He stilled, eyes rising to meet mine.
“Sarah can hear me when it’s really bad,” I said.
“Who’s Sarah?”
“My neighbor across the hall.”
Hayden looked at the door and then down the hallway to my room. It didn’t take him long to piece together how loud I must be for someone to hear me through two sets of walls.
“Jesus, Tenley, how long do you want to keep me in the dark? I need some fucking information here. How the hell am I supposed to fix—” He stopped abruptly and took a deep breath. “Look. We have a week before I start the tattoo. Tell me now if I’m alone in my desire to capitalize on your loophole.”
“You’re not alone.”
His shirt slid down his arms and pooled in his lap. “Then I don’t give a shit if you sing show tunes and juggle knives in your sleep. I’m staying.”
17
HAYDEN
I stayed at Tenley’s place every night leading up to her first tattoo session. For a student in a postgrad program, she was incredibly disorganized. It drove me batshit crazy, so I fixed the problem by setting up a filing system for her loose papers. I loved doing things like that.
Any other issues I had with her clutter I blocked out by keeping her naked—for the most part. After work I went over with snacks and beer, because Tenley didn’t keep much of either in her apartment. Aside from cupcakes, anyway. Those she seemed to have an infinite supply of.
We hung out and I told her about my day, and she avoided any discussion pertaining to the content of her thesis. Not that it mattered; I’d skimmed much of it anyway when I filed it in the first place. I assumed she thought it would bore me, which was untrue, but I didn’t push it. Based on what I’d read and the numerous books stacked on the floor, bursting with Post-it notes, most of her research centered around deviant behavior. Out of curiosity, I leafed through a couple of them while she was in the bathroom. Beyond the Post-it’s there were passages highlighted all over the place. From what I could tell, she had interesting insight into some rather extreme modification practices, and all of her ideas were rooted in philosophical principles. I wouldn’t offer my opinion, though, even if I did have one sect of the subculture well represented. I had an extensive collection of reading material on subjects ranging from anarchist philosophy and the history of tattooing to classic literature, but my education stopped at high school. My knowledge base came from practical experience and the things I read.
Aside from working on her thesis, the week passed in a blur of sexual activity: kitchen, couch, bedroom, the end result was always the same—Tenley naked, me inside her. But getting there was always an adventure, partly because her choice of underwear never ceased to amuse or arouse me. She had every style, color, fabric, and pattern covered. Although there were some highlights among her selection. On Saturday she came out of the bedroom in red satin with black polka dots and tiny black bows on each hip. Her hair in a ponytail, she looked like a pinup girl. We didn’t make it past the couch. After she fell asleep, I hung out with TK and sketched her in that getup, thinking it would make a pretty awesome tattoo.
On Sunday I changed it up and took Tenley late-night grocery shopping, because there was no food in her apartment. She had terrible eating habits, unless one counted iceberg lettuce as a healthy choice. I informed her it had the nutritional value of air. She responded with an eye-roll and traipsed down the cereal aisle where she picked up a box of Cap’n Crunch. She pointed out all the essential vitamins and minerals in a serving when I bitched about that, too. Why she would eat a cereal that tore apart the inside of her mouth was beyond me. I made her promise not to eat it until after Thursday, when I could no longer take advantage of the loophole because the session would put her out of commission.
On Tuesday night Tenley had one of those nightmares she warned me about. She wasn’t a very peaceful sleeper to begin with. Most nights I would wake up at some point to her soft whimpers. It made TK upset, and she paced around the bed, nudging me until I calmed Tenley. Some nights Tenley would flail restlessly and then cuddle right into me, like she couldn’t get close enough. But tonight it was worse, much worse. The whimpers were what woke me initially. I rolled over and put my arm around her, because it usually helped.