and stood, stripping off her clothes and tugging on her customary floppy hoodie and cozy pajama bottoms before she moved into the living room. The T.V. was still on the same Steamers channel, but now they’d updated the story with a camera crew filming Reese’s building and another one following Ryder as he left his gym.
“Ryder, you have any comment about you and Reese’s relationship in college?”
“What?” he said, head shaking at the camera. “Must be a slow news day.” Then he hopped in his Maserati and took off.
At least, Gia reasoned the QB was handling it on the surface. If she thought about it, if she pushed back her irrational anger, she guessed Reese was too. Gia had been the one quick to anger. She’d been the one shouting. Reese had only reacted.
Gia turned off the television, sick of the coverage, annoyed with herself and the way the night had ended. She thought of going to bed, spending the weekend curled up with a book, hiding from the world. There was a bookmark in the half-way point of the Glendy Vanderah hardback on her table. It wasn’t due back at the library for another two weeks. She could finish it and pretend there weren’t any dramas that needed her attention.
Or any across-the-hall neighbors who wanted explanations from her he had no rights to.
Then, Gia spotted the Polaroids jumbled in her armchair. The stack of beloved pictures were set in disarray, some flipped upside down, some with the edges folded. She dropped the remote, forgetting everything but finding the pictures she’d been looking for when Kai had started thumbing through them and tossing them to the floor.
Gia got to her knees, pushing the ottoman out of her way, shuffling through the pictures, setting them into stacks—those of men that still made her smile: Alton, Randel, Beau, Kenny; those of Joe and, finally, the most beloved of all: those of Luka.
There were five in all. They were the oldest. Worn and well loved.
She knew every line on his body all the curves and dips that made up the muscles and arches of his wide frame. Gia ran a finger over her favorite picture. It was the first. She’d never been bold enough, brave enough to take anyone’s picture, especially when they were naked.
She leaned against the chair, her eyes burning when she remembered that night.
Her dorm was empty. The campus had gone quiet and cold from the holiday break. Luka stayed with her when no one else would. Her rescuer.
“What are you doing with that thing?” he asked, grabbing for the Polaroid camera when Gia straddled him, coming to her knees as she aimed the camera down at him.
“I’m going to document this…” She laughed, moving the camera out of his reach when he stretched his arm, trying to get it from her. Instead, he curled an arm around her, holding her against his chest.
“You don’t need pictures when you’ve got me, nani Gia.” Luka kissed her mouth, his gaze scanning the surface of her face like he couldn’t quite get enough of her features. “I’m always gonna be here for you to see like this.”
“Not always,” she teased, pushing him against the mattress. Gia smiled when her nails against his chest elicited a low, guttural moan. She loved that sound best of the sweet noises he made. “Not when I’m in class.” She leaned forward, taking his nipple between her teeth, loving how he held her head against his chest. “Not when I’m an old lady and my memory is all gone.”
Luka laughed, stretching back when Gia came up on her knees again. His smile was slow, but sure, like he was warming to the idea of her looking at a picture of him, his body on display just for her anytime she wanted it.
“Alright then,” he told her, resting his head on his bent arm. “How do you want me?” Gia smiled, her heart pounding when he lowered the blanket, giving her an uninhibited view of his naked body. “You can have me anyway you want me, ko`u aloha.”
That night, alone in her Decatur Street apartment, Gia didn’t bother with the Vanderah hardcover or the subversive, healing poetry of Mary Lambert. She drank no bourbon and took no wine. She slept in her bed, with a single Polaroid clutched in her hand and the fading wish that for one more night she could be that girl Luka loved so much, taking everything he offered for the gift it was.