Clicking back to my contacts, I tap a different number and grab my backpack from beside the bed. “Laken — no, I didn’t change my mind. I need a favor.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Cora
I wake in an unfamiliar bed and tense instantly when I feel someone next to me. Panic seizes me and for a minute I stop breathing, the pain of failure and disgust so large I think they might crush me. And then that someone speaks, and my heart stops.
“Relax, Snow White, your virtue is safe.”
A.J.. Sweet Jesus, thank you.
Now that my heart’s pumping again, albeit a bit unsteadily, I relax enough to take in my surroundings. The room I’m in is what I would consider true bohemian flare with a ton of clutter. There’s a red sheer fabric over the window, giving the room a weird, ethereal glow. The majority of the wall space is taken over by some sort of painting or photograph or collage. There’s an old style oval vanity in silver against one wall, its surface covered in earrings, makeup, hair tools and more. A sewing mannequin stands in one corner with several necklaces, scarves, hats, and other paraphernalia decorating it. Finally, I turn to the girl in bed with me and I take in her clear skin and bed head.
“You remember now?” she asks and I nod, though I desperately wish I didn’t. Flashes of the crowded bar, my over enthusiastic flirting, the almost hook-up that was closely paired with the almost drink so I could go through with it. My anger toward A.J. and Liam after they saved me. Knowing the fact that I do remember those things, however awful, is something I owe to her, I swallow the bitter taste in my mouth and meet her eyes.
“Thank you.”
I don’t have any other words, nothing that will truly be able to tell her what it feels like to know I almost lost it, almost had to start over and work out of the hole that I’m now positive comes with that relapse.
She’s lying on her stomach with her pillow smashed under her cheek and her arms tucked under her body, staring at me. Without her black eye liner and exotic makeup, she’s still beautiful, but there’s a much more innocent appearance to her. Then she speaks and I realize it’s still the A.J. I know.
“Yeah, well, I figure there’s enough going on in your life that you get a pass for being an idiot. And if I’m being honest, throwing a drink in your face holds its own kind of satisfaction.”
I smile because she says it without sting, and because I can see the worry in her eyes. “I was a bitch to you yesterday. You could have just left me and let me ruin myself.”
She eyes me for a second before inclining her head on her pillow slightly. “Yeah, I could have. But, seeing as how I’ve been a bitch a time or two, and you helped me a few months ago, I figured our friendship could withstand a little turmoil. We are friends, Snow White,” she tells me, and for some reason it makes my throat want to close. “And regardless of bitchy outbursts, friends don’t let friends ruin sobriety and everything else to sleep with a douche who in no way would have been good enough in bed to make her forget why she was sleeping with him in the first place. Since you admitted to never sleeping with him in high school, despite his abundant attempts, I think you already knew that.”
This makes me laugh and I give in to press my fingers to my eyes. “Shit, A.J., I’m a mess.”
“You’re actually pretty fucking put together, Snow White, considering.”
“Christ, how can you say that? I almost ruined a year and a half of sobriety and slept with someone I couldn’t stand four years ago and barely remembered until last night, all because I’m angry.” And sad. Goddammit I hate being sad.
“Yep, but you didn’t, because even before I got there to give you an ass kicking, you’d already stopped yourself a few times, hesitated enough that it gave me time to get to you, slap you around and make you call your sponsor, who also verbally slapped your around, which I must admit shocked me. Aren’t sponsors supposed to be supportive and coddling?”
I smile. “Kari’s a breed of her own, that’s why I like her.” Blowing out a breath, I kick off the covers and smile down at the boxers and T-shirt I remember struggling into in a haze of tears and self-pity last night. They’re Liam’s, and when I hear a throat clear at the doorway, I look over to see him leaning a shoulder against the door jamb, a cup of coffee in his hand, an amused smile on his face.
“Now here’s a familiar sight. Coffee, anyone?”
“I’d give you any sexual favor you wanted for it,” A.J. responds and Liam laughs.
“I’ve got enough of those in reserve from others, thanks, so why don’t we settle for you brushing your teeth and doing away with the dragon breath before you come into the kitchen. You, too, Cora,” he says as he stands up straight. “That way you can have caffeine in you before I take my turn yelling at you for thinking the dipshit you were letting hit on you was worth any of your time or tears.”
I flick my eyes up but he’s already turned his back and walked away. A.J. must see my face because she laughs and flings off the covers. “Having friends can be a real bitch, huh?”
My mind flashes to Mia and guilt settles over me as I think of the fact that I haven’t called her, haven’t told her any of what’s happened in a feeble attempt to let her live her life without my interference and constant need for help. “You’re telling me. Why’s he so mad?”
“Liam’s a regular white knight. Doesn’t like to see anyone hurt — especially when the person hurting them is themselves. After he laid into the guy you were doing the pre-sex dance with, he called your cousin and left a voicemail, and then he called Jake and laid into him, too. I don’t think your hunk will be hearing normally for a while.”
This stops me cold. Even the mere mention of his name has my body tingling, yearning, needing… everything. And that’s why I had to let him go — I need too much and he deserves more than some rehabilitated leech who can’t control her own emotions.
“He shouldn’t have done that,” I say as I throw back the covers and stand. “Mia has a life of her own, and Jake needs to be focusing on his career. Neither of them needs to be worrying about me.”
“Wow, you’re dumber than I thought.”
I whip a glare her way as I search for my clothes. “Fuck you.”
“I knew you’d ask eventually,” she says glibly and I’m struck with the twin urges to laugh and scream. I hear her get out of bed while I’m searching out my shoes, and pause when I feel her hand on my shoulder. “Cora, listen to me and listen good. Sometimes, you have to let people know you need them — and more than that, that you want them. You gave me some advice once, now let me give that back to you. Your cousin loves you, which means she wants to help you. And Jake? He’s the one person you trust with everything, so trust him with this. Lean on someone, Cora, and let yourself expect them to be there. You deserve it, and so does he.”
~
I hate to admit it, but A.J. has a point. I hadn’t let Jake know I needed him to stay, or that I wanted him to, because I thought it was selfless to let him go. And, I was protecting myself against possible future rejection. Walking home from the meeting I stopped in on after I left A.J. and Liam’s apartment with my tail between my legs and pride smashed into the sidewalk, I rehash the words of each of the members that were there today, the stories they shared, and then those that I shared.
I always sit in the back to listen and find solace in the words of others, those people like me who can’t quite battle their demons and win on their own — the ones who understand weakness and pain and the always present draw of oblivion. But this morning I walked in wearing Liam’s borrowed white T-shirt with my black sequined pencil mini and stilettos, and after ten minutes of listening to others, I found myself standing and walking to the front. It came out in a rush, the fact that I’m not sure how to be a person who stands on her own and relies on others. I don’t know how to ask for help when I’m so afraid the person I’m asking will look at me and think I’m unworthy. Or that I’ll ask for too much and make life impossible for them, like I did fo
r my mother. I admitted that I almost took a drink and then another last night, because the idea of waking up and feeling bad was better than waking up and feeling useless.
Being someone who makes bad choices somehow always looks more appealing than being someone who has no control over her life, but now, in the light, I understand that the darkness is too easy to hide in. Sometimes, we have to feel hurt and out of control, because life isn’t just black or white — it’s gray and blue and red and every other color, and when we feel them all, we know we’ve lived.
I can’t stop the thought of Jake or how good I felt when I was with him, how safe… and how loved. A.J. wasn’t wrong when she said I never let him know how much I needed him — I’m strong, but I’m also an addict who fears falling back into weakness and, in the last year, I’ve learned to protect myself against that possibility. Now, I’m walking home after a night I can remember with too much clarity, and I understand that sometimes, protecting ourselves from too much is hiding, and it hurts just as much as the emotions we’re hiding from. I don’t know if I feel better or worse or if I feel anything at all with this revelation, but I do know that before I can deal with what I feel for Jake, I need to deal with what I feel for myself, which means I need to go and see my mother, to sit with her and talk to her, because no matter what my head tells me, I know in my heart that what everyone else is saying is right — I didn’t cause the stroke, and I can’t change the bad things that have happened in the past, I can only move forward today.
I take the stairs instead of the elevator, my fist version of penance and a damn harsh one in these godforsaken stilettos, and when I walk through the hall door I’m searching my bag for my fucking keys that continue to disappear on the daily. Stopping a few steps from my apartment door, I groan and crouch down to dump my purse out, sifting through the meager contents to discover that my keys are not there.
“Here I was worried that you wouldn’t need me when I left,” a familiar voice says and I pause in the act of cussing myself out to look up. He’s sitting with his back against the door to our apartment, his knees bent and his feet flat on the floor. His head is still resting against the wood, but it’s angled toward me and I can’t help the shameless perusal I give him, greedily soaking in the black baseball cap that’s pulled low to shadow his eyes, that beautiful dark hair flipping out from underneath it. He’s wearing a simple white V-neck and jeans that are cuffed over unlaced Nikes. He looks tired, but when he shifts to stand, I get a closer look at his eyes and they’re alert as he reaches toward me, taking my hand to bring me to my feet.
He keeps my hand in his as he stares at me and, without realizing I was holding it, I let out a breath and bring in another, this time filling my nostrils with the glorious scent of Jake Ferrari. He smiles and holds out his free hand until I look down and see the key he’s holding.
“How you doing, Blue?”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Jake
Cora excuses herself to go change when we step inside and, because I need the time to pull my shit together and keep from making this about me and her, I nod and turn toward the couch. The minute her bedroom door closes, I close my eyes and scrub my hands over my face. In theory, this was a great plan, romantic even. In reality, it’s fucking brutal.
Christ, is it possible to hurt this bad and still be alive?
Must be, since I’m here, in the place that felt more like home than any other I’ve ever lived, waiting for the girl I’m pretty sure owns me. Jesus, if this is how Romeo felt when he fell in love, I’m not surprised the poor bastard made so many bad decisions when he was trying to keep Juliet. Love really fucks with you.
When Yogi sidles up beside me, I smile down at him and lean down to scratch his ears, slightly mollified when he closes his eyes and arches his back, a deep purr resonating throughout. At least someone missed me.
I hear the door open and then Blue’s footsteps as she pads quietly down the hall, so I stand and turn around to watch her walk into the living room, even though my brain is telling me it’s a dumbass thing to do. It is, as my abused and aching heart takes another hit when I watch her walk in wearing those yoga pants that stop just below her knee with an oversized tank top the color of summer skies. Her hair is smoothed back from her face and left to spill in a tail past her bare shoulders, and her face clean and free of any makeup and still I can’t look away from her, as mesmerized by her beauty now as I was the first day I saw her. The only thing that keeps me from reaching for her are her eyes, haunted, dark, and so unlike the Cora I left sleeping months ago.
Whatever’s happening to Blue right now is beyond her and me, bigger than any dream I’ve ever had or lost. It’s her life, what she knows and doesn’t, her demons and her fears all rearing up to hit her while she’s down. Reminding myself why I came, I take a non-threatening step toward the chair and away from her to sit, hoping she’ll take it as the invitation it was meant to be.
She waits for me to sit and then walks around to sit on the couch, curling her legs under her. Yogi looks between us as if to choose, and then jumps onto the couch next to Cora, settling into her side and purring for her fingers like he did for mine not thirty seconds ago, opening his eyes only enough to stare at me as if he knows I’m jealous of him. And I am, the smug bastard.
“I’m sorry they called you,” she says without preamble, and I can’t help the small smile that curves at my lips. My siren might feel like she’s broken, but there’s strength left in her yet, and she just showed me the first little bit of it.
“I’m not.”
She raises her eyebrows. “You’re not what?”
“Sorry they called. But I am sorry that you didn’t think you could, or should, that the way we left things made you feel like I didn’t want to be here for you anymore.”
Something like fear flickers in her eyes before she looks away. I notice that the calm that surrounded her before I left, the ability to be still and process things has somehow been replaced with nervous movements and fidgeting, as if she’s lost her center and is searching for it.
“I need some coffee,” she says and gives Yogi one last scratch before she stands and heads into the kitchen. I give her eight seconds — the exact amount of time I need to calm the fuck down — before I stand to follow, flipping Yogi the bird as his eyes follow me. I swear if he could laugh at me, he would be. Leaning back against the counter, I watch her walk to the machine in the corner and take a pod out of a jar.
She opens a latch and sets the pod in, pressing it down before hitting some button. Soon, the scent of coffee fills the room and she turns to look at me.
“Jake, it’s not that I’m not glad you’re here, I am, I just… I don’t know, I just can’t think right now and it’s been a hard few days.”
I step forward and stop her before she says anything else, all too aware of why she thinks I’m here and the weight that assumption has put on her already overburdened shoulders.
“Blue, we need to talk because everything I thought I knew about why I walked away isn’t so clear anymore. But,” I say when that fear settles over her face again, “right now, I’m here for you for a few hours because I wanted to let you know you could lean on me, nothing more, okay? We can talk if you want, or we can sit. We can go for a run, or you can go take a nap while I sit here with you, or we can just sit and not talk. Whatever you need, I just want to be here for you.”
She stares at me, studying my face as if to see that I’m being honest. I stay still, my eyes never leaving hers as I let her see that I mean what I say, that I just want to be here for her until I can’t any longer. Finally, she breathes out a sigh and nods her acknowledgment and I relax.
“Coffee?” she asks.
“Jesus, yes,” I say and she smiles.
When she hands me my cup, doctored with the heap of sugar I usually use, I’m careful to keep my fingers from brushing against hers as I take it. Without a word, we walk to the table and sit, drinking from our mugs in silence for a wh
ile. It’s not a heavy silence, but there’s an energy to it, one that we both recognize, but don’t know how to deal with. Because I’m not sure what she wants to share, or if she wants to share anything at all, I’m taking my cue from her and letting the silence hang.
“What if you ask me questions, like we used to?” she says after nearly ten minutes, and I look over from my view of the window to stare at her. She clears her throat. “What if you ask me questions, and I answer them? Whatever questions you want, anything… just ask, and I’ll talk, I’ll tell you. I want to tell you,” she says and I understand what she’s doing. She doesn’t know how to begin, how to start off what is sure to be a gruesome tale — but she also doesn’t want to lock me out, or herself in. Trying again to remember that this is about her and not us, I clear my throat and lean forward, resting my forearms on either side of my cup on the table.
“Are you all right?”
Her eyes flick away from mine and find a spot on the table. “I don’t know. I didn’t take a drink, didn’t go home with anyone, but…”
Her eyes twitch from the spot on the table to me. Devastation coats her face and I squeeze my hands into fists.
“What happened, Blue?”
“My mom had a stroke. I was with her, doing her hair, trying and failing not to be pissed at her for saying she wished my father would just put her in a home and forget about her.” Her lips press together and I squeeze my hands tighter to keep from reaching from her. “I finally snapped and told her to stop being selfish, to think of him and me and how much we loved her. And then she had a stroke — brought on by an elevated heart rate and stress, the doctor said.”
Bingo. I don’t have to ask her the question to know that Cora thinks this is her fault, that she went out looking for a drink and a willing man because she was already so sick of herself she didn’t want to think anymore. And yet, she still called her friend, the one that would face down fire with a right hook if she thought she needed to, which is another sign of the sheer strength my siren possesses and forgets about. Hoping to remind her, I ask another question.
The Light of Day Page 22