Put Me Back Together (27 page)

Did I remember? It was pretty much seared in my brain—the first time I’d really realized how much I wanted him.

“I was just playing with you, trying to make you admit you liked it, even though you kept insisting you wanted to be ‘just friends.’ But then I saw your lips trembling and I could tell I was moving a little too fast. I put two and two together and I just knew.”

“And it doesn’t make you want me less?” I asked him, wishing my voice didn’t sound so weak and small.

“I really don’t think it’s a question of how much I want you,” Lucas said. Placing his hands on the small of my back, he very gently pressed me forward until I was right up against him, my panties pressing right against his crotch, and I could feel how hard he was right through his jeans. The slight pressure in that oh-so-sensitive place made my body flush all over again.

“Even now, while we’re talking? We aren’t even kissing,” I said, my voice very low. It seemed wrong to be talking about this in anything other than a whisper.

He wrapped his arms around me, somehow pulling me even closer, and the whole room seemed to shake as we rubbed together, the sensations that had been coursing through my body all redirecting their energy to that one little place. “Whenever you’re around me,” he said, his lips against my cheek. “In the car, at dinner, even in class.” He moved his hips and I let out a gasp. “This is what you do to me.”

Throwing my arms around his neck, I pushed my mouth against his, my every reservation disintegrating as my whole body throbbed.

“Take me to the bedroom,” I breathed into his ear, and I heard him take just one ragged breath in response before he stood up, my legs still wrapped around him, and carried me down the hall.

I had the sudden urge to scream out “Yippee!” but thankfully I was able to hold it in.

He paused as he reached the closed door, pressing me back against it. His lips met mine, but his kisses weren’t quite as frenzied as they’d been earlier.

“Katie, I’m going to take you into this room,” he said seriously. “And I’m going to do things to you that will make you scream.”

I giggled. Oh boy, I was really going crazy with desire if I was giggling.

“But,” Lucas went on, “I don’t think we should have sex tonight.”

“What do you mean?” I whined. All the right parts were still pressed together in this position. I could barely see straight, let alone control myself, or my mouth.

“Don’t get me wrong, I want to,” he said. “I think that’s pretty obvious. But I don’t want your first time to be on our first date, do you? Your first time should be wonderful. I want to make it wonderful for you. And I want to be sure that you’re ready.”

“Oh, I’m ready,” I said. The searing heat between my legs told me so.

“Just trust me on this one, okay?” Lucas said, and his expression was so pleading that I couldn’t help but agree.

“I’m still going to scream, though, right?” I said playfully as he leaned down to open my bedroom door, which, come to think of it, I didn’t remember closing that morning. My own words echoed in my ears as the door swung open and Lucas tensed, tightening his grip on me and trying to back out of the room again, but I was too fast. I slithered out of his grasp, taking in the confusion and panic in his eyes before I swung around.

I’m still going to scream, though, right?

But I didn’t scream right away. I didn’t scream as I took in my paintings, the ones I’d taken off the wall to hide from Lucas, strewn across my bed, torn to pieces. I didn’t scream when I saw the paper with its two haunting words, the paper I hadn’t noticed was missing from my coffee table, sitting now on my pillow, stabbed through with a knife. And I didn’t scream when I saw the four-letter word written across the wall above my bed in a red substance that might have been blood.

LIAR

Lucas put a hand on my arm and said, “Katie, what—”

That was when I started screaming.

“Get out!” I cried, shoving him backwards as hard as I could, ignoring the look of utter shock on his face. “Get out of here!”

I’d caught him off guard and he stumbled backwards, though he had thirty pounds on me at least. But he didn’t have the weight of my horror bearing down on him. He didn’t have the strength of my barreling dread, or the fear I’d been holding inside of me for what seemed like forever. Fear of this moment. Fear of what was happening right now.

“Katie, let me help,” he said. He’d regained his balance and turned back to the door, but I was too quick for him. “No, stay out!” I shouted, terrified more than anything that he might come back in and see it all again.

I slammed the door in his face and swiftly turned the lock as he called my name and shook the door handle.

That was when the tears came, blurring my vision and pouring down my cheeks. I slid down the door, which vibrated against my skin as he pounded on it. I slid all the way to the floor, and wept.

16

I slept right there on the floor, my cheek pressed into the hardwood, shivering long into the night in my flimsy dress. I didn’t even consider moving to the bed, and not only because it was a god-awful mess and my pillow—which I would be throwing out later—had a knife cut right through it. Not only because I didn’t want to lie down under those four letters, dripping with malice. The real reason I didn’t at least pull a blanket off the mattress to cover myself was that I didn’t think I deserved it.

My past had finally, completely caught up with me. My shame had nowhere to hide.

The sun woke me up the next morning, an errant ray of light falling through the window I’d failed to cover the night before to pierce my eyelids. I dragged myself off the floor and Turner did the same, uncurling himself from his position beside me on the floor. It was the first time he’d ever slept beside me.

Great. I’m so pathetic even my cat feels sorry for me
.

Grabbing my glasses from my dresser, I stood in the middle of my room facing my reflection in the mirror. My face was a disaster, my eyes raw and red, my skin a wan yellow, my cheek inflamed from spending the night shoved into the uneven wooden floor. I’d forgotten to take out my contacts the night before, but it didn’t matter; I’d cried them out. My bedraggled hair fell over my shoulders in knots I knew it would take me hours to brush out. Anita’s dress, now so wrinkled I doubted it would ever be the same, hung on me weirdly, making me look about fifty years old. I realized it was because I was stooping, as though fifty years of sorrow were piled on my back. Overall, I looked like a homeless widow, or a mad feral girl. What was most frightening was that I recognized myself in these figures.

That’s me
, I thought.
That horror is me
.

I didn’t know where Lucas had gotten to. For a long time, far longer than I would have expected, he’d stayed by the door, pleading with me to let him in. After a while I could tell he’d sat down with his back against it, because his voice had seemed to be calling right into my ear. As I sat there, still crying, I could almost feel the heat of him through the door, just a thin plank of wood separating his back from mine. Eventually I cried myself to sleep.

Peeling off the dress, I yanked on a pair of yoga pants and a Queen’s sweatshirt and pulled my nightmare hair into a ponytail, all the while peering at the crack at the bottom of the door to try to discern a shadow. But there wasn’t one. I assumed he’d gone home. Maybe he’d left a note.

My glance moved to the bed.

Or maybe not.

I didn’t touch the bed. I didn’t go anywhere near the bed. I stepped close enough to see that the red letters were not painted in blood, but in red paint, the paintbrush and tube pilfered from my supplies on the floor by my desk. Having seen this, I turned and left the room.

When I walked into the living room I saw some movement out of the corner of my eye and started, ready to scream, but it was only Lucas getting up from the couch. We stared at each other for a moment. His hair was sort of sticking up and his clothes were rumpled, but he was still the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. Even if his expression was unreadable. The emotions that bubbled up in me at the sight of him were so strong they were almost frightening, mainly because I didn’t feel as though I had the right to them anymore. I’d never really felt like I had a right to be with Lucas. It figured that I was about to lose him.

“I didn’t think you’d stay,” I said. It was the only thought in my head.

Lucas practically gaped at me. “You thought I would leave you here alone after seeing
that
?” He gestured in the direction of my bedroom. “Katie, what the hell is going on?”

He stared at me as I tried to avoid his gaze. He hadn’t exactly raised his voice, but he was as worked up as I’d ever seen him, his every muscle tense as if he expected some nameless enemy to come crashing out of my room at any moment.

“Nothing, it’s fine,” I answered, though since my voice was shaking when I said it I think it was pretty unconvincing. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Lucas flexing his fingers as though he was considering strangling me.

But he’s not going to strangle me
, I reminded myself.
Lucas is not Brandon.

Still, when he moved toward me I took a step back automatically. It seemed important to keep some space between us. I felt shaky and easily startled, like a wounded animal that has to be trained to trust again. I wasn’t ready to be touched. I didn’t mean to upset him, but the look of hurt that passed over his face said it all.

“Tell me you’re okay,” he said tensely.

“I’m really fine,” I answered, remembering how I’d said the same thing to my mother just a few weeks ago. It was as much a lie now as it had been then. “I just…overreacted a little about…something, but I’m really fine. Everything’s fine.”

“You’re fine,” he repeated, his tone fully implying how little he believed me. He picked up his cell phone from the coffee table. “Are we calling the cops?” he said. His thumb was poised over the call button and I could see that the numbers 9-1-1 had already been entered. I wondered how long he’d been sitting on the couch staring at those numbers.

“No,” I practically yelled, lunging forward and taking the phone out of his hands. He let me do it. “No cops.”

He stared at me.

“I’ll make some coffee,” I said, trying to sound normal, chipper, but I suspected I came off as mildly deranged instead. “Do you want eggs?”

I heard him make an exasperated noise, and when I stepped toward him to get to the kitchen, steadily avoiding his eyes, he took my arm and pulled me down onto the couch. He wasn’t forceful about it, but the way his hand was clamped on my arm definitely indicated he wasn’t about to let me go anywhere.

“Katie, you just spent about ten straight hours crying while I listened to you through the door, basically losing my mind with worry. You say you’re fine? You are about as far from fine as you could possibly be, and I’m not feeling exactly ship-shape myself. We are not going to sit down and have breakfast like everything is normal right now, okay? That is not going to happen.”

I could feel him peering down to get a look at my face as he’d done to me so many times before, but I’d tucked my chin in so tightly there was no way he was getting a glimpse. Taking a different tack, he leaned forward and placed one hand on the armrest and one on the cushion behind my back, forcing me to lean back and raise my head.

“There she is,” he said as my eyes met his at last. His gaze was steady and unflinching and it hurt like hell. I didn’t want him to see me now, like this. I didn’t want him to know the girl who’d spent the night lying on the floor. I wanted to get away, to hide, but he had me pinned. Ducking under his arm and scurrying back to my room was a little too pathetic even for me, but that didn’t mean I didn’t consider it.

He reached for my face and I had to grit my teeth to stop myself from turning away. Ever so gently he removed my glasses then smoothed his thumb over my throbbing eye. His palm cupped my cheek and a current of warmth flowed through it and into my body; it felt so good, so safe and comforting that I felt tears welling under my eyelashes. I clamped my eyes shut, trying desperately to keep those tears from falling, but one escaped anyway. Lucas’s thumb brushed across my cheek and smoothed it away.

Then I was in his arms, though I wasn’t sure exactly how I’d gotten there. His body finally seemed to relax, the strain in his muscles disappearing as I buried my face in his shirt and his hand smoothed my hair. I heard him let out a long sigh. Though no more tears came, I felt an aching deep inside, as though I was still weeping. A desperate need I’d been ignoring for such a long time was rearing its head at last—the need to be held, to be known, to be loved.