“I like the music,” she murmurs, and I swallow my groan, because fuck if that isn’t the most perfect answer in the world.

“And the computer?”

A flush flares up her cheeks again and she ducks away. I lean back, giving her room as I take a pull on my beer. She’s fiddling with the swizzle stick that came in her drink.

“I write sometimes. And the music is a greatinspiration.”

I was wrong. She could say something more perfect. I grin at her and say, “You might just be perfect.”

“Might?”

I hesitate and then shrug. “Need a little longer to figure that out, Red.”

Her eyes are still amused but a wary as she watches me, a finger circling the rim of her glass, catching the drop of whiskey from her last sip. She lifts it and licks the Jack away, and I swallow hard, chasing my groan away with a cough. “Go out with me,” I say, suddenly.

“I don’t date,” she says. She leans back and I want to drag her back to the edge of her seat, force her back into the easy warmth we were sharing even as she slams walls up between us.

“Why not?” I ask.

“Because I’m busy and because boys are idiots and because school—I don’t need to be distracted.”

“You aren’t too busy to drop by and listen to me play every week for three months. And I’m not a fucking boy,” I says the last bit tighter and fiercer.

Her breath catches a little in her throat as she licks her lips. “Maybe I’m here for Scotty.”

For the first time in almost two decades, I want to punch my best friend. Because fuck if he’s going to get this girl too, after all the time I’ve spent watching her. I’ve never cared who Scott takes to bed. Usually we take them together—women are no different than any other thing in our world that we share. But the thought of him touching her, or her on her knees in front of him,  makes me irrationally angry.

“Rike,” a sweet, low voice purrs behind me, and I blink free of my thoughts to twist and meet the gaze of the girl behind me. She’s all smooth curves and long blonde hair and legs for fucking days.

She went home with us a few week ago, and I knew even as she was in bed with us that it was going to be a problem.

“Scotty is flying solo,” I say, turning back to Red. I can feel the sorority girl at my back, the indignant fury from her. Red is watching her with curious eyes, gaze skirting between the two of us. I ignore the huffy girl behind me and say, “You aren’t. If you were, you wouldn’t be talking to me.”

Her eyes flicker with reserved amusement, and I lean forward, and whisper, “Please. Save me from the sorority.”

Her lips curve into a slow smile, something mischievous and mysterious in the twist of her lips, and I want to see that smile every day. I want to know why it’s different, and what makes it different from the smile she would give me half asleep and naked in my bed.

I blink, shake the thought. Focus on now.

God, she’s fucking with my head, hard.

“Go find a new toy, Lindsay. This one is mine tonight.”

That’s what her name was. Lindsay.

“You’ll like them,” Lindsay says, a smirk in her voice, and Red’s eyes slip past me, settling on the girl and hardening.

Shit. That’s jealousy, and a part of me wants to fucking crow with victory.

Instead, I reach out and claim her hand, letting my fingers trace over the curl of her palm, bringing her attention back to me as I absently caress her hand. She watches me curiously for a moment.

“Friday. Pick me up.” She reclaims her hand and scribbles on a note card, sliding it across to me. Then she grabs her bag, shoving her laptop inside as she slides out of the booth and across the bar. She stops Lindsay, and murmurs something to the blonde girl.

Curious, assessing eyes flick to me, but Lindsay only nods and turns away from me. Red smiles, and ducks out of the bar.

I glance down at the note card. Her handwriting is messy and strong.

And her name is Peyton.

Chapter 2 : After

Sometimes, the loneliness

Is a physical blanket,

A tangible thing that wraps around me,

Like a suffocating  wave that won't recede.

And then your hand,

Rescues me.

(Rike’s poems to Peyton)

Noise. Quiet, steady, noise. It breaks the stillness, shrill and sharp, then gone and it’s just a waiting silence. My eyes open, slow and painful, and I look at a fuzzing white ceiling, and the bright silver of a pole near my head.

Why the hell is there a pole near my head?

I open my lips to talk, to ask, and a body, one I hadn’t noticed before, shifts in the corner.

Someone—a nurse?—looks at me with brilliant blue eyes, and for a moment, I can’t remember what I was going to ask, because there are only his eyes and the questions there, and a scruffy beard, a sharp, angled face, and long hair that hangs like he’s been pushing his fingers through it.

“You’re awake,” he says, and I remember that I was asking a question.

But I can’t remember what it was. I think, struggling to hold onto the elusive question, and my eyes widen, panic slamming into me. Beside me, the shrill and sharp noise of the monitor that woke me screams to life as my heartbeat slams in my chest.

I can’t remember anything. 

***

It takes a sedative to calm me down, and when I wake, it’s slowly, with no idea of where I am. It’s dark, and I remember the light streaming into the room earlier, lighting his bright blue eyes, and the wild panic when I realized everything was a blank slate.

I feel it again, now, but the panic is tamer, not as sharp and choking. I shift to sit up in the hospital bed, and glance around.

My gaze lands on the nurse, sleeping in a chair in the corner. His hand is wrapped around a phone, and I wonder, inanely, if he sleeps in all of his patient’s rooms, or if I’m special.

Tattoos snake under the pushed up cuffs of a long, silver-blue thermal, and I have the absurd desire to push them up and see what designs will be revealed.

I don’t even like guys with tattoos.

Why is he here? I clear my throat, and his eyes fly open. For a moment, his eyes are sleepy, soft, so intimate it makes the breath catch in my throat, and I swallow hard. Then he blinks, and the hungry emotions are tucked away, and there is only concern there, calm and professional as he pushes out of the chair and comes to the bed.

“How are you feeling?” he asks, glancing at the machine briefly. His eyes flick over it, and his lips tighten before he reaches for a button.

I stop his hand with my own, and see his eyes flare wide before he closes them, and with a deep breath pulls away from me.

Stung, and strangely embarrassed, I tuck my hand back under my blanket. “Where am I?” I ask my voice shaky with disuse.

How long have I been here; how long have I been unconscious?

“St. David’s Medical Center.” He pauses, watching me. It feels like he’s waiting for something, but then he adds, “Austin, sweetheart.”

Austin. Why the hell am I in Austin?

“Where would you rather be?” he asks, his voice carefully neutral.

I blink. I hadn’t realized I’d spoken aloud until he responded, and I feel heat crawling up my neck. His eyes drop to it and heat, and I clear my throat, looking away. Searching for an answer to his question.

Where would I rather be?

It’s a blank page, my past empty, stretching behind me. For how long? I bite hard on my lip. “How long have I been here?”

“I think you should let me call the doctor.”

“Why can’t I remember anything?” I whisper, and tears sting my eyes. I blink hard and sniffle. He’s staring at me, his face tight and remote, and I want him gone, suddenly. I want just a minute, to break down in private. Away from this stranger with his tattoos and eyes that see too much.