Time Mends (18 page)

After what could have been minutes or hours,
I only knew that the band was playing a different song, Charlie
pulled away. His lips were swollen and his chest rose and fell
visibly with every breath. I was shocked to see tears glistening in
his eyes, threatening to fall.

“
Scout…” His voice was raw
with emotion, which only made my own eyes well up. I opened my
mouth, but there were no words, so I did the only thing I could. I
turned around and ran out of the bar.

I woke up in a strange bed. Before I could
ascertain my whereabouts, a glass of water and bottle of Aspirin
was placed next to the alarm clock professing it to be 7:47. As I
hefted myself up I began to understand their necessity.

“
How are you feeling?”
Charlie asked, adding a small bottle of V-8 juice to the bedside
table.

“
Like I just sat through
an entire Justin Bieber concert.”

“
Headache and
nausea?”

“
And an overwhelming
desire to die.”

Bits of the night before came floating to
the surface, causing the urges to puke and perish to grow in
intensity. Charlie had found me quickly since McGuire’s was
conveniently located in the middle of a soybean field. I was a
snotty mess as he ushered me to his truck. After that, things got a
little fuzzy, but I did remember Charlie trying to scoop me up to
carry me into an apartment building on the south side of town.
Unfortunately, I’m way too long and gangly for him to manage it. We
settled on a half-carry, half-drag type scenario, which became
especially complicated on the staircase.

“
Not surprised. Goat Girl
said you had five LITs. What the hell where you
thinking?”

Of course he wanted to be all chipper and
talkative now that my brain was threatening to leak out my
ears.

“
First, it was only
three.”
I think.
“Secondly, the name is misleading. I don’t think there was
any tea in those things at all.” I counted out three Aspirin, then
added another one for posterity’s sake. “And third, I thought my
Shifter metabolism would burn through the alcohol too fast to cause
any damage.” I sat up further to avoid choking on my water and
watched the room tilt to the left, then the right, and then back to
the left again. “Turns out, I was wrong.”

“
And you couldn’t have
used Jase’s performance at prom to figure that out?”

I felt exceptionally stupid for not having
thought of that. “Wolves are bigger and therefore have higher
metabolism?”

Charlie shook his head as he passed over the
tomato juice. “It’s a good thing the bartender started watering
your drinks way down after the first one, or you would be in a
hospital with alcohol poisoning. Seriously, what made you think bar
hoping with Ashley Johnson of all people was a good idea?”

The V8 tasted as wretchedly awful as tomato
juice always does, but I gulped some down assuming Charlie had
offered it to me for a good reason. “Doesn’t bar hoping imply
moving around to various establishments? Because we stayed at
McGuire’s all night. And Ashley was the only person I could think
of who would take me.”

“
Which leads back to why
you wanted to be at a bar.” He looked at me expectantly, but I kept
my mouth shut. “Scout…”

“
I didn’t want to be
alone.” I concentrated on the juice clinging to the side of the
bottle. It looked like blood, which didn’t do stellar things for my
stomach. “It’s worse when I’m alone and have time to think. So, I
went to a place where thinking is strongly discouraged.”

“
Half the Hagan Pack hangs
out at McGuire’s.”

“
I know.”

“
If Makya had been in a
different mood —”

“
I know.”

We sat there for a long stretch of silence,
me clutching the glass of tomato juice and Charlie working his
Adam’s apple.

“
Do you hate me?” I asked
when I could bear the silence no longer.

Charlie didn’t even blink, much less answer.
I was beginning to think he hadn’t heard me, that I was going to
have to work up the courage to ask again, when he lifted his head,
pinning me with those anguished green eyes. “How could you think
that?”

How could I not?

“
Everything is wrong,
Charlie. Everything. And it’s all my fault. I was selfish, taking
the one thing I wasn’t allowed to have, and now we’re all
suffering. You should all hate me. I hate myself.”

“
This isn’t your
fault.”

“
Yes, it is. I’ve ruined
so many lives, hurt so many people. And I just keep doing it.” I
thought about the bar, about Charlie’s face as I ordered him to
dance with me, the pain in the kiss I had commanded. “It should’ve
been me who died that night.”

“
Don’t say that.” His
hands clenched onto my face. “Never, ever say that.” And then he
kissed me. He moved in slowly, giving me a million opportunities to
stop him, yet it still shocked me when I felt his lips against
mine. These lips were completely unlike the ones last night. They
were hesitant and gentle, coaxing mine to respond. I closed my eyes
and allowed myself to be lost in the sensation, in the warmth
spreading through my body.

I don’t know who broke away first. Maybe
Charlie pulled back to catch his breath, or perhaps my
consciousness sent a message to my body before it screamed
awareness in my brain. All I know is the moment his lips left mine,
the spell was broken. I didn’t even say anything. I just pushed him
away and left. No crying. No running. No drama. I simply got up,
walked into the living room, and nodded an acknowledgement to the
guy I vaguely recognized from my afternoon shooting sessions at
Randy’s. Then I promptly walked to the nearest bush and purged the
entire contents of my stomach.

For the record, Long Island Iced Teas taste
even worse the second time they touch your taste buds.

Once I could move again I had to face my
next obstacle: Transportation. The keys were probably sitting in
the ignition of Charlie’s truck since no one would ever even think
about stealing a rusted old Ford pickup truck, but taking it would
have been a bit harsh. I could’ve called for a ride, but as far as
I knew my cellphone was still sitting in McGuire’s. Since phone
booths only exist in old movies and there appeared to be no stores
in sight, I was screwed.

I considered turning around, but couldn’t
force myself to go back into the apartment.

I had been walking about fifteen minutes
towards the general direction of home when a maroon grandma-style
car slowed beside me.

“
Scout? Is that you?” Joi
asked. I started to make some crack about being Scout’s long lost
evil twin, but stopped myself since she might actually believe me.
“Why are you walking down the street in that little fancy
dress?”

I kept trudging along. “It’s called the Walk
of Shame.”

“
Is that a Baptist thing?”
came the voice from the car as it kept pace with me.

“
Please tell me you’re
kidding.”

“
Of course. Of course I’m
kidding.” A pause. “Was it funny?”

I stopped walking and shielded my eyes
against the glare of the early morning sun.

“
Don’t give me that look.
Geez, how am I supposed to know? I’m Catholic,
remember?”

“
You’ve heard of a Walk of
Shame before, right?”

“
I do read and watch
television, Scout.” She leaned across the passenger’s seat, making
no attempt to disguise her critical perusal of my face. “You look
awfully pale. Like, paler than normal. Are you okay? Do you need a
ride?”

I didn’t hesitate before pulling open the
passenger’s door and crawling into the wonderfully air conditioned
car. The hem of my dress rose to an inappropriate level, but I
didn’t waste the energy to fix it since Joi had a pair of female
legs of her very own to look at if she so desired.

Joi remained silent for a record breaking
thirty seconds.

“
So, who did you hook up
with?”

I threw a hand over my closed eyes, but the
sun still managed to somehow stab through to my brain. “I didn’t
hook up with anyone.” Well, Charlie kinda, but she didn’t need to
know that. “My Walk of Shame was a variation on the original.”

“
Want to talk about
it?”

“
Absolutely
not.”

Three whole breaths of silence.

“
You’re moving around
really good. I guess your stomach is better.”

“
Yep.”

Four breaths of silence.

“
John and I are back
together. Did you hear?”

“
Nuh-uh.”

“
Oh yeah. That whole
break-up thing was a total misunderstanding. He’s like the sweetest
guy ever. He’s always sending me the sweetest text messages and
leaving the sweetest notes on my Facebook wall and even bought me
some of the sweetest looking daisies the other day for absolutely
no reason at all.”

“
Sweet.”

“
I know, right? And you
know what he’s started doing?”

“
Something really, really
sweet?”

“
Totally sweet. He’s been
coming to The Farmhouse and hanging out while I work every shift.
Like, the whole time. Even when I have to open, he is waiting at
the door when it’s unlocked at five in the morning.”

“
That’s not sweet, Joi.
It’s crazy.” Who wakes up at five in the morning? “Sweetie, I think
we need to have a talk about obsessive behavior and establishing
boundaries in a relationship.”

“
It’s not like that.” I
opened one eye and immediately regretted it. Why couldn’t I have a
hangover on a cloudy day? “Stop looking at me like that,” she said.
“I’m not an idiot, you know. He’s there because of this guy who
keeps coming in and wigging me out. My manager thinks I’m
overreacting, and I can’t afford to quit, so John has been playing
bodyguard.”

I still wasn’t sold on John’s nobility, but…
“You have a creeper harassing you at work and your manager won’t do
anything about it?”

“
He doesn’t actually do
anything, he’s just…” Joi turned the car off the main highway.
“He’s like a Disney villain. He’s got this Rasputin accent, his
face is all mangled, and he does this whole evil leering thing that
gives me goosebumps, and not the good kind.”

I felt as if I’d been stabbed in the gut
with an icicle. “Rasputin accent? Like Russian?”

“
Is there a non-Russian
Rasputin?”

“
And his face, is there a
scar that runs from here to here?” I asked, tracing a line from my
temple to the corner of my mouth.

“
So you’ve seen him too?
He’s got a bad aura or something, right?”

“
Or something.” I could
still see the man who approached me after Alex’s funeral. Three
minutes. That’s how long Stefan stood in front of me, yet he left a
lasting impression, and not just because he suggested that Alex
wasn’t who I thought he was. No, there was something about him -
maybe that aura Joi was talking about - that made me want to turn
tail and run. “Joi, do you know what he’s doing in
Timber?”

“
Besides scaring the
bejesus out of me? Not really. He comes in everyday, sometimes
twice a day. If he’s alone, he just sits there staring at everyone
as if he’s plotting their death. But most of the time there are
three other guys with him. One of them is kinda cute, but they stay
there forever.” The car stopped in front of my house. “It used to
really bother me, but now John is always there to protect me
because he’s the bestest boyfriend ever.”

I didn’t really see what good John was going
to do anyone, but I was glad Joi had someone looking out for her,
even if he was a clueless redneck. Joi really wanted to hang out
and chat some more, but neither my head nor teeth could handle any
more sweetness. After making her promise to watch herself around
the Russian creeper, I sent her on her entirely too merry way.

The house was quiet when I entered. The
parentals and Angel weren’t due to arrive home until early
afternoon, and Jase and Talley were both still asleep. After
throwing on some pajamas I found in the clothes dryer, I laid down
on the couch and tried to think through the whole Stefan situation
despite the Keith Moon solo going on in my head.

Logic told me he was still doing exactly
what he said he was doing at the funeral - looking for Liam. My
gut, however, had a different opinion. It was convinced I should be
worried, which was just stupid. Sure, the guy was creepy as heck,
and I wasn’t inclined to believe a word he said, but what interest
did he have in me? I felt certain the Hagan Pack was keeping their
word about my furry condition since I hadn’t heard of any of Jase’s
family members being hospitalized lately. So, to Stefan I was just
another grieving girlfriend, right?

My gut told me not to be a chump.

My brain said to just chill.

My gut disagreed.

My brain disagreed with my gut’s
disagreement.

Somewhere in the middle of the long and
unproductive argument which ensued I drifted off to sleep. The next
thing I knew someone was pounding on the front door.

“
Hang on a minute,” I
mumbled. Jase accidentally locking himself out of the house was
annoying enough under normal circumstances. When he woke me up
because of it, it was completely unacceptable. “You do know Dad
will kill you if you’ve lost the spare again, right?” I slung open
the door to reveal a grizzled old man with sapphire
eyes.