All the Things We Need Page 23

  “Tastes like shit,” she said after another awkward moment. “I wanted to love it the way I used to, but I guess I just don’t.”

  I wanted to ask her if she was talking about the smokes or my brother, but wisely refrained. “It must be a relief that the Bar Mitzvah’s over.”

  “Yeah. Totally.” She ashed into a small glass bowl and then took a long drag. She didn’t cough it out, but she definitely didn’t look as though she were loving it. She offered me the pack, but I shook my head.

  “Your mother called me, by the way. Left a message telling me to call her back.”

  “Ugh, sorry. Did you?”

  William had inherited his distinctive laugh from his mother. She shook her head. “Nope.”

  “You’ll probably have to, at some point.”

  She looked at me. “Why? Really, Elise, why do I have to?”

  “Because…she’s your mother-in-law.” I couldn’t even make myself sound convincing.

  “Life’s too short to put up with people who treat you like shit, you know that? In all the time you’ve known me, has your mother ever been anything other than some degree of shitty to me?” Susan took another drag. She seemed to be getting the hang of it again anyway.

  What she said was true, but still, as I’d thought earlier about William having to take sides, my mother was my mother. “It’s how she is.”

  “Sorry, but I don’t think the length of time someone behaves badly is an excuse to continue to allow it. I don’t care if it’s how she’s always been.”

  “I didn’t say it was how she’d always been,” I said sharply. “I said it’s how she is. If you want to know, she didn’t really start being such a bitch until my father left her.”

  Susan didn’t say anything for a moment. “That’s not what your father says.”

  “Since when are you and my dad best friends?” I frowned.

  “We’re not. I wanted to invite him to the Bar Mitzvah, but your mother started flipping tables over it, so I had to talk to him to explain to him why we couldn’t have him there to celebrate.” Susan stubbed out her cigarette and pulled out another, tucked it between her lips, but didn’t light it right away. “It was stupid. Your dad loves William, even if he and your mother can’t stand each other.”

  “He hasn’t exactly been the best dad to us, either. What did Evan say about it?” I asked, genuinely curious. I hadn’t spoken to my dad in about a year. When he didn’t show up, I assumed it was because, as my mother had said, he couldn’t be bothered.

  “He said it wasn’t worth getting your mother all worked up.” Susan fought with her lighter, which refused to give a good flame, then tossed it down with a sigh of disgust. “God forbid.”

  “But you had a nice long talk with my dad about her.” It was stupid, getting agitated about defending my mother, who absolutely was a pain in the ass.

  Susan gave me an exasperated and somehow defiant look. “Your mother likes to paint herself as quite the martyr, Elise. Don’t act like that’s a surprise.”

  “No. I can’t say that. But you barely know my dad. You don’t know what it was like when they were splitting up. He left us,” I told her harshly, hating the way the words snagged and tore at my throat. It had been years, and I hated that the pain could still punch me in the guts. “I don’t really care what happened between the two of them, but he left us, the kids, just up and fucking abandoned us like we meant nothing. Went off to Florida, miles and miles away. We didn’t know where he was for the first six months.” Shaking, I lowered my voice. “I don’t care how much of a bitch he says my mother was. He. Left. Us.”

  “Elise.” Susan shook her head and sounded sad. “You don’t know…”

  “Just stop, okay? I don’t want to hear it from you. I know my mom hasn’t been good to you. I’m sorry that you have to put up with it. I’m sorry my brother doesn’t fucking stand up for you the way he should and that he leaves his socks all over the place, too, but for fuck’s sake, Susan…he’s my brother. And William, I love that kid.” Breathing hard, I stared at her, waiting for her to say something even though I hadn’t asked a question. After a second or so, I tossed up my hands. “You have a family! Jesus. Don’t throw it away the way my dad did.”

  “You mean the way your mother did,” Susan said quietly, in a voice like the scratch of fingernails on sandpaper.

  I didn’t say anything. She picked up her lighter. Another try and the flame caught, and she held it to the end of her cigarette. She looked up at me with the smoke filtering through her nostrils.

  “She had an affair,” Susan said. “She told your dad to get out so she could move in some other guy. I don’t know what happened after that, but apparently it didn’t work out.”

  “No,” I said around the taste of ashes in my mouth, my lips so numb I was surprised they could form words at all. “I guess it didn’t.”

  CHAPTER 32

  I immediately knew the man Susan had been talking about. Sam Peters. Tall, sandy haired, big smile. He always had gum in his pocket, maybe to cover up the fact his breath was perpetually bad. He had square white teeth I realized now must’ve been dentures, hence the stench. He had a tattoo on his biceps of a little red devil, though over the years it had faded into a pale blob. You could see the tattoo because he favored shirts with the sleeves torn off, threads dangling. He was the guy who fixed my parents’ cars.

  The summer before my father left, he’d traveled a lot on business. At the time I hadn’t thought much of it—parents did things, kids accepted them without question. My mother told us our dad was looking for a new job, but until he got one, he had to spend a lot of his time on the road. I’d heard them arguing about money a few times as the school year ended, so the idea that he needed to find a new job wasn’t entirely out of line, especially since my mom’s car had been in the shop.

  A lot.

  Sick with the memories of it now, the smell of oil and exhaust overlaid by the sweetly minty gum Sam always offered me, I sat at my kitchen table flipping through an old photo album from that year. Looking for proof. I didn’t want it to be true, but there was no denying that the moment Susan told me, I’d known it had to be.

  And there it was. A picture of me and Evan standing in front of my mom’s slate-gray Volvo station wagon, both of us in matching denim shorts and white T-shirts. Normally I’d have chuckled at the sight of our mutually questionable fashion sense, but now all I could do was stare into the background of the photo. Behind the car, into the garage, in the shadows, where a hint of a familiar pattern blended enough that it was easy to pass over unless you were really looking hard. My mother’s skirt, one she’d worn to tatters that summer. It was a wrap skirt, tied at the hip, in a bright floral, and she’d always worn it with a white peasant blouse. At least until one day I’d found it smeared with grease in the pile of things to be sent to the thrift store. I hadn’t thought about it at the time, but those smears could’ve been made by dirty hands.

  I remembered muffled shouting behind closed doors. Trips to the grocery store with my mother, who’d ticked off items on her list with increasing vehemence and made me put back the sugary cereal I wanted because it was “too expensive.” I thought of the scent of minty gum and cigarettes clinging to her when I hugged her before I went to bed, and how I’d known that my mother smelled of Wind Song perfume and fabric softener, how unsettled I’d been by this strangeness, but how I’d also put it out of my mind because Alicia had called to tell me that David Birnbaum had a crush on me.

  My father had moved out just before school started for my and Evan’s sophomore year. No explanation, no forwarding address for six months. I’d listened to my mother crying in her bedroom, her shrieks cycling up and up. The crash of broken glass. The late-night sound of the telephone and silence if I answered it before she did. I’d always thought it was my father, too ashamed to
say hello to the daughter he’d seemingly left behind without a second thought, but now I thought it must’ve been Sam Peters.

  I was still sitting at my table when Niall knocked at the front door. With my head in my hands, I considered simply texting him that I’d gone to bed sick, but there was something beautiful and terrible about having someone in your life who was more than a fuck buddy. I could tell him all about this upheaval, and he would comfort me. The kicker was, if I told him all about what I’d learned, then I might have to let him comfort me.

  “Hey…” He stopped at the sight of my face. “What’s wrong?”

  There was still a silly few seconds when I thought I would lie and pretend nothing was wrong, but then without another word, Niall took me in his arms. He kicked the door shut behind us, and he held me without speaking. His lips to my temple. His breath warm on my cheek. His hands smoothed up and down my back, and I melted into him. Clung to him, in fact, hard and desperate and on the verge of tears.

  Something crinkled between us.

  I ignored it at first, but when he pulled me closer, the distinct sound of rustling paper pushed me away from him. “What’s that?”

  “It’s… I brought something for you. But it can wait.” Niall brushed his fingertips across my forehead, smoothing my hair off my face.

  “You brought me something? Honestly, I could use a present.” I poked the front of his shirt, trying to find the source of the noise. I found it in his breast pocket. A piece of paper, folded into quarters. I looked up at him, confused.

  Niall looked sheepish and pulled it out to hand it to me, though he held it just out of reach. “It can wait, Elise. Why don’t you tell me what’s going on first?”

  I shook my head. “It’s just…some family stuff.”

  “Oh.” He frowned. “Everything ok?”

  “Yeah. I guess so. I mean, no. I don’t know.”

  He hesitated. “Maybe I shouldn’t say anything, but…is it Evan and Susan?”

  “What makes you say that?” I reached again for the paper, but he pulled it again out of my grasp.

  “Just some things he’s said at work lately. Nothing specific. It’s not really any of my business…ah, sneaky.”

  I’d managed to snag the paper and take a few steps away so he couldn’t grab it back. “Ha!”

  “There’s a smile anyway,” he said.

  I unfolded the paper. Printed in gray ink, at first the tabulated contents meant nothing to me, but I got it after studying it for a few seconds. I looked at him, unsure what to say except, “Wow.”

  “I didn’t want to tell you until I had all the results,” Niall said. “But you can see it all right there. I’m safe as houses.”

  I blinked and looked over the test results again. Then at him. “You did this for me?”

  “Well…I guess I did it for me,” he said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a small plastic shopping bag wrapped around a box of condoms. “But I also brought these. Just in case.”

  * * *

  Upstairs, I let him take me to bed. Kissing, kissing, kissing until I couldn’t breathe. Niall laid me back on my bed, his weight covering me but never too heavy. Propped on his elbows, he again smoothed my hair from my face, his eyes searching mine. I wanted to ask him what he was thinking, but I didn’t have time before he kissed me again.

  Long, deep thrusts of his tongue had me gasping. I rolled my hips against him. He ground against me, then moved to kneel over me. He looked down at me and swiped his already glistening mouth with his tongue so that I groaned.

  “Touch me,” I whispered, arching my back so my breasts, naked beneath my thin T-shirt, could tempt him.

  He ran his hands up my sides then cupped my breasts for only a moment before moving back to the hem of my shirt and sliding beneath. At the touch of his skin on mine, I shuddered. He groaned. He pushed my shirt up to bare me to him, and I helped by tugging it the rest of the way over my head.

  “You have such amazing tits…breasts,” he corrected. “Is it cool to say tits?”

  I cupped them, thumbing my nipples as I gave him a look. “What do you think?”

  “I think,” he said, kissing me again, “I want to slide my cock between your amazing tits. How about that?”

  I laughed and gasped and moaned a little, too. I put my hands on his chest, digging my nails in a little bit. “Fffffff…”

  “Go on. Say it. You know you want to.”

  “Fuck,” I finished, breathless. “Say it again.”

  Niall shook his head and pulled away before I could capture his mouth with mine. “I changed my mind.”

  “What? No!” I nudged his thigh with my foot. “That’s not fair.”

  “I’ve waited too long to be inside you,” he said matter-of-factly, though his gaze burned me. “I want to make you come with my cock deep inside you and my mouth on those luscious tits, instead. Is that better?”

  “Much.” I fell back on the bed and toyed with the zipper on my jeans. Niall was idly stroking himself through his khakis.

  He stopped long enough to unbutton his shirt and toss it onto the floor. Idly, he ran a hand across his chest, fingers tapping on his belly. He stretched out over me to kiss me again. Side by side, we lingered in the kissing, joking gone. Hungry for each other, but not urgent. Slowly, he undressed me, following with his mouth every bit of skin his fingers revealed. Then himself, and I lay back to watch him in, for me, unaccustomed acquiescence.

  I liked watching Niall get naked for me. I didn’t have to tell him which way to turn to show me his body. He moved exactly the way I’d have asked him to, if I’d been commanding. Right now, it was a pleasure, simply watching. When he moved over me again, his cock thick and hot on my belly, I put my arms around him and held him close, and he let me without trying to force us along any faster.

  Niall kissed me slowly. His hands moved over me, finding the places I liked best to be touched. A few times I moved his fingers to the left or right, or shifted so he could get to me a little better, but mostly I just reveled in being so completely and utterly…known.

  Because he learned me, you see, inch by inch. Moan by sigh by gasp and groan, Niall paid attention to every noise that slipped from my lips, every shift and shudder of my body. Slower, faster, a little harder, sometimes softer, he taught himself the way my body worked, and I barely had to correct him.

  Trembling, I arched when he at last slipped his fingers up my inner thigh to press inside me. I was so wet I was almost embarrassed at how easily and deeply his fingers went. Almost.

  His thumb pressed my clit as his fingers moved, and in moments I was moving beneath him. Then grumbling when he stopped. He laughed into my mouth.

  “I told you it would happen when it happened.”

  “It hasn’t happened yet,” I murmured, circling my fingers on his wrist and guiding him back between my legs. “So get back to it. Please.”

  “So polite,” Niall breathed. “How could a guy say no to that?”

  He was kissing me when he pushed inside me. We both sighed. I tensed a little, unable to stop myself.

  “You feel so good,” I whispered.

  He nuzzled my throat, not moving. “It’s been a long time since I did this without something. Fuck, Elise, you’re so wet.”

  I rocked my hips a little to urge him deeper. “Fuck me.”

  “You’re going to kill me,” he said, his words stuttering when I moved again.

  “Hush,” I told him, and he did.

  Slow, smooth thrusts built as Niall perfectly found the right rhythm. It had been quite some time since I’d had a man bareback inside me, and it was as much a turn-on for me as it seemed to be for him. We moved together the same way we’d done on the dance floor, as though in some crazy factory somewhere the pair of us had been built from matching pie
ces. We fit. We just…fit.

  I don’t come from the missionary position; most of the time I refuse to even fuck that way. I like to be on top, or taken from behind, or standing, even side by side, but I’ve never liked a man’s full weight on top of me as he bangs away, focusing on getting off while I struggle to catch a breath. It wasn’t like that with Niall, though, and though I wouldn’t have expected it, every thrust pressed his pelvis deliciously just right against my clit until all I could do was lift my hips to meet each one.

  My nails raked his back. Niall bit into the curve of my neck and shoulder. I cried out his name, low then louder, and grabbed a double handful of his ass. He’d called my tits amazing, but the same could definitely be said for that butt. Firm, smooth, muscled. To die for, as the saying went.

  “I’m gonna come,” he muttered in my ear. “Come with me…”

  “I’m there,” I told him, tipping over. “Fuck me a little harder, baby, I’m there with you.”

  Firefuckingworks. The kind that burst and burst again, and when you thought they were finished, another cluster of crackling, sparkling flames exploded. That was how I came with Niall the first time we made love. Just like the Fourth of July.

  He shuddered against me and went still. Now, especially, was the time when I most often felt trapped, but I didn’t even have time to feel crushed or squished, because he rolled off me. Heat spilled from me, but I was too lazy in that moment to care. Sheets could be washed. I wasn’t fucking moving.

  Niall turned onto his back, one arm behind his head, the other gesturing for me to cuddle next to him. My body curved to his, and though I knew at some point my arm would cramp or fall asleep, for the moment I was content to press my face to his sweaty, fragrant chest and breathe him in deep. He turned his face to kiss my forehead.

  We didn’t say anything for a while, both of us breathing in sync. I ran a hand down his chest and over his belly, toying with the line of dark hair below his navel. After a bit, I propped myself on my elbow to look him over. I’d only seen pieces of him before. Now with him fully naked and sated, I wanted to see everything about him. Every line and bump and freckle, mole and scar. I kissed the small brown spot next to his belly button, and he laughed.