16. Daphne Lemon Bars
sixteen
Daphne: Lemon Bars
It turns out babies in Maine are born the same way as in Seattle.
Through the same violent love. Through the same wild screams. The same harrowing moment when the center of the earth pulls.
The only difference was the land beyond the window, and the way the sunlight stretched without ever finding his face.
“You did well today,” Finn praised, plopping down on the painted white stairs outside the birthing woman’s home. He pulled his knees, letting his sandy brown curls fall forward.
“Thanks,” I murmured behind a yawn, stretching my arms wide until my knuckles brushed past him. Ten hours in the trenches of childbirth does something to a body.
“I am starving,” I groaned, searching the coastal town for a food cart or anything with carbs.
“Yes,” Finn moaned, rubbing his perfectly smooth stomach in distress. “We need sustenance!”
Despite the thorny brambles that twined along the edges of his personality, he was a dream as a midwife. Calm. Sure. Thinking! It was strange to work beside someone so utterly pieced together that even when he unraveled, the world shrugged it off as character development.
“Come on,” he pointed to the Beachwood Cafe on the corner, where a worker had begun their morning preparations.
“I don’t think they are open. It is,” I squinted at my phone. “Five in the morning.”
“Maggie is always open for me,” he said through a laugh that made my face scrunch.
What the hell did that mean? Never mind. I understood.
It had been one week, seven days, and 168 hours since I last touched Thay, but as much as I wanted to be okay without him, I wasn’t.
Each breath felt like fiction, or some strange purgatory stemming from a waking coma I could not escape from.
I couldn’t sleep. My food tasted off… And there was this phantom itch inside my veins that never went away.
In the calm moments when I was not searching placentas or reading Finn’s notes, I would look for flights home, then spend the rest of my evening talking myself out of it.
“Come on!” Finn gestured, lifting the attention from my phone.
It had been half a day since I heard from Thay, and aside from attending births or the nature of his work, he never drifted this far for too long.
“Hey,” Finn nodded at the worker covered in tattoos before barreling through the glass door into the seaside cafe. I might have allowed my eyes to linger a tad too much on the distraction of unfolding chairs, because Finn’s brows perked in faint disinterest when we passed.
“Is that what you are into?” Finn asked, shuffling through the winding tables of handmade jewelry, boho art, and artisan soaps.
“What do you mean?” I mumbled, taking a whiff of “Dark Romance,” which smelled of cedar and ancient sea spray, before tucking the $54.00 bar of soap back into place.
“They are all imported from Illusory Farms in Upstate New York,” a creamy voice explained from behind the counter. She was warm, bouncy, and had literal hearts in her eyes for the male beside me.
“Xaden,” Finn answered my question, completely ignoring her. “I am pretty sure he is out on work release,” he clarified, as if that condemned his moral character. Half the men I loved had done time, but that did not make them less, only complicated.
“What for?” I asked, searching the menu for anything resembling food. Somehow, the gluten-free lemon pepper truffle poppers or the spinach egg-white-only croissant with red daisy jam weren’t going to cut it.
“Drug dealing, I think,” Finn commented, keeping his eyes forward. “Maggie is good at second chances.”
“And third ones,” she flirted, and I appreciated her flair.
Finn did not move, but the smirk upon his lips read that he got it.
“I’ll take one of those,” I pointed at the lemon bar as big as my face, “and a sparkling water.”
“That is not breakfast,” Finn groaned, and I waited in silence for his order.
What would it be? A cup of egg yolks. A protein shake? Grass.
“It is today,” I remarked with a smile, but he only scowled.
“Sorry. I don’t run off chia seeds and kale like the rest of my kind.
” He eyed me. “I am Daphne, by the way,” I said to Maggie, whose eyes were searching for any evidence that this male had seen me naked.
“I am one of the interns working with him for the season.”
“Oh!” she exclaimed with a sigh of relief. “I am Maggie. Pleased to meet you.”
“I’ll get the croissant and a cup of drip with Irish Cream.”
“Finn, I know how you take it,” she said, licking her lips, turning toward the prep counter just out of reach. My eyes shifted to Finn, who stared at her through a long breath.
“So, then what do you eat for breakfast if not kale and chia seeds?”
It seemed like a jab, but I moved around it.
“Honestly?” I ran my fingers through a string of silver chains on a side table. “Toaster waffles! With syrup in each square and pressed together like a sandwich.”
Finn shrugged his head, laughing.
“Because you are eight years old?” he teased, but my eyes only darkened.
“You know that might have been my age the first time I had one. My parents weren’t particularly great at feeding me, and Thay used the only ten-dollar bill we had stashed for emergencies to purchase a box,” I explained.
“I don’t know. We ate it like it was Thanksgiving, and I suppose to us, it was. ”
Finn’s expression faded into a pitiful twist that I had spent most of my adult life trying to avoid. Fuck me, I shouldn’t have told him.
“Thay? Is that who you check your phone 982 times a day for?” he asked, shuffling to his other foot.
“Yep,” I admitted, wondering just how long it took to put a lemon bar onto a plate.
“Is he your boyfriend?”
Finn tossed a glance at Maggie and stepped closer.
“No,” I palmed the cell in my pocket, resisting the urge to run.
“Best Friend? Brother?”
My eyes shifted to the door and then back to Finn.
“No,” I said again. “I suppose he is… Well, he is kind of…” I knew what I wanted to say, but the lie was too thick and brawny to force from my chest, “… basically, my architect,” I mouthed, lunging for the lemon bar that came sliding across the counter on a plate full of daisies.
Finn was unsure what to do with that response, but I did not care, nor did I feel like explaining it to him.
“I will wait for you outside. It’s hot in here,” I lied, pushing into the Maine breeze when… “Shit!” The lemon bar hit the ground with a soft thud, and my eyes squeezed shut on instinct.
Ten years ago, I would have eaten it off the pavement, but instead, I bent low to pick it up, barely noting the person who rushed past me to get inside.
I eyed it for a while, sitting dumb and yellow under the first morning sun, before a voice shook me from above.
“Here,” the distraction smiled, offering me the fresh lemon bar in his palm.
“Thank you,” I murmured, shuffling to my feet. “But you did not have to do that.”
“I know,” he said, his dark irises following the lines of my curves before nudging me to accept the pastry. “But I did. Also, this thing is like twenty bucks, so please take it.”
I let out a sigh and reached, this time holding on tighter.
“Twenty dollars?” I joked. “Were the lemons also imported from Upstate New York?” I laughed, taking a bite to show my gratitude. I expected the tang of lemon and the dry wash of buttery crust, but the entire thing sat sideways in my mouth.
“Try her backyard,” he lifted his lip, tilting his head into the sun. He was tall, dark, and my favorite kind of wrong. “How do you know Finn?”
“I work with him.”
“No shit?” he smirked, inspecting me closer. “I did not take you for a baby whisperer!”
“Oh?” I took another bite, allowing the sugar to coat my insides.
“Nope,” he flashed a smile. “I thought you were much cooler than that.”
A giggle arose in my throat, appreciating the jest. I wonder what Xaden would think if I asked him to aim it a little lower next time.
“I am sorry to disappoint,” I offered him a piece of the lemon bar that was nearly gone.
“You could make it up to me,” he pinched off the corner of the crust and plopped it into his mouth, making a face.
“Oh, yeah?” I arched a brow, not fully understanding why this busboy was causing me to blush. “How?”
“Let’s go,” Finn said, placing a hand along my arm in a tug.
“I’ll think about it,” Xaden leaned in with a wink, fixing his eyes on mine. “How’s it going, Finn? Still banging half the women in town?”
“Alright,” Finn groaned, glaring at the distraction with a clear warning. “Come on.”
“Be careful, Baby Whisperer.” Xaden rolled onto his heels. “In Maine, the most fucked-up things come in the shiniest packages.”
“I mean it, Xaden, shut your goddamn mouth!”
“Nah,” he smirked at Finn. “I don’t think I will.”
“Then maybe I’ll come back here and shut it for you.”
“Promise, Finny Boy? You know how I like it!”
Finn growled, puffing his chest when he turned us toward his Ford Bronco parked down the street.
“Fucking asshole,” he mumbled, pitching me the sparkling water that pinged off my stomach and onto the sidewalk with a scrape. I watched it sputter down the road, vomiting its guts as it spun. “Shit. I am sorry. I’ll get you another one.”
“It is fine,” I said, keeping my eyes on the eruption. “But are you?”
“Yes,” he ground out. “Why wouldn’t I be?” he mouthed, throwing open the driver’s door before slamming it shut.
Seattle was loud! Forever imbued with an eternal thrum you can never switch off. In fact, you could scream for miles, and all it would do was die inside the void like everything else. But in this town, unsavory emotions were a sundress with a bruise.
Buzz.
Wolfe: Free?
Seeing his name sent a sudden rush of normalcy into my bones that I had been reaching for, and I did not want to wait to reel it all the way in.
The beach opened wide to my left, and I bit my lip before shifting away from the car.
It was clear Finn needed a moment, and my presence would only make it worse.
It was not as if he knew me. Besides, whatever bad blood existed between Xaden and Finn could stay there.
I had enough shit in my life to deal with to take on any more.
Buzz.
Another vibration settled low in my stomach when my feet touched the golden sand. Unlike Washington, whose pebbled beaches bled into its bleak waters, Maine was happier. She blushed, twirling her blonde hair around her fingers in buttery strands.
I smiled at the picture flashing between my fingers.
“Hi!” I answered, removing my shoes to feel the squish.
“Hi back,” Thay’s voice spilled into me in warm waves that made my mind drift to the possibility of last night’s mistake curling into the crux of his body. He was enough of an asshole to call me with her still there.
“Sorry for the silence. Wolfe and I are working through some shit, which means a lot of long nights!”
“You alone?” I asked, burrowing my embarrassment into the front of my hoodie.
Did I feel guilty for flirting with Mr. Distraction at the cafe, or was I projecting?
“Yes,” he made a sound, and I could almost imagine his scowl. “Why? Did you think I wasn’t responding because I was fucking some girl?”
Maybe.
“Were you?” I swallowed, peering at my cabin in the distance. It would take me a month to reach it.
“Daph, what is this about?” he stepped around the question, shooting lemony bile into my mouth.
Gross.
“I don’t know,” I mumbled, kicking the sand, and hating the way this moment made me feel. “A guy who looked like you flirted with me this morning. Maybe it just set me off.”
I wasn’t sure why the rules felt different now that I was three thousand miles away, but the thought of him railing some unknown without my eyes on him turned everything to ash.
“I haven’t fucked anyone since you left,” he admitted, stopping me dead in the sand.
“Really?” was all that came out.
I remembered the first time I saw him hard, taking me in from the corner of our room.
We were teenagers, but it was not as though I could hide my body from him.
Thay had watched my curves form, my breasts grow, and every inch of my sexuality play out in real life, and it made me feel safe.
I smiled, thinking of the day his rasp came in all gravelly and low, coloring the world black.
“Yes, really.”
I wasn’t his first. You’d think after everything we had been through, this part of ourselves belonged to each other, but you would be mistaken.
Even when I had asked him to teach me how to kiss, he made me practice on my arm, keeping his lips at a distance.
I still remember the look on his face when he stumbled into our room in slow motion, wearing an expression that I did not put there. That, for once, didn’t belong to me.
I cried for a week.
“Since when don’t you have sex?” I asked, rubbing at the burn behind my calves, when a pair of joggers passed me with a smile. Assholes.
“Since my fucking soulmate left Seattle.”
I blushed, biting so hard down on my lip that tiny splatters of blood bubbled in the cut.
“Liar!” I called him, stopping again to catch my breath. This was it. This was how I would die.
“Why would I lie?”
“Thay.” I shook my head, veering toward the wet sand, hoping it would make a difference. “You can’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“Call me your soulmate, but never touch me. Don’t have sex when I’m not around, then sleep with a harem of girls when I am. It’s shitty.”
Thay laughed, making my thighs do the thing that made me want to shove his mouth between them.
“Does that mean you’re going to fuck the guy that looks like me?” he asked behind a smile.
“Yes,” I bit back a laugh when he snickered into the phone. “Why? Do you want to watch?”
“Always,” he cooed, shutting a door behind him. “Look, I have to ask you a question, but don’t get pissed, okay.”
“What is it?” My stomach clenched.
“Did you notice anyone in the alley the night you banged Wolfe at the party?”
Wolfe: I need to talk to you.
Air filled my cheeks in a stutter, and I nearly ate sand.
The only one who could have known that I was out there was Lyla.