Page 10 of Senseless
My mother never taught me anything remotely useful, but she didn’t need to know that. “Yes, thank you.”
“Want me to pour?”
“Thanks, I got it.”
“Such a gentleman.” Jen smiled, stretching her forearms out on the bartop next to me.
The bar was slow, which meant she’d likely want to hang out and talk. Her arms were covered in black outlines that I’d started a few days ago, along with small bits of color filled in for her sleeves. In another two weeks, she’d be covered in bright floral designs from shoulder to wrist.
I liked Jen, which was not something I thought I’d ever feel about another woman. She was friendly and talkative, protective of the service girls when men came to stay, and a hardass when it came to cutting off liquor for sloshed bar patrons. I could have done without the nicknames likebig guy,big boy, andhandsome, but other than that, she was a good client and bartender.
“You seein’ Doc soon?” she asked, her voice lowering.
“Yeah.” I swallowed my first mouthful of whiskey and poured another.
“How’s that been going?”
I paused to throw back my next drink before answering. “It feels like hell when it’s happening but…I think it’s actually working.” I started pouring my third shot. “So I keep going back.”
“That’s good!” Jen’s arm slid across the bar to nudge against mine. I fought back the urge to pull away from the touch. It would’ve been rude, or at least that was what some niggling voice in my head told me.
“I give him shit for being a dirty old man, but I swear Doc saved my life,” she continued in a near-whisper. “I was having nightmares, panic attacks set off by the littlest shit. Got hooked on booze, pills, anything I could get my hands on to make it go away. Fuck, I wanted to end it all.” Jen nudged her elbow into my arm. “What’s your flavor of misery?”
“Um.” I felt fine to talk to her about mundane things, but absolutely not this. “Nightmares, mostly. Sorry if you’ve heard me at night.”
She raised one shoulder in a shrug. “Hey, I get it. And I haven’t heard a peep out of your room in a week, so that’s somethin’, huh?”
“Yeah.” I stared at my bottle and empty glass, debating on one more drink before going to see Doc. It was still early on in my treatment, so I couldn’t be sure if it was Doc’s bizarre therapy letting me sleep through the night or simply my old habit of drinking myself into oblivion. “Maybe it is.”
Jen lifted her chin, her eyes focused on my other arm. “Your nightmares got anything to do with her?”
I followed her gaze to the fresh tattoo inside my left forearm, where a beautiful, dark-haired woman stretched from my elbow to my wrist. I did it in a pin-up style, the woman’s large eyes were sultry and inviting with her lips curved into a coy smile. She wore a cropped T-shirt with a horned skull on the front, black jeans with rips in the knees, and motorcycle boots with her feet crossed at the ankles.
“No,” I told Jen absently, my gaze fixed on the image embedded in my skin. “She has nothing to do with the nightmares.”
I loved her, and then becamehernightmare.
While I had no regrets about it, the tattoo was done in a moment of weakness. I had been here a full week, drunk in my room at night, my brain unwilling to let me sleep. I was missing her so badly, the ache in my chest made it difficult to breathe. I stared at the drawing I made of her for hours, tracing the pencil lines with my finger over and over, remembering how I’d mapped her body during our last night together.
The more I drank, the more I sank into the memories. Her voice, her laughs, the sounds she made in her climax. The taste of her, the warmth of her lips on my scars. The way she looked at me—without fear.
The paper wore so thin that it ripped.
I flew into a panic, immediately grabbing a pen to copy the drawing onto my forearm. Another empty bottle later, my tattoo machine buzzed late into the night, making the woman I loved in a past life a permanent fixture on my body. I could barely bring myself to think of her name because of how much it hurt, but not even Ivan could fully let go of the woman Shadow had loved.
Looking at the tattoo brought me no joy, no nostalgia of a better time. It only brought me sorrow. All it reminded me of was how much I lost, how badly I fucked up the one good thing I had. How much I deserved to be here, far away from the woman I missed so much.
With a resigned sigh, I stood from the bar. “I better get going. Thanks, Jen.”
“Hey.” She reached for me, her hand landing softly on top of mine. Again, I fought the urge to snatch my hand away. “If you ever want to talk after the bar’s closed, or you know, get something out of your system...” her fingers stroked over mine, “I’m here for you, Ivan.”
It took me a moment, but from the way she kept trying to touch me, I could figure out what she was implying. I tried to see her from the perspective of a normal man—the attractive, edgy bartender with her piercings and tattoos, damaged in her own way but not completely unlike me. She was a good friend, and if I was anyone else, maybe I would take her invitation as a way to distract myself.
But there was only one woman whose touch I craved. Maybe that would change in the future, but right then I was content to wallow in my self-flagellation. Torturing myself with the ink on my arm as a constant reminder, and holding on to memories I wasn’t ready to let go of.
“Thanks, Jen,” I repeated before sliding my hand out from under hers, unsure of what else to say.
Turning away from the bar, I headed for a side door that could have passed for an office or supply closet. In truth, it was a basement.
