Bittersweet Wreckage

by Erin Richards

  “You’re not breaking anything off.” I plunged my fingers through his damp hair.

  “I take it you want me too?” His lips vibrated against my neck.

  “Ditto.”

  “Say it.”

  “I take it you want me too?”

  He bit my earlobe. “Say it.”

  My peachy scent tangoed with his spicy cologne, arousing my new wanton senses. “I want you.” Answer enough for the questions in my own head. Head: zero. Heart: one.

  Chapter 20

  Our family of misfits fell into a summer pattern, an all-you-can-eat buffet of emotions. Jade slept until noon, hogged the bathroom for an hour, and left the house until dinner. After dinner, she’d sneak out to meet Ax on their way to wherever in Half-Wit Junction. She offered me no opportunity to engage one on one with her. Between times, she threw her voodoo curses at people, evidenced by the increasing population of pin-stuck voodoo dolls partying on her dresser. She had yet to replace my replica. Hooray for small favors.

  Mom rose at the butt-crack of dawn, ran errands, met mysterious people for lunches, and attended therapy, a new and nebulous pattern for the stay-at-home doormat mother. Detective Santiago and a lawyer called a few times and Mom disappeared after each call. When she returned home, she’d lock herself in her bedroom. Mom and I packed Dad’s clothes and belongings to donate to charity. She gave some of his clothes, jewelry, and knickknacks to Jesse, who accepted them gratefully and hid them in a box in his closet. She stowed away things to give to Jade whenever she came up for air. Every time I tried to bring up the night of the fire or one of my suspicions in a roundabout way, she’d shut me down hard. I feared breaking her even more and had to bite my ragged tongue each time.

  Jesse and I scoured the finances on a daily basis behind the locked door of the office. The chore I loved to hate, and hated to love. I now saluted the Master’s requirement for a couch in his office. Jesse and I spent a considerable chunk of our finance meetings on the couch, multiplying kisses, counting embraces, and adding in a few feel-ups.

  Most afternoons, he went to band practice. Once, I asked to go with him, and he emphatically said no, since Jade and the drummer were friendly. Jesse knew how much I loved live music, and I really wanted to experience the things he loved. So I hated that exclusion from his life.

  Goaded by Mom, I spent a couple of lunches with Will and listened to him rant about his troubles, adding appropriate sympathetic responses. I really cared and he seemed to appreciate our odd friendship. When he asked pointed questions about Jade and if she had a boyfriend, I steered him away from the subject the same way I steered the Porsche inside the garage: with a bucket of awe and a bundle of alarm.

  Jesse came home for dinner after practice each night and the sexual tension between us began to kill me slowly. We swam every night in the dark. Sometimes we’d toss our swimsuits out of the pool, never touching each other. In my case, I only removed my bikini top. I refused to go bottomless. I wasn’t ready for that kind of total intimate exposure. My brain constantly battled my hands, to keep them off him.

  Inches apart, we treaded water in the deep end, hidden from view of the master bedroom window. The water impelled us closer and closer, shimmying over my bare skin. Jesse did the unthinkable and pulled me to him, my naked breasts mashed to his chest in a sinfully erotic sensation that turned me weightless in the water. His fingers dug into my wet stringy hair and his lips captured mine, a hard and soft kiss, his lips cool from the water and hot from his passion. Flames danced in me, lower and lower. Our tongues tangled and I needed more of him.

  Holding me from drowning, he cupped my butt and a whimper escaped me. His fingers hooked my bikini bottoms and he hoisted me up, leaving me no choice but to straddle him, wrapping my legs around his torso, my arms around his shoulders. A shiver worked over me, and I became acutely aware how close his naked man parts were to me. He moaned into my mouth, a deep sound rising from the back of his throat.

  Our mouths parted. “We better chill. Jade could come home any minute.” I kissed the left side of his mouth and then the right, licking my lips, seeking his taste masked by the chlorine.

  He released me and floated away. “I know.” He dunked beneath the water, dampening his desire.

  I swam toward the deep end ladder, and unabashed at my partially nude self, pulled out of the pool. Jesse gawked at me, his eyes lit by moonlight, feral and hungry. A hot flush worked up from my toes, and I quickly draped a towel around the arousal attacking my breasts as much as the cool air pebbling my skin. He climbed the stairs, completely naked, and moved in front of me.

  Until our quasi-skinny-dipping nights, I’d never seen a boy up close and personal. I looked away, fought my desire to take him in. Gnawing on my bottom lip and squinting, desire won out. Despite his tall lankiness, he was a sight to behold, and again I fought my need to explore his body beyond the feast he presented my eyes. Yet, I still couldn’t look downward. He cupped my face in his hands, drawing close to my towel, and brushed his lips over mine, a breath of air, a touch of passion, and a promise. Most of all, his lips carried hope to mine.

  Soon, we’d leave for Lake Tahoe and say goodbye to our intimate moments. I looked forward to the challenge of finding alone time in Tahoe and exploring those places and fun times he and Dad had explored. Ladies and gentlemen: who will shed the most blood in the Lynwood versus Jerome cage match in the cabin they’d visited in two distinct family settings? We still waited for word on whether Kristen planned to join us. After all, she’d not met Jesse and Jade yet. She didn’t want to leave the art gallery job a professor had pulled strings to snag for her, which suited her artistic passions. You know, hot pink walls covered in big, colorful, hand-drawn flowers. Kindergarten crayon art.

  “Want to work on our song?” Jesse had put on his dry shorts and was toweling his hair, rubbing it vigorously, disconcertingly reminiscent of Dad.

  I scooped up my bikini top. “Love to,” I replied. “I’m going to change in the bathroom.”

  “Need help?” He moved behind me, so close that if I stopped he’d plow me down.

  “Ha ha. Funny. Do you write for Dumb Overused Pickup Lines ’R’ Us?”

  “If they’d have me.” He rubbed his hand down my left butt cheek and I suppressed a shiver.

  We entered the pool house, and he went straight to the refrigerator and grabbed a microbrew for himself and a soda for me. I donned a T-shirt, leaving my wet bikini top off. I finger-combed the snarls out of my hair and twisted a ponytail up on the side, then slicked on face moisturizer and tinted lip gloss.

  Jesse sat on the couch, his acoustic guitar on his lap, strumming the chords of a new song he’d written. We spent the next hour fitting one of my poems to his guitar licks. He had confessed he wasn’t a master at writing songs, but he was a natural at creating music, and our songs fit as well together as we did.

  The loud sputtering and spitting of the muffler on Ax’s clunker wafted through the open windows. Just as we’d planned, I gave Jesse a quick peck on his cheek and dashed into the house. He’d follow in fifteen minutes to give Jade the impression he was practicing his guitar alone in the pool house to avoid bothering my mother.

  I whipped off my clothes, tossed them toward my hamper, and snuggled under the covers. I lay awake a long time, realizing how liberating life After Dad had become, how amazing it felt to fall in love.

  Muffled sounds arose from Jade’s bedroom. Had she seen the peace offering I’d left her? The black T-shirt I risked half a life and two limbs to buy? I hated this. I hated sneaking around and living like strangers. Who was this girl my father had kept hidden from us for fifteen years? She might shed light on him, in another vein from the rays of light Jesse fed me, and I hoped we’d both come to a better understanding of each other. She grieved in worse ways than me. Despite my mother’s inadequacies, I’d die if I lost her. I experienced a pang of guilt in my chest for not being a better person, a better sister.

  I doubted Jade’s bu
rnout boyfriend gave her much sympathy or understanding. Jesse hated Ax and wanted Jade to dump him. Ax was all about sex, smoking dope, doing crack, and drinking with his Goth friends, luring Jade more and more into his illegal independence. Like a tick on a dog.

  Before I fell asleep, I heard sobs rise and fall from Jade’s room. Sorrow became a lodestone weighing my heart down.

  ~*~

  My peace offering was hanging on my doorknob in the hallway the next morning. The black silk-screened T-shirt fell to the floor in a pile of threads. Annoyed, I gathered up the pieces. It wasn’t an expensive T-shirt, since I didn’t want her to spin into her rich Princess Vine woe-is-me rant again. Still, I’d made a special effort to find a shop downtown catering to the Goth lifestyle. I braved the freaks in the store who’d smirked at my pink and pale blonde facade, and used my allowance to purchase the exclusive T-shirt. I almost had to pack a gun to enter the neighborhood. Never again.

  I scratched the spreading rash on my arm, rubbing on calamine lotion. It was Saturday, the day Jesse and Jade were packing up their house and moving their furniture and belongings to a storage unit. Jesse didn’t want me or Mom to help. Their Santa Cruz friends had volunteered.

  He texted me on his way out the door. “Nothing changes. CU 2night.” “Nothing changes” had become our motto. Change was all we’d experienced over the last two weeks. The two of us together had a semblance of stability, even if external forces still evolved around us. Although our lives hinged on the change, our relationship grounded us into our new reality, into each other. Yet part of me still thought it was wrong for us to be together, that our true happiness was elusive. I had a weird gut feeling that something was going to happen to smash it into smithereens.

  Seething, I snatched up the tattered T-shirt to show my mother. I didn’t know why I felt the need to tattle, but I wanted to prove to her that I was trying. Clinking noises came from the master bedroom, and I noticed the door open a few inches. Mom always kept her door shut—a hard-to-break rule of the Master Tyrant.

  I walked toward the bedroom. “Mom, what’s on your agenda today?”

  A drawer slammed shut and Jade slipped through the door. She rammed her hands into the pockets of her worn leather jacket. “She’s downstairs.”

  “What are you doing?” I advanced on her, my three inches of extra height giving me an Amazonian stance.

  Red anger stained round spots on her cheeks, and she glanced at the decimated T-shirt dangling from my fist. “Door was open. Just checking out the pictures on the dresser.”

  Right. In what universe? “I thought you left with Jesse.”

  “He’s waiting for me out front.” She skirted around me and hopped down the stairs.

  From the upstairs landing, through the window over the door, I watched their SUV exit the driveway, wondering what she was doing in my mother’s room of palatial clothing and accessories Jade wouldn’t be caught dead wearing. Plus, my mother owned very little black.

  Mom was reading on her tablet on the family room couch, her feet propped on the coffee table, a formerly forbidden move. She was appearing more relaxed every day.

  “Hey, did you find the money you lost?” I asked.

  “No. I must’ve spent it. Do you need cash?”

  “I’m flush. Will and I are hitting the Boardwalk today.”

  “Just the Boardwalk, right? Jesse and Jade didn’t want help.” She set aside her tablet and took a swig of coffee. I sniffed for alcohol, but only hazelnut creamer met my paranoia.

  “Exactly. I really didn’t want to go back to their house. It felt weird there last week. Leo Lynwood’s stamp and presence plagued it, but it wasn’t Dad, if you know what I mean. Guess it’s good they didn’t want our help.”

  “How’s it going with them?”

  “Jesse and I get along okay. Jade, not so much. I can’t seem to connect with her. We’re like burning sailboats passing in the night.” Mom frowned at my spot-on analogy. “And she totally embraces the Goth lifestyle, down to her black moods.” I tossed the shredded T-shirt on the table. “I bought this for her.”

  She picked at the torn pieces. “She’ll come around.” She wrinkled her nose as if I smelled rancid. “What’s wrong with your arm?” She twisted my arm to inspect it.

  “Some weird rash. Do you know Jade’s into voodoo curses? She made two voodoo dolls of me, using the hair from my hairbrush. I think she’s cursing me. I woke up this morning, my eyeballs burning, sneezing, and my rash worse. I slathered lotion on. Helps a little.”

  Mom flicked her hand. “Voodoo’s for the birds.”

  I blinked rapidly and squinted. “Have you seen her dresser?”

  She studied her perfectly pedicured toenails, and I noticed she’d had her hair color touched up as her mantle of depression and anxiety lifted. “I haven’t been in there since she arrived.”

  “Is it hard?”

  “It’s easier with Jesse. She looks so much like you that she reminds me of his affair.”

  I hugged her. “I know.”

  She sighed, her breath ruffling the hair over my ear. Then the doorbell fractured our bonding moment. Mom was happy as a clam to greet Will at the door.

  I hadn’t visited the beach since the last day of school. I missed Mariana and still hadn’t manned-up to tell her how my life had joined Nutcases Anonymous. I texted her inane things about the weather, my latest book, and meeting Will, so she’d think I was still interning at Dad’s company. She sent me gorgeous pictures of Italy and the tall, handsome Italian boy she’d met, the son of their landlord who helped maintain their rental house. Who goes to Italy and doesn’t hook up with a hot Italian? Because of Jesse, I no longer envied her trip. Dreamily, I laid my head against the headrest of Will’s car.

  “Boardwalk first?” Will shot into the highway traffic crawling over the hills to the coast. The trees shrouding the narrow highway cast undulating shadows on the tarmac, as fleeting as my mood.

  “I want to hit up a Goth shop downtown.” I told him about the T-shirt. “I’ll try one more time.”

  “Killer. I might buy her something too.”

  Jerking my head sideways, I ogled him. “You like her!”

  “Yeah, so?”

  “You know she has a boyfriend.”

  “He’s a tool. She can do better.”

  “Well, duh. Try telling her.”

  “That’s my plan. Did you know I was a Goth during freshman and sophomore years?”

  “Seriously?” How had I pegged Will so wrong?

  We parked downtown three doors down from the alternate lifestyle shop and fed the meter. I glanced across the street and recognized Ax’s deathtrap truck.

  “Isn’t that Jade?” Will stared across the street, his unhappiness hitting me like a ton of broken red bricks.

  Arms tight around each other with happy grins, Jade and Ax stood under the sign of a pawn and loan shop.

  Chapter 21

  I slapped a hand over Will’s open mouth. “Shhh. I don’t want them to see us.”

  His lips pursed against my hand, and then he licked my palm, rattling his mints in his pocket. Scowling, I yanked away my hand and wiped his cooties on my denim shorts. Avoiding his grin, I fumbled my cell out of my purse and shot pictures of Jade and Ax under the pawn shop sign.

  “What’s the deal?” he asked.

  Jade turned toward us. Ducking, I dragged Will behind a tall SUV. Peeking through the SUV’s windows, I waited for them to climb into Ax’s clunker and drive off.

  “Come on.” I flipped on my badass mode and we jaywalked across the street.

  “Think she hawked something?” Will asked, holding the door open for me.

  I covered my nose for a few seconds to absorb the musty scents of dust and other people’s crap. Reminded me of the saying “one man’s garbage is another man’s treasure.”

  “I caught her snooping in my mom’s bedroom this morning.”

  Crammed from floor to ceiling and all the walls in between, the sh
op held a vast array of treasures. Counters over glass cases formed a U around the room. The more expensive and breakable items, jewelry, watches, and glass decorations jam-packed the cases. A section in the rear displayed musical instruments, pictures, and decorations of all kinds on the walls.

  “Follow my lead.” I led Will to the rear counter.

  “Hey kids, what can I do you for?” asked the old man behind the antique cash register. Past his sell-by date, his bald head barely reached the top of the huge register. “Funny seeing two pair of kids in here one right after the other. You all a tag team?” His gnarled hand moved to a shelf below the register.

  Although I bristled with trepidation and anger, I smiled wide to set the geezer at ease. Didn’t want him to haul out a gun and mow us down. “Sort of. That girl was my sister.”

  He screwed up his wrinkly, brown-spotted face, scanning me up and down. “You do bear a resemblance. You’re the light side of her dark. My condolences on the loss of your parents. You poor girls.”

  “Thank you. We’re dealing.” I hugged Will’s arm for fake grief support. He patted my shoulder. Woof, woof. “Mom and Dad meant the world to us. Now we’re stuck selling off their things to make ends meet. But we made a pact not to sell certain mementos and I think she got confused.” More like drop-dead dumb. “Can you show me what she sold?”

  His deep-lined brow went all saggy while his brain took a spin at a decision. “I can make an exception.” He pulled a familiar turquoise box from a drawer beneath the cash register and opened the lid to reveal Mom’s diamond stud earrings. Dad had given them to her to atone for one particularly bad fight, and she’d only worn them when he wanted her to wear them. They cost bank.

  I mustered waterworks. “Those were my mother’s favorite earrings. My sister wasn’t supposed to sell them. How much did you give her?” I pulled my phone out and snapped a photo, evidence of the revenge kind.

  “Now, sweetheart, I’m not at liberty to give you that information. I’ll offer you a deal if you want to repurchase them.” The box snapped shut. He stuck it inside the drawer and locked it, his keys jangling in finality.