by Vivian Lux
Except for the one black chair in the center. That was where Dr. Roslin sat down, tucking her legs up underneath it and leaning forward.
"How are you?" she asked, notebook poised.
"Fine."
"I'm glad to hear it. Things are going well for you?"
I bit my lip. "You know I suck at those kinds of judgment calls. I mean, I think they're good. But everything I think is good for me turns out to be really bad so who the fuck knows?"
She blinked but her expression remained unchanged. "Why don't we talk about what's going on so we can determine whether these are good choices for you?"
I leaned back and folded my arms. "There's a guy," I said. I tried like hell to keep my voice flat and neutral, but even I could hear how breathlessly excited I sounded.
Her ears twitched. "You're seeing someone," she said. "That's progress."
"Yeah," I mumbled. "I'd say it is."
"And have you..."
"Fucked?" Ear twitch. "No. But I masturbated in front of him. Last night."
Ear twitch. "Was that, ah, empowering for you?"
"You know? It really fucking was." I closed my eyes so that her continual ear-twitches wouldn't distract me. "He, ah," my voice softened as I remembered the trembling in his upper arm, the way his hand jerked at his side, how badly he wanted to touch me. But he'd remained still. "He didn't push me."
"Have you told him about your history and your status as a survivor?"
I snapped my eyes open. "No."
She tilted her head. "Piper, we've talked about this."
"Yeah, and talking about it is precisely what I don't want to do!" I exploded. I closed my eyes again.
There was a pause. I could hear the sound of her pen click. "Well if you don't trust this man with your history..."
"Actually," I interrupted. "I do."
Her ears twitched just as I blinked and I realized that I meant it.
"If you trust him..."
"I do."
"There's no reason to be ashamed, Piper."
"I'm not ashamed!" I protested. "This is the part that no one understands. Not my brother, not anyone, not even you. I'm not keeping my secret because I'm ashamed." I leaned back and looked at the ceiling.
"Tell me why then," she said earnestly.
I closed my eyes. "Okay. Here I go. I'm about to tell True about my past." I cleared my throat and looked at her. "Hi True. I like it when you kiss me all soft and tender while your eyes get all hungry for more. I like the way your hands tremble because you can barely contain how much you want to touch me. And I want you to touch me, but before you do, lemme just real quick mention that I was violently raped as a kid."
I closed my eyes. I could see his stormy eyes, the way they'd snap back with fear, with revulsion and laughed helplessly.
"What? Oh yeah I was a little kid. How old? Young. No, younger. Younger than your daughter, actually. Yup. By my uncle. My dad's brother. Kinda fucked me up for the rest of my life but go ahead and touch me now, I'm sure that's the first thing you're thinking of..."
I snapped my eyes back open and ignored the track of tears that streamed down my face. "Sounds like a fucking plan," I hissed.
Dr. Roslin blinked, then she turned and reached for the box of tissues that sat on the table next to her. I snatched two from her and turned away. "Because of course, what is he supposed to say when I tell him that my uncle raped me behind an above ground swimming pool at my cousin's seventh birthday party?" I asked the wall. "He's not going to say a damn thing worthwhile, but he sure as hell will look at me different. And I wouldn't blame him for feeling shitty. It is shitty, I'm not denying that. I wished it never happened to me. I'm sure I would be a happier person. But it did happen. I have to live with that. And I also have to live with the fact that the second I tell you what happened to me, that's all you're going to think of me when you look into my eyes." I was shouting now. "Poor Piper. Poor damaged Piper. How can she ever go on?"
I took a hitching breath, squeezing the tissues in my hand, then started shredding them. Fuck her couch and fuck this whole situation. "If you ask me," I growled. "That's even bigger bull shit than what happened in the first place. I'm not a fucking victim. It's time for me to stand on my own two goddamned feet. I don't need to be treated with kid gloves. In fact, I'd rather somebody take off the gloves and hit back once in a while."
I turned back to face Dr. Roslin. Her ears were twitching with each word out of my mouth, but I wasn't talking just to freak her out any more. I was talking because the words would not stop coming. "I want to fight somebody," I said. "I want to feel something. Bad, good, I don't give a shit. I want to really get into it, to really feel emotions again. This..." I waved my hands, my breath coming faster now. "This glassed-in existence, where people only see me through the lens of my tragedy is getting really fucking tiresome. I'm done with staying apart. I'm done with being outside of everything, but I don't know how to do this."
I took a deep breath and waited, holding perfectly still.
"What do you want to do, Piper?" Dr. Roslin said. She didn't sound cool and professional. She sounded excited.
I was excited.
"I want to be... with him." I pressed my hands together. "I want the next step." I looked at her, no longer angry. "He did something for me," I said. "Last night. And now I do something back, right? That's how this works? Give and take? Transactions?"
Dr. Roslin blinked. "It's not exactly like that."
"What is it like?"
She blinked again. "What's what like?"
I cleared my throat. "Love?"
"You know what love is, Piper."
"Do I?" I choked. "I'm not really sure I do. This is...fucking scary, Doctor. Things I'm realizing I never knew and I never even knew I didn't know them. That's the worst part. I feel like an alien visiting earth. I don't know how this works."
Dr. Roslin leaned back in her chair. "You want to see him again?"
"Yes," I said firmly.
"You want to touch him?"
I closed my eyes, imagining the way his skin would feel under my fingers. How warm he was. How the little burnished hairs on his head would scratch under my fingernails, how his eyes would close as my hands moved down... "Yes," I whispered.
"And you want him to touch you?"
I shivered. What he'd done to me, last night, with just his voice... "He said it would be that good," I said out loud. "And even more than that." I didn't give a shit that she had no idea what I was saying. I was lost in the feeling of his hands on my skin, his mouth doing all those things he'd promised last night.
"I do," I said firmly.
"So you should see him again, then," Dr. Roslin said. Like this was just the easiest thing in the world.
"How?"
"Do you have his number?"
I thought for a moment. "I have the place where he works."
"That's not...ideal."
"I know where he lives."
"That's good!"
"You want me to just show up at his house again?"
If she was exasperated with me, at least the Botox hid it. "Could you think of a reason why you'd go to his house?"
"I could..." I trailed off, tapping my finger against my temple. "Bring him something?"
"Sure!" she said. "A present." What do you think he'd like?"
I thought for a second. "I have an idea. His daughter, she wants to play piano but she doesn't have one. I could give her one of the keyboards I have in storage. I'm not using them."
"Is that the kind of thing you think would make him happy?"
I flashed back to the way he'd watched Rory as she played next to me. "I think so."
Dr. Roslin looked down at her notepad. She flipped the page back, and then ahead again and looked up at me. Clicking her pen, she wrote something down. "Okay," she said. "But more importantly, how would it make you feel to give it?"
I pulled back and closed my eyes. In front of my vision I could almost see a million tiny lit
tle cracks, some bigger than others. Some big enough to let the light in. "It would make me really happy," I said, opening my eyes. I took in a deep breath and it felt like my lungs fully inflated for the first time. Like I was finally breathing free. "I would feel really, really good."
Even the Botox wasn't enough to mask the way Dr. Roslin's eyes widened in surprise.
And I'll admit, that made me pretty fucking happy too.
Chapter Twenty-Two
True
"Sorry," I said again, flashing the school secretary my widest, most innocent smile. "Won't happen again."
She gave me a look that let me know exactly what she thought of deadbeat dads like me, then turned and smiled at Rory. "Okay Aurora, you're all set."
Rory winced at the name, but she turned and gave me a big hug. "Bye Daddy."
I kissed the top of her head. "Bye little lady. You have a good day at school. Mommy will be picking you up, remember."
At that, she clung to me just a little bit tighter. I pulled gently on her arm. "Sweetie, you're already really late, okay?"
"I know, you didn't want to leave Miss Piper's house," Rory grinned.
The secretary gave an audible sniff of disapproval.
I glanced up at her. "I definitely didn't," I said a little more loudly than I needed to. "Miss Piper is a very nice lady.
Rory nodded, then grabbed her backpack "I'm glad we stopped at home so I could change my clothes," she said. Then she leaned forward and sniffed me. "You need to get new clothes too, Daddy."
I kissed her and shoved her out the door. "Bye, baby girl," I said, rolling my eyes.
The secretary looked like she was about to have an aneurysm.
Pulling my keys from my pocket, I headed back out into the dusty parking lot of Rory's faded elementary school. Rory was right, I needed a shower. Preferably an ice cold one.
Piper's eyes are squeezed shut, her pretty little pouted lips forming a perfect 'o' as her body arches upward, drawn from the center like she's being lifted from her navel, her thighs quivering, her legs splayed wide. Her feet are pointed, toes curled under and as the full force hits her, her eyes snap open, wide and awestruck...
There was not enough cold water in the world to erase that image from my brain.
I raced home, threw the truck in park and slammed open the shitty screen door. Our trailer was hooked up to municipal water at least, so I could crank the shower up to full blast while I shed yesterday's clothes like a snake sheds its skin. My skin was hot and tingling, and my cock was sore from the longest twenty-four hours of denial in my life.
"Shit," I hissed out loud. The water was like needles on my back and my shoulders grazed the slippery walls because the stall was so tiny, leaving me no escape from the icy spray. But just the thought of Piper, asking me to look at her, asking me to tell her she was beautiful, had me hard as a fucking diamond all over again. I closed my fist around my cock and moaned, long and loud and frustrated as all fuck.
"Tell me I'm beautiful," she whispers, her words just as naked and needy as she is. "You're so fucking beautiful," I whisper back, as I climb over top of her. This time she reaches for me, and the grace and strength in her fingers is evident as she moves her hands over my body, her eyes wide in wonder over how much she needs to touch me after waiting so long. I wait, trembling, my cock poised at her entrance, until the moment she looks at me again and her mouth curls up into a grin. "I'm ready," she says, and I slip into that scalding hot softness inch by inch, feeling her tighten and then bloom around me. I run my hands over every inch of her skin as I move inside of her because she wants me...she wants me...she wants me...
I gritted my teeth, my hips jerking in a quick spasm, and then groaned out, long and loud. I felt like I was going to come forever. The effort of holding back, of waiting, of hoping, made me sag against the wall of the stall, my knees almost giving out.
"Fuck," I sighed.
What the fuck was I doing here? A grown-ass man jerking it in the shower after a night of frustrated dry-humping. This was worse than being in middle school. Why the hell was I doing this to myself?
I toweled off, feeling no sense of relief. That same itching frustration still singed my skin. There were a million other girls who'd be glad to hop right into the sack with me. Hell, all I needed to do right now was head down to Halligan's and take my fucking pick. There was no need to wait, to be so fucking careful, to deny myself, when every other woman on the planet was down to fuck.
I don't want any other woman on the planet.
A mirthless laugh barked from my lips. "Holy fuck," I said out loud. "You idiot. You love her."
Somewhere in between the insults and the lack of touching, I'd somehow managed to fall head over fucking heels with Piper Stowe, a fucking rockstar goddess who wouldn't -- couldn't -- fuck me.
After spending years in a loveless marriage, I'd turned right around and immediately fallen in love with a person who wasn't ready to love me back.
I yanked my shirt on, alternating between flashes of hot anger and bursts of rueful laughter.
She'd never even touched me. Not once.
And I was irrevocably, irredeemably, one hundred percent in love with her.
"Fuck," I said again.
Talk about being stuck in a fucking rut.
I had to get out of this. It wasn't fair to Piper, who clearly wasn't ready for anything. And it sure as fuck wasn't fair to me.
It wouldn't take long. I was pretty sure. Hell, she'd never even asked for my phone number. It wouldn't be hard to just fade away.
That would be best. For both of us.
I caught my reflection in the fogged up bathroom mirror. I looked like shit. I looked like someone had punched me in the gut and I'd just puked up my breakfast all over the floor. I looked like someone who'd been blindsided with the worst possible truth.
I nodded at my reflection and tried to believe I knew what to do next.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Piper
Keir was pacing again. "What time is she supposed to be here?"
I looked up from my scales. For all we'd accomplished at this recording session, I could have skipped it entirely. The little Rory-sized keyboard was sitting in my backseat, ready for me to head out to True's place as soon as this rehearsal was over.
As soon as our guest vocalist arrived.
"She's probably tied up in traffic," Rane muttered. His whole attention wrapped up in Madeline Cole, his movie star fiancée. They'd been planning their wedding forever, but Maddie's shooting schedule and our touring schedule never seemed to mesh often enough for them to actually pull off a wedding. I didn't mind that she came and sat in on rehearsals like this. It was the only time the two of them got to see each other.
Scarlett Sawyer jumped down off the stack of amps she'd been using as a writing desk and went over to her pacing boyfriend. "You're making everyone crazy, you know that right?" she asked, wrapping her arms around his neck and pulling his forehead down to hers.
He sighed and kissed her and I looked away. Low cleared his throat and tapped out a quick staccato beat on the drums. "What are we right now, Pep?" he wondered. "Third wheels? Fifth wheels? This feels like a math problem."
I grinned. "Where's Zoe? She hasn't been around a lot..."
His forehead creased with concern. "She had some spotting, so she's keeping pretty quiet lately. Doc has her taking these weird hormone things she has to put..." He waved his hand between his legs. "Up there."
I wrinkled my nose. "You really think she wants you telling me that?"
He shrugged. "Got no one else to talk about it with." He looked down at his hands and tapped them idly on his knees. My heart went out to him. I could feel the worry coming off of him in waves.
"Want to talk about something else?" I piped up.
He looked at me with raised eyebrows. "Yes, please," he begged.
I bit my lip. "I've got some news."
His eyebrows crawled even higher on his forehead. "Yeah
? You gonna be all mysterious or are you gonna tell me?"
I grinned. "Well, that's sort of up in the air. You have to promise you'll be happy for me and not flip your lid."
"Hell of a pre-requisite there, Pep."
I looked down at my hands. This was my brother, my twin. We shared everything. He deserved to know. "I met a guy."
The sound of air rushing out of his lungs was loud enough that the whole room fell silent. Keir and Rane looked over at us with concerned looks on their faces and Balzac seemed to appear out of nowhere to glower in our direction. "Everything okay?" Maddie called over to us.
"Yeah," Low choked out in a strangled whisper. "Everything's fine."
"Lowell?" I asked.
"Nah, Pep, give me a second, okay?" His face was beet red and his fists opened and closed dangerously.
"Wait a second," I said, bristling. "You're pissed about this? You're actually pissed?"
"Pepper." My brother's voice was low and controlled.
"Hey Twitch? You wanna take a walk with me?" Keir called.
My brother's hand shot up to head him off. "Don't touch me," he shouted.
I reeled back in shock. My brother never, ever lost his cool. "Lowell," I said. "It's okay. I'm fine."
"Are you?" he snapped, staring me down with ferocity in his eyes. "How would you know? You have no idea what being fine even means."
"Hey now," Scarlett called softly. "That's uncalled for."
"You don't know," Lowell shouted, whirling around so violently that Keir stepped protectively in front of his fiancée. "Watch it," Keir glowered. "You need to calm the fuck down, dude."
Lowell looked at me and for a heartbreaking second I wondered if he was going to start crying.
Instead he whirled on his heel and ran out the front door of the studio.
"Oops!" a voice cried from the hallway. "Sorry 'bout that!" A beautiful redhead appeared in the doorway and set down her guitar case. "Um, I think your drummer escaped."
"Jane," I exhaled.
"Everything okay?" She looked back over her shoulder as a far off door slammed. "Bad timing?"
"Pretty much," Keir sighed and went to her with his hand outstretched. "Keir Wilder. Sorry. We're not usually this dramatic."