I leant against the bar and downed the shot. In the thirteen days since I’d lost my virginity and learned how to feel fuck all I was free. Sex was entirely overrated, pleasure wise anyway. What it did, however, was take me to a place where I didn’t have to think about anything.
Sophie loved the new me. She was promiscuous and now she had a wing woman. I hated the new me. Hated what I did to my body and hated how my relationship with Mum and Ava had so many cracks I didn’t think there was enough glue in the entire world to fix it. But I did love how I didn’t feel like I was standing in a room full of people screaming for help but not being heard.
No one can hurt the bitch.
Since Soph left me half an hour ago to dance with some guy I was left alone at the bar to drink until I passed out or was picked up. Either was fine by me. I’d never be clean again, so what was the point in worrying?
A guy with eyes the colour of dark chocolate and tattoos that’d make any woman swoon leant on the bar beside me. “Hey,” he said.
I sat up straight. Jesus, he was gorgeous. His just-fucked hair made me want to jump him in the middle of the club. “Hi.”
“I’m Kai.”
I smiled. His name was just as hot. “Tegan.”
“Can I buy you a drink?” he asked, looking so deep into my eyes I wanted to tell him to do one. I smiled again. He saw more. I didn’t want him to see me.
“Thanks,” I replied. “I’ll have a vodka and lemonade.”
Kai was different. The other guys – eight to date – hadn’t given a shit about me at all, they hadn’t asked if I wanted a drink or made any attempt to even learn my name. I wasn’t convinced that it was better this way but I couldn’t make myself walk away after that second drink or the third.
He was funny and a huge pervert. But he wasn’t a sleaze.
When he took me into a bathroom stall, for the first time since I lost my virginity, I wanted sex. Normal sex. When he’d kissed me I ached for a whole new reason. He kissed wherever his lips would reach, touched wherever his hands would reach. It wasn’t purely selfish, he wasn’t in a race to get off and then leave. He made sure it felt good for me and I realised that sex wasn’t overrated. Kai was the first person to make me come, the first person to kiss me after, the first person to ask for my number, and the first person to take me back to a table and continue talking to me for the rest of the night.
Chapter Three
Lucas
Dad lay on the sofa with two bottles of water, a cup of tea, all the medication he needed and a sandwich wrapped up for lunch on the end table beside him. Mum had to go back to work part-time yesterday so Dad was alone for a lot of the day, with plenty of people popping in to make sure he was alright. It had only been three weeks since the transplant and I was shit scared of leaving him in case something happened. He was going to need regular visits to the hospital and six weekly blood tests for the rest of his life. I wasn’t a religious person but I fucking prayed to everything that could be out there to make him okay.
As the last person that would be leaving the house every day, I had the responsibility of double-checking he had everything he needed for the first hour until my aunt and nan arrived.
“Lucas,” Dad said. “I’m fine and if I need another drink I’ll get up and get it. That much I can do for myself. Go to work before you’re fired.”
I did another check of the table.
“You sure you don’t need anything before I go?”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not in any pain?”
“No more than usual. I’ve got my tablets right beside me, ready to take in half an hour. Get going.”
I nodded. “Right. Okay. Nan and Leanne’ll be here soon.”
“I know. Now go.”
I was terrified of leaving him. Dad had congestive heart failure and it had been getting progressively worse until the point where we were told that he would die very soon if he didn’t have a transplant.
I walked out of the house, forced myself to get in my car and drive to work. I’d never wanted to blow off work and just drive so much. I thought things would get better after the operation, thought I’d worry less, but now we were faced with Dad’s body rejecting the heart and some pretty serious side effects from all the medication he was on.
The garage I worked at was a mile down the road so I knew I could make it back in a minute if Dad needed me. I just didn’t know if something bad happened a minute was quick enough.
“Morning,” Malcolm said, scratching his beer belly. Mal was the boss but he acted more like a dad, always looking over me and Leon. “You ready to spray the CLK?”
“Yeah, gimme five and I’ll be out back.”
I chucked my phone on the desk and grabbed a mask.
“Hey, how’s your dad?” Leon asked, coming out of the bathroom.
“He’s doing alright.”
“Good. And the girl you’re obsessing over?”