Chapter Five

I shut my laptop with a sigh. It gets harder and harder each week to keep up this pretense. I never thought I’d say this . . . but I could go forever— and a day— without speaking to them. Without seeing them. Without coming home.

It’s all a façade. My safe haven is wrecked. My heart in ruins.

I’m not the same. I smile, but it isn’t with them. I laugh, but it isn’t their jokes. I dream— but it isn’t in color. The things that used to be vibrant in my life, with what filled my heart with passion and promise, is gone. I don’t dream of arranging my gallery. I don’t conjure up thoughts of Caden coming home from school and me preparing dinner. I don’t allow myself to think of the fun games I was going to make up to help him study.

I refuse.

I won’t remember.

But— I can’t forget. I wish I could. Just like him.

“Láska.” Lukas saunters into the room. I ignore him when he uses that term of endearment. Love. I hate that word. Funny— it’s been said there’s a thin line between love and hate. I can say with clarity and reassurance I hate the word love. I hate the meaning behind it. I hate the way it causes you the highest highs to crash you into the lowest of lows. I don’t think it’s such a thin line— maybe a non-existent line. Lukas stands in front of me. “Mít knedlík v krku?”

He knows I don’t understand a word of Czech . . . yet he continues to use it hoping I’ll learn. He speaks perfect English, so I cross my arms waiting for translation. “I said have a dumpling in your throat?”

“The hell you say?” He sighs at my language.

“You didn’t answer when I called, so I was wondering if you were speechless, caused from my good looks.” I bend in laughter. He and Julie could give each other a run for their money with their egos.

“No. I was ignoring you.” I stick my tongue out. “I know what you called me and I’ve asked you to stop using that word.”

“As you wish.” He’s so full of shit. He babbled the same thing yesterday. The day before. The week prior to that. Lukas found me among the interns the first week and deemed me his. He took me under his wing and hasn’t let me go. He’s studying under Pasta Oner with me and said I had the look of . You can guess by the sound of that he came close to eating my fist . . . until he said the word heartbreak. And there, in the middle of the streets of Prague, I broke down in this stranger’s arms.

The rest is history. He packed my stuff from the hotel during day two. I’ve been staying at his flat since and I like having someone to talk to. The silence was suffocating. Sure, I could call my friends and I should’ve— but for the last four years Caden was that for me. Deacon has Saylor. Mason has Breck. Emberlee has Brody. Before everyone was coupled, we had that go to person and mine has been Caden. I hadn’t experienced a moment in my life he was unavailable . . . until now. Learning to live without him, retraining myself to stop reaching for the phone to call him, wanting to share a moment with him . . . it’s like learning to live all over again. In solitude. In bleakness. In misery. Or as Lukas calls it.

“Today is the day you’ll paint.” He’s so bossy and matter of fact.

“I don’t know.” I came to Prague to have the freedom to paint street art— graffiti in most of the states— and I haven’t picked up a brush or contributed one iota. My internship is half over and I have nothing but swollen eyes and a truculent attitude to show for my time here.

“Pasta is gonna send you packing.” He blows an air kiss and picks up his art bag.

I shrug. “Wouldn’t be the worst thing that’s happened.”

“You Americans love your pity parties.” He chides.

“You Czechs love your dramatics.” Lukas has a flair for being over the top drama central.

“No, láska, just me.” He winks and I follow him to the designated site— sans my brushes and paints.

I watch as each student takes liberties with their work and utilizes the space allotted to them. Pasta isn’t strict in giving us a theme but asks that we don’t paint over each other. Or them, seems how I can’t create jack shit. “Ms. Michaels. I chose you as a protégé because of your art. Yet, week three and I haven’t seen it.” I refrain from telling him to fuck off. I’m nobody’s protégé and he can send me packing whenever he wants.

“I understand. I’m blocked.” Fuck it, I’ll go with the truth.

“Nesmysl.” He bites. “That’s rubbish. A true artist, a real creator, works through the blocks.” Oh, this pompous ass is gonna get my foot up his ass and exiting through his esophagus. “You use that pain, the blank space in your head— that’s what your art is fueled by.”

“I’m sorry Pasta. That isn’t how it works.” I turn to watch the other students continue shading and finish the mural.

“That is how it works, Ms. Michaels. And I’m going to prove it to you.” These men in Prague have control issues.

“How’s that?” I refrain from adding a smart-ass name.

“We have four buildings to complete in the next three weeks. One of those is yours and Lukas’.” I slight my eyes at him. He’s insane. “Lukas will be there in terms of supervising. It’s a smaller building and it’s all yours.”

“If I don’t?” My voice tremors.

“I’ll inform your school and I’m sure you won’t get your diploma.” They’re holding it until this internship is completed. It was in lieu of my finals. “And I’ll blackball your name in the community.” Fuck.

“I’m blocked.” I shriek.

“You’re not. You’re hiding. You’re scared. Not under my watch.” Pasta stomps off and heads to Lukas to direct him in his grand plan. I should pack up and head home. Tail between my legs as a failure. Par for the course with me.

Lukas runs to me, throwing his brushes into his bag without cleaning and my body jerks. “Clean your brushes.” I bark.

“I see your sweet disposition is in place.” He chuckles and clucks me under the chin. I sigh and drum my fingers against my legs, indicating I’m waiting for him to take care of his supplies. He bends and begins the process as I pluck a cigarette from his pack. “Avery.” He warns. He hates I’ve picked this habit up from him.

“Can it, Novak.” I light the tobacco filled goodness and feel an instant calm morph through me with a simple inhale.

“How do you feel with your assignment?” Lukas Novak can bite me with Pasta Oner’s mouth.

“How do I feel?” I wind myself up. “I think Pasta is such a micropenised, self-absorbed-asshole, that he couldn’t get laid in a monkey whorehouse with a bunch of bananas.”

Lukas’ eyes widen and I know what— or whom— is behind me. If only I could scrounge up a fuck to give. I whirl and sure enough, Pasta is standing there. Lucky for me, he seems to be hiding a laugh. “Such candor, Ms. Michaels. Tell me, do you kiss your father with that mouth?”

“Sure do. Do you suck dick with yours?” I’m fired up and anyone in my path will get my misplaced anger.

“Blocked my ass.” He throws over his shoulder as he goes back to the other interns. “But I’m allergic to bananas.”

“Remind me to bake you some banana bread tonight.” I volley back.

“I won’t die. They just don’t agree with me.” He laughs.

“I guess I won’t waste my time or bananas. You’ll need them for your monkey whorehouse.” He shakes his head but chooses to keep his mouth shut. Wise choice.

“Woman, you need a drink. Or ten. Nobody talks to him like that.” Lukas grips my hand and yanks me down the street.

I dig my heels in. “I’m not a nobody.” I’m aware I’m haughty as fuck but I can’t stop myself.

“You’re a handful. Good thing my hands are big.” He waggles his eyebrows.

“Unlike your dick. You and Pasta are a match made in hell.” I yank my hand from his grip— I can’t stand to be touched— and carry on down the street without a care in the world. Just my attitude, Lukas’ cigarette, and me. That’s a ménage à trois I can get down with.

I want a glass of wine. A bottle would be sufficient. I want vodka. I could give two shits if it comes with a mixer. Remembering Mason’s battle, I refrain. I’ve fought the urge to drown my pain with analgesics. Instead, I’ve taken to cigarettes and wearing my pain like a cloak— one I’ll rip off in a second and shred you with my sharp tongue. I’m shocked Lukas wants to be near me.

“Going out, láska.” That. Fucking. Word.

“LUKAS!” He comes to the patio and drops a book in my lap. “Don’t say that word.”

“Anal? I thought that was the cool thing with you Americans. All the rage.” He grabs his pack of cigarettes from the table— no worries. I stole all but three of them. Fucker can stop and buy a new pack. Of course, I can’t be that hard— I try— so I slipped a twenty in the pack.

“I’m gonna shove a pumpkin girth squash up your ass and let you experience anal.” I narrow my eyes and warn him from that damn ‘L’ word.

“Fine. I’ll tell Eva you said hi.” I smile, a true endearment when he mentions his girlfriend. Eva is sweet, beautiful— much too good for this scoundrel.

“Tell her I’m dying for a shopping trip.” Eva heard the story of my heartbreak after a drunken night and breakdown the first week I was here. Since then, no alcohol and no sharing.

“She sent that book.” He nods to the book resting in my lap and I notice the pink carnations gracing the cover.

“Flowers?” I scrunch my nose. I’m not traditional in my painting— my creations usually pour from me. But I won’t allow it. I’m afraid to see the scene that will transform in front of me if I let go.

“Just read. We have to prep the building tomorrow. So, you have another day of reprieve but then you have to get it together, Avery. This is your degree. Your future.” I don’t need the fucking degree. But I want it. I’ve worked my ass off and I earned it. All but this stupid fucking project and the non-monkey fucking small-penised jackass who holds my future in his hands.

“Whatevs.” I light another of his cigarettes and ignore him as he leaves. My phone dings a few minutes after the silence convenes, reminding me it’s time for my nightly allowance of pain. Twenty-one days I’ve called his phone. He doesn’t have it. Three weeks of pouring my pain, my frustration, my hurt into his voicemail. His voice soothes and cuts me all in the same breath.

Exhaling the air of fear I’m holding, I pull ‘Ruthian’ up and hit send. Automatic voicemail as it’s shut off until he can remember. I can’t lie and say I don’t wish he’d answer because that means he remembers. I close my eyes, soak in his voice as he tells the caller ‘you know what to do’— and I do.

“Hey. It’s me. Again. Still feeling stupid doing this but if I stop that means I give up on us and I can’t do that. Caden, it hurts. It hurts that you don’t remember me. Remember us. That’s the point your memory stops and I’m afraid it’s your sub-conscious telling you that you don’t want me. You don’t love me. I don’t think I could forget you if I tried. Forgetting you is like cutting my heart out. It’s like stopping air from circulating through my lungs. That’s how I feel— lifeless.” I end the call and stare into the dark Prague night, running my fingers over the cover of fucking flowers.

Sighing, I flip it open and scan images. I’m drawn to the oranges, the vibrant hues of life breathing into the image. I settle into that section and begin reading. Devouring the words and before long, I’ve sought my sketchpad and at three o’clock I’m still on the patio, shading, rearranging, crying when Lukas returns. He stands at the patio door watching but I’m focused with what’s being constructed on the paper— what I’m creating. His footsteps stop next to me.

“Láska.” His voice warms me.

I put the pencil down and look into his eyes. “Láska.” I confirm.