“No, I’m sure you are, but you know I don’t share a bed with anyone.”
He leans over the counter. “I know and I’d really like to know why.”
I give a one-shoulder shrug. “For the same reason I don’t share anything else. Because I don’t like people touching my stuff.” That’s not entirely true. I used to hate sleeping alone—being alone in general.
After I found my parents murdered, I stayed in the house with them for twenty-fours hours, and it was the longest twenty-four hours of my existence. The longer I stayed in the house with the bodies the farther I sank into the loneliness and myself. I kept telling myself to get up, but I knew once I did that it’d be over. That I’d have to say good-bye. Finally the silence broke me down, though, and I had to move.
I didn’t cry right away after the funerals. It’d taken a few days and then I couldn’t stop. It went on forever and I just wanted someone to comfort me. And I hated sleeping alone with the nightmares filled with loneliness. I tried to get someone to hold me, hug me, help me not feel so alone, but in the end, no one wanted the job. And finally I decided not to be so weak. I made myself be strong. Be okay with being alone. Be okay with only having myself.
“Earth to Violet.” Preston waves his hand in front of my face. “You’re spacing off on me.”
“Sorry.” I go to put the bag of weed in my pocket, but realize I forgot my jacket. “Shit, I don’t have any effin pockets in this dress.”
Preston cocks his head to the side and strands of his hair fall into his liquid blue eyes. “Personally I like the dress…” He looks me over and I try not to let his penetrating gaze make me uncomfortable, but it kind of does. “I have an idea.” He rubs his scruffy jawline as he winds around the counter and I turn in the barstool to face him. He sticks his hand out. “Give me the bag.”
I drop it in his hand and he folds his fingers around it and reaches for my chest. I flinch, but don’t say anything, focusing instead on keep my breathing even as his hand brushes the top of the dress.
“You’re not wearing a bra.” He bites his lip, his hand lingering on my chest for a moment, then he moves it toward my hip, reaching around to my back where the dress opens up and my bare skin shows. He barely slips his fingers underneath the fabric and then tucks the bag just beneath the waistband of my thong, my skin blazing with heat at the contact of his fingers. It’s not like I’m innocent. Guys have groped me and I let their hands wander wherever they want as long as it’s nothing more than business. It’s easy to ignore everything when they’re just a face, think of something else, like how much laundry I have to do. But if there’s the slightest spark of emotion then I push away.
The idea of connecting with someone emotionally and intimately never has appealed to me. Emotions haven’t in general. They serve no point other than to lead to disappointment when you realize you’re feeling something for someone who doesn’t reciprocate. Preston knows this about me and it makes me sort of question why he would touch me like this. He can joke with me all he wants, but touching is off limits with people I have some sort of relationship with whether it be foster dad or friend, whichever he is to me… it sometimes gets confusing.
I’m battling to get oxygen into my lungs without gasping as my head swirls with confusion and the urge to ram my fist into his jaw.
“Just don’t get too crazy with your dance moves,” he says, withdrawing his hand and winking at me. Then he circles the corner of the kitchen counter. “There’s a party in Fairtown,” he tells me, carrying on the conversation as if nothing happened as he digs through his cupboards for something. “You should hit it up. That town’s full of potheads.”
I swallow the anger down and force my voice to come out as upbeat as a cheerleader on crack. “Okay, sounds good.” With my back turned to him, I squeeze my eyes shut, reminding myself to breathe, reminding myself that he’s all I got and when faced with the choice of being entirely alone or taking this, I choose this.
Chapter 5
Luke
I have a beer in my hand and a few shots in my system, building my safety net for the night. Without them, I’d feel like I was helplessly falling nowhere. I know it’s a dangerous road I’m headed down, especially because I’m a diabetic. There have been a few instances where I pushed my body’s limits and doctors have told me that if I don’t stop, I could end up dead. The problem is that living without alcohol is a life I can’t live.
It’s Saturday night and I’m checking my computer for listing of apartments for rent. As usual, nothing turns up, nothing affordable anyway. It’s the wrong time of year, summer break approaching, and all the college students are looking for places to live so they fill up quickly. If I had more money saved up, it’d be easier, but I don’t. I’m starting to debate whether I can look past my resentment toward my father and ask him if I can come live with him or at least stay at the beach house. But the idea of asking him for help, when I got so little of it growing up, makes me feel weak. I want him to have to work to be my father. I don’t know for sure how much he knows about what went on, but what I do know is that for years there wasn’t enough contact from him for me to even tell him. The only thing I can do is let the memories haunt my head, which they do pretty much every night when I close my eyes, unless I’m drunk. When I’m drunk, nothing is in my head.
I get a text as I’m shutting the computer. I pick my phone up off the desk and swipe my finger over the screen. It’s from Seth, Callie’s best friend. I sometimes hang out with him and his boyfriend Greyson, since they both like to party as much as I do.
Seth: R u going out tonight?
Me: Aren’t I always?
Seth: Where u headed?
Me: Probably to the Red Ink up on 6th street. Why? You got something planned?
Seth. Not yet. Red Ink, huh? You must be looking for a skank tonight.
Me: Tonight? Don’t you mean always?
Seth: You know, rumor has it you’ve been hanging out with the biggest skank on campus.
Luke: What? Who?
Seth: A bitchy roommate with a dragon tattoo on her neck. Goes by the name of Violet.
I scratch at my head, wondering where the hell he heard that from, but then it clicks.
Luke: Did Callie tell you that?
Seth: Well, she didn’t use those words per se since Callie would never use those words, but she said she saw you helping Violet around campus… what’s that about?