Page 15

Chapter 15

Brodie

Our conversation at breakfast had left me feeling light as a feather. Some of that dreamy, floaty, head-over-heels feeling returned. It would be easy to exist in a bubble here too. Shane and Kieran were both busy with their own boyfriends and Mom had never been the type to interfere in our private lives. But bubbles always burst.

I didn’t want a bubble. I wanted a life. And to get it, I had to trust that Liam wasn’t going to hurt me again. Wanting was easy. It was the trusting that was harder.

After breakfast, we drove around town for a while. I showed him where The Anchor was and explained that there was a tattoo shop above it now, even though I’d never been in it.

“Did you ever think of getting a tattoo?” Liam asked me.

“Not really, to be honest. I like how they look on other people, but I don’t think they’d suit me. What about you?”

Liam shook his head. “Never really thought about it. When I was thirteen, back before my parents died, I wanted my eyebrow pierced.” Liam glanced my way and grinned. “That request did not go over well.”

“I once asked Mom for a motorbike and she nearly shit a kitten. I’d watched some daredevil jump a bunch of busses and, to a nine year-old, it was the coolest thing I ever saw.” The memory brought a smile to my face. “We never did have a lot of money, so a motorbike wasn’t going to happen. But she went white as a ghost and bribed me with my favorite cookies if I never asked that question again.”

“Was it hard? Being gone for so long? I bet you missed her.”

“I did. But we talked on Skype sometimes and I emailed a lot.”

“No postcards?”

“Turn left up here.” I pointed at the next street I wanted Liam to take. “Nah, the postcards were for me. I don’t know why I started it. I mean, sometimes I’d send Mom a postcard, or one to Shane or Kieran, but mostly I sent them to myself. I guess I wanted to remember.”

“What are you going to do with all of them?”

“Well, see, I hadn’t thought that far ahead.”

Liam took the left like I’d asked and soon we were on the outskirts of town. The houses started to spread out more. Tall pines stood vigil on either side of the highway.

“In the winter, when we get a big dump of snow, I like to come this way and see the branches all weighed down with it. It’s even better if the sky has cleared so it’s blue and the snow is sparkling.” The weather had turned a little colder now as winter approached, or I’d have rolled the window down to feel the air on my skin. When I was a kid I thought I could catch the wind. But that’s because kids were innocent and foolish.

After driving for about twenty minutes, signs appeared advertising for a service station slash thrift store slash restaurant.

“Pull in there,” I told Liam.

He was obedient without question, even though I could see the what the fuck expression on his face. It was probably the scrap metal scarecrow that had him wondering where the fuck I’d taken him.

“There’s a local artist who does those.” I motioned to the sculpture. “He teaches shop at the high school, but in his free time, he does that.” I’d always envied people who had a talent. I’d never been particularly good at anything. I could draw a mean stickman if I put my mind to it.

“He’s very skilled.”

Liam and I got out of the car and wandered over for a closer look.

“I’d never be able to look at a pile of scrap and say ah, yes, there’s a scarecrow in here, and just”—Liam gestured wildly at the scarecrow—“make this appear.”

“It makes my head spin.”

Liam moved around the sculpture to examine it from all angles, but I stayed put. I’d seen it before and it no longer held the same level of awe that it had when it first appeared. He came to stand next to me, so close that our arms brushed against each other.

“Come on,” I said, breaking away. “Inside.”

I set off without waiting to see if he would follow. He would. He’d followed me halfway around the world already.

The restaurant was deserted except for a few older men who seemed to always be sitting at the same table drinking coffee and chatting away. I gave them a friendly wave and skirted past them and into the other section of the building. The one that was stuffed full of treasures.

Metal signs advertising everything from soda brands to ones that told stupid jokes. Touch lamps with glass panels decorated with images of wildlife. Salt shaker sets. Every kind of knickknack you could think of. And buried in the back corner, an old style pinball machine.

“Does that thing still work?” Liam asked me.

“You bet your ass it does.” I reached into my pocket and fished out a quarter. “When you stepped into the bathroom at Bennett’s, I got Ethan to get me some quarters.”

I flipped one in the air and caught it. “Want to play?”

Liam held his hand out and I dropped the coin into it. I showed him where the coin slot was and where the buttons were for the flippers.

“Your first quarter doesn’t count.” I told him when his first ball went straight past his flippers and into the gutter. “But after that, it’s on.”

Liam glanced over at me. “Why do I get the feeling that you’ve done this before?”

“Because I have. I used to beg Mom to bring me out here. When she did, she’d sit and have a coffee and I’d sink quarters into this machine until she made me leave.”

Liam, as it turned out, was horrible at pinball. Originally, I’d planned to let him get a few quarters under his belt, then challenge him to a friendly competition, but that was never going to happen.

After a couple of dollars sank into the machine, Liam stepped away with a laugh.

“I think you should give me a tutorial. Show me how it’s done.”

“Prepare to be amazed.”

I sank my quarter into the machine, pulled the rod that slammed into the ball to shoot it into play, and then I was transported back in time as my hands flew to the trigger buttons on each side of the machine.

The ball ricocheted off the bumpers, bounced off the sides, and I slammed it back up into play with the left flipper. The table had certain targets you could hit to rack up a higher score and there was a trick to hitting them all. I’d spent hours learning just how hard to hit the ball and what spot it had to be on the flipper to shoot up and get the trickiest target.

When my luck finally ran out and my play was over, I turned to Liam. I hadn’t realized I’d been smiling until Liam slanted his mouth over mine, catching me off-guard in the best kind of way.

I laughed against his mouth, a short burst of joy before melting into his kiss. Not too much, we were in public after all. And though there wasn’t really anyone around, I didn’t want to get too carried away.

That was the problem with Liam and me. One touch was never enough. It led to two. Led to holding hands or kissing. I could kiss Liam for days. Years. Eternities. I’d already fallen for him, but every moment we spent together, every little thing he did to show me how much I meant to him, only made me fall harder.

Liam’s hands dug into my waist, fingers like iron vises. He gripped me like he planned to never let me go. If only he hadn’t in the first place.

The thought was an unwelcome bucket of water. I pulled away, a little breathless. Disoriented. Sometimes I felt like I’d stepped out of reality and hadn’t found my way back.

Liam’s thumb traced my lower lip.

“Show me something else,” he said.

“Okay.”

He ducked into the service station slash convenience store and bought a couple bottles of overpriced apple juice. Instead of giving him directions, I plunked an address into the GPS.

He held my hand while he drove, which was a new experience for us. When we’d met, we went everywhere via transit or taxi. There was something far more intimate about sharing a car this way. If I let myself, I could get used to it. I could get used to a lot of things.

Kisses after pinball. Stealing bacon off his plate. The way his thumb stroked over my skin almost absentmindedly as he drove. Not sleeping alone. Fuck, I missed that. The way his body sought mine out in the night. I loved waking up with his arms around me, his lips brushing the back of my neck.

Was I ready to invite him to stay over? I wanted to be ready for that. For everything we’d had and had lost. Maybe not lost, but temporarily misplaced. I wanted it back. But only if I knew for certain that I’d get to keep it.

And that was the rub. There were no certainties in life. There was just chance and trust.

The car came to a stop in a familiar-to-me location. Liam looked around with a furrowed brow. I could understand his confusion. The place I’d taken him was a run-down house in a grungy neighborhood. More than a few houses on the street sported an overgrown lawn spotted with junk. Peeling paint. Boarded up windows. It wasn’t the nicest place.

“I grew up in that house,” I told him. To his benefit, he kept his expression neutral. More interested in me and what I had to say than looking at the house that would probably be better off demolished.

“It’s a two bedroom. I wasn’t really planned, but…” I shrugged. “There was a room that was supposed to be a storage room that was turned into my bedroom. It was barely big enough for a bed, and there were shelves built above the one side of it. I was terrified to sleep on that end of the bed. I thought the shelves would fall on my head and all my books and stuff would tumble down on me and kill me.”

Liam didn’t let go of my hand. “Did you want to get out and take a closer look?” he asked me. “Does anyone live here now?”

I shook my head. “Mom lived here up until Shane won the lottery. He bought her a nice house across town. She runs a shelter for abused women. She still owns the house, but she hasn’t decided what she wants to do with it yet.”

“Sometimes, it’s hard to let go of things, even if they serve no purpose for us anymore.”

“Did you want to see inside? I have a set of keys.”

“Only if you want to show me.”

Relief rushed out of my lungs in one huge breath. “Not especially. I think I’d like to go home.” A smile tugged at my lips. “Home. It’s weird to have one of those again. But weird in good way.”

Liam looked at me, long and meaningful. He held my gaze and lifted our joined hands. Brushing a kiss against my knuckles, he said, “Yeah, it is good.”

I knew what he meant by the way he looked at me when he spoke. The earnestness in his voice and the intensity of his gaze made my heart race. Me. I was his home.