82. Dollie—present day
Dollie—present day
“ I don’t think you should be doing this. You said your body was tired.” Three times, he almost fell asleep while getting tattooed.
It probably wasn’t a good idea to get tattooed, and the guys at the parlor even questioned it, asking why there were bandages on Ambrose’s wrists.
They were suspicious but continued when he laughed and said the bandages were merely there to hide something that offends me.
It was kinda true, until he winked at me and told the guy who was ready to jab a needle into his arm that they were ex-girlfriend’s names.
Sliding through the mud as rain pours down on our heads, Ambrose saves my favorite sneakers by carrying me on his back.
“You’re not exactly heav—” the word cuts off as we fall face flat to the floor.
Mud splashes up, catching me in the face and hair, and damn, there goes my sneakers.
I roll from Ambrose’s back, making it easier for him to lift his weight from the ground. Poor Duggan is squished between us as Ambrose lifts me into his arms. If I didn’t know his telltale signs, I’d never know of the pain in his arms.
“You’re hurting.” I almost fight him as he lifts me back into his arms.
“You rubbed my tattoo.”
“Lying to me again.”
“You worry too much,” says the man, keeping us out here in the pouring rain while he flicks mud from his hoodie with the hand not pressed to my back. “Of all the days to wear beige.”
A rumble in my stomach becomes a laugh. I blink back raindrops from my view as we continue, the rain washing us almost entirely of mud.
“My key is in my back pocket.”
My new key, as Nyx changed the locks this morning, without adding it to our bill.
We reach the door, and Ambrose props me against it while still in his arms. Wandering hands hunt through the tight pocket, prodding me long after a finger loops through the keyring.
“I know what you’re doing.”
“What am I doing?”
“Feeling me up, and you don’t have to be sneaky about it.” I press my body tightly against his, loving the feel of his hard muscles.
Bubbles’ bark greets us from the other side of the door, but it’s such a small distraction from the cheeky smile I see lift Ambrose’s lips.
I need to touch him there.
Stretching, the space between my thighs becomes flush with his abs as I place a kiss on his mouth. I pull his bottom lip between my teeth, and my eyes watch as desire twinkles in his. The green color darkens, blending in with that cute heart-shaped cluster.
I almost want to beg him to take me to bed.
Beg to feel the kind of love only he can show me.
But I’m not sure I have the courage.
The fear of rejection keeps me quiet.
I have enough courage for a kiss, a deeper kiss that leads my tongue deep into his mouth until he’s moaning against it. One of his hands leaves my body, pressing against the door.
“Tell me you want me?” I ask, breaking off the kiss and giving him my neck, where he nips with his teeth.
“I want you,” he mumbles between tiny bites. “Tell me you need me.”
“God, I need you. In so many ways, I need you.”
My body acts on its own accord, hips swaying into him.
Courage comes from somewhere, and I’m ready to say those words. To beg for more.
Then we fall into the light, the door behind me opening silently.
Fast feet steady us as we fall into the foyer. Bubbles’ excitement is contagious, as she jumps all around us. That joy to have Ambrose home, I feel it, too, and it makes me hold him that bit tighter.
“Hey, girl,” he coos, running fingers through her soft curls. “I missed you, too.”
“She’s fed, by the way.”
We turn to find Annabelle with a smirk on her face, arms linked with Nyx at the door.
God, his face is a picture. There’s so much shock there, it’s borderline horror and almost fit for Ambrose’s bedroom wall.
This is the difference between knowing I want Ambrose and seeing how much.
I rest my head on his shoulder, his hand never leaving me. The other, never leaving Bubbles.
“Feeling better, I see.” Annabelle’s stare moves between us both. “I texted you both.”
We both give our reasons for not answering. Ambrose’s phone was dead, and I wish the same were true for me, but I’m just avoiding Shane. Shane, whom I will block when Ambrose is out of the room and can’t see any of his written hate.
“Well, regardless, I’m glad you’re home and feeling well. Just an FYI, I’m no doctor, but you’re probably not well enough for that.” Annabelle points to what I can only guess is an erection.
Guiding me down to hide it, I feel the confirmation—definitely an erection.
Keeping me in front of him, his tanned cheeks pinken as he says, “Don’t perve on me, Annabelle. Your boyfriend is right there.”
Nyx doesn’t correct Ambrose by saying they aren’t an exclusive thing. Instead, he says, “Her boyfriend can see it, too. And god, I have no idea where to look or what to say.”
His eyes fall on me, and I can’t help myself. My mouth opens, and the words just come out. “Because you know I’m about to go love my brother in a way I shouldn’t?”
The blush appearing on Nyx’s face boycotts the pink stage and goes straight to red.
“O-kay, then. That’s our queue to leave.” Annabelle pats her new boyfriend’s arm, then grabs her coat from the hook. “If you are gonna be loving each other, you make sure she does the work. You’re healing.” She winks, and then they are out the door, leaving us alone.
I waited with Ambrose while Bubbles went out for the quickest pee in history, but not while he examines the yard that Nyx and his team will be done with any day.
Aside from knowing they struggled to carry out a large concrete centerpiece, I don’t know what they’ve done out there the last few days.
I stop thinking about it completely as I reach the top of the stairs, the door to Mom and Dad’s room still open, and calling me in.
So much of their stuff is still in sacks, bringing a pang of pain to my chest.
I step inside the room, their plush carpet soft beneath my feet as I drift deeper into the room.
I toss my phone to the bed to stop it from digging into me when I bend, and I rush to their stuff, needing it all out of the bags, needing Dad’s ties off his pillow because it feels too much like I’ll see him any second as he gets ready for work.
Opening up their closet doors, I pull the light string that hangs down. An orange glow welcomes me and the sack I drag along inside.
Ambrose finds me there a few minutes later, his height blocking out some of the light as he drags in another sack and starts hanging up Mom’s clothes. His top half is stripped off his wet clothes. His wet jeans squelch slightly as he moves.
We do this together, organize all their stuff, in silence until there are no sacks left and little trinkets line the dresser in the bedroom.
“I think we got everything in the exact right spot.” I gaze up at him as he stands behind me.
“I’m not sure our brains would have allowed different.”
I take his hand as I step away, passing by the window that overlooks the backyard.
New spotlights light up the area. A grassy patch still harbors the right side of the doors. Dad’s tiny tool shed is still standing close by, but the rest of the yard looks totally different. The left is taken up by tiny stones that look like?—
“Are those crystals?”
“Not authentic ones. I don’t forget what you tell me. I know lots of them can’t get wet.”
My cheeks bunch up as my smile grows, my squinting eyes still wandering the yard to the big centerpiece that stands raised and proud with a pentacle in the middle.
“It’s an altar.” My hand rubs the emotion welling in my chest.
“I’m not sure how often you’ll be able to use it, with the weather we get here, but?—”
“I love it. I’m not afraid of a little rain.” My cheeks get rounder until I can no longer see. “You did all this for me?”
“You needed cheering up.”
A tear falls, and I can only assume this one is from happiness.
“I really love you.” I turn to him, taking his face in my hands. “No one else would do this.”
My teeth chatter, emphasizing how cold I am.
“Take this off before you spend the next week on the sofa, fighting Bubbles for room.”
I lift my arms. “I won’t have the energy for that. My body has ached for days.”
“Are you coming down with something?” he asks, pulling the hoodie over my head.
“No, it’s the joys of being chronically ill.” My voice muffles as the thick material passes by my face.
“I get it.”
“Is HIV considered a chronic illness?”
“Yes, kinda. With the help of ART, it isn’t considered a progressive disease, but rather a chronic condition.”
Ambrose moves to the bed, pulling me by the hand and not letting go as he sits. The mattress dips under his weight. A wet patch forms around him, soaking the sheets that still, somehow, smell like both Mom and Dad.
He glances down at the scars that join up perfectly. “If you have questions, I’ll try to answer anything you want to know. I don’t want secrets.”
“If anything comes to me, I’ll ask. Thank you for being open. Okay, something has.”
“Go on.”
“Would you have ever told me?”
“Yes. I had lots of things to tell you, and you somehow figured them all out before I worked out the best way to do it, but I would have told you.”
“Is it why you haven’t tried to go all the way?”
“No. That was the sickness thing. I was so focused on our prior relationship that I couldn’t enjoy the one we were building.”
“And you no longer feel that way?”
“No. I’m done fighting myself. It’s too fucking hard.”
“Okay.” Unintentionally, I smile. “Good.”
“Good,” he repeats, a smile on his face, too. “We should get out of these wet clothes before we actually do end up ill again.”
Letting go of my hand, he bends his good knee and pulls at a sock. The black, wet material falls heavily to the floor.
Lowering to my haunches, I test my own aching joints. Sinking my hands into his other sock, I try to prevent the strain that bending would have on his knee.