Chapter 34
“Justin…”
With a deep breath he woke up
suddenly. His arm was sore and so was
his neck. In fact, his entire body felt
like it needed to be stretched in every way and every direction. He was thirsty and his eyes felt scratchy. It was dark in the room, the only light
coming from the doorway that was halfway open.
He could see Trace’s outline there, looking into the room with an
ominous presence. He squinted.
“Huh?” It sounded more like a grunt because his
voice was so gravelly. He sighed. He had several performances that afternoon
and starting off with a scratchy tone wasn’t a good sign.
“You gotta get up.”
The deep breath he took turned
into a yawn and he nodded, slinging his left arm over his eyes. “Right.”
The door closed and it was dark
again. He leaned his head back down
against the pillows and sighed. He just
needed five more minutes of sleep, just a little bit and he would be good and
could get up, start his busy day and get it over with. He never thought he’d want to have his album
release day go by quickly. He wanted to
savor it and enjoy it.
But sleep seemed more important to
him in that moment. He wasn’t covered by
a blanket or sheets but it was warm, incredibly and comfortably warm, the type
of warmth that makes you lazy and relaxed.
He knew it was early, his body felt achy and exhausted, as if sleeping
had made him more tired.
The bed shifted and it startled
him at first because he hadn’t moved.
And then it all came back, screeching as it sped to a halt in his mind. He knew why he was so tired and he knew why
he was achy.
His arm was pinned down by her and
his neck was being supported by way too many pillows. He moved to stretch his legs and could tell
he still had on his jeans, even his shoes were still on his feet. He pulled his arm from under her shoulders and
she sighed a bit and curled up. He
rubbed his hands over his face, remembering the tears and the yelling and the
kissing and the exhaustion and frustration of it all.
It had been too good to spiral down
this bad.
Nothing had been resolved. Even after he had asked her to stay, nothing
had made it better.
He had kissed her and she had
kissed him back, and then she started crying and he got mad at her.
And then she got mad at him.
And then they kissed again.
It was this strange emotion that had
surged through him the night before. It
wasn’t just one emotion, it was thousands wrapped up as one. Anger and sadness, lust and love, disappointment
and pity, anxiety and eagerness, excitement and exhaustion, annoyment and bliss
all crashing together and colliding like a war in his mind.
He was confused and didn’t know
what to do. He wanted to be with her but
he didn’t know if she was strong enough to be with him. As much as she pretended that she was sorry
and that she was ready the night before, he knew she was still broken; sure of
her actions one moment, terrified of them the next. He knew they both had a shit load of work to
do in order for them to work.
After a while she had stopped
talking and she had stopped apologizing. She sat on his bed and just looked at
him. She seemed just as frustrated and
exhausted about this as he was, but she was taking all the blame and guilt onto
herself and he hated that.
He was lost. He knew what he was supposed to do and
supposed to say, but he didn’t want any of that. He didn’t want to kick her out and he didn’t
want to tell her she had fucked up.
Because they both had fucked up,
and having her there even fighting with her, even having her cry and plead with
him was better than not having her there at all.
And he should have never given up
on her.
He never completely did. He said he had, and he believed he had. But somewhere deep inside of him held on and
hoped that what had happened the night before would occur. He had always thought that if he saw her
again he’d run to her and pick her up and kiss her and tell her he loved her
and never let her leave him again. But
that didn’t happen, and as soon as he saw her he felt like he had been cut in
half. He felt lifeless, not because she
was there, but because all the weight and all the loneliness came crashing down
on him.
And he realized how not having her
with him damaged him, how it was a betrayal to his feelings, and how it left
him miserable and used, as if the past year of his life had been a waste.
Suddenly, she flipped over on the
bed and held onto him, curling her leg over his lap and sighing as her head hit
against his shoulder.
He watched her and couldn’t help
himself from moving his arm and letting his hand run over her head and through
her hair. It felt natural and good. It was like the night before when he looked
over at her and was about to start in on their problems again and he discovered
she was curled up asleep on his bed. He
had moved to turn out the light and slowly shifted closer to her. He had held her against him and kissed her
shoulder, watching her sleep. It felt
good.
It felt like it did now that she
was holding him.
It felt right.
The night before she had shocked
him and amazed him and terrified him.
She had begged him and he had never really seen her beg like that
before. She said she would move to
Thankfully, she calmed down and
soon after was when she fell asleep.
And as much as the night before
had completely fucked with his mind, as much as the past few months had, that
morning he felt a little different. He
was still confused and his head still hurt and he was unsure. But he wasn’t depressed.
And most importantly, with her
there warm and soft, curled against him, he wasn’t lonely.
The door opened again roughly,
bouncing against the wall where Trace had swung it open. The lights flicked on
and Justin squinted and put his hand over his eyes. “Justin! I’m serious you need….” His speech stopped short and Justin slowly
opened his eyes to see Trace staring at the woman that was curled up on the bed. “Oh, sorry. I didn’t realize she was still here.”
Justin’s eyes had adjusted slowly,
but he looked down at Darcy, now able to really see her in the light. She looked calm and peaceful, beautiful,
completely different from the red eyes and runny nose she had the night
before. “Yeah…”
“How’s things?”
He sighed and ran a hand over her
head again. “I don’t know. I just don’t
know.”
“You really do need to get up and
get going. You have a shit load to do
today.”
Justin ignored his friend’s words
and remained staring at the woman that he so desperately wanted to be his
again. She was there, wasn’t she? So why was he fighting it? Why did he fight it the night before? He was confusing himself. “What do I do Trace? I mean, I know you’re biased ‘cause you
helped plan last night, and I guess I do still want her, but I…” He lifted his
eyes and saw Trace looking at him sympathetically. “She hurt me.”
Trace shrugged. “And you probably
hurt her, too. It shouldn’t matter. You need her.
And you love her, right?”
“God, I…” He felt kind of pathetic lying here with her
and having Trace stare at them, but it didn’t really matter. He shouldn’t have even asked that question
because he was sure Trace already knew.
He answered it anyway, if only to hear himself say the words, “More than
I thought possible.” His fingers
delicately moved her hair away from her face and behind her ear and his other
hand came up and covered the hand she had rested in the middle of his
torso. “When I saw her last night I—I thought
I was gonna faint, to be honest. I was
so damn happy.”
It was quiet for a while.
Finally, he glanced towards the
door and saw Trace staring at him with his nose turned up. “You’re kind of gay sometimes. You know that, right?”
“He’s just romantic.”
Justin looked down at her and her
eyes were still closed but there was a smile on her face. He pinched her arm lightly and said, “Hey!”
She moved and looked up at him
with squinted, tired eyes, “I’m sneaky.”
He got lost looking at her and having her still against him. Even with her eyes half closed and a yawn
contorting her face she was beautiful and he wanted her again. He wanted her to be his again.
And he didn’t care about anything
else.
“I’m serious…” He had forgotten that Trace was there and
looked up suddenly at the sound of his voice.
“In fifteen minutes Johnny is going to be here. You probably wanna get ready.”
“Thanks Trace.” His friend rolled
his eyes and closed the door as he left.
But he was smiling and Justin knew that was a great sign. Trace had rarely smiled at him in the
mornings the past month. Instead he had
always seemed pissed off and grouchy, and Justin knew that was just a
reflection of how he had been treating Trace.
He thought that maybe, just maybe all that unpleasantness was coming to
an end.
She moved after a few minutes of
silence and pushed her body up to look at him.
She was still lying over him and she was smiling. He was reminded of times they would park it
on the couch and watch a movie or TV and she would fall asleep and wake up a
half hour later. She’d always have this
look on her face, this tired yet restful look, wanting to go back to sleep, yet
happy to be with him. She use to be so
happy to be with him and to see that look back on her face made him want to
carry her away somewhere and leave everything else behind. “You need to get
up.”
He wanted to kiss her, but last
night kissing only seemed to confuse everything even more, so he remained
still. “He’s right, ya know?”
“What?”
He tried really hard to seem
neutral and unfazed by her, but then his hand moved up to touch her face
without him thinking about it and he began to smile at her. “I…I do need you.”
She ignored him and he knew she was
doing it on purpose. Her body moved away
from him and she tried to look over on the stand beside the bed for a
clock. “Shit Justin, what time did we go
to bed last night?”
“Late.” He moved onto his side and
looked at her. “It doesn’t matter.”
She sighed, ignoring him and
covering her face with her hands. He
didn’t know if she was doing this on purpose, but she was doing a good job of
not looking at him and not acknowledging how he was staring at her. “I shouldn’t have come last night. You have too much stress right now,
anyway. I’m really…”
He kissed her, only for a
moment. “Just shut up.” He mumbled close
to her, smiling. When he pulled back he
knew he probably shouldn’t have done that.
She looked shocked and scared.
“What are you doing today?”
“I—I don’t have anything planned.”
“Spend it with me.” It was out of his mouth before he had time to
think if he should really ask that.
But he was tired of being
unsure. And he was god damn tired of
thinking. It was all he had done ever
since their relationship went awry.
Thinking and thinking and contemplating and wondering what went wrong,
how to fix this, if he should do that, if he should say that. It was wearing him out. And it was completely different from how they
use to be when they were just…just together, happy, and not worrying about
every damn thing that happened.
When he first met her, or ran into
her, he was unsure of everything, but after a week of spending time with her
that all went away. Sure, sometimes he’d
get a little self conscious, but very quickly he stopped thinking. He just loved her and was himself with her
and had fun with her and was comfortable with her.
He wanted that back. God, did he want that back.
And he made up his mind. He made it up the night before when she came
in, he was just now realizing it. He was
gonna get them back. He was gonna get back the blissful
carelessness they were enraptured in months ago. He was going to make it better. He had to.
“Don’t you have promotions and
interviews and stuff?”
“Spend it with me.” He sat up on the bed and grabbed her hand,
squeezing it. He needed to prove it to
her, to let her see that last night he had been a fool and now he realized that
he wasn’t scared and he wasn’t unsure.
He loved her and that was the most important thing. “Please.”
She looked like she was about to
break again. She sat up against the
pillows and pressed her palms into her eyes, moaning out, “Why is this so fucking
hard?”
He leaned closer to her. “Let’s stop it. Let’s stop thinking about what we’ve done and
what we’ve said. I know the bubbly,
happy, confident girl I use to date is still in there.”
She started crying again and he
wanted to punch himself. He eased back
from her. Maybe this was wrong, maybe he
was coming on too strong. She smiled
underneath her tears and wiped at her cheeks.
“I was too upset to tell you last night, but…but you were right about
the dreams.”
He started to feel nauseated. “Darcy,
come on let’s not…”
“They were fate Justin. I’m not—I’m not a religious person and I
don’t really think about that kind of stuff.
And whether they were really of me or not they—they brought us together
and—and you don’t know what you’ve changed for me, what you’ve done for
me. But I don’t want to hurt you anymore
and I don’t want to cause you frustration.”
She was defending herself again,
starting to beg again, and he couldn’t deal with that. He never, ever wanted to see her like he did
the night before, desperate and almost, in a way, pathetic. Maybe that’s why he was so frustrated the night
before, because she had turned into a person he wasn’t use to. She wasn’t his strong, confident Darcy
anymore. She was broken. “I’m just asking you to spend the day with
me. And before you say it, you’re not
gonna stress me out today, you’re not gonna be a burden.” Her eyes were huge
when they looked up at him and he leaned closer to her once more and shook his
head, “You’ve never been a burden Darcy.”
Her throat moved in a visible
gulp. She licked her lips. She looked away from him and moved her legs
off of the bed. “You need to get up and
get ready and get a shower and stuff.”
“You wanna take one with?”
She looked at him with narrowed,
almost angry eyes. There was the
confidence and the strength he had been missing. He knew she was there somewhere. “Are you serious?”
“Yeah,” he shrugged. He was being serious. Being like that with her, well, it seemed
like the best way to get them to be like they use to be, carefree and fun. He knew it probably sounded horrible and he
knew that explanation was only half of it.
He wanted her, he wanted her bad.
He wanted her laughing and happy and curious and naked like she use to
be, like she use to love to be with him.
She stood off the bed quickly and
pointed a finger at him, pacing a little.
“Justin, last night you were really unsure about me, unsure about us,
about wanting to try this again. So I’m
sorry, but I’m kind of unsure of what’s made you change your mind.”
“I—I don’t think anything
has. I think—I think last night I was
over thinking. I was in shock, and—and I
was unsure if all this was really happening. Maybe it’ll all blow up in our
face and maybe you will try and leave again and—and I don’t know. But Trace is right. I need you in my life, I want you in my life
and…” He sighed. “And I want to try this again.”
She spoke slowly and clearly, “So
you wanna hop in the shower with me?”
“You don’t want to?”
She rolled her eyes and sat back
on the bed. She was glaring at him, but
there was a small, amused smile on her face. “I think you just want to get
off.”
“Seriously?”
“It’s been a while, right? You said last night you haven’t seen anyone
since me.”
He scooted across the bed to her
side and sat right beside her, his legs hanging off the end and his eyes
staring at her. She was looking down at
her lap where her hands were clasped tightly.
He waited until she finally looked up at him, and he caught her stare
and then began talking, slow and clearly, deliberately like she had just spoken
to him. “I wanna be with you like that again.
Like when it was really good. ‘Cause
girl we—we’ve barely been together. We
just started this thing and then we had problems. I wanna really give this a chance.”
She let out a deep sigh, making
her cheeks puff for a second. She pulled
her legs up Indian style and crossed her arms over her chest. “See now it’s my turn to be doubtful and
unsure.”
“Darcy, why?”
“It’s just so sudden. I mean last night you hated me.”
He passed her a look and nudged
her. She moved her body from being completely
crossed and closed off and stretched out her legs. “Oh, come on! I was confused. I didn’t hate you. I kept kissing you, remember?”
She had sometime between last
night and this morning taken off her shoes and he stared at her socked, pointed
feet. “And you kept stopping.”
He looked back at her face and
shook his head. “And last night you were
begging for me to want you back and now when I say I do, you’re unsure?”
She sighed again and stood up off
the bed. “Exactly, ‘cause last night you
were unsure, so it makes me wonder what the hell changed your mind.”
He snapped. Something in him just snapped. Here he was trying, trying to smile at her
and be easy and bring her back into the mindset they use to have. But she was being so stupidly stubborn. He threw up his hands and let them fall back down
his sides roughly. “You’re right. I just, I can’t do this. It’s too up and down, it’s…”
Suddenly she was the one smiling,
shaking her head, looking at him with an easy countenance. She stepped forward and touched his upper
arms. “What—what are we doing Justin?”
“What?”
She licked her lips and lowered
her eyes so they were looking at his chest.
“We’re both being pathetic. And—and
we’re ripping apart the best thing in our…”
She smiled and rolled her eyes a bit, “well, at least in my life.”
He grabbed her upper arms as well
and stared right at her. “Darcy, you know…”
“Justin, Johnny just called. He’s
in the lobby and he’s coming up. You
better get a move.” The door banged
against the wall again, as if a period to Trace’s sentence. He turned to look back and saw Trace shove a
toothbrush back in his mouth, smiling from his position in the doorway.
Justin glared at him and Trace
rolled his eyes in response and pulled the door shut again.
He pulled away from her and ran a
hand through his hair. As much as he’d
loved to just say fuck it to his day and dish this out with her until they made
it better, he didn’t have time for that.
Trace’s interruptions were finally sinking in for him. His album was out and he had to promote it. He had to go out there and appear happy, single,
pleased.
“I have to get a shower.”
“What are we gonna do?”
He looked down at the watch he was
still wearing from the night before. He
didn’t have a lot of time. He took it
off and saw that it had imprinted itself into his skin. “Will you at least come talk to me while I’m
in there?”
She didn’t agree but she didn’t
decline either. He ignored her for a bit
while he flipped off his shoes and started to undress. She remained on the bed and he figured she
probably would stay there while he showered.
Once he was down to his boxers he went into the bathroom and moved to
open the shower door and get the water running.
When the temperature was hot and
felt perfect on his hand he removed his boxers and turned to step inside the
shower and close the door.
She was right there, propped up on
the countertop by the sink, staring at him.
“This…” She blushed and looked away from him. “This is awkward.”
“It is?” He closed the door, but
couldn’t help smiling to himself at how shy she was acting. In the past, she
would have been on him like a cat to tinsel, clawing him, biting her lip,
looking up at him with those devouring eyes.
He used to love that look. He still did, and he wanted it back.
The water felt good against his
skin and he closed his eyes and let his sore bones and muscles relax in the
steam. “It doesn’t have to be this way,
ya know? It’s like I feel if we just
forget it and just get over it it’ll all be fine.” He sighed.
He still had to be realistic about this stuff. He couldn’t just forget it, he couldn’t. He knew human’s didn’t work that simply. He knew he didn’t work that simply.
She seemed to be reading his mind
when she said, “But my mind just won’t let it go. I don’t think yours is letting it go either.”
“Any suggestions of how we do let
it go?” He finished lathering himself up
and began to wash off. But she never
responded and he quickly wiped the soap out of his eyes so he could look and
make sure she hadn’t vanished again. The
last thing he needed right now was her bolting for the door and leaving him
again. “Darcy?”
A breeze of cooler air hit him and
he saw her peeking into the shower with the door slightly opened. Her eyes were large and staring at him. “I think I’m gonna get in. Is that ok?”
He smiled and saw that she was as
naked as he was. He didn’t know what
changed her mind, what gave her the idea to do this, but he wasn’t going to
question it. “Yes.”
She got in and he finished rinsing
off, trying to contain his smile, knowing she was standing a foot behind him,
naked. He turned and opened his
eyes. She was curled up, arms over her
chest, bent a little to cover herself, and further away than he expected her to
be. She laughed nervously and bit her
lip, “This is so fucking weird.”
“Then here, let’s…” He pulled her straight to him and moved them
under the water so she would no longer be cold and so they could be closer together. He wanted her to realize what they had, that
they could do this and that they could win.
He smiled at her and leaned in as if to kiss her. “Let’s—let’s stop it.”
“What...” She pulled away a little and went rigid in
his arms, her own smushed in between them.
She was looking away from him, her head turned. “What do you have to do today?”
“Why are you fighting it?”
She was silent, but he could feel
her body suddenly relax. Her arms
wiggled from in between them and slowly went around his back, pushing their
fronts together. He sighed and felt her rest
her cheek against his chest, holding onto him tightly. “I want it to be like it use to. I want it to feel that way again. I want to be with you, here and not be
stressed out and not be questioning everything I say and every move I make.”
“Then—then just stop.” She looked up at him and he never wanted to
kiss anyone more in his life than then.
But he didn’t. He held back and said very firmly at her, as
if his voice could break into her brain and make her see what he was now
realizing. “I woke up this morning and I
hadn’t slept very well, and—and I was grumpy and stressed out and I looked over
and you were there, and—and for a moment everything left and I felt at
ease. And then I remembered all this
drama and I wanted to forget it. I
wanted to, so—so I’m going to.”
Her eyes shifted downwards. “You
can’t just forget.”
“Yes—yes you can Darcy.” He shook her once and she looked back up at
him, hair wet, droplets of water on her lips and cheek. “You have to.
Sometimes in life you just have to let things go. And we’ve built this up bigger than it really
was. And I should have never let you
just walk out of my life.”
She sighed and pulled her hands
around from his middle and covered her face, still leaning against him, brining
back that panicky voice she had the night before. “I fucked up so bad. If I had never left, and I’m talking about
the first time, if—if I had just talked to you after my brother told me we
could have fixed it and—and we wouldn’t be here now.”
“Yes we would.”
“What?”
He pulled a hand up to hold her
face and whispered, “We’d be right here, and we’d be happy.” He pulled his
other hand up and held it to the other side of her face, staring at her
directly. “We can be happy Darcy. I believe it, and…” He paused and licked his
lips, “And you have to, too.”
She didn’t look away from him and
he wanted to kiss her. He had to. It was the perfect time to. It was time to put all the bull shit away and
just be Justin and Darcy again. And when
she began to smile at him, just a small, shy smile, he knew that he had broken
through.
But then her smile dropped quickly
and she muttered, “I’m cold…”
He realized he had somehow gotten
them away from the water and pulled her back into him and moved so she was more
under the shower head than him. “Better?”
She nodded and moved her hands up
around his neck and mumbled into the skin on his shoulder, “You being naked is
always very convincing.”
Her lips against his skin was the
last straw and he knew he had to get this done.
He had to make it work. “Let’s
try, please Darcy. Let me beg and don’t
turn me down.” He pulled away a bit and looked down at her, “And this time,
if—if we do fight don’t…”
“I won’t.” She cut him off and pulled him closer
again. He could feel it, he could feel
her. He could feel them getting closer,
he could feel the walls breaking down. And
he could sense that at least one or two pieces of their puzzle were being put
back together.
Something was starting to
work. It made him smile.
And she started to smile,
too. Her eyes were watery, but her smile
was wide and her hands were holding onto him, holding onto him like she use
to. “I won’t disappear. I won’t give up.” Without giving him warning
she pulled down on his neck and kissed him.
Her hands moved from his neck to his face and she held him there. He couldn’t help but smile and pulled away
only for a moment before pulling her back into him and kissing her with
everything he could, trying to force all the love and the forgiveness he had
for her through the kiss.
She pulled back moments later smiling
and breathless, with her hands on his shoulders and a small amazed look in her
eyes. “This—this feels so right.”
“It always has. We just, we let other stuff get in the way.”
He moved to lean against the cool,
wet wall and pulled her against him as she spoke to him, holding onto him
tightly. “I started having dreams. After it all blew up I’d have these dreams
about you and us and I’d wake up missing you so bad and—and it was like they
were telling me something, like they were rubbing it in my face what I did
wrong, what I gave up. ‘Cause I didn’t
just give up my boyfriend, Justin. I…” She closed her mouth for a moment and he
could tell she was getting choked up. “I
gave up my best friend. I felt like I had fallen into this well or something and
there was this ladder that I could jump and grab and use to get out, but I
couldn’t see and I was too weak to fight for it. Everyone else was outside of it, including
you, looking down on me, yelling at me to grab at it. I just had to fight. It was like my mind was screaming at me to come
back and fight for you and—and not give up like my parents, not just give up
like I have with every other relationship.
And last night I jumped and I guess it worked.”
He touched her face and smiled at
her, “We can make this work.”
She leaned into him as if to kiss
him and he went to meet her there. He
was so thrilled, so happy that they were working on it.
He knew they weren’t perfect and
he knew that one co-ed shower experience wasn’t the answer to the problem, but
they were better. They were better even
if it was just a little bit, and that was at least something.
Before he could kiss her there was
an abrupt knock on the door and he looked up to see the door open halfway. “Justin, you better be—” He could see Trace’s blurry form through the
steamed glass and the bathroom door suddenly that had been swung open was quickly
pulled almost shut again. “Oh…” There was a pause. He could feel Darcy clutching onto him. “Are you alone?”
Justin glanced down at her and
smiled. “No.”
“Right. Well, um…”
Trace cleared his throat and quickly said, “Yeah, bye.” The door was shut firmly and Justin began to
laugh.
“He’s hilarious.” She was smiling at him and it made him feel
like he was on fire, yet floating and strangely calm. “You’re gonna be late.”
He leaned down and kissed her neck,
pushing his body into hers, “I don’t care.”
He rubbed his lips against her neck, licking the shower water off her
and remembering how her skin tasted and how soft it felt against his mouth.
“But.”
He moved his head so he could be
close to her face and smiled, “I do not care.”
He kissed her firmly and when he pulled away she immediately rested her
head against his shoulder, holding him tightly, holding him like she use
to. “Are you gonna stay with me today?”
She paused for a moment and when
she looked up at him and said, “Yeah…” He knew that she meant a lot more. She pulled away from him shyly and moved to
wash her hair. But before she started,
she smiled at him and quietly said, “I’ll stay.”
He knew, even though they were
just showering now, forgetting to be romantic and actually trying to get a move
on his busy day, he knew that she meant it.
And he knew she meant more than just that day. He knew she was going to stay, to stick
around, to fight this, to work through it, to try and forget it and just be
with him. He could see it in her eyes.
It was something he hadn’t seen in
them since they were at her parent’s house in
The past few months had jaded that
and there had been other things in the way.
But that morning, that morning she proved to him that she was able to
push all that stuff away and over a cliff, letting them disappear from her
life. All the dreams, all the
negativity, all the insecurities for both of them were vanishing like clouds in
thin air, dissipating and finally gone.
They were going to do this. They were going to prove to themselves that
they could fix this, that they could get over their own mental bull shit, get
over their own problems and their own hang ups and be together, and make it
work. The circumstances of how they met
didn’t matter and neither did their pasts.
It was their future he wanted to concentrate on. She was back and she had made him strong.
And it made him feel incredible to
know that he had seen it in her eyes and could feel it in her body that her
strength had been renewed as well.
And they were going to make it.