Authors: Shey Stahl
“Yeah, what time?”
Dylan said rolling onto his back. I peeked my head over the side, smiling as I
peered down at his star tattoos on his stomach, knowing where they led to,
an
area I was dying to get to know again. Above the stars,
was another tattoo under his belly button that started on his right hipbone,
spread across his hips to the left side, and read:
Ride Hard – Give it Hard
.
I laughed. So far, it
was my favorite one that he had.
Dylan knew by my smirk
what I was thinking, squinted and covered himself with a pillow, but smiled, as
he curled into a ball on the floor holding his phone to his ear. “I’ll be there
around eight.”
Without another word,
he let the phone fall to the floor.
When he didn’t say
anything for a few minutes, I tossed a pillow at him. “Where are we going
tonight?”
With a huff, he rolled
onto his back pushing the pillows aside.
“To meet Eddy and
the Brickyard again.
It’s thirsty Thursday, apparently.”
“Oh no,” I groaned
shaking my head. “Not participating in Thirsty Thursday. Wasted Wednesday was
enough for me.”
Dylan laughed, the
sound comforting but annoying given my headache. “Just be thankful it’s not
Mystery Monday or Tanked Tuesday.” His hand raked through his hair and down the
front of his face. “I always hated both.”
“Oh yeah,” I teased
trying to find some sort of resemblance to myself. I smelled horrible and I’m
sure I looked even worse. “You got a lot of experience in Mystery Mondays?”
“More than you know…”
he said walking to the bathroom. “My friends back home were good at luring me
to the dark side of alcoholism and liver failure.”
After a shower and
three cups of coffee, I felt among the living again but still looked like hell
shit on me.
As we got ready to go,
I threw on another band shirt I had collected last night, somehow, and my jean
shorts. It was apparent I needed to do laundry at some point, as the ones I was
wearing were my last clean pair.
Watching us was
entertaining, at how we were so comfortable around one another and here we
were, getting dressed around each other and talking like we weren’t both
half-naked. Next thing we knew we’d be peeing with the door open.
“Have you always been
able to sing like that?” I asked him as he was slipping a black t-shirt over
his shoulders and buttoned his khaki shorts.
He shrugged, always
shrugging. “I guess.”
“Was that the first
time you’ve sang in public?”
“No, I did a handful of
times in Seattle too.”
“Oh.” Reaching for my
bag on the bed, I tossed a bottle of water in it from the fridge and the pack
of gum I had on the nightstand along with my wallet. “Eddy said only him and
your mom had heard you sing before.”
Dylan laughed opening
the door; his head tipped motioning for me to go outside when he grabbed the
card key from the table next to the door. “Eddy’s brain is fucking fried. Don’t
believe anything he tells you.”
“So you didn’t cry for
eight months straight when you were a baby?”
His eyebrows arched as
he checked the door making sure it was locked by slamming his hip into it. “I
did cry a lot as a baby. At least that’s what they tell me.” He smiled,
throwing his arm over my shoulder; his other held the handle to his guitar.
“Apparently I came out crying and didn’t stop until I started to crawl.”
“I bet you were
adorable despite the noise.” I gushed sinking into his arm.
In a sweet gesture, his
lips brushed my temple. “I’m still pretty adorable.”
Against my objections, we went back to
that bar but I swore off any alcohol.
That night the crowd
was rowdy and ready for more of Eddy’s band but Dylan was who most of them kept
requesting. “Bring up the kid!” they would shout each time they finished a song.
I meant up with
Lanny
again, she was sweet, and I also met Eddy’s
girlfriend Cheryl, who helped me stay away from thirsty Thursdays drink
specials. Apparently, I threw up on her too.
“Was there anyone I
didn’t throw up on last night?”
“Me, you didn’t throw
up on me.” A guy standing next to
Lanny
said, leaning
against the stage, he smiled at me and winked.
Dylan shook his head in
amusement throwing his arm around my shoulder. He kissed my temple and then my
ear, softly, my eyes closed briefly.
Lanny
pushed against the guy, he stumbled right into me.
“That’s ‘because you
were on the drums all night,”
Lanny
said to him.
“Those of us next to her weren’t so lucky.”
I was mortified that
I’d thrown up on so many people.
Standing around talking
between sets, Eddy tried to convince Dylan to go back on stage. He didn’t say
yes but he also didn’t say no. I had a feeling he enjoyed the rush; I remember
seeing it in his eyes last night. He loved being up there.
With a shy glance,
Dylan gave a dismissive shrug to Eddy’s questions.
“So
Bailey, you into drummers?”
Reece smiled giving his sticks a suggestive
rub moving his hips in a rotated motion. “Drummers hit hard and have sick
rhythm.”
Reece was cute, really
cute. He reminded me of a boy, a very flirty boy with a soft face, dusty blonde
hair that outlined his chocolate eyes. He was the type of guy that you knew
never took anything serious, aside from music and even then I questioned his
attention to it.
Dylan shook his head
with a deep chuckle that shook his chest. “Bailey, meet Reece Kinney, the
best drummer in the mid-west.”
“Uh,” Reece smacked the
back of Dylan’s head with the stick in his hand, “best in the world.”
“Fine.”
Dylan rolled his eyes stepping to the side of Eddy toward the stage. His hand
brushed my ass as he did so.
“Best in the world.”
Dylan flicked the back of his head with his index finger.
“Hands
off.”
Reece smiled and
stepped toward me when Dylan walked to the stage near the speakers, but then he
stopped and faced Reece again. “Don’t even think about it Reece,” Dylan warned.
“She’s coming home with me.”
Making his way on stage
whistles and shouts broke out in the crowd but Dylan didn’t look up, his guitar
in hand. Reece was up there now, as was Eddy, standing behind Dylan as he took
a seat on a wooden stool propping the guitar on his knees, never looking up, he
placed the guitar in his mouth talking over it. “Thank you everyone,” Dylan
said into the microphone, still not looking up, removing his guitar pick from
his mouth, he gave a soft smile. “This song is one of mine, hope you like it.”
A slow drum kicked and
then Dylan began to play his guitar, eyes down, closed, feeling the beat as his
left foot tapped against the stool.
As the opening notes
drifted, he leaned into the microphone and started singing. Immediately, I was
drawn in, held in place, listening to something Dylan created.
When the song reached a
crescendo and he leaned his head back, singing with passion, he let out a moan
I felt deep in my chest,
When Dylan sang, he was
alive and raw, in the middle of his own storm.
The left side of his
body was shadowed, the right side lit up and real, vulnerable to those who
found the need to judge him. Under the light, his eyes had never been so blue,
his voice, never so bare, his words, never so honest.
Hide you from the
fear
You find deep inside
His head bowed to his
guitar, a trail of cords broke the silence, his right hand thumbed against the
guitar as his voice carried through the bar to the very edges, bleeding hearts,
pensive silence spoke for those of that were watching.
You know you can’t
comply
To the desires you
can’t deny
Do you see it?
Do you hear it?
Can you feel it?
So deep inside of
you, do you fear it?
He was pouring out
words with need and words that spoke truth, the bare fucking truth for everyone
to see, to feel, to judge. His walls were down, demanding, needing answers.
And then, the
vulnerability was gone just as easily as it came, the storm moved through,
destruction in its wake.
His eyes found mine again
but now, here, right now, they told a different story from the one I knew. One
that split my chest and bared my own soul for him to see the hope, adoration,
happiness, trust, belonging, softness, love, forgiving. I knew his secret, in
turn, he felt mine.
Sometimes I feel like
we’re pulling a rope but neither one of us are pulling the rope at the same
time.
Sometimes I think that
loving someone is doing what’s right. Loving like there’s nothing else.
Feeling and believing there’s nothing else.
Looking at Dylan now
was too hard. It was all there, in every word being spoken. It’s the guilt
behind his eyes and the purple below them. It explained the way he won’t give
into me and the way he’s not running from anything. It’s in the way he holds
his smile at bay when he’s teasing. It’s in his tattoos that he claims hold no
meaning. It’s in how he always knows what to say to me even when he doesn’t say
anything. It’s in the way he touches me at night when he thinks that I’m
sleeping. It’s in the secrets he tells me. It’s in the life he threw away for
me. It’s in his uncertain future. It’s in the way his heart is beating for me.
Lanny
stood beside me, her arms wrapped around my shoulder, holding me close with the
way the crowd swarmed around the stage. “He’s singing for you.” She whispered
watching, knowing.
I nodded when Dylan’s
voice broke, his head hung in silence.
Do you see it?
Do you hear it?
Can you feel it?
“You
into him?”
Lanny
asked in my ear attempting to keep the
conversation private. “He’s into you.”
A smile appeared
though I tried for it not to. I never expected this. When I got in that car, it
wasn’t a thought out decision. The decision to want something more from my life
was but Dylan, what was happening now, that wasn’t planned. To me that was
the best part of it though, the unexpected, the dark gray morning when the sun
suddenly crept through the cracks in the window, broken and disheveled,
revealing sparkling honeyed rays that weren’t there before. Just like that
sunset that highlighted hills you never saw the beauty in, I saw beauty in
this.
Watching him,
comforted me and made me feel whole, but it also made it hard to breathe, ready
to fall to my knees, and swear my heart to him.
Leaning into
Lanny
, I whispered, my eyes on Dylan when he threw his head
back again belting out another moan, his eyes squeezed shut. “I’m not sure how
much more I could be into him without crawling inside him.”
When the song
finished, you could barely see Dylan anymore and it took nearly forty minutes
before I was able to see him again. When I did, we sat in a booth with Reece
and Eddy. We weren’t there very long, the guys throwing insults and rowdy
shoves Dylan’s way when a man walked up to the booth, beer in hand.
“Hey, I’m Sam
Young.” Dylan gave him a nod but didn’t shake his hand. Sam took this as his
opportunity to approach Dylan.
Sliding across the
booth next to Dylan on the other side of me, he grabbed him by the back of his
neck. “You ready for the big time kid?”
“No,” Dylan said
immediately turning his head to take a drink of the beer in his hand. “I don’t
play to make a living, it’s just a hobby.”
Knowing Dylan
wasn’t in the mood, Eddy managed to distract this Sam guy and Dylan thankfully
turned his attention to me, where I wanted it.
With his left hand
resting on my thigh, I pushed it higher in the junction between my thighs
knowing with the dark lighting in the alley, no one would know. Suddenly his
eyes darted to mine and I was caught in his gaze for a short second, tethered
by that crazy electricity between us. It moved through me even as I looked away
which was immediately.
There’s something
about watching someone sing, pour there heart into something that’s a huge turn
on. I now fully understood groupies.
It must have been
written all over my face that I wanted him. Dylan flashed a smile at me fully
aware of his charm.
Did he feel what I
was feeling right then? That gut deep butterfly, that all-consuming thirst for
more.
There was a good
part of me that thought he might. It was a quieter part that was taken over
when he threw a smile my way and every lingering glance my way over the years,
and now, since we’d left home a week ago. It was the same part that saw the way
his smile dimmed, just a little, when he would see me with Eric in the halls.
It was also the same part that noticed his reaction when that red hat guy
danced with me.
He felt it. After
all, he said it too.
Eddy supplied the
beer and other drinks and once again, that bad decision I tasted in my mouth
earlier returned and I gave into the delicious strawberry drinks.
That’s when
Lanny
, my bad decision partner, went over my bucket list I
hadn’t thought about. Dylan and I explained to her and Reece how we came up
with the summer bucket list and she decided to help me knock one off tonight.
Pole
dancing.
Lanny
wasn’t a good
influence for me. Confident wise she was but I got too comfortable around her
and found myself doing things like pole dancing.