Split (23 page)

She slapped my hand. “Derek! I haven’t even showered.”

The woman amazes me.

I chuckled. “Stop it.”

“Help me ease up,” she said, primping her thinning auburn hair. “And fetch me my Air du Temps.”

I handed her the perfume bottle. She poured a small amount onto her fingertips and dabbed her wrist and neck with them.

“Okay?”

“Okay.”

Lene and Boone seemed to be a balm on Aunt Fran’s spiritual wounds. She held their hands as if they carried absolution. She spoke softly, her eyes drinking in their beauty, and for the whole hour the Lunds were in her room, Aunt Fran’s usual caustic tongue did not make an appearance.

I stood in the corner, watching youth and health seep back into her tired face, knowing very well that it was a temporary hallucination.

An illusion brought on by wishful thinking.

“And how’s Scott?” Though she tried to sound uninterested, I had caught the anticipation in Aunt Fran’s voice.

Boone laughed. “Di Paglio? Still busting my balls.”

Aunt Fran fiddled with the edge of the sheet.

I watched her, amused by her little charade.

“Married?” she asked in the same disinterested tone.

Boone leaned in. “He was for a while, but he’s recently divorced.” He set his gigantic hand on Aunt Fran’s arm. “I don’t think he ever got over you, Ms. Saint-Jacques—”

Her gaze shifted to my face and I winked. She rolled her eyes. “Well, that was a long time ago. Anyway, he probably made his wife crazy.”

“Actually,” said Boone, “it was the other way around.”

“I see.” She quickly turned to Lene. “And you, my dear, no husband?”

Lene’s cheeks glowed pink. “Busy, you know.”

Aunt Fran scoffed. “Please, child. Ain’t no such thing.” She pursed her thin lips. “And Nicolas?”

Boone glanced over at me.

I shifted.

The mere mention of Nick’s name is like a warm hand sliding down the front of my pants.

Lene tucked a blond curl behind her ear. “Nico isn’t the settling-down type of guy, you know what I mean? He’s—” She smiled. “Wild.”

Wild
.

Instantly, images of Nick’s cock skimming my lips shot through my mind.

What does he sound like when he comes?

“Hon, you okay?”

My body pulsed with sex. I could hardy blink.

Boone laughed. “Don’t worry, Ms. Saint-Jacques, Derek always looks like that when the subject of my crazy older brother comes up. Been like that since we were kids.”

Lene squinted. “What are you talking about?” Her eyes queried mine. “Does Boone mean…?” She slapped her thigh. “That’s why you always looked so shell-shocked when you sat at our table! You have a crush on Nicolai?”

I have a crush the same way a great white has dentures.

“When Derek was a boy,” said Aunt Fran, a musing smile on her lips, “he used to draw everything in purple.”

“Purple?” echoed Boone and Lene.

“Yes. Purple.”

I remembered.

Purple trees. Purple cars. Purple stick men.

Purple hearts.

“Why?” asked Lene, watching me.

“I asked him that same question one day,” returned Aunt Fran. “Oh and Lene, you should have seen those big emerald eyes, the way they shone. He said, “‘Because I like mixing the red and blue.’”

Lene set her fingers on her lips, but a small gasp escaped them. “Red and Blue,” she whispered.

Yes.

Red and Blue.

*

I think Nathan is going to be leaving without me. I think I want him to.

He waits for me to deliver the final blow.

And I keep delaying it.

Why have you come back into my life?

Feels like you’re on a mission to tear it down.

*

Human resources declined my request for a temporary leave.

I had been harassing them for the last three days. I received an e-mail this morning: I can take the remainder of my vacation time, which adds up to eight days, or hand in my resignation. In the current situation, they cannot acquiesce to my request.

Eight days. That’s not enough time.

I need more time. She needs more time.

Why can’t we get more bloody time?

Aunt Fran suffers. She denies it, but I read it on her face every time she coughs, moves, breathes. They’ve upped the morphine dosage, but she refuses to let them reduce her to a “bag of bones and drool.”

Today, I sat at her side, watching
The Ellen DeGeneres Show.

“She’s pretty, no?”

“Ellen?”

“Yes.”

“Have you ever?”

“Have I ever what?”

“You know, hon, been with a woman?”

“No.”

“Why?”

“I never wanted to.”

With every commercial break, our relationship deepened.

“Derek, do you remember how beautiful I was?”

“Yes, Aunt Frannie.”

“I once invited three men into my bedroom.”

There were no taboos anymore. Nothing sacred.

As women washed their hair on the boob tube, I was explaining the pleasures of male anal sex.

Aunt Fran was curious and eager, and I offered her all of my answers on a plate of candor and truthfulness that I have never owned.

“Do you love Nathan?”

I sighed, fiddling with the silver band around my finger. “Aunt Fran, I said yes, when I shou-should have been say-saying no.”

A flash of anger illuminated her green eyes. “You have been trespassed on. You hear me, Derek O’Reilly? Trespassed on!” Her voice had risen abruptly, and it startled me quiet. “I’ve been watching you, Red, all these years, and you have allowed every one of your greedy lovers to rummage through your temple, and without any consideration for your limits, or boundaries, you have let them claim it as their empire.”

My lips parted.

Reality’s icy fingers clasped the side of my head.

Be quiet.

Don’t talk about this.

Be good.

Say yes.

Wear this. Wear that.

Eat this. Eat that.

Blow me.

Let me fuck you.

Turn around.

We don’t need rubbers.

Open your mouth.

Shut up.

My jaw tightened, and a quiet but deadly rebellion inched up my spine.

Aunt Fran fell back onto the pillow. “Honey, promise me something.” She closed her eyes, obviously exhausted. “Don’t go to Milan.” She opened her eyes. “Go to Split and kiss Nicolas Lund on the mouth.”

I laughed.

It felt tremendously good.

“I’m serious, Derek. Enough already. You go there, grab hold of that magnificent beast, and you stick your tongue down his throat.”

Laughter quenched my soul.

She smiled. “I bet you he’ll let you,” she said before dozing off into a morphine slumber. “I bet you that cold ocean could use a little of your warmth.”

*

“O’Reilly.”

I had just fallen asleep when Nick called.

I pressed the phone to my ear, and glanced at the clock. “Hi.”

“Sleeping?”

“No,” I lied.

It was ten p.m. How pathetic of me. How lame to have been reduced to falling asleep at this hour.

“You alone?”

I was. Nathan hadn’t come home yet. He was still at the gym.

“Yes,” I returned, feeling my body harden under the sheets. “How are you?”

“Good. Sorry ’bout not calling.”

“It’s okay. Figured you were bu-busy.”

“I’ve got shit coming at me from every direction.” He exhaled. I pictured him standing at Split’s back door, looking like some kind of Dionysus. “I need to get out of the kitchen. I need to blow my lid, you in?”

I sat up, my groin filling with heat. “Yeah,” I whispered in a breath. “I am.”

“Good. Come, then.”

I almost did. Right there in my pajama bottoms.

“Where do you-ou live?”

“Right on top of things. Split’s second floor.”

What a complete control freak Nick is.

“I’ll be there in about —”

“Whatever, O’Reilly. Just
come
.”

As I climbed up Split’s iron staircase, I could almost hear my mind humming.

I paused on the last step, watching the door.

I looked down at myself.

I wore my black jeans and an army green shirt. That shirt is snug in all the right places, and my black jeans have gotten me more action than any other pair of pants I own.

I blew a breath into my cupped fingers. Spearmint.

I ran a nervous hand through my hair. Not much I could do about that.

I took a shallow breath and knocked.

Immediately, the most gruesome, hellish sound filtered through the thick wooden door. I shrank back from it, as if the very sound could tear my throat open.

“Quiet!” Nick’s tone had a chilling authority to it.
“Stille.”

The thing, which I imagined was the offspring of Cujo and the devil, instantly stopped its barking.

Nick popped the door open. “Hey.”

My eyes darted down to the monstrous animal he was holding back from murdering me.

“What is tha-that?”

“This is Escoffier. Don’t worry, man, he’s real sweet.”

I smiled. “Sweet?”

“Yeah.” Nick began petting the thing, rubbing its gigantic head with vigor. The thing, which is in fact a red nose pit bull, is Nick’s “baby.”

“Come in, he won’t bite you. Well, only if you show weakness.”

Then I was screwed.

I eased myself into the entrance, my eyes never leaving the dog’s jaw.

“Put your hand out, let him smell you.”

I was quite sure the dog could smell me just fine from where I stood, but Nick’s blue eyes insisted, so I extended my hand, prepared to be carrying it in a bag of ice to the ER in a few seconds. The dog’s nose was wet and cold. “He’s very ni-ice.”

Nick laughed. “Go on, Esco.
Get.
” The thing padded down the hall. “Go destroy my boots or something.”

In the living area (everything is an
area
, as there are no rooms, no doors, just one huge space with scarcely any furniture), Nick pointed to the only chair in the place. “Sit down.”

I did.

He went to a box and pulled out a bottle of wine. “Take your shoes off, relax.”

I took my shoes off.

He then went to his laptop, which was set atop another box, this one wooden, and began scrolling down some list. His eyes were fixed to the screen, and I indulged myself while I could.

He wore faded blue jeans and a tight white T-shirt.

Nick’s lines are graceful. Everything on him is long and hard.

His ass tortures me.

As my eyes wandered over every inch of his body, I remembered the L-shaped couch.

I recalled the blue ink that had stained my sweaty fingers that night.

“Wing it, O’Reilly.”

Slowly, I loosened my grip on the moment and inhaled deeply.

Nick’s hair is shorter now, but the ash blond strands still hang loosely around his face, reaching just above the neckline. He kept pushing it out of his translucent eyes. “Yeah, this is good,” he whispered, stepping away from his computer.

David Usher’s childlike voice streamed out of the various speakers scattered around the room. The acoustics in the loft are amazing.

Nick uncorked the wine bottle and flipped a thick, sturdy cardboard box upside down. He set the glasses on it.

“Just moved in?” I asked.

Nick sat on the floor, curling his long legs under him. “No.”

I glanced around. “Okay.”

He lit a thin cigar. “Do you mind? I quit smoking last year, and this is my last guilty pleasure.”

I didn’t mind, but every time his lips sucked on the cigar, I held my breath, trying to hold myself back from knocking the box over and ripping his jeans open with my teeth.

“So, you never answered my question.” His blue eyes danced on my mouth. “Who’s
we
?”

I took a generous swill of the wine. It was fantastic. Deep, rich, and earthy.

“Come on, O’Reilly, tell me all about Mr. Roboto.”