Leaving Eden

by Kelly A Walker et al.

  As I slip out the back door, there's only one thought running through my mind – I get time off from work. The bills are piling up, my rent is late, and my phone might get disconnected, but I'm happy I can sleep instead of work.

  Ever since my parents’ deaths and the dreams that feel more real than fake, I've started sleeping more. The more I sleep, the more tired I seem to be. I don’t exactly know when this obsession with sleep started. I was doing reasonably well – making the right grades, doing all the things a grad student should be doing – and then I realized I could dream about certain things and certain people. Now, I want to be there all the time – not here where I have to worry about all these day-to-day problems.

  When I fumble with my keys for the entry door on the old house that’s been converted into small apartments, it opens from the other side. I mumble a thank-you before I even see who it is. My apartment manager. He’s an arrogant, brooding recluse, but a hot one. My hungry gaze explores the muscles that are visible under his tight tee. His personality fits all those muscles and the Harley he rides.

  “Aislynn.”

  My name on his lips does things to my body that my manager saying the same word could never do. He has a deep voice that fills the old hallway that leads into the building, and I’m acutely aware of how close we are. Only inches separate his chest from mine. It doesn’t help that we’re both thicker in that department than the usual person. I think I see his eyes flicker down to check out that chest, but it’s probably wishful thinking. Guys like him don’t want girls like me. I’m so low maintenance, I’m practically invisible.

  “Nash,” I respond when he doesn’t say anything else. We haven’t talked much since I moved in, but we exchange pleasantries and insist on calling each other by our first names. Being called Miss Suarez makes me feel like my mom, but a lot of professors insist on the formality.

  “You smell like french fries.” Since that wasn’t what I was planning on hearing come out of his mouth, I roll my eyes.

  “Working in a diner kind of makes that happen. Anything else?” Maybe I’ll get away without another scolding.

  “Yeah, your rent was due last week.”

  My cheeks color as I’m again reminded of my failings. First my professor, and now him. “I get paid this Friday,” I say quickly. It might not be enough, but it will be close. I hope. He’s let me slide before. I think he feels sorry for me. Poor orphaned girl and broke student all alone in the city. “I’ll have it for you then,” I add.

  He pauses as if he’s going to say something else, but in the end, he only nods and presses his body against the wall so I can make my way toward the staircase. It’s only one flight up, but I feel his eyes on my ass until I’m out of sight. A hint of a smile lights my face as I open my door and get ready for bed. Professor Reece can wait; I know what I’m dreaming about tonight.

  3

  AISLYNN

  I don’t want to be here. I stand, looking around the backyard I grew up in. There’s the apple tree I fell out of when I was six. There’s the garden my dad started and never finished. It’s overgrown with rogue strawberries that occasionally produce a berry, but it’s mostly weeds. The fence looks the same - in need of patching. If I think I’m lazy in real life, it’s not that different than what my parents were like.

  I try to change the dream because I’m fully aware that I’m dreaming, but it doesn’t budge. The sky is motionless, pale blue without a cloud in sight. There’s no breeze, and the suffocating southern humidity makes me feel like my hair is turning into a frizzy halo three feet wide around my head.

  “Aislynn?”

  I almost trip on the uneven ground as I whirl around. “Devon?” I ask uncertainly, my face scrunched as I look for similarities. I remember him as a skinny kid and an asshole teenager, lanky and pimpled. Now, he’s hot. Or at least my dreaming mind made him hot. Of course it would. This isn’t the first time he’s appeared in my dreams, but it’s the first time like this – us talking like we're both awake.

  “What are you doing here?” Devon asks as he steps off the back porch of my house.

  “I should ask you what you’re doing here as this is still my house last time I checked. But it doesn’t matter because this is a dream. Why are you here, though? In my dream?”

  Devon pauses, and I take a minute to study him closer. He’s broad-shouldered and fit now, his build somewhere between Nash and Reece. He wears black, square-framed glasses and has his hair cut tight against his head.

  “This is a dream?” he asks uncertainly, looking around my backyard. We lived three houses away from each other as kids and played together often. Any sort of kindness I felt for him dissolved when he looked the other way while his friend treated me like an emotional and physical punching bag.

  I square my shoulders and plant my feet. If this is a dream, I can say whatever I want to him. Better than any therapy. “You have no business in my mind, Devon. Go away.”

  “No,” the older Devon answers, surprising me. He was always a follower, but he appears to have grown a backbone in the time since I left our shitty little hometown – aptly named Eden because of all the sins it hid behind closed doors and pleasant smiles.

  He takes a step off the back porch and approaches slowly as if I’m a shy animal he doesn’t want to spook. Probably a good idea. I’m still trying to change the dream in my mind. I’d rather be with Nash or Reece. They don’t know my past and can’t judge me for it.

  He seems so much older. I know it’s been ten years since we graduated, but he seems to have changed so much whereas I still feel the same. I’d gained the freshman fifteen, and my hair is longer, but I think I look similar. As his eyes appreciatively travel the length of my body, I wonder if I’m wrong.

  “You look great, Lynnie.”

  “You don’t get to call me that, Dev.” I spit his childhood nickname. “And I suppose not having a boyfriend who breaks my jaw when I come home from work does wonders for a girl’s looks.”

  Devon’s face falls and he takes a deep breath. “Aislynn, I’ve thought about you so much since you left. It seems like I’m always dreaming about you or wondering how you’re doing. It’s really bizarre. But I know why. It’s because I need to say I’m sorry. I was wrong – so wrong – for not doing anything when Blain was mistreating you - abusing you.”

  Just the name makes me shudder. I try not to think about him. I’m past it. I really am – or at least enough that I’m no longer triggered when people shout and bang things around in anger. But I also haven’t let anyone close since then. I’ve had several one night stands or week-long relationships, but they were never fulfilling. I fulfill my needs in my dreams, sometimes with strangers whose faces I can’t see. It's best that way.

  I can sense Devon’s sincerity. He looks like he just stepped out of an Old Navy ad with only a shadow of whiskers on his square jaw. I sigh and look away. “It’s not really your fault. Blain would have kicked the shit out of you if you’d said anything.”

  “That doesn’t make it all right,” he says softly. I agree with him, but I also understand. He wasn’t the only one who did nothing. My hometown was pretty and shiny on the outside, but the worms ate away the insides, rotting the core.

  “Maybe not, but I understand. I guess.” I shrug again. I expect the dream to shift, to change to something else now that we’ve said our piece, but it doesn’t move.

  “Want to sit down?” he asks, lowering himself to the ground.

  I don’t know if I want to, but I do it anyway, pulling my knees up to my chest. It looks like I'm here for a while so I might as well get the most out of it. “How is Atlanta?” I ask. He left right after graduation, just like I did. My college was farther away from our home, though, and in a smaller town.

  “I’m not there anymore.” Toned muscles strain the soft blue fabric of his button-down shirt. “I left after I graduated. Didn’t know what to do with myself. I’m back in Eden taking care of my mom.”

  My smile falls.
“Sorry about your mom.” I’d heard she had a stroke right before my parents died, but Devon must have returned after the funeral because I’d seen rent-a-nurses at their house at the time.

  “Sorry about your parents. I didn’t hear about the car accident until after I’d come back. If I had, I might have returned for the funeral.”

  “They killed themselves,” I say shortly. My dream self has no filter on her mouth, and I like her like that. I wish I could be like that in real life. Just throw my shit out there and see how people react.

  Devon’s dark eyes spark in confusion. “The newspaper and everyone I talked to said their car drove off Cain’s Cliff - a problem with the brakes.”

  I nod. “It did. They did it on purpose, though.” Not many people know this, but a heavy weight feels like it’s been lifted off my chest. Devon and I were close at one time. Thankfully, he doesn’t ask why. I can’t answer that question without guilt consuming me.

  “Are you still in Augusta?”

  “Yep. Finishing up my master’s degree in Psychology.”

  Devon smiles and a spark of fire lights in my stomach. I can’t deny that he’s hot, but I shouldn’t be attracted to him, not after what he did - or didn’t do. Blain always said I was a whore - that I liked too many men at once - that I couldn’t stick with one. It was the one thing he said about me that I never denied. But just because I found other men attractive didn’t mean I wasn’t faithful to him. He still used those accusations to make me feel like shit, though, mentally and physically. Another reason I’m single. I like more than one person at a time; I always have. It shouldn’t surprise me that a third man has entered my dream world.

  “You were always brilliant,” he says.

  I shake my head. “I try. It’s been hard lately.” I don’t want to go there, though. Too many memories. Too much shit to deal with. He opens his mouth to say something else, but I’m done here.

  “Go away. I want to dream about something happy.”

  THE LANDSCAPE MORPHS SLOWLY. Devon fades away and every feeling the dream evoked fades with him. As I feed my mind what I want, it grows and morphs into something else. I don’t want my apartment, even though that’s where Nash and I would be the most comfortable. My fantasy doesn't include piles of dirty laundry.

  Instead, I picture a hotel room I went to with my parents when they were still alive. It was above a casino. I remember they let me run around the lower floors while they gambled away all our money. They knew the owners and the maids would just smile indulgently when I zipped past them. I used to have so much energy – so much stamina. That’s the only thing I miss about being a kid. I don’t miss how easily people lie to kids or how helpless I felt.

  The hotel room itself is generic, but I make sure to include the patio doors that overlook the Gulf of Mexico and open them so I can feel the ocean breeze and hear the waves crashing on the shore. There’s no sound of traffic or drunken voices from the outside pool because I don’t want them there. Instead of two double beds like my memory, there’s one king-size bed. I imagine I’m making myself prettier and slimmer in my dream, but I can’t really tell because I’ve never been able to see myself. When I look in a mirror, I only get a vague outline of a woman.

  Once the detail in the room is perfect, I lean against the patio door and close my eyes, picturing Nash. I want him just the way I remember him – in that tight, green t-shirt that shows off his muscles and the fleck of green in his hazel eyes. The black jeans and motorcycle boots, the slight scruff and windblown dark hair.

  And when I open my eyes, he’s there. A real smile spreads across my face – the kind I never really use when I’m awake. Dream Nash blinks, turning slowly to look around him.

  “Where am I?”

  I sigh. Why are all my dream men so curious? It’s not as if their consciousness is actually aware of what’s going on. “It’s a dream.”

  “A dream.” It isn’t a question. He turns back to me with a confused look on his face. “Why does it feel so real?”

  I shrug. “It’s my dream and I want it to feel real for you, so I make it feel real.”

  “Okay,” he says slowly, dragging out the word so that it makes two long syllables. “I don’t usually dream – or remember my dreams anyway.”

  “That’s because it’s my dream,” I repeat. I’m irritated because this is similar to the conversation I had with my grad professor the last time I dreamed about him. And then Devon too. Why can’t they just let me have my fantasy? Let me dream my dreams my way?

  Utilizing a confidence I never feel when I’m awake, I step up to Nash and press my palms against his chest. I want to feel the muscles I only get to look at. Thankfully, he doesn’t freak out like Professor Reece did - as if the student-teacher relationship is taboo even in a dream. Instead, he watches me closely while heat starts building inside my belly. I have a feeling I’m going to enjoy this one – a lot.

  “So, we’re in your dream,” Nash echoes, and I nod. My hands slide over the firm planes of his chest, tracing the ridges in his abdomen as I coast lower. I thought abs like this only existed in the movies or after Photoshop created them. I know Nash spends a lot of time in the gym; he’s always carrying around a gym bag and he drinks disgusting green drinks. Just thinking about it makes me tired. “And what is it we’re going to be doing in your dream?”

  The deep voice I’ve admired so often shivers across my skin like the gulf breeze gently blowing the curtains into the room. I shrug one shoulder, still intent on exploring the muscles under my hands. “Whatever I want,” I answer distractedly.

  Large hands wrap around my wrists, trapping them just as I reach the tempting line of his waistband under his shirt. “Is that so?”

  I nod, looking up into his brownish-green eyes. “My dream. My rules.”

  A corner of his lip tilts mischievously. “Really? Usually, I make the rules when I’m with a woman.”

  “You do?” The bit of reality surprises me so much that my breath catches in my throat. I imagine what he does when he’s making the rules, but I imagine him doing it with me. There aren’t any other women. Not here, not now.

  “I do,” he confirms as his hands take mine and lift them above my head. As much as I might want to, though, I’m not going to let dream Nash take over. This is the only place, the only time, in my life where I have control.

  “Not tonight,” I whisper and easily bring my hands back down. Gazing into his eyes, I step closer, driving him backward until he falls onto the bed. He’s just watching me – confusion and uncertainty warring with lust.

  “Why does this feel so real?” he murmurs under his breath, probably to himself, but I’m done being reminded that this isn’t real. I lean over and press my finger against his lips. The scruff of his unshaven cheeks and chin scratch my skin.

  “Shhhh.” My finger trails over that chiseled jaw and down the corded vein in his neck to the collar of his t-shirt. I move from leaning over to straddling him, my knees just above his hips where his legs hang off the bed. A muscle clenches in his jaw, and his dark eyes burn.

  “I don’t let people tell me what to do,” he growls. His tone lights up everything inside me.

  “Tonight, you do. After that, you can make the rules.” I shrug. “Besides, it’s a dream. It’s my dream. Let go.”

  He stares at me as if trying to discern the truth or weighing his options. I’m not sure what he's thinking, but I’m done reassuring him. I never know when I’m going to wake up, so I don’t like wasting time. I can feel the moment he gives in. His muscles aren’t as tense between my thighs and his face softens. His hands move from resting beside him to gripping my hips.

  “Okay then, little girl, what are you going to do with me?”

  Another genuine smile lights my face as he hands over the control. Having a man as sexy and powerful as Nash underneath me makes me feel invincible. Even if it’s just a dream, I’ll take it. I control nothing in my life. At least my mind lets me have this.

 
; Heat surging through me, I lean over. My lips move softly over his – tentative at first. He tastes like some dark liquor I can’t name, but it’s exotic and blooms over my tongue and lips as if I’m actually drinking it myself. His hesitation is gone. He matches every movement of my mouth, his tongue trailing over my top lip and then my bottom one as I nip at his. My cheeks flush and my breath comes short as my lips coast down his neck to the restricting t-shirt. With a thought, the offending piece of material is gone. He stares for a moment like he forgot this was a dream, but I just ignore it. I’m used to it; he’ll get used to it if he becomes a regular player. With the way it’s going so far, I’m thinking about keeping him.

  His chest is broad and dusted with dark hair. I flick my tongue over one of his flat nipples as my crazy curls trail along his upper arms and chest. He jerks under me. Smiling smugly, I do it again and follow up with a little bite which makes his breath hiss between his teeth. He may like to be in control, but he can’t hide that he’s enjoying this. That’s just the way I want it, of course, but I don’t think about how I’m manipulating his reactions. This is real for me at this moment.

  The hotel room fades as I lean closer, teasing his nipples and playing with his waistband with my free hand, dipping my fingers under to trace the outline and the smooth skin underneath. My hips slide down. Pressed against my aching core, I can feel the shape of his impressive erection. When he tries to thrust upward, I stop him with a small shake of my head.

  “No,” I whisper as I bite his nipple a little harder this time. “I’m in control.” I’m sure my eyes are on fire as I glance up at him. He’s watching me from under hooded lids, his dark eyelashes fluttering across his cheeks and his strong hands gripping my hips so hard I can feel the indentations of his fingers.