I Need You

by Jane Lark

  “So do you.” I lifted one brow at her.

  “Oh my God, my hair…” Her hand touched it. “We better go back.”

  Our jeans clung like a second skin and the white sleeveless tee Lindy had on beneath her open sweater had me swallowing. Every contour of her stomach and chest was visible through the translucent cotton, as well as the pale-pink lacy bra her nipples showed through. She’d be freezing when the shock wore off.

  Shit. I looked up, then laughed. Her hair was matted with salt and sand, and stuck to her head in rats’ tails.

  Her shoes hit my shoulder. “Don’t laugh at me!”

  I still laughed. “Come on. You need a shower. You’re all sandy.”

  “You douche,” she said as she turned away.

  Lindy

  “Two weeks to mourn him, then let him go, and go back and make a life for yourself.”

  I sighed, Billy was right. I knew that.

  I let the water run over my head as I rinsed my hair under the shower.

  Forget him.

  I wish I could.

  I wish my heart wasn’t empty. I wish my soul didn’t feel like I was dead and in Hell. I longed to let Jason go, because then maybe I could feel like a whole person again, not like someone with an arm cut off. Not like discarded trash.

  But forgetting Jason was hard when I hurt so much and I’d needed someone. He was meant to be here. To help me.

  My tears mingled with the water from the shower. I’d cried every day for months. I wanted to stop crying. But how could I get over him? How could I work out what to do without him?

  We lived in a small town. I walked past his shop all the time and saw the girl he’d dumped me for with him, standing where I used to. A constant reminder that I wasn’t good enough.

  Leaning back against the tiles, I let the tears come and the water wash them away. Then I slid down to the floor, sitting with my knees bent, my hands gripping in my hair, as hurt roared through me.

  Why was life so unfair? Why did all this have to happen to us? Why had Jason let me down when I’d needed him?

  I needed him…

  I wish someone would take this pain away.

  That was why I’d taken the pills. Because the pain in my head was too much.

  But that had been unfair––selfish and mean. I hadn’t been thinking properly.

  Mom.

  I was a coward. She wasn’t. She was brave and I loved her so much.

  My cell rang. I’d heard a couple of texts arrive earlier.

  I didn’t know how long I’d been in the shower.

  Whoever was calling hung up.

  But a moment later my cell started ringing again.

  I got up, not hurrying, and turned off the shower. By the time I’d wrapped a towel around me, to hide my body so I didn’t have to see it in the mirror as I passed it, my cell rang for the fourth time. I caught up another towel and wrapped it around my hair.

  Something thumped the door of my room. I’d guess the side of Billy’s fist.

  “Lindy! Are you in there! Answer! You’re scaring the fuck out of me! How long does it take to have a fricking shower! Lind! Lind! Are you okay?”

  I hurried across the apartment and shouted through the door, “I’m just putting on my makeup, give me a minute.”

  “I’ll wait!”

  I hurried back into the bathroom, unzipped my makeup purse and began applying foundation.

  “Lind, come on!” Billy shouted after a while.

  I stroked the mascara brush up my eyelashes one last time.

  “Lind!” He bashed the door again as I pulled out my lip gloss.

  “Wait!” My hand shook as I painted the lipgloss on.

  When I opened the door he was just about to bash it again, and the side of his fist came flying at me, I fell back, leaning out of the way. Instead of hitting me, his hand grabbed my arm.

  “You okay?” His eyes and his voice were loaded with concern.

  He smelt good. He had on a clean white tee, that stretched tight across his chest, hugging all his muscular contours.

  Billy always looked good, even on the beach earlier, when he’d been covered in sand and salt.

  “Lind, I thought… I’m not saying what I thought…” I knew what he’d thought; he didn’t have to say it. He’d thought I’d taken an overdose.

  “I was just having a shower.”

  My new guilt complex poked a finger in my ribs. We were good friends. I’d loved him like a brother for years, and I guess he felt the same about me. I lifted up onto my toes and hugged him. The guy had taken two weeks off to bring me here, and paid, and planned it all. Tears slipped out.

  Billy stood outside my room, so technically I was in the hall, in a towel sobbing, with my arms wrapped around his neck.

  He lifted me up, like I was nothing. His massive biceps like bars around me, and carried me into the room three paces before shutting the door with his heel.

  He put me down then, his big hands bracing my head, and then he kissed my temple. It was a protective gesture. I’d scared him.

  His fingers splayed on my cheeks as he looked into my eyes.

  I liked his eyes. They were always warm, they were dark blue, but there was heat in them. The guy had always been the complete opposite of Jason.

  “I’m allowing this,” he said, “because this is your mourning time, but you’re gonna have to stop crying in seven days, and you are definitely gonna have to carry your cell at all times. You scared the crap out of me.”

  I knew. He’d hugged me back fiercely.

  His hands dropped. “Do you want me to get lost until you’re dressed?”

  “No, stay. I’ll get my stuff and change in the bathroom. You can talk to me around the door.” I didn’t want to be alone.

  I valued his friendship. I’d lost touch with all my girlfriends the summer we’d left high school because everything in my life had changed and I’d turned to Jason. I’d spent every moment with him, and Billy had become mine and Jason’s shared possession. He could be relied on for anything.

  I grabbed my clothes up from the bed I’d pulled out from the sofa.

  He hadn’t answered.

  I glanced back.

  An odd expression twisted his lips, but he smiled. “Okay. I’ll wait out here.” He turned away and headed toward the balcony. “What do you want to do once you’re ready?”

  “I’d like to go back to the beach!” I headed into the bathroom. “The air down by the ocean felt good. There was so much energy in it. We can paddle now you’ve got your cargo shorts on.”

  “I’d have thought you’d have had enough of the ocean?”

  I pushed the bathroom door up so there was only a narrow crack we could talk around.

  “I don’t mind splashing around in the shallows! I hate swimming in the ocean, though! It scares me! You never know what’s beneath the water and if the seaweed wraps around my legs I think it’s something horrible!”

  “Then I guess you’re not gonna want to go surfing with me? I was gonna take you out on my board.”

  “Since when did you learn to surf?” I looked up, avoiding the reflection of my ass in the mirror as I slipped my panties on, without taking the towel off. My heart pounded. I hated seeing myself in mirrors. Scratch that. I just hated myself. I hated my face and I detested my body.

  “I learned here, the summer we left high school. I’ve come out here every year since. Believe me, it’s awesome. Just sitting out there letting the waves swill under you, until the right one comes along, and then you fly…”

  I hadn’t even known he’d been out here. But the summer we’d left high school, I’d had other things on my mind. Like Mom. And last summer Jason had decided that what he really wanted to do was leave me behind and go fulfill some dream I’d never heard of before.

  “Don’t worry, we’ll go paddling and jump the waves like little kids.”

  I faced the mirror once my body was hidden under my clothes. The makeup mask I’d painted
on my face looked back at me. I looked okay. I think I’d managed to hide the fact I’d been crying but I was overly pale. . My skin could do with some sunshine. I’d hardly gone out of the house for months.

  “What’s taking you so long?”

  “I’ve got to dry my hair.”

  “Lind, you’re going down by the ocean, it’s salty and damp. Forget your hair.”

  “No way! I am not looking ugly just ‘cause I’m gonna be walking on a beach.”

  “Believe me, you did not look ugly in that towel combo…”

  I laughed, though the sound only came from my throat not my soul. Billy was vibrant, full of talk, and a just-do-it attitude… I really did like all those things about him. Jason had always been more silent, thoughtful and hesitant. I really did need Billy’s company to get me out of my shell and over Jason.

  He didn’t say anything else as I finished getting ready, and if he had said anything when I turned on the hairdryer I wouldn’t have heard.

  When I came out of the bathroom, he still stood out on the balcony.

  “Hey.”

  He turned and his gaze dropped to my bare feet, then ran up my legs, over my mini-skirt and up to my face. “Sorry.”

  I frowned. What did he have to be sorry for?

  He stepped forward. “Come on, then, let’s go jump some little bitty waves.” His hand lifted.

  I held it for a moment, but then let go. “Is there a pool somewhere outdoors?”

  “Yeah, there’s a pool.”

  “Cool, I’ll swim when we go to the pool. I like swimming outdoors, but in a place where there’s no seaweed and fish.”

  “Wimp,” he said, as I slipped my sandals on. “Swimming in the ocean is exhilarating… You could swim in a pool back home.” There was a breathless sound of excitement in his voice. Billy was all about energy rushes, exercising, discovering, danger––full-on intensity no matter what he did. When we were at college just watching him wore me out.

  “You okay?”

  I smiled. “Yeah.”

  “Come on, then.”

  Billy

  My chest was hollow. There was no fucking air in the room. Lindy had on a little denim mini skirt that was frayed at the hem, and the flowery camisole thing she wore with it had tiny little straps that could be slipped off her shoulders so easily, and it hung loose over her breasts, just begging me to do that.

  She’d called me a douche on the beach; I was a douche. I was so sickeningly hungry for a girl I couldn’t have.

  It looked like she was wearing a pale-peach bikini top underneath the camisole, and I imagined my hand slipping inside that to cup her soft breast.

  You are sick, Billy.

  She picked up a sweater with a zipper and turned to go ahead of me out of the room. My gaze dropped to her legs. She had good legs. She was short but perfectly proportioned, like a little blonde Barbie doll.

  Hunger gripped hard in my gut.

  Great. It was going to be a long painful, pitiful two weeks.

  Her fingers shook as she unlocked the catch on the door. That had my lust subsiding and love and friendship taking over. I just wanted to protect her… and that included from me.

  I got the door and held it open as she walked out. Then, like before, I walked along beside her, with my hands in my pockets to keep them off of her. But this time we did talk.

  She asked me about work, about my clients, and then asked me who I kept in contact with from college, that led to us reminiscing as we walked along the shore, while the ocean waves rolled up, rippling over our bare feet, as we carried our shoes.

  It was nice… But it felt false, because the guilt inside me kept burning. Lindy looked vulnerable and heartbroken, walking next to me, swilling her feet in the frothing water, and brushing her toes through the shifting sand, her head down and her voice quiet.

  She was sad. But at least now she was trying not to be trapped in it.

  We’d walked the whole length of the beach when I looked at my watch and saw it was gone six. I suggested we walked back up to the town and looked for somewhere to eat. She looked at me for the first time in hours and nodded.

  We found a seafood restaurant and sat inside out of the breeze to eat.

  The conversation lapsed into silence a couple of times, but it was an easier silence.

  My guilt kept poking me, though, like someone jabbing a finger.

  When we’d finished eating, I said, “Shall we order another drink and go and sit outside? Then we can watch the sunset.”

  She nodded at me. Her eyes looked a little glassy from the drink. She’d had two large glasses of wine, and now she’d moved on to a cocktail.

  “Come on, then.” We got a table right at the edge of the terrace. No one was sitting around us, as the ocean breeze was cold.

  She pulled her sweater around her a bit more. “I know what you thought this afternoon.”

  I looked at her, my grip tightening on the beer bottle. We’d been avoiding serious subjects, dancing around them, but I was taking my lead from her. If she wanted to talk serious things that was okay. I lifted an eyebrow at her.

  “You thought I’d taken an overdose again or done something else when I was in the shower.”

  I let go of my beer, reached over and embraced her small hand, that lay on the table.

  Her blue eyes looked into mine.

  “I’m not going to do it again, Billy. It was a mistake. A moment of weakness. I hurt people. I am not going to hurt them again. You don’t need to worry. I’m just sorry you got mixed up in it. Sorry I scared you.”

  “You already said sorry…” My fingers squeezed hers as my guilt punched at me rather than poked. It was me who needed to apologize. “Lind…” This was touching an untouchable subject, but I couldn’t spend two weeks with her and not say it. “I…” God I needed to get a pair of balls. “What happened in the fall––”

  Her hand pulled free from mine and she leaned back in her chair, taking her drink with her, her big eyes staring at me.

  I took a breath. “It’s me who owes you an apology. I know you didn’t want it to happen.” Her forehead screwed up. She didn’t want to talk about it, but we had to. “All you wanted was someone to hold you and I took it too far.”

  Dual tears rolled down her cheeks and she sipped her drink, her gaze dropping to the table. She shut her eyes, like she could just make me disappear and not listen.

  But I carried on. I had to say this. I needed to get it out. “I’m sorry. I feel like… I forced you into it.”

  Her eyes opened and she leaned forward, setting her drink down. “Do we have to talk about this?” She still wasn’t looking at me.

  “Yeah. I’m living with it and I can’t stand it. I want to put things straight. I’m sorry. Now I’ve thought about it, I feel like I raped you.”

  She glanced up at me, pain in her eyes. Now I couldn’t look at her. My head dropped and I sipped my beer, shame slashing a knife at my chest.

  I’d had a drink that night, we both had. Jason had gone to New York a couple of months before. She’d gone out with me, to talk, and we’d been talking but I drove her out to the lake and parked up, to keep talking before I took her home. She’d got upset and turned to hug me, her arms hanging around my neck.

  She’d wanted comfort, that’s all, but I’d had a drink and I’d read it wrong, and my form of comfort had been to kiss her.

  She’d answered it, she’d been in a mess over Jason, she’d been hurting, she’d needed someone, and she’d accepted me.

  She’d had on a short loose skirt and my hand had roamed where it shouldn’t have gone, sliding up her thigh, then I’d I gripped her shoulders and tipped her backwards so we were both lying down… I’d taken it way too far. She hadn’t stopped me. I wish she had stopped me. She just hadn’t said anything, and let me do it.

  With my beer-fogged head, I’d carried on…

  The look in her eyes had haunted me for all the months we hadn’t been talking. She’d stared at
me, just lying there, waiting for me to finish.

  I’d been an ass. She hadn’t said no, but she hadn’t said yes either.

  When we’d finished, or when I had finished––she hadn’t taken any part in it. She’d sat up, with tears running down her cheeks. When I drove her home, she’d cried all the way back into town. Then she’d jumped out the SUV as fast as she could, and run into her house.

  When I’d seen her the next time, neither of us had acknowledged what happened. We had never spoken about it. Not that night and not since. We’d just carried on pretending it hadn’t happened.

  But it had happened.

  The only time it had been mentioned was when Jason threw it at her that he knew. Apparently she’d talked to his cousin about it, and his cousin had told Rachel. Ever since then I’d been wondering what she’d told his cousin. The more I’d thought about that night, since then, the guiltier I’d got. Why hadn’t she said no? She hadn’t enjoyed it; she hadn’t wanted to do it…

  “You didn’t,” Lindy whispered.

  I looked up.

  The onyx centers at the heart of her blue eyes were huge. She shook her head, disgust gripping her expression.

  I didn’t blame her. I was disgusted with myself. But I was facing up to this. I leaned forward, resting my elbows on the table. “I am sorry, and I told Jason the other night that it was all me. You weren’t unfaithful to him, you were just looking for someone to hold you and I took it too far…”

  More tears rolled onto her cheeks as her gaze fell. She wiped them away as her eyes shut. But then they opened and her head came up, anger burned there, accusing me. “Why the hell did you tell him? It’s none of his business! Why did you talk about it?”

  “I…” Because that was what I thought you’d want––for Jason to know the truth.

  “You shouldn’t have said anything to him!”

  She stood up, drank the last of her cocktail and thrust the empty glass down on the table, then turned away. “I’m going down to the beach.”

  Shit.

  I left my beer and headed inside to settle the check so I could follow.