Ink and Lies
Page 19
“I don’t understand why it’s so soon. I asked her about it when she dropped it off earlier this week. She said it’s because that doctor is moving her to the coast, and needs to be there by spring. Still, I think it’s too soon. What about her job? Her apartment?” He’s rambling. The Colonel never rambles.
“January 23rd,” is all I can say.
“Why can’t he go on to Seattle and set things up first? Why not deal with that first instead of trying to juggle a new marriage and a new city all at once?”
“January 23rd.”
“I know, son. It’s too soon. I wanted to tell her, but it just didn’t seem appropriate at the time. Now if she had asked me…”
January 23rd. I feel like I’ve just been told it’s the day I’m going to die.
Suddenly, the paper in my hand feels like it’s been lined with lead. My mouth is dry. My head is spinning. My face is hot.
“I have to go.”
“Now, wait a minute, son. Don’t go off and do anything you’ll regret. You can’t interfere if this is what she wants.”
“What she wants? Fiona doesn’t know what she wants.”
“You had your shot, August. All you can do now is try to make things right before it’s too late.”
I shake my head. “It’s already too late. We’re done. She made that perfectly clear when she chose him over me.”
“You can still be there for her. She needs you. You need her.”
I ignore him, and turn for the door, leaving him to shout reason at my back. I don’t need her. I don’t need anyone. And apparently, she doesn’t need me. Maybe she never did.
I’M FADING INTO OBLIVION, DRIFTING into a haze of purples and blues and yellows. The smoke tastes like sin in my throat, thick and heavy like 5 a.m. fog. I trade one burn for another and douse the wildfire with gasoline.
I’m in a club full of strangers, flying high above the crowd. There are hands on my thighs, lips on my face, teeth on my ear. I feel it, yet I don’t. I’m beyond sensation, beyond bliss, beyond feeling.
I’m nothing. I’m everything.
I’ve lost count of how many shots we’ve taken. Sunny and her friends have provided a steady stream of alcohol, courtesy of my credit card. I don’t mind. After I left the Colonel’s apartment, I knew I needed to get out of my head, get out of my skin. So I called up the one person who wouldn’t ask me if I was ok. She wouldn’t care if my feelings were hurt or if I wanted to talk. We don’t do that, and if we did, I wouldn’t remember at this point.
“Here, try this,” she whispers in my ear. She pulls back just enough for me to see a small pink pill on her tongue.
“What is it?” I slur.
“Don’t worry about it. You’ll be fine. My friends and I pop them like Tic Tacs when we party.”
I’ve never done the pill thing. Nicotine and fine scotch were always my drugs of choice. But in the spirit of pissing on the past, I grab the back of her head and snake my tongue into her mouth, drinking in the sweet taste of apple martinis mixed with the bitterness of the mysterious tablet. We stay intertwined like that for what seems like hours, fucking each other with our clothes on. She grips my cock through my jeans and I stroke the skin under her short skirt. Her friends don’t notice between taking selfies and dancing to Zedd, and I doubt they’d care even if they did. One of them even alluded to some group love later on.
The song switches to Justin Bieber’s “Sorry,” causing the girls to squeal with drunken glee.
“Come on, let’s dance!” Sunny shrieks over the upbeat melody.
“No, you go ahead,” I insist with a wave. I’m all for having fun, but I draw the line at Bieber.
I watch with hazy eyes as the girls grind and touch each other from a couple yards away. They’re putting on a show for me, making promises with each wicked sway of hips and ass. This should be enough to stifle the ache, to fill the emptiness. This should be enough to push me into total detachment.
“What are you doing here?” a voice asks me from behind. It’s the last voice I want to hear. It’s the only voice I want to hear.
With liquid limbs, I turn around to see Fiona, decked out in a tight, black sleeveless dress.
“Obviously, the same damn thing you’re doing,” I reply without hesitation.
My candor jars her and she shifts on her platform heels. “Oh. It’s just…you hate clubs.”
“Says who?”
“Says you. You’ve always detested them. Said it was no more than a modern day auction block with an outrageous cover charge.”
“Well, I guess you don’t know me as well as you think you do,” I smirk, reaching over to snag a random glass of champagne from our table. That’s when Fiona takes in all the various bottles of bubbly, vodka and tequila.
“Did you drink all this?”
“What does it matter to you?” I shrug. “Where’s your fiancé?”
“Home. I’m here with girls from work and some of the ladies from his office.”
“Oh. Celebrating the official announcement? Early bachelorette party?”
She fingers her styled curls nervously and her eyes dart around the club like strobe lights. “August, I know I didn’t send you an invite, but considering how you feel about Joshua, and how we left things, I didn’t think it was…”
“Save it,” I say with a wave of my palm. “It’s cool. I get it. No need to explain.”
The song ends and the girls come bounding back to the couch, a muss of sequins, hair spray and stilettos. Sunny flops onto my lap with a squeak, while her friends take the space at my sides, squeezing in as close as possible.
“Hey, who’s your friend?” she asks, looking Fiona up and down with an air of amusement.
“Yeah, August, who’s your friend?” the girl at my right chimes in.
I look back at Fi who wears a veil made of blood red rage and pain. Her big, brown eyes stare at me, begging me to snap out of it. Urging me to see past the hurt and humiliation and be the August that she once knew. Unfortunately, that man died the day Hope did.
“Nobody special,” I reply to my female companions. “She was just leaving.”
I hate him.
I hate him, I hate him, I hate him.
I hate that he’s so cavalier with his little tramps. I hate that he treats me like I’ve done something wrong. I hate that he pretends he doesn’t care.
I hate that I can’t escape him. I hate that I can’t shake him.
I hate that I can’t hate him.
I walk away feeling deflated on my four-inch heels. I hate these shoes too, even though Joshua thinks they make my calves look great.
“Hey, Fiona! Where have you been?” slurs my coworker, Andrea, as she slings an arm around my shoulder.
“Oh, went to grab another drink,” I lie.
“Oooh, good.” Andrea looks down at my empty hands and frowns. “Where is it?”
Busted. “Oh, um, I drank it. Thirsty,” I reply with a nervous chuckle.
Luckily, Andrea is beyond tipsy and successfully working her way to WGW (white girl wasted) status. She happily shrugs it off and returns to her own little bubble of cheesy man-boys and booze, inconspicuously pointing out some guy a few yards away that just sent her a drink. It’s an Appletini. Really? Do we look like college chicks with fake IDs and padded bras over here?
“He’s hot, right? Tell me he’s hot,” she whisper-shouts in my ear, blowing her sour apple-laced hot breath on me.
“Oh, yeah. Definitely.” Not hot. Seriously, how can your pants be too baggy and high-waters at the same time? His ankles look cold and sad.
“You better not just be saying that,” she warns playfully. “God, I’m so horny. I haven’t had sex in six months, and I just ran out of batteries. He is so coming home with me tonight.”
I divert my judgy eyes to the other ladies currently on the dance floor. If Andrea wants to get laid by a guy who thinks an apple martini is impressive and can’t even afford a full pair of pants, then who am I to stand in her way?
“Having fun?” Sue asks, wiping sweat from her brow. She’s gorgeous—of course. Everyone in Joshua’s office is, but I guess that comes with the job. No one wants to take cosmetic advice from someone who looks like Jabba the Hut.
“Oh, yeah. Sure,” I answer, trying to slap on a happy face. It isn’t working. “Hey, I’m going to go to the ladies room.”
“Want me to come with you?”
“Oh, no. I just need a quiet place to call Joshua.”
She lifts her brows in amusement. According to her, I’m the only woman Joshua has brought around the office and his employees. “Ok, but you better start having a good time or I may get fired! Hurry back!” Then she’s back on the dance floor, hooking some unsuspecting guy’s attention, and pulling him along with her.
I sift through the crowd, careful not to crush any toes with my heels. At some point, I give up on saying Excuse Me. You can’t be polite to someone with their butt cheeks hanging out of their shorts when it’s thirty degrees outside.
Once I get to the long hallway that leads to the bathrooms, I find a safe place against the wall and text Joshua. He has an early morning, so I don’t call. If he’s up, which I doubt, he’ll call or text back. My heart sinks after five minutes without a reply. It’s not that late, but I know he needs his rest.
“Well, well, well,” I hear a familiar sneer from down the hallway. “I thought you would’ve left by now.”
With an aggravated sigh, I drop my phone back into my bag, and look up to see August sauntering towards me. “And why’s that? Just because you so rudely dismissed me, that doesn’t mean I have to leave.”
“No, it doesn’t. I’m just surprised your loving fiancé hasn’t summoned you home by now.”
“Whatever, August. I’m done trying to talk to you,” I huff, trying to hurriedly brush past him. But before I can escape his rude taunts, he grips my forearm.
“Wait. That was mean. I’m sorry.” He sags against the wall and pulls me back towards him. “Don’t leave, Fi. I was only joking.”
I get a whiff of the alcohol concentrated sweat coming out of his pores and take in his hazy eyes. “You’re drunk.”
“You’re observant.”
“You reek. And you’re all sweaty,” I grimace, pulling my arm from his clammy grasp.
He laughs, tipping his head back and closing his eyes. Even with damp hair and booze breath, the sight and sound of him laughing still completely disarms me. I look down the hall toward the steady stream of patrons rushing for the toilets, just to give my eyes something else to look at.
“What the heck is so funny?”
“You, Fi. You’re hilarious. You never minded my sweat before.”
I shrug, still averting my eyes. “Well, you never bathed in beer before either. But don’t worry. Your little groupies will probably lick it off you later. Just make sure you have them home before their curfews.”
“Oh, don’t tell me you’re jealous.”
At that, I spin around to pin him with my best stank face. “Jealous? Jealous of what?” I ask incredulously. “Jealous that I didn’t have to use a fake ID to get in here?”
“Hey, now. Sunny and her friends are legal,” he insists with a grin.
“Sunny? Oh gosh. Are her friends named Snowflake and Stormy? Will they hit me with the Care Bear Stare if they catch me talking to you?”
August bursts into laughter, and shakes his head, unable to vocalize a decent defense through his chuckles.
“Seriously, August. Watch your back tonight. With their powers combined, they might try to summon Captain Planet. Your apartment is a landfill, and the only thing you recycle is women.”
“Ouch, Fi,” he snickers. “You wound me.”
“Oh, please. That would mean that you actually cared. And we both know that’s not the case.”
He instantly goes quiet, all signs of mirth wiped clean from his handsome face. Oh, his face. Perfect cheekbones that I’ve envied since the day we met, almond-shaped brown eyes, a strong chiseled jaw, and by far the most beautiful lips I have ever seen…or kissed. He once told me how he hated his mouth, saying it seemed too sensual, too soft. I almost replied that it was his sexiest attribute, aside from his mind. Instead, I made a tasteless joke involving Steven Tyler and a vacuum cleaner.
Had I’d told him then, maybe we wouldn’t be here. Maybe it wouldn’t physically pain me just to steal a glance at him. Maybe he wouldn’t be drunk and slouched over, looking like he’s carrying the weight of the world on his broad shoulders.
“My problem isn’t caring, Fi,” he says so quietly, I think I’m imagining it. “My problem is caring too much.”
I don’t know what to say. I don’t know if there’s anything left to say.
“August, I…,” I reach out to touch him, but stop myself. I don’t want to hurt him anymore.
He shakes his head before easing it back to the wall. He’s panting, and he hasn’t cooled down at all. He’s still sweating like crazy.
“Hey, are you feeling ok?” I ask, battling the urge to reach over to feel his forehead.
He begins to nod, but then thinks better of it. “I’m fucked up. I shouldn’t have taken that pill.”
Pill? Holy shhh…“What pill?”
“I don’t know. Think it was Molly. Sunny gave it to me. Dammit, I should’ve eaten or something. I need some water.”
I don’t resist this time. I rest a hand on his sweat-drenched face, only to find that he’s burning up. “August, you need to get out of here. Come on, I’m taking you home.”
He shakes his head, but his body is so limp, I’m able to pull him along easily. Now keeping him upright long enough to get out of here, that’s the feat.
“What about Sunny and the girls?” he slurs, as I lead him down the hallway.
“They can Uber it. They’re probably still dancing.” Not to mention, none of them have ventured out to find him.
“And your friends?”
“I’ll text them. They’re all probably getting lucky tonight anyway.”
When we get to the main bar area, August stops me with a slight squeeze of my hand. “I have to close my tab.”
“Ok, good. We can get you some water too.”
After much effort to keep him coherent enough to pay his astronomical bill (seriously, how much did he and those girls drink?), I usher him out of the club and into the cold, crisp night air.
“Come on, I’m parked over here.”
“Fi, you don’t have to do this. I’ll catch a cab…”
“Nonsense. You’re in no position for that. Come on. It’s not much further.”
Once I get him safely in my little Honda Accord, I roll down the windows and carefully make my way out onto the slick roads.
“Fi, you’ll freeze to death,” he groans from the passenger seat.
“N-N-No, I w-w-w-won’t-t-t,” I reply through chattering teeth. I’ve got good sense enough to put on my coat, but my legs are still very much exposed. “I’m f-f-f-fine.”
Maybe it’s the alcohol or the drug in his system that makes him throw all rationality to the cold wind, but without a second thought, he leans over to me, rests his warm cheek on my shoulder and carefully snakes his arm around my waist.
“Better?” he whispers, those full, sumptuous lips much too close, yet not close enough.
Better is the understatement of the year. I’m positively on fire. “Yes. Better.”
When we get to his building, the doorman helps me get him out the car and on two legs. In arrogant August style, he tries to put on a manly face and act like he doesn’t need help.
“I can’t believe you took something, Au
gust. What were you thinking?” I gently scold, unlocking his front door.
“I wasn’t,” he murmurs. “I didn’t want to think anymore.”
Walking inside his apartment floods me with more emotions than I can name. But I don’t have a chance to address them. We head straight to the bathroom where I begin to draw him a cool bath.
“You need to soak for a while until your body temperature comes down,” I explain while bending over to check the water. “It might feel cold at first, but you’ll adjust.”
When I turn around, I nearly run right into August. Naked. August is naked.
“You took your clothes off!” I try to divert my eyes, but it’s impossible not to look at him.
“That’s what you usually do before having a bath, right?” Despite my gawking, he walks past me to get into the tub.
“Yes, but…” But it’s highly inappropriate for you to be naked in front of a betrothed woman? Or, But it’s not fair that I can’t touch you the way I long to?
“It’s no big deal, Fi,” he insists, cupping water in his hands and running it over his face and chest. “It’s not like you haven’t seen me naked before.”
All I can do is nod, then force myself to give him some much needed privacy. Darn.
Remembering my plan, I grab my cell and text Andrea, telling her I was tired and calling it a night. I don’t mention August. After I hit send, I scroll to Joshua’s name. It’s a good idea that I let him know where I am. That’s what you do when you’re engaged. That’s what you do when you’re about to pledge to be someone’s wife and partner for the rest of your life. You check in. You make good choices. You don’t put yourself in situations that would tempt you to do something you may regret.
I power down and stow my cell back in my purse where it will remain, if only for tonight. Then I return to the bathroom, in search of a towel.
I AMBLE THROUGH THE FOG of forgetting, disoriented and weak. My head feels like lead, my mouth feels like cotton and my body feels…naked. Through the stiffness in my joints, I manage to do a quick assessment and find that I, in fact, have on underwear. So not technically naked, yet not technically clothed either.