Then there is nothing but our breath, easing back and forth between us like the sigh of the waves just outside the window.
Eighteen
Jess
I was expecting that Ashley Carmichael would be the kind of woman who would want to move on quickly after sex. I figured once we were done that she’d be up and dressed and heading out for a drink or something. I was okay with that, after all it’s not like our relationship is the real thing.
I really wasn’t expecting her to pull me against her bare chest and wrap her arms around me with a deep satisfied sigh. We wiggle a little until we’re both comfortable and the weight of her arms around me is a deep kind of soothing that I haven’t felt in a long time.
It’s like being cared for.
She runs her hands through my hair and when I glance up at her face I don’t see any hint of pity or discomfort in her face. She’s smiling blissfully, her eyes half closed as though she’s as relaxed as she seems. It’s not what I expected but I can’t say that I mind.
I don’t remember the last time I let someone hold me close like this and treat me as though I’m precious. It’s enough to open a deep well of feeling in my chest and I burrow a little closer to her to try to hide that my eyes are welling.
“You okay?” she asks, proving I am about as subtle as a tonne of bricks.
I laugh a little to try to distract her from my sudden emotional state. “You’re not at all like what I expected,” I say softly.
She chuckles in reply, the sound deep and soothing from her rib cage. Her long fingers tug a knot loose in my hair with surprising gentleness and she
smoothes her other hand down my back, helping me relax fully into the embrace. “Not quite the spoiled little bitch girl?”
“You do have quite the reputation,” I agree, and I feel her shift to tuck my chin in to her chest.
“I spent a lot of time forming that reputation,” she says, and it’s not her usual light-hearted tone. “Of course that’s a lot to do with my parents because what rich white kid’s drama isn’t about their parents in some way? Mama and Papa were hoping for a spare when they had me, just in case something should have happened to Robin. Instead they got a girl and from the way they acted you would have thought that they’d have been happier to have given birth to a puppy.”
I make a noise of encouragement, barely daring to breathe. It feels like this is an important moment between us and I’m scared that if I move too suddenly she might realise what she’s doing and stop talking altogether.
“I think my father spoke to me 3 times when I was growing up and my mother floated by on her way to work and patted me on the head while I was passed from nanny to nanny. Of course I figured out that the only thing that got their attention was when I misbehaved so I did that a lot.”
Ashley stops for a moment and twists so she can look at me. “I made my nannies so mad that I ended up in boarding school and then I got expelled from five of them. By that point I was a really mad teen so I went to college even though my mother thought I should learn how to debutant properly instead. And I really leaned into the fuckboy thing, you know? My parents kept acting like I was this big disappointment to them so I was gonna play into it.”
She sighs a little and I find her hand and give her palm a little kiss which gets me a quick sad smile. “Robin’s the best friend I’ve got and I love the dork, but he’s so perfect that I kind of hate him too. If he could have been a fuck up in one area that would have been okay but he’s smart and handsome and nice and a great student and it makes me want to rile him up. He’s always looked after me in the end, though.”
“Siblings are pretty great,” I say, a little surprised that those words are coming out of my mouth. Ashley hums in agreement.
“You’ve got a sister, don’t you?”
“Penny, yes.”
“What’s happened with her, why’s Alex with you?” Ashley must realise from my expression that it’s not the most polite of questions because she immediately says, “Don’t answer that if you don’t want to, of course.”
“She’s got an addiction problem,” I say. It’s usually where I stop. People don’t deserve to know about my sister if they’re going to be all judgey and ‘you should cut contact’ as a lot of people are.
Ashley sits up a little so we can cuddle together and better see each other’s faces. Her face is soft and concerned and I find I love the way her eyes look in the low light, it’s like seeing stars. “Addiction is hard on everyone,” she says, without a hint of judgment in her voice. “Is she doing okay?”
“She’s in rehab.” I take a deep breath. Ashley has told me so much about herself that I feel like sharing a bit from my life but it doesn’t come easy to me.
She must sense my reluctance because she takes my hand and presses it gently. “You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to. But I don’t mind listening, I just talked your ear off after all.”
“It’s okay, I just don’t talk about it a lot. When I was 13 our mother died, we never really knew our dad. Penny was old enough to drop out of school so she ditched her classes and got a job in a diner so she could support us. It was really tough, she worked such long hours and the pay wasn’t great. We hopped from apartment to apartment, always scared people would figure out how young and alone we were and take advantage of us.”
At the time being split up in the foster system had seemed like the worst thing that could happen but in retrospect the grungy flats, the fear and scrambling to become way older than we should have had to be was probably worse for us.
“After a while she fell in with a party crown, started drinking hard and coming home drunk or high out of her mind. I’d get my homework done early when I got back from school so I could be sure to get a nap just in case I’d need to be up half the night talking her down from a bad trip or cleaning up her sick all over the bathroom so we wouldn’t get thrown out. That’s when I started writing.”
“That sounds rough on both of you,” Ashley says in a subdued voice and I catch a glimpse of shock on her face. I guess she hasn’t heard many stories like this in her crowd.