slid off his lap onto the warm leather. “Ci,” he breathed with a hint of frustration. “I don’t believe you. Why does it sound like you don’t mean any of that?”

  Fuck.

  He could see right through me. The one time I needed to keep all my shit under wraps, it was flapping in the breeze and no matter how hard I tried to channel my onstage persona, the cool, unflappable, and indifferent stripper, I couldn’t find it in me. I was feeling too much. I pushed myself up to my feet.

  “I don’t know, but maybe this isn’t a good idea. No matter how casual we try to keep it, sex between friends always gets complicated. This was a mistake.” I searched in the silence for my clothes. I risked a look at his face once I’d pulled on my bra and underwear. His face was stony.

  I tried to smile, but it was probably more of a grimace. “We got a little carried away, but it’s not a big deal. Tomorrow things will go back to normal with us.” I slipped into my pants, and he’d still yet to move an inch. He just watched me with an almost blank expression. I wished to God I knew what he was thinking.

  Finally, he spoke. “I think we should talk about this some more before you go running out of here.”

  I fastened the button on my jeans. “Not sure what there is to talk about. The sexual chemistry has been crazy between us from the beginning. Tonight, it got the better of us. We’ll just have to try harder not to let it happen again. I just think a one-night stand might mess with our friendship and I don’t want that to happen.” That was at least the truth.

  He let out a heavy sigh and stood, yanking his jeans up and grabbing for his shirt. “I guess you’re right.”

  The last little drop of hope I hadn’t even realized I was still holding onto evaporated then, and I felt something inside me harden. The next breath I took was filled with resolve. I wouldn’t make this mistake again, and I should probably thank Luke for reminding me why feelings like the ones I felt tonight had no place in my life. I wouldn’t, but he’d just saved me future pain. Inevitably things would have gone sour between us, because that’s what happens when you give in to this sappy bullshit and think that you can let yourself depend on someone else. I would have lost a friend, one of the only real friends I’d ever had.

  That had to be what this was anyway. I’d never had a guy friend, especially not one I was sexually attracted to. I’d gotten confused. That’s all.

  With that thought, I felt a little lighter and less ashamed. We walked out into the main part of the bar, where I found my top and the shoe I’d lost.

  “Happy birthday Luke. I hope whatever it was you really wished for, comes true.”

  He gave an unintelligible grunt, and not knowing what else to say, I leaned up and kissed him on the cheek. “Poker night at your place still on for Sunday?” I asked when I pulled back.

  He raked a hand through his hair, exhaling deeply. “Yeah. I’ll see you then.”

  Twenty-Two

  Luke

  Present

  “Is she the reason you don’t know if anything could ever happen between us?”

  I was lying on my back, staring up at the ceiling lost inside my head. I hadn’t even realized Meg was still awake. I thought she’d long since gone to bed. I didn’t even know how long I’d been staring at the ceiling. Long enough that I was beginning to see odd shapes in the paint texture.

  I turned to look at Meg. She was on her side, covers pulled up to her chin, peering at me in the dim light cast by the bedside lamp I had yet to turn out. I could have lied and said I didn’t know what she was talking about, but I was tired of the lying.

  “Yeah,” I muttered.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you two were … you said you were just friends.”

  “We’re … complicated, but we are just good friends. She’s my best friend. I guess that’s what makes everything else so damn complicated.”

  “I know I don’t know her, and this might not be my place to say, but she seems like she’d be a hard girl to love.” I bristled at her comment; it annoyed me that she thought she knew Ci well enough to make a judgement like that. Then I let it go. I was extra sensitive at the moment and I didn’t believe Meg meant any harm.

  “You got it wrong,” I sighed. “The loving her part comes easy; it’s the getting her to let you part that’s a bitch. I’d sure be a hell of a lot better off if I didn’t feel shit for her. Sometimes I think I’d be better off if I’d never even met her, but then I know that’s not true, because the things that come easy aren’t usually as worth it as the things you have to work for. No matter how much she complicates my life, she’s the one I want. The one I’ve always wanted.” I felt a little of the weight lift just getting that off my chest. It was the first time I’d ever said any of it out loud. For years, I’d kept it all bottled up, to the point that it festered, almost like a poison in my gut.

  “And you’ve told her all that?” Meg pushed herself up on her elbow.

  I laughed dryly. “No. Any time we’ve ever gotten close to talking about feelings, she runs. The worst part is, I’m pretty sure she feels the same way I do. For whatever reason though, she’s so damn afraid of letting anyone love her, or maybe she doubts that anyone could. I don’t know. I think someone must have really done a number on her. If I were to just come right out and tell her I love her, I’d probably lose her forever. She’s like a spooked animal, or a butterfly. You go after it and it’s just going to take off and never let you close, but if you’re still and patient, it might just come to you. At least I’m hoping, but I don’t know anymore. The shitty truth is, she may never be ready.”

  “What are you going to do if that’s the case?” she asked softly.

  “That’s the question isn’t it.” What the hell was I going to do?

  At some point, Meg turned over and I think she finally drifted off to sleep. I glanced at my phone. The pool closed almost an hour ago.

  I cont
emplated the mini bar, but these feelings couldn’t be purged with alcohol. There wasn’t shit to be done for them. I couldn’t drown ‘em, bury ‘em, burn ‘em, carve them out, or even lose them in someone else–someone soft and sweet like Meg–no matter how much I might wish I could.

  Soft and sweet wasn’t really my thing anyway.

  I was somewhere in between awake and asleep when I heard the electronic lock disengage and the door quietly shoved open. A sliver of light from the hall cut across the room, and then receded as the door slipped shut again, casting the room back into near total darkness. I could barely make out her shadow.

  She grabbed something from her suitcase beside her bed, unaware that I was awake. Once she had what she’d dug around for, she tiptoed to the bathroom and shut herself inside for a long time. I listened to the water turn on and off multiple times.

  When she emerged, she paused at the foot of her bed. I couldn’t make out her face, just like I knew she couldn’t see mine, but still I knew she was staring at my bed. She was still for several seconds before she tore her eyes away and crawled beneath the covers. I didn’t know if she faced me, or had her back to me.

  Several times I started to open my mouth to whisper at her, only to have the words die on my tongue before my lips could form them. I didn’t know what to say, or what good my whispers in the dark would do.

  Yet with every second of silence that passed, it felt like the damage we’d done to each other tonight became irreparable.

  We got past that night four years ago, and I was able to just be her friend, because that’s what she needed me to do, but what I’d felt for her back then was nothing compared to what I felt now. In the last four years, she’d become everything to me. I didn’t think I could get past that this time. I wasn’t sure how I’d put it aside, but maybe in the morning I’d see a way.

  Those were the last thoughts I remembered having until I came awake the next morning when someone flushed the toilet in the bathroom and then turned the shower on. I blinked my eyes open and the first thing I saw was Meg’s bed, empty, blankets thrown back. Rolling over, I saw Ci’s form still curled beneath the covers, which rose and fell with her deep, even breaths, and the back of her head, all that honey blonde hair spilling over her pillow.

  I grabbed for my phone on the bedside stand. A check of the time informed me I needed to get my ass out of this bed. That was easier said than done considering I felt like I’d hardly slept. It was an effort to drag myself from the bed and throw on the first things I found in my bag.

  Coffee was my next mission. Slipping my feet into a pair of leather flip flops, I snuck from the room as quietly as possible.

  Had last night really happened?

  The awful heart burn feeling that wasn’t really heart burn told me it had.

  I got the biggest, blackest drip coffee I could get from the hotel coffee shop and some sort of egg wrap that was shit. I had to stop myself from buying the giant ass blueberry muffin that was approximately the size of my face. Ci’s favorite, but I wasn’t sure a peace offering, albeit a blueberry one, would do any good. More than that, I wasn’t sure I was ready to even make such an offering.

  I tossed the last half of the gross egg wrap and killed time messing around on the online, multi-player app I played with my brother. It wasn’t long before I got the text from Kellen letting me know everyone was ready for checkout.

  An hour later, we were checked out, luggage loaded, and everyone had grabbed something to eat from the little café coffee shop. My stomach actually hurt when I saw Ci grab one of those damn muffins. We hadn’t spoken a word. We’d hardly looked at each other all morning, and I wasn’t surprised at all when she climbed into the back seat instead of hopping up front with me.

  Everyone else pretended like they didn’t notice anything was up. Ci put her headphones on before we’d even pulled onto the street. The next five hours passed relatively uneventfully. Kellen and Shae were the buffers everyone needed, mostly Shae. She seemed to understand what had gone on.

  We made it to Kansas before dinner, and this time I checked myself into my own room. I couldn’t do another night of sleeping so close to her when the reality was that we were further from each other than we’d maybe ever been.

  Nothing changed over the next two days. Kansas was a blur and it felt like as quickly as we pulled into town, we were pulling back out. Ci and I hadn’t even spoken. Besides a few pained looks, we avoided even meeting each other’s gazes. That didn’t mean I wasn’t watching when she wasn’t looking. I was. I couldn’t do anything else. I hoped to see some sign that this was killing her as much as it was killing me.

  This was why I’d kept silent for years. I’d never wanted to risk losing my best friend along with the girl I loved. Neither one of us was willing to extend the olive branch though, and repair the damage. I wanted her to be the one, and I was sure she felt the same. Only this time, I was too pissed off to give in to her. Too pissed off to coddle her and say it was all okay when it wasn’t.

  Monday night, we pulled into Denver, but if I’d thought saying goodbye to Meg would take some of the strain off Ci, I was wrong. She asked to be dropped at the hotel, with the claim that she was tired, while we went and met Meg’s parents for dinner. They were real nice people, everything I’d expected of the people who’d raised Meg. They bought our dinner to thank us for bringing her back. When it was time to say goodbye, she and I stole a private moment.

  Just saying adios and waving goodbye didn’t seem right, but thankfully this time she didn’t kiss me, not on the mouth anyway. A hug and a quick peck on the cheek was it. I wished her the best when she got back to Nashville. She asked if she could keep in touch. I told her I expected her to keep me updated on all her successes, but we both knew there was no future for us down that road. As much as I did hope to hear from her, just to know she was doing alright, that’s all it was for me. She understood it, even tried to offer me advice.

  “Don’t give up on her. It’s obvious she’s hurting. That wouldn’t be true if she didn’t feel something. I’m sorry if I made a mess of things for you.”

  “Don’t. None of it is your fault. In fact, maybe I should be thanking you. We might have gone another four years, skirting around our feelings if you hadn’t forced her to acknowledge hers. At least this way we both have to face it.”

  “Well, I hope it turns out the way you want. Yours is the kind of story people write songs about.”

  “Yeah, but it seems like in the songs, the guy is always losing the girl.”

  “Not always,” she said softly and then we hugged one more time before she left with her parents. Kellen, Shae, and I wandered the streets of LoDo a while before heading back to the hotel.

  I stood outside Ci’s room for several minutes. I must have raised my hand to knock on the door ten different times, but each time I drew it back, until eventually I gave up and retreated to my room down the hall.

  The next morning, she looked as rough as I felt, like sleep hadn’t come easy for her either. I’d spent most of the night tossing and turning, tempted to text her or slip back down the hall to her room again.

  Expecting another day of nothing but silence from her, I was caught off guard by her softly muttered, “Good morning.” I returned with new hopefulness springing to life inside of me. At breakfast, I claimed the seat beside her. She offered a faint smile, her features softened by the continued lack of heavy make-up. I only wished I could read the thoughts that dulled the brightness in her eyes and left her distracted through the meal.

  We pushed hard for over eight hours to make it to Salt Lake by that night. I traded off driving stretches with Kellen when my lack of sleep the night before caught up with me. I wasn’t the only one who used the drive to catch up on my rest. Ci sat in the back with Shae, her head resting on a pillow shoved against the window, head phones on and eyes closed. I watched her in the rearview more than I probably should have.

  We pulled into the first hotel we came to that
didn’t look like it charged by the hour. I thought things were really looking up when Ci made no protest at all when we were only able to book two rooms together instead of three. I half expected her to insist that she and Shae take one, but she didn’t.

  It was our chance to get everything out and fix the mess we’d made of things. Only, when I came out of the bathroom, having brushed my teeth and stripped down to a pair of shorts, she was already burrowed into one of the queen beds, light off and her back to me.

  I lowered myself onto the edge of the other bed and sighed deeply. “Ci.”

  I knew she was awake. Her breathing stilled, but after a moment of wondering if she was just going to ignore me, she turned over. “Please not tonight. Just give me tonight.” The tiredness in her voice wasn’t a physical one. It was the same weariness that had seeped into my bones over the last few days, and I knew it would still be there in the morning, because sleep was no help for it.

  “Okay,” I said, noting her visible relief when I didn’t push. She could have tonight. But only tonight. In two days, we’d reach California, and the way things were now, there’s no way we’d be able to convince her family of anything.

  Twenty-Three

  Cici

  Present

  Road Trip to Hell Day 8

  Las Vegas. Even in the daylight it was everything I expected. I couldn’t wait to see it lit up at night. Luke was the only one who’d been before, and therefor the only one who didn’t have his face glued to a window, looking every which way as he navigated us toward one of the many enormous and extravagant hotels. I’d never seen anything like it. The closest was New York City, and even with all its impressive architecture and bustling streets, it didn’t compare with the energy and flare of Sin City. It was the first time in days that my mind took a break from its fixation on the Luke situation. My eyes weren’t fast enough to take everything in even though traffic moved slowly through the overcrowded streets.

  When Luke pulled the car up to The Venetian, I was in awe. A breathless, “Wow,” escaped my lips, but that was nothing to when we stepped inside. Wow didn’t even begin to cover it. I only half listened as Luke described his previous stay. I couldn’t get over how impressive the interior was. I felt like I’d stepped inside a palace, and then I heard the words canal and gondola ride and that caught my attention. Better believe I was going on one of those before we left.