It’s that she’s the first thing in a long time that I’ve allowed myself to want.

A car slows, a sleek gray Lexus and I see Lindsay, all straight hair and pursed lips as she watches. Peyton spills out of the car and shifts her bag on her shoulder. “I’ll get a ride home.”

Lindsay makes a small sniff. “Just call and I’ll swing back by.”

Peyton makes a face at her friend and steps away from the car, coming to stand in front of me with a small smile. “Hi, Jokes.”

“Knock knock,” I say.

A grin lights her face, and she says, “Who’s there?”

“Lettuce.”

She rolls her eyes and I nudge her with the toe of my boot. “Lettuce who?”

“Lettuce in please; it’s cold outside.”

“That’s horrible,” she says, but there’s a sparkle of laughter in her eyes.

I push off the stool. She’s wearing heels, but they still put her almost two inches shorter than me, and I’m struck by how tiny she is. With her big blue eyes and wild red hair, in a thin sundress and sandals with some kind of weird wedge that does fucking amazing things to her legs, she looks like a presence much bigger than she truly is. A part of me wants to scoop her up and tuck her somewhere safe, where she won’t get bruised by the world.

Because I know a fuck ton about the way the world can bruise the innocent.

“Where you at, Jokes?” she asks, and I blink out of my thoughts to focus on her. She’s watching me with curious, patient eyes.

No one has ever called me out like that. Pulled me from the dark spiral of my thoughts as easily as she just did—no one but Scotty.

I think I fall in love right then.

I shove that stupid thought down, and nod at the POS truck Scotty and I picked up a year or so back.  I hold the door open for her, and she doesn’t even seem to care that the truck is a rusted wreck. She just gives me a small, private smile as she slips into the cab. I shut the door behind her and jog around to slide behind the wheel.

“Where are we going?” she asks.

“A favorite place of mine,” I say and her eyes brighten with curiosity. But she doesn’t press for more as I put the truck in gear and pull away from the curb.

Keagan’s is a record store, although lately he’s been taking in boxes of old, used books. Records don’t sell, not the way they used to.

We push into the store and he lifts his head to peer at me from behind a ragged copy of Playboy. I wave once and steer Peyton toward the back corner. A stack of poetry books sits next to the coffee pot, and I glance at it as I pour her a cup.

“This looks like tar, Jokes.”

I nod and dump some shitty powdered cream in it before handing it to her. I make my own cup as I explain, “It’s a rite of passage. Keegan doesn’t really trust you unless you can choke down this shit. And it is shit. But I put up with it so I can come back here.”

I take her by the hand and she doesn’t protest as I lead her through the rows of crates.

Keegan doesn’t organize anything. He just puts it out there and lets folks wander through it. “I don’t know how long I’ve spent flipping through records and drinking this nasty coffee. A long damn time.”

She steps up beside me and touches the glossy cover of a record by Aretha Franklin. “My grandmother loved her. We used to listen to her for hours while Grammy would make cookies and I’d frost them. Every time I hear “A Rose is Still a Rose,” I can taste her cookies again.”

I swallow hard, shoving down the pang of loneliness that rises at her words. Not her fault, and she can’t possibly know why it stings.

I grab a crate and nod at the coffee. "Come with me."

Peyton give me an amused half-smile as she follows me to a small area with ratty couch. It looks vaguely like it was rescued from a dumpster after making a nice home for a rat family.

Smells that way too. For a heartbeat, as I drop onto the couch with a puff of stale old odor, I think I've fucked up bringing her here. Flawless and classy in her dress, she sinks down next to me, and kicks out of her wedges, curling up with her feet tucked beside her. "What are we looking for?"

I lick my lips and she follows the motion, and I know women enough to know exactly what that means,. She leans forward, just a little, and I get a peek of the gorgeous cleavage I've been trying to ignore. She smirks and taps the crate. "Focus, Jokes."

"I'm very focused," I say, my tone hoarse and hungry. Her eyes dart to me, and she hesitates for moment, but I pull back before either of us can act on the hunger that's running too hot between us.

Maybe I should have taken Lindsay to bed with Scotty. I probably wouldn't be so fucking desperate to get my hands on Peyton if I had.

"Nothing," I say, and force my tone to stay casual and even. "Anything. Nothing. We don't come looking for anything in particular, we just take what we find. That's the beauty of Keegan's; you never know what you'll come across, so you take what you find."

"When did you find this place?" she asks as I pull out a stack of records and begin flipping through them.

"When I turned sixteen. We grew up around here, and we both loved music. We had the freedom to roam then, so we'd meet here and flip through shit until it was time to go home. Keegan sold Scotty his first guitar—a broke ass piece of shit he picked up with a few dozen boxes of broken records. It was the only thing I've ever seen him give away, and I think it was mostly because Scotty offered to take the rest of the junk to the dump. We loved this place."

"You still do," she contributes, leaning over and snagging a bright purple record from me and examining it. She sips her coffee and shudders, before she sets it aside and studies the album artwork intently. I try to ignore her focusing on the stack in front of me. But it's hard, especially as she relaxes and more of her slight body weight leans into me, warming my side in the best possible way.

Her breath brushes against my neck as she leans across me and puts her selection in the keep pile.

"How did you get started on the drum?"

Keegan found a set of drums, a few weeks later. Looking back, we knew what he was doing. Keeping us together and off the streets. Out of the shit that was our reality. But at the time, it was just a weird coincidence that gave us another outlet. And as long as we weren't asking for money, no one really cared what we did.

It was one of the few bright spots of our life growing up.

"The drums showed up a little laterand the rest was history. We played all the time. I didn't really care; it was for Scott"

She examines me for a moment, and then, "You are very close to him."

I nod, not bothering to argue or justify it.

Most chicks don't really get my friendship with Scott. Most either like us because we're into sharing, or they get annoyed because we have no boundaries. I'm pretty sure Peyton isn't into kinky shit, but I don't know that she's sitting in the second category either. And that's something I'm not sure I know what to do with.

"You’re thinking again. Stay with me," she murmurs, squeezing my hand, and I flash her a smile before I drop a stack of records in her lap. She makes a little noise of surprise, and I grin.

"Help me."

Chapter 4 : After

Quiet. The darkness

Presses against me, the

Distance yawns between us.

Quiet. And in the stillness,

space melts away. And

there you are.

(Rike’s poem to Peyton)

The shrink the hospital sends me to is a fucking joke.

She wants to try meditation and hypnosis. Because either of those will help. I’ve spent three days here and I know nothing about who I am or why the hell I’m here.