Page 96 of Here's to Yesterday

“But it’snotokay, Tucker. Your tattoos are sexy as hell. I’ve always thought that. It’s just, my parentshatethem. So yeah, at first they were part of the reason I gravitated toward…” She trails off, avoiding mentioning my brother’s name. “The rest was all me and my clouded outlook on the type of man I was supposed to be with. I was wrong though. I sort of fell into this bitchy, judgy version of myself, and I’m not proud of it. I hate that side of me. It’s a shitty excuse, but it’s ingrained inme.”

“Maura,I—”

“I’m trying to get rid of it,” she interrupts. Her head drops along with her voice. “I promise. I don’t want to be anything likethem.I just want to beme.”

Part of me wants to tell her she should have been stronger and told her parents to go fuck themselves a long time ago, but I also get it. I’ve met them and can understand where they fucked up her perception ofpeople.

But the Maura I’ve always known has fought against them from the minute I met her. And that’s all that counts forme.

Pushing her chin back up until her alluring, aqua-blue eyes meet mine, I tell her, “You’re nothing like them, Maura.Ipromise.”

Her eyes are still sad when she says, “How can you be sosure?”

“Because I wouldn’t love you like I do if youwere.”

A gasp leaves her mouth, and I’m momentarily confused, but then I realize what Isaid.

Love.

I said I wouldn’tloveher, not I wouldn’tlikeher.

But I’m not taking it back, because it’s true. Instead, I’m going to pretend I didn’t say it and see where that leadsus.

Apparently she wants to ignore it for now too, because she lies back down on me with her head in the crook of my arm and her hand back over my heart. She begins tracing the lines of the tattoo, and I slowly start driftingoff.

“Why don’t you have condoms inhere?”

Random.

“I never bring girls in here,” I tell herhonestly.

She flings herself up again. “Shut the freak up! You dotoo!”

I shake my head. “I don’t. Promise. I…I haven’t had sex in about ayear.”

“A year?” she questionsskeptically.

“A year.” I smile shyly. “There was this girl who was stuck in my head. She was all I wanted, so I didn’t see the need to find anythingelsewhere.”

The look in Maura’s eyes is one I won’t be forgetting for a long time to come. She’s happy. Elated, even. Because she knows I’m talking about her. And she knows I mean every single word ofit.

I do my best to convey to her what I’m feeling in this moment with my eyes. I think she gets it, think she understands, because a small grin pulls the corners of her mouth up. She curls back into me, and I bend down to plant a kiss on her head, holding my lips there for longer thannecessary.

“Goodnight,Maura.”

“Goodnight,Tuck.”

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