by J. A. Huss
The back of the bar facing the lake is an expansive deck filled with umbrella tables and directly on the other side of the railing is a lawn of equal proportions for general admission seating. If you want to sit front row for a show, you get a rock. Boulder, actually. I’m not sure who flattened down the tops of the boulders that line the lake in front of Float’s like stadium seating, or when it was done, but that someone was a genius.
The boulders all require tickets. Capacity of thirty, thirty-five if we have a rash of small girlfriends. Our little corner of the VIP market.
No one is standing guard over the boulders right now so I jump from one to another as I follow Sean Whimel’s shouts.
“Goddamn it,” Sean says to a worker I don’t recognize. “Not like that, asshole. You want the fucking band to fall in the water? You want the inspector to shut us down on opening day?” Sean snatches a tool from the guy, who is rolling his eyes at Sean’s theatrics, and then turns and smiles when he notices me. “Hey, RK. What’s up, man? Come to help with the rigging?”
“I’ll help.” I did it enough growing up to know what needs to be done. Might as well waste time until Missy gets off work.
What will we do then?
I think about it as I let Sean boss me around and bark orders about shit I know better than he does. But I’m not even remotely interested in running this project, so I help where he needs it and spend the time zoning out, thinking about Missy.
My paranoia about the whole Melissa-Melanie thing is waning. I know Missy. I know Missy. And even though Melanie was a psychopathic liar, I know Missy.
This girl I’ve found myself living with is Missy. I feel it in my heart. Mel wasn’t ever that good. I mean, sure, she got me a few times with her tricks. But in my defense, and regardless of Melissa’s protests to the contrary last night, they are fucking identical. Right down to the moles on their legs, their equally thick eyelashes, and the shape of their toes.
I’ve seen both bodies. I’m not proud that Mel almost got me to fuck her. I’m ashamed of that fact, actually. But I figured it out before it got to that point.
Melanie was too eager. She was too aggressive. She was too mean.
Missy isn’t any of those things.
But…
There is one little niggling thought that bothers me. That first night I came back, when Mel—Missy—found me on my knees in the garage. Why did she say those things? She was mean that night. She acted exactly how Melanie would act.
But TJ was mean that night too. And now he’s not.
I don’t know, so I decide to drop it.
Missy calls my name from the boulders sometime around noon. The sun is high overhead, blazing down on the water. All us dock workers lost our shirts about an hour ago, so I pick mine up and call over to Sean. “Taking off, man. See you around.”
“Thanks for the help, RK. And come by on Wednesday for the launch party.”
“What launch party?” I ask back. But Missy is behind me, poking my bare shoulder. “Ow.”
“You’re sunburned,” she says.
“What launch party? I’m not playing in that fucking show next weekend, so why would I come to a launch party?”
“Of course you’re not playing,” Missy says. “None of those bands want you there upstaging them. It’s their day, not yours. We have a party for the opening bands and this year it’s next Wednesday night. Private and everything, so you won’t be mugged by fangirls if you come.” She smiles. “You wanna come? You can be my date. I have an extra ticket.”
“I need a ticket?”
“Of course, you’re no one special. Just Rowan Kyle Saber. Retired percussionist.” She winks and grabs my arm. “Can you drive me home? I smell like food and want to shower.”
I slip my shirt on and follow her up the rocks to the parking lot, then unlock her door and open it for her. She slides in and I give it a shove, then walk around and get in my side.
“What are you going to do the rest of the day?”
I start the truck up and shrug. “I dunno. Haven’t thought much about it.” I’ve thought a lot about it, actually. Trying to anticipate the empty silence Missy and I might encounter if we stay home all day. All the questions, the poking and prying. “What do you normally do on Saturday afternoons?”
“Sleep.”
“Oh.”
“Watch TV and stuff. I stay home mostly.”
“So who do you hang with these days?” I pull the truck onto the highway that wraps up around the mountain we live on. “Gretchen?”
“When she’s in town. She’s not usually in town. She’s only here…” Missy’s words drift off.
“Oh, school’s out, right? In between semesters?”
“Right,” Missy says.
“Hey, that reminds me. I talked to that therapist out in Granby last week after… last Monday, I guess. And she said Gretchen was here for me. Said she shouldn’t have let her take the lead or some shit. What the fuck does that mean?”
“Well, we had a little family meeting when they told us you were going to have to come home—”
“Who told you?”
“Um, well, you know, the sheriff’s department. You remember Angelo Marzetti? He’s a deputy now. He came into Float’s before you were released from that rehab place and said you’d have to stay in Grand County until they completed their investigation. So we figured, you know, we wanted you to understand I was alive, not Melanie. And you said some weird shit right before you left, RK. After Mel’s funeral. So we talked to Gretchen and she said she wasn’t allowed to be like, your therapist or anything. But she could do volunteer work for Dr. Sanderson and help you out. So, you know. Gretchen is a friend and you deserve to have support from friends.”
I suddenly remember a little quirk of Melissa’s when she was a teenager. She says ‘you know’ a lot when she’s nervous. Why is she nervous?
The truck climbs a hill as I weave around the side of the mountain, looking hesitantly at the guard rail. I always hated the fact that my house was built on a cliff. “Hmm,” I say, rolling all that bullshit about Dr. Margie Sanderson and Gretchen around in my head. Maybe my driving makes Missy nervous? I can’t blame her under the circumstances. I have been in two car accidents on these mountain roads. People died. Hell, maybe she thinks I’ll kill her too?
“You don’t have to babysit me, RK. If you want to go fishing with Sean or something. I’m a homebody now. I can keep myself busy.”
“When did that happen?” I ask.
“What?”
“This homebody business? You were never a homebody when we were kids. You were always on the run if you weren’t playing music. Hiking, biking, swimming, skiing.”
“People change, RK. I’ve changed a lot.” She shoots me a sidelong glance out of the corner of her eye. “So have you.”
“Not all my changes were bad.”
“Mine either,” she quips. “Like I said, I can find plenty of ways to pass an afternoon.”
“What’s going on tonight?”
“I’m playing tonight. At Float’s.”
“Oh.” Goddammit. Everything in the town revolves around the bar. The stage. The music.
“You don’t have to come watch, either. Probably cramp my style. Probably bitch about how I play, or sing, or try to critique me the way you did that pianist this morning.”
“I didn’t—”
“You did.” She laughs. “I saw the look on your face when he played Für Elise.”
“He murdered that song.”
“Anyway, I have fanboys. So you can stay home and do what reclusive rock stars do.”
“You got a boyfriend?” I ask, picturing her fanboys.
“Do you think I’d be living in your bedroom if I did?”
I shrug as I pull the truck into the long driveway that leads up to our houses and then park in the garage when I get there. We get out and I stare at the place where she grew up down the driveway. “Why don’t you just sell that house if you don’t wan
t to live there? It’s got to be worth, what? Two million by now?”
“I can’t,” she sighs. And then she goes inside the house, clicking the garage door shut. She leaves me there, watching her house disappear.
I follow her inside, drop my keys off on the kitchen counter, and then go for a beer. Missy already has the shower going.
I take a swig and wander down the bedroom hallway, calling out, “Wanna beer?” to let her know I’m coming, just in case she’s undressing. I find her stripping out of her clothes in my room. She’s not shy these days because she unbuttons her formerly crisp, white shirt and unleashes the bra on me. “Why can’t you sell?” I ask, watching her slide the shirt off. Then I glance to her fingers as she unbuttons her pants. My eyes linger on her flat stomach. That belly button I’ve dreamed about kissing more times than I can remember. Those hip bones that always felt like the right place to put my hands when we were slow dancing.
“I just don’t want to lose what I have left.” She stares into my eyes as she unzips her pants and then shimmies, dropping them to her ankles.
“What do you mean?”
She steps out of her pants and reaches around behind her back to unclasp her bra. It falls forward, freeing her breasts. “Well,” she says softly. “That’s all we have left, right? Those memories of living next door to each other. I know they’re not all good ones, but enough of them are for me to want to cling to it.” She lets the bra fall to the floor and stands there naked. “Do you want to take a shower with me, RK? You smell like the lake.”
“Is the lake a bad smell?” I ask, watching her closely.
“No,” she says. “Not at all. I just want to be the one to wash it off you.”
She slips by me, her fingertips flitting along my arm as she passes, sending a chill through my body.
Chapter Eighteen
I take my shirt off as I walk across the hallway, throwing it down on the floor. Missy is standing with her back to me, testing the temperature of the shower. She peeks over her shoulder and smiles. “I know you probably hear this all this time, but damn, Rowan Kyle. You should never take that shirt off in public again.”
I go for my pants, unbuttoning them, unzipping them. She watches every move. And then I kick off my boots and fling them into the hallway with the shirt. She turns all the way around now and I feel myself getting hard as she presses her palm against my cock, squeezing it through my pants.
“If I knew you were coming back I’d have waited for you.”
God, that hurts.
“I just…” She stops, her sad eyes lingering on mine. “I just didn’t think you would. Come back, I mean.”
“I’m sorry,” I say. And I mean it. I’m so fucking sorry I wasn’t her first.
“It’s OK. We get to skip all that awkward fumbling, right?” She swallows hard and I know she’s sorry too. She was the only girl I dreamed about. The only girl I ever wanted. Even after all my rock-star nights, Melissa Vetti is still the only girl I want.
I place both my hands on her cheeks and lean down to kiss her mouth. Her lips part, her tongue seeking out mine. It’s soft, and slow, and short. Way, way too short.
She pulls away, taking her hand off my cock, and turns, stepping into the shower. I let my pants fall to the floor and toss them in the hallway. The shower has a clear glass surround and I watch her as she stands under the water, her fingers massaging it into her hair.
I step in with her and place my hands on her shoulders so I can turn her towards me. “Melissa—”
“Shh,” she says. “I don’t want to talk about it right now. I just want to enjoy this.” She picks up the soap and starts to lather me up, massaging the bubbles along my arms. Over my chest. Up and down my back.
I grab the bottle of shampoo and squeeze some into my palm, then rub my hands together and begin working it through her long, dark, hair as I study her face. The makeup is smearing as I watch. It makes her look like she’s crying.
“I feel like this is a dream,” she says, her soapy hands moving to my front. “I feel like I’ve been granted some wish but it’s all fake and you’re just going to disappear again. Leave me here alone. Lonely. You want to know why I stay home, RK?”
No. No, I really don’t.
“Because I’m lonely. Because you were my life. And I know I was having doubts back when we were about to graduate, but they were small doubts. Growing-up doubts. Not-knowing-what-I-wanted doubts. But I was never going to break up with you, RK. Never. And I was certainly never going to walk away from us.”
Fuck. I guess I haven’t looked at it from her point of view very much. “I walked away.”
“You walked away.” Her frown is so deep it hurts my heart.
“I’m sorry. I don’t even know why—”
“Shh,” she says again. “Later.”
Her hand slides up and down my cock as she looks me in the eyes. It’s a very intimate moment. Probably the most intimate moment I’ve had in years.
“Rinse,” I say.
Missy turns away, and I swear, I know what she’s feeling. Every time she does that I think she will never turn back to me again. I hate when she turns away. I watch as she rinses the shampoo out of her hair. The water streams down her face like that waterfall where we had our first kiss.
She’s not Melanie. How could I ever think she was Melanie?
“Can I make you dinner tonight? Before the show?” she asks when she turns back. The relief that she’s still here is real, as irrational as it is.
“Dinner?” I say, trying to wrap my head around the change of subject. I was about to attack her, lift her up, press her back against the wall, and fuck the shit out of her and now she’s talking about dinner.
“Yeah. Do you still like lemon pasta? Like your mom used to make?”
“Jesus,” I say. “The angel hair with the white wine sauce? I haven’t thought about that in years.”
“Yeah. Remember when I made that for you on your seventeenth birthday?” She laughs. It was a fun night. A really fun night. The kind of fun you only have with the girl of your dreams before you turn to drugs and need alcohol and sex to force the fun. “I fucked it all up,” she says through a giggle.
I grin as I picture her attempt to cook me something. “I’m not sure how anyone can fuck that recipe up, but yeah. You did.” She bites her lip and I almost die. “It was perfect though. Because you made it. And you made it special for me.”
“You ate every bite.”
“There was no chance in hell I wouldn’t, Missy. Not after you went to all that trouble. So sure. I’m not gonna complain about a trip down memory lane with you tonight.”
“Good,” Missy sighs. “Good.” And then she grabs the conditioner and the possibility of sex fades away.
I’m actually glad it fades. I’m glad she changed the subject. Turned us in a different direction. I know I hate-fucked her when I first got back into town, and I’m sorry about that. I’d like to take it back and get a do-over. I’d rather wait. Like we did when we were kids. I’d rather wait until we know for sure this is real, and special, and maybe even permanent.
I’d like to take my time with Melissa Vetti.
Chapter Nineteen
We finish up in the shower, get out, and go our separate ways. Her to the bedrooms where she’s got her clothes stashed in various places. Me to the living room where my former life is boxed up in cardboard. I grab my usual jeans and a t-shirt—this one is a once black, now faded gray, Something Corporate tour shirt from 2003 that I found in a record store where Son of a Jack did a promo appearance right after the first album launched. It’s been worn and washed so many times, there’s a two-inch rip near my right hip and the sleeves are frayed. Fucking love this shirt.
I don’t bother with the shoes, just finger-comb my hair back and make my way into the kitchen where Missy is already busy. “So,” I say, coming up behind her as she puts a pot of water on to boil. “What kind of songs do you play, Miss? Covers? Originals?”
She shoots me a look over her shoulder, one eyebrow raised. “Covers? Please. I’m an artist, RK. I outgrew covers a while back.”
“I know you’re an artist. I’m just asking. I’m out of the loop. I kinda want to know if you’re my competition.”
“Shit.” She laughs. “You can write the fuck out of a song, Rowan Kyle. I’m not sure there’s anyone alive who comes close to your talent.”
“Yeah,” I say, backing up. “He’s dead, I guess.”
Missy sighs but doesn’t turn around. “I know why you didn’t come back for the funeral. So if you think I’m judging you for that”—she shoots me another look over her shoulder—“I’m not. Your dad was a dick. Hell, my dad was a dick too. They were a couple of old, washed-out, rock-star dicks. You don’t get to choose your parents.”
She whirls around and starts rummaging through the fridge for lemons, sets them on the counter, and then goes for a bottle of wine in the wine fridge under the counter.
“So why’d you move in and help him out?” I ask. “When he got sick?”
She shrugs her shoulders at me, still busy with food preparation. “I wanted to root through your room. I’d been dying to do it since you took off. So I figured, two birds, right? Keep that bitter old man happy as he wasted away from lung cancer and obsessively pine over my long-lost love at the same time.”
I laugh.
“Besides, he was never an asshole to me. Just you and Teej.”
“I guess TJ was pretty pissed off when I never showed up.”
“He got over it. And I wouldn’t call it pissed, not really. More like disappointed.”