Something was different.
I couldn’t pinpoint it, but Lucy was looking at me differently. There was something speculative in her eyes, like she was weighing and judging, making a list in her head that I couldn’t define.
She’d gone to work, and she’d gone to therapy. In between those two places, more than likely therapy, something had shifted in her head. More than anything, I wanted to pry her open so that I knew what she was feeling.
Somewhere, there were probably statistics about people like us. Relationships that sprang from a dark event, an experience that bound people together because of the adrenaline and the fear and the unbelievable, but who would keep track of them?
We wouldn’t. No one would know, if we had our way. While she was gone all day, I’d thought about that plan, and it was solid. I had no plans to move, so the home itself should be safe. I had no ties to Ronald, beyond a possible future relationship with Lucy, but that was flimsy at best. Not only that, but a drug dealer would be sure to have plenty of enemies. For better or worse, my brain was hardwired to ferret out the worst possible outcome of any situation, and throughout my lonely hours during the day, I’d turned all of them over in my head.
In the safety of my bedroom, with Lucy scurrying around the bathroom to get ready for bed, I actually felt like we were going to be fine. The plan that we had laid out before us gave us the best possible outcome. The water in the bathroom sink turned off and I heard her start brushing her teeth. She’d gotten home from therapy and remained fairly quiet for the rest of the night. We watched Titanic curled up on the couch next to each other, because it felt appropriate after my mother’s visit.
All evening, she’d given me long glances, turning away when I tried to meet her eyes or ask her what was going on in her head.
I wanted to know. And every time I tried to dig up more about her, she shut me down. Quite effectively, too. She wasn’t obvious about it, which meant my Lucy probably had a talent for deflecting when someone tried to delve too deep.
The terrifying part of that was that I’d made up my mind. I didn’t want to be just another person that she had to deflect to. I wanted to be different to her, because she was an entirely new creature to me.
“You’re quiet out here,” she said, framed in the doorway of the bathroom. Since there was no light on in the bathroom, all I could see was the line of her waist underneath the sleep tank she had on. Her legs were bare, and her underwear cut high on her leg.
“Did you expect me to talk to myself?”
“I guess not.” She smiled as she walked toward the bed. “Are we gonna crack open some concrete tomorrow?”
I nodded. “Might as well. I only have one neighbor that might care, and I told her earlier when I was getting the mail that I would be doing some work in the garage for a few hours tomorrow afternoon, if the noise bothered her.”
“All the bases covered.” She sent me a sly grin. “Have you ever even spoken to her before?”
“Hey. I’m not agoraphobic. I just…”
“Don’t like people,” she added helpfully as she braced a knee on the mattress and pulled back the sheets.
Lucy slipped under the covers and burrowed her head into the pillow. “Why are your pillows so nice? I swear, I could buy one brand new, but once I put it in my apartment, it would smell like poor people and ticks.”
The bed shook when I laughed. “What do ticks smell like?”
Her nose wrinkled adorably. “Bad. They smell bad. But your shit always smells like happiness. Just because of the walls around it. I wonder if your pillows have any idea how good they have it.”
Bracing my hands behind my head, I thought about that for a second. I also thought about the fact that Lucy was perfectly capable of going back to her apartment once we cleaned all the evidence that Ronald had ever been there. But neither one of us had brought it up. Me, because I liked having her here, despite the way I’d felt so betrayed by her uninvited presence that first night. There was life and light in my home now, and she made me laugh. I gave her the same in return, and that wasn’t something I’d want to let go of easily, skittish though she was.
No, I’d hold onto it with a grip that I only reserved for the most important things in life. And if I told her that now, she’d probably run.
When she inhaled my pillow again, groaning like I’d just touched her between her legs, I shook my head. “You’ve never actually found ticks in your apartment, have you?”
Lucy poked a finger in my stomach. “You never would have walked through that door that day if you’d known that.”
I grabbed her hand, because the truth was that I was incredibly ticklish, and she’d never let me forget that if she knew. “Of course I would have.”
“Oh sure,” she teased, snatching her hand away and trailing her fingers along the edge of my boxer briefs. “If you’d only seen that wolf spider that lived in my bathroom with me the whole first month I was in that place.”
Ahh, a voluntary nugget of information. My brain scrambled for more. All of it trailing back to how she even got into this life in the first place. How did she, bright and attractive and incredibly street-smart, become the person who spent time in jail and got blackmailed by drug dealers who shouldn’t be allowed to breathe the same air as her.
“Only a month?” There. I could do small, baby step questions.
She rolled on her back, a lock of hair wound around her fingers as she thought. “Yeah. I guess I’m a pretty shitty roommate. I’m sure I didn’t clean the bathroom floor enough for her liking. Behind the toilet was her happy place during our time together.”
“You didn’t kill it?”
Lucy turned her head and hesitated before answering. Her mouth opened once, and then twice before she shook her head. “I’m not afraid of spiders. Besides, Wolfie never did anything to hurt me.”
“Is that the criteria?” I asked lightly, keeping my eyes trained on her fingers.
“I suppose.” Her exhale was shallow and slow.
“Ronald was hurting you.”
She nodded slowly. “He was.”
I licked my lips and thought carefully about my next question. We hadn’t discussed it much, beyond what to do with his body. “Would you have used the frying pan on him if it had been close enough?”
Her eyes cut over to me for a moment and then she looked away. “Do you feel guilty for doing it? Is that why you’re asking?”
Instead of answering quickly, to reassure her, I gave her enough respect to think about how truthfully I could answer that question. If I told her that I did feel guilty about it, she’d think she wasn’t worth saving, wasn’t worth the situation we were in. But the truth was, Lucy was worth every moment of it.
“No, I don’t.”
“Really?” Her voice was quiet, but not unsure.
“Really. I’d make the same decision again, even knowing what I know now.”
Lucy didn’t react much to that, but her brow furrowed slightly.
When she did speak, her voice was firmer, and I knew the subject was closed. “If Wolfie had bitten me, I would’ve stomped the shit out of her.” Her lips curved slightly when she glanced at me.
In the wake of her answer, which I’m sure was meant to lighten the mood, her fingers picked up speed as they worried her hair. Yes, something was different. It didn’t take long for her hair to tangle and she cursed under her breath.
“Here, let me,” I said, extracting her fingers from the knot. Lucy’s chest rose and fell on a deep breath while I rolled closer and pulled on the silky strands. The last stubborn knot gave way under my careful tugs, not a single piece lost in the meantime. Something about her—even if it was different tonight, if it would be different tomorrow and the day after that—had wrapped around my insides in the same kind of messy knot. Even if it fit the definition of clinical insanity, I had absolutely no desire to untangle her.
Show me who you are, how you became this Lucy, I begged silently. Like I’d somehow gain the power to slip into her head and extract that truth independently. We lay in loaded silence, and I realized after a few short moments that even if I did have the ability to do that … I wouldn’t want to. It would be cheap. Cheating my way to the place that I ultimately wanted to end up.
Her hair was free, and I took the opportunity to play with the ends.
“Your shampoo makes my hair really soft.”
I smiled. “Your hair was nice before.”
Lucy rolled on her side toward me and tucked her hands under her face. “Only a man would say something like that. From you, it’s especially sad because your bottle in there probably equals what I make in a month at the diner.”
“How long have you worked there?”
“Why? You want me to put in a good word?”
She smiled when I snorted. When she didn’t answer, I lifted an eyebrow.
“You really want to know about that place?”
“Sure.” I wanted to know everything. I didn’t know when that happened, but I did.
“Well, it’s hard to find a job … with my background.” Her eyes were focused on my mouth, but there was nothing amorous in her face. It was easier than looking me in the eyes. “And I needed something as a condition of my parole. They were short-staffed, and my uhh, my friend Kissy convinced them to hire me.”
“That was nice of her.” Maybe I’d send Kissy a check. Or buy her a car. Anything for someone who had helped Lucy. I blinked a couple times when I realized how crazy that sounded.
“Oh, she didn’t know me at the time.” Lucy rolled to her back again and stared at the ceiling. “She was the only person waiting tables when I came in. I guess she’s my only friend. Not that we hang out that much or anything. Just … work friends.”
“I’m your friend.” At my tone, serious and heartfelt, she turned to me and searched my face. “Aren’t I?”
“I don’t know. Are you?” Lucy hummed and propped herself up on her side, her elbow braced on the bed so she could hover over me. “The things we’ve done aren’t very friendly. On couches and in showers and in the really nice chair in your living room. I liked that one.”
Beneath the black tank top, her breasts were unbound, and they brushed against my bare chest when she leaned down to lick along my bottom lip. I didn’t want to be distracted, to be lost in her, but she was impossible to resist. In moments like this, with the little scraps of truth she’d tossed at me, I knew I’d give her anything that I was capable of giving.
“If you’re my friend, Xylophone, then I’ve never quite had a friend like you.”
“Xavier,” I said against her lips. She jerked back, but I gripped the back of her neck so she couldn’t pull away completely. “It’s Xavier.”
Lucy licked her lips and looked into my eyes. Suddenly, she looked terrified. “Why are you telling me now? Don’t like my nicknames?”
My thumb dragged over her jawline and she tilted her chin up slightly.
“I just want to hear you say it, I guess.”
That was the tip of the iceberg. In the moment, knowing I wanted more of her than she was giving me, I didn’t want the silly names. I wanted Lucy to see me.
She nodded slowly, but didn’t say anything. Against the meat of my palm, the joint by my thumb, I could feel the hammer of her pulse underneath her skin. Faster and faster it went, her heartbeat increasing in a way that I couldn’t ignore was a direct reaction to what I was showing her.
But she wasn’t running.
The heady sensation of it, something I’d never felt before, made me tighten my grip on the back of her neck and pull her down for a deep, lip-bruising kiss. Her tongue was minty and cold against mine while she settled over my chest. This was too fast, too soon to be believed. But emotions were never logical, were they?
You couldn’t put them in a box of the perfect size, because emotions, even the same one, were always different from person to person. You couldn’t make a neat, bullet-point definition that would translate correctly for each person claiming that feeling.
Maybe what I was feeling was illogical and irrational, border-line unhealthy in its intensity, but it felt too right for me to care. I rolled over her and she opened her legs to fit me. Her arms wound around my neck and she kissed me deeply, her eyes pinched shut.
When I pulled back, she followed. Her eyes popped open as her fingers tightened on the back of my head.
“What?”
“I want to hear you say it,” I whispered. I touched my forehead to hers and listened to her breath. “Ple—”
“Don’t,” she interrupted in a harsh puff of air that I felt against my skin. Her hand laid gently over my mouth, to stop me from speaking. “You … you should never have to beg me for something like that.”
I brushed hair off her face when she dropped her hand.
I would though. It was instant. Maybe to some, it wasn’t a manly enough thought. Not alpha enough. But I’d beg Lucy for a good number of things, and right now, I very much wanted to hear my name on her lips. Even as she hid her background, hid the things that she was embarrassed about, that made her insecure. But this? I wanted this from her.
Her hand cupped my cheek and she touched her thumb to the corner of my mouth.
“Th-this feels different,” she whispered and then blinked rapidly, like she couldn’t believe she said it out loud.
The honesty of that from her felt like a major victory. I couldn’t help it, I rolled my hips against her and she sighed. “It does.”
Lucy lifted her head and fitted her lips against mine. Her hips moved in a slow wave, and my tongue trailed the edge of her jaw.
“Xavier,” she said into my ear, and tugged on my earlobe with her teeth.
The blast of heat, of unfettered electricity that that unleashed through me was staggering. I kissed her again, deeper, teeth clacking and tongues pushing harder and harder. With frantic hands, we ripped off the clothes between us, shoved the sheets away so neither of us were covered by anything but each other.
By the time Lucy cried out, long, sweaty, muscle-burning minutes later, my name wasn’t on her lips, but it didn’t matter.
What mattered was that she was still there with me.