Page 38 of Reckless Roses
Until last year, when Leo bought out the entirety of the Pacific Shores Boardwalk. The small businesses we loved as kids have slowly gone under over the years, one by one. With the money he made from surfing and modeling, Leo reinvested in the community by buying the entire building, all five suites that line the promenade in front of the pier.
He and Everett plan on opening a surf shop in the first unit, and they offered me a space as well. A tattoo and piercing parlor. I chose the suite on the far end, opposite the surf shop, so it would feel like my own space. Everett, Leo, and I have been working our asses off the last few months to get everything refurbished and ready for business. It’s exhausting, but we’re getting close to opening, and I couldn’t be more excited.
“You think of a name for it yet?” Elena asks, plopping down beside me.
“Nope,” I lie. I definitely have a name picked out, but I’m not ready to tell her yet.
The sun sinks low over the Pacific, casting the sky in cotton candy colors, the ocean below us in gold.
Elena hums. “Well, what are you drawing?”
“Just playing around with some sketches.” I flip my book closed before she can see what I’m actually working on.
She sighs, laying her head against my shoulder, watching the sky fade. “Draw something that reminds you of me.”
I smile to myself. She asks me to do that all the time, and I always draw the same thing. She must have enough sketches of violets to line her entire apartment, but every time I make her something new, her face lights up like it’s the first time she has ever seen it.
“What’ve you been working on?” I ask as I get to work. We’ve both been so busy lately, I haven’t had time to talk to her much about her new manuscript. It’s the fifth book in her ongoing series, all surrounding domestic villains and how they overcometheir darkness through love and romance. Her writing is poetic and soft, though the content of her stories is dark and morbid. The combination of it all creates a unique experience readers can’t get enough of.
I was the first person to read her work, and it still feels like an honor, the same way all those poems she used to write, that I still keep beside my bed, feel like a privilege. People all around the world pay for her words now, and I’ve always had them for free.
Elena lies down on the grass, putting her head in my lap. Her flawless face is incredibly distracting, and every time our eyes meet, she smiles at me in a way that makes it hard to breathe.
Rambling about her manuscript, she tells me every detail, and before long, the sun has completely disappeared, and it’s too dark for me to keep drawing. I set my sketchbook beside us, leaning back on my elbows.
“I’m trying really hard to be happy,” she says softly after we’ve finished talking.
“You miss him?” I ask.
Zach left three months ago to work on a ranch in Wyoming. There’s no cell service out there, so he’s only able to call on Sundays, when the workers head into town. I know he’s purposely keeping his distance from Elena, but he has been checking in with me, our friends, and my parents. He seems to be doing well—enjoying it, even. It’s like whatever answers he was searching for out there, he’s finally finding.
I don’t tell Elena when I speak to my brother, I don’t want to upset her. I’ve also found that when I’m keeping my relationships with Zach and Elena completely separate, I like him a lot more. He has always been a great brother, a good friend—he’s just a shitty boyfriend, and when he’s being that to the woman I’m also in love with, it cuts deeper.
“I don’t want to, but I do.” She sits up, dark curls flowing wildly around her face as she spins toward me, crossing her legs.“I think I need to…date? Maybe? I need to remind myself how much better off I am. Zach, he…” She sighs. “He didn’t want me to be me. He didn’t like what I read or what I wrote. He thought I was annoying when I talked about the stars, and he didn’t like the idea of my body being covered in tattoos. He never wore the necklaces I made him. He didn’t believe me when I told him citrine brought prosperity and meditating with certain crystals could manifest the path he was so desperate to find.” She rolls her eyes, but I smile. I love when she rambles about the things she’s passionate about. “My point is—now that he’s gone, I’ve remembered who the fuck I am. I’m dark and weird and moody and stubborn. Zach wanted me to fit inside a certain box, be the type of girl who belonged on the arm of the all-American boy next door like him, and I’ve never been that girl.” Her face drops into a frown. “I think that’s why he was never fully able to show us off to the world, to give us a title. He was always a little embarrassed of me.”
“There is nothing about you to be embarrassed by, Elena.” I lean forward, grasping her chin and lifting it, forcing her eyes to meet mine, forcing her to see the fervor in my face when I say those words.
She smiles softly. “I know. It felt like Zach wanted me to be…” Her brow furrows with deep thought, eyes darting to the sketchbook sprawled in the grass beside me. “He wanted me to be roses, but I’m not.” Elena’s gaze meets mine. “I’m a violet.”
“Violets are my favorite.”
“That’s because you’re a violet too.” She laughs, shoving my shoulder. “I guess I just kind of feel like there is this film covering my body, the sheet he tried to hide me behind. I want to rip it off, cleanse myself of it.” She shrugs, a small smile accenting her lips. “And they say the best way to get over someone is to get under?—”
“No.” The word rips from my throat, far more aggressively than I intend, but the second I realized the direction her thoughts were going, I cut in.
I don’t often let my thoughts filter to the possibilities of Elena being with another man, because that man had always been my brother. I’d always assumed if it wasn’t him, it’d be me, and realizing she could end up with someone else entirely is a sickness I feel down to my marrow.
My tone is harsh enough that Elena rears back, eyes going wide, then narrow.
“Sorry.” I clear my throat. “I just…” I stop myself. I’m done hiding the truth. My brother isn’t here for her to go running back to, and we’re not kids anymore. “Actually, you know what?” I shake my head. “I’m going to be honest. I cannot stand the idea of hearing about you with another man again. I’ve dealt with it my entire fucking life, and I won’t do it anymore. I won’t watch you give yourself to anyone else.”
Elena looks at me like she can’t decide if she’s pissed off, confused, or intrigued. “What do you propose then, Augustus?” she asks, voice dropping to a rasp. “That I become some kind of celib?—”
“If you want to use someone to get over my brother…” I sit up on my knees, crawling toward her as she falls back onto the grass. Something akin to allure rages in her eyes as I hover over her. “Use me.”
She licks her lips. Chills race down my body, settling in my core as she slides a hand up my back, cupping the nape of my neck—a featherlight touch we’ve never dared to share before.
“What do you mean by that, August?” she whispers.
