Six
“When I think about you I touch myself…” My hands slithered down my breasts, to my stomach, and stopped on my crotch to which I cupped myself.
My giggle fit erupted out of nowhere and the whiskey straight in my glass sloshed over the rim, splashing on the tall, dark and handsome fella whose arms were snaked around me a wee bit too tight.
“Encore!” Emily yelled.
My hands dropped from my crotch and went straight into the air with a wide smile spread across my face.
“Thank you!” I bowed as the entire room cheered, which was a total of about ten people.
“How about we go back to my place?” Brad, Bob, or Ben…whatever his name was huskily whispered into my ear as he walked me off the stage.
The whiskey was flowing so heavily through my body that I didn’t think twice when my head nodded and my hands slipped beneath the hem of his shirt, caressing his abs. My eyes fluttered shut as he nibbled just below my ear and a soft moan passed my lips.
“She’s going with me,” I heard him say.
“Is that what you want?” Emily’s voice forced me to open my eyes and I smiled at the intensity in hers.
I nodded once.
“Are you sure?” Her eyebrows dipped low.
I nodded a second time.
Emily pulled me into her arms and whispered “You’re one hundred percent sure?”
I might’ve been hellaciously drunk, but I knew exactly what she was doing. But the sensations rolling through my body each time he touched me combined with the alcohol in my veins, I needed someone to make me forget what night was upon me and help me make a new memory.
I nodded a third time.
Emily let me go as the guy she’d become well acquainted with throughout the night grabbed her ass like the bartender did our waitress earlier, their lips instantly found one another’s and our convo had officially ended.
“Hey, Ben, another round?” the girl behind the bar asked.
Ben…that’s it! I knew I was close.
I shrugged and giggled to myself.
Ben’s hand linked with mine as he started down the hall that read "Employee’s Only" on a sign directly above the entrance.
“We’re gonna get in trouble…” I slurred.
“Not when you know the owner.” Ben opened a door at the end of the hall and started up some stairs.
I teetered on the second step and his large hands quickly grabbed me. “Whoa there, Maci.”
Maci?
“Who the hell is Maci?” I slapped his chest as the room started to spin.
His eyebrows furrowed. “I thought it was you…”
I’d completely forgotten that I’d given him a false name.
High five, Arbor.
I laughed. “I just recently started going by my middle name.”
Liar.
He dropped his head to the curve of my neck and placed his warm lips against my skin. “I don’t care what your name is as long as you’re enjoying yourself.”
My eyes closed and a brief second later my body was lifted and being hauled up the remainder of the staircase. The boom of the door slamming against the frame echoed through the dark room just before the light flickered on and a bachelor pad laid out before me. Chocolate walls with a small seating area on one side of the open room and a bedroom on the other. My eyes wouldn’t fully focus as Ben carried me toward the bed and dropped me to the mattress.
It was happening.
I was about to cross the line that hadn’t been crossed in years.
He gently unzipped the lone zipper down the side of my skirt and slipped it from my body, leaving only a small pair of teal panties covering my lower half. I fisted my hair at the scalp as his lips made a path up my bare legs, stopping at the apex of my thighs as his thick finger trailed down the center of my panties, causing my hips to buck upward. My heart slammed in my chest, but not the kind of slamming that made me feel giddy, the kind that made me feel…afraid.
“I can’t do this.” I slipped off the bed and teetered as I quickly tried to gather my discarded clothes.
“Where you going?” He jumped from the bed, jeans hanging wide open and his erection tenting through the opening of his boxers.
If it had been another time and I hadn’t been scarred from life, I’d have jumped on his thick member that was standing to attention, but I just couldn’t do it.
“I’m sorry…” I choked out as tears pricked my eyes.
Don’t you fucking cry, dammit!
The alcohol and emotions were too much for me to fight off and I succumbed to the wailing sobs the ripped through my body.
“What the fuck?” Ben shouted. “Why the fuck are you crying?”
“Leave her the hell alone!”
“This doesn’t concern you,” he spat.
“She’s my best friend. Everything about her concerns me, asshole!”
“Well then get your crazy bitch of a friend out of here!”
“If you call her another name I’m going to cut your dick off, you asshole,” Emily warned.
I blinked repeatedly to try and focus my eyes but everything was blurred from tears. “Emmy…” I hiccupped.
“It’s okay, I’m here.” She rubbed my hair out of my face. “Now let’s get you back in your clothes so we can get the hell out of here, okay?”
I nodded.
“I should’ve known better,” she said through gritted teeth.
“Not your fault.” I forced myself to get off the floor as she quickly dressed my lower half.
“What kind of fucked up bitch breaks down crying when she’s about to get her rocks off?” Ben spat.
I’d almost forgotten where we were until his voice filled the room.
“Give me a sec.” Emily propped me against a chair.
A loud pop echoed through the room.
“The fuck?”
“That’s for being a real son of a bitch.”
“Get the fuck out!” Ben’s voice boomed.
I flinched as tears raced down my cheeks, my bottom lip quivered.
“Do you think we’d stay, fucker?” Emily yelled back as she hooked her arm around my middle and I tossed an arm over her shoulders.
We descended the stairs as fast as possible while I tried my best to choke back the sobs that were causing my entire body to shake.
“We’re almost to the door, Arbor. Our ride should be waiting.” She rubbed my arm as we stumbled toward the entrance.
“I’m so—sorry,” I hiccupped as the doors came into view.
“No need for apologies. I knew deep down you were making the wrong decision but I didn’t want to get in your way. I’m sorry for being a shitty friend.”
“How are you sober?”
“Believe me, I’m not.” A humorless laugh broke up her statement. “Just a bit less drunk than you are.”
I nodded.
We pushed through the doors and sure enough, a yellow cab sat at the curb. Emily helped me inside and slipped in beside me. She rambled off our address as I curled up against the closed door.
“By the way, your head’s going to fall off if you keep nodding like you have all night.”
A deep belly laugh erupted from me, this time pulling tears of laughter from my eyes instead of distraught and sad ones.
The taxi ride seemed like an eternity as I bounced in and out of consciousness. My body was exhausted, but my mind was still reeling with drunken thoughts of how the night had unfolded and the demons from my past.
“We’re here.” Emily’s soft voice brought me out of the newest slumber I had fallen into.
I groggily managed to open my eyes and slapped my hand against the door a couple times before I actually found the door handle. By the time I had the door open enough to attempt to get out, Emily had already paid the cabbie and rounded the vehicle to help me.
“Just a couple dozen steps and you’ll be in your bed.”
“Ugh…” I groaned as the world around me chaotically spun on its axis.
My guts rumbled and the taste of bile flooded my mouth, causing me to gag.
“Oh, shit.” Emily groaned as I gagged a couple more times, choking back the vomit that was trying to rise up my throat.
Emily kicked the door open then closed. The clank of the deadbolt locking quickly followed before she rushed me down the hallway and we took a sharp turn into the bathroom. My knees bounced off the tile floor just before I spilled the contents of my stomach into the commode.
“Get it out, Arbor.” Emily sat on the edge of the tub, holding my hair with one hand while rubbing soothing circles on my back with the other.
“I’m never drinking again—” I mumbled into the giant hole where your ass usually goes.
“Yeah, yeah.” She giggled. “And I’m never having sex again.”
If I could have laughed, I would’ve.
“I mean it.” I sat back against the sink cabinet. “I think I’m dying.” I groaned as I wiped my mouth with the hem of my shirt.
“How ‘bout we rinse your mouth out and get you to bed. Sound good?” Emily crouched before me and slipped her arms under mine.
“Bed sounds good.” I sighed as she helped me to my feet and handed me a tiny paper cup of mouthwash.
I sloshed it around in my mouth a few times and spat it in the sink. Emily rinsed the sink out while I attempted to stumble my ass out of the bathroom and down the hall. I didn’t take into account that the lights hadn’t been turned on anywhere in the house when she’d brought me in, and walking in the dark was even harder while under the influence.
My hand slapped the wall, searching for a switch but instead found a row of picture frames, sending them crashing to the floor.
“Shit!” I tried to bend over to collect the mess but ended up crashing myself to the floor in the pile of it.
“Dammit, Arbor.” Emily huffed. “Remind me to never let you drink again.”
The lights came to life. I lifted my shaky hands from the pile of glass shards and cringed when I saw all the crimson running down my skin.
“Crap, you’re bleeding.” Emily darted into the bathroom and I heard a cabinet slam shut as she passed the threshold back into the hallway with a first aid kit in tow.
“I’m sorry.” I held my hands in my lap as tears flooded my eyes and sat there silently crying as she bandaged me up.
“It’s nothing we need to take you to the hospital for, but you’ll probably be a bit sore.”
“Okay.”
Emily lifted her eyes to mine and frowned. “Shit happens. Don’t cry because of how tonight unfolded, because tomorrow will be better.”
My shoulders shook as the flow of tears raced down my face. “I highly doubt that.”
“Come on.” Emily helped me to my feet for the millionth time and walked me to my bedroom.
“Thanks.” I plopped down on my bed and kicked my shoes off one at a time with the toe of the opposite foot.
“You don’t have to thank me.” A closed-mouth smile sat on her lips. “I’m usually the one shitfaced and acting a fool.”
She was trying to bring laughter to the situation but I cringed at the thought of how things unfolded with that stranger at the bar, and how I’d made a complete ass out of myself. I pulled my shirt over my head and tossed it on the floor, wincing with each movement of my hands.
“Do you want me to help you?” Emily started toward where I was sitting but I shook my head.
“I can manage.”
Once I was out of everything but my bra and panties, I crawled up my bed and slipped beneath the comforter. My head was rocking and the room had died down from spinning as drastically as it had been, but I knew a hellacious hangover was in my future. I turned on my side and reached for the locket that always hung around my neck like I did every night to fall asleep. The smooth metal of the backside was such a contrast to the etched design on the front side. My fingers slipped back and forth against it and my mind wandered to the place I rarely let it go. It only took a brief moment for the heartache to pierce me like an arrow and uncontrollable sobs to shake my body with grief.
Would I ever learn to move forward, or would my heart forever feel this way?
Losing someone is a heartache that flairs up whenever it wants. You can’t stop it, you can’t pretend it isn’t there; you have to allow it to run its course or drown out the pain with medication. I’d tried doing all three.
The bed dipped and Emily’s body slipped behind mine. Her arms wrapped around my shoulders and pulled me against her. She knew what I was dealing with, and was showing me that she cared. How I’d managed to find a lifelong friend the moment I’d pulled into Indianapolis was beyond me. But I sure as hell was thankful to have her as my lifeline.