I sighed heavily and continued stroking his hair. At my silence, his grip tightened and he shuddered, but he didn’t press it.
“I can’t, Key,” I sob as I try again to pull my leg back toward my chest.
“You have to, Mina,” he says, standing over me as I lay on my back on the stage. “I’ve seen you do this before,” he goes on, sounding a little exasperated. Why won’t he look at me in the eye? He seems to be looking everywhere else but at me.
“I have, but I also wasn’t in as much pain then,” I hiss at him, annoyed by his bossiness. He wasn’t Miss Riley, but he certainly acted like her. Sit up! Suck in your belly! Extend, extend, extend! I try again to pull my leg, hooking my hands behind my knee, but I just felt too weak today. It had been a rough night. Shay came home acting like he just discovered the cure to world hunger, though I know he would never celebrate as loudly as he did over such a selfless notion. He was slightly inebriated as he stumbled into the house, laughing and joking around with his friends who followed him in. Luckily, Mum and James were out on a date night together, and weren’t home to be disturbed. I shoved my pillow over my head, trying to drown out the noise as he and his buddies continued their little celebratory party in the main room. I couldn’t make out much of what they were saying. Just the occasional gutted… scarred… screamed like a little girl… Aw, shit, there’s fucking blood under my nails…
I can only imagine what it was he was talking about. It was moments like this that Shay gave in to the demons in his head and revelled in the horrors of his job. And he and his friends partied and celebrated into the early morning hours. Now here I was, exhausted, sore from endless dance classes, and all I wanted was to lie on this stage and sleep.
I released my leg, letting it fall on the wooden planks of the stage with a loud thunk, and lay there, eyes closed, feeling like I was on the verge of crying my heart out. Covering my face with my hands, I tried my best to control my breathing, but it just came out in quick, shuddering breaths. Next thing I knew, Keenan was on his knees at my side, lifting my leg up until he was pushing it into my chest. My eyes flew open in shock when I saw how close his face was to mine as he bore down, helping me stretch.
Unable to help myself, my gaze flickered down between us, and I flushed red when I realized that he was basically lying over me, holding himself up on one elbow, while his other arm and shoulder was pushing my leg back. His body didn’t touch mine, but I could feel the heat radiating off of him. Holy fuck…
Keenan kept his eyes on mine the entire time, so close that our noses were nearly touching. It was only for a minute, before he released my leg to bring up the other one. “How does that feel?” he asked as he leaned forward against that one, pushing it to my shoulder.
I grunted from the strain. “It’s… good. Tight.”
“Mm-hmm,” he nodded, his eyes drifting over my face. His expression was unreadable, blank, with no sign of his usual playful smile. My hands pressed against the floor to keep them steady as my body began to tremble. “You look tired, Mina. Have you not been sleeping?”
“Just last night…” I couldn’t stop myself from yawning right in his face. But Keenan was undeterred. He just smirked.
“You’ve been killing it lately,” he says. “Don’t let the assholes you live with fuck it up for you.”
As usual, Keenan always seemed to know exactly what was bothering me, even if I didn’t share details with him. He could just… tell.
Being so close to him, I found myself getting lost in his gaze, picking out the light and dark shades of blue in his eyes. I wondered, were his eyes like his mother’s? As mine were?
When his blue gaze flickered over my face, then paused on my mouth, I felt my heart flutter and my palms turned clammy. Was he going to…?
“Okay. Now, get up and let’s get going.” I blinked, and he was gone, having set my leg down and was already on his feet, jumping down from the stage to take his usual seat. “I have a meeting at the club tonight that I can’t be late for.” I lay there for a second, my mind whirling and confused. Keenan had never touched me in a way that made me uncomfortable. Mostly because of his adverse reaction to it.
For the rest of the afternoon, he watched me dance, teasing me when I messed up, but always ended up encouraging me to try again. Whatever had just happened, I clearly had read too much into it.
When we were through, after eating another meal prepared by him (cold pasta salad, bacon sandwiches, and some mandarin oranges), he led the way outside the theatre. In the distance, the sun was starting to set, reminding me of my stupid curfew. I glowered at the sunset, knowing that when I got home tonight, it would be to an empty house. Mum and James were going out together, and Shay had club obligations.
A loud, obnoxious caw snapped me out of my sudden dark mood. At once, I peered up into the trees until I spotted the beautiful black bird in the canopy, eyeing Keenan and I as we stood there in the golden sunlight.
“Bad crow,” I whispered, my lips curling up into a small smile. The simple word, dad, slowly ebbed in and out of my mind, as it always did when I spotted his favourite black birds. When I turned back to Keenan, it was to find him watching me with a curious expression on his face, “What?”
But he doesn’t say anything for what felt like a full minute, his gaze piercing through me in a way that left me speechless. Why was he looking at me like that?
“Just… seeing you standing there in this light… with your sad, little smile…” He lets out a sharp, shuddering exhale. “You are breathtaking.” I stare up at him as he reaches out and very lightly cups my cheek, his touch burning my skin. “I’d just like to see your real smile… not the forced ones you give me when you hide behind the so-called good things in your life… not the sad ones you make when you get lost in thought as you relive moments of your past that haunt you… your real smile.” His thumb brushes my cheek so softly, it’s like the feather touch of a butterfly’s wings.
“I want your real smile, Mina. And one day, I’ll get it,” he says, the corner of his mouth lifting in that beautiful crooked grin as he gives me that slow, sexy wink I love so much. “See you around, Sunshine.”
The Present
Mina: Seventeen Years Old
July
When I open my eyes, the first thing I become aware of is how dry my mouth is. Yeuuuch! I make a face as I smack my lips and try to sit up, but my head is swimming, and I swear, someone must have used a nail gun on my skull last night because it’s pounding. So I sag back into bed, my eyes squeezed shut, and I take a minute to gather myself. Slowly, my other senses start to kick in, and I realize how different the sheets feel beneath me… soft, but not silky. The air smells of leather and… Shay!
My eyes fly open as last night's memories come crashing back to me. My birthday at the club, drinking, playing pool, sitting with Shay and his friends, sitting on Shay, then there’s a bit of a blank space after that. I can’t remember how we got home.
Beside me, I hear a deep, breathy moan, and the mattress rocks a little as Shay rolls over, still asleep. I stare at him, a strange numbness washing over me like a cold shower as the rest of the night’s events come back to me. His kisses, his touches, his tongue… how I chased that feeling, how greedy I was to feel something that didn’t make me feel afraid or alone. But all of that was followed by something else, something that seemed to wake up in my brain and latched on, but I’d been too drunk and exhausted to focus. And now, finally, I fully understand what it is he wants from me. Exactly what he wants from me.