CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Layla
Sometime the next morning I wake up with a stale taste in my mouth, feeling like my head is being squeezed tightly in a vise. K.C.’s recording studio has no windows, so the only light filtering into the room comes from the tiny crack at the bottom of the door. I reach a lazy arm to my side, where Nico spent the night curled around my body like a clamshell, but I only find rumpled sheets. He is nowhere to be found.
Cautiously, I slide out from under the twisted mess of sheets and comforter and attempt to stand up. I crouch awkwardly and feel around the floor for my clothes—or at least something to drape around my naked body. The movements make me wince slightly and remind me of what happened on this futon.
My night passed blissfully, if not quite restfully, considering I was woken up two more times by prowling fingers and inquisitive lips looking to explore just about every surface of my body. Nico’s got stamina far beyond mine—I feel like a wrung-out sponge. But even in my half-asleep state, I couldn’t say no to him, which is why I’m now sore all over. Wincing again, I reach around the padded walls for the light switch, taking care to avoid the places where I think the drums and guitars are set up near the door.
“Ow! Shit!” I yelp as I step on the sharp edge of a soundboard. I hop in the direction of the door, find the switch, and rescue myself from the dark.
After I pull on the leggings and tank top I brought with me, I pad down the hall to the bathroom. I splash water over my face and brush my teeth, eager to cleanse the residue of sleep. I didn’t drink anything last night, but my face feels hot and cloudy, like I’m hungover. I throw another splash of cold water over it, then tie my hair up in a messy knot on top of my head. There: comfortable, yet effortlessly sexy. At least, that’s what I’m going for, even if I’m not quite feeling that way. Fake it ‘til you make it, right?
I’m drawn to the kitchen by the smell of coffee and find Nico setting donuts on a plate, wearing nothing but his jeans. They hang slightly loose on his hips, revealing the mouth-watering contours of the muscles that dip below his waistband, under which he’s obviously got nothing else on. A small bouquet of tulips is arranged in a vase on the kitchen table—purple, my favorite color. I wonder if he figured that out from the color of my bedspread at the dorms. My body starts humming again at the sight of his smooth, broad back. He turns around and smiles. The hum intensifies.
“Hey, good morning, Sleeping Beauty.” He places a final donut on the plate and comes over to smack a kiss on my lips. “How you feeling?”
I smile up at him. “Pretty good. Ah, a bit worn out.”
That earns me a devilish grin—he knows exactly why I’m worn out. “What can I say, baby? You’re irresistible. Plus, I don’t remember a whole lot of complaining.”
I duck my head into his bare chest as a tell-tale blush rises up my neck. No, I definitely didn’t complain at all. In fact, contrary to what my sore parts are telling me, I want more. So much more.
But instead of saying so, I focus on the plate of pastries and the smell of coffee, hopping up onto the counter next to him. Nico steps easily between my knees and delivers another sweet kiss, tasting a little of fresh donuts and cinnamon.
“Mmm,” he vibrates against my lips. “That’s what I want for breakfast.”
I giggle into his kiss. “Maybe. But those donuts look good too. Where did you get them?”
He picks up an apple fritter and splits it in half, holding one out to me and taking a bite of the other. “I ran out while you were sleeping and picked them up from the shop a few blocks away.”
“Like that?” I nod at his bare chest as I accept the donut and take a bite.
He looks down at his shirtless form and back up to me somewhat sheepishly. “Well, I did wear a coat and shoes. But I couldn’t find my shirt anywhere, and I didn’t want to wake you up. You looked so cute with your head buried under the pillows.”
I stifle my laugh with another bite of fritter. I wonder if his coat was open or closed. The fine folks at the donut shop must have gotten quite an eyeful.
“Do you work out?” I ask suddenly.
Some people are lucky enough to look like models without doing much, but I doubt he has a six-pack just from pushing boxes all day long.
Nico laughs. “Other than my job, you mean? Um, yeah, I do. I mean, I try.”
“What do you do?”
He smirks. “There’s a boxing gym around the corner from my mom’s place. Sometimes I’ll go and mess around. Been doing it since I got back––um, since I was a teenager.”
I lean back a little, looking him over. Another component of Nico’s personality emerges. His physique starts to make sense—he’s definitely built like a boxer.
“Did you ever compete?” I ask.
He tips his head back and laughs. “Fuck, no. I wanted to keep my teeth and my brain cells. But I like the training. Sometimes it feels good just to take your frustrations out on a heavy bag. Living in this city…”
He trails off, suddenly struck by some unknown specter from his past. His face darkens. I desperately want to know what he’s thinking about, but I don’t want to pry.
So I’m a little disappointed when he slips away to grab two coffee cups from one of the cabinets. “You like cream and sugar in your coffee, baby?”
“Yes, please,” I say, and tell him when to stop as he doctors up my cup. I inhale and take a long sip. “God, that’s good.”
It’s utter ambrosia to my woozy head, and my stomach growls in response, eager for sustenance after a long night of activity. I scarf down the rest of my fritter and reach to the plate beside me for one of the chocolate donuts.
“Yum,” Nico concurs as he picks up his second donut as well. “God, I’m going to miss this in LA”
“You’re going to LA?” I ask as I break off a piece of donut and toss it in my mouth. “That sounds fun. When?”
His head snaps up, and I find him staring at me like he’s just ran over my new puppy and is afraid to tell me. The lightness of the morning seeps out of the room, and the hunger in my stomach turns to a giant ball of dread. Bad news.
~
Nico
I can’t believe I did that. I mean, I can’t fucking believe I just did that. I had a plan for how to tell her. I woke up this morning, tossed and turned about the fact that I’d let things get as far as they did without telling her the truth. I stole out this morning, not even bothering to find my shirt, even though it’s fuckin’ twenty-eight degrees outside. Left her in the bed, sleeping like a damn angel, and crept out like the thief I am when it was still practically dark to get donuts and coffee. I practiced what I was going to say the entire way there and the entire way back.
And all for what? So she can think I’m an asshole just using her for sex? Waiting until I fucked her until I mentioned offhand that I’m out of here?
I am a fuckin’ asshole. She’s going to hate me. Fuck, I hate me right now.
“I, uh, shit, baby,” I stumble over my words like I’ve got a sudden speech impediment. Shit. Shit, shit, motherfucking shit.
Suddenly the donuts are all in the wrong places on the plate, and I have to rearrange them. Layla watches until I’m done and crosses her arms while I brush my hands off on my jeans. I don’t know where the fuck to put them––I hook my thumbs in my belt loops, but that just makes me feel like Fonzi. So I fold my arms over my chest, even though that probably makes me look even more like a bouncer.
No, I think. You look like an asshole.
“I meant to tell you…I didn’t want to spoil things…but, Layla…”
She’s watching me, her big blue eyes already full of mixed emotions: regret, fear, frustration, and that hint of desire that never seems to go away. I know, baby. I feel it too. Fuck, looking at her in a thin white tank that’s clinging to everything, I’m feeling it coming like a freight train.
Just say it, you mother. Fucking. Pussy.
“I’m moving to LA in May.” The words burn, just like I knew they would. “K.C. knows some people out there; he hooked me up with a job doing security for one of the clubs where he just got a job. It’s been in the works for a while...but he just found out that it’s a done deal. So…yeah. I’m going.”
She drops the donut she’s holding on the counter, and the dread in my belly turns much darker. Shit. Fuck, fuck, shit. I was right––this meant something more to her, maybe as much as it has to me. All sorts of emotions filter across her beautiful face: frustration, sadness, which eventually morphs into anger.
I should have just stayed the fuck away.
“You knew this,” she says, horrified. The tension in her voice is already tightening, like a rubber band ready to snap. “You knew you were leaving in a couple of months, and you—”
She mashes her lips together, and I know what she’s thinking. We didn’t make love last night, but we weren’t exactly fucking. Not the first time, and not the second or third either. But whatever it was, it was a fuck lot more than just a good time.
“—did that to me anyway,” she continues. “Tell me all this stuff about how much you wanted me, you touch me and kiss me like you want us to be lovers, bring me fucking breakfast in the morning!”
The rubber band snaps. Suddenly, she’s gesturing wildly to the set up in the kitchen with the food and the flowers, her hands flailing around and threatening to knock the coffee mugs off the counter. I stay perfectly still when she hops off the counter and starts pacing angrily around the kitchen. If she’s anything like my sisters, one wrong move and the whole place will get smashed.
“Layla.”
I’m a statue. I keep my voice low, calm, and begging for her to look at me, even though my insides are completely twisted up.
Layla whirls around and glares.
“So that’s it?” she demands, trying and failing to keep the shake out of her voice. The sound of it makes my heart jump in my chest. “Was this all some ploy to nail some college chick? Was this your plan all along, to tell me how special I am, fuck me, make me fall in—fall into bed with you, all the while you’re secretly planning to run off to fucking California?!”
She stops at the far end of the kitchen, where a cloudy window faces the back of another brick townhouse. This would have been the part where my sisters would start throwing kitchen utensils and breaking dishes, but Layla just grips the countertop and bows her head. I know without asking that she’s trying not to cry. She’s trying not to look weak, look like she cares as much as she does.
I only know because I’m trying to do the same thing. I’ve known this girl less than two weeks; been with her for maybe forty-eight hours. But as I see her there, so clearly in pain––pain that I caused––the truth is so fuckin’ clear. It’s a fact that hits me with so much force that I actually have to grab the edge of the stove to keep from falling down.
Fuck me. What am I going to do?
Finally, after several minutes of trying to get myself together, I find my voice again.
“Layla,” I say again, this time more softly.
I push off the stove and shuffle toward her. She doesn’t move, just keeps standing at the window. I can feel the warmth of her body from inches away, and it’s causing me physical pain not to touch her, even a little.
So I do. Because I really am an asshole.
I slide my hands tentatively up her arms to rest on her shoulders. Then I lean down and rub my nose down her neck. Because really, this might be the last time I get to do it.
“Please,” I say into her warm, soft skin. “I didn’t mean to tell you like this. I didn’t mean for all this to happen.”
She sighs, and for a second I think she might forgive me. But then she ducks out of my reach to the other side of the kitchen. It’s for the best. I can’t be close to her and keep my hands to myself. I don’t think she can either.
“Why are you even going there?” she asks me, her voice suddenly sharp. “You’re a New Yorker if I’ve ever met one. This city is in your blood. Is this just a spontaneous move? Something that just came up?”
I shake my head, shifting awkwardly in my sneakers. “Ah, no, not exactly. I’ve been trying to figure it out for a while now. I was in LA for a few weeks last year and met some of the people K.C. set me up with. It’s been in the works since then, and stuff just came through for me.”
I don’t mention the people who are waiting there for me. People I haven’t been talking to much for the past few weeks because I’m too wrapped up with Layla. People like Paul, the owner of the club where I’m supposed to be working. People like Jessie, the girl I spent a good chunk of that time with.
Layla’s mouth opens and closes a few times. “But…you don’t really have to leave, do you?” she pleads, and it just about breaks my heart. “I mean, it’s not like you’ve signed a contract, right?”
From anyone else, it might sound pathetic. But from her, I get it. If it were me on the other side, I’d already be on my knees, begging her to stay. But there are other things to think about here. Things like, I’m nowhere near good enough for Layla, that she deserves better than a fuckin’ delivery man or a part-time doorman. Things like, sometimes I feel like I have to get out of this fuckin’ cesspool of a city or else I’ll die. Or I’ll never figure out what or who I am without the chains of this place holding me down.
“No, I do have to go, baby,” I say quietly, and watch her face fall. “And not just because I already made the commitment. I’ve spent almost twenty-seven years in this city. Never lived anywhere else, never had any other job. My sisters are old enough now to help out with our mom, and my brother’s eighteen, almost done with school. I need to try to do something different with my life, but everything I try here goes nowhere. It’s time.”
I sigh and take a deep breath as I voice all the things I’m not sure I’ve ever said out loud, but have been thinking for years.
“I don’t want to work at FedEx forever, baby—you gotta understand that. I feel like this is my shot at something new, and I have to take it. Just like what you’re doing here, away from your family and where you grew up.”
“You’ve lived somewhere else,” she argues stubbornly, unwilling to let it go. “Those years in the country, when you were in high school, right?”
“That was in juvie, Layla,” I admit quietly, dropping the other bomb I hadn’t ever planned on telling her. That she didn’t just sleep with a guy with no future, but one with a fucked-up past too. A criminal. “Juvenile detention. It doesn’t exactly count as a positive experience outside the city, you know what I mean?”
She’s stunned. I’d be willing to bet I’m the first person she knows with a record. I was a minor, it’s true, but a record is still a record. It’s something I have to explain to any employer for the rest of my life.
“What did you do?” she asks, unable to hold back her curiosity. There’s a gleam in her eyes I’ve seen before––this turns her on.
I hate that it turns her on.
“Hung out with the wrong crowd. Got caught with some kids holding up bodegas. The third time they kicked my ass out to the center for eighteen months. I got out just in time to finish high school.” I raise an eyebrow. “Do you hate me now?”
I can see plainly she doesn’t. But more than that, I can see that she’s not scared of me. The gleam is gone, and she’s not looking at me any differently than before. I’m still just Nico to her.
I’m shocked by how relieved I am.
“Please,” she says. “If I was going to be judged for every stupid thing I did in high school, I wouldn’t have any friends left in the world. Have you held up any bodegas since then?”
We both know I haven’t. There is no way I’d have the job at FedEx if I had an adult record. I barely got it as is, and that’s only because Flaco was friends with the hiring manager.
The conversation lulls, and I feel like the space between us is huge, like these two bombs having created a chasm between us. Was I really so stupid to have fooled myself into believing she wouldn’t care? Of course she cares.
“Layla, please believe me when I say this,” I start to say.
She looks up, and my throat tightens at the pain shining bright in her eyes. Fuck. Fuck.
“I didn’t expect to meet you when I did,” I ramble on. “Didn’t expect to feel what I do this intense, this fast. You’re so…fuck, you’re so everything. Beautiful, smart, sexy as hell, fun to be around, easy to talk to…the whole package, really. I…I swear to God, I didn’t expect to like you this much, baby.”
My voice cracks like a teenager’s when I finish. I’m so weak. I should just be the asshole she thinks I am. I should just let her fucking go.
“I could go with you,” she blurts out, pulling me out of my thoughts. The next words follow in a rush. “I could transfer to USC or UCLA or some other school in LA I could fly out with you when I finish the school year in May. It wouldn’t be that hard…”
Even as she trails off, we both know how nuts it sounds. She’s thinking about jumping ship for a guy she literally met two weeks ago. It’s crazy. And yet, I can see in her eyes she’s serious.
So now I have to break her heart again. Because even though I have to leave this city, I can’t take her with me.
“Shit. Baby, that’s so sweet, and I’m honored that you would even offer to do that for me.” I walk slowly to where she stands, like I’m approaching a wild animal. Even more slowly, I take her hands lightly in mine, playing with the edges of her fingertips as they interlace between mine. “God, you’re so beautiful…” I whisper.
She blinks hopefully. My heart drops another story.
“We both know you need to stay here, finish what you started,” I continue. “You have your friends, your degree…law school eventually, right? Coming out to LA will only put you behind, and baby, you can’t do that for someone you’ve only known a few days. I can’t let you do that for me.”
I take a deep breath, lean in to kiss her lightly on the lips. She doesn’t respond as my words sink in. I’m numb and falling apart at the same time. Maybe this is the real difference between our ages—she’s still young enough to be optimistic, to throw caution to the wind for her heart, but I know the realities of everyday life. The complications of mine are only going to hold her back, and I won’t do that.
“Let’s just enjoy the time we have left together,” I say, because I’m still too weak to let her go completely. How can I live in this city for three more months, knowing that this beautiful, amazing creature is in it?
But then she says the one thing I knew she would. The smart thing to say. And I know I’m wrong––our age difference doesn’t mean shit.
“No.” Layla pushes off the counter and out of my grasp. She shakes her head as I step toward her again and shuffles backward out of the kitchen. “No, no. I-I can’t.”
I watch dazedly as she disappears down the hallway toward the bedrooms and returns with her overnight bag. I watch as she stuffs the books on the dining table back into her messenger bag, as she pulls on her boots and coat. I watch because I’m stuck in place, like a statue.
“I have to go,” she says, as if it isn’t obvious. “I can’t do this with you. It’s…it’s going to hurt too much. It already does.”
Her voice cracks across the last words, and she swipes viciously at the tears falling down her cheeks. Fucking fuck. All I want to do is go to her, wrap her in my arms, tell her I’ll stay, tell her I’ll do whatever she wants if she’ll just stop crying.
But instead, I keep watching as she heaves her bags over her shoulder.
“Layla.” I finally find my voice just as she opens the heavy front door. “I’m sorry.”
She turns around and stares at me, her deep blue eyes shooting a bullet right through my fuckin’ heart. I chew on my lower lip, unsure of what else to say. I want to grab her, tell her this has been a sick joke, show her that I’m willing to make it work no matter what, that this feeling between us is too special, too rare to just throw aside for things like jobs and school.
That’s what she does to me. She makes me hope in ways I never thought I could.
But then Layla turns away again, her eyes cast downward
“I know,” she says finally. “I’m sorry, too.”
And then she pulls the door shut behind her, and I, like the lonely, downtrodden, fucking asshole I am, let her find her own way back to Manhattan, back to where she belongs.
~