Fearless King

by Hughes, Maya

  Grabbing some pillows and blankets, I made up the couch and settled in for a long night filled with tossing, pillow punching, and memories of our last non-puke-tainted kiss. I stared up at the ceiling before dropping into the most fitful sleep I’d had in a long time.

  10

  Liv

  Nails on a chalkboard mixed with a jackhammer topped with a cottonmouth cherry on top. The only thing rivaling that was the sour, stomach-turning taste on my tongue. Did I gargle a handful of pennies?

  I squeezed my head, pressing the heels of my hands into my temples. This was how I usually felt after cramming all night for a big test—or hell, most nights. Well, the pounding headache part was more usual, but not the stomach that was trying to climb out of my mouth. Slowly cracking my eyelids, I snapped them shut at the bright, surface-of-the-sun light from outside.

  My eyes shot back open, and I whipped my arm up to cover my face. This was not my bed. Shoving the sheets back, I stared at my body, swimming in an oversize T-shirt. Oh shit!

  I still had on my underwear and bra. Please tell me I didn’t blackout hook up with someone. I rolled over twice on the bed, and my feet landed on the wood floor. The trash can and glass of water beside the bed told me everything I needed to know about how my night had ended.

  A pop and sizzle from the other side of the wall that didn’t reach the industrial-height ceiling got me off my ass. I tried to run my fingers through my hair and nearly yanked myself off my feet when my fingers got stuck in the tangles.

  On my tiptoes I walked down the two steps leading from the bedroom. Rounding the corner, I shielded my eyes from even more sun. Was this apartment somehow closer to the sun than normal human dwellings? Had I been abducted by an alien approximating a regular apartment but getting the lighting wrong?

  In front of me, standing at the stove, was the broad back I’d committed to memory. His ruffled hair and thick, corded muscles under his light blue T-shirt did crazy stuff to my stomach that had nothing to do with how much I’d had to drink last night. I’m delirious. That’s it. It’s a fever dream and my head is still in the toilet at the Brothel. Please let that be the case, and not that I got blackout drunk and puked in front of Ford. My silent prayer was cut off when I came face-to-face with the chef.

  “Morning.” Ford turned around with a pan in his hand, sliding a golden-brown pancake onto the big stack already teetering on a plate.

  “Morning.” My voice sounded like I’d been gargling broken glass.

  “How are you feeling?” Pity swam in his eyes.

  “Like death? Would that be too overdramatic? I feel like I’ve been dug up after two weeks underground.”

  “There’s an extra toothbrush for you in the bathroom.” He pointed to the hallway behind me.

  The words were barely out of his mouth before I shot down the darkened corridor, closing the door behind me.

  Don’t freak out. This is totally fine. Ford saw you in your underwear, heard you puke, and put you to bed. No biggie.

  I spotted the dirty clothes hamper in the corner. I walked toward it like a person in a horror movie opening the closet door with a gently swaying hanger on the handle. The smells emanating from the hamper as well as the tangled fabric, namely my dress and a men’s button-down shirt, were my own silent horror reel. Not only had he heard me puke, I’d blown chunks all over him.

  I gingerly rested my forehead on the cold granite counter. How many floors up were we? Could I crawl out a window to escape and preserve some of my dignity? I stared into my bleary-eyed reflection. Of course not.

  Brushing my teeth, I ran my fingers through my hair to get rid of the rest of the rat’s nest as much as possible and then turned to face the music. Actual music pumped through the Bluetooth speakers, and the smells from the kitchen made my stomach clench.

  “Here, have this first, and then we’ll slowly move you up the food chain.” He pushed a churning glass of pink liquid toward me.

  I smacked my hand over my mouth. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “It’s the perfect hangover cure.” His cheeks fought against the smile he held back.

  Eyeing it suspiciously, I lifted it to my nose.

  “Don’t smell. Just drink. Bottom’s up.”

  Pinching my nose, I choked down the glass of pure evil and waited for the detonation, maybe a geyser erupting from my mouth or, if I were seriously lucky, it would be from the other end and the humiliation would be complete. The drink settled into my stomach like lead and I braced for the inevitable rewind, but instead of creating the seventh level of hell in my intestines, the churning stopped.

  Ford set a plate of bacon in front of me, and the salty sweetness called to me like cherubs on clouds playing harps. I picked up a piece, not sure if the truce in my stomach would hold. My first crispy bite set off every taste bud. Each bite got quicker as I was assured I wasn’t going to have a repeat of the night before. I devoured the plate like a zombie at a brain buffet, each strip restoring some of my bodily functions.

  “How are you feeling now?”

  Full, I leaned against the counter and licked my fingers. “Better.” The word was muffled by all the bacon shoved in my mouth.

  “If that’s sitting okay in your stomach, try a couple of these.” He lifted two fluffy pancakes from the big stack and put them on my plate. Carbs, glorious carbs. He slid a bottle of syrup toward me, but I picked up the warm pancake and broke it apart with my fingers.

  “It’ll help soak up some of that hangover.” He sat on the stool on the other side of the counter and dug into the other full plate of pancakes and bacon.

  With the imminent eruption from my body canceled, the guilt and humiliation of the night before slammed into me.

  I’d puked on him.

  Had I said anything? Done anything I should run for cover from? He wasn’t acting weird. Maybe we could do this friendship thing. He had rescued me from myself the previous night, after all.

  “About last night…” I picked at the pancake on my plate.

  “Don’t worry about it. You’re in college.”

  “I know, but puking on you—” I cringed. “I’ll pay for the dry cleaning or a new shirt or whatever else you need.”

  He glanced up from his plate. “Seriously, don’t worry about it. I’ve helped Grant out loads of times before.” His face fell the second Grant’s name passed his lips.

  Yeah, Grant. I winced. I needed to have that conversation with him and let him know, one more time, we were better as friends. It reminded me a hell of a lot of the one Ford had probably wanted to have with me after the kiss…and now my stomach churning was back.

  “Are you going to tell Colm? Have you already told him?” My shoulders shot up to my ears as I braced for the earful I’d get from my brother. Ford had probably already told him. I could just envision the angry messages rolling in on my phone.

  “I’m not your babysitter. I’m your friend, remember? He doesn’t need to know unless you want to tell him.”

  The tension in my shoulders relaxed a little. My friend. I played with that phrase in my head for a bit, and it almost fit…almost. It was a puzzle piece with the right picture, but the grooves were off.

  “So what happened last night?”

  He stared into my eyes, and I prayed to the drunk gods it hadn’t been as bad as I thought.

  “I brought you here, you puked, and that was it.” He shoved a forkful of pancakes into his mouth.

  “That’s it?” I leaned in and kept my eyes trained on him.

  “That’s it.” His words were muffled by pancakes and syrup.

  A sigh of relief whooshed out of my lungs. “Thank God. I was worried I’d tried to kiss you or something.”

  He froze with his fork midway to his mouth, and a sharp cough broke free from his throat. He grabbed his glass of orange juice to wash it down, and that small ray of hope that what he’d said was the end of the story was washed away as he downed the glass, not quite meeting my gaze. I sent
up a silent prayer. Please let me be wrong.

  11

  Liv

  The pungent smell of fear, textbooks, and no. 2 pencils mixed with the scribbled scratching of lead on the exam booklets. Running my pencil down the last few equations on my paper, I glanced up at the clock. Crap!

  There wasn’t time to triple check my work. The oxygen in the room thinned, and it was hard to catch my breath. My chicken-scratch answers covered in eraser fuzz and the remnants of previous answers I’d corrected would have to do.

  I hopped up from my seat and dropped off my exam in the pile on the desk at the front of the room before darting back down the aisle. I packed up my things, grabbed my coat, and bolted from the room. Outside, the sharpness of the winter freeze didn’t seem to care that March was fast approaching. I turned on my phone, and a message from Ford popped up.

  Things had been different since my drunken night out. There hadn’t been any angry messages from Colm about how irresponsible I was or how I was screwing up my future. Ford had kept his word, and our texts were less stilted. Every call from him wasn’t a butt dial until proven otherwise, but in some ways that made it harder. Every little joke made me smile. Each notification sent my pulse racing. The sweet, strong side of him I’d crushed on so hard was right back in my face.

  Shaking my head, I jogged the last few blocks to the studio. Inside those walls, the tension seeped out of my muscles, and the tight clench of my jaw that I didn’t notice until I walked through the door relaxed. Dance kept me sane. Exams, med school, Colm, Grant, Ford—life was throwing everything it had at me.

  The freezing brass handle of the studio door made my teeth chatter, the alcove between doors warming me the slightest bit before I made it inside. My squeaking boots made their own soundtrack on my way up to my classroom. The remix version would be coming out the following week. I checked the time again: only fifteen minutes before class. I’d have barely enough time to change, stretch, and run through the choreography to make sure I didn’t screw it up. If I was lucky, I’d have a few minutes to inhale a protein bar in my face. After ducking into the changing room, I put on my dance clothes and shoved my street outfit into my bag.

  I scurried back out into the studio. Voices echoed up the stairwell, and people climbed the steps, spilling onto the floor.

  I leaned out the door as they got closer to the room. “Give me five minutes.”

  Rolling my head and stretching out my bad case of exam-taker’s neck, I shook out my arms and shoulders. With my eyes on my reflection, I went through the entire routine, my ease of movement returning with each step, bringing the dance that had only lived in my head to life. In the mirror I tracked my arms and legs, correcting myself as I went. There wasn’t the same pressure that weighed me down inside the classroom or on the pages of my textbook.

  Slamming out the last move, I laughed at myself in the mirror. My heart raced, my skin tingled, and every worry I’d had before I stepped into that room had melted away.

  The class began, and for sixty minutes, nothing outside those walls existed.

  This was where I was alive.

  Where nothing bad could touch me.

  Where I’d always found the pieces of me that were lost out in the real world.

  * * *

  Still sweaty from the studio, I jogged up the steps to my apartment.

  Opening the door, I stopped short. A tangle of limbs and bright colors greeted me by the couch.

  “Hey, Liv,” they chorused together. Marisa blew her hair out of her face, her cheeks flushed red and her body contorted half over and half under LJ.

  “She tried to take the last Snickers.” His words tumbled out as a breathless, choppy mess.

  “Sharing is caring.” She wheezed and shoved at his shoulders. Shimmying out from under him, she redid her ponytail, laughing and popping a piece of the candy into her mouth. LJ grumbled and pouted, but the undercurrent of their caring for each other shined so bright it almost hurt. They had this connection that didn’t come around too often. I couldn’t hold back my smile that they had each other, but it also constantly reminded me of my third-wheel status.

  “Maybe I do, maybe I don’t, but you know what’s mine?” He lunged under the coffee table and shoved the last lonely fun-sized Snickers into his mouth, grinning the whole time.

  “You’ll pay for that later.” Marisa picked up a pillow and chucked it at his head before turning to me. “How was class?”

  “They are blowing me away. I keep throwing these moves at them, and every class everyone is getting better and better. I’ve got some new routines I’m planning in my head. It’s going to be insane. They’ll hate me at first, but once everything’s flowing, I’ll get them on board.”

  She laughed and gathered up her books on the coffee table. “I meant biochem. Didn’t you have a test today?”

  “Don’t remind me.” I flopped down onto the couch. “It was a bloodbath. If I get an A minus this semester, it will be a miracle, which means I’m screwed.” The knot in my stomach and tension in my shoulders that had relaxed over the sixty minutes of dance were firmly back in place. If I made it out of college without an ulcer, I’d be shocked.

  “That’s what happens when you’re at the studio nearly every night.”

  “You’re the one who told me I can’t stay chained to my desk every day.”

  She held up her hands in mock surrender. “There’s a difference between taking a break and hiding from what’s coming.”

  I shrugged as LJ took a bite of a Twizzler.

  “Where did you get that?” Marisa’s gaze darted to the candy in his hand.

  “I have my secrets.” He waggled his eyebrows at her.

  “You’re like a piñata. Maybe I should shake you to find out what other secrets you’re hiding.”

  “Maybe you should.” He stared down at her. She froze with her fingers poised at his sides, mid-tickle.

  Clearing her throat, she stepped back and turned to me. “When’s your brother back? Maybe you should talk to him about putting off med school for a bit, travel or something.”

  I flopped back against the cushions. “It’s not that easy. I wish it were. You don’t understand how important med school is to him, to our family.”

  “But he’s not the one who’s actually going to med school. How important it is to him doesn’t really matter.”

  “It’s been the plan since forever. It would be a big adjustment from ‘yay, I’m going to be a doctor’ to ‘screw that, I’m going to be a dance teacher.’ It doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue.”

  “The longer you wait, the harder it will be—for both of you. Ease him into it. At least tell him your doubts about it. You can’t exactly spring it on him at graduation. ‘Hey, remember that whole med school thing? Yeah, not doing it. Going to teach dance. Bye!’”

  “I know.” I leaned my head against the back of the couch and closed my eyes. Wasn’t I supposed to know what the hell I was doing as I got older? Instead the questions got harder, and someone had stolen my study guide. My phone buzzed in my pocket.

  Ford: There is no way in hell you can beat me in Scrabble.

  Our earlier argument picked up right where we’d left it. He hadn’t run away, but I was once again friend-zoned.

  I tried my best to squash the giddy anticipation that came with each notification.

  Me: We’ll have to wait and see because I’m the reigning champ in this apartment.

  Marisa had banned all board games after I’d beaten her in everything from Candyland to Risk.

  Ford: I eat those tiles for breakfast. I’ll spank the hell out of you.

  The phone nearly fell out of my hand, and I snorted. I could just imagine the way his eyes would bug out when he realized what he’d typed.

  Ford: I mean I’ll cream you!

  Ford: Shit, not what I meant. Not that you think I meant anything

  The text bubble popped up and disappeared at least three times.

  Ford: I’ll kic
k your butt in a fair and square game of Scrabble

  Me: I’d like to see you try!

  * * *

  Three days later he got his chance.

  “Seems someone was a little overconfident.” Ford grinned at me across the board.

  “You got a lucky hand,” I grumbled before shoving another handful of popcorn into my mouth.

  He looked larger than life sitting across from me at our small dining room table.

  “These chairs could be used for torture.” He stretched his back.

  “It’s how I get my competitive edge. How long until practice?”

  “Another couple of hours. The practice rink’s all screwed up, so at least I don’t have to go all the way out to Jersey.”

  My phone rang from my bedroom where I’d plugged it in to charge. I hopped up, stopped short, and squinted at him. He whistled a tuneless melody, staring up at the ceiling, twiddling his thumbs. I raced back and grabbed my tiles, taking them with me. Lunging for my phone, I tapped the screen.

  “Hey, what’s up?”

  “Thank God you’re there.” The dance studio receptionist’s relief seeped through the phone.

  “I am indeed here.” Ford walked by my room, and the bathroom door closed.

  “Emergency situation—can you pretty please teach the three o’clock class?”

  That was soon, and Ford hadn’t been at my place long. I stared out into the hallway. We didn’t get much time together. I wanted to tell her no, maybe pretend she’d gotten a convincing version of my new voice mail, but the students would be disappointed. Canceling a class with some people traveling from all over the city sucked, especially when I could do it, even if at that moment I’d rather have been curled up on my bed with Ford. I checked the time: half an hour to get ready and get there.