Chapter Twenty-One
KNOX
As we step inside, she flips on the lights, and I get my first glimpse of the space—small but lived-in.
The perfect size for one person. Two small ceiling lights cast soft yellow light on everything.
A couch clearly chosen for comfort over style, a dated but sturdy-looking entertainment center, and a single plant trying its best, sitting on the side table beside a bronze floor lamp.
“Welcome to my temporary palace,” she says, dropping her keys into a bowl by the door.
She kicks off her heeled boots, and I follow suit.
“It’s nice,” I say, and mean it.
It’s nothing fancy, but it’s still nicer than my first apartment after high school.
I’ve become convinced in the years since I lived there that it was a former drug house.
The number of weird hiding spots I came across was too numerous to count after a while.
I was elated to move out of there, to put it mildly.
“Tour?” she asks, and I nod.
Without moving from the center of the room, she points to her left.
“Kitchen, of course.”
Ven gestures to the other spaces around us. “Living room, obviously. Bathroom’s there.” She points. “And…” taking a handful of steps towards the one closed door, she pushes it open and turns on that light also. “Bedroom.”
It is another simply decorated space—a neatly made bed, two books on the nightstand, an old lamp. Nothing staged, nothing hidden. But also nothing that screams Ven. Seeing it makes me curious what her apartment looks like back in L.A.
“Cozy,” I say.
“That’s one word for it,” she replies with a small laugh, closing the door again.
She moves back toward the kitchen, opening the fridge.
“Want something to drink? I’ve got beer, some wine, soda… or water, if you’re boring.”
Leaning against the counter, I say, “I’ll take the boring option.”
Ven glances over her shoulder. “Yeah?”
“Yeah. I don’t drink anymore.”
“Now we both know I’m going to have to respond to the anymore part of that statement.”
I figured as much.
“The full novel or the too-long-didn’t-read CliffsNotes version?”
Ven shrugs, reaching into the fridge. She brings two water bottles over to the counter, placing them between us.
“Whatever you want to tell me.”
I consider her words.
I haven’t told anyone the full story of how I find myself at 37, single, only recently employed, living with my mother and treading water every day for nearly five years.
Everyone important in my life lived it with me.
Raven is the first person in as many years that I’m even remotely interested in knowing about that dark stretch of time for me.
“My dad died five years ago.”
“Oh…” Her eyes widen slightly. “I didn’t know. I’m—”
“Sorry. I know. And believe me, I do appreciate that.”
I sigh, looking down for a moment as the light refracts through the water bottles, creating illusions of movement across the countertop.
“He died at the beginning of the pandemic, before anyone even really knew how bad it was going to get. The Nightshades were just beginning a nationwide tour when I got the call from my mom that he was sick enough to go to the hospital. I didn’t really think much of it at the time, him going into the hospital.
I figured he’d be there for some tests. An overnight observation at most. So we kept going with our tour.
When his overnight stay turned into an admission, I still didn’t worry too much.
Pa wasn’t the healthiest guy most of his life, and even though he’d made an effort to clean up his diet and move more, he still had some underlying health concerns.
If anything, I thought his being in the hospital in that moment was a good thing.
You know, have the doctors and nurses right there.
“But within days it all started to fall apart. The tour was suddenly canceled, and lockdown orders were being issued. We were stranded on the wrong side of the country until we could get flights back. And by the time we realized how bad he was and I got back home, hospitals weren’t allowing visitors anymore.
He…he was on a breathing tube by then, so I couldn’t even talk to him.
The nurse would have to hold his phone so he could type out his reply to us on his tablet. ”
Pausing in my story, I take a deep breath, forcing my body to untense. It’s been a very long time since I thought about Pa’s last days and everything that followed.
“And then suddenly he wasn’t here, and my world shattered overnight.
We couldn’t even have a real funeral because of the lockdowns.
The funeral home was limited to close family, so it was me, my ma, and my aunt and uncle.
No one else was allowed to be there. They all had to video conference in.
We couldn’t say goodbye to him, with all the people who knew and loved him.
We didn’t get to trade stories or share tears together.
It felt unfair on a level I wasn’t prepared for.
“But of course it didn’t end there. He was gone, but the world was still on fire.
Everyone I knew and loved was trapped in their own little bubbles, and Ma and I were trapped in ours.
It was a really bad time for me. I started to spiral almost immediately.
I tried to self-medicate my depression and anxiety away.
Sex with anything with legs, drinking whole bottles of rum, smoking myself silly.
Really anything that was reckless or ill-advised or let me forget how miserable I was for a few hours. ”
I was lucky enough to have a great relationship with Pa my entire life.
Even when we clashed, there was never love lost between us.
We said I love you all the time. But the fact that I was never able to say a proper goodbye to him, that I never got to hear him say I love you one last time, still shreds my heart some days.
I’m not sure that wound will ever fully heal.
“It all came to an impasse when I got into a car accident. I didn’t injure anyone else, thank God.
At the time of the accident, I was just under the legal limit, but that didn’t save me from legal action.
That was my wake-up call. Not just the legal action, but the fact that I had been drinking and was on my way to get more when I crashed.
A hefty fine, a suspended jail sentence, a halfway house for six months, and probation for nine.
There were a few backslides, but I’ve been good about staying away from all of that for a while now. ”
Ven pushes one of the water bottles towards me, and I reach out to take it. Our fingers brush briefly. For a moment, neither of us moves to pull away, the electric pulse trading between us.
“Boring it is,” she says softly.
“Thanks,” I say, opening the top and taking a deep drink, feeling parched after speaking.
She does the same.
We stand there in the quiet, drinking our water. I’m hyperaware of the city still humming faintly beyond the window. Raven gestures towards the couch, and we make our way towards it together.
“Thanks again for tonight,” she says, tone still soft. “It’s been too long since I’ve taken a night off or done anything approaching fun outside of a pre-planned work event.”
“It was my pleasure, truly,” I say, and it was.
The whole multi-story exhibit was exciting in ways I never would have been prepared for, least of all getting to spend it with Raven.
Tonight was another glimpse behind the no-nonsense manager’s mask she always wears.
Within twenty minutes of walking around, she was bouncing from display to display, her eyes lighting up from the immersive experience.
Now more than ever, I’m even more determined to get her to take that mask off completely.
Ensuring the cap is on tightly before placing my water on the floor, I move closer to her so there is only a foot between us.
“This is a bad idea,” she says.
“Oh?” I reach out and play with one of her pink braids, never looking away from her dark eyes. They remind me of lamplights, darker around the edges but fully golden in the center.
“We work together. Everything could get so messy if this doesn’t work.”
I chuckle lightly, “All true. The most solid of all reasons to not. But…and just hear me out…what if, maybe it does?”
Ven’s eyes go wide behind her glasses at my words, but I don’t say more, letting her consider what I’ve said.
Her tone is soft and reluctant as she says, “Maybe. But what if I give you a chance and it all blows up in our faces?”
“Give me a chance to fuck it up before you start catastrophizing.”
Her smile is subdued, and I see the wheels turning in her mind.
“One chance,” she whispers.
I attack her mouth with mine. I half expect her to be hesitant, but instead she matches my aggression.
Soon we’re both panting. Ven is pushing me back so she can straddle me, grinding into my lap.
Our clothing is still completely on, and just this friction between us has me wanting to explode in my pants, but I force the idea away.
I want this to last all night, but my body is fighting that. Wanting instant gratification.
“Slow down, baby,” I say.
I shift our position so I can cover her body with mine. From here she can’t grind her hips into me so firmly.
“Slow,” she nods, arching up to kiss me. She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath before looking up at me again. “I can do slow.”
“It’s been a while,” I admit, pulling back from her lips to look her in the eyes.
“Yeah, me too.” She smiles up at me. Her fingers run through my hair, her hands resting on my shoulders as I hold my body over hers. “Slow is good.”
Leaning back in, I deepen the kiss, her smell filling my senses.
“How long?” she asks, her words breathy.
“I haven’t felt the need to pull out the measuring tape since high school.”
Ven chuckles, rolling her eyes. “You know that is not what I meant.”
“I know.” I bite her earlobe, her breath hitching. “A while.”
“Give me a number.”
“Two is a number,” I say.
“Two is nothing. Try eight.”
“It’s been eight years for you?” I ask, unconvinced.
I do that math in my head. There is no way this 27-year-old has gone eight years without sex.
Oh.
“No. Eight months.” Her expression shifts to something more contemplative. “It’s been two years for you?” she asks.
My throat works like I want to swallow hard, something like embarrassment coming over me, but I force the impulse down.
“Yeah.”
“Oh shit. So this is like your virginity 2.0.”
My laughter runs through my limbs, and that moment of embarrassment shifts away.
“Sure.”
“Okay, rewind.” She sits up, and I shift backward so I’m sitting fully on the couch. Ven might be fully clothed, but at this angle I can see directly down her shirt.
Hello, the two most wonderful things I have ever seen.
Her curves move gracefully beneath her clothes, full breasts and a generous waist, tempting me further.
“Do you want to stop?” she asks, expression serious.
I’ve spent five years picking up the shattered pieces of my life, and this woman could destroy me all over again.
Because that’s what this moment feels like to me.
I see it with such clarity. It’s like a movie playing in front of my eyes.
If we do this, I won’t be the same by morning. I feel like being destroyed.
Suddenly annoyed at myself for suggesting slow, I stand, taking her hand. She follows me down the short hallway into the semi-dark bedroom.