Completely denied.
Christmas lay right beside me, but I couldn’t touch my present for fear of hurting him further. I might just beat up Eric myself. Slap him around the head a few times with a handbag, something like that. It would be fitting.
Vaughan’s hand slid over mine. Care of the calluses on his fingers from playing guitar, they weren’t soft. The skin there was harder, jagged, even. But I didn’t mind. He could touch me as much as he liked. Hell, mood I was in, I’d tape myself permanently to his side if I could get away with such a thing.
“Did you hear from the real estate agent?” I turned my hand over, palm side up. All the better to catch his fingers with mine and hold on.
“He’s bringing through some people tomorrow. Guess the trashed sitting room isn’t going to look so great.” He swore softly.
“It’s fine,” I said. “Nell and Rosie and I cleaned up the worst of the mess. If they ask, he’ll say you’re a minimalist who doesn’t believe in having much furniture or something. It’ll be fine.”
A sigh. “Yeah. Well, it’ll have to be. Thanks for helping out.”
“No problem.” I gently lifted his hand to my lips and kissed it, careful to avoid the two cracked knuckles. “Can I ask a personal question?”
“Shoot.” He didn’t even hesitate.
“What’s the deal with Eric and you? Why did he react so badly to you working at the bar in the first place?”
The groaning was back, but it soon turned into laughter. The sound was not a happy one. “Thought you’d have asked about that before now, actually. After that damn scene at the bar last night.”
“I didn’t want to pry.”
Without a word he lifted my hand to his lips and kissed it. Oh, god. I was melting. All they’d find of me come morning was soppy goo on the bed and it was all his fault.
“I like you, Lydia.”
“I like you too, Vaughan. Now give me the gossip.”
His laughter turned to an altogether more acceptable sound. “Eric was in the band all during high school. Helped me put it together, actually. We were tight back then. His parents only live a street over, so we pretty much grew up together…”
“What happened?”
“Same things that’s happening now. He fucked it up with the band. He was always screwing around, never taking the group seriously. All he had to do was learn how to hit the fucking drums in time, but was he able to do it?” He held my hand to his chest, heart pounding away against the back of my hand. It felt strong, good, like the man it lay within. “Not a chance. I warned him, if he didn’t get his act together then he wasn’t coming west with us after graduation. Guess he didn’t believe me. Time came and I had to tell him he was out. He didn’t take it well.”
I sucked in a breath, blowing it out between pursed lips. “Hell. That must have sucked. Now I know why you were nervous about showing up to work at the Dive Bar.”
“Yeah.” He said no more.
We lay in silence, holding hands, ever so slowly dozing off to sleep. Despite my busy mind, exhaustion called to me loud and clear. Sheets and pillow smelling of Vaughan, the heat of his body right next to mine and a cool early morning summer breeze blowing in through the window. My own personal paradise. God, if anything I was overtired. The weight of my body seemed to have tripled, and yet, it felt light as a feather at the same time. Like I could feel myself sinking through the mattress and floating off into the ether, attached to the earth only by Vaughan’s hand. I wanted to float there forever, having sweet dreams.
I wondered how Chris and Paul were doing, living it up in Hawaii. Interesting, the thought could almost drift through my brain without me wanting to go into a berserker rage and set fire to shit. Almost. The time Chris and I had spent together, the wedding that never was, all of it just kind of free-fell through my mind.
Beside me, Vaughan’s bare chest rose and fell in perfect rhythm. All of his immaculate ink no more than a blur in the low light. The eye that I could see was closed, his poor battered face relaxed.
“I didn’t love Chris like I should have,” I whispered. “I think I was just lonely and all the attention … I don’t know, it went to my head or something. But it wasn’t real.”
He didn’t move. Nothing changed. The night went on.
I stared back up at his bedroom ceiling, my old friend. It made as good a witness to my confession as any. “In two and a half days I think I’ve honestly come to feel more for you than I ever felt for him. It’s different, though. I thought I knew exactly how life would be with Chris. What we’d do, how we’d be together. He fit into this mold that I thought I wanted and understood, and you don’t.”