That's why the ladies loved him? I bet they did, and I was trying hard not to be another one of them.

I hesitated as we stood at the little desk in the front of the tattoo parlor, my eyes couldn't take in all the art fast enough.

"We need one tattoo, please," James said as he leaned on the counter.

"Three," I blurted out.

James's eyes glued themselves to my face. I felt the heat in my cheeks under the scrutiny of his stare. He grabbed onto my elbow and gently pulled me away from the desk.

"Three tats, Ains? At once? I figured you'd just get a little something that made you smile. Like a little portrait of my face on your middle finger or something."

I smiled at the thought and pulled my arm away from his grasp. "I want three. Today."

The man behind the desk tapped a pencil on the counter as he glanced at the computer and sucked his teeth. "I got room for one today. We're pretty booked."

James grinned in self-satisfaction. He'd inadvertently won. "It will be better this way. You won't cry as long with just one tattoo."

"Not true, James. This draws out the crying time."

He switched his weight to his other hip and chewed faintly on his lower lip, his eyes dropping as he thought about it. "Huh. Well, there are other tattoo joints in town..."

"What did you want to get done?" the man said emphatically, leaning forward after hearing James mention taking his business elsewhere.

I set the papers in front of him on the desk and turned around the picture of the bird breaking free from its cage. "That one on my back."

James leaned over, trying to get a look, his chest hot against my backside. I nudged him with my elbow and he twirled away, moving towards the big window, staring outside.

The man nodded, "All right. That's going to take a while with color."

I nodded. "I know. And I want..." I flipped through the papers and stopped at a sketch of two kittens curled up together and lightly scratched the back of my neck as I pushed it forward. "That one, on my ankle." The kittens were supposed to represent myself and Katie. She'd been an asshole keeping her secret from me but she was still my best friend. The more I thought about it the less angry I was with her. This would be my way of showing her that I forgave her.

He nodded and then glanced behind me. "Dude," he scolded, his eyes crinkling with disdain.

"Sorry, sorry."

I turned to see James rubbing his spit off the glass. I shook my head and turned back around.

"And I'm not sure about the third yet. But it would be another small one. Black."

I felt James's breath on my ear as he came up behind me. Goosebumps rose over my flesh as he whispered.

"Let me choose the third. Please, please. Pretty please?"

"No," I said, "you'll probably put a pair of boobs on me."

"No, Ains, I won't, I swear it. You already have a pair of boobs on you. Good ones. Please?"

When I turned he had his hands pressed together, and he was going down to one knee. I rolled my eyes and turned away. "You can submit three suggestions. I have the final say."

"Yessss. Okay, first one is "James is awesome." in a kick ass script just right along here." His finger skimmed across the top of my breasts before I smacked it away.

"No. Two more."

"Okay. How about "James is awesome" in a kick ass script right along here..." His hand went towards my leg and I slapped it away.

"No. Last chance."

"Okay, okay. How about a word? Right here." He grabbed my hand and turned it over, his thumb tenderly stroked my wrist.

It took me a minute to realize I needed to respond, I was so entranced watching his finger stroke me. "Um ... what word?"

"Do you trust me?" he said, softly, his thumb still stroking me like I was a baby kitten.

My eyes lifted to his, his expression was so serious. The truth of it came out. "Yes."

He released me and banged his palm on the desk. "It is settled!"

The dude behind the desk scratched the back of his head before typing on his computer. "Great. We're going to need a few minutes to get these transferred over so we can get started."

"She's gonna have lunch with me first and then we'll be back. Get to work on that back on first." He leaned over when I opened my mouth to protest. "Trust me on this one."

I nodded and smiled as James paid the deposit before going down the street to eat burgers with James.

While we ate we talked about talked about his life, which predominantly revolved around the band. We talked a little about his family, his mom, his dad and his role in the family construction business, which wasn't much of one. And it left me wondering.

"So you don't want any more responsibility?"

"With Pops?" He shook his head as he stuffed a French fry in his mouth. "No. I don't want to be some old man sitting behind a desk bossing grown men around."

"What do you want to do then?"

He chewed as he analyzed me. It looked as if he were deciding if he would be serious or a smart-ass. I leaned back and munched on my own fry. I could wait him out.

"My oldest sister, Jessa, she paid for this clown to show up to my nephew, Joseph's, 5th birthday party. I was really excited, you know, I mean my mom never got me a clown, Stephen King kind of ruined it for our generation and whatever. Anyway, the clown never showed. Jessa waited thirty minutes before throwing up her hands and turning away in a fit of tears. My mom she gave me "the look.""

"The look?"

"You know, the "James, your sister is crying, why don't you fix it?" look. Well, I grabbed the signed Elvis Costello guitar from my brother-in-law's study and plopped myself down in the grass. I started to sing that Mickey Mouse Clubhouse theme song."

I raised my eyebrows questioningly.

"You're not familiar?"

I shook my head.

"Ah, well, no accounting for taste. Anyway, that song got them hooked and then we just jammed together for the next hour or so. It went by in a flash and I had a really great time. It was awesome seeing all those cute little fucking faces smiling at me, laughing with me, picking boogers with me."

I wrinkled my nose in disgust and he winked.

"Just kidding about that last part. But yeah, I think if I could make a living doing it, I'd do that."

"So why don't you?"

The corner of his lip quirked up in a tiny smile. "You make it sound so easy."

"I mean, you were living with your mom. It seems like that would've been a good time to see if you could make a career out of it."

"But I'm not living with my mom anymore."

"Not yet, anyway. Not until I impress her with my ... How exactly am I going to make her want you back again?"

"You're going to shatter my big heart into lots of tiny pieces."

"Ah, right," I nodded as if that could totally happen. We both knew it couldn't.

We finished up the burgers and moseyed back to the tattoo parlor and for the rest of the day I was subjected to pain by tattoo gun. James held my hand the whole time and made jokes at the expense of everyone else. And I felt immensely thankful that for my first, second, and third tattoos that he was there by my side.

"How are you doing?"

"I'm all right. I'm already used to the pain."

"Yeah? That's pretty bad-ass, Ainsley. I pissed and moaned about every single tattoo for weeks afterwards. But, of course, it was mostly to my mom. She'd feel so bad for me that she'd make me my favorite things to eat. But after week three she caught onto the game. Took me a long time to realize that I needed to keep spreading the tattoos out further and further to get the same attention."

"...That's not why you did it though."

He grinned. Not saying another word about it. And it still left me wondering. Did he or didn't he? I blew out an exasperated breath because I knew he would never tell me. He was being mysterious to ruffle my feathers and get me worked up. I wasn't playing this time. Despite what I'd said to him it hurt like a mother--, and my Ibuprofen was wearing off.

"Whatever, I'm going to work on your aunt's website for a few," I said and retreated into Katie's room. I sat down carefully on her bed and pulled my laptop onto my lap. I could at least get some work done.

My eyes flickered to the living room when I saw a flash of movement. They stayed pinned to James. He was shirtless. Again. What did the man have against shirts? He whistled to himself as he cleaned up the coffee table. Not one word was said about the fact that I'd left my dirty dishes behind.

I looked back to my work as he walked away, a smile on my lips. I think James likes me. And as high school as it sounded, it felt fantastic to feel giddy in crush-town again. Better than the alternative of being lonely and feeling sorry for myself. I'd take feeling like Scarlet Johansen over feeling like Frankenstein any day of the week.

I went back to my laptop. A few minutes later there was a knock on my doorframe. I jumped and glanced up. James was wearing his normal black wash jeans, but he was also wearing a black button down shirt. And it was tucked in.

"Didn't your mom teach you that it isn't nice to stare?"

My eyes flicked to his face. "Sorry. I just thought you had a stain on your crotch." I groaned internally. His crotch? Really Ainsley?

He glanced down briefly. "I thought I got that out." He wiped at his crotch and then looked up, grinning at me. "You're a pervert, Ainsley. Are you ready to go? My mom is going to be upset if we're late."

I glanced at the time. "But you said we weren't going to go until eight."

"Yeah, and that would've still been the plan except that she called your brother to ask if he could make it and he tattled on me. My mom knows that the band isn't practicing right now and wants dinner at six. She's getting to be an old lady. I don't argue. Just means we can go out to the bar afterwards." He grinned again.

"Okay, well," I checked the time. "You might have to call your mom and tell her we're going to be a little late. I'm not ready to go."

"You look fine."

"Fine? Exactly. I'm not ready."

"Ains. Stop being such a girl. Let's go."

I snapped my laptop shut and put it aside. "Alright. I'll be ready in five minutes. Longer if you don't get out of here."

I thought he'd moved away from the door, but he must have come back because when I winced he was almost immediately by my side, his hand on my hip, branding me.

"You okay?"

"I would be if..." I grabbed his hand and pulled it from my hip. He pulled his hand away like he'd been burned.

"Sorry. Thought you were tough?"

"It was the drugs talking."

He pressed a kiss to my forehead and then jogged from the room. I shook my head, no idea what he was up to, if anything. I grabbed my red, black, and cream plaid shoes and slipped them on.

I grabbed the lip gloss from my purse and reapplied. By the time I had my purse in hand James was back, a glass of water and two transparent blue pills in his palm. I plucked them up and swallowed them down with a water chaser.

"Thanks. You're kind of sweet."

His eyes searched my face and then he pressed his lips to mine. It was the third time today he'd done it. I still wasn't used to it. The pain I'd been feeling melted away as he overcame my senses. Just when I was about to grab onto him he pulled away. His eyes were dark, and he gazed at me a moment with a clenched jaw. "Don't ever call me sweet again. Or else."