I washed up as well as I could, then started straightening my clothes while Tristan cleaned up. I was just tying my dress when Tristan moved close and kissed my forehead, then my cheek, then the corner of my mouth.
“Love you, sweetheart,” he said quietly but vehemently, then walked out the door.
I stood there, frozen, staring into space like a lunatic, for the longest time.
The words just stayed there, right at the edge of my thought, distracting enough, but somehow hard to focus on, in the light of day.
And then, as though I’d just snapped out of it, I went back to the party and had a mostly good time.
Not all the way good, but mostly.
Mostly because there was one very bad moment when I walked out back to find Tristan performing one of his tricks for the handful of tiny kids that were having a pool party while the grownups had a baby shower. He was so good with kids. Amazing. I watched the entire thing with what could only be an infatuated smile on his face.
That wasn’t the bad part, not yet.
The part that turned the day just a touch sour was when he walked up to me after moving close, and with no hesitation, he stroked his hand over my lower belly, stroked it right there, and he didn’t have to say a word. I could read his mind.
I got away as fast as I could, going inside, trying to stay far away from him until I could breathe again.
And I did bounce back, even tricking Tristan into letting me win the diaper pin game. It was easy. I had some dirty tricks up my sleeve, too.
I grabbed a marker, a Sharpie to be exact, from one of the tubs of supplies in the living room turned painting studio, and went into the bathroom. I pulled my dress down all the way to my bra, and wrote BABY on the skin right above.
I tugged my dress back into place, dropped the sharpie back in the bin, and went in search of Tristan.
When I found him talking to Akira who was on his way to feeling up a giggling Lana, I quietly pulled him aside.
He raised his brows, looking very happy. “You ready for another round?”
I shook my head and pulled my dress down far enough to show him what I’d written.
He cocked his head to see the words, and read slowly, “Baby.”
His eyes widened, neck straightened, and he pointed at me. “Wow. You are evil.”
I held out my hand, and slowly, grudgingly, he unfastened all of his pins and gave them to me. “I hear it’s a deluxe spa package,” I taunted him. “I’m pretty stoked.”
“I know. I was going to use it to bribe you into doing me sexual favors.” He said it in a pout.
As though he needed a bribe.
It was only later, at night, as I lay in the dark that his words began to move in my head. To circle. In a crazy loop.
Here’s all you need to know about crazy: Crazy’s favorite shape is a circle.
Broken records, crazy urges on a loop. Any of this ring a bell? That’s how crazy works, and why it keeps repeating itself.
And boy was it repeating itself now.
It was all happening again. Every insane f**king bit of it was back.
The all-consuming infatuation. Back.
The tight pull in my chest every time I looked at him. Back.
Falling asleep in his arms and still dreaming about him. Back.
Insane psychotic jealousy. Back. Doubly, because we were both afflicted with it.
Public make-out sessions, as though we were teenagers. Back.
Vibrating tongue and magic hands that made me lose all brain function. Back.
The heaven and hell of being with a man I couldn’t stand to be parted from for even an hour. Back.
His smile ruining me for every other smile in the world.
The joy and the pain of being undeniably, unquestionably in love.
How could one person, who’d proven to be so inherently bad for me, so wrong, still be so utterly necessary for my happiness?
It wasn’t fair.
I wasn’t lying there thinking about Trouble. And I wasn’t even thinking of how to avoid it. I simply wanted to co-exist with it.
The question was, as well-adjusted, okay, somewhat well-adjusted adults, could we turn this crazy thing healthy a second time around?
I was trying to plot it out, trying to find a game plan that could work, because I wanted this.
I needed goals, and rules, and a clear picture of what the future could hold.
But I didn’t have a clear picture of where this could be going, not long-term. And that terrified me.
CHAPTER THIRTY
The first three times he brought it up, I changed the subject. I really didn’t think it was a good idea.
Just the thought of going to one of his performances had me thinking of old times, bringing up long forgotten memories of the days when I’d lived to see him on stage.
The fourth time, he had a ticket for me, and he didn’t seem to be taking no for an answer.
“We don’t do these very often,” he cajoled. “I want you to be there. It could be a year before we perform live again. It’s a toned down venue. It won’t be some wild audience. Everyone will be sitting down, I swear.”
“Oh Tristan.”
I was hopeless. Truly.
“Please. As a favor to me. It would mean a lot to me for you to be there. For support.”
Just hopeless.
Why had I ever pretended that I was capable of telling him no? Utter denial, that.