We’re out in a back parking lot, quieter, more secluded. I wonder how she knew to go out that exit? Maybe Harley told her. He got her the tickets, after all. I watch her go, then press my back to the brick wall, hearing the commotion still happening inside the arena as the next band comes on stage. Most people would stay for that, but not me, no, I’m out here crying like a damn baby.
As if the universe is laughing at me, the back door swings open and then he’s there.
Right there.
He’s got that look on his face—the one he used to get after getting into a fight and having to decide whether to punch back or just walk away. It’s a mix of angry and confused. For a second, we only stare at each other, and then he flicks a cigarette onto the ground and crushes it under his boot. He knew where to find me, I have no doubt about that.
“You gonna tell me why you came?” he says, voice hoarse from the set.
I laugh, though it sounds like a cough, and cross my arms over my chest. “You want me to lie or tell the truth?”
He narrows his eyes. “I want the fucking truth, the same thing I’ve always wanted, Violet.”
I look up at the sky. "That fucking song hurt, Travis.”
He steps closer, the rain making his hair stick to his forehead. "I didn’t ask you to come."
“Yeah.” I close my eyes, then open them again, because every time I try to walk away, I end up right here, in front of him. “Did you mean it?”
He doesn’t answer at first, and when he finally does, there’s a rasp to his voice, like the words hurt him. “Only song I’ve ever fuckin’ written that destroyed me.”
I swallow, then meet his gaze. “You really think I’m the one to blame for everything?”
“No,” he says, his voice low. “I know I fucked up, I have lived with that choice every single fuckin’ day but when you left, and you just cut me off, it was like a fuckin’ piece of my soul died. I have never needed something in my life the way I needed you, Violet, and you just left me hanging.”
The air goes thick between us. “Then why didn’t you find me? Come for me? Fight?”
He swears, low. Then, “Because you made it very fuckin’ clear you didn’t want to see me again. It broke me. Fuckin’ destroyed me. I had nothing left.”
He’s right.
I know he’s right.
“It wasn’t easy, you know,” I whisper. “Walking away from you was the hardest thing I ever had to do, but I was fucking drowning, Travis. All the lies, the secrets, they were crushing me. I couldn’t breathe.”
“I know,” his voice is low, broken, so full of pain it hurts. “I fuckin’ know and I’ll hate myself until the day I die for destroying the most precious thing in the world to me.”
Something inside me snaps, maybe it’s alcohol, desperation, grief, pain, or a million memories I have tried to push away. I grab his shirt, rainwater running down my arm, and yank him towards me so I can press my mouth against his. It’s not gentle. It’s a collision. He lets his body fall into mine, slamming my back against the wall as his mouth consumes me.
This moment.
It is everything I have thought about for the last two years.
I forgot how good he tastes, how hot his body is, how perfectly he fits against me.
He lifts me, palms under my thighs, and my back scratches against the brick wall, cold and jagged but I don’t care. He kisses me like he has been underwater for so long that the air is a blissful relief. I gasp against his lips, tongues tangling, and it is akiss that they write about in books or put in movies. It’s the kind of kiss that makes the world stop spinning.
His hands push up under my dress, fingers rough and greedy. He hooks my knee higher and our bodies fit together the same way they always did, good or bad or ugly, like two puzzle pieces matching together just right. His hands are everywhere, in my hair, on my hip, pinning me to the wall. I grab his belt and fumble it open, desperate, frantic, like maybe if I take enough from him, it’ll fill the empty space he left behind.
The rain picks up, harder now, drenching us, and I let my head fall back. He kisses down my neck, open-mouthed and hungry, and then he’s inside me, hard and fast, a mix of pain and pleasure that has a moan escaping my throat that is loud enough to be heard over the rain. It’s not romantic. It’s not even pretty. It’s hard and it’s brutal. All the feelings we have kept pent up for the last two years, all the anger and the hate, but mostly the hurt and the loneliness.
I claw at his shoulders, fingers digging into muscle, remembering each line of his body. He mutters my name under his breath, over and over, like an apology and a curse at once. The wall scrapes my spine with each thrust and it feels perfect because pain is the only thing that makes me sure this is real. That he is real.
I erupt with a feral cry that echoes through the night, and with his fingers digging into my bottom, he finds his release too. I can feel every burst of his hot breath against my mouth as he pants, his body rising and falling against mine, his muscles bunching with tension. Eventually, he lets me slide down the wall until my feet hit the ground, my hair soaked and clinging to my face.
He reaches out and slides a wet piece of hair from my forehead, then holds my face in both hands, searching my eyes like there might be something left in us worth saving.
“I’m sorry,” he says, in a way that lets me know it’s real.
