Текст книги "The Edge of Always"
Автор книги: J. A. Redmerski
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Текущая страница: 13 (всего у книги 23 страниц)
Andrew
25
I don’t even know how I find our way back so easily. I think at one point, I didn’t care much if we got lost. But I get us back without a wrong turn or having to pull over and ask for directions. Not much is said between the four of us. And the little that was spoken, I don’t remember any of it.
We pull into the parking lot of the hotel and part ways with Elias and Bray. Maybe I would’ve thanked Elias or wished them luck on the rest of their trip, or maybe even invited them with us somewhere tonight, but given the circumstances all I can do is nod when they thank us for the ride.
I pull away and drive around to our side of the hotel.
Camryn seems uncertain about talking to me yet. Not afraid, just uncertain. I can’t even look at her. I feel like fucking shit for what happened, and I’ll never forgive myself for it.
Camryn grabs my hand and we head straight up to our room. I swing open the door and start tossing our stuff in our bags.
“It wasn’t your—”
I stop her. “Don’t. Please. Just… give me a minute…”
She looks at me so dejectedly, but nods and gives in.
Soon, we’re on the road again, heading north up the coast. Destination: Anywhere But Florida.
After driving for an hour, I recall what happened last night in my head over and over again, trying to make some kind of sense out of it. I pull off the highway and the car crawls to a stop on the side of the road. It’s so quiet. I stare down at my lap and then up through the windshield. I realize that I’m white-knuckling the steering wheel. Finally, I swing open the door and get out.
I walk fast over the gravel and dirt and then down through the slope in the ditch, coming up the other side and head straight for the first tree.
“Andrew, stop!” I hear Camryn calling out to me.
But I keep going and when I face that goddamn tree, I hit it as hard as I hit Tate and Caleb. The skin over two of my knuckles splits open and blood runs over the top of my hand and in between my fingers, but I don’t stop.
I only stop when Camryn steps around in front of me and pushes me so hard in the chest with the palms of both hands that I almost fall backward. Tears are streaming from her eyes. “Stop it! Please! Just stop it!”
I let myself fall onto the grass into a sitting position, my knees bent, my bloodied hands dangling at the wrists. My body slumps over forward, my head hanging there. All I can see is the ground beneath me.
Camryn sits down in front of me. I feel her hands on the sides of my face, trying to raise my head, but I don’t let her.
“You can’t do this to me,” she says, her voice shuddering. She tries to force my gaze, and finally I let her because it hurts like hell to hear her cry. I look her in the eyes, my own eyes brimmed with angry tears that I’m trying to contain. “Baby, it wasn’t your fault. You were drugged. Anybody could have made that mistake as messed up as you were.” Her fingers tighten against both sides of my face. “It. Wasn’t. Your. Fault. Do you understand me?”
I try to look away, but she moves my hands out of the way and sits between my legs on her knees, facing me. Instinctively, I put my arms around her.
“I should’ve known still,” I say, looking down. “And it’s not just about that, Camryn, I was supposed to keep you safe. You never should’ve been drugged in the first place.” Just thinking about it causes the anger and hatred toward myself to rise up again. “I was supposed to keep you safe!”
She wraps her arms around me and forces my head onto her chest.
She pulls away. “Andrew, look at me. Please.”
I do. I see pain and compassion in her eyes. Her gentle fingers cup my unshaven face. She kisses my lips slowly and says, “It was a moment of weakness,” as if to remind me of what I said to her several months ago about the pills. “It’s my fault as much as it was yours. I’m not stupid. I should’ve known too not to leave our drinks alone with them even for a second. It’s not your fault.”
My eyes stray downward, and then I look back at her again. I don’t know how I can make her understand that because of how and who I am, I feel an intense sense of responsibility for her. A responsibility that I take pride in, that I’ve felt since the day I met her. It kills me… it kills me to know that in my “moment of weakness” I couldn’t protect her, that because I let my guard down she could’ve been hurt, raped, killed. How can I make her understand that it doesn’t matter if she doesn’t fault me for it, that her opinion, although I don’t take it for granted, doesn’t excuse my moment of failure? She’s entitled to a moment of weakness. I’m not. Mine is just failure.
“And I would never, ever hold that against you,” she adds.
I just look at her, searching her face for meaning and then she goes on:
“What that girl did,” she clarifies. “I’d never bring it up. Because you did nothing wrong.” I feel her fingertips press into the sides of my face. “Do you believe me?”
I nod slowly. “Yeah. I do believe you.”
She sighs and says, “It might’ve been partially my fault, anyway.” She looks away from my eyes.
“How so?”
“Well,” she says, but hesitates with a distant look of regret on her features, “I think I may have accidently given her permission.”
That certainly takes me by surprise.
“I remember her asking about sleeping with us, and I think I told her that yes, she could. I-I didn’t know she meant it… sexually. If I had been sober I definitely would’ve caught onto that. Andrew, I am so sorry. I’m sorry I let that crazy bitch violate you.”
I shake my head. “It’s neither one of our faults, so don’t feel like putting any of the blame on yourself, all right?”
When I don’t see that smile I was fishing for fast enough I reach out and grab both sides of her waist. She squeals as I start tickling her. She laughs and squirms so hard that she falls backward onto the grass, and I sit on top of her waist, holding my weight up by my knees on either side so I don’t crush her.
“Stop it! No! Andrew, I fucking swear! Stooooop!” She laughs hard, and I bury my fingertips around her ribs some more.
Then I hear the warning siren from a cop car sound once and go dead as it pulls up behind my car.
“Oh shit,” I say, looking down at Camryn. Her hair is matted with dried grass sticking out in various spots.
I jump off her and reach out my bloody hand to help her up. She takes it and rises to her feet, dusting herself off. We head back to the car just as the cop is getting out of his.
“Do you normally leave your door wide open on the highway like this?” the cop asks.
I glance at my door and back at him.
“No, sir,” I say. “I had to throw up and just didn’t think about it at the time.”
“License, insurance, and registration.”
I pull my license from my wallet and hand it to him and then go around to the passenger’s side to fish for my insurance and registration from the glove box. Camryn leans against the back of the car with her arms crossed nervously over her chest. The cop goes back to his car—after taking notice of the blood on my hands—and sits inside to run my name.
“I hope you’ve not been hiding any robberies or murders or anything from me,” Camryn says, as I lean against the hood next to her.
“Nah, my serial-killing days are over,” I say. “He’s got nothin’ on me.” I elbow her gently in the side.
A few unnerving minutes later the cop joins us at the back of the car and hands my stuff back to me.
“What happened to your hand?” he asks.
I look down at it, for the first time feeling the throbbing pain now that he’s brought it to my attention. Then I point to the tree not too far away. “I sort of hit the tree.”
“You sort of hit the tree?” he asks suspiciously, and I notice him glancing at Camryn every few seconds. Great, he probably thinks I beat her or some shit, and considering she does look pretty rough after last night’s incident and our recent scuffle in the grass, it probably helps confirm his assumption.
“OK, I hit a tree.”
He looks right at Camryn now. “Is that what happened?” he asks her.
Camryn, nervous as hell and likely knowing what the cop is thinking really happened as much as I do, suddenly has a Natalie moment.
“Yes, sir,” she says, gesturing her hands. “He got mad because some assholes—” she winces “—sorry, took advantage of us last night, and he was beating himself up over it all morning to the point of ultimately taking it out on that tree! I ran out there to stop him before he hurt himself and we talked about it and the reason I look like hammered shit—sorry—is because of the screwed-up night we had. But I promise we aren’t bad people. We don’t do drugs and he’s not a serial killer or anything, so please just let us go. You can even search the car if you want.”
Face. Palm. Moment.
I laugh it off inside. We don’t have anything to worry about if he searches the car. Unless… our temporary friends, Elias and Bray, just happened to drop a bag of weed or any kind of incriminating stuff somewhere in my backseat, by accident.
Oh shit… please don’t let this turn out like it does on television.
I glance over at Camryn and subtly shake my head at her.
Her eyes widen. “What’d I say?”
I just smile, still shaking my head, because it’s all I really can do.
The cop sniffles and then gnaws on the inside of his mouth. He looks back and forth between Camryn and me several times without a word, which only increases the tension we’re feeling.
“Next time don’t leave the door wide open like that,” the cop says, his expression as unmoving as it has been this whole time. “It’d be a shame to see a passing vehicle knock the door off a 1969 Chevelle in that good a condition.”
A slim smile brightens my face. “Absolutely.”
The cop pulls out ahead of us and leaves while we stay parked inside the car for a moment.
“ ‘You can search the car if you want’?” I repeat.
“I know!” she laughs and throws her head back against the seat momentarily. “I didn’t mean to say that. It just came out.”
I laugh, too. “Well, looks like your innocent rambling, which by the way scares me a little; I think that bipolar best friend of yours has rubbed off on you, but it charmed us out of that one.”
I rest my hands on the steering wheel.
She was smiling and probably about to comment on my Natalie joke, until she sees my bloody knuckles again. Then she moves over next to me and takes my hand carefully into hers.
“We need to clean this before it gets infected,” she says. She leans closer and carefully starts picking tiny pieces of grass and dirt from around and inside the open gash. “That’s pretty bad, Andrew.”
“It’s not too bad,” I say. “I don’t need stitches.”
“No, you just need to be slapped. Don’t ever do something like that again. I mean it.” She picks out one last bit of debris and then leans over the back of the seat, reaching for the small ice chest in the back.
I turn my head to the right, and all I see is her ass hanging out of those shorts. I reach up with my bloodied hand and slip my finger underneath her bikini bottom elastic and snap it back against her skin. It doesn’t faze her, but she rolls her eyes at me when she emerges from the backseat and sits down with a water bottle.
“Rinse it out,” she demands, holding the bottle out to me.
I open my door and take it from her, holding my hand out and pouring water over the wound.
As she’s rummaging through her purse for something she says, “The next time you get that pissed off and feel the need to take out your anger on inanimate objects, I’m officially going to jot your name down on my Psychotic List.” She holds out a tube of Neosporin to me.
I just shake my head and take it. Guess I can’t argue with her on that one.
She points at the Neosporin in my hand and tells me to hurry and put it on. I laugh and say, “You sure are a demanding little heifer.”
She play-punches me in the arm (which actually hurts her) and accuses me of calling her fat. It’s all in good fun, and I think it’s her way of helping take my mind off what happened. Within minutes we’re lost in conversations about music and what kinds of bars or clubs we might play in along the way to New Orleans.
Yes, we decided at one point that no matter where we stop on the way or how long we stay that eventually we’ll visit our favorite place along the Mississippi, no matter what.
* * *
That was two days ago. Today, we’re laid up in a decent hotel in the great state of Alabama.
Camryn
26
“Are you excited about tonight, or do you need a paper bag to blow in?” Andrew asks, coming out of the bathroom with a towel around his waist.
“Both,” I say. I set the remote control down on the nightstand and sit up in the bed. “I know the song, but it’s my first solo. So yes, I’m freaking out a little.”
He digs around inside his bag by the TV and finds a pair of clean boxers. The towel drops to the floor. I tilt my head to one side, watching his sexy naked ass from the bed. He steps into his boxers and snaps them around his waist.
“You’re going to kick ass,” he says, turning to face me. “You’ve had plenty of practice and you’ve nailed it already. Besides, if I thought you weren’t ready, I’d tell you.”
“I know you would.”
“Well, are you ready for work?” he asks, slipping on the rest of his clothes.
“Yep. I guess so. How do I look?”
I stand up and twirl around, dressed in a skimpy spaghetti-strap black top and tight jeans. “Wait,” I say, putting up my finger. I slip my feet down into my new sleek black calf-high boots and zip them up the sides. Then I retwirl and do my pose again, overdramatizing it a bit.
“Unbearably sexy as always,” he says, grinning, and then he steps up to me and runs my braid through his hand.
Tonight I may be performing solo “Edge of Seventeen” by Stevie Nicks, but for two hours before I go on I’m going to waitress and Andrew will be busing tables. Score! I get the cool job.
It’s a packed house when we arrive at seven. I love the atmosphere of this place. The stage is decent sized, but the table and dance floor are enormous. And it’s full, which makes me that much more nervous. I walk through to the back, my hand clasped in Andrew’s as we weave our way through the crowd. We got lucky with this temp job to be able to work together for a few nights. Every other side job along the trip since Virginia has been sporadic. I’d work cleaning rooms here and there while Andrew would bartend or even fill in as a bouncer. He may not be steroid-big (and I’m glad because that’s gross), but his muscles are big enough that they hired him easily. Thankfully he didn’t have to drag anyone out by their shirts or get into any fights.
Our boss for the next few days, German—it’s his name, definitely not his nationality, because the guy is as redneck as they come—hands Andrew a white apron and a pin-on name tag that says Andy.
I hold in my laughter, but Andrew sees the amused look on my face.
German rubs his chunky sausagelike hand across his nose, wipes it on his jeans and says, “A’soon as someone leaves a table an’ takes ther’ shit wit’em you get o’er ther’ an’ get that table ready fer anodder customer.” He shakes his finger at Andy, er, I mean Andrew. “An’ don’ touch tha tips. Dems’ de waitress’s, y’hear me?”
“Yes, sir,” Andrew says. When German looks down at his order slip book for a second, Andrew mouths the words What the fuck? and I try to straighten my lips into a hard line to keep from smiling when German looks back up at us.
German looks at me, I mean really looks at me, totally unlike he was looking at Andrew just now. He smiles a yellowed smile and says, “An’ you jus’ need ta look ’zactly like you do now. Put on dat sweet smile an’ rake in dem tips.”
I can only imagine what the other waitresses who work here full-time have to go through with this guy.
I bat my baby blues at him and say with a sweet, seductive country twang in my voice, “I sure will, Mr. German. And lata when my shift is ova’ I’m sure you will unda’stand that I’ll need to go in tha back an’ freshen up before I perform t’night.”
I notice Andrew’s eyes get bigger and more intrigued, but I keep my attention on German, who I already have so tightly wrapped around my finger that if I told him to lick the floor he would ask Fer how long?
Andrew
That Southern belle accent that came out of nowhere really turned me on. She and I are gonna have to talk about that later.
I pin on my name tag, tie my apron at the back, and grab the plastic tublike thing German points to when I look over. Hell, I don’t mind this kind of work, but German is a redneck dickhead who I hope stays out of my way for the next two hours. And he could use a stick of deodorant. I mean the whole fucking stick. He really doesn’t go with the place. He’s like a rebel flag hanging in the window of a $400,000 house. The bar-slash-restaurant is actually decked out pretty nice. On the inside, at least.
I head out onto the floor with my tub fixed underneath my arm and go to the first empty table I see. I clear away all of the trash and dirty dishes covered with uneaten fries and hush puppies, and toss everything into the tub. Then I wipe the table down with the rag in my apron pocket, and straighten the ketchup and steak sauce bottles. It’s all pretty straightforward, unlike waitressing, which I guess is why only Camryn had to get an hour’s worth of training yesterday before she could start today. She may have the tip job where she can work that sexy charm of hers, but she has to put up with the creepy perverted boss. And I’m lovin’ the shit out of it. It’s what she gets for making fun of me getting the busing job. She joked around by calling me the bar’s “bottom feeder.” Well, I hope she doesn’t expect me to save her skinny butt from German’s advances. She’s on her own with that one.
I bus a couple more tables, leaving the five-dollar tip on one table and the twenty on another. When I start to head into the back to drop off the load, I’m stopped by four girls at a booth near the bar wall.
“Hey baby doll,” one of the older women says, gesturing me with the curl of her finger. “Can you take our drink order?”
“I’m sorry, ma’am, but I just bus the tables.”
I try to walk away, but a prettier one stops me.
“I bet if we requested that you be our waiter, you’d get promoted.” Her eyes are glassy and her head sways a little. I notice—because it’s hard not to—her huge boobs busting out of her tight tank top. She pushes them further into view.
“Well, you could ask,” I say, putting on my own charm, lifting one side of my mouth into a grin. “And if the boss man says so, then I’m all yours for the evening.”
All four of them look at one another, having some kind of inside conversation. I’ve got them eating out of the palm of my hand.
Camryn comes up behind me bearing a drink tray lined with shots of whiskey and a glass already stuffed full of bills. I wonder if that’s the tip jar or the money she collects from the alcohol. It’s making me anxious.
She smirks at me, looks down at the table of women, and then back at me again briefly. “Is he bothering you ladies?” she asks.
I know she’s not jealous; it’s all about competition tonight, between her and me. And she’s going to do whatever she can to keep me from winning the little bet we made in the car on the ride over here:
“You don’t think I can rake in tips as a busboy?”
“No,” she said. “Busboys don’t collect tips.”
“Think about it,” I said, looking at her from the driver’s seat. “It’s a bar full of women and alcohol. I bet you I can get tips.”
“Oh really?” she asked, pursing her lips.
“Yeah,” I said and then took it up a notch because I was feeling bold: “Actually, I bet I can rake in more tips than you.”
Camryn laughed. “Seriously? You want to bet on that?” She crossed her arms and shook her head at me like I was being ridiculous.
“Yes,” I said when I knew I should’ve said, No, I’m just kidding.
But I didn’t say no, and now I’m stuck in this bet where if Camryn wins, I have to give her an hour-long massage for three straight nights. An hour is a long time for a massage. I can already feel my arms going limp just thinking about it.
The older woman answers Camryn, “No, he’s not bothering us at all, sweetie.” She looks me up and down like she wants to strip me naked and lick me, propping her chin on her enclosed, upright hands. “He can stay here for as long as he likes. Where is your boss?”
“He’s somewhere around here,” Camryn says. “Just look for the big guy in the company shirt. His name is German.”
“Thank you, doll,” the woman says and looks back at me.
That one, I admit, kind of scares me. And since she seems to be the leader of their pack, I decide I need to move on before she really thinks I’m that into her and I’m the one needing Camryn’s help to get me out of the mess I started.
“Have a great night, ladies,” I say with an inviting smile and then I turn to walk away.
I feel a hand slide into my apron pocket. I stop and look down as the woman’s hand moves away. She’s gazing up at me with that famous horny look.
“You too, sugar,” she says.
I wink at her and smile at the other three as I casually walk away. When I make it into the kitchen, I empty my tub and then reach into my pocket and pull out three twenty-dollar bills.
Hell yeah, maybe that bet wasn’t so ridiculous, after all.
Two hours later…
Yeah, the bet was ridiculous.
“Two forty, forty-one, forty-six, fifty-six.” Camryn keeps counting her tips now that our short shift is over. She smirks and adds, “And how much did you get?”
I’m trying to keep a straight face to make my disappointment seem somewhat genuine, but she’s not making it easy. So I pull out my money, count it again, and answer, “Eighty-two dollars.”
“Well, that’s not bad for a busboy, I have to give it to you,” she says, pocketing her cash.
“Give it to me how?” I ask as I untie the apron and take it off. “You’re letting me out of the bet?”
“Pfft! No way,” she says.
German comes up behind us.
“You two betta be good,” he says. “An’ none o’that rap stuff or dem fancy new-age songs.” He snaps his fingers rapidly as if he’s trying to name an example, but then he just gives up. “This ain’t no ’Merican Idol.”
“Understood,” Camryn says with that sweet smile of hers.
German, with a big dopey grin on his face, snaps out of her spell, and as he walks away he snarls at me as he passes. It’s better than him looking at me the way he looks at Camryn, so I’m not complaining.
I turn to Camryn. “Don’t be nervous.” I take her hands into mine. “Like I said, you’re going to kick ass out there.”
She nods nervously. Then she lets a quick burst of air move through her little rounded lips and inhales a deep breath.
“I’ll run out and get the guitar while you get ready,” I say.
“All right,” she says.
I kiss her on the lips and head outside to the car where the electric guitar she bought me for my birthday is hiding in the trunk. “Edge of Seventeen” may be her solo, but the guitar riff itself is so well-known that I’m almost as nervous as she is about performing it. OK, maybe not so much as nervous—it’s a fairly easy song to play. What has me a little on edge is screwing it up for her. She’s the only reason I feel any kind of pressure about tonight’s performance.
I walk up onto the stage to find the drummer, Leif, who we met yesterday, getting set up. “Thanks for doing this, man,” I say to him.
“Hey, no problem,” Leif says. “I’ve played this song a number of times at a bar in Georgia I used to work at a few years ago.”
Camryn was happy to find a drummer who knows the song. She was prepared for it to be just the two of us, knowing it wouldn’t sound the same without the drums, too. But when we met Leif yesterday during her waitress training and he agreed to play with us tonight, I think Camryn’s confidence level shot up a few notches.
I slip the guitar strap over my shoulder just as Camryn steps onto the stage.
She walks right up to me, and I lean in toward her ear and say, “You look hot.”
She blushes and looks down at her clothes. She changed out of that cute black top she was wearing and replaced it with another black silky top that hangs low in the back, exposing her skin almost to her waist. The necklace I bought for her dangles in the front, shining against the black. And she let her hair down. I love the braid she always wears, but I have to say, she’s a whole other level of sexy with that long, soft blonde hair falling all about her shoulders.
The voices in the bar carry through the large space, loud even over Leif messing around with the bass drum behind us. All of the tables on the floor are full, as well as the booths lining the back wall. My four “girlfriends” are still here and have migrated from their booth to a table closer to the stage. They seem intrigued that I went from busboy to guitar player. Normally, I would be scanning the audience for my “victim” of the night by now, but tonight is different and there won’t be any of that from either one of us. Camryn’s too nervous and focused to try pulling off our usual.
After we finally get set up and are ready to begin, Camryn holds her breath for a moment and looks over at me.
I wait for her to give me the go, and when I see her nod I start to play, and all eyes in the room turn to us. That guitar riff always manages to turn heads in a crowded room. And Camryn, the second she starts to sing, she does like I always do and becomes someone completely different, so much so that it stuns me. She owns it. It’s so unlike how she has been during every one of our practices together. Confidence and sexiness exudes from every line in the song and every movement she makes and my entire body reacts to it.
“Ooo, baby, ooo, ooo!” I join in with the chorus.
But everybody’s looking at her, even my four girlfriends, who I know at first moved closer to check me out. No, they now belong to Camryn for the most part, and it makes me proud.
Before the first verse is even over, the dance floor is packed with bodies. The power and sex in Camryn’s voice mixed with the fascination everyone has for her performance sends me over the edge, and I hammer out that riff with more devotion than before.
“Ooo, baby, ooo, ooo!”
Every few seconds I hear a voice scream in the background: “Wooooo!” and again, each time Camryn hits a moving note.
And I can’t get enough.
I sing my heart out along with her to the next two choruses, and I know the fourth verse that she always got tripped up on is next. I look over, still moving my pick fast over the strings, my back arched, and I don’t see a nervous muscle in her face. She’s got this; I can tell by looking at her that there’s no way she’s going to screw it up.
And then the words come and go so fast and flawlessly from her lips that I feel my face stretched to its limits with a smile as I follow loudly into the next chorus line with her.
Damn, my baby owns this song. Look out, Stevie Nicks!
Passing the middle of the song, Camryn sings: Oooo! And her voice fades in that ominous part of the song which allows her voice a short rest.
But the guitar riff goes on and on. It’s exhausting, but my fingers never stop, never miss a beat.
Camryn and I look at each other and share a moment. Then she starts singing again, and I join in where I’m supposed to.
She sings on, both of her hands come up to grip the microphone stand, her eyes shut as she belts out with so much emotion, “Yeah! Yeah!”
Then she looks right at me again and keeps her eyes trained on mine while she belts out the next verse as if she’s singing solely for me.
Shivers run up my spine. I grin and fall back into the guitar until the song is over.
The audience erupts with shouts and screams. Camryn takes a bow first, and then I follow. She’s smiling so hugely as she looks out at the crowd, and it kind of chokes me up a little inside.
Keeping the guitar strapped around my body, I push it behind my back and walk right over to her, then lift her off the floor and into my arms. There are whistles and shouts all around us, but all I really notice is Camryn looking back at me. I kiss her deeply, and the crowd whistles and shouts even louder.
Before the night is over, we end up playing a full ten-song gig to a growing crowd as the hours wear on. We go back to sing some of our favorites: “Barton Hollow,” “Hotel California,” and “Birds of a Feather,” among others, and each song seems to please the audience as much as the previous one. I don’t do a solo tonight, even though at one point Camryn asks me to. This was her night and only her night. I refused to be the center of attention even for one song.
We make it back to our hotel by two in the morning, and I’m gladly paying up on the bet I lost.
