Page 19 of Cherry Beats

Presley’s face was on every billboard, magazine article, news feed, and Internet search—you name it, he stared back at me from it. There hadn’t been anything that had stalled him in his rise to success.

Some people were made to be great. He was one of them.

He was meant to be out there, a shining beacon for everyone to stare up at in awe.

Sometimes the weeks would go by and I’d feel like I was coping just fine. In between track releases, a world tour, and his two albums being promoted, the universe had allowed me to settle into some kind of false security blanket, all cosy and warm, far away from any pain. Then a new shot of him would appear out of nowhere, being brooding and sincere like he was staring through the pages of a magazine into your darkest, most private thoughts. One look at him would strike me in the heart like a toxic arrow, and all the words we’d whispered, the places he’d touched, the moans he’d made me moan, and the cries he’d turned into screams… they haunted me.

His eyes haunted me.

His smirk haunted me.

That damn, irreplaceable leather jacket haunted me. Every time I saw him wearing it in the magazines, I hitched in a breath, wondering if my name was still scrawled on the inside.

The name I’d placed there with his permission.

“Do you ever take that thing off?” I asked as the taxi bobbed along with the two of us twisted towards each other in the back seat.

He glanced up at me and raised a brow. “I can keep it on when I put your legs over my shoulders if you’d like? Just give me the dream and I’ll use it against you.”

“How do you do that?”

“Fuck you with my jacket still on?”

“No.” I smiled. “How do you reference sex so… casually?”

Presley reached over and pinched my chin between his finger and thumb. “It’s what our bodies were created for. I don’t get why people make such a big deal about it.”

“There’re no feelings involved for you… ever?”

“Do you want me to lie to you? Would that make you feel better if I told you I’d loved the women I’d screwed?”

“When you put it like that, no. I guess not.”

“Listen—” He slid closer, avoiding all the laws and regulations about wearing a seatbelt in a moving car. He was a rock star. I guess a near-death experience would make for one hell of a song for him, anyway.Presley’s thighs pressed against mine, and he leaned in to whisper in my ear. “Just because I haven’t felt the need to give a tiny piece of my heart to a woman before, that doesn’t mean I never will. There’s no mask on me, Cherry. I’m open to anything. Everything. To living. To breathing. To being proven wrong. If you think you’re up for the challenge of proving me wrong… if you think you’re up for the challenge of making one night with you count more than it’s ever counted with any of those before you…” He reached up and pushed a lock of hair behind my ear. “Go for it.”

“And if I win?” I asked, turning my head his way so our lips were only a whisper apart.

“I’ll let you keep the damn jacket on my back.”

“I could never take that from you.”

“That’s up to you.”

“Maybe I’ll just write my name in Sharpie on the inside as a reminder of that one time a cherry-haired, smart-mouthed bartender took on the big bad rocker with the too-cool-for-school heart, and she won.”

“You have to do that first, though.Win.”

“Those with nothing to lose have everything to gain.”

“Damn, you make me hard.” He grinned devilishly, running a hand up my thigh before he slipped his palm between my legs and pressed down on my heat. “Peeling you out of these trousers is going to be a moment I’ll treasure forever. I just know it.”

I rolled over in bed, dragging my pristine white bedsheets with me as I turned towards the sun that was streaming through the window of my shoebox apartment. It was a mild day in September. My favourite time of year. My usually pale skin had some colour from the summer sun, giving me a small spattering of fading freckles across the bridge of my nose. The weather was still warm enough to allow me to wear T-shirts all day, every day, sans jacket.

The one good thing about working mostly evenings was that it allowed me to enjoy my days. It allowed me to never miss a warm afternoon or the opportunity to hit the streets, even if just for a small walk. Today, however, I wanted nothing more than to enjoy the quiet of my apartment. I wanted to sit, lay down, stay in my short-short pyjama set, not wear a bra, not brush my hair, and let last night’s mascara linger under the bags of my eyes. That’s exactly what I planned to do. I was going to take a selfish day, just like Presley took a selfish day every day of his life, right? If it was good enough for him, it was good enough for me.

The eye roll I reprimanded myself with was instant. That was the problem with having hit the jackpot just once. Everything reminded you of it. Every. Little. Damn. Annoying. Thing.

The ache between my legs when I lay in bed and thought of him was brutal.

---