The Temptation of Lila and Ethan

Chapter Eight

Lila

I’m a bitch. I’ve been snapping at Ethan and saying mean things even though he helped me out when he didn’t have to. He let me move in with him, and even went as far as helping me pack up my apartment. But I can’t help it. It’s like there is this foul thing living inside me, this famished monster that wants nothing more than to be fed, and Ethan is getting in the way of the feast, only giving me broken pieces of pills, and he’s giving them to me less frequently each day. I haven’t felt this shitty since my mom and her driver picked me up from boarding school after the incident. She wasn’t there to rescue me, though, like I hoped. She was there to talk some sense into me.

“Well, I have to say that I’m very disappointed in you,” she’d said, staring out the tinted window as we drove through the city, the tall buildings shadowing the streets and the car. “Although, I’m not surprised.” She angled her head to the side to look at me and slipped her sunglasses onto the top of her head. “As much as I hate to admit it, I expected nothing less of you.”

The indignity and mortification of what happened at school still burned inside me and yet I still couldn’t control my tongue. “And why’s that, mother?”

“Watch your tone,” she snapped. “Just because your father isn’t here doesn’t mean you can disrespect me.”

“Why? You let my father.” I was sitting on the opposite side of the backseat, looking at her with such animosity for making me come to the city and the school. If I’d been in California then maybe I would have made better decisions. I wouldn’t have felt so lonely and therefore wouldn’t have gone looking for something to fill the emptiness inside me. I would have never met him and never have done things, disgusting, unimaginable things that I’ll forever regret.

Her eyes snapped wide and before I had time to register what she was doing, she slapped me hard across the cheek. Heat and pain ignited across my face and inside my heart, too. But I didn’t cry. I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction of crying in front of her.

I cupped my cheek with my head hung low so she couldn’t see the hurt in my eyes. “You’re acting like this was entirely my fault, but I didn’t even know what I was doing. I didn’t understand… I didn’t…” I shook my head, discouraged at myself, but still able to will myself to sit up straight. “It really hurts.”

“Hurting and crying over something a guy did to you is pathetic, Lila Summers,” she said and I had to resist an eye roll because she was seriously one to talk about being pathetic. “And it is your fault. You made the decision to be with him, even though you knew he was older, and now we have to deal with the consequences.”

“We?” I questioned.

“Yes, we,” she said in a calm voice as she tugged off her leather gloves. “Everything you do is done to this family. Your father has family here—you know that. You have cousins and some of his business colleagues’ kids go to the school. How do you think I found out about this to begin with?” She tossed her gloves onto the seat, then reached for her purse. She took out a prescription bottle and read the label. “And the outburst in the middle of class… you’re making us look like we’ve raised some kind of lunatic.”

I’d balled my fists. “The other kids are tormenting me, though. Those stupid Precious Bells told the entire school, and now everyone keeps saying what a little slut I am and how I threw myself on Se…” I trailed off, unable to utter his name. “A-And I haven’t been sleeping very well… I’ve been having nightmares about waking up underneath… underneath him.” I summoned a deep breath, wishing she’d hug me or something, or try to make me feel a little better. She used to give me hugs when I was little, but then my father got a mistress and she got her pills and wine. When she was taking them, which was almost always, they became the most important things to her, and everything else, including me, didn’t seem to matter.

She stared at me with a little bit of sympathy as she twisted the cap off the pills. “Take one of these a day until you’re feeling better.” She grabbed my hand and dumped a pill into my palm.

“What is it?” I held the tiny white pill warily.

“It’s something that’s going to make this all better,” she insisted, screwing the cap back on. “For everyone. You, me, and your father.”

I knew it was wrong, yet she was watching me expectantly, and all I really wanted to do was make the heavy, humiliating, filthy, self-loathing pain vanish, so I tipped my head back and swallowed the pill.

“Good girl,” my mom said like I was a dog who had just done the correct trick and had been rewarded with a treat. She handed me the bottle and then pulled her sunglasses back over her eyes and crossed her legs. “And if you run out, let me know and I’ll get you more.”

And she did. Every time I’d run out, she’d get me a refill. Sometimes when I was visiting at home, she’d share her stash. We’d take the pills and then go shopping or something, the only visible thing inside either or our bodies were the shallow, materialistic, shadows of our true selves.

I’ve been spending a lot of time in Micha’s old room, which is my new temporary room. And a lot of that time I spend staring in the mirror, not in vain or anything, just looking at my reflection and trying to figure out who I am without pills in my system. The blue eyes that stare back at me are not recognizable, too wide and confused, instead of blank like they’ve been for years.

As sobriety starts to seep in with each passing day, I try to figure how I got to this exact moment when it felt like I’d been okay just a few days ago. In four days’ time it feel like a thousand bricks have tumbled down on my chest and are pinning me to the bed. And I wonder if I’ll ever be able to stop them from crushing me.

Ethan

What the hell am I doing?

I’m not looking for a relationship. They’re ugly, raw, brutal, painful, life destroying. They exist only in the hearts of the needy and I don’t need anything from anyone. I’m perfectly content being alone, hiding in the desolate place inside myself. It’s what I need to exist because I don’t think I can handle anything else. Even with London, I made sure to keep as much distance as I could and I’m glad. If I hadn’t, I might have broken apart that morning when I got the news. But instead I felt numb, barely feeling a thing about it, almost like it never happened. And being in that place is a great place to be. It’s quiet and still and peaceful. There’s no yelling inside my head, no commotion, no anxiety. I don’t have to worry about being walked all over by someone, being controlled, or losing myself, or trying to take away the identity of another person, pretending to love them, when really I just want to own them.

Within the loneliness inside me, I don’t have to worry about turning into someone I don’t want to be, like my mother or my father. I’m just Ethan. And I can live with that. But with Lila… Jesus fucking Christ, I’m turning into a person I barely recognize. A nice guy who cares way too much, who’s breaking his rules and getting involved.

Yep, I’ve become everything I promised I never would be after I lost London.

“Your couch smells like old cheese.” Lila walks into my room with a scowl on her face. It’s the same scowl she’s been wearing for the last four days, ever since I learned about her habitual pill popping habit. “And your fridge has mold in it.”

“Well, at least it runs.” I put my pen away and shut the notebook, toss it on the nightstand, and lean against the headboard. “It could have no power and be growing mold.”

Her forehead creases as her scowl intensifies. Her hair isn’t combed, and she still has on the pair of boxer shorts and the tank top she slept in. “What were you just doing?” She eyes the notebook. “Writing about what a bitch I am?”

I cross my arms and stretch my legs out on the bed in front of me. “Why would I have to write about that when I can tell you in person?”

Her blue eyes turn cold. “You’re an asshole.”

“You know, you’ve said that about twenty times in the last few days and it’s getting really old, especially since most assholes wouldn’t just let you move in with them.”

She shakes her head and huffs with frustration. “It’s time for you to give me another stupid piece of my pill.”

I glance at my watch and then shake my head. “Not yet.”

She lets out a scream through gritted teeth and then flips me off before leaving my room. My head flops back against the headboard and I stare up at the crack in the ceiling. I’m not sure if I’m doing anything right, whether I’m helping her or harming her. She’s so much different, more closed off and stubborn and bitchy. She won’t talk about anything and complains about everything. She’s driving me fucking crazy.

I rub my forehead, cursing the nonstop headache I’ve had for days. Finally, I can’t take it anymore. I need to relieve the stress and there are only two ways for me to do that. Sleep with someone or play the drums. Usually, I’d go with the first, but I’m not feeling it at all.

I get up from the bed, take my shirt off, and sit down on the stool beside my drums, scooping up my drumsticks from off the floor. I reach over to my dresser and grab my iPod from the dock. I select “Gotta Get Away!” by Offspring, put the iPod back in the dock, and crank the volume, wanting to drown out the noise of my thoughts and any more potential Lila drama.

Once the song clicks on, I slam the sticks down on the drums and start pounding to the rhythm with more force than usual. I’m usually considerate of the neighbors, but right now I need to let off some steam. The longer I go, the more into it I get. Midway, I just close my eyes and let myself drown in the music and beat, my skin covered with sweat and my pulse hammering against my chest. I feel myself getting dragged away from my problems and life. For a moment, I’m alone in the apartment, in the world, and all the worries that surround me cease to exist. Then the song ends and I open my eyes and nearly fall off the stool.

Lila is sitting on the edge of my bed, watching me with what looks like a disinterested look, but I think it’s a mask to hide the fact that she’s curious.

“Jesus, Lila.” I try to catch my breath, sweeping my fingers through my sweaty hair. “You scared the shit out of me.”

She crosses her legs and stares at me impassively. For a second I think she’s going to ask me for another pill, maybe even try to bargain with me, something she’s done a lot over the last few days. But instead she says, “How do you think I feel? One minute I’m sitting in a quiet room and then suddenly the whole place is shaking?”

I clutch on to the drumsticks, rotating them in my palms, gripping them so forcefully the wood rubs coarsely at the skin. “Sorry, but I had to do it, otherwise I would have done something really stupid.”

She elevates her eyebrows. “Like what?”

“Like leave the house.”

“Good, I wish you would have.” She pauses contemplatively. “Wait, why would you leave the house if you didn’t play?”

“Because I needed to let off some steam.” I wipe some sweat off my forehead with my arm. “And it was either this or go get laid.”

I catch the faintest flicked of annoyance in her neutral expression. “You should have gone with the getting laid. It works a lot better.” Her tone is clipped and she’s breathing stridently, working hard to keep the oxygen flowing.

I study her, really missing the smiling Lila I first met a year and a half ago, the one who I thought was my complete opposite, but now I’m reconsidering this idea. In fact, the more I get to know her, the more she does kind of remind me of London, erratic and full of secrets. I thought I knew Lila but I guess I was wrong and I’m not really sure what to do with it or how I feel about it yet. “How do you know? Have you ever played before?”

“You know I haven’t.”

“How do I know anything that you can’t and can do? Because I’m learning pretty quickly that those little heart-to-hearts we had for the last year weren’t real.”

“They were too,” she says, looking hurt, and I relax at the sight of emotion in her face, even if it is sadness because at least it’s something. “Everything I told you was true. I just didn’t tell you everything, which I’m sure you did with me, too.”

I don’t bother trying to deny it. Sure, she knows stuff, like how my parents were and are, but she doesn’t know about my fear of being with someone because I’ll turn out like them or about what happened to London. “All right, fair enough.”

We sit in silence for a little bit and she’s either staring at my drumsticks, which are on my lap, or my dick.

Finally, she asks, “Is it really therapeutic?”

I wipe the sweat off my arm with my hand. “Is what therapeutic?”

She catches my gaze and she looks helplessly lost for the first time since I met her. “Banging on the drums. You said it was good for letting off steam.”

“It’s even better than punching a bag.” I collect the drumsticks from my lap. “Do you… do you want to try?”

She leans back, shaking her head, like she’s afraid of them—or me. “I don’t know how to play. You know that.”

“No, I don’t know that since I never got around to asking you.” I inch back in the stool. “But I can help you if you want. It might help with your”—I press my lips together, trying not to grin—“bitchiness.”

I wait for her to get all riled up, but instead she stands up with confidence and weaves around the drums toward me and I can’t help but think, Now there’s my Lila. But I quickly shake the thought away because she’s not my Lila. She’s my friend.

“And how are you going to show me?” she wonders, eyeing the sticks in my hand.

A thousand dirty comments run through my mind, but I bite them back and scoot away just a little bit more, making room for her, and then pat the spot on the stool that’s in front of me. “Sit down.”

Her eyes sweep the small space, and then biting her lip she tucks locks of her messy blonde hair behind her ears and tentatively squeezes between my knees and the drums. She drops down in the seat and I realize just how bad of an idea this is as her ass presses against my cock. I try to keep my dirty thoughts to a bare minimum as I reach an arm around each of her sides and hand her the drumsticks.

“What song do I get to play?” she asks as I slant to the side to grab the iPod. “One of your crazy rock songs?” She sounds amused and it makes me smile.

“Not too crazy.” I select “1979” by Smashing Pumpkins, then quickly place the iPod into the dock, press my chest against Lila’s back, and wrap a hand around each of hers so that my fingers are folded around her wrists.

“You’re sweaty,” she remarks. “It’s gross.”

“Well, you haven’t taken a shower in, like, four days. Imagine how you smell,” I retort, but she actually smells good—fruity, like watermelon. I swiftly sweep her hair to the side and lean over her shoulder, resting my chin on it so I can see what I’m doing. The song starts playing and before I know it the drum section is starting.

“We missed the intro,” Lila says, stating the obvious. “And this song is really fast anyway. I can’t keep up with this.”

“Never say can’t.” I lift her arms in the air. She’s still holding the sticks and my fingertips are pressing against her hammering pulse. She’s nervous, which surprises me. I expected her to be more subdued, because that’s how she usually is. But then again, this is a whole different Lila, one without drugs in her system. “You ready?” I ask her and I have to momentarily shut my eyes when she shudders against the feel of my breath against her shoulder.

She nods and I open my eyes. “I’m ready,” she calls out over the music.

I take a deep breath, feeling uneasy. Thankfully I know it will clear as soon as I start playing. The song is reaching the chorus, the perfect time to jump in and start playing. We wait and we wait, breathing in and out until it feels like we’re going to combust, and then finally the song approaches the perfect moment. Gripping her wrists, I bring her hands down to the drums. I hear her laugh as the sticks hit and don’t quite match the beat. It’s a little harder to play like this, but I make it work, because playing well isn’t the point. Playing from the heart is and letting her tune out her thoughts with something else other than the overwhelming desire I know she’s still feeling.

She continues to laugh, a few times trying to take over on her own. It sounds terrible, nail-scratching, ear-clawing terrible, but it’s making her happy and relaxed, completely out of her own head, and honestly I feel the same way.

Lila

Once I take a seat, I know I’m in trouble. His sturdy, tattooed chest is crushed against my back, radiating heat through my thin shirt and making it hard to breathe. Something about the feel of him melts the starvation inside me and suddenly my thoughts are sidetracked. I’ve seen him without his shirt on before, once when we were playing strip poker. But I was drunk and medicated, and truthfully I’m not sure I was seeing very clearly because he looks so much sexier now. All the guys who I can remember being with have been clean-cut, with perfectly tanned skin and chiseled abs. They looked like good guys who use manners in public, although behind closed doors it was usually a different story.

I’ve never been with anyone who played the drums, had scraggily, untrimmed hair, a five o’clock shadow, or lean, tattooed arms that rippled as they slammed drumsticks down on the drums. I mean, I knew Ethan had tattoos, but I’d never paid enough attention to how many. And God, they look good on him. There’s one in particular going across one of his pecs that’s always caught my attention. It looks like letters from maybe another language that go around in a circle, sketched in jet-black ink. The only other language I can speak is French, so I’m not sure what language it is. But by the unique shapes of each letter, I’m guessing it’s not a very common one. I wonder if I’m right. I wonder what it means. I wonder if he’d tell me if I asked him.

My palms are sweaty against the drumsticks and my heart thrashes up as he holds his fingers around each of my wrists. I know he can feel my pulse jolting against his fingertips, but he doesn’t say anything about it, either to be nice or because he’s getting too caught up in playing. I’ll admit it’s liberating, slamming the sticks to the rhythm of the music and I even manage to laugh.

As he continues to move my hands, I dare to steal a glance over my shoulders at him. He looks so peaceful and in harmony with the song, like he’s thinking about nothing but the beat and lyrics. His eyes are shut and he has this euphoric look on his face. It’s fascinating, watching him match the beat of the song, moving my hands right along with his. He’s really getting into it and it’s sexy and hot and, oh my God, I have to bite down on my lip to restrain unwelcomed noises escaping from my lips as I remember how it felt when his tongue and teeth were on my skin.

It’s the most amazing feeling I’ve ever experienced, like all of my negative emotions are channeled into slamming the sticks and I wish I could keep doing it forever. But then the song comes to an end and the moment of freedom disappears.

I quickly look away from him before he opens his eyes and catches me watching him. I’m panting and so is he, the movement of his chest and my back harmonized.

“That was fun,” I say, breathless, my skin damp with sweat. Everything inside me is so scorching, but in a mouthwateringly good way, and unlike usual, I can feel it, taste it, breathe it, want it. Want him. Good God, I want him. I’m sober, completely coherent, and I want him, like I had him that night we took shots at the club and then I just laid in my bed, feeling my usually self-induced numbness, only this time he wouldn’t stop and leave and I wouldn’t shut down, instead letting myself feel everything.

His chin is on my shoulder and when he tips his head to the side, his breath caresses my neck. “I think you’re a natural,” he says, amusement in his voice. “Maybe we should get you your own set.”

I chew on my lip, slanting my head to the side to look at him and almost end up kissing him. “A pink set, maybe?” I wet my lips with my tongue, noting the close proximity of his mouth, feeling this new, unfamiliar pull toward him as sensations of heat and tingles course through my body.

He laughs at me, his breath warm against my cheek as he shakes his head. “Pink? Why am I not surprised?” He leans in, pressing his chest harder against my back, but I’m unsure if he even realizes he’s doing it.

“What’s wrong with pink?” I ask, the feeling of desire and hunger leaving my body.

“Nothing’s wrong with pink.” Smiling, he climbs off the stool and holds out his hands, and the desire in my body fizzles. “I just think it’s funny that now you want a set when just a little while ago you came in here to complain about the whole house shaking.”

I swallow the lump in my throat as I place the drumsticks into this hands and climb off the stool. “Sorry,” I mutter, feeling bad, remembering how I was acting like a bitch. Usually I wouldn’t care, but right now I feel like I’m on the verge of tears, my emotions all over the place. I swing around him, banging my hip on one of the symbols. “I’m just going to go back to my room.”

“Lila, wait.” He snags my elbow as I reach the foot of the bed. “Look, I’m sorry. I was just teasing, but I really shouldn’t be. Right now is not the time or place.” He takes a deep breath and his chest sinks as he releases it. “I know how you’re feeling, and teasing is the last thing you need.”

I close my eyes, taking a cleansing breath and mentally clearing my head of any sexual feelings I have for Ethan, before I turn around and look at him. “Don’t be sorry. All of this is my fault. I should have never called you that night and brought you into my secret train-wreck life.”

His fingers leave my arm and he deliberates something, chewing on his lip while he does. I wonder if he knows he’s doing it, or if he knows how crazy it drives me when he does it. “What do you want to do today?” he asks, throwing me off guard.

I stare perplexedly at him. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, what do you want to do today?”

“What are my choices?”

“Anything.”

I hold on to the bedpost, feeling light-headed for no reason as I consider what I want to do. “I think maybe you better choose,” I say. “Because everything I’m thinking involves things you’re not going to let me have.” Pills. Alcohol. You.

He presses his lips together, looking strangely happy. I’m about to ask him why when he says, “Go take a shower and get dressed in something comfortable.”

I put my hand on my hip. “Why? Where are we going?”

“It’s a surprise.” He reaches for his shirt draped on the bedpost and I have to step back so his arm doesn’t brush my breast. “And no questioning. It’ll take all the fun out of it.”

I’m skeptical, but curious enough that I obey his instructions and start to head out of the room to take a shower. But I pause in the doorway, my mind going back to his tattoo as he goes to slip his shirt on.

“What does that mean?” I ask, pointing at his chest.

He glances down with his shirt half on around his neck. “This?” He touches the tattoo lightly with his finger, then glances up at me through hooded eyes. “It means solitude in Greek.”

“Solitude?”

He nods, slipping his arms through the sleeves. “It’s a dream of mine.”

“To be alone?” I question. “Like on your little road trip thing, because I thought you were going to take me with you.” I try to say it lightly, but I’m feeling too low and down.

He shrugs. “Dreams change, I guess.”

“Then maybe you shouldn’t tattoo them permanently on your skin,” I joke.

His lips tug upward. “Whenever I put a tattoo on my skin it always means something to me at the time, and I’ve never regretted getting one.”

I bite on my already chomped-off fingernails as he makes his way over to the dresser. “Maybe I should get one.”

He glances over his shoulder at me through hooded eyes and slowly scans my body, making me feel naked. “Maybe you should.”

It gets really quiet between us as we stand there staring at each other, my body heating with each second his eyes are locked on me. Finally he clears his throat and the tension crumbles.

“Now go take a shower so we can get going,” he says, picking up a bottle of cologne from off his dresser.

I nod and go take a shower, wishing the water would wash off the untamed emotions flustering inside me, along with cleaning me. But I pretty much feel the same way when I get out, all riled up inside. I try to shrug it off the best I can and put on my one and only pair of jeans and throw on a pink tank top. I braid my damp hair to the side since I’m not in the mood to curl it. Then I slip on my sandals and head out into the living room where he’s lying on the couch reading a book.

“You read more than any other guy I know,” I say, sitting down on the arm of the couch. “It’s weird.”

Without looking up at me, he turns the page. “Good. I like being originally weird.”

I cross my legs and fiddle with my braid. “Do you now?”

“Absolutely.” His eyes return to the book, like he can’t quite break himself away from the story. His hair is swept to the side and he’s wearing a gray T-shirt, accented with a black-and-white-pinstriped shirt and a pair of black cargo shorts. He has leather bands on his wrists and boots on his feet.

I sit there for a while, waiting for him to put the book down, but I’m starting to grow bored and restless. Finally he sets it down on the coffee table, marking the page by folding the corner over. “Sorry,” he apologizes, getting to his feet. “I had to get to the good part.”

I eye the worn, bent, torn cover as I rise to my feet. “It looks like you’ve read it, like, a hundred times.”

“I have.” He scoops up his keys and wallet and then opens the front door, holding it for me. “But that doesn’t mean that the good parts get any less good.”

I roll my eyes and walk out into the sunlight. “Whatever. I’ve never understood what the big deal is about reading.”

He shuts the door and locks it, turning for the stairs. “Going to another place. Getting lost in time. Pretending that you’re living a different life.” He heads down the stairs and I follow him. “What’s not to love?”

“Is that why you’re reading all the time? And writing?”

“Who said I read and write all the time?”

“I said so,” I say as we arrive at the bottom of the stairs. We head for the carport where his truck is parked. “I’ve seen you reading and writing in that journal a couple of times, but now that I’m living with you”—I grab the door handle of his lifted truck—“you do both a lot.”

He beeps the truck unlocked and we open the doors and hop in. It takes me a little bit more effort, considering how tall his truck is and I’m barely average height. We slam the doors simultaneously and he starts up the engine, giving the gas a few hard revs.

“Okay, I have to ask,” I say, securing my seat belt over my shoulder. “What is it with guys and their cars or trucks or anything with an engine, really?”

He shrugs as he shoves the shifter into reverse. “I grew up around cars so it was kind of a given that I’d love them.” He backs out, cracking the wheel to the right. “As for every other guy out there, you’ll have to ask them.”

I rest my elbow on the console. “So, what? You guys don’t ever discuss your love for engines or whatever?”

His forehead furrows as he straightens the truck and drives for the exit. “You mean, do we sit around and dig into the depths of our dark hearts to figure out why the power of an engine is so appealing?” Amusement dances in his eyes.

I aim an annoyed look at him, but when he smiles, I hopelessly lose the battle and grin. “Dark hearts?”

“Oh yes,” he says, pulling out onto the main road beside his apartment. “Us men have very dark hearts. Isn’t that what you women talk about all the time?”

“Maybe.” I sit straight forward in my seat, staring at the towering casino buildings of the main area of the city that’s out in the distance in front of us, the lights of the marques so bright I can read them, even though they’re a little ways away. The sun is gleaming and the sky is a flawless blue as we head toward the freeway. “Some really do have dark hearts, though.”

He arches a brow. “What do you mean?”

I shake my head. “I mean exactly what I mean. That some men have dark hearts and some women, too.”

As he slows at a red light, it looks like he wants to say more, but I look out to the side window, not giving him the opportunity. I haven’t made any promises to him about whether or not I’ll stop taking the pills. I’ve just chosen not to contact the guy who writes the prescriptions for me yet. I could any time, but part of me feels guilty since Ethan’s helping me out by letting me live with him. But talking about dark hearts and thinking about the men and women who I know have them makes me want to race to a place where I can get some pills, and not a half of one. I want a full dose, maybe even two or three, so that maybe my own heart doesn’t seem so dark.