rock (20 page)

I dig my fingers into his hips. He snaps into a thrust that jolts me with deliciousness I need more of.

He thrusts into me like a waltz, three times and the swivel of his hips, over and over until I hear the music and feel it beating against my skin.

He kisses me again, and closes a hand around my cock.

I clench at the pleasure and we both let out a groan. His thrusts push me closer and closer to the edge. I want to fall so badly but I don’t want this to be over. Never want this to be over.

As if he can read my mind, he slows his thrusts but he doesn’t let go of me. I fight not to give in to the pleasure of his strokes and the way his thumb brushes over the head.

He looks down at me, his jaw clenched in passion, but he never closes his eyes. His mask glitters but his eyes are pinning my soul to his. It’s intimate in a way I’ve never experienced. I’m somewhere between panicking and experiencing the biggest release of my life.

He bites his lip and rocks more quickly into me. The bed groans with us, and I clutch Jace’s ass tightly, pressing him in, in, in.

The strokes on my cock are in time to his and when he presses his mouth against mine and calls my name over my lips, I come with him, crying out as my orgasm bursts out of me and keeps coming, coming, coming.

malachite

I follow his blog through Germany, France, Spain, Greece, Turkey, and Scotland. I wish I’d thought to give him a piece of malachite to protect him on his travels.

Malachite, a copper carbonate hydroxide mineral.

Mineral. Not a protective talisman.

He’s Jace, a pianist traveling the world before settling into a career of teaching.

His own person. Not
mine.

Tonight, he posted about England.

I’m at Mum’s for our weekly roast but I’m not hungry. Paul offers me the carafe of gravy, but drowning the dry vegetables isn’t going to make a difference. I pick at the chicken and eat a few peas. After a bite of potato, I rest my knife and fork on the plate.

Mum eyes me, questioningly arching an eyebrow. “Ever since you started flatting, you’ve neglected your diet.”

“I’m not hungry right now,” I murmur. I ask Annie where Ernie is tonight.

Mum cuts over her answer. “It’s not just now. You haven’t been hungry in months and you’re studying yourself thin.” She turns to Annie. “Get your boy to take this one out on a guys’ night. I think he needs it.”

“What I need,” I say, shoving my chair back from the table, “is to bloody well be in England.”

I walk out. Everything is winding me up the wrong way—even the way the bus driver gave me a cheery greeting earlier. No, I won’t have a good day, dammit.

My days are restless as though ants are marching through my veins, tickling my insides so I can’t settle.

I stop in my bedroom doorway. It looks smaller than it used to. Even the toolboxes lining the walls don’t seem to have the presence they once had. I breathe in the stale air, then turn my back on the younger me and head outside.

The veranda creeks underfoot, and the winter air bites as I hunker down, resting against the house. I pull out my phone.

England, Stonehenge

A picture with a short caption underneath:

Something’s missing.

I rub my phone over my forehead, trying to smooth out the heavyset frown that seems to be staining itself to my skin.

The wooden planks creak, and I glance up. Mum is shrugging on a brown winter coat and stealing toward me. She sighs and drops down next to me, draping a green mohair scarf around my neck.

“It’s Jace, isn’t it?”

“What?”

She takes my phone and slips it into her pocket. “You miss him.”

I knock my head back against the side of the house and stare at the quarter moon. “It’s complicated.”

“Ah,” she says in that all-knowing tone that mothers have. “I see.” I drop my head to her shoulder, and she pats my head in that awkward way she does.

“It’s okay,” she says. For a second, the stars look like the glowworms in our cave. “It’s not like you’re real brothers.”

apache tear drop

It is said those who have an Apache Tear Drop will never cry again.

Legend speaks of a brutal surprise attack on the Apaches, where fifty of seventy-five men were shot. The remaining twenty-five retreated to the edge of the cliffs, where they chose to jump rather than be killed as their brothers were.

The Apache women, lovers, mothers, sisters, and daughters gathered at the base of the cliff and mourned their loved ones. Their sorrow was so great that their tears turned to black stones.

Holding this stone to the light reveals the shimmer of the Apache Tear Drop and is good luck to those who have it. They will never cry again because the Apache cried enough for them.

I hold this stone after learning that Lila’s cancer has returned.

I hold it after learning that the cancer has spread to her bone marrow, lungs, and liver.

I hold it after watching Dad cry that it’s the liver that will take her away from us in a few months.

I hold it after overhearing Dad telling Jace to cut his trip short and come home.

I hold it after Annie hugs him, me, then Lila who is sitting on the grass outside in the spot her and Dad were married.

I hold it but it doesn’t take any pain away.

The Apache women did not cry enough for Lila.

stonehenge bluestone

Annie brings over the kauri rocking chair I gave her. She smiles at me in the doorway to the dining room as Lila sinks onto the cushions.

The patio doors are open and a warm breeze stirs the trees and ruffles Lila’s skirt. She grips the chair arms and rocks. “This is lovely, Annie.”

Dad squeezes Annie into a hug and slips into the kitchen to make tea. His back is to me and his shoulders are higher up than usual, as though he’s stiff with worry.

I push off the doorway to help him when the doorbell rings.

“I’ll get that.”

For all the windows in this house, it is strange that the door is so solid, so dark, so impenetrable. I grip the cool handle, ready to let him in.

I pull the door open.

Jace stands in the porch with his suitcase and carry-on bag. He’s tanner than the last time I saw him at Lila and Dad’s wedding, but unlike the suave suit he wore then, he’s wearing jeans stained with flight food and wine. Even with sunglasses on, the puffiness of his cheeks gives his tears away.

“You’re home,” I choke out.

He doesn’t move forward to hug me or even push past me. It’s as though he’s afraid to cross the threshold of truth.

I pick up his suitcases and drag them inside. They’re heavy with a hundred memories of fun and laughter.

“I’ll put these in your room.”

He stops me, finally breaching the threshold. “Wait. I have something in there for her.”

Jace unzips the front pocket of his large bag and pulls out a small box. He hops to his feet, sliding his sunglasses onto his head. Tears have made his eyes a shocking blue. “Where is she?”

“The dining room, by the patio.”

He clutches his gift and heads toward his mum.

I move his stuff to his room and head downstairs.

Dad is still standing in the kitchen with his back to us, even though the water is well and truly boiled. Annie is on the patio watering the potted plants, and Jace is placing a pendant over his mum’s head.

“What is it?” she asks.

“Stonehenge bluestone.” A precious stone used for centuries in alternative healing. “It’ll help you get better.”

A cup drops and smashes on the floor. I hurry into the kitchen to help dad clean it up. It’s my cup he dropped—my Rock Whisperer one. Though it’s beyond saving, I stow the pieces in a freezer bag anyway.

Dad is sitting on the floor leaning against a cupboard. I crouch next to him and rest a hand on his knee, rubbing the linen.

“Come with me,” I tell him. “The afternoon, just you and I.” Let Lila have time with her son to break it to him in her way.

“Yeah,” Dad says, running a hand through his greying hair. “That’s probably a good idea.”

We hike the ridges of the hills where pine needles sweeten the air. Birds click and cackle and wheeze overhead. I wonder if they are conversing about us:

They seem rather somber, don’t they?

Like they built a nest in the shadows and have never see the sun.

Poor things. Someone should teach them how to fly.

A white-tufted bird with dark, iridescent feathers swoops in front of us, bringing us to a sudden halt in the middle of a patch of sun. “Jesus, that was close.”

I spin in an arc to find the bird again. I spot its black opal feathers in the tree to our left. “It was a Tui.”

Tui. Tui. Tui.
The word is mimicked back to us. Yep, definitely a Tui. “Hear that? It’s incredible.”

Dad nods. “Sounded just like you. Lila would be beside herself. She loves Tuis.”

She loves Tuis. She loves Tuis. She loves Tuis.

And it sounds a bit like
She loves you, eh
?

Dad laughs, his crow’s feet deepening. “That’s beautiful.”

He slings an arm around my shoulders and kisses my temple.

That’s beautiful. That’s beautiful. That’s beautiful.
The bird says.

It is.

smoky quartz

At home, Jace is pulling ingredients out of the fridge and pantry for dinner. Lila sits in her rocking chair with a notepad and a pen, letting ink flow over the fine blue lines as she writes. Dad kisses her cheek and she stops writing to ask what we did. She laughs as I draw in a breath and move into the kitchen.

Jace.

He glances up at me and steps to the side, offering me space next to him. But he doesn’t say anything. I take a cutting board and a sharp knife, then take over cutting the onions. They sting my eyes but I’m used to that now. I dice until Jace is ready for them.

They sizzle when they hit the pan. Jace stirs them into the butter with a long wooden spoon and languid strokes, cutting into the onions like he’s writing something of his own.

“How was Europe?” I ask when the mushrooms are frying and the pasta is boiling. I cock the lid of the pot so the water doesn’t bubble over.

“Good for me.”

“Better than home?”

He stops stirring and looks me squarely in the eyes. “I know we have to talk.” He swallows and looks toward his mum and our dad. “But can you wait?”

I can. I have. I always will.

When dinner is ready, Dad calls down Annie and Ernie and we all sit around the table and eat.

Lila smiles at each of us, winking at Ernie, who blushes the color of the roses in the middle of the table.

Lila eats a few mouthfuls more than she has the past couple of days. “This tastes great, Jace. Mushroom and capsicum cream sauce?”

“The very one you taught me.”

I poke at the pasta Jace served me, preparing to pull out all the capsicums before I dig any more into it.

I frown at Jace twirling his pasta on his fork.

You took out the capsicum for me, didn’t you?

Ernie clears his throat. “Hey, Jace.”

“Yeah?”

“Knock-knock.”

Jace raises an eyebrow. “Who’s there?”

“Amish.”

“Amish who?”

“Aww, I missed you too.”

Annie claps him over the back of the head. “Ernie!”

Dad and Lila laugh, and Jace grins too for the first time since coming home. I could kiss that dumb joke to bits; it’s like smoky quartz—immediately relieving the tension in the room.

“I have another one,” Ernie says as he swivels to face Annie. “Knock knock.”

A short laugh. “Who’s there?”

“Olive.”

“Olive who?”

“Olive you too.” Lila holds her breath and Annie smiles. Ernie pushes his chair back and kneels on one knee. He pulls a velvet box out of his pocket and opens it. Annie gasps. “Will you marry me?”

Annie bites her lip and throws her arms around his neck, knocking him backward until the chair behinds him tips and they are on the floor, laughing.

“Is that a yes?”

“Olive to marry you.”

Dad leans over and kisses Lila’s glowing face. I stand up on shaky legs, and everything is blurry as I round the table. Annie and Ernie are pulling themselves off the floor, and when my sister is on her two feet, I lift her into a hug and twirl her around. Her laugh puffs against my ear. “I’m so happy,” she says and squeezes me back.

I set her down and invite Ernie into a man-hug with three quick thumps on the back. “Welcome to the family. Remember what I said to you at the Halloween-birthday-masquerade wedding?”

He snorts at the mouthful. “Like I could forget.”

Dad pipes up. “Remember what I said too.”

“Said?” Ernie cries out. “You
demonstrated
what you’d do.”

“Yeah, but if you break your promise, the next time it won’t be with props.”

Dad is scary when he wants to be.

I laugh and hug him too. I breathe in the smell of pine on his clothes. “Jesus,” he says, “you’re all growing up. Next you and Jace will be engaged as well.”

I know he doesn’t mean engaged together but my heart skips a beat. Jace is hugging his mum but he’s looking at me.

“Thank you, Ernie,” Lila says when Jace pulls away. “I wish you and Annie a bright, beautiful future. Maybe you’ll even give this one grandchildren one day,” she says, pinching Dad’s butt.

He jumps and scowls at Ernie. “Not for a long, long time.”

Lila smiles, taking Dad in. “He’ll be a wonderful granddaddy.” She looks at Jace and me. “They’ll be the best uncles, too.”

Jace ducks out of the dining room and pounds up the stairs.

Lila makes a move to stand but Dad pats her shoulder. “Give the boy some time. He’s jetlagged and tired. He needs his space.”

I duck out as soon as I can, racing up to the gaming room where he’s playing something soft on the piano.

When he finishes, he faces me. “Bit rusty,” he says. “Haven’t been practicing as much as I should.”

“Sounds good to me.”

“Are you living here?”

I incline my head. “Staying in a flat wasn’t working out for me. Thought I’d camp here again for a while.”

This isn’t the whole truth. I came home with my bags last weekend. Lila’s going to stay at home for the end and I want to be here.

“Me too,” Jace says, closing the lid to the piano and standing.

“Guess that makes us neighbors again.”

“Like the old days.”

“But without switching houses.”

He crosses the room and for a moment I think he’s going to stroke my cheek but he rubs his eyes. “I’m glad of that.” He yawns. “I really need to sleep.”

We step into the hall and make our way to our rooms. Our gazes flicker to the balcony before we each crack our doors open.

“Good night, Jace.”

“Night, Cooper.”

I drop lengthwise onto my bed, gripping my bedcovers. Breathing in the stillness, I replay the night of the infamous Halloween-birthday-masquerade wedding.