I watch her, staying silent until I’m sure she’s said everything she needs to say. She’s in control, back to being the cool and levelheaded Cora, but now that I know her better, I can see how much it costs her to hold her head high at times, how much energy it takes to stand up straight when it’s obvious she’s tired and hurting.
Again, I want to push her, to ask her what’s wrong, what would make her think sleeping with me, with anyone, would fix what she’s feeling. And then I remember how many girls made the trek from a party to my bed in the past year, my feelings for them never going beyond that initial physical desire that was soon appeased, only to leave me feeling the same sense of aching emptiness I had before they’d touched me. For a while, the hour of oblivion spent inside of someone else seemed worth it, but now I know the truth: the darkness always comes back, no matter how many times we think we can avoid it by ignoring it. We have to work to live in the light, and even then there’s no guarantee of forever. So I don’t ask Cora why she’d do this, not only because a part of me understands, but because I want to show her that sometimes things can just be easy. And forgiven.
“I think I’ll get over having you strip down and plaster yourself to me. As torture goes, I guess I could withstand it again, you know, just in case you were ever thinking of punishing me.”
It takes a minute, but then her smile blooms and it’s almost real. She gives a small laugh and I do what seems natural and pull her in for a hug. There’s nothing sexual about it, no pressure, just the need I have to give her comfort.
She surprises me when she doesn’t even hesitate before wrapping her arms around my waist and holding on. She burrows her face into my shoulder and I tighten my hold, again wondering if Blue’s ever let herself just let loose and cry, scream, rage. Not about something or someone, just for herself.
After a minute she pulls back and looks up at me, her eyes serious. “Thank you. For not letting me… for not letting me,” she finishes. “I was having a bad day and for a minute, it just seemed like if I could forget about it, it wouldn’t be so bad when I came back to reality.”
I know that’s a lot for her, a lot of honesty, a lot of sharing, and I know if I push now she’s just raw enough she’ll give me everything. And still, it won’t be because she wanted to. I can’t get past that, so I smile and press my lips to her forehead.
“I’m here for you, Blue. Eventually I’m going to ask some questions,” I say and she smiles.
“You have questions? I can’t imagine.”
I return her grin and press a small kiss to her lips that’s more friendly than anything and step back. “I can’t promise to never ask again, but I can promise to try and be patient until you’re ready.”
“I can’t figure you out,” she says after a minute and I bring her close again, hugging her tight before releasing her.
“I’m not that complicated, trust me. Here’s your soup. It should still be hot.”
She doesn’t reach for it, rather, she stares at me for the span of a few heartbeats and then she nods, as if accepting a request I never made.
“My mom has early onset Alzheimer’s — or dementia; I forget which one, though I guess they amount to the same thing. She’s forgetting things, and it’s getting worse.” She presses her lips together for a second, preparing for what’s coming next. “I go by on Mondays and do her salon treatment for her, though she never asks me to, never thanks me, never really speaks to me. It’s been almost three months and this last Monday I couldn’t stand the silence anymore, so I began talking, reminiscing I guess, but it turns out all of my memories with her are bad ones, ones where I went out of my way to shock her, and she responded by slapping me, or calling me names. I don’t know if I expected her to give me a reaction still, but it doesn’t matter because she didn’t. Nothing changed when I spoke to her, almost like she didn’t even register that I was with her and it hurt me enough that when I came home I took it out on you.”
I nod but keep silent, because I know her story’s not done yet.
“For some reason, I went by today in a kind of spontaneous gesture, like a friend would do, just dropping by to say hi. I think I wanted to prove to both of us that I’m different than who I used to be, that I’m making an effort, one that proves we can actually have a relationship if we’re willing. I guess I went for the same reason that I still go on Mondays even though she doesn’t really want me there. Just the thought that by taking care of her, of giving her that small thing that she’s always cared about, I’m helping her, giving her some good memories to fight for, if that’s even possible.”
She shakes her head and offers a wry smile, a smile that says she’s laughing at herself but doesn’t find humor in anything that happened. “But instead, I fucked up, like I always do, thought only of what I needed and she paid for it.”
“What do you mean?”
“She forgot me today, forgot everyone, really, and when she came to she was a wreck and it was my fault. I dropped by on a day I’m not usually there, and it was her caretaker’s afternoon off. My dad wasn’t home yet and when I got to her rooms, my mom was rushing around half dressed, searching for a dress for the benefit dinner she was hosting. When she saw me, she yelled at me, ordered me to start her hair and I realized she had no idea who I was, or who she was, really. Not anymore.”
She looks at me now and her shoulders are slumped. “She was in a different time, and when my dad came home and she was startled back, she broke, and when I tried to offer my comfort to her, they both turned me away and I let them, because protecting her from me has become habit for all of us.”
None of this information is one hundred percent new to me. From the few conversations we’ve had about her family, I’ve drawn a picture of what Cora’s childhood and young adult life have been like so far. She and her mother don’t get along and never have, because neither of them felt good enough for the other (though that’s not how Cora’s put it). Cora’s mom felt threatened because she saw how beautiful her daughter was and resented it and the fact that Cora wouldn’t become the Barbie doll she wanted her to, and Cora felt abused, humiliated, less, because all she wanted was love from a woman who seemed hell bent on giving only criticism. Neither knew how to break the mold they’d lived in for so long, and now the choice to mend those fences has been taken from both of them.
I want to reach out and take her hand, to bring her against me and give her the contact that shows her how much I care, that she’s not alone. But I don’t, because if there’s one thing I’ve learned about Cora, it’s that she needs to stand on her own first, to trust that she really is strong enough to survive. Balling my hands into fists, I shove them into my pockets and lean back against the counter.
“I’m so sorry, Blue.”
She doesn’t acknowledge this, just stares out the window to the street and continues. “It’s weird because for the first time in our relationship, I didn’t fight back. I just stood there watching her fall apart, and I did nothing because all I could think about was that the woman I’ve wanted to overcome my entire life is finally going to forget me and I suddenly don’t want her to.”
Now she turns so she can look me in the eye. “Do you want to know the worst part?” I nod my head. “She’s losing her mind, piece by piece, day by day, struggling with bouts of sheer darkness when she finally comes back, and all I can think about is the fact that I didn’t have enough time to show her I could be the daughter she always wanted. Even as she’s struggling to place my face, and I can see the panic clawing at her because she can’t remember, not right away, all I can do is think about how I wish I had more time to show her I was someone different, someone she might have actually cared for.”
There are times in life when people never shed a tear and you watch them shatter in front of you. That’s Blue right now — her eyes are dark and hollow, her shoulders hunched protectively. I wonder if there’s a way to reach her, or if I should let her be. When her eyes meet mine my decision is made, and I
stand up straight before scooping her close. Her hands find the front of my shirt and hold on as she burrows into me.
I wrap her close, as close as I can, my arms circling all the way around so they almost touch the opposite shoulder. I don’t think about the angle on my elbow, or the ache that’s spreading through my chest at the realization of just how hurt my siren is. For a second, all I do is bring her into me and hope that I can be the anchor to hold her here, to keep her from floating away, just like she did for me the first time I saw her.
“Why can’t I just let her go? We’ve always hated each other. Why does it matter that she’s leaving me, when the truth is I left her first?”
I’ve been good with words my entire life — that’s why I chose my major. I remember them, love the sound of them, love hearing the cadence each new voice can bring to them. Yet, standing here I don’t have words, none that will do this situation justice. She’s overrun with guilt and fear and hurt and I can’t tell her not to feel them, because I know she has to. There’s no living life without all of those things — it’s knowing when to set them down that separates the weak from the strong, the survivors from everyone else.
Despite what she’s been through, or maybe because of it, I know Blue’s a survivor and I know that eventually, when she gets past the overwhelming pain and shock she’s feeling now, she’ll find a way to move on and make her relationship with her mother as right as it can be before the end. Until then, it’s my job to make sure she remembers how to fight, for herself and everything she wants.
Leaning back, I say her name. When she looks up, I wait until her eyes clear enough to actually focus on me. “If you want your mom to stop blaming you, if you want her to accept you and believe in you, you have to do it first. Stop thinking you’re always wrong, Blue, and stop waiting for people to be disappointed.”
There’s fear in her eyes as she stares up at me, and I worry that she’s going to finally let loose and cry. My belly clutches and I breathe deeply. She’s looking at me out of wide, devastated eyes, eyes that have been ingrained in my memory since that first night when I couldn’t look away from her. For perhaps the first time since we met, though, there’s true vulnerability. There’s no anger, no shock, no annoyance or resistance — for once her eyes are open and clear and in them I can see more than I ever imagined.
“Why do you get it?” She’s still staring at me, her hands gripping the front of my shirt as she shakes her head. “We barely know each other and I haven’t been particularly nice to you, but you always manage to understand what I’m feeling before I do. No one’s ever done that before.”
I’m treading on dangerous ground right now. I’m so needy for her my body physically aches. Warring with my desire for her is my intense need to protect her, from me and everyone else, including herself. Carefully, I reach out and skim a finger down her cheek, my eyes watchful and alert to everything hers give me.
“I’m starting to understand you, Blue. And more than that, I care about you.” I swallow with a throat that’s gone suddenly dry. No time like the present to put it all out there. “I care a lot, Cora.”
The words are quiet, but they change the air around us even still. She steps closer until we’re molded together from chest to toes and looks up. She swallows and then her tongue darts out to wet her lips and my already aching body bursts into flame. “I don’t know why, or how, but I — I care, too. More than I ever have. More than I thought I ever could.”
I can’t hold back from her, not now. I know it’s not the time, that it shouldn’t be now after she’s told me everything she has, but I can’t step away from her, can’t make myself stop because whatever’s happened, this is real. Right now, her and me and everything we’re building between us, it’s fucking real and I need her more than I need air.
Leaning down, I stop a breath from her lips and look into her eyes. I need to know, to be sure, and I need her to tell me because I’ve lost the ability to walk away. She’s all I can see, all I can feel, and every second that passes I need her more.
“Yes,” she says, and again, bolder, “Yes,” and that’s all it takes. My lips are on hers and my hands are at her hips, urging her closer until I shift and boost her up. When she wraps her legs around me, I wrap my arms tight around her and head toward the hallway.
Chapter Twenty
Cora
I used to dive into a potential bedmate the way a swimmer dives into the water — quick, clean, effortlessly really, after following a very specific routine. With Jake, every move I have is obliterated until everything I feel is all I can think about. I have no moves, no protocol, no brain power to do anything but feel his words and see from his face that he means them.
Which is why I’m wrapped around him and meeting his lips with my own, rocking my center against his and praying to God he gets us wherever we’re going fast. After years of being cold, the fire smoldering between us is consuming, and he’s the only one who can make it better. I hear a door kicked open, a thud, and a curse from him. I pull back a little look around his room.
“Why not mine?” I ask. He grins and throws me onto the bed where I land in a heap of covers.
“Because I want you in mine.” And then his body is covering mine and I don’t know or care where we are as long as he never stops kissing me. His hands are sure, slow and thorough as they peel away my clothes and explore my skin, and just when I’m ready to beg, he shifts away and stands, walking over to snap on the standup lamp in the corner before he returns to the foot of the bed, his eyes blazing into me.
“I want to see you,” he says and I lay still, too mesmerized to speak or look anywhere but at him. Even with a tan, my skin is shades lighter than his, and I watch in euphoric rapture as he picks up my foot, skimming his hands down the length of my leg and back before pressing a small kiss to the inside of my arch.
“These legs have fascinated me since the first time I saw you.”
“You can barely remember the first night you saw me, let alone what my legs looked like.”
He shakes his head and places another kiss just above the last. “Not true. I didn’t want to remember you because you stunned me the first time I saw you.” Shivers ripple through my whole body as I lie here watching him watching me, my heart beating so hard I wonder I can even hear him over it.
“Your skin is so smooth, the muscles beneath so strong. And then I saw your eyes and I knew even from across the room that I had to be near you. I won’t hurt you,” he says and my breath catches in my throat.
My eyes burn and my vision blurs with unshed tears because I know he’s reassuring me that what we are together is different than what we’ve ever been with others. I’m not a virgin — the pain he’s talking about won’t be physical, and I wonder how I think I can know him and still be surprised by his tenderness, his thoughtfulness. His ability to know what I need, even when I don’t.
“I want to see you,” I tell him as he makes his way back up my body.
“Then you better get started.” There’s a smile in his voice as he skims my breast with his lips and I suck in a breath at the sensation. I don’t move instantly, too steeped in what he’s doing with his tongue to function, and then I feel his teeth on my nipple and my eyes snap open to meet his laughing ones. “If you keep closing your eyes, you’re going to miss it.”
I grin and shift so I can grip his T-shirt, yanking impatiently and reaching for the bared flesh when he pushes to his knees and tugs it the rest of the way off. His skin is warm and I feel it all the way to my core when he reaches for me again and our bare chests brush against one another.
A year ago, I had wondered if a small part of me had died inside and the connection I once craved through physical contact had forever altered my ability to feel anything anymore. Now, feel is all I can do.
Every time he touches me a fire ignites and my body bends to its desire. It’s as if Jake has reached inside and warmed all of those frozen places, bringing my passions back to life and nurtur
ing them, and me, as I come alive with them.
What was once a fast and frenzied escapade with only the end pleasure in mind is now a moment made up of touch and taste, a time to discover one another in ways I’ve never known. He leaves no place of me untouched, unfulfilled, as he takes his lips on a tour of my body, reaching my hip bones, the inside of my thigh, the back of my knee and up again. I want to roll him and give him the same treatment, to make him feel the drowning pleasure and desire that I feel, but at this moment I can barely lift my arms. His tongue joins his fingers, pressing inside and curling up, and my body throws itself from the cliff, my back arching and my hips bucking until he uses his other hand to press them down and ride through the wave with me in place.
I’m shivering, my body absorbing the last aftershocks of my orgasm when he makes his way back up and kisses me. The pressure that was relieved just seconds ago begins to build again when his tongue twirls with mine and his thigh presses between my legs, igniting my sensitive flesh. His lips leave mine when I gasp, and then he shifts and I hear the crinkling of a cellophane packet before I feel him shift back.
“Look at me, Blue.”
I do and what I see is impossible. It’s as if I’m all he sees, all he wants to see, all he needs, and then he braces his weight on his forearms and kisses me long and hard as he begins to move, gently rocking back and forth, easing his way inside until he fills me all the way. The sensations that envelop me are too many to name.
I hear him suck in a breath and he pauses for a moment, our eyes locking, our bodies frozen. He feels it. I can see it in his face, feel it in the pulsing of his body all around and inside of mine. Whatever we are, this has inflamed our connection and smart or not, I can’t turn back. When he begins to move again with long and torturously slow strokes, I think I might die of pleasure. One hand reaches down and curls around my leg, pushing it higher as his movements become more forceful, more uncontrolled. My breath catches, my lungs freeze, and all I can do is hold on as he takes me to a place I’ve never been.
The Light of Day Page 13