Chapter 19
Chapter Nineteen
Dixon
The walk to AJ’s place was as known to me as breathing, and I grinned like a goof as I hurried over there, like somebody lit a fire in my pants. I didn’t want to show up too soon, or she’d think I jogged there, but I also didn’t want to make her wait.
The image of her standing in her doorway, welcoming me into her home, had become my favorite part of the day. I envisioned it while I walked and thought about all the animals I’d met in the day and how stoked I was to be a part of the All Animals team.
It was a job I could be proud of, a job Stu could be proud of.
What kid didn’t like animals? And it felt really good to be considered part of a team.
I’d never really felt that in a work situation, and I was unusually excited to meet the other team members.
Granted, I was only a small part, but they were good people.
They cared about the animals they treated, and I was proud to be part of that.
I wanted to kiss AJ for asking about my day.
There wasn’t one person in my life who bothered.
That wasn’t exactly true. Abey had tried to connect, but it wasn’t an easy connection.
There were just too many years between us, still so much she didn’t know about me.
The ambiguity was my fault, I knew, but I wasn’t ready.
I couldn’t even imagine sitting down with my sister, or any of my siblings for that matter, and spilling my guts.
I would, in time, but I got the feeling that they didn’t know what to say to me, and I had the suspicion that they were wary of saying anything in case it might set me off, that anything they had to say might drive me back to drugs.
For AJ to care enough about me to not be scared of my reaction and ask about such a mundane thing seemed huge to me. It had been so long since I’d let anyone care for me at all, and AJ made me realize more than ever what a mistake that had been.
So, when I stepped onto her porch and she answered her door in pink pajamas, mint green fuzzy slippers with pink bows, and her hair up in a knot on her head, I couldn’t help myself.
Wrapping my arms around her, I drew her into them and leaned down to kiss her soft petal lips. It was just a quick peck, but she rested her head against my chest and let me hug her silently, and the sound of her quiet breath and the steady pulse of her heartbeat was like a drug.
But to compare her to some dirty, life-threatening substance that had the power to rip families apart and make liars and thieves out of honest people seemed gross and insufficient.
AJ was so much more than that. She was the strength of the sun when it beat down on a sapling in the dirt, giving its power to the tree, telling the small, unprotected thing it was okay to thrive, to grow and be seen.
She was the love behind everyday words and actions that allowed the people around her to feel secure and brave.
She made me feel brave.
“I thought about you today,” I said, hugging harder and pulling her closer.
She wrapped her arms around me and clasped her hands together behind my back. “You did?”
“Yeah. The first dog I worked with was a Dalmatian, and he reminded me of your old dog, Miggie. Remember her?”
AJ laughed against my chest. “Oh God, I miss that dog. Remember she used to dig up the wild thyme Gran planted, and she’d eat it with a side of cat poop from the neighbor’s yard, and then she’d come home smellin’ like an overripe garbage disposal? Her breath!”
Chuckling, I said, “I remember, and then your mama used to make us try to brush her teeth, but we thought your toothpaste would make her breath smell better than the beef-flavored dog toothpaste. She ate the whole tube of Aim and barfed all over your bedroom floor.”
Laughing softly, AJ pulled back and looked up at me, so I released my hold around her, but she took my hand and dragged me inside and to her couch.
A mug with a snapshot of AVery Pretty Petal’s storefront printed on it sat on her coffee table, the peppermint tea bag dunked into the steaming water and the tag hanging from its string over the edge.
“You’re too good to me,” I said as I sat, then lifted the mug for a sip.
Fancy Kitty jumped onto the back of the couch to sniff and check me out, and then she perched behind my head and began to lick her ginger paws and start her nightly cleaning ritual.
“No I’m not,” AJ replied. “I’m perfect for you.”
We both paused. I knew what she meant, but to hear her say it like that…
“So,” she went on like she hadn’t said anything, “what kind of animals did you get to play with today?”
I pretended she hadn’t said anything either and counted off the different species of animals on my fingers. “Dogs, cats, two ferrets, a horse, and a llama.”
“Really? They threw you right in there, didn’t they? A llama on your first day? I’ve heard they can be pretty temperamental.”
I laughed. “You ain’t kiddin’. That thing hated me. It was kind of a ding to my ego. I pride myself on bein’ able to relate to animals.”
To prove my point, Fancy stood and stretched, digging her sharp claws into the back of AJ’s couch, and then her paws began to knead my shoulder. She climbed over me and laid on my chest, looking up and right into my eyes.
Scratching behind her ear, I said, “It’s always come so easy to me, but this llama today?
No go. I think he knew we were there to rid him of his most prized jewels.
He spat at me the minute he saw me, and things only got worse from there.
And that green stuff they spit smells like death.
Miraculously, he missed me. Even the vet was surprised.
He said llamas usually have pretty good aim. ”
AJ made an “ew” face, but then laughed. “You were lucky.”
“I dunno about luck,” I said, “but I’ve still got good reflexes.”
I pushed my hair behind my ear, and AJ’s eyes followed my hand. “What are the tattoos on your fingers?”
Splaying my fingers, I looked at the markings. They weren’t the most sophisticated tattoos, but they meant a lot. I lifted my hand and held up four fingers.
“A number for every time I quit drugs.” Tucking those fingers to my hand, I held up my thumb with the X.
“And the X is for this time. The last time.” I put it on my thumb because that was what I used to push the plunger down on the needle every time I shot up.
If there was ever a time I thought about doing it again, I’d see the X.
It stood for Stu. It stood for the end of a really shitty time in my life.
It stood for me because I’d made the decision to stop and to place value on myself again.
AJ smiled softly and swiped her own mug off the coffee table and sipped it, bunching her knees up in front of her, but then she extended her legs, and her slipper rubbed against my thigh.
Fancy jumped down and ran off when I set my tea on the table and lifted AJ’s legs. When I set them in my lap, she tried to pull her feet away, but I held her ankles and wouldn’t let her.
“How was your day?” I asked, sliding her slippers off her feet and letting them thunk on the floor in front of the couch.
She set down her mug and wiggled her toes, which not surprisingly had been painted a bubblegum pink color. Quietly, she sighed and tucked a throw pillow behind her neck, then reclined against the arm of the couch.
When I began to rub and dig my thumbs into the high arch of her foot, she moaned softly.
“Long, which is kind of unusual for a Saturday in late summer or early fall. Usually, people are too busy with the new school year or with the harvest to remember to order flowers for their loved ones, but I got slammed. I made seven arrangements, took almost twice that number of orders for next week, and at one point the shop had so many customers waiting, they had to line up out the door. Poor Gran’s tuckered out. She was my helper.
“I’ve got an online ordering portal, but most local folks just stop in when they’re out runnin’ errands.”
Working a stubborn knot of muscle on the rise of her arch, I rubbed it out over and again until it released.
“That feels amazing,” she said, and she closed her eyes.
“Sounds like a successful day though.”
“Oh yeah. I’m not complainin’. Today’s sales will pad my bottom line and allow me to run more ads. Soon, I’ll have to hire help. I always thought the shop would stay local and small, but with online orders and the ease of makin’ websites nowadays, we’re growin’ without me even really havin’ to try.
“Gran’s been retired for years, but she loves hangin’ out so she can get all the town gossip.
She always offers to help, and so does Mama when she’s not workin’, but I can’t rely on them.
Gran’s got bad knees, and my mom has zero creative bones in her body.
I have to instruct her and tell her where to place every single flower or else her bouquets look like a tangled, messy pile of flower vomit. She tries, but…
“Someday, I’d like to open a second store. Maybe in Jackson. I’d need several employees to pull that off, but we’re not quite there yet, you know?”
I watched her mouth as she talked, stealing long, wanting glances since she couldn’t see me. I wanted so badly to kiss her again.
She moaned louder when my hands slid higher and wrapped around her ankles. And when they moved even higher and slipped beneath her silky pajama bottoms, she sighed and scooted closer to me. Her pillow fell to the floor, and her hair splayed out beneath her on the couch cushion like silk.
“It’s been a long time since anyone touched me like this, Dixon. I-I think maybe you should stop.”
“Why’s that?” I asked, scooting closer to her, too, and I turned and lifted her foot to my mouth.
When I kissed the tip of her big toe, she gasped and her eyes popped open. “Because you said you only wanna be friends, but that’s not what I want, and you touchin’ me like this isn’t makin’ it easier to not throw myself at you again.”
I wasn’t sure when or why that had changed, but it wasn’t what I wanted either.
In her quiet house with not so much as a clock ticking, the connection we’d always had sparked and flashed between us.
Since the day I’d stumbled into her shop, it had been morphing and changing into something I had no right to expect.
Quietly, I said, “Maybe I want you to.” Maybe I want you to plaster yourself all over me. Maybe I want your full, lush ass in my hands, your legs hooked over my shoulders, and your fingers streaking my back with scratches.
“You do?”
I nodded. I couldn’t speak. The want I felt for her was so big, it clogged my throat and made my heart race like a jackrabbit trying to escape a cougar’s snapping jaws.
The happy, calming sound of her voice was doing something to me, and how had I never noticed the sexy timbre and the squeaky rasp? It had always been that way, I finally realized, kind of a husky, beckoning sound, and now I wanted to hear it when she came and called my name.
She stared at my face, probably trying not to get whiplash, but I watched her reacting to my touch, watched her breasts rise and fall with her breath, watched her hands grip the couch.
She licked her lips, and her pink tongue left behind a silky, wet sheen that made the pout of her bottom lip irresistible, and that was the last straw.
I needed that plump skin between my teeth.
Carefully, I inched closer, sliding my hands even higher.
I had been wrong before. AJ was a drug. She was a comforting ease, and every touch of my skin on hers made me remember the past. It became clearer and clearer, but the bad, painful memories weren’t flooding my mind like they usually did.
No, AJ made me remember laughing with her in the forest. She made me remember the simple happiness of long summer days under the sun, reading together as she lay next to me in the dirt or propped against the base of a tree, peeking over my shoulder to get lost in whatever fantasy I’d borrowed from the library, and Smartie wars when we kept count of how many we tossed that landed in each other’s mouths.
Her mouth now was the portal to remembering who I used to be, and I wanted so goddamn badly to remember the person who hadn’t injected filth into his veins or lied to the people he loved.
I wanted to be worthy of my son, and even though I was sober and should’ve been able to hold my head high, I couldn’t.
AJ’s touch on my skin or the taste of her tongue in my mouth couldn’t make my neck any stronger, but I wished for it.
Her eyes didn’t stray from mine, and slowly, she unbuttoned her pajama shirt. The fabric slipped over her skin like water over a stone at the edge of a brook and revealed to me something I hadn’t realized I’d been longing for.
Connection, touch, and need. But not chemical need. No, this was about instinctual need, a base desire.
But only AJ would do. It was why I’d been dreaming about her before I came home. Somehow, somewhere deep inside, I knew I needed her in my life.
I hadn’t been with a woman since Kel, and sadly, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t recall the act that had created the best thing in my life. We had been high that night. We got high every night back then, and all those nights bled into days in my mind.
It was just another reason I wanted to remember who I’d been before the drugs. Another reason I wasn’t good enough for my son.
Only AJ had the power to make me forget. She could blur out the ugly with her flowers, her gentle acceptance, and her beautifully brilliant smile.
“Please,” I whispered. My hand wandered up her leg and over her soft stomach.
She nodded and reached for me, and her legs settled beneath me as I crawled over her.
Regarding me for a long moment, her eyes caressing the long strands of my hair as it fell between us, finally she asked, “What’s changed?”
“I’m not sure, but I need you. I want you. I need my face buried between your thighs, and I wanna know the taste of you.”
She blushed and lowered her gaze, but I fit my finger beneath her chin and lifted her eyes back to mine. “But can I ask, why do you want me? I don’t have much to give you.”
She breathed a laugh, and the sound was sex and home and the answer to a question I’d never bothered to ask.
“I’ve always wanted you,” she whispered. “You have to know that.”
“I don’t know that.”
“Well, now you do. Kiss me. Touch me. Take what you need from me. Everything I have to give is yours, even if it’s just for tonight.”