“Two whiskeys—neat. Bourbon,” Grey casually orders as he slides onto one of the barstools. He aimlessly throws down the money, and I bite my tongue. I’ve never had whiskey before, but I’ve heard it can mess people up big time. That and vodka are hardcore, and I’ve already had vodka at the party. That alone makes me feel light-headed yet heavy at the same time, which is beyond strange. So adding in whiskey will only intensify the fire in my head and the rocks sitting in my stomach.
He must have read my thoughts or just knows me well enough, because he adds, “Make that one on the rocks.” Then he swings a barely there smirk and explains, “The ice’ll dissolve a bit and water it down some.”
“Thanks,” I say, though I highly doubt it’ll matter. The liquor could be stronger than some ice cubes. But I stay quiet and cautiously watch him, careful that he doesn’t catch me. I don’t want one glance to be the thing to set him off or send him back over the edge. He hasn’t even climbed back up, so I have to be very aware around him.
“Interesting location for date night,” Patch, the bartender, jokingly comments as he sets our drinks in front of us. To prevent rings, I pick up two coasters from a little stack to my left and place them under our drinks. Patch laughs a belly gut laugh and shakes his head at me.
Grey merely raises his lips higher and lifts his small glass to his lips.
“We’re actually here on business,” I tell Patch, and he raises a questioning brow and passes me a little red straw. I think he’s making fun of me. But I don’t mind, because I was actually going to ask for one. I squish the thin straw between mounds of square ice and take a little sip. I cough slightly and make up my face. “Strong.”
“It’s bourbon, darling,” Patch says, running his hand through his chestnut hair and cocking a teasing eyebrow. He looks so young. Maybe twenty-three? What is he doing tending a bar?
“Only the best whiskey there is,” Grey murmurs. I frown as he knocks back more of the drink before making it hit the counter. It sounds like he’s gloating, but I don’t have enough knowledge on other kinds of whiskey to compare.
“Back to this business of yours; what is it exactly?” Patch asks, eyeing me as he wipes down an invisible spot on the counter.
I’m cut off before I can even open my mouth.
“Making me forget about my wicked bitch of a mother,” Grey gripes through his clenched teeth and pats the counter.
Patch raises his dark eyebrows and eyes me with a confused expression. I just shrug and sip through my straw. Grey’s glass is refilled, and he downs a good half of it before staring ahead.
I can practically see him floating in space. Eyes shut and arms spread out. A black star that’s just exploded and aimlessly swimming around in the air. And his mother was the bomb planted on his exuberant surface. When she showed up, she detonated. She destroyed my black star.
I wish I could be there floating with him. I want to be the astronaut that spots the fragments of this ethereal boy, and I want to throw a rope out from my spaceship. And I want to pull him in and repair him and curse the blasted woman for hurting something as precious as he is. Peculiar cracks in his soul or not, I love him. And the fact that she would even attempt to ruin him…well, it makes my blood boil.
“Oi! Your hands. What happened? You two the fighting couple? Bonnie and Clyde?” Patch nods to my hands, and for a second, I’m as surprised as him. My knuckles are bruised and bleeding. My stomach caves in on itself, and I feel my head grow light. I don’t know if it’s because of the blood or the fact that I hate violence, yet I committed it myself, but I feel bile rise in the back of my throat.
Grey flashes his own battered ones like he’s showing them off or admiring them, and my dread flushes out further. Blood and cuts and skin peeling off—all because of that woman. I almost jump off the stool and race back to the apartment and force myself to forget about my tolerance for violence. But then I somehow remember that I’m drunk and I’m sipping a whiskey on the rocks, and I really have to pee.
“Come with me.” I stand up and tug at Grey’s shirt. I don’t want to hurt his hand even further, but I doubt that’s even possible at the moment. He doesn’t protest and follows me to the ladies’ restroom in the back. But I find it strange, because barely any girls are here. Just men with really massive beards.
After I do my business, I stumble out of the stall, shake my head, force my feet to not succumb to the Bourbon, and wash my hands. Grey watches me the entire time with an unreadable but dark look that makes me a little bit queasy.
Luckily, I find a first aid kit in the back of one of the sinks and prop it open on top of the sink he’s leaning against.
I take my time applying alcohol, and though he should flinch, he acts like I poured water on him. I take that bitterly and continuing wiping down and cleaning his wounds before moving on to wrapping them with the Ace wrap.
Then it’s his turn to do the same to mine. And where he applies alcohol, I moan in excruciating pain; he softly coaxes me, his words slurred, and gently kisses me.
How morbid is it that we’re cleaning each other’s wounds? We were both controlled by pure rage and an unadulterated need to hurt, so much so that we injured ourselves. I don’t like it. In fact, I hate this. Hate how we can get wrapped up in our minds and lose control of ourselves. He does this for a living—fight. But I don’t. I still can’t believe I lost my cool and snapped like that. I’m normally well-reserved and non-confrontational, but the liquor and my overall hatred for the girl pushed me overboard.
It honestly feels like we’re hitting a hard bump. Again. And we’re taking a hundred violent steps back in our relationship. It’s beyond frustrating, and I wonder if he thinks about it like I do, stresses over it like I do. I doubt he’s thinking past destroying furniture and hurting his mother like she hurt him, but it’d be nice to know I’m not the only one worrying about these things.
I just wish things between him and his mother were healthy…spectacular even. And I could curb my sudden anger. And he and I could just be together without life hurling obstacle after obstacle at us. Is it so hard to ask to just be able to love him?
“I know what you’re thinking, and I’m not letting her stay and fuck up the one good thing I have in my life,” his hoarse and raspy voice cuts through the silence.
“I wasn’t thinking anything,” I lie, and he knows it too, because he lifts an eyebrow and clenches his jaw. “Fine. But I was just wishing that—I don’t know. That she wasn’t even here, and Diana wasn’t such a bitch, and we could be happy without something getting in our way. It just gets kind of frustrating. That’s all.” I speak in a low, almost shy, tone as I nervously pick at my bandages.
He lets out a sigh, making me look up. He rubs his eyes and pinches the skin between them. “Bebé, that’s all I want. You. Nothing fucking ruining things, be it me or anything else. But it seems we’re not that lucky.”
“It’s not fair.” I run my hands through my hair and lean on the sink beside him. “But our lack of luck isn’t important right now. The woman—your mother—sitting in your apartment is the important thing right now.”
“I don’t want to talk about it,” he says gruffly, crossing his arms.
“We have to, and you know it.”
“No, we don’t. I’ll drag her ass off my couch and throw her on the latest bus to Indiana.”
“Grey,” I warn.
“I said no, Liv.”
“I know how much you hate her for what she did…but maybe, after five years of no contact…maybe she’s ready to make up.”
There can’t be any other reason. She was so furious, so out of her mind when she kicked him out after a tragedy. It still hurts me to think of a troubled little Grey, hurt and on his own. He had suffered too. What she did was ultimately selfish. And she doesn’t deserve Grey giving her another chance. But he is fundamentally broken, and if his messed-up relationship with her is holding him back from being put back together, I will do anything to mold him again.
“Or maybe she wants to fuck with my life some more,” he suggests with a tight grip on the sink behind him. “Maybe she didn’t do that enough when she pushed me out of the door and into the cold rain. Maybe her forcing me to grow up so soon didn’t satisfy her. So she’s come back five years later, intent on completely ruining my life, for good measure.”
“I’m just asking you to try,” I say softly.
“There is no trying with that woman,” he exclaims, frustrated. “She’s fucking bonkers!”
“Why do you keep saying that?”
“Because she actually is. She has bipolar personality disorder!” he screams.
There is a beat, then two, and then I cock my head to the side.
“Grey, that’s not fair. You have bipolar disorder, but you aren’t crazy.”
“Aren’t I?” he breathes. “And she actually is. She’d randomly go off on teachers when I was in elementary school. She’d blow up on my dad if he forgot to bring home milk. Throwing around plates and vases. She couldn’t go a day without baking a fucking cake. She completely lost her shit. Talking to herself and making huge shit-show fights with my father. She even got him arrested after exaggerating that he hurt her when he never laid a finger on her. She may have even killed him her damn self!”
“I’m sorry, but that was the past,” I say softly. “All you can do is give her a chance.”
He pulls me into his arms and just holds me.
“You’re too forgiving for your own good,” he grumbles in my hair. I shrug and kiss his cheek. He sighs and lifts his head to stare into my eyes. “You don’t understand how much I despise that woman.”
“Then do it for me.” He furrows his brows, and I take a deep breath, shrugging. “Just try for me.”
Maybe if I try it this way, he’ll really give it his best. And if she’s still insufferable and as horrible as he makes her out to be, then I’ll gladly press that elevator button for her and send her packing myself.
He pulls from me and leans against the sink. He chews on his lip and rubs his bandaged knuckles, deep in thought. After a long while, he pushes off the sink and spins on his heels, tugging and pinching his lower lip, as he does when he is contemplative.
I know I’m asking so much from him. I know of his talent when it comes to holding grudges. And I know how firm he can be. How hard-headed he is—stubborn. But I am begging him to trust me. And if this fails, if she only came back to do what he claims…then he can unleash the greatest “I told you so” onto me. And I’ll take it and never doubt him ever again. Well, when it comes to his neurotic mother.
“You’re lucky I love you,” he murmurs so low, it’s almost inaudible.
But I do, and I walk over to him and throw my arms around him.
“I’m proud of you,” I whisper in his ear, then kiss his cheek.
He grumbles and holds me tightly. Despite his grumpiness, I know that the tiniest part of him actually has hope. But the much larger fraction of him, the “tougher,” darker one takes over easily. However, that doesn’t mean I can’t see that little cute dot of brightness in him. But day after day, with my being by his side every step of every way of his broken mind and soul, I can see that dot growing wider and wider in size. And it makes me pretty damn proud to be the one doing it.