Unscathed

by Tim O'Rourke

  When she raised her hips again to meet mine, I felt her tense once more, this time her hands slid down and wrapped around both of my biceps, squeezing as she screwed her eyes shut and threw her head back. I watched her ride another sinful wave and it was my undoing.

  Without any more control left in me, I let myself go, arching my head back and gripping the sheets, balling them in my fists as I tried to keep from crying out at the sensations ripping through my body. It was like nothing I had ever experienced.

  I dipped my head down, panting into her neck, her fingers playing gently with the hair on the back of my head.

  She was breathing heavy in my ear. “Jax, that was…”

  She didn’t finish her sentence. I lifted my head and looked into her face, waiting for her to continue. “Cat got your tongue?” I asked, amused.

  “I’ll show you my tongue,” she teased back.

  “You already did, but I’d like to see it again.”

  She stuck her tongue out at me and I nipped at it with my teeth, capturing her mouth once again in another deep thank-you kiss that she seemed to happily return.

  I wanted to lie with her like this and never leave the house.

  But with a groan, I eventually rolled off of her to get rid of the evidence. Then I found my boxer briefs and slid them on. I climbed under the covers and held her soft body against mine. It was warm, almost hot. She was still flushed red, and when she laid her head on my chest, I closed my eyes and gripped her tighter, running my fingers lightly over her arm.

  “You’re incredible, Mina,” I said.

  She didn’t look up but I felt her nod against my chest. “I was just about to say the same thing to you.”

  “Do you have any regrets?” I asked her.

  She seemed to pause a lot longer than was comfortable and I began to regret asking her about regrets. I was about to say something else – anything to break up the silence, when she answered me.

  “No, Jax. No regrets. Not a one. I’m glad you came over tonight. I’ve felt things tonight I haven’t been able to feel in a long time…”

  I nodded as she trailed off, and kissed the top of her head. We lay like that for a while when I decided we needed some music. I spotted a small stereo on her dresser. I gently untangled myself from her, first needing to use the adjoining restroom. I left her beautiful glowing body lying on her queen-sized bed.

  After I finished, I opened the bathroom door and must have let it swing a little too hard, because it smacked right into a large framed poster of London she had on the wall. I saw the poster come loose and fall, and I tried to catch it, hoping the glass it was encased in didn’t break.

  I managed to catch it enough where my hand broke its fall. I eased it to the floor, breathing a sigh of relief, but feeling a little embarrassed, too. I shook my head.

  Smooth, Jax. Real smooth.

  Mina shot up out of the bed, a distressed look on her face as I lifted the poster, intent to get it back on the wall, hoping I wasn’t going to need some tools. As I faced the wall, I let out a gasp and almost dropped the poster again. Dozens and dozens of photos of me were plastered where the poster once was.

  Me in the coffee shop. Me at work. Me going into Rowdy’s with my friends. Me in front of my house. Me sitting in my truck somewhere. Me on my bike.

  I was stunned, confused, and horrified all at once. I couldn’t wrap my brain around what I was looking at. I slowly turned around and looked into Mina’s red and sheepish face. “What in the hell is this?”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Mina

  Pulling a sheet about me like a cape, I scrambled from the bed. With one of my feet getting caught up in the bedclothes, I dropped to the floor and clawed my way up again. I grabbed the picture of London from off the floor and tried to cover the mosaic of pictures Jax had discovered. Before I could cover them again, Jax had pushed me away. He stood, open-mouthed, and looked at the hundreds of pictures that had once been hidden.

  “What the hell?” he gasped, as if finding it hard to breathe. He glanced at me, then back at the wall again. His face had drained as white as soap. “These are all pictures of me…”

  “Jax, you don’t understand,” I cut in.

  “That’s a picture of me in Starbucks… the day you and your friends were laughing at me,” he whispered, like he was just waking from a nightmare or perhaps at the start of one. “These are pictures of me going in and out of my house… with girls…”

  Jax,” I pleaded, trying to pull him away from the wall.

  He shrugged me off with a grunt. Jax stepped closer to the wall, the tip of his nose almost brushing against it. His eyes grew wider as he inspected the pictures. My heart felt like it had stopped as I struggled to breathe. I had never intended for Jax to find out about the fact I had been spying on him – not yet and not like this. I covered my face with the sheet draped about my shoulders. I didn’t want him to see it and I didn’t want to see the look of horror on his. I felt humiliated and embarrassed that he had finally discovered what I had been up to. But I also felt a sense of panic and dread, not knowing how Jax was going to now react. I didn’t have to wait long to find out. I peeked at him through my fingers as I clutched the sheet to my face.

  As if in slow-mo, Jax turned to look at me. A mixture of distrust, horror, and bewilderment etched on his face. “You’ve been spying on me, Mina,” he whispered as if shock. “What are you… some kind of freaking stalker?” I watched as he fumbled around on the floor for his clothes and slid them on angrily.

  “Please, Jax,” I said, burying my head in my hands and the sheet. I couldn’t bear to see that look of revulsion in his eyes. “It’s not what you think.”

  “You don’t know what I’m thinking,” he hissed, now sounding angry. He pulled the sheet away, so I could no longer hide behind it. “Look! Look!” he cried, grabbing me by the arm and dragging me closer to the wall and the pictures. “That picture is of me at my place the other night. You were filming me as were making out…”

  “No…” I mumbled, my mind racing. How did I explain?

  “Is that how you get your kicks?” he said, his voice cold. “What do you do – film yourself with guys and go show your friends? Have a good laugh?”

  “This has nothing to do with my friends,” I started, tears stinging the corners of my eyes. I still couldn’t bring myself to look at him – to look into his eyes. The sharpness of his voice told me how pissed off and angry he was.

  “So what does it have to do with?” he barked. “Fucking hell, Mina – I thought you were a little cranky at times – but I had no idea you were fucking dangerous.”

  “I’m not dangerous,” and this time I did glance at him and wished I hadn’t. His face was twisted in a grimace of anger and hurt.

  “This sorta shit isn’t normal,” he said, jabbing his thumb at the wall. Then as if something had come up and slapped him up the side of his head, he looked at me and added, “That’s why your cell phone never leaves your hand… you’ve been filming and photographing me the whole freaking time.”

  He pulled the sheet from me. I stood naked again before him and covered my breasts with my arms. “Jax, what are you doing?” I gasped, as he seemed to be searching the folds of the sheet.

  “Looking for your cell phone,” he snapped. “It’s got to be around here somewhere. It doesn’t leave your hands for very long.”

  “I don’t have it,” I said.

  “Where is it?” he demanded, throwing the sheet at me.

  I wrapped it around me as Jax pulled on his jeans and shirt.

  “It’s in the kitchen,” I said. “I wouldn’t have filmed us up here together…”

  “Liar,” he spat, heading for the door and charging down the stairs.

  I raced after him, the white sheet flapping about my legs like a dress. “Jax!” I yelled after him. He was at the bottom of the stairs before I was even halfway down. Jax raced across the hall and into the kitchen. I followed.

  In the
kitchen, Jax stood and scanned the work tops and table for any sign of my phone. “Where is it?” he said, talking to himself more than me. Then spying it on the table, he raced across the kitchen. I got to my phone first and snatched it up. Jax gripped my wrist.

  “Get off me,” I wailed. “You’re hurting me.”

  “Give me the phone,” he warned. “I want to see what else you’ve been filming.”

  “No,” I said, fighting back against him.

  We struggled against each other as both of us fought over the phone. But it was impossible, as I was trying to grip the phone with one hand and keep the sheet wrapped around me with the other. Jax prised the phone from my fingers and staggered backwards. He hit the worktop where the laptop lay. I threw my hands to my face, fearing that it would clatter to the floor and smash. I couldn’t let that happen. I needed the footage I had been filming on it. Jax saw the fear in my eyes, then glanced at the laptop as it rocked back and forth over the edge of the worktop. I ran towards it, one hand outstretched.

  “No!” I yelled as it tipped over the edge of the worktop and headed for the hard floor. With a rattlesnake-like reflex, Jax shot his free hand out and stopped the laptop from crashing into the floor. He held it in his hand. With a frown in his brow, he looked at it, then back at me.

  “Why were you so scared this was gonna break, Mina?” he asked.

  “It belongs to my uncle,” I said, drawing breath, relieved that he had saved it. “Just give it to me.” I held out a hand to take it.

  Jax looked down at it again as if trying to figure something out. Slowly, he raised his head and looked back at me again. “You’ve been filming me on this tonight, haven’t you?”

  I just looked at him, heart pounding in my ears. The moment of hesitation on my part told Jax everything. He knew.

  “My God,” he breathed as if winded. “You’ve been filming me the whole time. That’s why you invited me here tonight… that’s why you had sex with me… you’ve been filming us…”

  “No,” I said, taking a step forward.

  “Keep away from me,” Jax said, holding out his hand as in warning for me to keep well back. He placed the laptop and the phone down, like he no longer wanted to touch them.

  “Jax…” I started, but couldn’t find the right words, however hard I searched for them. “You don’t understand…”

  “You sick bitch,” he grimaced, now he couldn’t bring himself to look at me.

  “Jax…” I tried again. I couldn’t let it end like this.

  “And to think that for the first time in my life I was prepared to take a relationship seriously,” he muttered, as if talking to himself again. He looked stunned at what he had discovered.

  “I can explain…” I started.

  As if he hadn’t heard me, Jax headed out of the kitchen, across the hall, and back towards the front door. He almost seemed to stagger, like he had just got up from some fight that had left him battered, bruised, and bleeding.

  “Jax, please…” I called as I made my way after him. As he pulled open the front door, I grabbed his arm.

  He shook me free. Then looking back over his shoulder at me, he said, “I hope you and your friends have a good time watching the video of us fucking.”

  “No,” I said, shaking my head, unable to bear how he was now looking at me.

  “You disgust me,” he whispered, then pulled the door closed behind him.

  I stood alone in the hall, feeling for the second time in my life that I had lost everything. Dropping to my knees, I began to cry.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Jax

  My blinding rage didn’t allow me to remember the drive home. My phone beeped several times with incoming texts and I had heard it ring at least four times but I didn’t even bother to look. I knew it was her and she could go to hell for all I cared.

  I screeched into my driveway and didn’t even go into the house. I slammed the truck’s door closed and got on my motorcycle and roared out of the driveway, peeling off down the street, a black zag of smoking tire marks staining the concrete.

  This was my life. This was what happened to me when I let someone in. When I finally did, she does this shit. Why did I attract the damn psychos? I thought I was a pretty nice guy. Was I too nice? I don’t know, but I do know this; no more Mr. Nice Guy. Screw everyone. If these girls want a bad boy… an asshole… then that’s what I’ll give them.

  Mina had no right to film me like that. What a mental case. And she had the nerve to say she could explain. Really? Explain what? I’m obsessed with you and couldn’t stop filming you? Shaaa right. It made me want to throw a Molotov cocktail through the window and torch the entire house, just so she wouldn’t have any more photos of me.

  But who was I trying to kid? They’re all digital, probably saved on some online account where she can access and print them anytime she wants.

  The wind was whipping me fast and hard in the face. It was pitch dark out and I realized I had no destination at all. My bike had just taken me away from her… from my house, from hers; I wasn’t even in the same town any longer.

  Where the hell was I?

  I realized I was zooming down the interstate and saw an exit for a small town I had visited on one of the fishing trips I’d taken with my dad. I cut off three cars, who blasted their horns at me, and took the exit. I remembered a small rickety dive bar that sat on the edge of the swamp and tried my hardest to remember the way there.

  Thankfully there wasn’t much around in this tiny town and I found it fairly quickly. The Marlin was the bar’s name. I almost smiled at the memory, but then I remembered that my dad was gone, probably dead, and Mina had just ripped my guts out. I didn’t need fond memories or smiles. I needed a stiff drink.

  I wandered into the bar. It was pretty dark with torch lamps burning on the walls and round tables everywhere. It reminded me of something you’d see in a pirate movie. I walked over dusty planks of wood up to the bar and ordered a straight whiskey from the old timer who was wiping down the countertop there.

  He nodded and threw the towel over his shoulder. Turning around, he poured a large measure of amber liquid into a thick scratched glass and set it down in front of me. I slammed it back in one swallow and signaled for another. He raised a bushy gray eyebrow at me and poured another. I paid the man and took it to a dark table in the corner to lick my wounds.

  The first shot had gone straight to my head quickly and I decided to nurse this next whiskey. A calming, numbing feeling began to spread throughout my body and my head began to get fuzzy. I could feel my body and brain begin to relax, but the anger still ebbed through me, buzzing around like an annoying bee. I had to take deep breaths to keep myself from punching a hole in the table with my fist.

  As I sat and watched two couples slow dancing to some sappy country song on the small dance floor, I couldn’t help but let my mind drift to the events of the night. My brain ruthlessly replayed the entire erotic scene with Mina, starting at our flirtations over dinner to the very end when we were lying in bed together, sated and high on sex hormones. I began to get angry with myself for already mourning the loss of any future sexy romps with her.

  I knew I could get laid pretty much whenever I wanted. But after being with Mina, I had realized that I wanted something more than a roll in the hay. I’d never had emotions like that during sex before and honestly, I didn’t even think it was possible. I’d heard people talk about it, and thought they were bullshitting.

  I gritted my teeth together and forced myself to think of something else – anything else. Which of course led to me thinking about my dad again. It was like a punch to the gut every time I thought about him. I felt physically sick. If he was dead, at least I could bury him and move on. Maybe buy a boat and name it after him or drink myself into oblivion with grief. Go leave a six pack on his grave on a sunny Sunday afternoon and tell him how much I missed him. But there was no closure when you didn’t have answers. I needed to go talk to the cop in charge
of his case… but that would probably lead to more frustrations and letdowns. If they had any leads, I’m sure they’d tell me. Obviously the case had gone cold and nobody cared anymore. Who gives a shit about an old drunk who disappeared? Apparently, only me.

  I wondered what my mom would think about this whole situation. I wished she were here so I could talk to her. I thought about her short blonde hair and kind, smiling blue eyes and how badly I missed her. My dad probably wouldn’t be missing if she was still alive. I had always had a sneaking suspicion he had gone on a bender and had gotten in an accident of some sort that day. I never once believed he had just run away and left me here to cope without him. He may have been a drunk and a bastard sometimes, but I knew it was the alcohol and grief that caused those traits, and that he loved me, for whatever it was worth. I wished I had a brother or sister to talk to, but I had been my parents’ only kid, so now I was alone in the world. I had begun to think maybe I’d have Mina by my side as my lover and partner in life, but that was out the damn window now too.

  I looked down at the liquid in my glass and tapped my fingers against it. What the hell was I doing with my life? Maybe I should try to go back to school and make something of myself other than a frickin’ mechanic. The world will always need mechanics, my dad used to say, as if to justify not needing an education. Ain’t nothin’ wrong with a good, honest payin’ job, son.

  I thought about the last time I’d seen him. It was a late Saturday afternoon and I was in the driveway tinkering with an old Harley we’d bought to fix up. He said he was running to the store for smokes and just never came back. I didn’t actually start worrying until the next morning when I woke up and he wasn’t there. I knew sometimes a cigarette run lasted hours. I never knew where he went, but I knew he would drink and not want me to see, which led to drinking and driving, something else I knew he hid from me.