The Contradiction of Solitude (8 page)

I looked at the time on my phone. It was just after nine. I stood up and stretched my back, hearing the satisfying pop of joints and bone.

I picked up the discarded chip bags and the remnants of the burrito I had had for dinner. Tossing them in the trash as I walked out into the main store. Rolling my head from side to side, I rubbed at my neck, noting how sore I felt from being bent over my workbench for the last few hours.

Then I stopped in my tracks.

“Shit,” I all but yelled.

Layna was already there, looking up at the guitars lining the walls. I hadn’t heard her come in. She had slipped in silently without my noticing.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you,” she said, her voice ever soft, glancing over her shoulder.

“No. I just didn’t hear you come in. Have you been here long?” I asked, tossing my trash in the bin behind the register.

She was studying one of the guitars intently.

“This is one of yours,” she said, lifting her finger and letting it hover over the shiny wood. She didn’t ask, she stated.

“Yeah, it is. It’s one I just completed last week actually.” I was surprised she could know that this particular instrument was of my creation. She didn’t know me. She had no idea of my style. Yet somehow,
someway
, she knew.

It was eerie. It was flattering.

I was unsettled.

The acoustic guitar she indicated had taken nearly three weeks to complete. I had meticulously sanded down the rich rosewood that composed its body until it sheened. The Canadian spruce top shone in the dark. I was proud of it. More so than any of the guitars I had made before.

There was something personal about this piece. I felt as though I had bled myself dry when I had made it, giving it everything I had. There were elements of the real Elian within the guitar that were inconsequential to anyone but me.

I hadn’t wanted to put up for sale. I had even argued with George about it.

“My shop, my product. You used the tools
I
own to make it, it belongs to me. This will make us both a pretty penny. Stop being such a wimp about it,” he had barked, annoyed when I suggested we keep it as a showpiece instead.

I had wanted to hit him. Smash his face into a dozen, bloody pieces. But I had swallowed my fury and backed off.

It’s what Elian Beyer would do.

The slopes and lines were reminiscent of the guitar my sister had left behind. Her favorite. The same guitar I kept in its case beneath my bed to this day. The guitar that hadn’t been played since I was twelve years old.

I had fashioned the headstock from a recognizable symbol.

A nautical star.

The same symbol I now had tattooed on the center of my back for reasons that were mine and mine alone.

“It’s beautiful,” she said genuinely. She carefully traced the line of the star, barely touching.

Her appreciation caused something warm to unfurl in my gut. Hot and liquid it spread with the beat of my heart through my veins.

“Do you play?” I asked, noticing the covetous way she regarded the guitar.

“Never,” she said quietly, her fingers recoiling from the wood as though stung.

“Would you like to hold it?” I asked, reaching around her to lift the guitar off its wall stand. My front pressed, ever so slightly, into her back. She stiffened instantly.

My arms, encircling her body from behind, but not touching, held the guitar. “Here,” I told her. She slowly took the offered instrument, and I moved back, only a fraction of an inch.

She held the guitar naturally. Her left hand clamping down on the neck, tips of fingers pressing down on the strings. She didn’t struggle with the weight, though I knew it was heavy.

She lifted her hand and lightly touched the strings. I noticed that she was shaking and I wondered about it. But I didn’t ask. I wasn’t in the habit of prying into people’s business. I knew the importance of secrets.

Her face darkened suddenly and she jerked her hand down viciously. It was an abrupt, violent squealing of strings. The discordant tone echoed around the empty shop.

For the first time I saw true and honest emotion on her face that had nothing to do with sadness or desolation.

It was anger.

It was longing.

It was unquestionable hatred.

It was love as deep as the ocean…

“Take it,” she said, her voice cracking and broken.

I didn’t ask her if she was all right. That would have been a typical response. I didn’t do typical responses.

I took the guitar, feeling almost as though her rejection of the guitar was a rejection of me. Which was ridiculous.

“I have others—”

“I have to go.” She shook her head and turned her body away, her face concealed behind the fall of her hair.

“You don’t have to. We can leave. Go somewhere else,” I suggested, confused and bothered by her attitude. But I was also intrigued and protective at the same time.

“I have to go,” she repeated, as though not hearing me.

I reached out, not wanting her to leave without touching her. My hand grasped, almost roughly at her hair. It was warm and alive.

It was everything I expected touching her would be.

My fingers tangled and caught and I thought about wrapping my fist in the strands and pulling, stopping her from walking out the door and into the night.

“Elian,” she whispered, power in her voice that I couldn’t deny.

I let go of her hair, my gut hollow. My heart empty.

“Will you come back?” I asked her.

She didn’t answer.

She left.

But I knew.

She’d be back.

I
couldn’t move. My feet were stuck to the ground.

It was the smell I noticed first.

Sharp. Tangy like metal.

It filled my nostrils and became lodged in the back of my throat. I gagged. My mouth opened and closed wordlessly.

The panic was acute but then just as suddenly as it appeared, it was gone.

A wet warmth swirled around my legs and I felt relaxed as it soothed me.

The smell didn’t make me sick. It enticed. It made me hungry.

I held my hands down at my sides, fingers parted as I dragged my skin through the swirling liquid rising…rising.

I felt myself start to sink. My body was weightless and buoyant.

I was on my back, staring up at the stars. My dad’s stars.

I looked for Emma’s and found it just above, twinkling for me.

I smiled as the blood closed over my face.

I opened my eyes. Not in terror but in disappointment.

I lay there for a long time listening to the ticking of the clock across the room.

Tick. Tock.

I listened to the rhythmic constant until the sun came up.

“This is what you want?” the heavily tattooed guy asked, holding up the drawing I handed him.

I didn’t like him questioning me.

I pointed at the drawing that I had painstakingly recreated on the sheet of white paper. “Just like that,” I told him firmly.

“And you want it here?” he asked, lifting my shirt and running his rough fingers along tender, vulnerable skin. I shivered. But not from pleasure.

I nodded, grabbing ahold of his hand and pressing his fingertips into the side of hip, just over the bone. I felt the tattoo artist stiffen and still beneath me, his breathing becoming ragged and shallow.

I smiled, dazzling and heart-stopping. I smiled to make him shut up.

“Right there,” I said softly, lying down on the cushioned seat, rolling my shirt up and tucking it beneath my bra.

The tattoo artist cleared his throat a couple of times and pulled his hand away. I shouldn’t mess with him. I didn’t want him screwing this up.

I clenched my teeth together and lay perfectly still as he put the needle to my flesh.

“Are you okay?” he asked, lifting the needle but the buzz continued to pierce my eardrums.

Was I okay?

That was an easy question for me to answer. Because for the first time everything seemed to be falling into place.

And I knew now was the time.

“I’m okay.”