24. PAIGE
TWENTY-FOUR
PAIGE
“You good?” Ellis’s voice sounds from the other side of the door, and my body jerks upright.
I’ve been in the bathroom for at least fifteen minutes while I literally cut the leather off of my body. As I toss the scraps in the trash can, I huff a small laugh as I think—just like Olivia Newton John in Grease.
My mouth quirks at the corner. I’ll have to make sure to pay Rio for the material.
Not that she pays for costume supplies with her own money, but I don’t want them to do something shitty like take it out of her paycheck.
Ellis clears his throat, reminding me that he asked a question.
“Yeah, sorry,” I finally rasp, then grunt. “I’ll be right out.”
The relief I feel at not being twisted up is short-lived when I catch sight of myself in the mirror.
Buffy bless, I can’t believe he let me in the house.
The wild blue strands of my hair are unruly and knotted —bed head to the extreme from driving full speed down the freeway— I see now that there’s one part of my cheek, right near my lip that’s still red, a little swollen, and there’s a cut there, but I think that’s because I bit it.
My eyes are also glassy, picking up on the gray from my zip-up, but it’s also evident that I’ve been crying, which doesn’t surprise me but . . . I don’t remember it happening, or for how long, or when it stopped.
Feeling my eyes well again, I shake my head and then run my fingers through my hair. After I’ve pulled through most of the knots, I shove it up in a bun, allowing some of the shorter pieces to fall around my face.
After wiping under my eyes and cleaning up my lip, I take another breath. I’m certain this is the most okay I’m capable of looking right now. And I just . . . don’t think it’s enough. Not for who is waiting on the other side of this door.
Linc and Ellis are living together.
In a house in the mountains. Just under an hour drive from the city—from Venice.
My eyes peer around the swanky bathroom with modern finishes, then back at myself in the mirror.
That same inward chant keeps finding me, “Keep going,” but it’s more of a feeling than the words themselves now, a wound-up feeling, like the crank on a music box.
With that, I take an inhale, swipe the scissors off the counter and open the door.
The bathroom is conveniently located right in the entry hall. I head in the opposite direction of the door we came in, and walk toward the slate gray cabinetry I see just past the hallway. When I reach the kitchen, I’m unprepared for the fucking beauty that is this view.
The dark tunnel you enter through is like a portal. The house has a fully-open concept and the entire wall opposite the kitchen, next to the living room, is floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking . . . well, it’s night right now—so all I can see is a dark, forestry landscape down the mountain, dotted with lights like fireflies from other homes, I assume. But the vast depth of the dark mountain range is still breathtaking.
I see Ellis out there in a pool of light, standing with his back to me, and my shoulders hunch.
This is going to suck.
“ There’s good and bad suck, this we know, ” Gram reminds me somewhere inside, and my lungs expand. I hold her words, I feel that inward pull, and timidly cross through the living room, toward the sliding door.
Opening it, Ellis’s chin jerks in my direction, but my breath gets caught in my throat once I step on the balcony, looking up.
“The stars . . .” I gasp.
And oh my God, the moon . It feels so close, I feel like I could just lift my hand and run my thumb along the smooth, inner curve of its crescent shape.
Wow . . .
Suddenly, Ellis is in front of me, handing me a small ice pack. With the natural nocturnal glow and the small corner light from the balcony, I can see him a little better now. His gorgeous boy face, but with some lines of manhood that weren’t there before. Still clean-shaven. And while he’s barefoot, I’m surprised to see him in a tank top. The Ellis I knew is the reason businesses put “Must wear shoes and shirt” on their doors.
I don’t say anything though. That would be weird.
I take the pack from him, but mumble, “Thanks, but I don’t really need it.”
He shrugs. “It’ll help with any swelling.”
Shuffling my feet, I nod, holding the pack up to the corner of my lip. He sits in one chair, so I sit in another. The silence is a living, breathing part of this moment.
It’s so quiet up here . . .
It seems like an eternity passes before I finally work up the courage to ask, “How long?”
Ellis sighs, leaning back. His green eyes catch the light from behind me with a glint, eyebrow lifting. “Me and Linc?”
My jaw tightens. Why did he say it like that?
He holds the challenge in his eyes for a moment more before his mouth quirks at the corner, and he shrugs. “He’s been living here for four years, but we reconnected five years ago.”
Five years ago?
“If you’d have answered one of my seven-hundred calls or texts, I would have told you.”
My eyes clamp shut with a small shake of my head. It’s terrible. The fucking worst. And even worse than that? I don’t even have a good explanation for why I stopped talking to him.
I didn’t mean to.
But I did.
He was away when Linc left and I didn’t want to talk about it. Then it quickly became about taking care of Gram, and then one day it felt too overwhelming to even pick up the phone and try to call him, so I just . . . didn’t.
Another casualty of the life pause.
The one I always knew would restart with a vengeance if it restarted at all.
But I miss it—him, us—so fucking much.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, barely audible, but he hears it. I can tell in the way his shoulders sink. His chin drops, and he breathes deep.
“What are you doing here, Paige?” he asks, quietly.
The tone isn’t harsh but tight. And of all the things he can ask me right now, I guess that’s the least spiral-bound.
I clear my throat. “Something . . . happened at The Window. I saw Linc, but only for a second, then I—uh . . .” I trail off, jaggedly explaining myself. “I ran away. Got his address from a coworker.”
He studies me a second, he looks like he wants to ask me something else, but then thinks better of it. After another sigh, he says, “Full disclosure, Linc will probably be here soon. I texted him while you were in the bathroom.”
Jesus. How is this happening?
How is this all happening?
Pushing my heels into the floor of the porch, I resist the urge to jump up and book it back down the mountain, back to my car, and instead take a breath. “H-How did you guys end up living together?” I ask timidly.
Fuck. I feel like I’m stepping on a frozen lake—just the right amount of pressure will break the ice and send me sailing down.
He clears his throat, then shrugs. “The usual way. I bought a house, he needed a room to rent.”
Glib asshole. He’s being vague on purpose.
Standing up, I drop the ice pack on the chair and step in front of him. “Look. I know you’re mad at me. And you have every right to be, I . . .” I shake my head, realizing at this very minute. I did to him what Linc did to me.
I just . . . disappeared.
He stands too, his scowl deepening, but I continue, the words barely scraping past my lips, “Something happened . . . after graduation.”
His chest inflates with a deep breath. “A lot of somethings seem to happen to you,” he mutters, and I wince. He takes a deep breath, then says, “Sorry. That wasn’t cool.” He shakes his head. He again, looks like he wants to say something else, but doesn’t. Instead, he pulls me into him, surprising me with . . . a hug.
It finds that part of me instantly—the deep, deep part I keep hidden. Like it knew the way. And holy fuck— it’s like the embrace taps the outer barrier of my well with a pick, piercing it, and a small sputtering of sadness trickles out. A stream of pain I’ve been feeling by myself for the last year.
Since Gram . . .
My eyes fill and tears race from the corners and down my cheeks as I bury myself in his shoulder. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.
“I know,” he sighs.
I didn’t realize I had been saying it out loud, but I shove myself into him harder and he holds me back, rubbing his hand up and down my back.
Oh my God, I can feel my body crumbling.
Breathe.
Ellis hugs me tighter as another moment passes, and he leans his cheek on the top of my head. “I’m sorry about Darlene.”
A gasp stutters through my tearful breaths, realizing now that’s why I’m quaking and crumbling to the ground.
A hug. A real one. From someone who used to care about me. I haven’t felt this comfort since she died last year.
My hands twist and pull at the soft material of his tank top. “Me too,” I croak, feeling even worse. I didn’t plan a funeral, but people all over Venice did stuff in Gram’s memory. I didn’t go to any of it because I suck.
“I went to the celebration of life at Queenie’s. Thought maybe I’d see you there,” he says. With my cheek still pressed against his chest, a shaky, shameful inhale is my only response, then he whispers, “We still talked sometimes, ya know.”
My wet eyes pull up, looking at him, my brow furrowing. “You did?”
He nods. “Not a lot. Less after her stroke. I know whatever happened after graduation fucked you up, Paige. Him too,” he mutters, then shakes his head. “I’m still so fucking mad at you for shutting me out. But . . . I still thought about you. I’ve missed you. We were . . .”
“Family,” I say brokenly.
I feel his nod. We were a family. All of us. And it twists the knife in my gut, amplifying my stupidity. I could have had years of Ellis hugs.
I would have known five years ago that Linc was back. Not that I was sure what any of that meant since he still left in the first place.
Left me.
“How is this happening?” I wonder absently, feeling close enough to the sky up here, yet safe, protected in Ellis’s arms, that my voice comes out a bit dreamy.
Ellis takes a steadying breath, looking off the porch as a car whips in through the opening.
I feel a twitch in his hand just before he drops them from me. “Fuck, this is—I really don’t know how this is gonna go, Paige.”
My eyebrows pinch. “What do you mean?”
He releases a long, drawn out exhale with another shake of his head. “I wanna give you guys some time to talk and whatnot, but . . .” he trails off, looking unbearably conflicted about something as he rubs the back of his neck. “Just . . . if you notice him start to space out, or blink a lot—don’t . . .” he groans. “Just don’t touch him, okay?”
What?! Don’t touch him?
The confusion on my face must be apparent because Ellis shakes his head. “This isn’t my business to tell. And the only reason I’m telling you this right now is for your safety. Just . . . be cautious with physical contact. Feel it out.”
So many things shoot forward like a firework, and it’s hard for me to grasp onto one thing. So I don’t. I watch all the thoughts crackle and fizzle in the air in front of me.
Can’t touch him?
How the hell will I kick his ass if I can’t touch him?
I hate that Ellis knows something about him that I don’t know. So many things, probably.
Does Ellis know what happened after graduation?
I hate that they’ve been living this close—for four years—becoming closer while I’ve been disappearing deeper and deeper into the abyss of loneliness.
And it’s all my fault.
But wait . . .
We graduated seven years ago, they’ve been living here for four years, but reconnected five years ago . . .
My awareness returns and the question that surfaces is, “Where was he for the other two years?”
Ellis shakes his head immediately. “Nope. Not touchin’ that.”
He gives no further explanation and his tone is definitive, pulling at my nerve endings like loose rope, but the thought falls when I hear the faint beep from inside the house.
The security system. It did the same thing when Ellis brought me inside.
My pulse skyrockets as my head suddenly feels like it’s in a fucking blender—whirling and slicing through any bit of strength I’ve managed to build through these years.
Ellis was a casualty of my inability to cope—and I always knew if I saw him again, I’d have to face that shitty part of myself that allowed it to happen. That made it happen.
The sound of the sliding door, opening and then closing knocks me back to now, but I can’t look over.
“ He’s here, ” I faintly hear Gram and clench my teeth.
Yeah, no shit, I think, and I swear to God, I hear her joyful humming to “Daydream Believer,” but the sound quickly distances in my head, and I finally turn my chin and look up.