Addicted to You (14 page)

I lie supine on the bed and stare at Lo as he shambles about the room, cleaning up spills and shutting away bottles.

“Lo…ren,” I say his name that feels funny on my tongue. “Ren…lo.” I smile stupidly.

“I’m glad you find my name as amusing as the rest of your sisters,” he says, locking the last of his cabinets. Then he sits beside me while I shut my eyes. “How do you feel?”

“Spinning,” I murmur.

“Don’t think about it,” he instructs. “You think you can crawl underneath the covers?”

“Hmm?”

Everything starts fading. And I drift into the blackness.

I don’t know what time it is. All I know is that there’s a monster rumbling in my stomach, and it wants out. I’m underneath Lo’s comforter. I don’t remember even getting here or putting my head on his pillow. Lo sleeps on the other side, facing towards me, but he keeps his hands to himself.

I debate whether I’m really sick or not. The effort to walk to the bathroom sounds strenuous and painful and way too taxing on my head and body. But I am past nauseous right now. And then my stomach contents start rising.

I have to get up.

Hurriedly, I race to the bathroom and pull open the toilet seat. Everything I drank appears in the bowl like a magic trick.

“Lily?” Lo flips on the bathroom lights. “Shit.” He runs a wash cloth underneath the faucet and then kneels behind me.

I can’t stop vomiting, but each time I do, I start to feel somewhat better.

He rubs my back and pulls strands of hair out of my face. After a few minutes, I start dry heaving, no longer actually puking anymore. He flushes the toilet and wipes my mouth for me with the cloth.

“I’m sorry,” I mumble, about to set my cheek on the toilet seat. Instead, he gently leans me into his chest, and I rest my head against him.

“Don’t apologize,” he says, sounding pained.

“Lo?” I whisper.

“Yeah?”

“Please…don’t move, okay?” The thought of standing or shifting my body at all may just send me back to the toilet.

“I won’t.” He wraps his arms around me, keeping me warm on the cold tile. We stay like that for quite some time. And I start to fall back asleep, my eyes heavy. And then I hear his voice, so soft, that I think I’ve made up the words.

“I should have just had sex with you.”

The morning sunshine burns my vision. I squint and scoot up, trying to right my world.
Where am I?
is the first, scary thought that I process. I take in the champagne comforter, my two legs underneath it, my hair pulled back into a nice pony, and little flashes of last night course through me.

Lo carried me from the bathroom to the bed, tucking me in and keeping my nasty hair out of my mouth. Last night, I think I snatched a bottle of whiskey right from his hands. Even as he protested, I guzzled the liquor like an idiot. I’m
that
kind of drunk.

I let out a tired, mortified groan. When an antagonizing voice doesn’t make fun of my bear-like noise, I frown and glance at the right side of the bed. Empty, except for an unmistakable butt print.
He has a good ass.
I stuff my face in the pillow and groan louder. I hate that I think that.

I try not to dwell on whatever stupid things I said or may have done while intoxicated. I rub my eyes and sit up, but a piece of paper safety-pinned to my shirt, which is actually
his
shirt, distracts me.
He changed my clothes?
I think at first. Must have puked on the other tee.

My cheeks rose as I pluck the paper off and scan it. The letter is scrawled so fast it looks half in cursive. My eyes widen in horror.

“What the hell?”

Parents are here. Get the fuck up.

What are my parents doing here? Do they know Lo and I aren’t really together? Do they think Lo’s an alcoholic? Are they going to send him to rehab?

I stand on two quaking feet and find a glass of water and four aspirin on the desk. Gratefully, I pop them and begin to search for clothes I can wear. His closet doesn’t have a wide selection, but I store a few emergency outfits just in case of the worst.

I hop into a lavender day dress that will impress my mother, considering my greasy hair will dock me a couple of points. After brushing my teeth four times, rolling a stick of deodorant on, and pinching my cheeks for natural blush, I gain the courage to leave the sanctuary of Lo’s bedroom.

I take a sharp breath, voices echoing off the hallway walls from the living room.

“Where is she, Loren? The morning is almost gone,” my mother complains. I wish he could use the “she’s ill” excuse, but for the Calloways, ill requires a hospital visit and an extended stay. Otherwise, you’re fit to enter the world of the living.

“I’ll go check on her,” Lo says, voice tight.

I step into the living room as he rises from the gray couch. “Ah, there she is,” my father exclaims with a bright smile. My mother and Daisy sit on the gray-stitched couch, both sporting pretty floral dresses. Everyone stands as I enter, as though I’m a Queen or something. But then I spot the Hermes suitcases and luggage bags leaning against the wall. They’re a matching set. Lo’s and mine.

What the hell is going on? They know, don’t they? They’re sending us away! Maybe to a far off rehabilitation center. We’ll be apart. Alone. For real.

Just as I put a shaking hand to my mouth, seconds from puking again, Lo rushes to my side and speaks. “It’s your father’s birthday weekend.”

I try to breathe. My eyebrows shoot up in surprise.

My mother fingers her pearls that choke her bony neck. “For goodness sake, Lily, I’ve been reminding you for months. We’re taking the yacht to the Bahamas to celebrate.”

I’ve never been good with dates or other peoples’ schedules. I turn to Daisy who seems to be looking everywhere but at me. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Lo’s cheekbones sharpen, his jaw clenching, and I realize I’ve missed something. Daisy clears her throat, but her eyes train on the carpet. “I knew you would have made some sort of excuse…and we all agreed…” she trials off.

It hits me. She lied. She didn’t want to be here last night. I wasn’t really on her list of sisters to call for help. This was a set up.

“We knew you would forget,” my mother clarifies. “This is an important trip for your father. He’s been working hard, and we want our
entire
family present. If that meant having Daisy spend the night so you can’t run off in the morning, then so be it. But now you’re awake and we have to go. Rose and Poppy are already waiting at the plane.” I assume we have to fly to Florida in order to take the yacht to the Bahamas.

My head spins, excuses resting on the tip of my tongue, anything to avoid a family event. Even if it is my father’s birthday, they should have never tricked me into going.

Lo runs his hand along my arm. “You okay?” he whispers so only I can hear. Maybe he thinks I’m going to throw up again.

I nod even though the news slapped me in the face.

He says, “Put on a smile. You look horrified, Lil.”

I do as he requests, offering my mother a small one. Her shoulders stay tense, but her lips twitch in acceptance. Good enough.

It isn’t until we leave the apartment that it dawns on me. I haven’t had sex in over twenty-four hours, and Lo hasn’t consumed his usual amount of alcohol since he watched me all night. And we’re about to be sequestered on a boat. With my family.

This just got a whole hell of a lot worse.

I try thousands of excuses before boarding the yacht. Lo and I planned a double date with Charlie and Stacey. I’m failing economics (true) and I need to cram for the upcoming exam (truer). None stick.

After I puke over the side of the boat, I admit to being hungover and layer on the “drank-to-much-wine-last-night” defense. My mother looks less than thrilled by my behavior, but it gives me free reign to openly sip Lo’s hangover brew. I never ask what’s in the brown liquid, lest I barf again.

He nurses a glass of Fizz in his right hand. I accompanied him earlier when he slipped the bartender five hundred bucks to serve him three-fifths bourbon whenever he orders soda. That also covers the liquor bottles he requested to be sent down to our cabin. He’s a stealthy one.

I admire the tenacity, but I’m not feeling incredibly supportive. I lie on the yacht’s sun deck with a nauseous belly and a pounding migraine. I put a towel over my head to block the radiating sun from my tender eyes and pull a corner up so I can vaguely see my surroundings. The rays beat on my fair skin. Even after applying SPF 15, I know I’ll roast in the heat. And I secretly hope I’ll burn. Maybe it’ll get me off this fucking boat.

“Feeling better?” Poppy asks, dragging a lounge chair next to Lo’s. I make a great effort to
not
stare at his abs and toned body that bakes in the sun. He probably won’t get much of a tan because he has on SPF 90.

Poppy spreads out her Ralph Lauren towel and puts on large, engulfing sunglasses and a floppy hat before sitting down.

“No,” I tell her. “Where’s everyone else?”

“Still eating lunch inside. Are you sure you don’t want anything? I can bring you a sandwich.”

I groan at the thought of potent smells.

“That’s a definite no then.”

I nod. “Definitely no.”

Rose and Daisy have both earned official Brutus badges for tricking me when Rose announced my “pregnancy” scare secret, and my mother keeps shooting me sharp looks. She probably hopes I’ll turn to stone.

“Do you think they’ll notice if I jump overboard?” I ask, sitting up and plugging my nose before taking a much larger swig of the hangover drink. I stifle a gag. Gross.

Lo doesn’t say a word because he’s fast asleep, his Fizz-bourbon still wrapped in his fingers. I wonder if he stayed up all last night, taking care of me. I gently pry the glass from his clutch so it doesn’t spill all over him.

“It’s not so bad here,” Poppy says, cracking open a hardback. She relaxes, and if I was her, able to enjoy the sunshine, to read, to stare off and drift and dream about anything, I’d think this was pretty lovely too. But as I gaze at the wide, vast and endless ocean, I imagine my body rocking on someone else’s. I recreate the blissful feeling of reaching the highest peak in my mind. The elevator. The man in a suit. Thrusting. It’s all planted there, telling me to feel a familiar sensation again and again and again.

But I can’t. Not here. And so I’m left craving something that will never come.

The sliding door
whooshes
open, and Rose walks out with a tequila sunrise. She spends a great deal of time bringing the lounge chair in front of everyone’s, the legs scraping against the hard flooring. When it’s just right, she spreads out a light blue towel and sits, facing me.

“Do you want me to get you one?” she quips, raising her alcoholic drink.

“Very funny,” I say, my stomach gurgling, still unsettled.

Lo could have easily downed fruity drinks all night without too much suspicion, but he hates sweet mixes. And he’d rather not draw any attention to himself. He puts away drinks too quickly that people are bound to be suspicious or worried that he’s returning to those old, inebriated, party-filled years before we got together. Of course they never really ended, maybe the prep school parties, but not the drinking. No one knows that though.

“Did he get you drunk?” Rose wonders, eyeing Lo’s sleeping body like she could stick him with voodoo needles.

“No,” I lie. “He actually tried to get me to stop.” Semi-true.

Rose looks doubtful and she kicks his lounge chair, waking Lo up from his nap.

He jolts, startled. “What the hell?”

“Rose,” I say with the shake of my head. “He was tired.”

“Really? I hadn’t noticed.”

Lo pushes his hair back with his hand and mutters a few insults under his breath. Then he raises his lounge chair to a sitting position. “Look what the wind blew in.”

“What?” Rose snaps.

Lo’s eyebrow rises, confused. “What
what?”

“What did the wind blow in? Finish what you were saying if you have the balls.”

“You’re right, I’ve lost my balls. You win.” Lo scans around his area for his drink. I hand it to him, and he looks appreciative that I kept it safe. He chugs down half.

He doesn’t need to finish his statement. I’m almost positive he meant to call her a bitch, or at least implied it in the vaguest way possible.

Poppy says, “I think you’re getting burned, Lily.”

Oh great. My plan to burn alive has been ruined by Poppy’s maternal worry.

She tosses me a bottle of suntan lotion.

“I’m fine, really. I burn and then tan. And I need the color.” I push my aviators further up my nose.

Rose snorts. “That’s the dumbest thing I’ve heard in a while.”

“That’s not true,” I retort. “I’m pretty sure Maria said something about the color of the sky actually being orange. And you were there.”

“I’m excluding children from this.”

Lo smiles. “Ooh, Rose, showing favoritism towards children. What is the world coming to?”

She glares at
me
. “I still hate that you brought him. Poppy had enough sense to leave her husband and child at home.”

Lo finishes off his drink. “I’m right here, you know.”

Rose ignores, waiting for me to respond.

“It’s not like I have a child that Lo needs to look after. If Maria wasn’t born, Sam would be here, right Poppy?”

Poppy looks impassive. “I’m not getting into this.” Sometimes, being Switzerland during family tiffs is super annoying for everyone else.

Lo sets down his drink and then picks up the suntan lotion. I think he’s going to apply more to his Irish skin, but he stands and then pushes my legs up to my chest. He straddles my lounge chair, not noticing how his movements cause my chest to cave, my breathing to shallow and my heart to race.

With only a thin bathing suit on, I feel ready for something more. The sun soaks my skin, the heat intoxicating, dizzying my thoughts, a headiness I drift in. My toes curl inward as I try to suppress my feelings that will surely volcano sooner or later. I need him. I need to release all of this, but I don’t know how to ask without it being awkward. This is so different than supplying him with scotch and rum. I’m asking for his
body
. That’s not okay.