Page 47 of Nightclub Surprise
A little smile crept across her lips. “Sweet of you. So, our final count is nineteenthen.”
“Do you think August wants to invite his business partners?” Leila asked me. “He used to go out every weekend with them. They’re all prettyclose.”
“I’ll ask him if he ever calls me.” And with that my cell buzzed. Pulling it out of my back pocket, I didn’t recognize the number, but saw that it was a local call. “Hello?”
“Baby, have you missed me?” came August’svoice.
I screamed and jumped off the barstool, too excited to stay sitting. “August! Yes! Yes, of course, I’ve missed you!” Glancing over at the two women who were laughing at me, I excused myself and headed to the next room, which happened to be a sitting area. “How are you,babe?”
“Doing pretty good,” came his reply. “I’m feeling a little exhausted right now. A lot of memories are being dredged up. When I’m on the MDMA, I can take it all well. But afterward, when the drug wears off, then I feeldrained.”
That didn’t seem like progress to me, so I asked, “Do you feel like this is a waste of your time,August?”
“No, they told me it would be like this at first. This is a process, and these first fourteen days are just the tip of the iceberg.” He sighed heavily. “The hardest part is being without you and Calum. I’m not sure why they think it’s so important to have us here without any kind of friends or family around, but they do think it’s important. I’ve asked quite a few times if you could at least come for a visit, only to be told that’s notallowed.”
Biting my lower lip, I felt the same angst he did. “Well, most recovery programs want the person to know they have to handle things on their own. There can be emotional support, but the idea is to make you see that you’re okay all on your own, and that you don’t have to depend on anyone butyourself.”
“I guess you’re right. I don’t know or care really. I’ve talked to a lot of people here this last week, about what they’ve gone through, too, and to say the overall atmosphere of depression is demoralizing is an understatement.” I could hear his breathing, and I longed to feel his warm breath on myneck.
“Um, your sister’s here. We’re going to host Thanksgiving this year. Is that okay with you?” I asked him to get my mind off his breath and lips and everythingelse.
Ugh! I needed him sobadly.
“Oh, are we?” he asked with a laugh. “So, Leila and her brood want to come trash our place,huh?”
“They’re here now, the whole lot of them.” I chewed on my thumbnail as memories of his body on top of mine filled my head. “Oh, and do you want to invite your business partners? Leila said you’re pretty close tothem.”
“No, Gannon has big plans this year, and Nixon is flying home to Texas to be with his family. Thank you for asking though. That’s nice of you, baby.” Another long sigh came out of him. “God, I hope the next week goes by faster than this one. Once I get out, I have to come to therapy every day. The sessions last eight hours, so I’ll be gone allday.”
“Even Thanksgiving?” I asked, despair filling myvoice.
“Yeah, even Thanksgiving. They told me it’d be from nine in the morning until five in the evening. Can we have the party during the dinner hour?” heasked.
I wasn’t about to let him down. “Of course, I’ll make sure to tell them all that it’ll be a dinner party, with dinner being served at, say,eightish?”
“That sounds good to me. Invite your parents, baby. I can’t wait to see them again. Your mom’s fudge was the best ever. She came over and gave us a batch everyChristmas.”
“And your mother gave us her famous peanut brittle, too,” Iadded.
We did go way back. We did have a history. Maybe we hadn’t ever been a couple, but we’d spent a bit of time together as neighbors. Backyard barbeques and neighborhood block parties. Every New Year’s Eve watching the fireworks, all of us in our own backyards, but sharing things over the chain-link fence—the only thing that separated us from eachother.
“One more week,” he said quietly. “I can hold out that long. Can you,Tawny?”
“I have to, don’t I?” I laughed to lighten things up. “So, how is it besides feeling so drained? Are there people there you can relateto?”
“A couple of fellow former marines are here. We sit at the same table for all the meals. Natasha is thirty, and she’s married with kids. Her marriage is on the line because of her PTSD. Tom’s a kid who barely made it two years in the service. He’s seen shit that haunts him. I worry about them both. But not as much as I worry about Tillie. She’s this young girl whose father sold her into sex slavery when she was only ten. Can you believe someone would do that to their own child, baby? It’s too disgusting to even think about. And I’ll tell you, it makes me feel like a wimp that I’m having so many problems, when what I’ve been through is nothing compared to what she’s beenthrough.”
“You’re still human, August. You’ve still been through bad things yourself. Don’t lose sight of what you have to work on just because others have had it bad, too,” I gently chided him. “But that is a very sad thing for the poor girl.” My stomach knotted as I thought about what a horrible life she must’ve had, and how hard it would be to ever get overthat.
The world could be a terrible place. It would be wonderful if things could be perfect all the time, but that’s not the way of the world. And my poor man had been through awful things, too—things that would break the averageperson.
August was beyond average. He was a hero through and through. If he could learn how to manage his bad memories, things would get better for him and for the rest of us,too.
“When you come to pick me up, have Max drive you,” he toldme.
“Why is that?” I asked him as I pushed my hand through my hair, pretending it was his hand instead. My body tingled as I thought about him touchingme.
“Because I’m going to devour you completely on the ride home,” his voice had gone deep withlust.
