In the present, he couldn’t take his eyes off her hand, the reddened tip of her nipple. She might as well have been stroking him. He got with the program like a roadie, chasing a bump-out bonus, meeting her on the bed, tumbling her backwards, making her shriek, tucking his face against her neck so he didn’t seek the knowledge of her lips.
Evie used that ring on him and made him squirm, then she used her mouth on him and made him see the future. He had to find a way for them to keep their shells intact and go from sex to being together without losing the independent futures they’d already drawn up, without hurting each other again.
Sleep was a friend who wouldn’t leave a party long over. Even with Evie breathing softly in his arms after he’d finger banged her into a coma, he couldn’t find its quiet, his head full of new hopes and old fears, a crosstalk of all the reasons why they might not make it work a second time. He had a kind of heartburn of the soul and it kept waking him until close to dawn when what woke him was the sound of a guitar being strummed. Suzy Q.
It was early, gritty orange sky. Evie wasn’t beside him, she was in the other room plucking some tune he didn’t recognize, stop start, then over again. How long had it been since she picked up a guitar?
He sat bolt upright, his skin goose bumping, a chill rippling up his spine when he heard her voice. A field of carpet and a showroom of furniture stood between them and yet he went rigid, trying not to rustle the sheets in case she shut down. She wasn’t goofing off, she wasn’t singing in the shower for the love of the acoustics. She was singing about fate and second chances.
About ten minutes was all he could stand of hiding out. It’d started to feel dishonest. He had the tune in his head and he needed to see her face. He got to the doorway where he could see her sitting cross-legged on the sofa wearing undies and a slinky little robe she’d brought from home. Her eyes were on her hands, but her vision was somewhere outside the room, in the flow of finding words to go with music.
This wasn’t some song he’d simply never heard, it was song she was writing. He cleared his throat.
In her normal speaking voice, she said, “I woke you. Sorry.” Her eyes coming to his slowly, as if she was reluctant to be back in the room.
“I was having trouble sleeping.”
“I woke up and couldn’t get back to sleep.” She sighed and that didn’t need to be explained. They were in this after-zone of misplaced feelings and more sex wouldn’t fix it.
He came further into the room. “That’s good. What is it?”
“It’s nothing. I’ve almost forgotten how to play. I’m just noodling.”
“But it’s yours?”
“It was just there in my head.” Her eyes went wide as if that was freaking her out.
“Can I hear it again?”
She put the guitar’s base on the floor, hands still on the neck. “No. I don’t remember it. It’s not anything.”
“It was something. And look at you.” That tie on the robe had come undone, it was short so she was all thighs and knees and a glimpse of her polka dot underwear. There were dark smudges under her eyes and her hair was tangled and knotty. “You’re beautiful and I’ve missed your voice.” He went across to the stand of instruments and picked another guitar from the group. Steel string. He played what he’d heard her play.
“I’ve missed it too.” She swung Suzy Q back into her lap and he sat on the coffee table facing her and they played together. The second time around she sang the chorus, eyes still on her hands, a tremble in her voice.
“Side taker, heart wrecker, world maker.
Damage is a speeding ticket to a truth zone.
Throw a girl a bone.
Danger courter, soul breaker, loss maker.
Love can be risk factor, consequences unknown.”
He would’ve kissed till her mouth ached and they both wept, if he’d had permission. He knew she had more, but she stopped, rested her chin on the guitar’s waist. “I don’t remember the rest.”
“Yeah, you do.” She’d almost had a whole song. “Throw a boy a bone.”
“It was too easy. It’s really nothing.”
“You think that was easy.” He reached over and cupped her face in his hands. “There’s a decade’s worth of living in those words and an afternoon of hard truth. Time to let it out.”
She pulled away. “I don’t know.”
“What are you afraid of?”
“Your multiple hit singles. Come on, Jay. I haven’t done this for years. I don’t want to be doing it in front of you.”