by Holt, Mina
I traced a long, abstract pattern of symmetrical designs that curved around and around his forearm. The same arm that was wrapped around my midsection, the same arm I had clung to in orgasm.
“Just some images I liked,” he replied and I dropped it. He didn’t seem as though he wanted to talk about them.
Still, they were gorgeous, skilfully done and they fit on his body perfectly, enhancing his bulging muscles, not too garish or obvious. They were all in black, all abstract and symmetrical patterns that moved up his arm and down one side of him. Interspersed in the designs were some images, a Koi fish, a lion, a dragon.
“Okay,” I said, “I was just curious. Did they hurt?”
“Not that much,” he replied, “I had them done over a few years, so it wasn’t too bad.”
“It’s a little shocking though, right?” I said, “I mean for somebody from your social upbringing.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“You came from money. Here in the US we think of you guys as preppy private school kids. Not exactly the tattooed bad boy image.” I smiled and wiggled up a little so I could look at him. “Not meaning you’re a bad boy, but you know.”
“So you think a kid from a nice family with a wealthy background can’t have ink?” he asked and grinned.
“Do your siblings have any?” I asked, “or your parents?”
“Dear god, no,” he laughed, “although I might pay good money to see my brother the investment banker get a full sleeve. Or my sister the international broker with a neck tattoo.”
I laughed with him, thinking of my own lack of ink. I hoped he didn’t see me as too boring because of it. “I have nothing,” I said, “maybe one day. I just don’t know what I want to look at on my old, wrinkled body. It might look pretty bad by then.”
“I think it would look fantastic, love,” he said, “but then again, I think you’ll be one hot old lady.”
I giggled and play slapped him, “I doubt you’d think my old wrinkled ass would be hot.”
“I think anything about you is hot, love,” he said and pulled me up on his chest and kissed me. I slid myself against him and felt him harden at my touch. I was already wet for him, I was pretty much always wet for him though. His body still affected me on some weird electrical chemical level. My nerves felt heightened around him, like they’d been rubbed raw and were sensitive to every cell in his body.
“You’re only saying that because I happen to be half naked on top of you,” I said, “I have a feeling you’d tell me anything right now to keep me here.”
“That’s not true,” he replied, suddenly serious, “I think you’re beautiful, and I’m not just saying that because you’re here. I care about you so much, Ms. Britton, and want you to know it.”
“I feel beautiful when you say it,” I replied and frowned, “and that worries me.”
“Why would it worry you?” he asked and rubbed my back slowly.
“It either means you’re sincere, in which case you will slowly deconstruct my carefully constructed walls at some point soon and I’ll be vulnerable…or you’re a very good liar. If that’s the case, guaranteed I will get hurt at some point soon.”
“I’m very good at a lot of things,” he said and pulled me in for another kiss, “but lying to you is not one of them. I mean it when I say it, you are beautiful and I care for you.”
“I care for you too,” I replied and kissed him this time.
“In fact,” he continued against my lips, “one might even say I love you.”
I pulled back and scanned his face for a joke. There was none, he was being sincere. I smiled, pressed my lips against his and whispered, “One might say I love you too.” Then we kissed again, his frantic tongue swirling around mine, his hips grinding against me, and his hands running all over my back. I moaned and felt a snake of pleasure travel up my spine. I shivered and fell deeper into the kiss.
After a moment he pulled away, furrowed his brow and was silent, his hands stopped moving. He scanned my face, as if looking for an answer, and appeared to have gotten what he needed. His face relaxed and he said, “They’re for my mother and my brothers.”
“What are?”
“The tattoos.”
“But you just said your family doesn’t have any,” I replied. I was confused, everything I’d read indicated his family wasn’t the kind to appreciate gestures such as this.
“My real family,” he said quietly, then closed his eyes. I felt him tense up, and I felt him withdraw from me, as though instantly regretting what he’d said.
I sat up slightly, propping myself on his chest and looking at his face. His eyes opened and he stared at me. “What do you mean?” I asked.
“I’m adopted,” he said and screwed his mouth into a twisted grimace. The pained look passed as soon as it appeared, but I could see it in his eyes.
“Your family isn’t your biological family?” I asked, incredulous. From the outside it had all seemed like a fairy tale.
“I was adopted when I was four,” he said, “I haven’t told anyone this, love. I want you to know that, this is how important you are to me.”
“Oh Gavin,” I said, exhaling in wonder at the trust he placed in me, “I am honored by this.”
“You were too young to remember it, and I’m not sure how much coverage it got over here, but I was found in a terrible situation. My father was an abusive drunk who went after my mother one night,” he said and his voice caught in his throat, “I had two older brothers. They…”
“It’s okay,” I said, “you don’t have to tell me everything.”
“I want to,” he said, “I feel like I need to. One night the police were called, the neighbours heard them fighting. My father had gone nuts and beaten her so badly she was almost unrecognizable. My brothers…they didn’t make it. She died later in hospital and I was given up for adoption.”
“Oh my god,” I whispered, “I am so sorry.”
“The press apparently called me Baby Charlie, it was all that was on TV for the entire year. My family saw the story and my mother decided she absolutely had to have me. Strings were pulled, and I became theirs, all aspects of my past was erased from the record and nothing more was said about it.”
“Do you remember anything about that time?”
“Not at all, thankfully.”
“Where do the tattoos come in?”
“The symbols are my mother’s sketches, from a couple things that were given me when I turned eighteen. My birth mother had books and books full of these intricate, abstract drawings so I had some turned into these tattoos,” he said and indicated the lines wrapping his arm. “The animals each represent one of them, my mother and two brothers.”
I was speechless, I hadn’t expected him to tell me such a deeply painful and intimate story and I wasn’t certain how to react, what to say.
Instead of saying anything, I laid my head on his chest and listened to his heart, put my arms around him the best I could and said, “Thank you for sharing that with me, I love you for it.”
“I love you too, Sarai,” he said quietly.
He started rubbing my back again and we fell into a comfortable silence, the crappy kung fu movie on in the background and the sound of the city from down below on the street was the backdrop to our deep thinking.
I felt a communion with Gavin that was growing by the day. Every moment I spent with him tightened the bonds that were growing between us.
Each beat of our hearts put more distance between who I was then, and who I had been. The fear was being left on some distant horizon as we moved towards something new together.
“Thank you by the way,” he said.
I looked up at him, “What for?”
“For not looking at me differently, for not flinching while I told you,” he said, “you don’t know how much that means to me, love.”
“Why would that change what I thought of you?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he said, “I’v
e had it bottled up and hidden for so long I didn’t know how it would sound once it hit the light of day.”
“It sounds atrocious,” I said, “and shocking, but it doesn’t change how I feel about you. If anything, it makes you more human to me.”
He seemed to pull back slightly, raised an eyebrow and said, “More human?”
I blushed and stuttered, “Yes, not to sound rude but it makes you more approachable.”
“What else did you need to approach me?” he teased, “I practically chased you down, Ms. Britton. I don’t think you had much of a choice.”
I laughed and hid my face in my hands, suddenly overcome with embarrassment at my assessment. “I mean here you are…you…and you’re famous and amazing and everybody knows who you are. And here I am…me…a nobody. I still don’t know how this all happened.”
“You are certainly not a nobody,” he said, “especially not to me, love. You are very much a somebody.”
“But it’s all so crazy,” I protested, “this kind of thing really doesn’t happen in real life. So when you tell me something that makes you less than one hundred percent flawless, it means I can relate with you on some level.”
“I wish it weren’t that particular level though,” he sighed.
“Me too,” I replied, “but sorrow is powerful, and if that’s the one place where we meet up, then perhaps it truly is meant to be. We’re in each other’s lives to help each other heal. I know I haven’t felt this alive in years, but of course I can’t speak for you and your amazing life.”
He paused and appeared to think about my response. I loved studying his perfect face while he thought about something I said. He finally replied, “It’s odd though, people look at me from the outside and assume everything is perfect. It’s not, and for years I’ve felt like I’ve been living a lie.”
“Do you not like modeling?”
“I do,” he admitted, “I enjoy what I do but there are times I feel like half a person. My family doesn’t want anyone knowing about the adoption, and my publicist said if the press caught wind of my early childhood, it would be career suicide. There’s nothing sexy about the poor little orphan boy who was almost killed by his deranged father. The general public doesn’t want real, they want sexy.”
“I’m not the general public,” I replied and pressed my face to his naked chest again, felt the steady rhythm of my heart reassuring me this wasn’t a dream, this was all happening. “I find you sexy and wonderful and absolutely perfect for me no matter where you came from.”
He kissed the top of my head and said, “That’s exactly why I love you so much, Ms. Britton, you are unlike anyone I’ve ever met.”
I smiled and closed my eyes, felt his hands touching me, but more than that, I felt his soul touching mine.
Chapter Twenty
“It’s just for three days,” David, Gavin’s agent, said, “and the pay is awesome. We’ll fly you there, shoot for one full day, dinner with the photographer, and back here the next day. So not even three full days, really.”
He had just told Gavin about a short job in New York, but it was starting tomorrow and would go over the weekend. He wouldn’t be back until Sunday evening, and my birthday was Saturday. We’d planned a small party to celebrate.
He looked at me and rubbed his chin, he had some stubble growing in and the small action of his hand moving over it made me squirm in my seat.
I wondered if I’d ever get tired of looking at him, if I’d ever get bored of his incredible hotness.
My clenching, wet pussy said the forecast was not bloody likely.
“I can’t do it,” he said, “I don’t care who it’s for.”
“Calvin won’t like this,” David replied, “this might mean you’re bumped off next season. I know it’s not convenient, but you have to understand that the best photographers are booked years in advance, when they get an opening, the team has to take it.”
“It’s Sarai’s birthday,” he said and grabbed my hand, “I can’t turn my back on her.”
“Bring her along then,” David said, “make a weekend of it.”
“I’ve got inventory Friday,” I interjected, “I promised Marta. She’s short staffed as it is…sorry.”
“It’s not going to work,” Gavin insisted, “tell Calvin to give me more notice next time.”
“Gavin,” David said, “I don’t think you quite get this.” He looked at me, shifted in his seat and looked extremely uncomfortable. “I know you think you’re in love, no offense Sarai, but this is your career. This could make or break you. If you want to stay in the US, you need to go where they want you.”
“He’s right,” I said and sipped my drink, “photographers are booked forever. I mean, the good ones are.”
“Yes,” David said and looked at me to mouth, “thank you” under his breath.
“Your father was a photographer, wasn’t he?” Gavin asked me.
“He was. Harold Britton, photographer to the stars,” I said and smiled, “he was a pretty cool guy.”
“Oh my god,” David said, “I had no idea! I worked with him. I mean I worked within some of the same circles, but we all seemed to orbit around him. He was his own little world, on his own level of greatness. I’m sorry about what happened.”
“Thank you,” I said and sipped my drink again. I always hated it when people made the connection, that my parents had been murdered and I’d been left orphaned, but being with Gavin was taking the sting off. Knowing his life only added to accepting my own life story.
“So that means your mother was Vivienne Reynolds. Oh, it’s all making sense now. You look so much like her, have you ever modeled?”
“Oh god no,” I snorted, “I have my mother’s height and my father’s grace. Or lack thereof. It’s not exactly a printable quality.”
David turned to Gavin and said, “Wow, she’s in the business. This is fashion royalty right here, did you know that when you snatched her up?”
Gavin was looking at me strangely and said, “No, I had no idea.” He smiled, as though discovering me for the first time, his face full of wonder.
“I wouldn’t say royalty,” I blushed and stuck my face in my martini glass yet again. Sipping my Manhattan was a convenient way to avoid the conversation. I might be drunk if they kept flattering me like that.
“I would,” David said, “I had a poster of your mother when I was a teen…wait, that sounded creepy. I mean I admired her work.”
I laughed to let him know I wasn’t offended. Almost anyone over the age of thirty told me that when they found out who my mother was, man or woman, it didn’t matter. My mother had been one of the very first super models, a known humanitarian and constant advocate for the oppressed. She’d been an amazing woman really.
“It’s quite all right that you had the poster,” I said to David, and to Gavin I added, “and that you will miss my birthday. Just promise to Skype with me and read me a bedtime story and I’ll be okay.”
“Just okay?” Gavin said and looked at me as if to gauge my sincerity.
“More than okay,” I laughed, “I’ll be fine.”
“There’s my girl,” he said, “but I’ll only go if you’re absolutely certain.”
I looked at David, gave him my most serious face and said, “Make sure he goes to New York, but also make sure he gets me an amazing birthday present.”
“Sounds good, I promise,” he replied, laughed and shook my hand.
Gavin still seemed reluctant, but I’d be damned before I let him put his career aside because of me.
***
“You’re serious, he didn’t show up for your birthday?” Jenny whined for the tenth time that night.
We’d decided to do inventory on Saturday since I’d be kicking around town anyhow.
At the end of it, they’d surprised me with a dinner at a restaurant just around the corner from the bookstore. Auntie G was there, so was Jenny and all my coworkers. They’d even invited Ethan and Jane and I was shocked t
o see them there in my world.
“He’s awfully sorry he couldn’t make it,” Jane said, apologizing for Gavin yet again.
“Don’t worry,” I told her and glared at Jenny, “I made him go. It was an amazing opportunity for him to work with a top notch photographer.”
“He’s said your father was a photographer, and your mother was a model?” David joined in.
“Yes,” I replied, “but unfortunately they passed away several years ago.”
They gave the appropriate looks of sympathy, then kept talking like I wasn’t a sad orphan girl with a chip on her shoulder.
That’s when it hit me, I no longer was that girl, not really anyways.
I still felt awkward around Ethan and Jane, and even my friends on some level, but I felt more and more like I was earning my place in the world. Being around Gavin had given me confidence, but being loved by him had allowed me to open myself up and accept new experiences and people into my life.
I loved him even more for that.
“He’s really mad about you,” Jane said, “it’s so lovely for us to see. We’ve watched him through the years and always hoped he’d find somebody he was truly happy with. You make him happy, and we thank you for that.” She glanced nervously at Ethan as though she’d made a social faux pas. He nodded and agreed with her wholeheartedly.
It felt good.
“But still, he didn’t show up on your birthday,” Jenny said loudly. I kicked her under the table and she jumped, fell quiet and shot me a look of anger.
The rest of the dinner was perfect, the wine, the food, the conversation, even the presents. From Ethan and Jane I received a beautiful and elegant hand bag, something I never would have thought to buy for myself but it would be perfect with the style I was slowly adopting.
From my coworkers, I received a tea travel mug with a secret compartment for my tea bag. The hilarious thing was that it had Rebecca Hawk’s book cover printed on the side, so I would essentially be drinking my hot beverages from Gavin’s abs.