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Chapter Six

Under your scars I pray

You’re like a shooting star in the rain

You’re everything that feels like home to me, yeah

Under your scars, I could live inside you time after time

If you’d only let me live inside your mind…

Sully

“You left?” Mya says from the entrance of my booth as I work on a piece for a client coming in this weekend.

I turn in my chair and lift my glasses taking in her beauty, even disheveled. She is wearing a pair of torn up faded jeans and a PIT hoodie. Her hair is in a messy knot, and I want to take it down and let if fall all over me again.

I don’t know what she has done to me, but I am waxing poetic on some basic shit. “Hey,” I stand, and offer her a seat, but she hops on my tattoo table instead. “How you feeling?

She looks at me through the sunglasses she still wears. “Dreadful, but better than I would have been had someone not taken care of me.”

I shrug. “Yeah, you were out of it. I crashed for a few hours to make sure you didn’t get sick and cruised home at five.

She nods and hands me my folded T-shirt. “I remember. Well, I remember getting up in the middle of the night and seeing you there. Thank you, for the shirt. I didn’t wash it yet.”

I nod, and secretly love knowing she slept in my shirt and brought it back with her smell on it. “Cuervowill make ya sick. Should have chosen thePatron.”

She hops off my table and steps up close to me. “You told meCuervo.”

I step towards her. “I told you that you couldn’t handlePatron. You could have decided for yourself.”

We stare each other down, talking in this fucking code ofPatronandCuervo, and I know I am crossing my own line.

I also know that I can’t give a fuck anymore.

She traces her finger along the tattoo that is on my jaw and neck slowly. “I am pretty sure that if I chosePatronagainst my better logic, I would be feeling even worse today,” she says this just seconds before kissing me sweetly, once… twice, before turning and leaving my shop.

Later that night, I think of what she said and wonder if I should keep fighting her. If I am honest with myself and her, God knows I do want her. I don’t know how to co-exist with happiness when I am plagued by sadness.

Deciding I don’t want to waste her time or mine, I shoot a text and offer an olive branch. I need to see what this is once and for all.

Me: Hey, do you have plans tonight?

My heart stops and starts beating insane when I send the message and fear her response. This is me moving forward, and I should welcome it. It’s all about healing, right?

Mya: Nothing in stone. What’s up?

I read the message and I don’t think it is what I wanted. I think I half expected a resounding, ‘nothing come get me?’

Me: We are throwing a party for Asa at the shop tonight.InkedMag gave him a spread. I wanted to see if you wanted an invite?

Mya: Are all your ‘friends’ going to be there?

Fuck!

I finally try, and she plays this fucking game? Okay, maybe it isn’t a game. After she kissed me at the studio, she told me to do something. I denied her again and ran straight into the arms of everyCuervototing asshole in theSue. Chances are she is ready to tell me to fuck off.

Me: Whatever. If you show, you show. Seven sharp.