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He grimaces and shakes his head. “It better be somewhere the cops can’t find us right away. I doubt that asshole will stay quiet.”
I nod. “Fine, a different motel room then. We’ll pass something with a vacancy soon.”
I drove this way in the morning on my way to the island. We’re just about to hit a long, straight road lined with a couple of motels and junkyards, but mostly strip clubs. The first motel we pass is all dark, but the second has a flashing neon pink sign proclaiming they rent by the hour and that they have vacancy.
I open my door before we even come to a full stop in front of the office, tell him I’ll get us a room and am out of the car before he can say anything.
The bright lights in the small reception room feel like a punch to the head and the lingering headache makes it easy to ignore the sleazy, greasy haired dude who has all sorts of questions about what a pretty girl like me is doing here alone. I don’t tell him I’m not alone. I don’t tell him much at all. Just ask for a room as far from the road and reception as possible.
“Really, why?” he asks in a fake disappointed voice. “I’d prefer to keep you close.”
I pretend I didn’t hear that. If I were staying here alone, I’d be scared of getting visited by this guy in the darkest part of the night. In fact, if I were alone, I wouldn’t stay here at all.
Jax has the car turned around and is looking at me as I reenter the car. I just show him the number singed into the block of wood hanging off the key and say nothing as he drives off to find it.
I also say nothing as we park, get out and go into our room, and neither does he.
The room is just as I expected—dark wood, chipped decor, a bed that looks lumpy despite being covered by a duvet, comforter and at least eight pillows, and a pervasive smell of bleach hanging in the air so strongly I’m sure every piece of furniture and cloth in here has long since been completely infused by it.
“Well, this place is seedy enough that it might not be the first place the cops look for us,” Jax says. “If only it didn’t have to reek of bleach.”
He chuckles at this and I’m sure it’s some kind of private joke of his. I can read it off his face. I can read so many things off his face. Much more than he actually says. Or do I only imagine I can?
I shrug and don’t say anything, because I don’t know what to say. I’m not great at communicating with words in a one-on-one conversation. I much prefer to do it through my lyrics and music.
He comes closer, the little smile on his face telling me he knows exactly what I’m thinking.
“I’ll explain everything,” he says and reaches for my hand.
I take a step back out of his reach. “But you need to take a shower first. And I’ll find something to put on those cuts on your hands and face.”
He looks sad and disappointed and annoyed that I’m not letting him touch me. Sad mostly. But I can’t let him touch me. If I do, I’m lost in him again, and I promised myself I’ll never let that happen again until I’m sure he won’t just walk away again. This wasn’t the first time he decided I was better off without him and left me. It was just the worst.
“Some clothes would be even better,” he says edgily.
I shrug and nod and don’t tell him I have that sorted too.
I wait until I hear the shower running before going back out to the car to get the first aid kit and my second traveling bag, the one filled with clothes I don’t plan on wearing every day.
I’m sad, embarrassed and kinda happy as I lay out his old sweatpants and red and black plaid shirt on the bed. They’re comfy and I wear them sometimes when it’s cold. And when I’m writing new stuff. So what?
“Wow, are those mine?” he asks in happy exasperation.
He’s standing by the open door of the bathroom, steam that smells faintly of soap wafting into the room and reminding me of each and every time I shared a room with him believing nothing would ever change that. And the actual sight of the rest of him reminds me, in large part, of why I thought so.
The tiny, grayish white towel he’s holding closed over his left hip because it’s too small to wrap all the way around, somehow reveals more than it conceals. My name over his heart that I wrote there. Every one of the ridges of his abs ending in that V I can never take my eyes off. His eyes glowing like a cat’s as I take it all in, full of love and lust and endless desire. All of it is still there, and exactly as it was when I saw him last.
The longer I look at him, the more the months we spent apart start to fade and dissolve. I loved him before I knew I did. And I think I always will. No getting away from it. There’s a song in that. One I feel I could write tonight where I haven’t been able to write anything worth showing to anyone since I left. He is my inspiration. My muse, you could say. But he doesn’t like being called a muse.
What is also still there is every one of the reasons why I decided to move on.
Well, maybe not every one of the reasons.
“I hope they still fit,” I say, meaning the clothes, but maybe not.
I move to the small, blackout curtains covered window by the front door and turn my back on him, moving the curtains aside and looking out like there’s something very interesting to see. There isn’t.
Our car is one of six others parked in an otherwise empty and dark parking lot with an even darker road running past it. The faint pink light from the welcome sign is barely touching all that darkness.
