You'll Be Seeing Me In Your Dreams
Chapter Ten
Cardan
I hear her family's car pull into the driveway. It's one of those massive, bulky ones that seats seven because apparently having three adopted children takes a toll on a man, and makes him buy ridiculous cars.
Lurking around the corner, I listen to the slide of the seats being pushed forward, the opening and closing of doors and the rustling of plastic bags. They enter the house and slam the door.
I wait for a few minutes before sneaking around to the back of her house and scooping up a handful of pebbles from her driveway. I throw one and it glances off her window. Honestly, I felt a bit stupid doing this. What was I, a 90's cliché?
She opens her window and leans halfway out, brown hair falling over her shoulders. I lift a hand and wave once.
"I'll be down in a second. I need to think of an excuse."
She slides the window closed. For I second, I'm just standing in her backyard. Then, she's leaning out the window again.
"Meet me down the road." She hisses. I nod and walk away, careful not to pass by any of the windows.
I lean against a lamp post and wait for her. I don't even know why I did what I did. It's not like I have a plan for what I'm going to do, or where I was going to take her.
Jude walks down the sidewalk a few minutes later, hands stuffed in her jean pockets, wearing only jeans and a Marilyn Monroe t-shirt, despite the cold weather.
"You must be freezing." I say.
She shrugs. With an eye roll, I shrug out of my denim jacket and hold it out to her without looking. She takes it.
"Where are we going?" she asks.
"My house." I decide on the fly, finally turning to look at her. She's wrapped my jacket around her shoulders like a cape, using one pale hand to keep it from flying off in the wind.
"I've never been to your house before." she says, obviously startled. We start walking.
"Well I never." I say drily. "I was under the impression you were over all the time."
"Shut up." She punches my arm lightly.
I press a hand over where she hit. "Ow! Why must you hurt me this way?" I joke
"Coward." She snickers
"Unlike some people, I refrain from insulting and physically harming people I make out with at night."
She blushes "But you didn't stop insulting me before this-" She tugs on the red string connecting us and my hand automatically jerks toward her. "happened. Why? Why bully me?"
The question frazzles my brain. "First of all, I'm sorry. It's not an excuse, but I hated you because I wanted you. I wanted you so much that sometimes it hurt to look at you. I took it out of you, made it seem like I hated you so you would never know that I liked you. Most of all, I hated you because I thought of you. Often. I disgusted me but I couldn't stop."
She continues to walk next to me in stunned silence.
There's a minute or so of silence, apart from the sounds of us walking.
She puts one hand on my arm. "It's kind of fucked up, but , in a way, I understand. That doesn't mean I forgive you though."
"I don't expect you to."
"Good."
We arrive at my house. I open the door for her and she sweeps in.
"Dude, your house is massive."
"Thanks for telling me, I hadn't realised before."
"Oh, fuck off."
I take her hand and lead her up the stairs and into my room. I sit down on the edge of my bed and she follows suit, eyes scanning my room.
"It's cleaner than I expected?" she phrases it like a question.
I laugh. "What did you expect?"
"I'm not sure."
I lie down on the plush duvet and close my eyes, thinking of what I told her earlier. A second later, she lies down too and takes my hand. Slowly, I circle my forefinger around the back of her hand.
We lay there, not talking, listening to each other's steady breathing for a while. Her fingers were constantly laced with mine. Occasionally, she'd squeeze my hand as if to reassure me she was still there.
Internally, I wrestled with what I was trying to say to her. What would be her reaction? Did I really have the guts to do this?
I cleared my throat and opened my eyes. At the sound, hers fluttered open too, staring expectantly at me.
"I need to tell you something." I say awkwardly.
She nods. I disentangle our fingers.
There's no going back now.
"Well, it might be better if I, like, showed you." I tell her, now completely unconvinced of my ability to form the words.
She sits up. "What is it, Cardan?"
I also sit up, but move so my back is facing her. With slightly trembling fingers, I lift the hem of my t-shirt and pull it over my head in one quick movement. I curl my hands toward my chest.
A small inhalation of breath is all I hear of her reaction. In a feather-light brush of skin on skin, her fingertips trace one of the arching scars that pattern my back. I shudder under her touch and my eyes sting with tears.
No-one has touched me this gently in years.
Her fingers come to a halt and splay on my back, her palm warm against my skin.
"Who?" her voice is steely, a controlled calm ready to break.
"Balekin." I say, in barely more than a whisper.
She moves so both her hands rest on my shoulders and in a touch so gentile I could be mistaken, she presses her lips to the start of one of my scars.
"How long?" the little restraint she's excising strains her voice.
"Since I moved in."
Another press of her lips, to the end of a scar this time.
"I'll kill him."
I turn my head as much as I can. "Jude, he's still my brother."
"He beats you!"
"I deserve it."
She moves so quickly I almost don't see her do it, but she's straddling my lap, cupping my face in both hands. Not knowing what to do, my hands hover just over her thighs.
"Shut up." She says ferociously "Shut up. No matter what you do, how little you care, how cruel you are, no one deserves this."
Her wicked eyes are trained on mine, searching for something.
"Jude-"
"Say it. Say you don't deserve this, Cardan."
I swallow the lump forming in my throat. Briefly, her eyes flash down to my Adams apple and back up to my eyes.
"I don't deserve this." I hate how broken my voice sounds. I hate the way her body relaxes against mine when I say it. I hate myself for telling her. I hate how vulnerable I am.
I close my eyes as to not look at her ferociously sad eyes. Lifting one hand from my cheek, she strokes her thumb across my eyelids.
Part of me wants to never let her go.
"I'm sorry Cardan." She says softly, her breath blowing onto my face. She wraps her arms around me in a way that's careful not to apply too much pressure on my back, but is tender all the same. "I'm so sorry."