Stronger (10 page)

"Are you crying?" I ask.  Long pause.

"Do you really think you have that kind of power over me, Lyddle?"

Yes.
  But I say, "No."

"Well, you're right," he snaps.  "You don't." 

A drizzle of wax splatters down my thigh and I curse.  Des's fingers are on the restraints and as soon as he frees my hands, I rip off the blindfold and throw it to the floor.  I rub away the wax.  There are welts beneath it.  

"Lydia..." There are a million apologies and pleadings in his tone, but I yank on my clothes and leave without looking at him even once. 

<<<<>>>>

My skin is still burning when I get out of the cab in front of my apartment building.  It doesn't stop, even when I'm sitting on my couch with a bag of ice wedged between my legs. 

I sip a tumbler of wine and stare at the ceiling, trying to separate the mess of my life by assigning different nail pops and spots in the uneven paint job to Des and Claudia, to Des and me, to me alone, to Aidan, to me and Aidan.  There's too much for me to keep straight.  I'm overwhelmed with how big the ceiling is and how it still isn't big enough to hold all my problems.  I keep trying to straighten it out, until someone knocks on my door.

I hobble over and swing it open, expecting Des to be there, full of apologies, even though that's not his style.  And it's not him.  Aidan's in the hall.

"Can I come in?" he says.  I lean heavily on the door knob.

"Some other time, alright?  It's been a long day."

"It will only take a few minutes," he says, striding in past me.  He never does seem to understand that
no
is a legitimate answer. 

He takes the chair at the small end of the coffee table and watches me stagger my way back to the couch.  His eyes glide up my yoga pants to where the ice pack has left a dark ring.  I try not to notice him assessing my gait, my bag of ice, the open bottle on the coffee table.  It leaves me with an aftertaste of guilt that is a little overwhelming, since there's nothing I can do about any of it.

"What happened to you?" he says.  I shrug it off.

"Nothing.  I think I pulled a muscle."

"With him?"  There's an accusatory edge to his tone that I really can't handle right now.  I should've never opened the door.  It's my fault.  I invited the vampire in--even though Aidan is the kind that sucks out my emotions, instead of my blood.

"No, it wasn't him," I lie.

"Weren't you with him?"

"I was, but..."

"Then when did it happen, Lydia?  With me?  Or him?"  He leans forward, elbows on knees, his weary eyes searching mine.

"Neither," I say.  "I just pulled a muscle, alright?"

He drops back in the chair, watching me.  "I know he hurts you, Lydia."

What am I going to say?  Mostly, it's a
consensual pain that Des and I conjure between us?  Granted, I'm the only one who limps home, but I agree to it.  Do I say this is the first time I've had to use our safe word, that it's the first time Des took it up way too many notches?  Do I say it was all because of
him?
 

No.  I'm not fool enough to spill the truth to Aidan--that these burns on my leg are directly connected to him.  I don't need to light that wick.

I take a drink.  Aidan studies every movement.  His eyes trace my throat as I swallow and then escort the empty glass down to the table top.  He inclines off the edge of the chair, and for a second, I think he's going to snatch up my glass and hurl it across the room.  Or snarl in my face that he wants the truth.  My muscles tighten up, ready to respond to whatever kind of assault he launches.

Aidan swoops down and I startle as he catches my bare foot.  I fall back as he scoots over, taking a seat on the edge of the coffee table in front of me.  He lifts my heel tenderly into his lap. 

Without a word, he presses his thumbs into my sole, kneading the skin.  His eyes are centered on my foot in his hands, and it takes me a few minutes to realize he's not interested in looking me in the eyes.  Slowly, my body relaxes.  My neck feels weak, so I drop my head on the back of the couch and look back up at the ceiling again.

The configuration up there seems different than it was earlier.  A little clearer, maybe.

CHAPTER TEN

THE COLDER THE BETTER

Aidan keeps kneading my feet without a word.  My muscles loosen to the consistency of puddles.  My defenses spread thin, until I'm about as tenderized and translucent as my soul.  Of course, that's when he clears his throat to speak again.

"Lydia," he begins.  I spread my toes in his palm.

"
Shhh
...this feels too good to ruin with talking."

"All you have to do is listen," he says.  Even his voice is a massage.  I reply with a tiny moan of agreement as he presses his thumbs into the ball of my foot.  He can talk all he wants.  I can ignore it.  We're just neighbors.  He's made that clear by disappearing after the night we spent together.  "There are a few things I wanted to talk to you about.  The first one is the girl that showed up here the other day--Marta.  I was sleeping with her about a year and a half ago, when I was still drinking.  She's one of the few that I remember."

"Mmm," I say, head back and eyes closed. 
Drug deal Marta? 
Maybe they were doing drugs together and he shorted her.  Anyway, I haven't seen her since the day she showed up at my door, so it's tomato/potato to me. 
Neighbors. 
Besides, it's no big deal now that she was with him a couple years ago--

"I lived with Marta for a few months.  Well, actually, I crashed at her place on the nights I didn't have anywhere else to go.  When I decided to get clean, I never showed up at her place again.  No call, nothing."  He says this, his voice tipping like an airplane on its way to the crash site.

I want to say,
don't give a shit, keep rubbing,
but, instead, I murmur, "Mmm...rough."

"She didn't know where I went or why and I uh...I stole two thousand dollars from her."

"You little thief," I say, without opening my eyes.

"I had to return the money to her.  It's part of the plan that I follow now.  Part of my sobriety is righting any of the wrongs I can."

"Good plan," I mumble.  His fingers are expert.  Every word is nearly extracted from my mouth with a low moan of satisfaction. 

"I have to fix something that happened between us too," he says. 
Shit, he can have all my money. 
"Sleeping with you the other night..."

"I have no complaints about that."  I smile without opening my eyes.  "In fact, if you want to wrong me again, I'd be up for it."

That slipped out.  Kind of.  I bite my lip.  I should be keeping my neighbor at arm's length, with my invisible wall between us, but he's already fuck-rubbing my feet, and all I
really
want is for him to climb off the end cushion of the couch and spread his body over me.  His thumbs pause and I think I'm going to get what I'm hoping for, but then he starts kneading again, deeper into the middle of my sole. 

"Lydia, I should've never slept with you."  His thumb digs into my instep and I yelp. 

Usually, an admission like that would garner a kick to the head or the demand that he leave, but I don't want Aidan to go.  His tone is melancholy and remorseful and I feel like I can save him from whatever guilt is consuming him, if he just keeps his hands on me.  I can forgive him, I can redeem him, by encouraging the magical circulation of his fingers to work their way up my body again. 

I must've heard it wrong.  He couldn't have meant what he just said, the way he said it.  Maybe he meant,
I should've never slept with you, because we could've been screwing the whole time. 
Or,
I should've never slept with you, because now I'll never be able to stop. 

I want him to want me.  I want him to need
me
--and more than just that one piece of me that rests between my thighs.  I want Aidan to need the real me, the entire one, that puts dandelions in my empty whiskey bottles, and sings old church hymns in the shower.  The
me
that used to dot the 'i' in Lydia with a heart.  All the ancient variations of
me
and the
culmination of
me
's that are gathered up on this couch cushion with my foot in his hands, wanting
him
. 

I haven't wanted a man like this since I walked up the aisle in a Vegas chapel to marry Des. 

I haven't cared enough to want any of them, until now.

"Wow.  I've never had anyone complain after sleeping with me."  I smirk, like it's nothing but a joke, but it's slowly tearing a hole in me. 

"It's not what you think," he says. 

"Maybe I wasn't really thinking anything."

"I'm an alcoholic, Lydia," he says.  This is where it's going?  He's going to blame sleeping with me on
not drinking?

"Not really.  You don't drink anymore."

"It doesn't change what I am."

"No, it kinda does.  If you're not drinking, you're not really an alcoholic.  You're just a guy that used to drink."

"That's not the way it works." He smiles.  "But that's not the point I'm trying to make anyway.  What I'm trying to say is that I'm nothing but a lousy drunk, still waiting for the next drink, and I knew better than to sleep with you."

I stare at him, long and hard.  "You knew better..."

"You're struggling with it too and I'm just muddying the waters even more by..."

"Hold up," I say, yanking my foot from him grasp as I scoot to sit up straight.  "
I'm struggling with it too? 
I thought we were done having this discussion.  I know I am."

He wipes his face, from forehead to chin, with one hand.  "You're in denial..."

"Fuck you," I say.  I jump to my feet.  "Leave, Aidan."

"Lydia, I want to help you."

"I don't need your amateur psychologist bullshit!" I explode.  "Don't you dare come in here and think you can transfer all your problems onto me!  You keep trying to do that!  I'm not a fucking drunk, Aidan!"

"I want to help, but you need to see the problem," he says, leaning forward to pick up the empty bottle on my coffee table.

"That was from last night!"

"There are four or five of these in the trash," he says.  I want to hurt him.  Kill him, maybe.  Who the hell does he think he is?

"Get out," I say.  I don't have to explain myself to him.  He meets my steely glare with one of his own.

"Recognize the problem."

"You're the problem.  Now get out, before I call my husband and he comes and gets you out for me."

Aidan gets to his feet, but he doesn't leave.  Instead, he takes a slow step toward me.

"The husband that beats you, Lydia?  I swear to God, if he showed up right now, I think I'd enjoy it.  I'd beat him within an inch of his own life, just for what he does to you."  I take a step back, but Aidan keeps coming.  "Is he the reason you live like you do, Lydia?  What's he done to you and why do you let him keep doing it?  You can't love him!  What is the arrangement you have with him?  I don't know of many women that would put up with a husband who only comes around to beat them.  Or a woman that loves her husband so much, she doesn't live with him and sleeps with her neighbor."

I slap him.  My palm explodes in tingling needles as he lurches to the side.

I fully expect him to swing back. 

I'm so angry, I stand there with my jaw out, offering him a clean shot. 

Aidan straightens up, rubs his jaw.  He takes a deep breath and another step away. 

"That was over the line," he says. 

"You call me a drunk..."

"I meant
I
was over the line.  Again."  His eyes move over the floor, shamed.  Good.  "I'm sorry.  I guess it's the wrong way to do this, but my gut says it's the only way I can get through to you, Lydia.  I don't think you have anyone else that will be honest with you.  But I'm always going to be honest.  Please...please see that I'm trying to help you."

"You're psycho,"  I tell him.  I look him right in the face.  "You need to get out.  I'm not the one who needs help."

<<<<>>>>

I feel really good about throwing him out.  I'm even able to gloat a bit for the first few minutes, after the door shuts.  I don't know who he thinks he is.  He's a mess.  I splash some rum into a glass of Coke, but my hands are shaking so much that when I try to take a gulp, it spills down my shirt. 

Damn him.

I know I'm falling apart.  I try to keep the shadows locked away, so no one ever sees them--especially me.  But now, with Aidan chased off, I fall down on the couch, sloshing even more of my drink on me, and those shadows come crashing out. 

When they come, a few drinks can't always chase them away.  Lately, it's been even less effective.  When the shadows absolutely outnumber me, I go down to Modo's.  It's hard for the darkness to cling to me when men are vying to take its place.  That's why I usually bring someone home.  A warm body tends to distract the shadows, until the sun comes up. 

Tonight will be one of those nights.  I slam what's left of my drink and jump off the couch.  I stare straight into my mirror as I walk into the bedroom, staring down the image I cast, as if it's an opponent. 

Even though parts of me are still blistered from what Des did to me and other pieces are seething from what Aidan said, I've got to pull whatever's left back together.

I have to look fabulous tonight.

<<<<>>>>

Dressed, I finally open my door and there is Aidan, standing in the hall like a mortician.  I can't stand to look at him.  I start down the hall, eyes straight ahead, but I feel his fingertips on my arm.

"Talk to me," he says. 

"Just let the drunk get her crazy on," I say, yanking my arm away.  I continue down the hall and Aidan's voice follows after me.

"You're going to Modo's," he says.  "What I said got to you and now you're going to go down to Modo's and pick up some random guy, aren't you?  You're going to show me that you don't need me and that I don't control you..."

I punch the button for the elevator a lot harder than necessary, but it doesn't come fast enough.  Aidan won't shut up behind me.  That steady voice of his rolls down the hall and crashes over me.   

"I don't control you, Lydia, but I know you.  Didn't it ever seem strange to you that Shane didn't recognize you?  That he didn't have any recollection of sleeping with you?  Do you believe that you are that forgettable, Lydia?  Hasn't it bothered you?"

Hell yes, it's bothered me.  I have wondered why Shane didn't remember me, but then again, I don't really recall him either.  I assume he was as pickled as I was that night, although it has dented my ego a little.  It still doesn't mean that Aidan can use it against me now, to make me turn around and listen to him. 

I clonk the elevator button again, as if that will rush it. 

"I know why he can't remember you," Aidan says.  His voice and his footsteps are bringing him down the hall toward me.  "Don't you want to know why?"

Damn elevator.  I finally turn on my heel to face him, shooting him my most jagged glare.

"It sounds like you want me to know why, Aidan, so go ahead.  Get it over with.  Tell me."

He's so close, I can smell the deep, heady scent of his skin.  So close, he could pin me to the wall.  I keep my eyes on his lips, so I don't have to meet his gaze, and as if he knows exactly what I'm doing, he traces his tongue over his lower lip.  I instantly wish we weren't fighting.  I wish we were lying in my bed, raking each other over with soft murmurs of affection--instead of him spewing ex-lover riddles that I don't give a shit about solving.

"I've been in this hall with you before," he says.  His lips move gently and the words are unexpectedly soft as they slip through them.  "You picked me up at Modo's.  Or I picked you up.  I don't remember all the details of it, except that you were lying on the bar and I drank a Mojito shot from your belly button.  It tasted amazing, I remember that.  The best drink I've ever had.  Probably because it was my last."  He wipes his mouth with the side of his arm as if he's wiping away the remnant taste.  He's so close now, only two steps away from me.  "We came back to your place.  Here.  I probably would have never remembered that it was this floor or which one was your apartment door if we hadn't shared the night that we did that night."

"You're trying to tell me that you gave me your friend's name?" I say.  Well, there's a curve ball.  Still, I need to keep my cool.  "Ok, whatever.  No harm done."

The elevator doors roll open.  It's empty.  Aidan grabs my wrist with one hand and darts the other into the elevator and slides his palm down the panel of floor buttons.  I can almost hear them all lighting up.  

"I've got to tell you the rest," he says.  The doors roll shut as he hangs onto me, holding me back from leaving. 

"It's not important," I say, even though my head is still reeling from the realization that I've slept with
Aidan before.  It's infuriating that I don't have a clear recall of it.