Chapter 10 #2
"Absolutely not," I growl. "I wouldn't let you. This is who you are. I see that. I wouldn't change it for fuckin' anything, Cadence. It'll suck a big one having you leave when I'm just gettin' to know you, but I couldn't live with myself if I held you back from what you feel called to do."
Eyes shimmering, she looks up at me, and the expression on her face makes me feel like the only man on the planet, the only thing that matters, and it's a feeling I'll die treasuring, even if I never see this woman again.
"You are a damned good man, Riley Crowe." Her use of a curse word lends immense weight to her statement.
I almost feel like I could believe it.
She lifts up on her toes and kisses my lips. "We should return to your friends."
"Yeah, I gotta talk to Nyx."
The night ends up being the most fun I've had in a long, long time. Cadence is everyone's new favorite, with the girls all playing musical chairs so they can get a few minutes of conversation with her and the guys all trying to impress her with jokes and stories.
I'm proud of my crew, too—no one bats an eye at her unique way of talking or asks invasive questions. They just accept her. And she notices it—wearing her emotions on her sleeve the way she does, it's easy to see how much she's enjoying being a part of this evening.
More than once, I see her literally pinch herself on the thigh.
I wish to fuck this could be our life. I put that aside, though. Can’t go there.
We close the bar down and spend another half an hour in the parking lot, standing near our cars in a big circle beneath the glittering Three Rivers night sky, talking.
Eventually, we all get in our cars and head for our various homes. As I'm leaving the lot, Cadence glances at me. "I have a request."
"Anything."
She grins at me. "I am a literal girl, Riley. What if my request was for the moon?"
"I'd contact NASA."
She rolls her eyes. "You have an answer for everything." She lowers her window and leans out, looking up at the sky. "Can we get away from the light pollution? I would like to stargaze."
"I've got just the spot," I tell her.
I take her to Grace Point, a little spit of land jutting out into the bay—it's not far north of the spot we locals call Secret Beach.
It's not easy to find, as the access road leading to it is hidden from view of the main road.
Once you get there, you have to park in a little circle of dirt and hike up a steep path through towering, swaying pines.
The trees thin out gradually, and after a quarter of a mile, they end abruptly, and you find yourself on a bluff some twenty or thirty feet over the water, dune grass waving around you with sand underfoot and nothing but sky in almost every direction.
When we reach the point itself, she stops, hands to her mouth, spinning in a slow circle.
The beach stretches away to the left and right, endlessly, curving out of sight.
The water ripples, a fluttering black blanket strewn with a billion glittering, spilled diamonds.
Above, the sky is infinite. The stars are beyond number, and you could almost be swallowed whole by the breadth and depth of it.
Staring up, Cadence is visibly moved. She looks at me with wet eyes. "This is glorious!"
"My favorite place. I come here to think. To get away from…everything, I guess.”
"I will find it hard to leave." She sits cross-legged in the sand, and then lies back, smoothing her dress over her stomach, and lets out a deep, contented sigh. "This has been the best day of my life."
I lay beside her, wishing I could pull her onto my chest. "I'm glad."
She takes my hand. "You gave it to me, Riley. You shared your friends with me." Her eyes glitter in the dark. "I shall treasure this day all my life."
It's hard to swallow, dammit. "Cadence…" I trail off with a sigh. "I will too."
We lay in silence together for a long time, just staring at the sky, counting stars, and holding hands.
I can almost forget everything else. I've never been good at living in the moment—I've got way too much fucking baggage for that—but this feels pretty close to what I imagine that's like.
There's a smear of faint gray on the horizon where it meets the water when Cadence rolls to face me, cheek pillowed on her hands like we're snug in bed together. "I have a question."
"Okay. I'll answer as honestly as I can."
Her smile at this is faint, thoughtful. 'I know you will," she says absently. "My question is…difficult for me to verbalize."
"Take all the time you need," I say, tracing her hair behind her ear, marveling at her beauty in the silver light of starshine.
She takes nearly a full minute formulating her question. "In the realm of physical affection, things seem to exist on a gradient…or a spectrum. On one side, you have simple things, like hand-holding and hugs."
"With you so far," I say, trying and failing to anticipate where she might be taking this.
"Then there is snuggling, kissing, holding one another, touching one's face, and things of this nature."
"Yeah…."
"On the opposite end, obviously, is sex."
"Ah." I think I'm starting to see where this is going. Maybe.
"My question, then, is this: what is between kissing and sex?"
"Touching that is sexual in nature but not sex.
I dunno how linear it all is, though. I mean, me caressing your ass is a step in that direction.
Touching each other under clothing. Taking off clothing and kissing and touching each other while naked.
Then, right before sex, you have foreplay.
That's touching each other sexually, like…
" I trail off, trying to figure out how graphic I should be.
"Like what?" she presses.
"Trying to figure out how to put it. I don't wanna be crude about it."
“I would rather you be crude and honest than circumspect and vague or dishonest.”
"Using your hands to make each other come,” I blurt.
She blinks slowly. "Oh. I see." She rolls away from me. "I must seem so childish to you. So na?ve.”
"No," I protest. "Not at all. Innocent, but not childish or na?ve.”
She's silent awhile, then, and I watch her breathing come faster and faster. "Riley?"
"Yeah, babe?"
"I…" A shaky breath. "What is it like? To share that with someone?"
"Depends on the person, honestly." I can't stop myself—I pull her to me and cradle her against my chest. She cranes her neck to look up at me, chin on my chest, eyes as wide and bright as the moon. "Ask what you really want to ask, Cadence."
"I would like to share…that…with you." Her voice is so soft, so quiet.
My entire being tenses. "Cadence, I…"
I feel her deflate at my hesitation. "Oh. I see."
"No, no, no," I murmur, cupping her cheek. "You always assume the worst reason for what I say or don't say."
"Because that is my experience when it comes to allowing myself to hope," she murmurs.
"What is it you're hoping for?"
"To feel…" she trails off with a sigh. "I could stop there and say ‘simply to feel.’” She gnaws on her lower lip, looking up at me with trepidation and hope in equal measure. "My whole life, Riley, I have been…a mind." She taps her temple. "This is who I am."
I frown, not quite following. "I mean, yeah. Me too."
"No, Riley. It is different. You are, by and large, one cohesive individual. You are your mind and your body. Your body simply works. You do not feel your body, you are your body. You think and you feel automatically. Your mind is…is part of your body.:
“Hmmmm. And it's different for you?"
"Yes. Very. The term is dissociation. I feel physical sensations intensely and acutely.
With the mental noise I constantly experience, that hypersensitivity causes me to be easily overwhelmed by physical sensations.
It is not merely being overly sensitive, like, 'oh, just toughen up,' as I have been told by plenty of physicians and therapists in my life—those who do not understand autism and ADHD, and especially how differently it manifests in women versus men.
It is painful. Loud noises are excruciating.
Rough, gritty texture on my skin is…like nails on a chalkboard or a fork dragging across a plate. "
My stomach twists. "Really?"
"Yes. It is not just me being a silly, sensitive girl, Riley."
"That never crossed my mind,” I tell her.
She smiles, resting her cheek on my chest and continuing to talk.
"In a world of overwhelming noise, visual stimulation, olfactory input, and tactile sensation, with a mind that is already at a metaphorical redline at all times, the only way I can function day-to-day without being in a constant state of fight-or-flight is to dissociate from my body.
I learned to do so at a very young age. I did not cry almost ever, I am told.
My parents had to learn to check my diapers on a schedule because I simply would not cry if I had soiled myself. Same with hunger, or heat, or cold."
"So you just…taught yourself not to feel what’s going on in your body?"
"Correct." A roll of her shoulder. "I have lived my life in my brain, occupied by my thoughts.
My body is merely the vessel in which I move through life.
It is…sometimes a separate thing from me, myself, the entity that is Cadence Creswell.
It is a burden—it requires sustenance, so I must remember to feed it.
It requires clothing, so I must remember to clothe it.
It requires sunshine and exercise. Hydration.
Proper nutrition. That last is tricky for me when I am working, especially.
It is common for me to go a shift or two without eating, or subsisting on protein shakes and coffee. "
I lead her back to the truck, grab the old, thick, wool ex-military blanket I keep in the back seat, and spread it out in the bed of my truck. I bunch up a hoodie as a pillow and we lay together and stare up at the stars.
I consider what she's telling me. "So, sex, for you is…what, then? Impossible?”