Justin was standing in front of me, and I swear it was like the boy I’d left behind had been swallowed up by a lean mass of muscle. He just looked so different from what I remembered nine years ago. The anger on his face was transparent and somehow made him even more incredibly hot. It just would have been better if it weren’t directed toward me.
His skin was a beautiful shade of bronze that complemented the natural golden streaks in his dark blond hair. The smooth face I remembered was now rough and unshaven. A rope and barb wire tattoo wrapped around his bicep. He was wearing camouflage cargo shorts with a tight white ribbed tank that hugged his chiseled chest.
An indeterminate amount of time passed as I just took him in. Even though I was too stunned to say anything, my heart was screaming. I knew deep down my reaction wasn’t just because of my physical attraction to him. It was because despite all of the changes, one thing had stayed exactly the same. His eyes. They reflected the same hurt that I remembered from the very last time I saw him.
His name finally managed to roll off my tongue. “Justin…”
“Amelia.” The deep, throaty sound of his voice vibrated through me.
“I wasn’t sure if you were ever going to show up.”
“Why wouldn’t I have?” he sneered.
“Well, I thought maybe you were avoiding me.”
“You’ve overestimated your significance to me. Of course, I was going to come. This is half my house.”
His words stung. “I didn’t say it wasn’t. It’s just…I hadn’t heard anything from you.”
“Interesting how that goes.”
Clearly uncomfortable with our sparring, Jade cleared her throat. “I was just asking Amelia if she wanted to have dinner with us tonight. Maybe you guys can catch up.”
“Apparently, she already has plans.”
I turned to him. “Why do you say that?”
“Oh, I don’t know…because you’re holding a bag that smells like dirty snatch?”
“It’s fresh seafood.”
“Doesn’t smell very fresh to me.”
“God. We haven’t seen each other in nine years, and this is how you act?” I turned to Jade. “Is he always this rude?”
Before she could answer, he cracked, “I guess you bring it out in me.”
“You think Nana would be happy right now with your attitude? Something tells me she didn’t leave us this house so that we could fight with each other.”
“She left us both this house because we each meant something to her. That doesn’t mean we have to mean anything to each other. Anyway, if you cared so much about what Mrs. H. thought, maybe you shouldn’t have run away.”
“That’s a low blow.”
“The truth hurts, I guess.”
“I tried to contact you, Justin. I—”
“I’m not talking about this now, Amelia,” he said, speaking through gritted teeth. “It’s old news.”
It was unnerving to hear him call me by my actual name. Aside from the very first day we’d met, he’d always called me Patch or Patchy. Hearing my name come out of his mouth felt like a slap in the face for some reason, like he was trying to emphasize how much we’d grown apart.
Justin went from hot to cold as he shut down, heading back outside to retrieve the groceries from his car but not before slamming the door behind him.
I shuddered, looking over at Jade whose eyeballs were moving back and forth from side to side in confusion.
“Well, that was a nice start,” I joked.
“I don’t know what to say. I’ve never seen him act like that toward anyone to be honest. I’m really sorry.”
“It’s not your fault. Believe it or not, I probably deserve it.”
The only thing worse than the rude reception he’d given me was his blatantly ignoring me during dinner and for the rest of that night. That hurt more than anything he could have ever said to me.
***
If I thought the evening was horrible, lack of sleep assured that the next morning was even worse.
Apparently, Justin found a way to take out his anger—by taking it out on Jade. Let’s just say playing guitar wasn’t the only talent he’d fully developed over time. Jade’s moaning in the middle of the night as Justin pounded into her woke me up. The walls literally shook. It was impossible to go back to sleep after that. I tossed and turned, my thoughts alternating between rehashing Justin’s words to me from earlier to imagining what that scene in the other room actually looked like. Not that I really should have been thinking about the latter, but I couldn’t seem to help myself.
It was 7AM, and the house was quiet, so I assumed they were both catching up on sleep after their sexcapade. When I snuck downstairs to make some coffee, to my surprise, he was standing in the kitchen alone staring out of the spacious window overlooking the water. Coffee was percolating. His back was toward me, so he hadn’t seen me standing there yet.
I used the opportunity to admire his stature and the flawless skin of his defined, shirtless back. Black gym pants hugged his beautifully round ass. I never realized how incredible his ass was. My physical attraction to him really irked me under the circumstances, but that didn’t stop me from checking him out. He had a rectangular-shaped tattoo in the middle of his back. Squinting, I unsuccessfully tried to figure out what it was. He startled me when he suddenly turned around and met me with an incendiary stare.
“Do you always ogle people when you think they can’t see you?”
I swallowed the lump in my throat. “How did you know I was standing here?”
“I could see your reflection in the window, genius.”
Shit.
“You didn’t even flinch. I didn’t think you noticed me.”
“Clearly.”
“Are you trying to make me hate you or something? Because you’re doing a pretty damn good job.”
Justin didn’t answer my question. Instead, he just turned back around toward the window.
“Why do you do that?” I asked.
“Do what?”
“Say things to piss me off then shut down?”
He continued to speak to the window, “Would you rather I just continue to piss you off? I’m trying to get my anger in check with you, Amelia. You should be happy I know when to stop…unlike some people.”
“Will you at least look at me when you’re talking to me?”
He turned around and walked toward me slowly then leaned his face in. I could feel his words on my lips when he asked, “Is this better? You’d rather me in your face like this?”
I could practically taste his breath. My entire body felt weak from the close contact, so I backed away.
“I didn’t think so,” he snarled.
I walked over to the refrigerator and opened it, pretending to look for something. It annoyed me that my peaceful mornings were a thing of the past.
“You always get up this early?” I asked.
“I’m a morning person.”
“I can see that…so bright and cheery,” I said, sarcastically. “Some of us need sleep, though.”
“I slept just fine last night.”
“Oh, I know…after you traumatized me. You must have passed out after all that screwing. Could you two have been any louder last night?”
“Well, excuse me. If I can’t fuck in my own house where do you expect me to do it?”
“I didn’t say you couldn’t do it. Just be more respectful.”
“Define respect.”
“Doing it quietly.”
“Sorry. I don’t fuck quietly.”
As much as I hated that answer, I somehow felt that those words would be repeating in my head later tonight.
“Forget it. Clearly, you don’t know the meaning of respect.”
“Respect you? Why…because you’re not getting laid? Why don’t you hook up with some salty dude down at the dock? Maybe then you won’t care so much about other people’s business.”
“Salty dude?”
“Yeah. You know, the guys that live on the boats…the ones who sell you that nasty fish you were eating last night.”
I just shook my head and rolled my eyes, refusing to dignify that comment with a response.
He surprised me when he suddenly lifted the carafe. “Want some coffee?”
“Now you’re being nice?”
“No, I just figured you’re sticking around for some reason. It must be the coffee.”
“This is my kitchen.”
He winked. “Our kitchen.” Grabbing two mugs from the cabinet, he asked, “How do you take yours?”
“Cream and sugar.”
“I’ll take care of it while you go put on a bra.”
I looked down at my boobs which were hanging freely beneath my white t-shirt. Not expecting to run into him this early, I hadn’t thought to put one on. Too embarrassed to acknowledge the fact that he’d noticed, I went back to my room and got dressed.
When I returned, he was back at the window, drinking his coffee.
“Is this better?” I asked, referring to my dress.
He turned around and gave me a once over. “Define better. If better means I can’t see your tits anymore…yes, it’s better. If better, means you look better, that’s debatable.”
“What’s wrong with this?”
“It looks like you sewed it yourself.”
“Actually, it’s from one of the shops on the island. It is handmade.”
“Out of a potato sack?”
“I don’t think so.”
Maybe?
He snickered. “Your coffee’s on the counter, Raggedy Ann.”
My inclination was to try to come up with a comeback, but then I realized that was probably what he wanted. I needed to kill him with kindness instead of showing my anger.
“Thank you. That was nice of you to make it for me.”
Asshole.
I took a sip and immediately spit it out. “What did you put in this? It’s so strong!”
Instead of answering me, he just started to crack up. His laughter resonated through the kitchen, and as much as I hated that it was at my expense, it was the first time he’d laughed. It took me back in time for a moment and served as the only real reminder that the smoking hot asshole in front of me used to be my best friend.
“You don’t like it?”
“It’s a bit strong. What is it?”
“It’s coffee fusion, actually.”
“What does that even mean?”
Justin sauntered over to the cabinet and took out a can and a package. “It’s my own recipe. Cuban coffee mixed with this one.” He pointed to the black packaging that had a white skull and crossbones on it.
“What the hell is that?”
“It’s coffee. I order it online. Nothing else is caffeinated enough for me.”
“That’s why you wanted to serve it to me, wasn’t it? You knew I’d hate this…concoction.”
Instead of answering, he simply let out that raspy laugh of his again, except this time, he was laughing way harder than before.
Jade entered the kitchen, wearing a long black t-shirt that must have been the one he wasn’t wearing. “What’s so funny?”
Justin’s mischievous eyes peeked from behind his mug. He snickered. “We were just having coffee.”
Jade shook her head. “You didn’t drink his mud, did you? I don’t know how he likes that stuff.”
I reminded myself of my plan to kill him with kindness. Taking another sip of the coffee, I nodded. “Actually, at first taste, it was pretty strong, but I actually think I really like it.”
It was disgusting.
“You’d better be careful. That shit is potent. Justin is immune to it, but the one and only time I drank it, it kept me up for like four days.”
Justin chuckled. “Apparently, we kept Amelia up last night.”
Jade turned to me. “Oh, shit. I’m sorry.”
Shrugging, I said, “It’s no big deal. I got used to it after a while.”
“Was that when you decided you wished you could join in?” he cracked.
Fuck him.
I was not going to respond to that.
The more I looked over at his smug expression, the more determined I became to finish the entire damn mug of coffee to spite him. “I’m really surprised at how much I’m actually liking this,” I lied.
Jade chose to ignore Justin’s earlier comment. “What do you say after breakfast we head to town, Amelia? I’d love it if you could show me around the island.”
“Alright. That would be nice.”
She walked over to him and wrapped her arm around his waist. “You want to come with us, babe?”
“No. I have shit to do,” Justin said before finishing off the last of his coffee and putting the cup in the sink.
“Okay. Just the girls then.”
***
The coffee had turned me into a spaz. As Jade and I walked around Newport that morning, she kept having to tell me to slow down. Apparently, in her heels, she couldn’t keep up with me.
At one point later in the afternoon, we stopped to rest our legs. Jade and I sat on a wooden bench overlooking the dozens of docked sailboats as the sun shined over the water.
“So, how did you and Justin meet?” I asked.
“I was in the audience at this club called Hades in the city. Justin was performing there that night. He was eyeing me the whole time he was singing and after the show, he came to find me. When he said he was thinking of me while he was singing the last song, I nearly died. We’ve been inseparable since.”
My face felt hot. I wasn’t willing to admit to myself that it was jealousy. The thought of them connecting so intimately while he was in the middle of performing made me uncomfortable for some reason. Maybe because it reminded me of the songs he used to write for me. You’d think nothing would bother me after having to endure their fucking last night.
“What kind of music does he play now?”
“Well, he does some covers of artists like Jack Johnson, but he also writes a lot of original stuff. He mostly plays clubs, but his manager has been trying to get him a music deal. Of course, the girls all go crazy over him. That part has taken some getting used to for me.”
“I’m sure it’s hard.”
“Yeah. Big time.” She tilted her head. “What about you? No boyfriend?”
“I just got out of a relationship.”
I spent the next half-hour rehashing to her what happened with Adam. Jade was really easy to talk to, and I could tell it really upset her to find out about Adam’s cheating on me.
“Well, better to find out these things now while you’re still young than to waste a decade with someone like that.”
“You’re very right.”
“We’ll have to find you someone this summer. I’ve seen a lot of hot guys walking around here today.”
“Really? Because the only ones I’ve seen were holding each other’s hands.”
She laughed. “No. There were others.”
“I’m really not looking to get into another relationship.”
“Who said anything about that? You need to get laid…have some fun, especially after what that dick of an ex did to you. You deserve a hot summer fling, someone who knocks your socks off, someone you can’t stop thinking about even when they’re not around.”
Sadly, it’s your boyfriend that I can’t get out of my head at the moment.
She meant well, so I just smiled and nodded even though I had no intention of sleeping with anyone this summer.
On our way home, we passed Sandy’s on the Beach, a restaurant that was known for live music at night and really good food. A sign out front read, Temporary Summer Help Wanted. Since there was a university just over the bridge, a lot of the students went home in the summer, leaving some of the local restaurants in need of temporary wait staff.
I stopped short in front of the entrance. “Do you mind if I go in and inquire about this?”
“Sure. I’d actually like to check it out, too.”
It turned out that Sandy’s was desperate for summer help. Both Jade and I had waitressing experience, so we sat down and filled out applications. By the time we walked out of there, we each had a job. The manager basically told us we could work any night we wanted. The extra money and flexibility was impossible to pass up. Jade was particularly happy that he’d told her it was no problem if she had to suddenly cancel a shift in the event she got called back to Manhattan for an audition. We were each going to start tomorrow.
That night, Jade thought we should celebrate our new jobs over dinner and drinks on the upper deck back at the house. It hadn’t dawned on me how peaceful being away from Justin all day had been.
When we walked in the door, butterflies started to swarm in my stomach again as soon as I smelled his cologne. Justin was standing in the kitchen drinking a beer when Jade ran over to him and wrapped her arms around his neck. Justin was tall—over six feet—but Jade wasn’t that much shorter than him. Next to both of them, I was basically a midget.
God, he cleaned up nice.
Justin had changed out of his camouflage shorts from earlier into dark jeans and a gray shirt with black stripes that hugged his chest. He’d done something to his hair that I couldn’t pinpoint. Maybe washed it? Whatever it was, it brought out the blue in his eyes—eyes that were now gazing into Jade’s.
She ran her fingers through his hair then kissed him. “I missed you, babe. Guess what? We both got jobs at this restaurant on the beach.”
“Did you tell them you could get called back to New York anytime?”
“The guy said it didn’t matter. He said I could basically just work whenever I want.”
“Really. That sounds a bit shady to me. But whatever. You sure he doesn’t just want in your pants, Jade?”
“He said the same thing to me,” I interrupted.
“Well, then it can’t be that.”
It took me a bit to realize that he’d just insulted me.
Jade intercepted before I could muster up a comeback. “It’s mild out. How about we all have dinner on the upstairs deck tonight. We could barbecue that steak I have marinating in the fridge.”
I didn’t have the heart to tell her I don’t like red meat, so I just kept quiet. He would probably think I was looking for an excuse not to have dinner with them.
Kill him with kindness.
“I’m not that great of a cook, but I can make a big salad.”
Justin smacked the counter. “Great. I’ll start the grill while Amelia tosses her big salad.”
He started to walk outside when I yelled after him.
“You know what Nana would say to you right now? She’d tell you to go wash your dirty mouth out with soap.”
He turned around and lifted his brow. “Soap wouldn’t cut it.”
I suppose I should have been happy that he was talking to me as opposed to pretending I wasn’t there. I guess we were making progress?
After chopping up lettuce, carrots, red onion, tomatoes and cucumbers, I dressed the salad with homemade honey mustard vinaigrette.
I carried it upstairs where Justin and Jade were already sitting down at the table. Jade had poured three glasses of Merlot, and Justin was sipping one as he looked over at the waves, which were rough tonight.
Once we started eating, Justin wouldn’t look at me or make conversation. I filled my plate with salad and bread, and it took a while before anyone noticed that I wasn’t eating anything else.
Jade’s mouth was full when she said, “You didn’t even touch the steak.”
“I don’t really like to eat meat.”
Justin chuckled. “Is that why you can’t find a man?”
I dropped my fork. “You’re a prick. Seriously. I don’t recognize you anymore. How were we ever best friends?”
“I used to ask myself that all the time before I stopped giving a shit.”
I got up from the table and went downstairs. Leaning against the kitchen counter, I breathed in and out slowly to calm myself down.
Jade came up quietly behind me. “I really don’t get what’s going on between you two or why he refuses to talk about it. Are you sure you guys never dated?”
“I told you, Jade. It wasn’t anything like that.”
“Will you tell me what happened?”
“I think he should be the one to explain it to you. Honestly, I don’t want to piss him off any more than I already have by overstepping my bounds. Besides, I can honestly say that if he’s mad, it’s because of the way I left…my running away. Anything that happened before that is irrelevant now. He’s pissed because of how I handled it.”
“Let’s just go back upstairs and try to have a nice dinner.”
Back on the upper deck, Justin was stone-faced, pouring more wine into his glass. A part of me wanted to slap him across the face, but another part felt guilty that I had caused so much anger in him. He said he didn’t care, but I refused to believe he would be acting up like this if he didn’t.
I touched his arm. “Will you just talk to me?”
He whipped his arm away. “I’m over it. I’m not talking about anything.”
“Will you do it for Nana?”
His head flipped up, and his beautiful blue eyes darkened. “Stop fucking bringing her into this. Your grandmother was a wonderful woman. She was the mother I never had. She never turned her back on me like pretty much everyone else in my life. This house is a representation of Mrs. H., which is why I’m here. I’m not here because of you. You want me to talk, but what you don’t seem to understand is that I don’t have anything to say about anything that happened almost a decade ago. I’ve erased it all. It’s too late, Amelia. I don’t care if you and Jade become friends, alright? But don’t bother trying to get through to me because we’re not gonna be friends. You put me in a shit mood, and I don’t want to spend this whole summer in a shit mood. We’re roommates. Nothing more. Stop pretending there is something more to it. Stop pretending to like the goddamn coffee. Stop pretending everything is just great. Cut the shit and see things for what they are. We don’t mean anything to each other.” He got up and took his plate. “I’m done, Jade. I’ll see you in the room.”
Jade and I sat in silence, listening to nothing but the sound of the waves crashing beneath us.
“I’m so sorry, Amelia.”
“Please. Don’t, okay? He’s right. Sometimes, you can’t fix things.” Despite the complacent words that had come out of my mouth, a tear fell down my cheek.
***
Eleven Years Earlier
Mom had left to go out again. Lord knows where she went or with whom. I could never count on my mother, Patricia, for anything. There were only two people I could depend on in my life: Nana and Justin.
The one good thing about Mom leaving me alone most nights was that it allowed me to sneak out of the house and go wherever I wanted. Nana assumed my mother was home half of the time, so she couldn’t stop me.
Justin and I were planning to meet in fifteen minutes. We were going to the mall to hang out with some of the other eighth graders from school. These kids were part of the cool crowd that Justin and I had been trying to break into. Because the two of us mainly hung out with each other, we really weren’t associated with any one clique.
He was waiting at the corner with his hands in his pockets. I loved when he wore his baseball cap backwards and the way the dirty blond strands of hair peeked out of the sides. I was starting to notice little things like that more and more lately. It was hard not to.
He walked toward me. “You ready to go?”
“Yeah.”
Justin started to run. “We have to hurry up. The next bus is in five minutes.”
I didn’t know why the thought of hanging out with these kids was making me so nervous. Justin didn’t seem nervous at all. He was more confident than me in general.
When we stepped inside the mall, the fluorescent lights were a sharp contrast to the dark winter outside. We were supposed to be meeting these kids at the food court, so we made our way to a map of the three-story building.
My heart was pounding as we approached the two boys and a girl who were standing outside of an Auntie Annie’s pretzel stand. Justin could tell I was on edge.
“Don’t be nervous, Patch.”
The first thing I remember hearing out of Chandler’s mouth was, “What the hell is that?”
“What?”
“Did you shit yourself, Amelia?”
My heart was now beating out of my chest as I looked down at myself. I knew that despite my nerves, I hadn’t lost control of my bowels. One knows if that happens, right? No. This was not poop; it was blood. I wasn’t prepared for it because it was the first time I’d ever gotten my period. At thirteen, I was later than most of the other girls I knew. This was probably the worst timing imaginable.
Justin looked down then up into my panicked eyes.
I mouthed to him, “It’s blood.”
Without hesitation, he gave me a quick nod as if to say that he had it covered.
“It’s blood,” he said.
“Blood? Ew…gross!” the other boy, Ethan, said.
“Amelia stabbed herself with my knife on the way here.”
I’d been looking down, but I whipped my head up and looked over at my friend incredulously.
Chandler’s eyes widened. “She stabbed herself?”
“Yeah.” Justin smiled. To my surprise, he took a pocket knife out of his jacket. “See this here? I carry it everywhere with me. It’s a Swiss Army knife. Anyway, I was showing it to Amelia on the bus. I dared her to stab herself in the abdomen. Crazy girl that she is, she actually did it. So, anyway, she’s got blood on her pants now.”
“Are you joking?”
“Wish I was, dude.”
The three of them looked at each other before Chandler said, “That’s the coolest fucking thing I’ve ever heard!”
Ethan smacked my arm. “Seriously, Amelia. That’s some epic shit right there.”
Justin laughed. “Yeah, so anyway…we figured we’d come say ‘hey’ since we were almost here anyway…but we should probably get her to the emergency room.”
“Cool, man. Let us know how it goes.”
“Alright.”
“What the heck did you just do?” I whispered as we walked away.
“Don’t say anything. Just walk.”
The cool night air hit us as we exited the rotating doors of the mall. We stood on the sidewalk and stared at each other for a moment before breaking into hysterical laughter.
“I can’t believe you came up with that crazy story.”
“Not that you should be ashamed of the truth, but I knew you were embarrassed. So, I wanted to do something. You were pulling on your hair like crazy.”
“I was? I didn’t even realize.”
“Yeah. You do that when you’re really nervous.”
“I never knew you noticed that.”
His eyes travelled down to my lips for a moment when he said, “I notice everything about you.”
Feeling suddenly flush, I changed the subject. “I never knew you carried a knife.”
“I always do. You know, in case something happens when we’re out. I need to be able to protect you.”
My heart that was beating for those jerks just a moment ago was now beating incessantly for an entirely different reason.
“I’d better get home.”
“There’s a drug store right there. Why don’t you go get something. Ask them if they have a bathroom you can use.”
I went inside and used the money I had reserved for video games at the mall arcade to buy a box of maxi pads and some cheap granny underwear. I’d tackle tampons later when I had time to figure out how to use them.
When I emerged, Justin took off his hoodie and handed it to me. “Here, wrap this around your waist.”
“Thank you.”
“Where are we going now?” he asked.
“What do you mean? I have to get home! I have blood all over my pants.”
“No one can see it with my jacket wrapped around you.”
“I still don’t feel comfortable.”
“I really don’t want to go back home tonight, Patch. I know where we can go…where we won’t know anyone. It’s some place I go by myself sometimes. Come on.”
Justin led me down the sidewalks of Providence. After about ten minutes, we turned a corner and approached a small red building. I looked up at the illuminated sign.
“This is a movie theater?”
“Yup. They show the kind of movies that nobody knows about or that people don’t talk about. The best part? They don’t even care how old you are here.”
“Are they bad movies?”
“No. Not like those naked kind of movies, the ones I told you my dad watches. No. These ones are like foreign with subtitles and stuff.”
Justin bought two tickets and a popcorn for us to share. The theater smelled musty and was practically empty, which was perfect considering I didn’t want to see anyone tonight. Even though the seats were sticky, this was just what I needed.
The movie was a French film with subtitles, called L’Amour Vrai. The cinematography was mesmerizing, and the plot was more serious than the comedies we normally watched. But it was perfect. Perfect not only because of what was on the big screen but because of who was next to me. I lay my head on Justin’s shoulder and thanked God for a friend who always knew exactly what I needed. There was also a twinge of something unidentifiable running through me, a gnawing feeling that would eventually identify itself over time and reach its pinnacle shortly before I ran away from it all.
That wasn’t the last independent film Justin and I would watch together at the little red theater. That place became our secret hangout over the next couple of years. Indie movies became our thing. Going there wasn’t about being seen at the big cinema or running into people from school. It was a place where we could both escape from reality without being watched, a place where we could be together and get lost in a different world at the same time.
The following afternoon, I listened from my window as Justin sat on Nana’s stoop, playing a new song I’d never heard him perform before. It sounded like I Touch Myself by the Divinyls, but he’d changed it to I Stab Myself.
Gotta love that kid.
