Page 26

Chapter Twenty-Three

Ashland

I’m lying in bed when I get a text from Penny saying she’s got to cancel movie night again. I expected it. She’s insanely busy at the internship. I’m glad we aren’t doing it. I’m in a mood. Koda is out of town, and I’m spiraling. Aggravated. Seeing Damien. It’s sad that Koda is the only thing that’s keeping me together, and he doesn’t even know it. The next thing I get is a group text. Penny sends a picture of some fancy showing, and they start going at it. Buzz. Buzz. Fucking buzz.

I throw my phone to the side and huff, staring up at the ceiling at the nineteen stars I pasted up there earlier tonight. You’d think, after everything, that I wouldn’t ever want to see stupid glow-in-the-dark stars again, but I do. Maybe I haven’t healed. Maybe I never will, but those nineteen stupid stars remind me that I’m alive. That I’m here. That I’m a failure. Some would say the opposite, but I don’t really give a shit what everyone else says.

I get up, not able to sleep, and grab paints from Penny’s studio. I don’t bother acting remotely organized when I get back into my room. My phone buzzes with a phone call, driving me crazy. I grab it, not bothering to look at who it is to send it to voicemail, and accidentally answer.

“Stop calling me,” I answer angrily.

“Somehow I’m always surprised that you’re a bitch,” Koda says on the other end.

I take a look at the caller ID. Micropenis has now been changed to Human Dildo. “I’m sorry, I thought you were…Why the fuck are you calling me?”

“Wondered what you were doing.”

I’m confused. I stand in the center of my room, frozen. I know things have changed between us. That’s what he wanted. It’s what I secretly wanted, but a phone call while he’s out of town still feels weird.

“Well?” he asks.

“I’m…” I look around the room. Suddenly the space is too small. Too tight. “What are you doing?”

“Just got back from dinner." I hear some guys shouting at each other in the background.

I press the speaker button quickly and set the phone on the top of my desk then try to drag it by the legs.

“Ashland?” It sounds louder, clearer. “Why am I looking at your ceiling?”

Fuck. I look over at the phone, blowing the hair out of my face. “I didn’t mean to do that.”

Koda’s sitting in a chair of what looks like a hotel lobby. “Oh, I didn’t realize you were in the middle of something.” I didn’t mean to video him, but he sounds kind of disappointed that I didn’t.

I take the phone and head for the bathroom to grab a hair clip. “I wasn’t. Now I am.”

“I can let you go,” he says slowly as I set the phone against the books on my shelf and twist my hair up into the claw.

“No, it’s fine.”

He’s definitely in a hotel lobby. Sage eyes dart away from the screen a few times, surveying whatever is happening in front of him. Koda is fidgety. His phone is set on some sort of coffee table, and he has ear buds in. He's leaning forward with his knee bobbing up and down. He’s dressed in varsity sweatpants and a sweatshirt. The bill of his hat is facing forward for once, his sandy blonde hair peeking out of the edges, and he has his hood pulled up over his head.

He seems to settle a little at my response, sinking back into the armchair. “Oh, alright. So what are you doing?”

I grab the edge of the desk and start to push. The stupid thing is so heavy that I’m already breaking a sweat as it screeches across the floor. “Moving shit.”

“Clearly," he huffs. “But it’s like…eleven PM there. Why are you redecorating so late?”

I shove my back against the desk, trying to use my legs for leverage. “Because I fucking want to.”

The desk doesn’t move an inch, and I collapse onto the floor, breathing way heavier than I should.

Koda laughs, but tries to quiet himself. “Just wait until I get back tomorrow afternoon. I’ll help you.”

I crawl over and grab the phone from the bookshelf, sitting against it, and examine his surroundings. “Back? Are you in a hotel or something?”

“Yeah. Our scrimmage was earlier.”

“Oh.” I blink. “Who was bottom?”

He rolls his eyes. “If that’s Ashland for ‘who lost’ then the answer is Napoleon.” I give him an empty stare. “The other team,” he clarifies.

“Right. Right, the other team. What were the goals or whatever it’s called?”

“That’s soccer,” he snorts.

“Uh, no, actually. It’s football.” I pick up the phone and head into the kitchen.

“What do you know about football?”

I open the fridge and grab one of his sports drinks. “Too fucking much. My ex was really into it.”

“Your ex?” he asks, leaning forward.

“What? You think I can’t have one?” I settle the phone against the coffee maker and crack open the lid.

“It’s not that,” he tries to recover. “You just never talk about it.”

“I don’t talk about much,” I point out.

He bites his lip. “So what’s his name?”

“Pass,” I giggle. “He’s a psycho.”

“No way.” Sarcasm bleeds into his voice. “Not someone who would date you.”

“If I recall correctly you’re my human dildo.”

He sits back rolling his eyes slowly. “What kind of psycho are we talking?”

“Sets shit on fire for fun.”

“Of course he does,” he scoffs. “I’m surprised you aren’t into that.”

I root around in a cabinet and find a bag of Doritos. I try to empty it into a bowl and pout; it’s fucking crumbs. “Oh, I am.”

“Is he the one who wrote you an album?”

“You’re really not going to let that go. Yeah, if you must know, he is.”

“Why did you break up then?” I can tell he’s jealous, and it’s funny. Cute.

I pause, opening the freezer. “The world wouldn’t be able to handle it,” I say dramatically.

Koda plays with the strings of his hoodie. “Do you still talk?”

I purse my lips. “Why? Wanna know if I’ll still answer your weird phone calls when we inevitably break up again?”

“Ashland,” he warns. “Stop being like that.”

“Being like what? Realistic?”

He glares at me through the phone. “There’s alfredo in the fridge.”

I find a plastic container of fettuccini alfredo that I forgot about. I’m fucking starving. I grab a fork and spin the noodles on it, shoving it into my mouth without heating it up. “It was fun, but it wasn’t sustainable.”

“So you drove him insane, too?”

“Of course,” I smirk with a mouthful of noodles. “Before we went to college, I convinced Penny to swim in the Thames. If it hadn’t been for him, we would have drowned.”

“Why the hell were you near the Thames?”

“It wasn’t that long of a walk.”

“The Thames is in England,” he reasons.

I jump up onto the counter across from the phone and cross my legs, putting the tupperware into my lap. “So you do know how to look at a map.”

“This was on one of your summer adventures?” he asks with wide green eyes. They’re really pretty.

“Something like that. We hadn’t been there very long when I pulled that stunt.” I snicker at the memory. “Do you have siblings other than Alexi?”

“Uh, no. My parents are trying to adopt this little girl though.”

“How old is she?”

“Seven. Her name is Elise.”

I frown. “Terrible age.”

“On that, we can agree.”

Someone off camera hands him a box. “Man, Armory, you missed a hell of a dinner. Who the hell are you talking to?”

Alexi appears behind Koda’s chair. When he sees me, his face lights up, and he grabs Koda’s phone. “Ashland? If you were that bored you could have just called me.”

I laugh. Alexi’s eyeball is in the camera, and I can hear Koda fighting him. “Fuck off.”

“Did you miss dinner? I thought you weren’t doing anything?” I ask when Koda finally wrestles the phone back into his hands. His face turns red. I didn’t even know it could do that. He glances quickly at Alexi before shoving him away.

“Fine, geez. Hey, Ashy,” he calls out. “When you get tired of him just know that my phone line is open just for you.”

Koda hits him again, and Alexi runs off laughing.

“I didn’t really want to go to dinner. It’s always boring and just a lot of bullshit about prospects for the NFL,” he explains.

“Isn’t overplanning the future your entire brand?”

“There’s nothing wrong with a plan.”

I jab the fork at the camera. “That’s what boring people say.”

“It’s not.” Koda opens his container and unwraps his plastic silverware. It’s so careful and concise that it makes me laugh. “What’s so funny?

“You’re always just so particular.”

“You mean that I’m not messy.”

“I mean that, I bet you’re the kid who carefully unwraps his Christmas presents and saves the wrapping for next year.”

He chokes on a bite. “I am not, but there’s no point in making a big mess.”

“I bet you’d have a brain aneurysm just tearing open a package.”

“It wouldn’t be that severe.”

It’s nice just eating dinner and talking to Koda. He’s curious, like me. We both finish, and he heads up to his room. When he gets into the elevator some of the other players are in there.

“Ooh, Armory is on the phone.” They make kissy sounds. Koda looks like he might deck them in the face.

“Who is it?” Barnes peeks over his shoulder.

“My girlfriend. Fuck off.”

Barnes' eyes widen. “Ashland?”

It’s weird to hear him say it. I don’t know how to be someone’s girlfriend. I’ve been with exactly one person since I started having my own life, and that was never going to be normal or healthy. It kind of feels nice though, even if it sounds like a foreign language.

“Ashland is your fucking girlfriend?” Barnes continues.

Koda leans his head back against the elevator wall with regret. “Can you mind your own fucking business?”

The elevator dings, and he shoves Barnes out of the door while he protests.

“Sorry,” Koda mumbles.

I start washing dishes. “Really abusing the whole ‘girlfriend’ thing.”

Koda looks like he just shot himself in the foot. “Why does it bother you so much?”

“I don’t think anyone has ever called me that before is all.”

“You said you had an ex,” he points out. “That would mean you were his girlfriend.”

“Not exactly. Infatuated, yes. Girlfriend, no.”

“You’re fucking with me.” He rolls his eyes and heads down the hallway.

I walk back to my room, setting the phone back on my shelf. “Usually, but no.”

“I thought he wrote you a fucking album,” he says with clear jealousy in his voice.

“Doesn’t mean he was my boyfriend.”

“So some random guy you were fucking wrote you an album?”

“He wasn’t random.”

He huffs with exasperation. “Please explain why some asshole wrote you an entire fucking album, Ashland.”

“I don’t think you’ll want to hear it."

“The more you pretend it doesn’t matter, the more I’m going to ask about it.”

I grab my favorite book from my shelf and flip through it. “Musicians do shit like that.”

Koda slides his key card in while his jaw ticks. I can hear the door hit the stopper and the clap of his key card on a dresser.

I glance up. “You really want to talk about my complicated relationship with my ex?”

“Yeah, Ashland, I fucking do.”

“Ugh,” I groan. “He doesn’t…It’s not like that.”

“Are you still fucking dating him or something?" He narrows his eyes. "Is that why you’re being weird about the girlfriend thing?”

“No,” I laugh. “We broke it off before my Freshman year.”

“Did Penny ever meet him?”

“Yeah, they’re friends.”

“She still talks to him?” he asks incredulously.

I shrug. “We both do.”

Koda tosses himself into a chair, and I’m pretty sure he might destroy the hotel room. “That means he’s still around.”

“We’re friends.”

“You had sex with him.”

“It’s kind of hot when you’re jealous.”

“Please do not go out of your way to make me like this.”

“Were you this obsessive about all of your girlfriend’s exes?”

He runs his tongue along his top teeth. “No, I didn’t really pay attention to them.”

“Not surprised. Have them call me so I can figure out the secret.”

“It was high school. I was focused on football.”

“And you aren’t now?”

“Not entirely,” he mumbles. “So you’re not dating anyone else in some poly situation you’ve managed to forget to tell me?”

“I mean, he’s a watcher for sure, but no. I don’t date.”

“We are,” he emphasizes.

“That was the agreement, yes.”

“It’s not an agreement, Ashland. You’re my fucking girlfriend.”

“Right, right.” I nod my head sarcastically. “Do we have to call it that?”

“Yes, we do. I mean it. I expect you to make it clear that you have a boyfriend.”

“I’m sure you’ll do it for me.”

“So, what’s his name?”

“I don’t want to talk about him.”

He huffs with aggravation, but he doesn’t rebuttal. “So how’s Penny?”

I dig through my dresser looking for my favorite tee. “Good. At some art mixer thing tonight.”

“Is she having a good time?”

“I think so.” I wiggle out of my leggings and pull off my top.

“Sounds…” his voice fades away. I glance over, and he’s staring at me.

“Looking at something, Armory?” I smirk and pull the shirt over my head, yanking him out of his trance.

He clears his throat. “Uh, um, don’t you guys do movies on Fridays?”

“Her internship is more important.” I set my phone on my nightstand and crawl into bed. My sketchpad and pencil are already sitting on the sheets, so I flip to a new page and start to aimlessly draw. Koda takes off his hat and throws it on a table. Then he pulls his hoodie off, draping it over a chair.

“I like that hoodie,” I comment.

He rolls his eyes and sighs. “You can fucking have it, Ash. Jesus. You’re relentless.”

“I only asked once!”

“At least you asked this time.” He starts to pull his shirt over his head.

“Slowly,” I demand.

He peeks out at me from behind the collar. “Huh?”

“Slowly.” I chew on the end of my pencil. “Take it off, slowly .”

“I didn’t objectify you,” he argues.

“Armory.”

He mumbles something to himself as he slowly takes his shirt off. Koda gets caught somewhere in it, and I start giggling. Even with as stupid as he looks, he’s still hot. His muscles flex when he finally tears it off in a frenzy. Those green eyes have been replaced by the dark ones, but only for a moment.

“Are you happy?”

“Oh, I think you just cured my depression.”

“Glad I could be of service.” He climbs into his bed. “What are you drawing?”

I cast him a glance before quickly drawing a stick figure giving him the middle finger and showing it to him.

“Wow, I can’t believe you’re not in art school with Penny.” That actually makes me laugh. “So did you give up on redecorating?”

I’m fucking exhausted. All of the sleep I’ve been missing for the days he’s been gone is catching up to me. I toss my sketches and pencil to the end of the bed and pull the covers up over me. “I thought you said that you would help me tomorrow morning.”

He has one hand behind his head, leaning against the wooden headboard. “I said in the afternoon.”

“Then I guess I’ll just do it now.” A text banner crosses my phone, accompanied by three more, but I ignore them.

“Do you need to go to bed?” Koda asks softly.

“No.” I fight a yawn. I might be tired, but the fear of seeing Damien in my nightmares is too real to let myself go to sleep. I close my eyes, telling myself it’s only for a moment.

“Your eyes are closed.”

“Yeah, because they hurt.” I grumble. “Just talk about your hand ball thing or whatever.”

Koda starts to talk aimlessly. I think he knows I’m not paying attention.

“Are you making fucking coffee?”

“Yes. I have shit to do.”

“When was the last time you went to bed?”

I’m too embarrassed to answer.

“What are you? A fucking doctor?”

“Alright. Fine.” Koda starts furiously typing away on his phone. He’s concentrated on whatever it is. “Can I call you back in a little bit?”

“You called me. I don’t fucking care what you do.”

“Yeah, okay. I’ll talk to you in a little bit.”

When the phone call ends, I feel like I’ve been in a fever dream. Three days ago. That’s the last time I slept. It was the last time I spent the night with him. I throw some music on and start trying to clean the house. A full manic clean. My arms are heavy, and I keep shaking myself awake. While I’m in Penny’s studio organizing her paints for the third time, because half way through I forget whatever system I’m making up, my phone starts ringing.

I drag my feet to the kitchen. Sure enough, it’s Koda. It’s also past three in the morning. Only a few hours to go before the sun comes up, and I can let it burn my retinas awake.

“What?” I growl.

“Open the door.”

Surely, I heard him wrong. “Tell Cupid to leave the roses there to rot.”

“I don’t even know why I bothered calling. You don’t lock the fucking door,” he mutters.

I hear the front door open and the panic sits well below where it should. Heavy steps come down the hallway until I’m confronted by Koda in the flesh. I shouldn’t be surprised. He made it back to get me from the party where I was drugged, but I wasn’t coherent then.

I still have my phone in my hand. He drops a duffel bag on the floor and looks around. “You’ve been cleaning?”

“Uh.” I just stare. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. Maybe I’m sleepwalking.

“It’s freezing in here, Ashland,” he growls, tearing his hoodie over his head and shoving it over mine. I instinctively put my hands through the arms. It smells like him, and it’s warm. So, so warm. I didn’t notice it, but I’m shivering.

“Cold equals awake,” I say through chattering teeth.

Koda finds the thermostat and turns the heat back on. “It’s cold out. You can’t do that. You’ll freeze to death. Come on.” He ushers me down the hallway into Penny’s room. “Lay down.”

He points at her bed and I just stare at him. “Did you drive back?”

“Yes. Your bed or Penny’s? I don’t really want to wake up with that cat you two feed meowing at me through her window.”

“What do you mean?”

“It stands there and paws at me to let it inside.”

“Not that. How did you know that was Penny’s room?”

“Hard not to figure it out. The walls are bright. You hate happy shit.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

He sighs. “You don’t want me in yours.”

“Did Penny tell you that?”

“Ashland, quit avoiding. Get to bed.”

I pout. “No.”

“Fine. We’ll do this the hard way. Your room it is.” He picks me up, tossing me over his shoulder, and carries me down the hallway.

“No, I’m not fucking sleeping.” I try to fight him, but I’m too tired, too weak. “You’re not really here. You’re just a robot trying to steal my body.”

Yanking the covers back, he tosses me onto the mattress.

“Where do you get this shit? You’re killing yourself by not sleeping. Now scoot the fuck over.” He shoves me into the wall and climbs under the covers, dragging me into his warm body. “Go to sleep,” he commands.

“No, I’m redecorating.”

He sighs and shoves my head into his shoulder. “I’m here, baby girl,” he says softly. “You can go to sleep.”

Those words are all it takes for my eyes to close. I know it’s a trap, a trick of the mind, but I can’t help it. I lose the battle and drift off.

The mattress sinks as Damien lays out next to me. He’s too big for this bed. It forces me into his arms, and it makes my skin crawl as much as I like the contact. I hear the turn of a page. A book? I flip to face him, and he’s got his back against the cinder block wall and my journal in his fucking hands.

“Is this what you think of me?” His voice is so nonchalant, and I think I might actually be in fucking trouble. This will be ten stars at least.

“It’s just stupid poetry,” I try to defend myself.

“If it was just poetry why were you hiding it under the mattress?”

“I wasn’t hiding it. It’s just a way for me to speak to myself,” I say sweetly. I know for a fucking fact that some of the shit I write in there is hateful and sad. Damien isn’t an idiot.

“Why do you need to speak to yourself when you have me?” He still hasn’t looked at me. He keeps reading, flipping the page each time he’s done. My heart starts beating wildly.

“You aren’t always here.” It’s a flimsy argument.

“Is that why this is so lonely? You miss me?”

Some of it is about missing him even though the admission knots in my stomach.

“I do.”

“I miss you, too. I just don’t write shitty poetry about it.” He tosses it off of the bed. “I like that you’re thinkin' about me though.”

He pulls me into him, wrapping his arms around me. I don’t like the touch. I’d rather him hurt me.

“I always am.” Because there is nothing else to do.

“I’ll let you keep it, but you’re gonna leave it out for me to read whenever I want. Who gave it to you?”

This is a loaded question. I tell him a man, and he kills them and then also targets me, because that means I accepted a gift. If I stole it, that’s on me.

“I dunno. I thought you did. It was layin' out one morning.”

“Hm.”

He’s tired. If he wasn’t, this would be an explosion instead. When he’s like this it’s easier to talk. There’s no one around to hear, and he doesn’t feel the need to make a display of me submitting. We’ll have sex either way, but I can’t be greedy about it.

“It'll be a while before I leave again.”

That’s great news and also bad news. Damien gets restless. In a few days he’ll be angry, and inflicting it upon anyone who is in his path. It’s not always me. Not in that way, anyways.

“I would like that.”

“Yeah?” He has bags under his eyes like he hasn’t slept in days.

I nod.

“I love you more than you’ll ever know, baby girl. Sometimes I wish love was limitless.” His eyes pour over the stars, counting them. He readjusts me in his arms and winces.

“Damien,” I whisper.

“Hm?”

“Are you in pain?”

“It’s not a big deal. I wanted to get back to you.”

If Damien dies then I do, too. I doubt they’ll keep me as a toy for very long if he goes. I have to tread carefully. Show concern without making him feel stupid.

“I love you, Damien. I don’t wanna hurt you. Where?”

He sighs and pulls up his shirt. His shoulder has a knife wound. I know what they look like. He’s not strung out on pain pills. When he’s vulnerable, he can be unpredictable. I start to cry. He swipes a tear and sticks it into his mouth.

“Don’t be sad, baby girl. I won’t go without you.”

Is he here to kill us both?

“I wish I could take your pain,” I offer. Will it hurt? Fuck yes, but at least he’ll see me as the victim instead of himself.

“You’re fucking perfect. It’s why I don’t understand when you disappoint me.” He gets up and leaves, returning with his knife. Fuck this is going to hurt.

He leans down and kisses me. He likes to catch my screams and swallow them for himself.

“Goddamn, you’re so beautiful when you cry. Who do you belong to, Ashland?”

“You.”

“Good girl.” He pushes my shirt up and shoves my legs apart. He’s large, so at least it feels good. It makes me so confused.

The first time he gave me an orgasm I cried for days. The person you hate the most can make you feel so good. His love is the only thing that sustains me. As he enters me, I feel the piercing pain in my shoulder, but before I scream his mouth is back on mine. Deeper and deeper. My mind is a forest fire. The pain is horrible, but the rest is like bliss.

This is only the beginning.

“Fuck, you’re so wet.”

He drives the knife, pushing it through muscle, keeping me lucid. The pain is a different kind of high.

“Ashland!”

My eyes shoot open and I gasp for air. “Ashland, it’s okay.”

Koda. This is Koda. I can smell him and I can feel him, but the phantom pain from that night is burning through my shoulder. I’m clutching it and crying. I must have screamed, and there was no one to take it. He tears my shirt off inspecting me. The scar is hidden by intricate tattoos.

I shove him away. “I’m fine.”

“You're not fine. You were fucking screaming.”

“I’m sexually frustrated,” I try to laugh it off.

“That was…Ashland. Please. Don’t lie to me.”

“I’m not lying.” I start to slide my hand down his abdomen but he stops me.

“What was your nightmare about?”

I can’t tell him that. I'll never tell anyone ever again. “Cupcakes and rainbows.”

“Yeah, I can tell. That’s why you were doing everything you could to stay awake. What’s going on?”

“Nothing. I—“

“Save the bullshit, Ash.”

I avert my eyes. “Just dumb shit.”

“Didn’t sound dumb. Sounded pretty bad, actually.” When he can see I’m not going to say anything he continues. “I used to have bad nightmares, too.”

“Congratulations.”

He peers at me. “What are the scars from?”

I close my eyes and take a deep breath. “I covered them with tattoos for a reason.”

“And the one on your ass?”

It finally happened. He finally asked. “Didn’t think a tattoo would look good there.”

“I care. Why can’t you believe that?” His finger traces the scar from Damien’s knife in my shoulder.

“There is no point in getting to know each other like that.”

“I would like to.”

I take a deep breath and stare at the ceiling. “Being sad is the worst pain that there is.”

I know it sounds like it was a suicide attempt, and in a way it sort of was. There’s more than one scar on my body. A lot of them were just deep enough to hurt—to leave a mark. Damien loved that shit. What would be considered damage to everyone else was dedication in his eyes.

“Should I be worried about you?” I can see him, scanning my body for fresh wounds.

I flash him a smile. “You should always worry about me.”

He doesn’t laugh.

“No,” I concede. “Penny.”

It’s the only explanation I’m going to offer.

“Someday you’re going to talk to me.”

“Well, today, you’re going to help me move that desk. So get up, Golden Boy. We’ve got painting to do.”

“I’m putting a lock on the front door first.”

I don’t protest. I think I want that, too.