Breathe With Me (The Breathe Series Book 3) (52 page)

“Abby, you’re just a saint, taking care of me like this…” I laugh. “You still think I’m a penis head?” I fall forward, spitting out a lungful of laughter and not sure if I can even sit back up. “So, what’s that friend of yours up to tonight? Maybe we can call her, from your phone, she doesn’t answer my calls…” my mouth suddenly feels as though it may be hinged open this whole time and my sentences just one big conjoined word. Closing my eyes, my whole body grows heavy as I remain bent forward in a touch my toe position.

“I have a better…” Abby’s voice trails off…

The ringing of a phone goes off.
Is that mine?

It sounds again, this time louder.
Geez!
Stretching my hand out to the side, I reach for my phone, expecting to find it in its usual resting spot on my nightstand, instead my hand finds something soft and fuzzy. I keep my head buried in my pillow, the likelihood of me smothering growing more imminent by the second as I sweep my hand side-to-side, getting more frantic with each swipe.
Holy shit…what the hell…is that hair?

I raise my head in a panic, the nostalgic remnants of some girl laughing at me in my drunken haze last night, creeping up in my head and causing me to freak out a little.

Bam…

My head cracks on something solid sending a shooting pain through my skull and making me extremely aware that I am in fact, not in bed at all. A dull throbbing sensation continues as I turn my head to see what my hand is on. I squeeze my eyes shut to ward off the discomfort right as another sensation sparks in my ass.
Geez, what did I do, sit on a broken beer bottle while I was drunk?
Opening my eyes, I feel like the biggest dingbat around as I view my outstretched hand grasping at the rug. I begin to chuckle, the vibrations of a light laugh jogging my body just enough to send another throbbing sensation through the back of my head to the top of my scalp and making me cringe.
Oh I need some Aspirin.

Slowly and steadily, pushing up onto my hands and bending back, I sit up with my heels below my ass.
I’m never drinking again.
My eyes scan my surroundings, trying diligently not to make any sort of quick movement that will spark more hangover pains. I usually don’t get sick the morning after, but I drank a hell of a lot last night. I don’t remember anything after leaving Judd’s apartment. I continue to look around, my eyes landing on my phone on the floor, exactly where I had heard it only minutes before.
Geez, this is going to be a doozy of a day.

Throwing myself forward to grab it, I immediately regret my quick movement and feel that my head is not screwed on very tight. A sharp stabbing sensation burns through my ass and my head nearly sends me back to bed for the remainder of the day.
What the hell!
I grab it and waste no time.

Just what the hell did I drink after I left his house. I trip over snippets of my memory, Abby’s face coming up time and time again from pissed off to cracking up to nearly gloating. I click on Judd’s name, hoping he can fill in the blanks.

Ring, ring…

Pulling the phone away from my ear, I check the time; 12:31.
Well hell, everyone should be awake by now.

“Hello,” Judd picks up on the third ring.

I jerk the phone back to my ear, working hard to put my left foot out and use the bed to stabilize myself enough to stand. Another pain pierces my left cheek.
Geeeeez! What the….

“Hey,” I try my best to mask my agony over the ferocious conglomeration of aches and pains in my body.

“You survived?”

I snicker, dipping my brows, scrunching my face and holding my other hand over my ass.

“Of course I survived,” I say in a tone that doesn’t send a shock wave of aches through my head as I make my way into the bathroom. My legs feel like limp, dangly noodles that may not be able to hold me up. “I
have
been drunk before, and even drunker than last night, I’m sure.”

Judd laughs, “No, I meant I’m glad to see Abby didn’t kill you.”

After rounding the corner into the bathroom, I turn with my back to the mirror and start unfastening my pants button and zipper with the phone pressed into my shoulder. I tug at the waist band of my pants and pull them down, immediately finding a white bandage over my asscheek.
What.The.Hell!

I grab the corner of the gauze and look up, a memory of me signing some document while Abby ranted about how I was not drunk to some long haired dude behind a counter.

My eyes draw up to the mirror and I stop, holding my fingertips to the corner of the bandage and my phone securely pressed to the side of my face as I stare.

“Abby, huh?” I mumble practically to myself, putting the pieces of the puzzle together as I read the bright red letters written across the mirror in either marker or lipstick or something:

My mouth falls open and I barely register Judd’s voice at first, “Hey…Evan! You got home, right?!”

I shake my head and look back down at the bandage that is still covering up what I fear may be completely permanent.

“Ahhh, yeah, I got home. Hey, I gotta go.”

Judd says something, but I click end call before I can say another word, pull up Abby’s name in my phone and hit call with my pants still pulled down below my hips. My eyes stay glued to my covered up cheek in the mirror;
you’ve got to be kidding me!

The phone rings once and I start to peel the corner of the gauze, squeezing all the features of my face together into a scared-to-look sort of frown. Another ring and I peel it more, making out bright red, inflamed looking flesh surrounding dark black ink that is fully embedded into my skin.
You’re kidding me!
Another ring and I rip it off, killing the suspense with a blaze of pain and a sting that doesn’t even measure up to what I am feeling in that general area.
Holy shit!

“Hello, sunshine,” Abby’s voice comes on the line pert and chipper like she just destroyed someone’s life that she hates with a passion, then continued on to win the lottery and go on an all-day girls shopping excursion to blow it all; gratification and satisfaction laces her every word. “How are we feeling today?” her smile drips off of every word.

My mouth, which currently sits on the floor, hinged open in shock and disbelief as I look over every swoop of the tattoo that now takes up residency on my very pale white butt cheek. I begin to trace the letters, mentally following along each cursive letter as if I have an invisible pencil, then stop. My eyes move pain-stakingly in astonishment to the heart above the letter ‘I’, to the grass that adorns the bottom of the word, onto the small frilly flower behind the ‘R’ and then up to the dainty damn butterfly that sits on the capital ‘P’.
Son.Of.A.Bitch!

“Abby, what the fu…”

“Hey…” she cuts me off, a cocky tone that is ready to let me have it even more than she apparently already has. “I just figured that would be a change up from the lame-ass tattoo that Hayden may get on his bicep. Seemed pretty fitting…don’t you think?”

“Ohhh Come On!” I holler out, staring longer at the tattoo, with the phone now crushed in my hand. “Are you serious?!”

Abby laughs. “Yeah, I think that is exactly what the tattoo artist said when I showed him what to put on it.”

“What the hell was I doing the whole time when you were discussing this particular design?”

She lets out a squeal, enjoying the hell out of my agony, “Oh, you were right there, talking with us. You had a ridiculously huge smile on your face the whole time.”

“Geez! You mean, I didn’t see the freaking flower and say…Oh whoa, whoa, hold up…lets butch this bitch up and add a skull and cross bones or a baseball bat or a damn hammer or something?” I whine, sounding like a girl now with a pleading tone and hoping that I at least spoke up.

“Oh no…are you kidding! You couldn’t even see straight at that point. You probably thought the tulip was a bat,” she says in a matter of fact way. “Oh, but hey, it’s better than my first idea.”

“Well just what the hell was that, dolphins and gold fish jumping through the ‘P”?”

“Oooo, that would have been good too. Nope, I was going to have them tattoo a penis to your forehead, you know, given the fact that you are now a penis-head…your words not mine.”

I imagine Abby on the other line, painting her nails or doing some nonchalant, every day thing while I am freaking out that I am now branded across my ass with something that makes absolutely no sense to have on my body.

“Well, you should have gone with the dong on my face, because she won’t even talk to me and now…”

Abby spits out a loud laugh. “Well I really didn’t think you’d go for that one, but not to worry, I saved the sketch. We’ll do that next time we go out.”

“Oh hell, no, woman. My drunken, ink covered ass will stay far, far away from you.”

“Well, I think there is only one solution here, don’t you think?”

I stare ahead, unable to unlock the trance I have on my new found body décor.

“What’s that…skin grafts? The makeup shit you girls put on your face across my ass every time I have a date? Butt implants?”

“No, Evan…maybe rather than being a pain in the ass, maybe you need to just go and get her. I mean it looks like your ass belongs to her now, after all.”

My eyes focus on the curve of every letter, ignoring all the lame frilly garbage that makes me look like a tree-hugging, nature-loving dude or extremely secure in my masculinity.
What the…

I don’t even respond to what she says, I don’t need to. I know she’s right and what better to remind me to get my ass in gear than this.

“You know I’ll get you back, right?”

“Well you know that I have that other tattoo design handy at any moment I need it.”

I chuckle, looking at the blades of grass along the bottom of the tattoo, “I guess my ass would be grass if I tried anything to get you back anyways, huh?”

“Yep so you better get your ass on the move.”

I shake my head; there is no getting one over her. “Bye, Abby.”

Clicking end call, I set the phone on the counter and slide my jeans up, nearly jumping out of my skin as they brush over the red, irritated flesh. I grab my phone and bring up a text to her.

Me: Please tell me there are instructions for taking care of this thing?

Abby: Hahahaha…It’s not a puppy, Evan!

But yeah…they are in your nightstand drawer. And wth is with all the condoms? Good grief! Maybe we should get Whore branded across the other cheek?

Shaking my head, I crack up at her feistiness.

Me: No! Never Again!