Ripped

  “Be good, Dad. I’ll try to visit when the tour’s over. I’m working on Leo to get some time off. We can hang.”

  “No such thing as love—remember that! At least, no such thing as a woman’s love.”

  I stand by the door, battling with myself. Battling with the memory of a girl, and an angry woman who wants me inside her like she needs to breathe—even if she hates her body for wanting me.

  No such thing as love . . .

  “I’m a rockstar, Dad,” I say, the words bitter in my mouth. “Clearly, I sing about that shit because I believe in it. I just don’t believe in it for me.”

  Outside, though, I’m morose as shit as I pull my cap over my face, slide on my aviators, and slip into the back of the waiting car.

  I drum my fingers on my thigh and stare out at the windows of all the buildings outside.

  I used to climb to her bedroom window. It’s not as simple as it looks in the movies, but I managed. One particular night, I’d wound through the thorny, spiky bush, up the damn trellis, onto the window ledge, then up to her window—which had the tiniest fucking ledge in the history of ledges—hanging by one arm and knocking until she opened. Then I swept inside, both of us plucking the thorns from my T-shirt.

  “Fucking bush,” I growled.

  “Shhhh,” she said as she ran to check the lock on her door. “What are you doing here?”

  “Can’t sleep. Dad’s drinking. Breaking whatever the hell’s left. Wanted a look at you.” I take her in and holy shit, I never thought she slept in that sort of sleep gear. Tiny shorts. Loose T-shirt hanging over one shoulder.

  “And you came to me because . . . you needed a teddy bear?” she asked. “If I were ever to be considered a bear, I’d be more like a grizzly.”

  “Then, Grizzly, you’ll have to do.” I kicked off my shoes and slid into her bed, pulling her in with me.

  She laughed lightly and tried to stifle the sound. She never laughs, this girl, but she laughs—with me.

  “I couldn’t sleep either,” she whispered suddenly up at me, tracing circles on my forearm. Right where I have my tattoo now. Fuck, she killed me. She’s always been a closed little box, Pandora, and not prone to saying much at all about how she feels. She can be bleeding to death and be asked if she’s in pain, and this girl? She’d probably shrug even when it’s killing her.

  I get her. Somehow, I get her. And she gets me. That night, I clutched her tight, and within seconds, she dozed off in my arms. She used to trust me enough to do that. Lie asleep, pressed close to me. I set my phone alarm for 5 a.m. so her mother wouldn’t catch us. Then I stared at her ceiling and wondered if she thought of me whenever she stared up at that twirling fan. Or if she thought of me at all the way I thought of her when in bed.

  My mother died when I was just three. I remember how she smelled, and felt, but not her face. I kind of hate that I can’t remember her face. Hate even more the fact that my father didn’t cope well and got rid of any pictures before I had a say in it.

  When my dad was caught dealing, the government was quick to take the cars, the house. We moved in with Uncle Tom until the trial, and he was worse than Dad. Alcohol is all the man knew. My friends? Interesting to see how they scattered once my dad’s face was plastered on the evening news.

  In a day I went from being the most popular little shit in private school to being the loner at the table. Everything, poof, in the wink of an eye.

  It felt surreal. Unreal.

  Couldn’t sleep, eat, because I somehow knew what would happen next.

  I dreaded it, even while I waited for the last shoe to drop. That last drop to spill the glass of water that would drown me. Tighten the last fucking notch of a noose that hanged me. I kept waiting for the one thing I had left—the one I most wanted—to go poof as well.

  When your life does a one-eighty on you, you develop fears. And I feared losing her more than I feared anything. Hell, I feared I already had.

  At 5:02 a.m. I hadn’t had a wink of sleep, but there she was, and all I wanted was to make sure she was there for me. Digging into my pocket, I curled my fingers around my mother’s ring. The only thing I could save. Because I’d hid it. Legally, I shouldn’t even have had the ring. But it was all I had of my mother, and I wanted my girl to have it. The next day I took her out to the docks and gave it to her before we left the yacht we stole into.

  The way she’d kissed me . . .

  Guess every time she kissed me back like that, I kidded myself that she loved me too.

  One day, months later, the day after Dad was sentenced, it happened.

  I found out that the girl I wanted to love me like I wanted to breathe . . . could never be for me.

  I had to go. I left, hating every step I took.

  No booze, no prostitute, no girl, nothing could numb me enough for me to stop, just fucking stop, needing her.

  Not even a song.

  Drunk, I poured it out months later, needing to blame someone for my shitty life. So I blamed the source of my pain. And my new friends, the Vikings? Hell, they embraced the anger in it, the irony of mixing it with Mozart. I sing it now, every day it seems, and I could sing it a million times more, but I still won’t believe that I wouldn’t kill for her to love me.

  For a fucking minute.

  A second even.

  To just give me a fucking kiss and tell me that at least back in those days, she loved me.

  NINE

  DANCING TO THEIR TUNE

  Pandora

  I wake up early, and the choreographer waits for me in the hotel ballroom, along with eleven other dancers. Letitta is also there, watching with a smirk as I come in. I’m coffee-less, humorless, and sleepless. I don’t even smirk back.

  I got no sleep last night. I kept expecting you-know-who to come to my bed. No, not expecting. Almost . . . anticipating. Sad, but true. I kept remembering when we were seventeen, and he used to slip up the trellis into my room, and I’d be waiting—pretending I wasn’t waiting—my heart leaping when he tapped lightly on the window. I’d let him in in a hurry, and he’d take off his shirt, his shoes, slipping into bed with me with just his jeans on, and I’d smell him and press close, wanting to say that since my dad died he’d been the only one able to make me forget the pain. Wanting to tell him that it hurt to know my mom was, day and night, preparing her case to take his dad away from him too . . .

  “It’s all right, he did it to himself,” he whispered when I told him I was sorry, again. But he sounded sad. How could he not be sad?

  And then I’d fall asleep, even as I fought not to, too comfortable with his smell, and warmth, and the way he stroked his hand long and lazy down my back. Then I’d wake alone, seeing the dent in his pillow and the slightly open window where he’d slipped out, just in time before my mother came to wake me for school.

  “Close the window, it’s chilly!” she’d scold.

  “You’re like a grandma already,” I’d grumble.

  “That is so disrespectful, Pandora.”

  “I’m sorry,” I’d mumble and disappear into the shower, letting the water run over my body, already loathing the day ahead. I knew what would happen, because the same had happened yesterday, and the day before that too.

  I’d see Mackenna from afar. He’d look at me too. We’d pretend we hadn’t just held hands, or slept with my body twined like a pretzel around his long, ever-growing one. I’d hang out with my tiny circle of friends, feeling him guarding me like a wolf from the table crowded with wannabes, but after the hearing, only the real rebels with troubled families hung out with him. They all waited for his dad’s trial and sentence—but Kenna?

  Kenna had already been “tried” by everyone in school. Everyone but me. We’d pass each other in the hall, both of us straining to bump shoulders.

  We’d go late to class, our methods different every time. Sometimes he’d tie his shoelaces at a tortoise’s pace as the halls emptied. Other times, I’d drop my books at the exact moment he passed so he coul
d drop to his haunches close to me and slip my books into my backpack. It was stupid, really, but the day was torture if I didn’t exchange at least one word. One word, with him. “Hey,” he’d say softly, only one side of his mouth smiling.

  “Hey. Thanks,” I’d say, when really I meant, I want to be with you.

  And his silver eyes would say in quiet frustration, “Why can’t I fucking be with you?”

  Every couple walking down the halls holding hands killed me. I’d never miss the clench of his jaw, the coiled energy as I knew he wondered why we couldn’t have that. “My mother,” I’d explain. She wouldn’t understand. She’d been watching me like a hawk since she’d seen him walk me home. My mother would ruin it all.

  “Yeah, I know, I’m just frustrated,” he’d whisper in my ear, his breath like a soft wind as he hung my backpack over my shoulder and rubbed his thumb on the skin where my T-shirt pulled, stealing that touch . . . and my heart with it. “Come to me tonight,” I blurted out.

  “Always,” he said.

  Always . . .

  Six years—a little more, actually—and I still remember that Always. How, when he became aroused, his eyes—sometimes without warning: over a look, a smile, a brush, a pair of shorts I wore—looked like dirty silver, and I could never again look at dirty silver without a pang in my chest. Mackenna isn’t that boy anymore. And I’m not that girl, waiting in my bed, eagerly watching my window. But last night, I felt very much like her.

  I felt exactly like her. Eager, hopeful, scared to be hopeful. Vulnerable.

  He’s been the most powerful source of pain in my life, and my survival instinct rears up stronger than ever when he’s near. Every part of him is a threat—his voice, his kiss, our past, my own heart. I was so sure I’d gotten rid of my heart, but he makes me so aware that it’s still here, inside me somewhere. It’s alive when he’s near, and it screams, “Danger . . .”

  Now I’m grumpy because he didn’t seek me out, like I—even if I hate myself for wishing it—still wished he would.

  He’s managed to make me restless, to the point where I considered taking my clonazepam at midnight. But I only have two more pills, and what if we need to fly again? I’d die of cardiac arrest, if the stupid plane didn’t fall on its own.

  Groggily I pour a steaming cup of coffee from a small buffet table on the side, sipping it as I study the two girls at the front of the room. One dark-haired, and one blonde.

  Tit and Olivia.

  Oh, yes. They’re like ringleaders, those two. I can recognize them instantly.

  Tit is the blonde, not natural blonde like Melanie is, but a salon blonde with dark eyebrows. Olivia is dark-haired, almost like me, but her face is rounder and her expression, I guess . . . softer. But the look in her eyes? Nothing soft about that.

  I meet her gaze square on, because you can’t ever look away from bullies. I practiced this to perfection when my father died and my mother intimidated me, and at school, where I was laughed at until Mackenna made sure I wasn’t laughed at again.

  Now a dozen twenty-year-olds look at me like I’m bound to be their entertainment for the day. The choreographer claps her hands to pull every dancer’s eye from me over to her.

  “My name is Yolanda,” she tells me. “And I’m in charge of getting you to move that body as if you’ve trained professionally your whole life. Not an easy task, so I warn you, your baths? Should be ice cold after this. You will never in your life be as stiff as a two-by-four and as awkward as a newborn giraffe. You will stretch with us now, and watch, and learn!” She snaps her fingers, and the other dancers start to stretch. Olivia seems impressed I’m even trying to stretch. Can I touch my toes? No. I’m as unbending as a stick, and I almost grunt as I keep trying.

  “Gently! Or you pull and break the muscle and it’s no use to us!” Yolanda chides.

  She’s Latin-blooded—I can tell by the passion in her voice and her thick accent. Her body is beautiful, with perfect curves in all the right places. The other dancers’ clothes cling to their beautiful bodies. Unlike mine. I’m a bit too flat-chested, and my ass could use a little meat too. I don’t have many curves. I do have big nipples that poke out too much, calling way too much attention to themselves, which is why I’m actually glad my boobs are small.

  The outfit I’m wearing, sent to my room on behalf of Lionel, doesn’t really help my small boobs and small ass.

  Trying not to watch myself in the mirror too much—and therefore avoiding a reminder of just how flat-chested I am—I make my way to the center. Yolanda calls me over.

  “You. You and Olivia are both choreographed differently than the others. Pretend I’m Jones. Now you walk up to me, your moves sensual. Hypnotic. Sexy. Make contact with your inner mermaids . . .”

  I feel stupid. Ridiculous. But I try to walk with a little sway of my hips. I hear snorts all around and I stop and scowl, swinging my scowl across the room so every woman here gets the full blast of my displeasure.

  “Ignore . . . girls!” she chides, clapping, then to me, “Now . . . sensual. Not so stiff. Like making love. You will make love to Jones with your clothes on, onstage. Everybody wants Jones. Imagine his body, moving sinuously against yours. Mackenna Jones has the best moves—Magic Mike has nothing on him. Are you prepared?” She reaches around me and grabs the small of my back, undulating her body against mine.

  Our tits are pressing. She’s pretending to be Mackenna and looking at me with an expression I believe she believes is Mackenna’s. Just thinking about being like this, in front of an audience, makes me want to gag. “I can’t—”

  “CAN’T! That word does not exist here. We are all doers here. Now circle your hips. Hands on waist. Side to side, front, back, side to side. Just loosen it up!” She goes to turn on the music while all the other dancers stretch and I’m humping the air like a ridiculous little shit. “Good!” she praises. “Very good! Now add your arms . . . circle them to the side . . . up above . . . loosen that stiff little body of yours.”

  We’re dancing to the group’s song, and the music starts reverberating in me. The girls swing their heads, and I pull my hair loose and follow suit, going up to Yolanda and rubbing my hands up her sides.

  I am suddenly skating, my feet in charge under me, and Mackenna’s hands are on my waist, and I know he’ll catch me. If I fall, it’s not embarrassing but an excuse to get him to touch me and hear his low, rumbling laugh. I like when he laughs. I like his chuckle, how he picks me up, dusts my ass with his gloves, kisses me on the cheek in case anybody recognizes us, and whispers, “Enough?”

  And I say, “Never!”

  And he spins me like a top with another, deeper laugh, and pulls me down the rink, skating close to him. Suddenly dancing is not that different. I’m swept by the music, following the lead of the girl in front of me, letting my legs repeat the steps I’m shown, my hands moving and tracing my imaginary man. Yolanda silences her instructions as I start rocking, losing myself, picturing the way Mackenna had been up on stage with the two women. Now the one right in front of him will be me.

  Reminding him what we had.

  This is what you want, remember? Make him lose it. Remind him of the girl he used to skate with. The one he used to twirl around like a top. Remind him that she’s gone to him. Gone because . . . HE left HER.

  She loved him and he LEFT her.

  Make him regret walking. Without a word, or a goodbye, or an “I’m sorry,” or a reason . . .

  The thought only invigorates me, and I’m still shaking my little ass seconds after the song stops.

  “Good job, girls!” Yolanda calls with another clap.

  The dancers seem quite composed, while I, on the other hand, am gasping for breath as I follow them to the towel stack and wipe my neck. Yolanda comes over to me, approval shining in her eyes as she pats her cleavage dry. “You have something to prove. I like that.” She tips my head up with her free hand and dissects me with her eyes. “You in love with him?”

  “Pfft!”
I spit accidentally. “Sorry!” I laugh my evil witch laugh. “No way.”

  She smiles a strangely expressionless smile. “Pandora. Hmm.” She walks away.

  As if she knows something nobody else does.

  ♥ ♥ ♥

  THE REST OF the day, I watch the band’s rehearsal from backstage, my eyes trained on you-know-who. He laughs out loud. A lot. He curses a lot too. The twins pick on him and he picks back, exchanging endearments such as “fucking jackass,” “get to work, douche,” and—my favorite—“suck my dick, asshole.” At one point, I’m pretty sure they talk about me.

  “You get it on with your box of chocolates last night?”

  “If I did,” says Mackenna smoothly, almost cockily, “that would be none of your goddamn business.”

  Me? Box of chocolates?

  “We’re being filmed, asshat. What we do from now until Madison Square Garden is everybody’s business,” Jax tells him. Is it Jax? I don’t know, I mix those two up so much. It helps when they’re bare-chested because Jax has a snake tattoo. Lex seems more talkative and is, in fact, grinning at me as I hide between the stage curtains.

  I sink a little deeper into the shadows and wait for Mackenna to say more, but he doesn’t. Instead he rubs the back of his neck and rolls his shoulders, his body sweaty and moving in complete rhythm to the beat as they start up again.

  The twins strike their guitars, the orchestra takes up with a frenzy, and Mackenna adds the vocals while a dozen male dancers dance in perfect synchrony behind him.

  Yolanda’s right. No man should be so masculine, so muscular, and still be able to dance like that. A thrust of his hips, a swing of his body, and then he’s up on his arms, then back on his feet, singing in low tones while Bach and their rock music play in alternate tempos. It’s a perfect duet.

  Up on the stage, he’s a rock god, but I can still remember when he used to give me wildflowers. I remember being so nervous that my mother would find out about us that sometimes I threw them away before I got home. What a coward I was.