Yet I hang from her words like Stallone in Cliffhanger.
“I want Beau.” She hiccups, shaking her head and slicing her hand through the air between us in a buzzed panic. “No, no, I mean, I wantaBeau.MyBeau.”
I scratch the back of my head. I know I’m not her type because she’s all shiny and shit, but she wants a dude like Beau? I don’t know why but that surprises me. Nothing wrong with Burns. He’s a good guy. I just pictured Goldie with… someone different.
“A guy like Burns, huh?” I ask, trying to right myself with these facts. I just didn’t expect it, that’s all. That’s all.
“No!” she says adamantly, this time through a hiccup and a giggle. “What I meant was…” her eyes are getting glassy, and it’s as she’s formulating her response that I slide her a glass of water I snagged from the sink.
“The way those two are together. He hugged me hello once, and then his arms went straight back to her, like her being out of them for just a few moments was too much. I don’t know. It’s like this electric, all-consuming magnetism they have. Even if they’re fighting, they are still dying to be near each other. Like they really do love each other's flaws as much as the good things. And it’s real. It’s the realest love I’ve ever seen, and honestly, I didn’t think that was out there. Cynically I believed that kind of happiness was a device created by companies to sell things. Rings, necklaces, chocolates, cards. But seeing Beck and Beau together… itisreal. And they’re selling those things to celebrate that kind of love because… it’sworthcelebrating.”
“They’re tryin’ to sell shit, too,” I add because tears are streaming down her face and I want to bring her comfort and levity is the only form I know how. “Use the sleeve,” I tell her. She smiles shyly at me before covering her entire hand in the sleeve and blotting under both eyes.
“They got the real deal,” I add, leaning back, sipping from my wine. Goldie sips her water.
“You think so too? So it’s not just my lonely and pathetic idealization of every single relationship?”
I shake my head and scratch under my chin as I look at her. Her eyes are looking tired. “Nah. They got the good shit. The shit they write love songs about.”
She nods. “They totally do.”
“What else?”
Her brow furrows. The wind outside the cabin picks up, hissing through the trees and making the windows rattle. “What else what?”
“What do you want from life?”
“Oh,” she says, covering her mouth for a hiccup. “Well, I guess after I find my career and my Beau–”
“Can you just say my partner? I really don’t want to picture Burns and you,you know.”
“Fuckin’,” she says as dirty as she can. Then she grins so broadly that I cannot keep the grimace on my face. Breaking from her antics, a smile curls my lips, and she leaps out of her chair, standing on top, clapping and whooping loudly.
“You smiled! I got you to smile!” She holds her arms up in victory. “I got Atticus the grouch to smile! Ha! And how annoyed are you right now that I got you to smile? Oh my god, I bet you’re so annoyed!” She cheers, and then, before I can reach out and stop it from happening, she slips off the chair to the ground. As fast as I can, I push back and fall to the ground, ducking beneath the table to check out the situation.
Goldie is splayed out, laughing hysterically but holding the back of her head. “I’ll be embarrassed tomorrow, but I don’t care. Totally worth it.” Her body stops seizing as her laughter slows. “I got you to smile. A real smile.”
My head falls between my shoulder blades as a relieved breath leaves me. I get my big ass off the floor and extend a hand to her. Her plump bottom lip sticks out in a playful pout. My dick likes that pouty brat look apparently because bottle of wine be damned, he gets hard.
And fast, too.
I shake my hand, wanting Goldie off the ground before she–
“Oh.” She hiccups again, and I shake my hand at her more violently, but she doesn’t move. Her eyes stay fixed on my hard-on, which seems to grow under her gaze. “Ooh,” she says again, this time turning her head a little to stare at it from a different angle.
“Give me your fuckin’ hand already,” I say, shaking my open palm one more time. She reaches out, but before our hands connect, hers drops to the floor, and she sighs loudly.
“I’m drunk,” she whines.
“No kidding,” I deadpan. Then, because she is still staring at my cock and wearing my hoodie, and I’m all sorts of fucked up right now (and I don’t mean drunk), I reach down and scoop her up off the floor.
“You scooped me,” she coos, her cheeks very flushed now. “I’ve always wanted to be scooped.” She blinks a few times then her face goes sour. “I wanted it to mean something when it happened, though.”
I blink down at her. Why does she make shit so complicated? “I wanted to get you off the floor so I picked you up. It meant something. It means you’re not on the floor.”
She brings the neck of my hoodie to her nose and inhales. “I don’t know what it is, but I love the way you smell.” She doesn’t let the compliment make me warm and fuzzy because she adds, “you kind of smell a little dirty all the time, but god, I fucking like it.”
“Stop talking. You will hate yourself tomorrow if you don’t,” I say, giving her the opportunity to wake up with just a hangover as opposed to a hangover with a heaping side of regret.