Collide

  Johnny didn’t flee screaming from my bitchery, which is what I’d have done in his place. He was infinitely patient with me. Driving me to work, picking me up, sitting beside me silent on the couch while we watched stupid movies or sleeping next to me without seeming to mind that I turned to face away from him every night with barely a kiss.

  I didn’t want to become this sexless, irritable bag of woe. I hated it, in fact, yet I couldn’t seem to break myself out of it. Hanging with Jen didn’t help. She was thoroughly head over heels for Jared, who seemed equally as enamored, and of course I was happy for her, but it made it impossible to talk about what was going on with me when our duo had become a quartet Saturday mornings at the Mocha.

  Carlos had a clue. He cornered me one morning as I ducked in, leaving Johnny waiting for me in the car, to grab us both a couple of coffees. “Trouble in paradise, huh?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Your face is sour. What, you got him, now you don’t want him?”

  I stopped, clutching two paper cups that were so hot they were going to burn me through my gloves. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  Carlos snorted. “You don’t look happy, that’s all.”

  “It has nothing to do with Johnny,” I told him.

  “Yeah? Well, if I were you, I’d make sure he knew it.” Carlos cast a significant glance toward the car idling at the curb. “I mean, a dude like that, he doesn’t really need to put up with any shit, you know?”

  I knew it. And as I slid into the car and handed Johnny his cup, I also leaned across to kiss him. He looked at me, surprised.

  “What’s that for?”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I’ve been a bitch.”

  He laughed and kissed me. “Yeah. So? I figure you’re a little entitled. Besides, I knew it wouldn’t last.”

  Being forgiven, especially for something you know is your fault, is an easy spirit-lifter. “Oh, really? You know that?”

  “I knew it,” he said, and pulled into traffic.

  “How? What if I’d turned out to be a supermegatwat forever?”

  He shook his head, smiling as he cast me a quick glance before putting his eyes back on the road. “Nah. I told you. I knew it would get better.”

  I turned in my seat to face him, the seat belt digging into me a little. “How?”

  He sighed. “Because you told me, Emmaline.”

  “I did?” I frowned. “When?”

  Johnny hesitated and reached for my hand. He squeezed it. “One time when…”

  “I talked when I was dark?” I knew sometimes I did.

  “Yeah.” He hesitated again, but nodded.

  “What else did I say?”

  “Nothing. But it’s okay, honey, I’m just glad you’re feeling better. That’s all.”

  I didn’t deserve it to be this easy and told him so. “It’s not a good excuse, Johnny.”

  He was pulling into the parking lot of the credit union by this time, and he put the car into Park before turning to me. “No, it’s not. But it’s okay. Believe me, I’ve had my share of asshole moments. I can give someone the benefit of the doubt.”

  “I love you,” I said, and kissed him before the words I’d let slip out could embarrass me. “I mean…”

  “I love you, too, Emm,” Johnny said.

  The kiss was longer and more thorough this time. Tongue. Hands got a little frisky. We were steaming up the windows.

  I let my forehead rest against his shoulder for a second. I never wanted to be that girl, the one who said, “Do you? Do you really love me? Do you?” And the funny thing was, with Johnny, I didn’t feel like that. If anything, our mutual announcement had felt pretty anticlimactic.

  “Do you really?” I asked, anyway.

  He kissed my forehead. “Hell, yeah.”

  I laughed and kissed his mouth. “I love you. Love, love, love!”

  “Get outta here,” Johnny said. “Before you’re late for work, Jesus.”

  “Ah, there’s the grouchy pants I first met,” I teased. “That’s more like it.”

  “You like it when I’m grouchy.”

  “I do. Sort of like Mr. Darcy. All brooding and stuff.” I tickled him, and Johnny laughed, pulling away. I caught the end of his scarf and held him still for another kiss. “Say it again.”

  “I love you,” Johnny said.

  “Love you, too,” I told him, and got out of the car.

  That night, in my bed, I didn’t turn away from him. “Do you mind sleeping over here so often?”

  Johnny, who’d been reading, took off the glasses he didn’t like and I privately had been fetishizing. “No. Do you want to stay at my house instead?”

  “It’s not that.” I ran a hand over his hair, ruffling it, thinking of how it felt in my fugues. Rough silk. It felt the same in real life, too. “I just want to make sure you’re okay with it.”

  “Well…” He folded his glasses, then put the book on the nightstand to roll to face me. “I like your place. And I spend all day in mine when you’re at work, if I’m not at the gallery. So it’s okay.”

  I traced his lips with a fingertip, not pulling away when he bit it lightly. “I just want things to be fair, that’s all.”

  “Emm,” Johnny said, and kissed my palm. “I don’t care. So long as I’m in a bed with you in it, I don’t really fucking care which one it is.”

  “You,” I murmured, “have a fucking mouth.”

  He laughed. We kissed. The kiss became a cuddle, then something more. I couldn’t believe I’d been passing this up night after night. Okay, so maybe only a week or so of nights. Still, too many. When faced with the delectableness of Johnny’s cock rising between us, I found it hard to believe I could ever pass it up again.

  “Nice,” he said when I stroked him. “Keep doing that.”

  “This?” I arched a brow and continued the rhythm until his eyes grew heavy-lidded. “You like that?”

  “Fucking love it,” Johnny said.

  “I know something else you’ll love.” Grinning, I slid down under the blankets, into the dark, and found his cock with my mouth. His groan was muffled but entirely satisfactory when I took him in as deep as I could.

  The air was close beneath here, but I didn’t care. His scent covered me. Sexy as hell. His erection, thick in my mouth, tasted sexy, too. I lost myself in sucking, licking, even gently nibbling with my lips covering my teeth to keep from biting too hard.

  He thrust a little, not too much. Not choking me. I stroked his balls with my hand, then followed the path of my palm and licked him there, too. I grinned against his flesh as I heard another muffled curse. His hand came down to wind in my hair, tugging and pushing gently, setting the pace. I let him. I liked knowing he was feeling good. It made me feel good, too.

  I was feeling even better when I used my free hand to slide between my legs and stroke myself. My scent joined his, there in the cave I’d made of bedsheets and blankets. I circled my clit with my fingers, slowly, easing into the sensation.

  The air got hotter as I did, too. I moved my mouth along his cock, sucking a little harder at the top when he pushed into my mouth. I used a hand, too, stroking along with every slide of my mouth and lips on his flesh. He’d set the pace, but I teased him every so often by slowing down, swirling my tongue, twisting my grip on his shaft. I was aiming to make this a truly stellar blow job. I couldn’t stand the heat, though, and paused to throw off the covers.

  Cool air, not cold, flooded over me. I nuzzled at Johnny’s cock, feeling him tug my hair a little harder to get me to look up. I did, smiling.

  Johnny-then pulled me up to his mouth, his hands roaming. Cupping a breast, tweaking a nipple, replacing his fingers with his mouth while his hand slid down to move between my legs. I was too stunned to move. I’d had no warning, nothing. And my body wasn’t protesting this, not at all.

  “Johnny—”

  “Shh,” he said against my breast, fingers making magic on my c
lit. He drew me to his mouth again, and I gasped into it.

  I didn’t want to protest this, but I thought I should. Still, as he urged me to straddle him with his hands on my hips, I did. When he took his cock in his hand and guided it inside me, I let him. When he kissed me, I kissed him back.

  Johnny-then.

  Johnny-now.

  Was there a difference? Just then, swept up in our lovemaking, no. He tasted and felt and smelled and sounded the same.

  He thrust up inside me slowly, one hand positioned to rub my clitoris with each movement. Orgasm swelled inside me, made me stupid with desire. Made me not care about anything but what was going on.

  Then.

  Now.

  I let my head fall back, my hair tumbling over my shoulders, tickling. I rode him. We rocked. He made a fucknoise that sent pleasure spiraling through me, and I came with a stutter, a flutter, a shudder.

  I sank onto him, my face buried against his neck. Smelling. Feeling. Tasting. With my eyes closed, I didn’t know if I was locked in my imagination or back in the real world. His hand stroked over my hair, and he flipped a sheet over us. I kept my eyes closed, my face pressed to his skin.

  “That was fucking fantastic,” Johnny said.

  “It always is.”

  He laughed. “Yeah. It always is.”

  “Listen, Johnny…” I licked at the salt of his skin and he shifted at the touch of my tongue. “Thank you.”

  “For what?”

  “For loving me, even when I’m a bitch.”

  He was silent. Our breathing synced, rising and falling at the same time. His fingers tangled in my hair at the base of my skull. “You’re not a bitch, Emm.”

  “I was angry…not at you. Just at everything. And I might be that way again, Johnny. Because it’s hard, knowing that my head could send me spinning at any time.”

  He was quiet for another second, before he said, “Everyone has bad days.”

  I laughed a little hoarsely. “Does that make it okay to be a jerk to you?”

  He kissed the top of my head. “What do you want me to say?”

  “I guess…I just want you to say that you’ll forgive me when I’m being a douchenozzle to you.”

  His entire body twitched and jerked with laughter. “What the fuck is a…. Fuck, Emm. Sure. Okay. I’ll forgive you.”

  He kissed the top of my head again, holding me close. I still had my eyes closed. I was drifting a little, sleepy. Could I sleep inside a fugue? Dream inside a dream?

  “I’ll forgive you,” Johnny said.

  Chapter 23

  Whoever I’d fucked the night before, I woke up with Johnny-now. We made love again before I forced myself into the shower and then to breakfast. No Mocha for us that morning, just bagels and coffee at my kitchen island. Very domestic. Very sweet. Very normal.

  Because it was his night to be working late at the gallery, I asked Jen to hang out with me after work. We hadn’t had a girls’ night in a long time. First we swung by Arooga’s Sports Bar and picked up some crazy amount of hot wings in all different flavors, along with a couple of six-packs of beer. At my house we kicked off our shoes and changed into lounging pants.

  “This is another reason we’re friends.” I pointed at her duck-patterned pj bottoms. “You always come prepared.”

  Jen laughed. “Girl, do you know how long it’s been since I just lounged around in elastic-waist pants getting my feed on? Too long, that’s how long.”

  “What, you and Jared don’t hang out in matching pajama pants?”

  “Not yet. Do you and Johnny even wear pants?”

  I laughed and opened the container and set it out on the coffee table. “Sure we do. When we’re not too busy being naked.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Jen grinned. “So, spill it. I know it’s kinda creepy, but I want to know all the details. All of them!”

  “Only if you share yours.” I popped the cap on a bottle of Guinness and admired the steam wisping from the top. “Just to be fair and all.”

  “Girl, I’m pretty sure my details aren’t as exciting.”

  I picked out a wasabi wing and licked my fingers of extra sauce as I gave her a look. “Get out of here. Jared’s verrrry cute.”

  “Oh, he is. But you know, he’s no Johnny fucking Dellasandro, that’s all.” Jen chose an Old Bay seasoned wing and nibbled it.

  I paused and put the wing on my plate. “Really, you’re not pissed off? I know you said you weren’t. But…really, Jen?”

  She looked surprised. “Hell, no! I mean, it’s not like I ever had a shot with him and besides, honestly, Emm…he was always a fantasy. Not real. I’m happy he’s real for you.”

  I thought of the fugues. “He’s a fantasy for me, too.”

  “Well…yeah.” Jen sounded confused, and no wonder. “I’m sure that’s part of it.”

  I wanted to tell her. I wanted to tell someone, and I didn’t want to tell Johnny that I’d fallen so hard for his young self before even saying a word to the man he was now. I didn’t want him to think it was only the movies and the “pitchahs.” I wanted him to know it was him, no matter how it happened, even if…even if I wasn’t so certain myself.

  “What’s up?” Jen licked spices from her fingertips. “Is it…not as good? I mean…is the reality not so good? You can tell me. It’ll break my heart, but you can tell me.”

  “No. Nothing like that. If anything, it’s better than I could ever have thought.” I drank some beer.

  Jen laughed. “Hey, that’s better than the alternative, right? I mean, there are times with Jared I’m not sure it’s going to work out at all, you know?”

  “Really? Why not? Well, I guess I know why not, because of course you can never be sure in the beginning…but why aren’t you sure?”

  “Okay, babblemonster,” Jen said. “What’s going on? Really, now?”

  “I have to talk to you about what happened at the dinner party,” I told her.

  She didn’t say anything for a few seconds, just drank some beer and licked her fingers clean before picking up another wing. “Your mom told me about the accident. About your seizures.”

  “Yeah, they’re not really seizures. They’re blackouts. Fugues. I go dark, that’s what it feels like. They usually last just a few seconds. Maybe a minute. I haven’t had one that lasted that long in forever.”

  She nodded as she picked the meat off the bone and ate it. “Your mom said you’d been good for a couple of years, that it was a real surprise. I’m sorry, Emm, that sucks.”

  “Yeah. It does. I can’t drive until I’ve been seizure-free for a year. Johnny’s been getting me back and forth to work.” I grimaced. “I hate it, actually. I thought I could finally move away from home, get a better job… It does suck, Jen. It sucks hard and mightily.”

  She frowned. “So, what now? How’ve you been feeling?”

  “Fine.” It wasn’t a lie. The fugue I’d slipped into the other night while giving Johnny a blow job hadn’t left me with any residual negative effects. “I’ve stepped up my appointments with my acupuncturist to once a week, and I’ve made an effort to make sure I get back into my meditation. That helps. Um, sugar and caffeine help, too, so I’ve been eating a lot of brownies and coffee.”

  “Lucky you.” She grinned.

  “I have prescriptions for meds, but I hate taking them because they make me feel fuzzy all the time. And don’t really work, anyway.”

  “I don’t blame you. Still—” she finished off another wing, then used a wipe to clean her fingers “—I’m sorry you have to go through this. If I can help, let me know. I can probably pick you up from work a couple nights a week, stuff like that.”

  I didn’t want to cry, but her offer wrinkled my face and stung my eyes. “Thanks. Believe me, I fucking hate having to ask.”

  “Girl, it ain’t no thing,” she said with a little rotation of her head on her neck and an accompanying hand gesture. “Fuhrealsies.”

  I managed a laugh. “It’s just…it’s abo
ut Johnny.”

  “It bothers him?” She gave me a sympathetic look. “He’s not being a dick to you about it, is he?”

  “No. The opposite. He’s been fan-fucking-tastic about it, totally. Too good, in fact. If you think I hate having to ask you to give me a ride, think how I hate having to count on him to drive me around, even though he offered. Before the dinner party, I mean. He…insisted, actually.” I drank more beer. “He knew about the fugues.”

  I’d told her the story about the cookies, but not the part about ending up naked in my hallway, or of Johnny returning my clothes. I told her now, quickly filling in the missing pieces, adding the part about how I’d gone to the gallery and kissed him, how he’d assured me nothing bad had happened.

  “Wow,” she said in the silence after I stopped talking. “How come you didn’t tell me any of this before?”

  “It’s embarrassing,” I said flatly. “Some stuff is just too much to share. I’m sorry.”

  She waved a hand. “Ain’t no thing, girl, how many times do I have to tell you that? I mean, it would’ve made the stories a fuckton more interesting if you’d told me everything earlier, but I get why you didn’t. So, he’s known pretty much all along and he’s still with you.”

  “Yeah.” I took a deep breath. “But there’s more. Something he doesn’t know.”

  Both her brows raised. She leaned forward. “Oh, yeah?”

  I nodded. “When I go dark, I sometimes have hallucinations. Very vivid. Very real.”

  “Ooh, girl.” Jen grabbed up another wing and looked rapt. “Tell more.”

  “Just after the accident, while I was in the coma, I had really intense dreams about a lot of things. Most I can still remember, though they were jumbled up. Bits and pieces. Random. I dreamed a lot about the Doctor…”

  “That makes sense, you were in the hospital.”

  I laughed. “No, not the doctors in the hospital. The Doctor.”

  “Doctor who?”

  “Yeah, exactly.”

  She frowned. “Huh?”

  I laughed again. “Doctor Who? Science fiction TV show, he had a long striped scarf? There’s a new version out now. Daleks? The TARDIS?”