“What?” I asked.
“I can’t do this.”
“Okay,” I said, backing away a fraction. “What’s wrong?”
She ran her hands through the long lengths of her blonde hair. “I don’t know. I just… I don’t know.”
“You don’t want sex right now or at all?” Man, I was getting some pretty mixed signals from her but then I probably didn’t help matters.
“At all,” she whispered.
On the one hand I was glad, if she wasn’t using sex as a distraction then maybe she would face what was going on, but on the other, I was getting any sex.
“We don’t have to sleep together, Tegan. There’s no unwritten rule that says you need to open your legs to me.”
“I know that but…”
I nodded and closed my eyes. “But that’s what we do.”
“Yeah, we have hot, blow-your-mind sex and I… Well, I’m a bit of a mess right now.”
“It’s okay.”
“What does that mean here?” she pointed between us and bit her lip. Her cheeks reddened.
“It means we’re not going at it like rabbits anymore.”
She rolled her eyes and cracked a smile. “Yeah, I got that part. Look, for a while now the people in my life haven’t really been in my life. My fault, I made it that way, but it’s kind of lonely and you’re the only person that I don’t feel I have to pretend around or put on much of a show.”
“You’re saying you want us to be friends but you’re worried that I only wanted to be around you while I was getting my end away?”
Turning her nose up, she replied, “Nice. Yeah, though.”
“I get it, Tegan, but that’s not why I want to spend time with you. I’ve told you this and I mean it.” She frowned, genuinely curious why I wanted to be around her. It sent me right back there, to a few years ago when I thought so little of myself that I didn’t understand why my own parents still called me son. “Now we’re definitely keeping our clothes on I will miss the sex.”
That made her laugh and she finally relaxed. “Yeah, me, too. I don’t have a whole load of people wanting to spend time with me right now.”
That was probably because she didn’t want to spend time with them. I would’ve preferred to chew my own arm off than spend time with friends back when I was like her. I was lucky that James and Holly were still around when I came out of it or I would’ve had no one. Back then the only people I wanted to be around were the ones that didn’t really give a shit about me. We hung out with each other for convenience, for selfish purposes and nothing was even remotely real.
Tegan should’ve been cutting me off and telling me she never wanted to see me again and I wasn’t sure if that was because we had something deep, deep down that stood a chance when things for her were better or because she hadn’t fully committed to turning her life around. I wanted option A but I couldn’t be sure.
“I doubt that’s true,” I said, “but I know what you mean. Do you want me to take you home or do you want to chill here for a bit?”
“I think I should go home, see my mum.” She was lying. She didn’t want to go home but she didn’t want to stay either. “Think maybe we can hang out in the week? If you’re not busy.”
“I’m sure I can fit you in. Want to go on the bike? I feel like a long ride when I drop you off.”
She blushed.
I loved the bike even more after I’d had her across it.
“Good and yeah, the bike sounds great.”
“Sounded better with you moaning over it.”
Ignoring me completely, she got up. “Let’s go.”
I took her home, dropping her off two houses down so I wouldn’t get chased out of town by her mum and crazy-eyed sister. Ava was like one of those creepy-arse dolls that watched you wherever you went.
I rode mostly without thinking where I was going and ended up back in my ‘dark place’ haunts. It looked the same: run-down, going nowhere and lifeless. There was no ambition here other than getting so off your face you didn’t think about what a dead-end life you were leading.
Most windows in the houses along the long stretch of the high street were boarded up. Graffiti was the only colour around; everything else was grey and dull. Police rarely bothered coming here anymore, unless there was a murder.
I left my bike in a mate’s garage and went to have a look around. A year ago this was pretty much home and I didn’t even care how shitty the place was. It gave me everything I needed to not really exist for a few years.
“Kai!”
I turned around and immediately tensed for a fight. That was how it was around here. Most people were off their tits on whatever shit they could find to shove in their system so you never knew who was going to turn on you. Plus, I’d not been back since the day I left.
“Fuck me, man, it is you!” Declan said, slapping my shoulder.
“Hey, Dec, how’s it going? I borrowed your garage, by the way.”
He nodded. “Yeah, not bad, take what ya want.”