Remake

by A. J. Sand

  He smacked her butt. “Whoa. Hey now, don’t do that. You’re playing with fire!” But then he got serious and she saw traces of nervousness.

  “What’s up?” Erica speared his hair back with her fingers.

  “Will you marry me when you get back?” he asked. “I mean like right when you get back?” Lucky. So lucky, she thought as she smiled. “Are you still trying to see if you can find out where your mom is? I don’t want to rush you if you are. I want to be able to call you my wife, but I’ll wait.”

  It wasn’t that Erica had some deep sentimental need to have her mom at her wedding, and she knew if she asked him, Kai would be more than thrilled to walk her down the aisle, but Bryson had a warm, loving family. And her side of the church wouldn’t be empty, but those pews reserved for family in the front would be. Her maternal grandparents were too old to travel across the country comfortably, she didn’t know any of her father’s family, and she didn’t really know any of her other family members well enough to ask them to fly anywhere. There would be no invitations with her parents’ names on them. No father-daughter dance. Bryson wouldn’t really have in-laws. For the first time ever, she was saddened that he was part of such an amazing family.

  “Karen not being there is really the tip of the iceberg, Bryce. It’s going to be a big wedding for you…and I don’t really have…”

  Bryson held her face. “Baby, I’d rather have none of my family there than have you disappointed on your wedding day. In fact…why do we even need something big and traditional? We could do something else entirely…go somewhere else entirely…”

  “Wait…what? Like…eloping?”

  “Exactly!”

  “Yes! Let’s! If you’re serious…but your parents…”

  “They’ll understand. And look, every guy knows the wedding day is really about your girl, anyway.” Bryson kissed her forehead. “Whatever you want.”

  “Okay! Yes. Yes! Let’s go get married somewhere! But where in the world do I…” Erica beamed. “…Get to become Mrs. Ellis?”

  Bryson slipped out from under her and walked toward a globe he kept on a bookshelf. “Well, let’s look at our…” He froze and spun around with big, wild eyes before he pumped out a grin. For a second, he looked exactly like the goofy, toothless kid in the pictures hanging in his parents’ living room. “What? Erica…Ellis. Erica Ellis. Wow. Seriously?”

  “Yup! Erica Anne Ellis. Not even a hyphen. Get used to saying it, buddy.” She went and stood next to him.

  Bryson scoffed and dotted his lips against her forehead as he pulled her into a hug. “I’ve been saying it to myself for years. Everyone at work thinks you’re already my wife.” He rubbed his hands together before picking up the globe and setting it down on the coffee table. They both dropped down to their knees in front of it. “These are our possibilities. I spin. You point. But you can’t look. If you pick somewhere that’s in the middle of a conflict now, in the middle of a conflict when you get back, or an ocean, we pick the nearest stable, ocean-bordering country…east of it?”

  “Agreed.” A giggly Erica placed her hand over her eyes, and she heard the globe squeak on the axis. After a silent three-second count, she stopped the rotation with her finger, but before she could see the location, he snatched the globe away. “Bryce!”

  “Oh! This is going to be a good surprise,” he said with a sly smile as they both stood.

  “I don’t think you can top bringing me stars.” But he would. For their forever, he would. She didn’t know how, but he’d figured out a way.

  “What?” He pulled his lips into a smirk. “Is that the standard?” He twirled her around and dipped her backward, and the pink flowers caught her gaze.

  “Those so pretty,” she said on the way back up.

  “They’re Buttons N’ Bows camellia flowers. There are as many in there as days you’ll be gone, and they’ll help me count down until you come home.”

  I’m so sorry.

  Erica reread the note and her eyes warmed up with impending tears. She could’ve sent him the same note if she wanted. Maybe she would.

  “How come that one’s different?” Dylan sat next to her and slid her feet into a pair of black platform peep toe pumps. Erica took in the rest of her friend’s outfit; she was wearing a pair of dark blue shorts and a loose, flowing white top under a boyfriend blazer. Date night.

  “Just a thing between me and Bryson.” Erica flipped the note between her fingers. “Me and So Sorry.”

  “So… pink mean anything?”

  “Yeah… longing. Pink camellias represent…longing.”

  “Hm. Longing. Interesting.” Dylan sounded as if she wanted to inquire further, but she kept it to herself as the edges of her mouth turned up. “Kai and I are driving up to Malibu so I can meet some of his music industry friends. You wanna come? It’s not a couples’ thing, so you’re welcome, but I think we’re going to stay the night. I packed a bag, just in case.”

  “Oh no. You’re not third-wheeling me, Carroll. It’ll be nice to have the place to myself tonight. Me and Buttons. I want to check out some of the interviews you’ve done so far for the project, and see if I can set up some gigs for Fading Fast. I’m gonna make them my first clients…after Kai, of course.”

  When her phone chimed, Dylan hugged her good-bye, but held her tighter and longer than normal. “You know, five months ago, a friend of mine who might be in the vicinity right now, really, really opened my eyes to just how amazing and special my boyfriend is. I almost lost the chance to know that because I was so scared of so many things. Fear can be a prison, E.” Dylan finally let her go and stood up. “And please call Abel Elliott. He seems to think when he can’t reach you, he can just call me over and over and over to track you down.” Dylan ran for the door. “Do you want me to set this? For now, the code is your birthday, month and day.”

  Erica noticed the alarm keypad to the left of the door. “You got Kai to stay today, huh? Nice work.”

  They high-fived each other from afar. “Sure did. Okay, have a good night. Be nice to Buttons.” Dylan blew her a kiss and shut the door behind her.

  Erica checked her cell, which she hadn’t touched in hours, and saw the missed calls from Abel. She punched out a quick text telling him that she’d call him tomorrow. Buttons barked after Dylan for a while but treaded over to Erica when she summoned him. “Look, I didn’t have a pet growing up. Maybe that’s my issue with you.” She scooped him up and went into her bedroom. “You’re sort of cute, though, so I get the attraction. Wanna help me defriend Chase Bunyan?” But first, she typed out a text to Bryson, something she hadn’t done in ages: Thanks, Bryce. Can we talk soon?

  Maybe it was time to come clean about everything: the rape, Kai’s alley fight, the witness, and now, the private investigator. She wouldn’t tell him over the phone or at some coffee shop or something, but maybe she could do it at a private place without any interruptions, somewhere she would feel comfortable. She stared at the phone, grumbling with impatience when it didn’t vibrate back right away. You responded to Naomi quickly, she scolded him in her mind. But maybe she had lost that privilege. After about fifteen minutes—but it might as well have been years—the reality of his busy Saturday evening hit her, and she tossed the phone onto a pile of clothing on the floor. Other things were occupying her thoughts, anyway. But not by much.

  After dinner, a very long shower, and a change into her PJ, she opened her laptop on her bed, intent on figuring out what the hell was going on with her pictures. With Buttons cuddled against her, she navigated her web browser to her Facebook page and found a few albums from past Halloweens, which included those infamous she-devil and French maid costumes. She simply deleted those and any pictures, no matter how harmless the actual situation had been, that could be purposely misconstrued by someone like Chase because of what she was wearing, who she was with or because she was being silly and inappropriate with her friends. Basically, she removed any showing her being a typical twenty-something. Havi
ng to pull photos from parties and modeling and hanging out with her friends was unfair and unfortunate, but it was better than handing him any more ammunition.

  Next she scanned the thumbnails of faces on her friends list, but Chase’s name wasn’t there, and he wasn’t on any of her good friends’ lists, either. There was some relief that came with being certain that he wasn’t actually a virtual friend, but an upsurge of worry followed because that meant somebody might be sharing her pictures with him…so he could throw his cheap shots at her sexuality. Of course, they still had mutual acquaintances. And of course, privacy on social media was like closing semitransparent curtains. But over the next few days, she’d contact all mutual friends of theirs and request that they untag her in pictures or hopefully convince them to take them down or set them to really private settings. She scanned her entire list again, and a thought flitted across her mind. Maybe someone in her tight-knit group of friends had done it, but she discarded the idea immediately. Her friends had believed her right away about everything, so to think that one of them had told Chase after she had confided in them… Buttons lifted his head when Erica shifted in her discomfort.

  “It’s crazy, right?” she asked out loud, feeling guilty as she rubbed him on the side. But there was still no clear explanation for how Chase knew she had told people about the attack. It didn’t surprised her that Chase would doubt what his brother had done to her or that he would try to imply that it was something she deserved. And she had considered that whatever narrative came out of this from their end would be about damaging her reputation. So it was starting. This was why it was so important to her that Dylan helped her capture her story on film for her own safekeeping, even before they had ever discussed the documentary idea she was working on. She needed to have her experience in her own voice.

  Her ringing cell tore her from the stream of thoughts, and a pleasant feeling swept over her when the screen lit up with their picture together; she had never changed it. Bryson was calling. Her entire body jerked as though ice was being drawn down her back. As she answered, the doorbell rang.

  “Hey, Bryce…” she said, her voice breaking on his name. She was nervous but thrilled to hear from him. The doorbell rang again.

  “Hey, E… ” But nerves completely took over, as that now familiar silence fell between them. She could hear her bare footsteps moving across the carpeted floor better than any indication of his presence on the other end.

  “Can I put you on hold for a minute?” She wasn’t even sure he was still there.

  “Can you answer the door instead?” he said, laughing. The doorbell rang out in a series of short tones. Holy crap. He was actually there? Erica stood in the middle of the living room, frozen, as she watched his shadow shift at the slit beneath the front door. Shit.

  “In a sec,” she said, before hanging up. Dashing to the bathroom, she yanked the ratty scrunchie out of her hair then finger-styled, shamelessly pulled her “good” mascara through her lashes, and put on a bra, all with her hands trembling the entire time. She could preen in three minutes, but no amount of time spent trying to curb her anxiety would be enough for this.

  He was still ringing the doorbell when she walked back out. “Christ, Bryce, I’m here,” she said, managing to keep her tone steady, and as she pulled the door open, he crashed against her and she stumbled back inside. He outweighed her by close to fifty pounds, so it was more like careening backward until she finally caught her balance. And he smelled like a distillery. “You’re drunk. Did you drink and drive?”

  “No, Erica,” Bryson said with offense as he collapsed hard on the couch when he managed to lumber over to it, but then he released a lazy laugh. “I stared at your text for an hour, drove here…and then drank.” He had also been on his way to some event apparently, because he was dressed even nicer than usual, but disheveled in a way only Fitz could appreciate. The front of his hair was matted to his forehead, his tie was askew, and the bottom half of his shirt was part way outside of his slacks. She had never seen him like this before. “Nice place, E.” Bryson pointed aimlessly behind him. “Ours is better though. Hey, you got a puppy.” Buttons had ambled over and was sniffing him.

  “He’s Dylan’s.” Her chest was tightening and each subsequent breath choked its way out. My text caused this? “How much did you drink, Bryce?” They both drank sparingly but neither were lightweights, so Bryson had to have challenged himself to get to his current state.

  “Some.” Doubtful. He couldn’t even say it with a straight face. Erica sat next to him and smashed into a wall of alcohol odor. She inspected him again and noticed a dark pinkish hue overtaking the cuff of one of his white sleeves. When she flipped his arm over, she almost screamed at the sight of his palm, which was hemorrhaging blood in streams down his fingers. “I would’ve gotten you a puppy, E…” With his uninjured hand, he patted Buttons on the head. “Anything you wan—”

  “Bryce, you’re bleeding!” The tiniest sprinkle of glass glimmered in his hand. Some pieces were simply pressed against his skin, but others were embedded in his flesh. One particularly jagged piece, probably the largest, was rooted in there at an angle. “You’re really hurt.” There was a first aid kit in her bathroom with tweezers and gauze and instructions about glass removal, but she wondered if he needed stitches, too.

  He examined his bloody hand for a moment with a creased brow. “Oh…yeah. Shit. Tripped. Bottle fell. Landed on it.” He squeezed his wrist. “Oh crap, it really hurts…”

  “I can get the glass out, but we need to wash your hand first…and, um, take your shirt off. I can probably get the blood out if we treat it right now.”

  Bryson’s brows rose over barely focused eyes and a mischievous smile. “Tryin’ to see me naked, E?” She looked away to hide her smile. He reached over his head for the back of his collar, trying to pull his shirt off that way, and one of the middle buttons popped.

  “Hold on…” Taking to her knees, Erica undid each button for him and was immediately wrapped in a warm feeling as her fingers skidded over the smooth skin of his sculpted biceps and forearms when she peeled the shirt off him. She missed undressing him like this, and from the way Bryson’s expression shifted into something more desirous, he missed it, too. The longer she looked at him, the more she felt a tether forming and pulling between their hearts. But in truth, she knew that it had existed this entire time, never thinning or fraying.

  He squirmed in place, his eyes finally managing to focus when they settled on her chest in front of him, and it sent a sweet pulsating blaze straight down between her legs. Erica puffed out a deep breath that did nothing to calm her on the way to soak his shirt in the bathroom sink.

  “We need to walk now, okay?” she said when she returned to the living room, and they made a slow trip over to the kitchen sink. His eyes stayed on her as she rinsed the streaks of blood and loose pieces of glass away from his hand. He mumbled or slurred something—to her or about her—and ended it on soft laughter; she smiled over her shoulder, away from him. Bryson drunk was a little hilarious. “What?”

  “You wore the same dress on our first date. Last time I saw you,” he said, almost like he had spoken song lyrics. “Blue one.”

  He was right. “Do you always remember everything?” she teased.

  “About you? Everything.” He suddenly leaned against her, burying his face in her hair, and Erica nearly lost her balance.

  “Bryce!” As uncoordinated as he was right now, he managed to plant an unstable foot and clutch her side. She didn’t feel secure in his grip, but the way he had reacted, like instinct, to prevent her from falling, was endearing. Her body immediately responded to the touch, too, heating up from the protective way he was holding her. “I missed that smell. Brings back good memories.” His mouth was right near her temple.

  “My shampoo?” she asked as she dried off his hand, her gaze slowly rising to his face when he leaned back. Bryson smiled sadly as he stared over her head, locked in a short daydream, before his e
yes hooked to hers.

  The grasp on her side tightened. “I always knocked that damn bottle over in the shower.”

  Erica giggled as she recalled that. “And then you’d fuss at me because I’d leave the top unscrewed and it would spill everywhere.”

  “But you always did!” he said with a grin. “You got something against screwin’?”

  “Just in the shower!” she quipped. She missed this, too—the back and forth, and the way they could so easily be playful with each other.

  “Joseline still won’t throw the last one away,” he whispered as she guided him back to the couch. The last one. Erica bit her lip softly as she recollected now that in her haste to get out of the apartment, she’d left it. As much as she tried to block it out, the memory invaded her mind, anyway. She was tossing stuff in a bag, grabbing everything within reach. She knocked the bottle over, like he always did, and before she could grab it, Bryson was standing behind her. Then she’d pushed past him... It was too horrible to keep picturing. Her stomach had twisted into painful knots by the time she dumped him on the couch.

  Bryson took in a deep breath and shut his eyes, wincing in pain as he flexed his hand with some shards still lodged in it. Erica wasn’t squeamish, but she definitely wasn’t looking forward to yanking out those broken pieces. Goddammit. Why was everything broken?

  On her first step toward the bathroom, he clasped her wrist, and he didn’t release her hand until she sat again. “I’m sorry I’m a mess. I just wanted to see you. I just didn’t want to feel anything…because all I feel is hurt.”

  All I feel is hurt. The words felt like her soul had spoken them. Her billowing emotion came too fast, and she was unprepared for the rush of tears that warmed her cheeks. Their relationship hadn’t been perfect. Like every other too young to love each other that much kind of love, it’d had its ups and downs, but this much pain, this kind of overwhelming pain, was new. Raw. Scary. She didn’t want this. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be.