AISHE

Troy’s eyes are on the gravel as we walk down the moonlit path from the hotel. He was right. No one’s here at this hour.

When he invited me for a walk, all I wanted was to burrow under my pillows upstairs and sob out my humiliation. But Hailey’s intervention snapped me back into survival mode, and now, I can’t even understand how I’d considered turning down his offer.

“What was that about?” I ask, eyeing him beside me. I’m trying to keep my anger at bay. I can’t believe she got to speak with him alone before I did.

Shadow and light create a fluctuating pattern over his face. Even so, I see the mirth bringing his lips up. “Oh nothing. Hailey was just explaining in detail what you’d been up to at the merch stand today.”

“And what exactly was that, besides listening to her whine out my full name at the top of her lungs and wanting me to assist her instead of my customers?”

“That’s what happened?”

“Yes, that’s what happened.” I snort out my own incredulity. “And I didn’t even think about it until it was too late. Can you believe it still took people half an hour to put two and two together? ‘Aishe! Can you throw me another of the red shirts? Aishe! Aishe, did you hear my question? Do you have change for a twenty, Aishe Xodyar!’ She had more than enough change in her own money box.”

“That’s crazy.” He gives a slow shake of his head. “Why do you think she did that?”

“She wants me gone? I don’t know. All I know is she was damn happy when people started acting like jerks to me.”

“Did someone actually offer to pay for a night with you?” Hands in his pockets, he ambles next to me, a small glance on my face before returning to the gravel.

“That would almost have been better,” I say, and then I move on to describe my faux savior of the day and how he did a one-eighty and made people howl with laughter. “I was about to start crying at that point, so I left before I could lose face completely.”

“That’s so fucking wrong,” Troy mutters.

“I should have just listened to you. Changed my clothes, at least.”

“You think that would’ve helped? Sounds like with Hailey around, it was like having a neon arrow blinking down at you, reading ‘TROY ARMSTRONG’S VIDEO SLUT!’” Troy’s mouth falls open. “Shit, I’m just kidding. I really didn’t mean…”

My abdomen contracts with laughter. Then, it ripples up my chest until it bubbles out of me. I bend over, leaning on my knees, trying to control my fit. A Video Slut’s Life, I think up a book title, and that gets me going even harder.

It’s all too much.

I feel Troy’s hand on my back. “Are you okay? I’m sorry. That was a terrible joke. I don’t know what I was thinking. My mind’s gone, I guess. Time to sleep or something.”

I shake my head, holding a finger up while my crackup turns into some kind of guttural squawking and my eyes fill with tears.

“Just. Laughing,” I manage, but when my stomach cramps and I can’t breathe, I realize hilarity has morphed into hysteria. He doesn’t stop stroking my back. Quietly, he curses himself for being an idiot and will he ever learn.

I seriously can’t breathe. My heart is batting like crazy. It’s getting erratic too, and fuck, what is this—

A heart attack?

I curl around my laughter

this pain in my chest

my lungs aren’t working

“Aishe. Aishe?” Troy’s voice, alarmed above me.

His touch firm over my back. He clamps around my arms and lifts me up. I can’t stand on my feet. My eyes are blurry.

“Come here. Sit. Shh. Are you having a panic attack?”

A hard surface under my butt. I struggle, needing oxygen, and Troy’s by my side, unwavering, warm, the length of him against my body.

“We’ll be okay.” Slow strokes over my skin. “We’re going to figure this shit out, and no one will ever call you names again. I promise you that. Breathe, baby mine. Breathe.”

I fight.

“Shh.” His hand on my back. Sure. Slow. Easy strokes up and down. “I promise you: no more, ever.”

That’s too funny! I pull in a stutter of air and plug my new bout of amusement; he can’t keep a promise like that—he’s not God Almighty—but me laughing about it could set off another burst of hysterics.

Patiently, he sits with me through the storm of my insides, small hmms and shhs his interjections for the rest of this time. Seconds tick from me, away and unimportant. Forever has passed when the park comes back into focus, still moonlit and a part of the world around us.

“Feeling better?” he whispers, the glow of the moon dulling his gaze.

“Yeah… God, that was crazy. Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me,” he murmurs. “I feel like enough of a jackass already.”

I shake my head. “It was just a catalyst. I really did think it was funny. It just became a lot to take in, I guess.”

Troy leans forward, bracing his elbows against his knees. The ribbed silhouette of his back cuts the moon off from our secrets. “Yeah. You’ve had some upheavals lately.” Turning a little, his dreadlocks roll over his thighs. He lifts his hand and wipes below my eye.

“I’m a mess.” I smile and wipe some more with the sleeve of my shirt.

“Don’t. It’ll stain.”

“It’s okay. I’ll wash it.”

Our eyes meet, and neither of us pull away. His are tender. Mine, I don’t know how they look, but they feel stripped.

He breaks our connection first. He does it quietly. It’s barely a whisper above the breeze when he says, “It’s late. You need rest. Let me take you to your room.”

I’m exhausted, and all I can do is agree. The small creases between Troy’s brows and at the corners of his eyes speak of his own fatigue as we get to our feet, limbs creaking with lack of use.

“It’s five a.m.,” Troy says, smiling. “We sat here for a while, huh?”

“Yeah, I’m sorry about that.”

“We’re both so sorry.” He winks at me.

“Which I’m also sorry about,” I say. “Sorry about the sorrys.” We share a smile.

Slowly and in silence, Troy and I walk toward the hotel. I feel the calm amber of his presence, the faded Artemisia of him, his warmth a reminder of how he kept me safe during my meltdown.

Our synchronized gaits cause our arms to touch while we head toward the park exit. Our hands bump against each other, until Troy links his pinkie with mine and we’re in sync.

“I don’t mind,” he murmurs, voice low to not disturb the silence of the night around us. “I’d prefer to see you enter your room and lock the door behind you. I’d sleep better that way. You had enough bad run-ins last night.”

“I know, but I’ll be fine. It’s so late, and you need your rest too.”

He raises an eyebrow. “I’d lose exactly two minutes on taking you to your door. Worst case, the exercise will make me fall asleep even faster.”

I look down at our still-hooked pinkies. We’re back in the lobby of our hotel, and we’re standing so close, the night clerk probably misunderstands our connection.

“I’d hate to put any sort of pressure on you, but— Can I insist on taking you to your room and it’ll be okay?”

“Oh my God!” I bite my lip, smiling. “Okay, let’s go.”

“Are you sure?”

“Are you kidding me right now?”

He can’t hold back a triumphant smile.

At room 603, we slow to a stop. I fumble the key out of my pocket, wondering if Waris is at Elias’ tonight. I wouldn’t mind being alone, take a shower, and wind down. It would be nice to sort through my thoughts before falling asleep.

When I look up, Troy is staring at me. He instantly veils the raw intensity there, but his tenderness still lingers.

“Thank you for the kiss at the concert,” he says. “I didn’t expect that, and it made my night.”

“It was Waris,” I say. “She didn’t think you’d go onstage without it.”

Laughter wrinkles the bridge of his nose. I see freckles. Troy has the finest sprinkle of small dots fanning out over its ridge, and something fluffs into a happy-cloud in me at the realization. How is he so beautiful?

“I have no idea what I was thinking. I needed that kiss, so thank you.” He bobs his head curtly, definitively, letting go of my pinkie. For just a second, he stands there. Then he straightens to the full length of his frame, angling the slight square of his chin up enough to look down at me with half-lidded, catlike aloofness. It makes me smile.

“Would you like another kiss?” I tip my chin high too.

Eyes glittering, his temples smoothen with humor. “Are you offering your lips to a thirsty wayfarer?”

My snort is as close to an oink as it gets. “Where did that come from?”

“L.P. Gurglesson, famous Australian poet from the thirteenth century,” he jokes.

“Gurglesson, huh? That’s interesting. Thirteenth century?”

“Maybe seventh. Something like that.”

I can’t take my eyes off him. I stare until his smile fades.

“I’m thirsty,” he whispers, and I step into him. Troy bends, until he’s there and I’m savoring him all over again.

It was minutes or centuries ago, familiar, right, perfect, and missed for so long. I wanted this. Needed this. I’ve craved it since I let go of his cinnamon to let him walk onstage.

Warm and buzzing, I’m not sated when I wave goodbye. I shut my door, chain-link-lock it so I don’t stalk him all the way to the ninth floor, room 908 and chain-link-lock the two of us in there forever.

How bad would it be if I did?

Except, our time was over before it began. Sometimes, it’s not about the number of infractions. It’s the gravity of the few there are.

In the shower, I let the water drizzle over me. I don’t want to churn on what I did again, don’t want to brood over the measures Emil took to get rid of me… or the means Troy used to help him.

My heart stutters again. Maybe I’d had a heart attack out there after all.

The clean verbena fragrance envelops me as I dry off. I go to bed, my body sedated by the heat from the shower. We’re getting up for breakfast in just a couple of hours, and if I’m not there, Troll will have a meltdown; he tolerates it from the guys, but anyone else, he’ll cut with his razor-sharp tongue, and I can’t take that right now.

I set my alarm. Get up to change the setting on the A/C. Rip the blankets free from their tucked-in claustrophobia before I thump back down on my back. I remove my nightie after all, ready to sleep the way I only do when I have a visitor.

Troy interpreted me right; my whole life, I’ve been traveling, either with my family’s caravan or with a band, so I’ve never been the type of girl to keep boyfriends. What I used to do to stay sane—feed my urges with a bed friend here and there as we passed through our destinations—I haven’t done since I left Clown Irruption.

Keeping my eyes shut and hoping for sleep to claim me, I slowly realize that instead of abating, the heat is concentrating. It congregates in my lips, my breasts, in the sensitive areas on the inside of my arms and my thighs. And I see with crushing clarity what’s happening to me.

My lower abdomen is warm with need for anything but sleep. My hot core throbs, and what I need isn’t just some visitor. I don’t need a sweet, random, sexy bed friend. No, what my whole body screams for is Troy.

There’s no use in denying its cravings. I keep my eyes closed now that I’ve understood, given up, and I’m running my hands over myself like I know he would if I let him. I travel downward, sliding the tip of my index over the wet warmth at my center, moving, shifting, massaging, making tension build from down low until it makes my chest inflate.

I arch off the mattress, and of all the things I could imagine, I see Troy in the mirror in that wretched hotel room, only it’s not so wretched in this moment. I see the undiluted passion in his eyes as he stares down my reflection, as he enters me so deeply, my elbows slump to the desktop in bliss.

Shivering, I recall how I took my eyes off him only for a moment, only when I couldn’t keep them open anymore, when the immensity of my second orgasm shook every muscle in my body. When I came back again, Troy’s eyes were closed in unheard-of ecstasy too, and even then I knew I’d never seen a more breathtaking sight.

I bow off the mattress, choking my little scream.