Page 51 of The Intimacy of Skin

I picked at the skin on my arm, freshly red with a few streaks of blood brimming on the surface.

My fingertips were caked in it, the grooves of my nails flooding with it.

“I have one more idea. I’m not giving up that easily.

” My words were clipped and harsher than they should’ve been.

Couldn’t she see, though? If we stopped, it was like we were giving up.

Crew needed someone who wouldn’t give up.

Willow placed a gentle hand on my arm, the one I was absentmindedly using to scrub my skin raw.

“Don’t accuse me of giving up on my best fuckin’ friend.

” She was speaking softly but concisely.

“If we stay out here much longer, we’re gonna get stuck.

You have to know that. We get stuck, we’re just as screwed as C. Now, what’s your next idea?”

I shrugged her hand off, pulling my sleeves down immediately after. She was right, no matter how little I wanted to admit it. The storm was pushing hard, threatening to consume us alive. If we kept going for much longer, we’d be losing our battle with Mother Nature.

Taking ten times longer than it should’ve, we made it to our final destination for the night. Maybe tomorrow we’d go on foot, but hopefully, Crew would turn up before then.

The moment I scanned the street, I realized something humbling. Something I foolishly hadn’t considered before. Though we were under a dangerous and potentially fatal snowstorm, the street I picked Crew up at on our first night together was lined with people.

Each person I focused on looked more miserable than the last. Some were huddled together, sharing what looked to be jackets as they hovered their asses above the ground, sitting in a squat so they wouldn’t touch the snow.

A few hunched bodies began to worry me. They were sitting fully in the snow, their backs against the walls, and they weren’t moving.

Willow gasped from beside me, putting sound to what I was feeling.

I zeroed in on the people who weren’t moving, willing, and begging for them to move.

Twitch. Brush their hair out of their face—anything to prove that, not only were they not Crew, but they were alive.

All five of them had hoods over their heads, covering themselves like a turtle’s shell.

I would never understand the human need to be quiet during something stressful.

The way we stop breathing while waiting for it to resolve.

We were in the truck, where no one could hear us. Nobody was even looking our way, yet I sat in my seat, holding my breath until I began to see spots in my vision, and my chest began to burn.

“Just move, ” Willow pleaded. She sounded terrified, an emotion I’d never seen from her before. Willow was always levelheaded, albeit mostly pissed with me. If she was losing her resolve, what did that mean for me?

A person appeared from the left. They were tall and wearing a thick coat acceptable for the weather. I watched as they bent down towards one of the people Willow and I were watching.

The person finally lifted their head, the other four flinching at what I guessed was the sounds of their voices.

Willow and I both sighed in relief at the sign of life.

I took a few extra ragged breaths, willing my heart to calm its incessant racing.

The person in the thick coat looked to be a client propositioning the person on the ground.

None of the people on the street were Crew.

Logically, I knew from the beginning what Crew and the other sex workers were doing.

It was dangerous. A lot of them were homeless or being sold by people who had complete power over them.

I knew that, but I don’t think I ever understood it.

Crew told me once that the life aged a person: their skin, their hair, their souls…

Emotionally, I never thought about it that often. It was dumb of me not to. Stupid to live my life thinking I understood shit I could never truly understand.

Seeing these people freeze on the side of the road, desperate for work or shelter for the night in the form of a shitty, roach-infested hotel room the clients would undoubtedly pay for. Crew told me he was lucky because he had a home, but was he really?

How many nights had he spent in the cold, waiting for someone to come along and punish him the way he thought he deserved?

How many times had he gotten soaking wet from a torrential downpour, just so he could get some money and the bruises he thought he needed?

How often does he think to himself that he deserves worse, deserves what the more “unlucky” ones have?

The road was hard to see. The snowfall kicked up exponentially, and my eyes were flooded with unshed tears, too hot to let go. I was losing my fire. Losing it all. I wanted to hold onto the warmth of my tears just so I could remember what fire felt like.

Frigid, arctic air was cradling my bones, rising into my chest, and threatening to take over my heart. All the air was being squeezed out of me by invisible forces. I was ice, slowly being prepped to become pure. For a moment, I wondered if I was turning into the glaciers Crew told me about.

We were about five minutes away from Willow’s house, where Crew had hopefully ended up. The heat was on full blast, useless against the numb chill of my skin. Nothing was playing on the radio. Nothing could fill the empty void of worry and concern both of us felt.

“I never knew it could be like that.” Willow wasn’t facing me.

She wasn’t even facing the windshield. She was looking at her phone, refreshing her text messages every few seconds.

“Aren’t they cold? Why don’t they just take a break from the storm?

I can’t wrap my head around it, Price. And even worse, I can’t help but wonder if that was Crew at some point.

Before we moved here, he’d disappear for whole nights and entire days, only to turn back up with cuts and bruises all over his face and a wad of cash. ”

I sat with that for a moment, trying to stop myself from imagining Crew as a scrawny teen, punishing himself for something he wouldn’t tell me about. “Whether it’s for a place to stay for a night, or because whoever controls them demands it, none of them have a choice, Willow.”

“But Crew does. I’ve been asking him the same question since we were sixteen—why? Why ruin your mind and your body for something so dangerous and demeaning when you have the choice not to? I—I’ve tried so hard for him. His mom and I both did, Price. You—fuck, you gotta believe me.”

Her voice was breaking. I heard the desperation and frustration in her voice, and there was nothing I could do to help her.

I shook my head just as I began to pull into her driveway. The porch light was on, illuminating the mounds of snow that now covered it. “You think Crew has a choice, but he doesn’t. Not really.”

She turned to me; her face caught in the yellowish lighting.

Her eyes were full of sadness, a deep, vast hole I knew had been dug years ago.

“I think I know that. I mean, somewhere deep down, I do. He’s even said it without outright saying it.

But he won’t tell me why his choice was taken from him.

That’s what I don’t understand.” I watched as she opened her phone again, swiping out and back into her messages to see if she had any new ones.

She didn’t. “We grew up together. He knows everything about me, and I’ve tried so hard to be who he needs me to be. ”

“You’re an amazing friend. He loves you with his entire being. I think he’s trying to protect you, or maybe himself. I don’t know.”

“He likes you, y’know?”

“I know.”

“No.” She shook her head, the red in it gleaming under the light. “He’s gonna kill me for saying anything, but he called you his catalyst. He knows you can help him, even if he won’t admit it. Crew wants you, Price. He just doesn’t know how to let himself want you.”

I stared at Willow for much longer than would’ve been appropriate, stuck in a loop that was playing in my mind. The recent change in Crew’s behavior, the way he’d started to give himself to me more. He started to open up, to allow me into his life.

It started to form a sort of hope in the back of my mind. Hope that I wasn’t the only one feeling the way I was with him. I knew I wanted Crew for longer than our stupid time limit, and now, I could begin to hope that he wanted that too.

Tearing my gaze away from Willow, I stared at their front door.

I imagined Crew was there, waiting for me to come inside and kiss the shit out of him.

I smiled at the thought. “Well, he’s my catalyst, too.

He’s taught me what it felt like to enjoy life again.

To enjoy people and real connections. If I have my way, I’m going to find him and never let him go. ”

There was a pause. One that felt like forever, only to be a few seconds in reality. “You’re in love with him, aren’t you?”

I jerked my head towards Willow, face flaming. “I?—”

“It’s okay. I think he feels the same.” Willow began to open the truck door, turning her attention away from me. “I’ll text you if he is or isn’t here. Go ahead and take the truck back to your place. We can pick up our cars after the snow settles a bit.”

All I could do was nod and hope that Crew was there. I watched as Willow carefully traversed her way over the slippery walkway. She slipped into the front door, the windows lighting up as she turned the lights on.

Little butterflies squirmed in my gut, forcing nausea to rise and fight for control over me.

What the fuck were we supposed to do if he wasn’t there?

I wasn’t ready to admit defeat, but there was no way we could keep on like we had been doing.

We’d have to wait until tomorrow, and even then, we might be looking at going on foot. What if we were too late?

A revolted shiver rushed through me at that last thought.

I didn’t want to imagine a world without Crew, especially not one where he was gone because we didn’t look hard enough.

The police very likely wouldn’t take his situation seriously until after twenty-four hours, and even then, once they got word he was a sex worker, it might be even less. We were stuck with each other for now.

A text came through on my phone, and I hurried to open it.

Willow:

He’s not here. Be safe going home. I’m sorry.

I frowned, knowing that even though this was the most likely thing to happen, it still hurt. A frozen mist splashed along my spine, freezing me from the inside out. Crew still wasn’t answering his phone, his voicemail officially full from us calling to check on him.

The drive home was long and lonely. I found myself moving back to scratching, desperate to calm the constant itch and buzz that was driving me wild.

When I was with Crew, the itching was usually tolerable if not gone altogether.

It was like he was magic, convincing my brain that there was nothing in the world to be worried about.

Now that he was gone, it seemed like my brain was punishing me.

It was brutal, reminding me of the days I would cook to keep my hands busy while Mom and Dad screamed at each other in the other room.

I could hear every word. Every insult to my mother or me that my dad threw.

Some days, I’d have to put on latex gloves just to make myself stop.

Tonight was one of those nights. I still kept gloves at home just in case. I hadn’t needed them since I was much younger, but still. If I couldn’t have Crew, and I knew cooking wouldn’t help, I’d have to resort to them over drinking.

My apartment complex looked entirely too lonely.

Management seemed to have thrown some salt down on the sidewalks and most parking spots, including the one in front of my stairwell.

Leaving the truck, knowing I didn’t accomplish what I wanted to, was difficult.

More than difficult; it was devastating. Soul-crushing.

I kept my gaze low as I walked up the stairs, not only to keep myself from tripping but because I didn’t have the energy to look up.

I stopped just before the final step, noticing something black peeking out from my doorway.

The walls were built weirdly—they came out more than they should, so there was space for an animal to hide just out of my sight.

Expecting a cat or stray dog, I kept walking. Then it came into view. My breath hitched in my throat, causing an embarrassingly loud gasp to fall from my lips. A rush of fire blasted from the pits of my gut, warming me so immediately that I was afraid I’d burn alive.

Crew was there. He was sitting in front of my door, curled in on himself, and holding a black box. His eyes were closed, his head hanging forward. A flash from earlier took over my brain, reminding me of the people on the street. My heart began to hammer so fast I could feel it in my head.

I took a step forward, praying to God that Crew would move. The moment my foot connected with the concrete, Crew’s eyes shot open. He looked up at me, blood caked around his nose, a cut on his lip, and what looked to be bruises forming around his neck. The porch lights around us only did so much.

“Crew?” I thought I whispered, but I realized I was wrong as it echoed in the hallway. I sounded… broken.

So did he. “Hey, Prince Charming. Can I come inside? I have a lot to show you.”