Page 12 of You Rock My World
DORIAN
One Year Ago
Josie’s still smiling, smug from her “waxing poetics” joke. I should quip something back. Instead, on impulse, I ask, “What color do you see me as?”
Without missing a beat, she says, “Definitely a maroon.”
“A maroon?”
Her goofy grin gives her away. She’s messing with me.
Josie fires off a playful finger gun. “Gotcha.”
After she blows on the tip of her index, her expression turns serious and she destroys my soul a little more. “You’re ultramarine, streaked with gold. Full of depth and imperfections that hold a beauty most people don’t take the time to see. They stop at the blue and forget to search for the gold.”
My knee-jerk reaction is to volley back that her waxing-poetic skills are no joke either—defuse with humor. But something in her tone stops me short. Her words have no trace of irony, no hint of flattery. She means what she’s saying. That’s really how she sees me.
I settle for, “That makes me sound like a painting no one could afford to buy.”
“Maybe you’re more like abstract art.” She joins her fingers in a square and studies me through the pretend frame. “Misunderstood until you take a closer look.”
“I’m too tired to make sense of that analogy.”
“Are you calling my analogies confusing?”
I glance at my watch and am surprised to see it’s already four in the morning. The hours have slipped by like sand through an hourglass, each grain a flicker of Josie’s light I get to keep for myself and steal from the rest of the world.
“I’m saying it’s late and my brain is fried.”
I stare down at my palm, tracing one of the lines creasing my flesh—is it the life line, the love line? I can never tell them apart.
I don’t look at her as I speak next. “Even if you told me half an hour after meeting me that you’d never sleep with me, maybe we should try to get some shut-eye. No one’s coming until morning.”
Josie gasps, mock-scandalized. “Aren’t rockstars supposed to live like vampires, from dusk till dawn?”
I wince. She has a knack for finding all my open wounds and rubbing salt into them. “It gets old after a while.”
“Well, I guess even vampires need a break.” She kicks out a leg, and in the most casual tone, asks, “Do your feet smell?”
I gape at her. “No?”
“Then take off your shoes.”
She slips her sandals off, wiggling her toes, the nails painted in a shade of bright mint green that’s perfect for her.
Next, she loosens her topknot. The elastic band slips down her wrist like a bracelet as she combs her fingers through the strands, massaging her scalp in slow, circular motions while her locks tumble down her back in burnished toffee waves.
Once she’s done hypnotizing me, she folds her bag into a makeshift pillow and stretches out on the floor, one arm tucked under her head, messy hair fanning out.
I trace the swell of her chest, her collarbones, her mouth, the way her lashes cast faint shadows against her skin. Her beauty is maddening. It doesn’t demand attention at first but steals it before you even realize it.
I pull off my sneakers and toss them into the corner, then peel off my leather jacket and lie on my side, facing her.
“Goodnight, rockstar.” Josie yawns.
“Goodnight, sass master,” I reply, already knowing I won’t sleep.
Twenty minutes later, I’m still awake despite being bone-tired. Josie’s eyes are closed, but her breathing isn’t slow and regular enough for her to be asleep. I suspect she’s awake too.
“Josie?” I whisper into the dimness. “Are you sleeping?”
She opens one eye. “Nope. You neither, huh?”
“Must be the five-star accommodations.”
“Yeah, the carpet leaves something to be desired.” She rolls on her side, facing me. “You should sing me a lullaby.”
“A lullaby?”
“Yeah, I have the most celebrated singer-songwriter of our time all to myself, don’t I deserve a private performance?”
I’d give her that and more, but I can’t tell her. So instead, I go with, “Close your eyes.”
And I start singing.
“There’s a road I’ve never traveled,
A space I’ve never known,
It’s a dream I can’t hold.
Or a voice without a song.
“I’ve been chasing the horizon,
But the sky keeps pulling away,
And the closer I get to the answers,
The less I know what to say.
“But there’s something in the quiet,
In the way you hold your ground.
Like a song I didn’t know I knew,
Echoes that were never found.
“You’re uncharted, you’re the edge of the earth,
A compass spinning, still finding its north.
You’re the gravity I didn’t know I’d feel,
Pulling me back to something real.
“Uncharted, untamed, undefined,
But somehow, you’re the place I call mine.”
She’s asleep before I reach the second verse of “Call It Mine.”