Fear of Falling

  She met my penetrating stare, those green eyes filling with tears before she batted them away and turned her head. I felt like a fucking asshole.

  “I’m…I’m fucked up, Blaine,” she whispered. If I hadn’t been hanging onto her every sigh and whimper, I would have missed it. “Like really fucked up. And if you knew what was good for you, you’d leave me alone.”

  “I don’t believe that,” I replied, shaking my head. My hands cupped her face, turning it back towards me. I needed to look her in the eyes. I needed her to see just how serious I was. “I’m not going anywhere. I mean that.”

  She pulled away from my touch and shook her head. “I’m telling you, I have problems. And you don’t need the headache. I’m not like your other girls, Blaine. I can’t be saved.”

  What the fuck?

  “My other girls? What the hell does that mean?”

  A hard scowl marred her soft features as if she was conjuring an unpleasant memory. “CJ. He said you like damaged girls. He said you needed to feel like you could rescue them.” She looked down at the cooling mug of tea in her slightly shaking hands. “Because of your mom.”

  I was on my feet and pacing, fists clenched at my sides, before good sense could stop me. “CJ needs to mind his own fucking business!”

  Kami flinched, and I instantly regretted my outburst. I willed myself to calm down, shaking away the fresh wave of tension. “I’m sorry,” I muttered pathetically. “But he doesn’t know what he’s talking about. I don’t have any other girls, Kami.”

  She nodded, though I could tell she was unconvinced. Shit.

  “But you have, and that’s why I’m here, isn’t it? You do feel the need to fix girls like me, don’t you?” Anger and disgust replaced the fear that had occupied her face. “You can’t fix me, Blaine. So don’t even try.”

  “Dammit!” I nearly flew to her side, snatching the mug out of her hands and setting it on the nightstand. “That’s not why you’re here, Kami. Not at all. Do I want to take your pain away? Yes. Do I want to make it so you never have to wake up crying like that again? Hell yes. But do I want you here just to satisfy some sick wounded-bird complex? Fuck no!” I grasped her face between my hands, forcing her to look at me. “I want you, Kami. I care about you, and that’s the only reason why I want you here with me. Ok? Fuck what CJ said. I just want you. And if you need me to demonstrate just how much that is, I’d be happy to… Again.”

  Her face flamed red, as memories of the early morning hours came barging into the tense moment. She was remembering my lips on her, tasting, sucking, teasing. My tongue plunging into her, devouring her sweetness like it was my last meal. The feel of my barbell flicking her sensitive clit, causing her to cry out my name.

  Kami was ready for me, and holy fuck, I was ready for her. But I wanted to make her feel good. I wanted her to know that I wanted nothing from her aside from her taste on my tongue. And my God, she tasted good. So good that I was ready to dive in for another round just to hear her scream my name again.

  Or maybe that was just what my sick, twisted mind wanted to believe. It was hard to tell, being that all the blood in my body was centralized elsewhere.

  “Do you trust me?” I asked, touching my forehead to hers.

  “Yes,” she nodded.

  “Then stop trying to leave. Just stay, Kami. If you don’t want to sleep, we don’t have to. I can just hold you. Or we can talk. Whatever you want to do.”

  “I don’t want to talk anymore,” she replied with a shake of her head. “Let’s just…lay here. Let’s just be.”

  I crooked a smile and eased her head down on the pillow, positioning myself on my side to lie beside her. We stared at each other for long seconds that turned into minutes, neither one of us knowing the right words to say. I wanted her to know how I felt, but I didn’t want to scare her. I also wanted to know how she felt about me, but I was too chicken-shit to ask.

  “Blaine?” she whispered, breaking the ice. “Can I ask you something?”

  “Anything.” And she could. She could ask me absolutely anything.

  “Your mom… What CJ said… What did he mean?”

  Anything but that.

  I rolled onto my back with a huff and scrubbed a hand over my face. Shit. I didn’t want to go there. Not with her or anyone else.

  “If you can’t talk about it, I understand,” she muttered, sensing my discomfort. She was giving me an out, and, dammit, I wanted to take it. But I had promised her honesty. And if I had any chance at cracking the mystery behind those green eyes, I had to prove myself.

  “My mom died when I was 13. I was sent to live with my uncle and his family right afterward,” I answered, my voice devoid of all emotion. Over the past twelve years, I had the said the same lines over and over again until they didn’t hurt anymore.

  “And?”

  She knew there was more. I just didn’t know if I could give her more than that. Not when it came to my mother.

  I shook my head. “And that’s all. People die. We move on. We learn to deal.”

  “But you haven’t,” she interjected, placing her small hand on my bare chest to cushion the blow. “You haven’t learned to deal. You’re still hurting.”

  I placed my own hand on top of hers and gripped it, holding on to any semblance of peace. “We all hurt, Kami. It’s a part of life.”

  “Can you tell me about it?” she asked, her small voice filling me with foreign emotion. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but everything about her felt sincere and humble. Like she actually cared about me and wanted to share my pain. Like maybe she felt for me what I couldn’t help feeling for her.

  I took a moment to collect my thoughts, sifting through the memories in the forbidden Rolodex of my mind. I didn’t revisit my past if I could help it. It wasn’t a place anyone wanted to stay for long.

  “My mom killed herself,” I finally said. There was no way around it. The best way was to tear off the band-aid as quickly as possible. “It was always just the two of us when I was growing up. She was always so happy, so free-spirited. So it came as a shock when I found her dead on the bathroom floor. She had overdosed.”

  Kami moved closer to me, close enough for me to feel her warm breath on my arm as she gasped at my mournful account. “I’m so sorry,” she croaked, her voice thick with emotion.

  “I later found out that my mother suffered from schizophrenia. I just thought she was eccentric. She’d get these hare-brained ideas, and we’d be off on an adventure. She’d pull me out of school for impromptu road trips. Let me eat ice cream for dinner. Throw me birthday parties when it wasn’t even my birthday. She was my best friend, and I didn’t even know she was sick.”

  “Blaine…” Kami stroked my cheek, letting her fingers travel up into the locks of hair that had fallen over my forehead. “You know it’s not your fault, right? You know that it wasn’t your responsibility to save her?”

  I turned on my side to face her, revealing the ugly scars I still bore after all these years. “Wasn’t it? I was all she had, and I didn’t even know my mom was dying inside. I could’ve helped her. I could have done something to stop her and get her help. But no. I thought I had the coolest mom in the world when all the while she was suffering. Don’t you see how fucking selfish that was of me? Don’t you get why I hate myself for letting her die?”

  I turned away from Kami, utterly disgusted with my self-loathing. “How unhappy must she have been to take her own life? How unhappy must she have been with me? To not at least try to survive?”

  Kami hands tugged my bicep, pulling me, until my back was once again flat on the bed. Then she was straddling me, her small body pressed into mine while she buried her face into my chest.

  “I’m so sorry,” she sobbed, kissing my chest. She rained light pecks along my upper torso, her sorrowful eyes leaking with sympathy. “I’m so sorry, Blaine. It’s not your fault. I swear it!”

  I wrapped my arms around her and cradled her head against my chest, stilling
her movements. It’s not that I didn’t want Kami to kiss me. Shit, that was all I wanted. But I wanted it to come from a place of desire. A place of affection. Not pity. I wanted Kami to kiss me because she wanted me, minus the bullshit of my past. I wanted her body to crave me like mine craved hers. Not because she felt sorry for me.

  I held her soft body on top of mine until her sobs subsided and her breath grew heavy and deep. And just as the sun had begun to peek over the horizon, I let my eyes close to soak in the feel and smell of her.

  Kami was in my arms, and in my bed. And for the first time since my mother’s suicide, I felt like I could begin to forgive myself.

  “Oh my God, you dirty little slut! You did it, didn’t you? You totally did it!”

  I kicked off my shoes and stowed them in my closet before lying back on my bed. “Did what?” I huffed.

  Angel put a hand on her narrow hip and slid next to me. Then she bent over and sniffed me. She fucking sniffed me like a dog.

  “Ewww, what the hell are you doing?” I yelped, scrambling away from her curious nose.

  “You had sex! I can smell it on you! You fucked Blaine last night when you swore up and down that you wouldn’t!” With a goofy grin, she bounded from the bed and stuck her head out my bedroom door. “Dom! Wipe the coochie crumbs from your chin, and get in here! I won, fucker! You owe me fifty bucks!”

  Won? What the hell?

  “Angel, it’s not what you think,” I tried to explain. But before I could come up with a believable story, Dom swaggered in, wearing nothing but tight, black boxer briefs, his muscled, tan body looking as amazing as ever. But he wasn’t Blaine. No one had a body like Blaine. Or hands. Or a tongue…

  Shit.

  Dom settled beside me just as Angel hopped on my other side, wrapping her arm around my waist. “Kam, please tell me you didn’t do it. I thought we had an understanding, woman! I was gonna split my winnings!”

  “Oh, Kami wants the D, Kami wants the D, ohhhh, Kami wants Blaine’s big nasty D,” Angel sang sweetly.

  I shoved Angel’s arm off me. “No, Kami does not want the D.” (Yes, she did.) “And, no, I did not have sex with Blaine!” (But I wanted to.)

  “See! I told you; I know my girl!” Dom exclaimed before kissing the side of my face. “Not everyone is totally slut-tastic like you, Angel.”

  “Pffft. Yes they are,” Angel retorted, twirling a lock of blonde hair. “They are just too scared to admit it.”

  “I need to get ready for work,” I said, climbing to my feet in an attempt to avoid questioning.

  “Not so fast,” Angel called out before I could make my escape. “I know something went down last night, Kam. You’re practically glowing, and you look like you’ve had a 24-hour full body massage. And you look less… stick-up-the-ass-ish.”

  “Stick-up-the-ass-ish? Seriously? Since when do I look like I have a stick up my ass?” I scowled.

  “Whenever you’re not getting a stick up your ass,” she smiled. “Which is, like, never. I think I’ve had more dicks than you, and I’m allergic to them.”

  I rolled my eyes at my friend and her colorful language before turning to my closet to retrieve a clean Dive tee and a pair of jeans. Then I spotted my favorite denim skirt hanging up nearby. Oh, what the hell. I slipped it off its hanger and stowed the jeans. Blaine never said it was against the dress code policy. And Mick so rarely poked his head out of the office when he was actually there. Plus, Sundays were slow, relaxed days. A little…distraction…never hurt anyone.

  I gathered my outfit and undergarments, bypassing my roommates’ conversation about their weekend trysts. Apparently, they both got lucky last night after AngelDust’s set and were comparing the sordid details. They could keep the countless one-night stands with different women every other night. I didn’t envy their raunchy conquests in the least. I had something much more exciting and fulfilling. I had possibilities. Possibilities with a man that was worth the risk of falling flat on my face.

  I strode into Dive an hour later, my head held high and a mischievous grin on my face. For the first time in a long time, I felt good. A little tired from staying up most of the night, but good. Maybe Angel was right. Maybe I did look different now. Maybe Blaine had breathed life into me with a flick of his silver-studded tongue.

  Blaine spotted me right away, his brown eyes growing wide with craving. He licked his lips, giving me a peek of that tongue ring and reminding me of what he did to my body in the wee hours of the morning. My knees nearly buckled, as I made my way to the back to clock in.

  “Hey, Kami!” Trisha, a part-time day shift bartender waved at me as she grabbed her purse from her locker. We had never worked together, but we saw each other in passing a few times a week. She was a college student/model, and, holy shit, she was gorgeous. Tall, blonde, and tan. I thought for sure that she and Blaine had been more than friendly being that they were both equally beautiful. It only made sense, but apparently things between them were strictly platonic.

  “Hey Trish, thanks for covering for me Friday night. I owe you one,” I smiled as I clocked in.

  “Oh, please, girl. You were doing me a favor. I’ve been begging Blaine to give me more weekends, so I was thrilled to get the chance. Anytime you’re not feeling well, give me a call. I’m happy to do it.”

  Huh.

  “Blaine does the scheduling?”

  Trisha shrugged. “Well…yeah. I mean, I guess he could delegate the task to Mick, but he said he’d rather do it. He likes knowing who is where. Between you and me, I think he’s a little OCD. Complete control freak. But he’s nice and fair, so I’m not complaining.”

  She waved goodbye though I was too engulfed in confusion to return the gesture. Was Blaine the shift supervisor or something? It’d make sense, being that Dive was family-run. Of course he’d have to take on a bit of responsibility. And if he was making the schedule, then was he purposely scheduling all of our shifts together? I hadn’t worked with any of the other two bartenders, and I never worked by myself, which was normal for slower weekdays.

  Well, only one way to find out.

  “Hey Kam!” CJ called out with a devilish smile before I had a chance to fully step behind the bar.

  “What’s up, CJ,” I replied, wrapping my black apron around my waist. Before I could twist the strings together, Blaine was behind me, his agile fingers easing them from my grasp.

  “Let me,” he breathed, his lips grazing my earlobe. “I like your skirt.”

  “Do you?” I replied for only his ears. “Not too…distracting?”

  “Oh, it is. But I’d gladly get lost in your distraction. Over. And over. And over.”

  He finished tying the knot above my tailbone before running his fingers through a rogue lock of hair. “I missed you,” he whispered, as he placed it behind my ear.

  “You just saw me,” I said, turning to face him. The overwhelming urge to kiss him was growing by the second. And if it weren’t for CJ sitting just yards away and the evening crowd trickling in, I would have done it. Well, maybe.

  “I want to see you again. I want to see you in every way possible.”

  I crooked a playful grin. “Oh, Blaine Jacobs… are you asking me to go steady?” I jibed.

  “No, I’m not.” His fingers were in my hair again, as he stepped into the tiny space that separated us. “I’m telling you that I want you to be mine. Because, Kami, I’ve been yours since the first day you walked in here. And I think, on some level, you’ve been mine since then too.”

  The conviction of his words stole my breath, and I couldn’t do more than melt under his gaze. But what was more than that, it was true. I had been Blaine’s all along. I couldn’t even see anyone but him since the day we locked eyes. Since he marked me over a shot of tequila and a slice of lime. Blaine was the only man that existed in my world. And at that very moment, I couldn’t be entirely sure that he wasn’t the world itself.

  “Excuuuse me, but some of us are thirsty over here!” CJ hooted, swinging
his empty beer bottle in the air.

  I broke away from Blaine, hoping to regain just an ounce of my wits, and cracked another beer for CJ.

  “You know, it didn’t take much skill for me to do that,” I said, gesturing towards the open bottle before looking back at Blaine. “Is there some special reason why you still need to babysit me?”

  A small frown creased Blaine’s forehead. “No. Why?”

  “I don’t know,” I shrugged. “Trish said something about you making the schedule. And I noticed that I never work alone. Is it Mick? Does he not think I’m ready?”

  “Mick?” CJ interjected behind me. “What would he have to do with it? He doesn’t have any control over that. That was all Blaine.”

  I lifted a brow at Blaine, who was staring daggers at CJ. He was already pretty pissed at his cousin for his slip up the night before. I wouldn’t be surprised if Blaine had words with him later.

  “So?” I asked, hoping to break his death glare.

  Blaine turned to me and quirked a crooked smile. “I like the company.”

  CJ snorted from behind me, but was smart enough to keep his mouth shut.

  “So you do make the schedule. Oh my God, don’t tell me you’re like my supervisor or something.”

  CJ made a coughing noise behind me like he was choking, drawing the attention of Lidia, the waitress, who began to lightly pat him on the back.

  “What are you guys talking about?” she asked. I liked Lidia, I really did, but she was extremely nosey.

  CJ wrapped an arm around Lidia’s waist and gestured towards Blaine with a jut of his chin. “Blaine here was just explaining to Kami why he makes the schedule and not my pops.”

  Lidia shrugged and placed a hand on her hip. “Well, it’s his bar. He can make the schedule however he wants, as long as I keep getting Wednesday nights off for my Zumba class.”