Chapter 11
Chapter Eleven
Ayda
The earphones were pumping music into my ears, the beat forcing my feet to move as I separated the whites from the colors.
I had the laundry down to a fine art in this place.
I’d made it clear that I didn’t care who owned what.
I did colors on Fridays and whites on Sundays.
You missed the day, you were on your own.
The truth was I'd been hiding in the huge laundry room. I still wasn’t ready to talk to Tate. Even though the place was mainly free of the other women due to it being Black Friday and I should have been soaking up the time without them, I couldn’t face my kid brother just yet.
You’d have thought after months of living with him and Sloane heading back to our home after school most days, I would have been better equipped to deal with that particular situation.
However, there was something to be said for ‘seeing is believing’.
I’d never had to deal with the reality of what Tate and Sloane were doing, because I’d been too wrapped up in what bill was due next or whether I’d washed my sheets in the last month.
That ignorance was bliss, and there wasn’t an image scorched into the back of my eyelids that I couldn’t get rid of.
Reaching into the container to grab a little laundry bubble, I chased air around the damn thing before pulling it from the shelf only to find it empty.
I’d barely turned half way around when I saw movement from the corner of my eye and threw the box at the figure with a yelp of surprise.
The very feminine grumble of pain was the only thing I heard over my music, and it forced me to pull out the earphones and drop my hands to my sides.
“Was that really necessary?” Libby asked, pulling her hand from her head and checking for blood.
“Hey, you’re the one sneaking up on me here,” I said, even though the guilt was eating me alive.
“Right. I guess I am,” she mumbled, pulling the bottom corner of her lip and chewing on it as she swung her arms and clapped them together as she started to pace.
I watched with interest, my chest rising and falling as we stared at one another and waited for the next words to come.
The question was, who from? I thought I had nothing to say to this woman.
“Tate doesn’t know I’m here.”
I blew my bangs from my face and headed toward the small closet where I stored and hung up anything that needed hanging.
I almost wished it was bigger so I could step inside and hide, but there was barely enough room for me to push to my toes and grab the new detergent from the top shelf. “And why are you here, Libby?”
“Because I feel like I should explain.”
“About sleeping with a fifteen-year-old boy? Please, do explain it to me, because I’m having a really hard time understanding what the hell you get from the relationship. I can see the appeal for my brother. You’re cute. He gets bragging rights—”
“Oh, fuck you, Ayda. You don’t know shit.”
I spun on my heel and stared her down, but she wasn’t looking at me.
She was rocked back on her heels, her toes banging together while her hands gripped one of the shelves behind her.
She looked as though she was in pain the way she held her lips.
There were some days I really hated being as empathetic as I was, because I shouldn’t have felt guilty about what I said or for the way she seemed to cringe at the thought of her own response of cussing me out.
“I’m s-sorry. That was out of line, and I didn’t mean it. You have every right to be upset, but I need you to know that I like him. Tate, that is. I’m only eighteen, and the girls invited me in to help around the place.”
“Wait. You’re eighteen?”
“Yeah, but I ain’t slept with any of the guys or nothing. I just served drinks so the girls didn’t have to. The others said it was like an initiation or something, but it was more like free labor.”
“Now that I believe,” I said, ripping at the cellophane on the packaging.
I continued to work, dropping the bubble at the bottom of the washing machine before starting to pile the clothes on top.
I was struggling to find something to say.
It was almost as bad as talking to Tate. “Why’d you stick around?”
“I didn’t have anywhere else to go. My mom kicked me out, and I was staying with one of the other girls. If I backed out, I had nowhere else to go. So I stayed and did what I had to. The guys were really sweet. Then you showed up, and—”
“Everyone participated in hating me?”
“Something like that.”
“What about you and Tate?” I asked, slamming the door and pressing buttons to start the wash. I gave the girl a contemplative look and slipped onto the washer, folding my legs under me. ”When did that start and how?”
“When?” She looked up at the ceiling with a small, wistful smile before catching herself and looking back down at me.
“A couple days after the fire. He was pretty low and had taken a bottle of bourbon from behind the bar. I found him in the kitchen at two in the morning, hunting for munchies, and we started talking. Next thing I know he’s kissing me.
Tate’s a force of nature, Ayda. I’ve never known anybody like him.
I swore I wasn’t going to see him again, but he grabbed me one night and pulled me in his room, and I couldn’t say no.
You don’t see what I see. He’s so mature and respectful.
He loves to talk about anything, and he knows all this stuff from reading books.
He’s passionate about everything, including me, and I guess… ”
“You’re asking me not to stop him from seeing you.”
Libby’s shoulders slumped, her hands swinging around in front of her as something in her nails was somehow suddenly very interesting.
My brother the heartbreaker… Jesus, I was in trouble with that one. If it wasn’t Libby, it would be someone else, someone who wouldn’t give a shit how I felt about him screwing them, someone who just wanted to use him as a prize and would think nothing of breaking his heart.
Rolling my eyes, I patted the top of the dryer next to me in a request for her to join me. For a second she looked unsure, but moved anyway, sliding up onto the metal surface and swinging her legs against the front as she leaned back and turned her head to look at me in question.
“I’m taking a stab in the dark here and saying that Tate is just outside. He can’t hear us. We both know that, but he’s there to step in if needed. Am I right?”
“I told him it was a stupid idea. You’re protective, not clinically insane.”
“Gee, thanks!” I huffed with a quiet laugh. “ And get used to stupid ideas. He has a lot of them.”
I picked at nothing on my leg and looked at the girl who seemed to be holding her breath.
She obviously liked Tate or she wouldn’t have been the one in the room with me.
He would have been here yelling and screaming like the child he was.
With Tate about to turn sixteen in just under two months, I felt as though eighteen wasn’t such a big leap.
He was smart, and he was passionate. He wore his heart on his sleeve and still believed he had the world at his fingertips.
Maybe he did, which was why this idea of Drew’s seemed more and more like a good plan of action.
I wasn’t asking Tate to give up a future that he wanted.
I understood the draw of the club and even, to an extent, the draw of Libby, but I needed him to see what else was out in the world.
I felt obligated to show him the decisions he still had in front of him, not make them for him.
Who the hell was I to take away something that he wanted now?
“Tate!” I shouted, throwing a small wink at Libby.
She seemed confused. Her eyes were narrowed and focused in my direction as she tried to read me.
I wished her the best of luck with that.
Tate had been trying to read me for years and he still couldn’t figure me out. I was a perfect blend of our parents.
When the door finally opened, I schooled my face into a serious look and raised my eyebrows at him in question. He shuffled deeper inside and pushed his hands into his pockets, a sheepish smile aimed at Libby. Needing to grab his attention, I coughed once.
“What?”
Worked every time. “You know what.”
“I really don’t, A.”
“Yeah. You really do, T. Why were you lying to me?”
“I wasn’t lying.”
“Like hell you weren’t,” I said, slipping down off the washer and approaching him. I looked up at him and smirked, shaking my head slowly as I finally let my smile show. “You sent a girl to talk to me.”
“I know. I figured it would be less awkward and there was a chance you’d listen to her. Because let's face it, you sure as hell wouldn’t have listened to me.”
“Bullshit.”
“Liar. You know you would have talked over me and not listened to a damn word I said.”
“That’s not fair.”
“Like you’re an ambassador of fair? Come on, A.”
I pushed my lips together in frustration and nodded in agreement.
I thought he was being a tad dramatic, but I could see the point he was trying to make.
Libby softened the blow and opened up the lines of communication.
She’d helped me see sense where Tate would have only incited me to see red.
There was no way in hell I was getting that guardian of the year award.
“Just lock your door in the future, and stop fucking stealing bourbon, jackass.”
“That’s it?”
“You want more?” I asked, folding my arms and narrowing my eyes at him. “I have plenty more where—”
He kissed me on the top of my head quickly, almost shy about the affectionate gesture before he held his hand out to Libby and backed away slowly. The eyes he shared with Dad were twinkling back at me, full of his usual mischief.
“That’s what I thought, turd. Don’t go too far, though, T. Drew wants to see you.”
“Oh, come on, Ayda.”
“Not about this, you brat. Stop whining and go make yourself useful.”
Tate nodded as Libby hopped down from the dryer, her eyes flickering between the two of us.
She wasn’t as stupid as she looked. As much as she knew Drew was probably staying out of their business, she could read the uncertainty in my eyes, the doubt, the fear.
I just hoped Tate had the sense to say no where I couldn’t.