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Jax
The fire is crackling merrily, sending up glowing sparks each time a log falls, its light coloring her bare, long, glistening legs gold. I’ve had her every which way and now I just want to hold her in my arms.
We’re on the floor by the fireplace, my back resting against the cushion-less sofa because we made a bed out of them, her back against my chest, her soft hair tickling my nose and her soft hands caressing my arms. I wouldn’t want it any other way.
She cranes her neck up and looks at me, her eyes bright and alert, catching the red light of the fire and holding it.
“Do you know why I love you?” she asks. Another of those complicated questions that require deep answers she’s always full of. But as annoying as that can get, I still wouldn’t have it any other way. I know that now.
“It’s because you like dark, complicated and sad things and people, and I’m the closest you got in your cushy universe,” I tell her, because, yeah, these kind of conversations will never be my favorite, despite knowing what I know.
She shrugs and looks back at the fire.
“That’s part of it, I guess,” she says after a pause, surprising the hell out of me. Like only she can and does all the time.
“My songs were so boring and plain until you came along and dared me to stop hiding who and what I really am just to make everyone else happy,” she continues.
“Yeah, well, you’re not theinnocent and pure as a raindrop straight from heavenwoman that your father wants to believe,” I say and pinch her nipple, because I love the way it makes her purr and my head is suddenly full of all the ways she is umpure. Heavenly, yes. Innocent, rarely.
She chuckles softly and starts caressing my arm again. “You’re right, I was always treated like a princess by my parents, wrapped in bubble-wrap and kept from everything to protect me. And I had to be a good girl so my mother wouldn’t worry about me, because she worries about everything. So yes, I owe you my music and my career, but that’s not the only reason why I love you.”
“All right,” I say since this isn’t a bad conversation overall and I don’t want to keep saying the wrong thing.
“It’s because of your light,” she says. “Despite everything you’ve been through, there’s still so much light inside you and it’s so bright and warm and I just never want to be without it again.”
“Oh, please, whatever light there is, that’s all you Harper,” I say. “I’d be at the bottom of the dirtiest rotten ditch long ago if it weren’t for you.”
“You’re wrong,” she says, takes my hand and kisses it. “And I want you to know that.”
“OK.”
“No,” she says forcefully her eyes fixed on mine again, and full of raging fire. “I want you to know it, so that next time you think of leaving me, you’ll know that you’re taking all my light with you. And then maybe you’ll stay instead.”
If she knew how much those words hurt, maybe she wouldn’t say them. They hurt worse than getting bitten by dogs, or getting stabbed with a screwdriver, or having cigarettes put out on my arms for hours. Because it’ll come to that. It’ll come to a point when I can no longer stay. And I’d go through all those other things again right now just to change that. But I can’t.
“I’m sorry,” she says, because she probably knows what I’m thinking. She has a way of knowing that. “But I had to say it.”
“And now you did,” I say.
“Because I need you to know that you’re the only family I’ll ever need. And that’s the truth.”
It’s not. She needs her family and she needs her music and she can have both without me. The way things are, she’ll have to.
“And I love you because you say things like that,” I say and hold her tighter.
Even when you can’t possibly mean them.
But I don’t say that. Because there’s no use hurrying this thing that we both know is coming.
17
Harper
The days that we’ve spent here at the cabin have blended into each other and I no longer have any idea how many of them have passed. I just know there haven’t been enough of them.
Between making love just about everywhere we could, in the grass, in the forest while skinny dipping in a gorgeous, untouched wild lake we found, or simply on the floor by the fire. Between laying in the grass and watching the starry sky so full of shooting stars I ran out of wishes. Between writing songs more beautiful and complete than any I’ve ever written and singing them for him. Between playing house that led me to try and make the kind of wild blueberry muffins my mom is famous for, messing up the entire kitchen and Jax pretending they’re the tastiest thing since Nutella even though they were barely edible.
