“We’re all done in here.” Casey suddenly appears at the kitchen doorway, my father behind her, interrupting our conversation. “For our first session, I’d say it went pretty well. James is a fantastic patient,” she smiles, squeezing Dad’s arm.
She smiles, and the kitchen, my chest and my whole life fills with light, as if I’ve been woken from eight years of darkness. It’s a blinding light, so bright that it hurts your eyes – but you never want to close them. You want to look around you, even if it’s painful. There’s nothing else you’d rather do.
“Thank you, Casey. You’re an angel,” Mum says.
Even an idiot like me can start to understand what she was talking about.
* * *
“Thanks for lettingme use your bathroom.” Casey comes slowly down the stairs, moving breezily and confidently: like a woman who knows full well the effect she has on men. I follow her movements right until her foot lands on the bottom step, putting my self-control to the test as I let my gaze slide slowly up her figure, examining every tiny, insignificant detail.
My breath catches in my chest; my heart leaps into my throat, trying to suffocate me. I think I’ve lost my eyes somewhere – or maybe I’ve just lost myself.
Insignificant? Did I really say that?
Like fuck I did.
There’s nothing insignificant about her. Not a single thing.
“Sorry, but I had plans this evening so…”
“You look stunning.”
“Oh. Thanks.”
Stunning?Am I kidding?
Her outfit is screaming:please, rip this dress off me and push me up against the wall until I can’t walk anymore.
Why couldn’t she have left wearing the jeans she turned up in, with herDo I look better with no shirt?top?
Fuck, no. That would’ve made it too easy.
“Isn’t that right, Nick?” Mum asks.
“Eh?”
“Doesn’t she look amazing?”
“S-sure,” I say, trying to avoiding looking at her again, before my thoughts are broadcast to everyone; but looking at her is useless. Her image is already imprinted into my memory, along with a hundred other images of her which are surfacing only now, as if my mind has just decided to drag them all up again, playing a game ofLet’s see how long it’ll take Nick to realise he’s fucked.
Her dress is green: my favourite colour. Her heels aren’t too high – she doesn’t care about how short she is. She loves being cuddled, squeezed, feeling safe at your side. Her legs are bare: she’s always had fantastic legs, even when they were littered in scrapes and bruises. Her cleavage is covered, but she is simply beautiful. It’s the kind of beauty that can knock you out with just one glance of her peaceful, sea-blue eyes, dragging you down into their stormy waters with no hope of returning to the surface.
She is stunning, just as she’s always been; even when she was wearing men’s rugby shorts and battered trainers. Even when she was coated in grass and mud, with wild, unbrushed hair. Even when she was a teenage girl playing at being a tomboy, when she didn’t have an ounce of masculinity in her. Even when I used to secretly spy on her, tormenting my heart and body. Even when I wanted her, in that way that you want things you know will hurt you, but you can’t help but desire them: like an alcoholic’s last drink. You look at it, you crave it, you sniff it: then you chuck it down, letting the liquid slip through your body, from your tongue to your throat. And while it courses through you, sending you up in flames, you know that it’s poisoning you; but you never want to give up its taste on your lips. Even though it’s slowly killing you.
Even though you know it’ll be hell.
How can nothing have changed in eight years? How can I still have the same problem in my jeans right now, just by looking at her? Just by thinking of her?
“Is your mouth open, Nick?”
I shake myself from my daze, begging my thoughts to lock themselves back up where they’ve been hidden for the past eight years.
“You like my dress, then?” she asks, fully aware of the effect it’s having on me.
“Yeah, it’s nice,” I say stupidly.
“Good evening. I’m looking for Casey?” The unmistakeable voice of a dickhead calls from the hallway.
