Page 47 of Rivals
I don’t do relationships. I never have. It opens you up for responsibilities you didn’t ask for, and the reality is I don’t want to care. When I care, I feel too much. I have never loved someone before. I live in a world full of creativity, poems, paintings, and tattoos dedicated tolove. It’s hard not to care. Revna may be my muse, but I can’t allow myself to consider feeling more for her, right?
Wrong.
I freeze and continue to stare at the ceiling. How the hell am I still hearing voices? I’m not high, and I’m definitely not drunk.Maybe I should be.
I know I am not easy to love, and my father made that perfectly clear. I am the storm around other’s calm. I ebb and flow. There was a time when people were constantly in my path of destruction, and as a result, I lost my family. A final blow.
I can hardly handle myself, and I do everything I can to deal with it all. I incessantly work out, go to school, do my job, it’s a lot. I’m a lot to anyone that knows me, which is no one. So, I keep the door shut and locked tight.
There is no good orsafereason for me to open that door to Revna. It leaves me open for her to stomp on my roaring heart before she exits my life. Then, I will be left to rage alone in the dark like I always have been. This is why I’m always so closed off to people. It’s alltoo muchto handle. But I’m considering opening the door to Revna. That tells me I may have to reconsider everything I thought I knew. The exhaustion of the day and my running mind makes my eyes heavy. I let them close, and I see my little bird in bliss as I drift away.
Chapter 33
Lachlan
IwakeuptoRevna curled into my side. I almost jump in surprise because there is no way she went to sleep like this, I’m amazed she even came to bed in the first place. I stare at her slightly parted lips as she breathes out. Careful not to wake her, I pull myself out of bed and quietly start the coffee. It’s seven in the morning, so I only slept for a few hours. But I want to leave Revna to rest for a little bit. I’m sure she kept working until she physically couldn’t. While the coffee brews, I go look at the second canvas. It’s half done with her portion, leaving mine bare for me to add to it.
Once the coffee is done, I write her a note on the back of a receipt I found on the counter saying I went up to the roof. This building has a green space on the roof, and I need to breathe some fresh air, even if it’s city air. I lay the note on my pillow and grab my cup quietly, closing the door behind me.
It’s cool this morning as I lay back in one of the Adirondack chairs. The sun is bright, and car horns blare below me. Birds fly in the big blue cloudy sky, and I take a deep breath. I canceled all of my bookings for the next few days.
Luckily, my boss, Elias was fine with it. I told him I had school finals that needed to be finished. Most of the people I had scheduled were perfectly fine with it and willing to wait. I don’t know why, but I’ve grown a list of returning clients. I look at the sticker tattoos I did on myself. They’re from when I first got into tattooing. I needed a job. I got fired from the last two I had because I cussed someone out and punched a dude who was yelling at his girlfriend. He was being nasty to her, and she looked terrified of him, so I closed his mouth for him. I don’t regret it, but my anger sometimes gets the best of me. Part of me is afraid it will get the best of me with Revna. I would never hit her, but I know my mouth can move before I can force it shut.
We all have our problems. I just don’t know how else to diffuse it or to make it stop. But she calms me, centers me. That doesn’t mean she solves my problems; that’s on me. I know that, and I don’t want to put that on Revna, either. That’s not fair to her because she is clearly facing her own demons.
“Hey,” Revna says. I look up, and the sun shines on her as she rubs her sleepy eyes.
“Hey, baby, what are you doing up?”
Her cheeks turn pink. We shared quite a day yesterday, and now I want a repeat here on this roof and make her scream loud enough to scare the birds out of the trees below. “Come here.” I hold my hand out for her. She takes it as I pull her onto my lap. She curls up into me, and in this moment, this brief blink of time, I feel ok. I feel like I can handle the day. I’m not alone. She’s here, and the future doesn’t feel so scary or dark. I’ve worked for so long to get myself through school, and this MoMA competition was the break I needed. It brought Revna and I together.
I want to hold onto this calm. She shifts in my lap and lays her head against my chest. “Coffee,” I offer, handing my cup to her. She takes it and sips it while I wrap my arms around her small frame. “How long did you sleep?” I ask her. She shrugs and takes another sip.
“Not long enough.”
“Then maybe you should go back to bed for a bit,” I suggest.
She shrugs. “We really don’t have that kind of time, Lach.”
“I like that better than ‘asshole.’” She flicks a look at me, then the cityscape over the roof. Brooklyn isn’t like the Upper East Side. It’s more warehouses, converted and otherwise, but still just as loud and constant.
“I used to think the city was where I needed to be, but now I’m not so sure.” My arms involuntarily tighten around her, and she turns to look at me.
“What does that mean?” I ask her. She shrugs.
“I thought it would be the answer to all my problems.”
“Why?” She takes another sip of coffee and looks at me again.
“Where I came from, literally anything was better. I took a chance coming here, and it’s panned out for the most part. Well, I hope it will. We’re almost done with school. Who knows after that.”
A crushing feeling falls onto my shoulders and I look at her profile. I want to spend more time memorizing every part of her. She’s right, I know that. “Maybe we should just let ourselves have this moment instead. Maybe we shouldn’t worry about the future.”
She scoffs. “What do you mean? It’s all I do, Lachlan. It’s all I’ve ever done. If I don’t, then I don’t have a future. I’ve fought for everything I have. I can’t stop now.”
“I understand that, but maybe if we just focus on what’s in front of us right now, then…” I stop talking.
“Then what? You and I can ride off into the sunset together?” She pauses and takes another drink of my coffee. “This isn’t a forever thing. This is while we are in it until it’s over.”
