On Solid Ground: Sequel to in Too Deep (2 page)

“Dreams come from your subconscious. It’s not your fault you still dream about him. Please don’t feel guilty for something you have no control of.”

I nodded. “So maybe my dream was symbolic of me keeping him out of my life.”

“Could be, baby girl.”

“I just wish there was a switch that could wipe him completely from my memory.” The realization that Noah Foster would most likely always be a part of my memories brought back the weight of the dream. I hated that.

“I think you have a switch right here.” He held my face and leaned in and kissed my lips so gently, it gave me goosebumps. His short pecks grew into longer kisses. His tongue gently parted my lips and made its way to mine. I gasped for a quick breath, because the passion in his kiss increased my heart rate. I laced my arms around his neck and pulled him as close as we could get in the position we were sitting. He was right; this was my switch. Jake was my switch.

As our kisses slowed, we rested our foreheads together and I smiled.

“Better?”

“Yeah. Thank you.”

“Anytime, beautiful.”

Jake did make things better, but I was smart enough to know that even the love we had couldn’t erased the year of heartache behind me.

When I turned my head to lay it on Jake’s shoulder, I noticed the clock. We had, once again, slept away most of the morning. Just then, someone’s stomach growled.

“Was that mine?” Jake laid his hand across his bare middle. My mind rewound itself to all the attention I’d paid to his abs the night before.

“Actually, I thought it was mine.” I threw on my cami from the night before and the closest t-shirt I could find and stood to search for my shorts.

“Come on, I’m taking you to lunch.” Jake rummaged around for clothes in his clean but unfolded laundry pile and was dressed in no time. When he was hungry, there was no standing in his way.

I checked my reflection in the mirror, wiped away some smudged mascara, and stole a UT baseball cap off Jake’s desk. It was always the perfect co-ed bedhead cover-up. When we got to the kitchen, I grabbed my new messenger bag from the chair and turned toward the door, but halted when I hit Jake’s firm chest. I peeked up from under the brim.

“You are freaking adorable when you wear my stuff.” Jake pushed me out the door and locked it behind us. “If we don’t get away from this apartment soon, I am going to take you back inside and strip you down to nothing
but
that hat. The look on his face made the pit of my stomach clench.

“Romeo, as loud as your stomach is growling, you’d never make it through once.”

“You don’t think?”

I rolled my eyes, grabbed his hand, and pulled him toward the elevator. I knew he could far surpass one time. He had been proving his ridiculous stamina to me since we became an official couple.

Two

Jake

It had been almost two months since I watched Gracie tell Noah they were over for the last time. I had never been so proud of her. Of course, I had to lay him flat a couple times to get him to listen to what she had to say, but the bloody knuckles were well worth the satisfaction she got letting him know she deserved better. I had never hit anyone in my life before that day. I was the last person most people would think of when it came to fighting, but I couldn’t hold back one second longer. When he sneered and said, “All she had to do was spread her legs,” my blood boiled. Then he took it one step further with, “Been there, done that,” and I lost it. No one was going to refer to Gracie with such crude terms and phrases.
Asshole.

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t thrilled Noah went home for the summer. I knew Gracie needed a break. The fear of running into him around every corner almost did her in during the remainder of the spring semester. But she was getting stronger.

****

The atmosphere of Café Best had the ability to make life go away for a while. I think it was the smell of freshly ground coffee that worked as an elixir even before the caffeine hit your bloodstream. Of course, it could have also been the company that made the rest of the world fall away. Gracie sat across from me at our favorite hi-top in the window, the exhaustion of the last year of her life still evident in her eyes. It broke my heart. She glanced up at me and forced a shy smile.

“You’re so beautiful.”

“Jake.”

She covered her face with her hands and rested her elbows on the table as though she was waiting for me to look away. Her shoulder-length hair was pulled back into a messy knot that stuck out through the hole in the back of my UT cap. She wore my Rolling Rock t-shirt and a pair of her favorite threadbare cut-offs. So simple, but this girl could one day cause me to spontaneously combust. She was so sexy and she didn’t even realize it. That was such a turn-on.

She rolled her eyes, dropped her hands to the table, and twisted a paper straw wrapper around her finger. Her smile grew, and she looked up at me again from under my cap, her eyes begging me to stop showing her the attention I believed she deserved. The attention Noah never gave her.
Bastard.

More and more, I noticed she was comfortable, but uncomfortable at the same time. I tried to use compliments to lift her up. I was determined to help her absorb all the beauty she was until she could see it herself. But that proved difficult. It was almost like Noah was still knocking her down.

“You
are
beautiful, baby girl.” I stood, patted her hand, kissed her on the top of her head, and walked up to order for us. I couldn’t stand not being able to fix her heart. She was going to need to do that herself, but I wasn’t sure she was capable at this point. I wanted to be able to take away all the pain I saw in her eyes. I wanted to steal the nightmares that haunted her almost every night. I wanted to make her whole again, but it was too soon. Everything Noah took from her was still beyond her reach. She was quiet and reserved, not the bubbly girl she was when we first met, although I could see it just below the surface. She remained guarded and second-guessed herself and her actions when it was her spontaneity that used to light her up like nothing I’d ever seen. And I knew she couldn’t look at me when I complimented her, because I was focused on a part of her she no longer saw. It was so hard to watch her struggle.

Gracie Jordan was the love of my life, my soul mate, and I was ready to do whatever I needed to keep her on the path to recovery following Noah’s abuse. My fists clenched thinking of all he must have said and done to her to diminish her spirit to its current state.

The barista slapped the bell on the counter, and I jumped. I noticed everything about the space behind the counter was moving at lightning speed. Water was running, filtering through the overflow drains in the machines, the steam wands never stopped whistling, and the people behind the counter moved in almost a choreographed dance to wait on customers, fill orders, and prepare food and drinks, all the while trying not to bump into each other. I was thankful everything on our side of the counter ran much slower. Slow was good. Slow is exactly what Gracie and I needed on this bright, sunny Saturday.

“One hot Carmel Macchiato for my love.” I placed the tray on the table and handed her the oversized, bowl-shaped mug. I slid into my seat, never taking my eyes off her. Her eyes closed, and she breathed deeply and swallowed her first sip.

She reached across the table toward my cheek and softly brushed her hand along the side of my face I assumed bore a red handprint. I yanked my head in the opposite direction and winced. I gasped as though it still stung, but instantly regretted it when I saw the look of horror on her face.

“Gracie. I’m kidding. It doesn’t even hurt.” I smiled, winked, and saw her shoulders relax.

“Jerk.” She giggled.

“But, I’m
your
jerk.”

“Yeah. Lucky me.” She rolled her eyes and burst out in a fit of laughter when she saw my shock at her sarcasm. The sound of her laughter made my heart skip a beat.

“Maybe your dream had something to do with you wanting to set boundaries.”

She shrugged and took another sip of her coffee. I worried I might say the wrong thing while trying to help her make sense of the nightmares or her insecurities. I knew she should talk through her trauma with someone qualified, but I didn’t know how to bring it up without making her feel self-conscious.

Gracie suddenly slid her chair back with such force, its legs barked across the tile floor. I watched her reach around the back of her chair and swing her messenger bag into her lap. The bag was Gracie’s gift to herself soon after spring break. We saw it hanging in the window of one of the hippie shops on College Avenue. Gracie thought it was too expensive, but after we walked past it three times, she caved and bought it. The roughed, chocolate suede bag with the embroidered purple flower hung across her shoulder so naturally, and it held something I was certain would become as much a part of her as her hands were a part of her arms. I watched her open the plain black sketchbook in her lap and jot something down.

“What’s going on in that head of yours, Gracie?”

She held up one finger and quickly went back to writing. “Hang on...”

When she was done, she didn’t hesitate handing it over. I read the first few lines and recognized the lyrics of “Behind Blue Eyes” by The Who scrawled across the page.

“Those are some pretty heavy lyrics.”

She nodded and I handed her sketchbook back. I was confused because I assumed she was thinking about my eyes, but if she was, she paired me with a song that, to me, described Noah perfectly.

“Am I the bad man behind blue eyes?”

“Oh my Lord, Jake, no!” She playfully yanked her sketchbook back. “I was on a poetry website looking for ideas on how to use creative writing to heal from ...well, just heal.” She laid the sketchbook back in her lap and scooted her chair in. She couldn’t even say the word abuse when she referred to what happened with Noah.

There was no doubt in my mind that, at first, Noah saw her as a conquest. He was a sick bastard, and he thrived on the things he could get an otherwise innocent girl to do. But he had us all fooled when it came to Gracie. We all thought he’d done a complete turnaround. I believed he loved her, but he could only hide his true colors for so long.

“Cool.” I pushed my empty plate away and tipped her big mug to see if she needed a refill. She shook her head, knowing why I was checking. “So, why those lyrics?”

“One of the suggestions was to jot down things that evoke emotions in your daily life. You know, sounds, smells, lyrics to songs, and even thoughts. All the things that could go unnoticed if we weren’t watching out for them.”

“Have you not yet learned ‘bad men’ should probably go unnoticed?” I took a sip of my iced tea and cautiously looked up when I realized my knee-jerk reference to Noah may have stung.

She just rolled her eyes and gently kicked me under the table. “I was noticing how blue your eyes were with the sun shining through the window, and that song, “Behind Blue Eyes,” popped into my head. Exactly the kind of evocation I read about.”

“Wow. More journals.” I smiled. Half of the bookshelves in her apartment were taken up with journals. Most were filled with what I imagined was a part of her heart she didn’t share with anyone. I knew writing was the one place she could lose herself. This really was perfect therapy for her.

“It’s really amazing, Jake, what the creative part of your brain can do when you turn off the outside world and just let go.”

“I wouldn’t know.” I was a business major. She was speaking Greek.

“Well, you’re missing out.”

“I’ll have to take your word for it. You ready?”

She smiled and nodded.

We walked out into the warm sunlight, hand in hand. Gracie stopped after one sidewalk square and took a slow deep breath. I hoped the warm, clean air would chase away some of the sadness and self-doubt that might still be lurking inside her.

Three

Gracie

“So wait, you’re saying he broke up with you because he thought you two were getting too serious?”

“That’s what he’s claiming.” Becki shook her head and flipped her perfectly straight, golden brown hair over her shoulder, revealing her exquisitely etched collarbones. She was beautiful. Not a stitch of make-up and she had the busboys tripping over each other.

“That’s just ridiculous. Did you call Stacy?”

“No, not wasting my money on international rates just to hear her flip out. Shawn should count his lucky stars she’s backpacking in Europe or she’d kill him.” Stacy flew over the Atlantic in May after her last final. We hadn’t heard much from her, but assumed she and Greg were having a blast.

“Seriously, though, don’t most people find their soul mates in college? Isn’t that sort of what a relationship is for?” I watched her face, amazed that she wasn’t crying. She seemed to be at peace. She and Shawn had been dating since the weekend after we transferred over a year and a half ago. I couldn’t figure out how she was staying so calm.

“I guess some people do. Apparently Shawn does
not
.”

I was excited to start our Saturday lunch dates, but I hated that this one began on a sour note. We’d put a plan in place so we’d never get too busy for one another. With a regular girl date planned into our schedule, we guaranteed we would catch up at least once a week. Of course, we also agreed that our “lunch” would be at two p.m. This gave us enough time to recuperate from Friday night partying and made it easier to be vertical when we walked into the dining hall at her dorm.

“So...You seem fine.
Are
you fine?” I couldn’t wrap my head around how okay she was just hours after being dumped. I didn’t understand how she wasn’t drowning in her own sea of tears

“Yeah, I’m good. Sad. But good.”

I stared at her as if she’d told me she had a monkey growing on her brain. “Becki, I’m so glad you’re fine, but...how? How can you be so strong? Didn’t you think you guys would get married?”

“I assumed we were headed in that direction, but I never let myself become dependent on him to complete me. I’ve always made sure I wasn’t allowing someone else to become the other half of me. I want to be someone’s one hundred percent, not someone’s fifty percent. Ya know?”