was mad that she saw you first. Mad that I was going to miss out on something, even if I didn’t know what that something was.”My throat gets tight.
“You snuck out.”
“I know.”
“Look at me, babe,” he orders, and my eyes open. “I should not have said what I said to you over text.” My lips part at his admission. “I’ve wanted to call you every fucking day to apologize. I didn’t, but I should have. If you can forgive me for that, I can forgive you for what happened.”
“You were right to be mad. I would have been too,” I say softly, and his eyes flash with some kind of emotion that is there and gone way too quickly for me to read. “But I am really sorry.”
“It’s all good.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah, babe.” He leans back. “Now, tell me about your tattoo.”
I study him for a moment, trying to understand why I still feel this heavy weight in my stomach, the one that’s been there since I read his text. It should be gone now that we talked and after he accepted my apology, but it isn’t.
Figuring the best course of action is to get this over with so we can both go our separate ways, I explain the tattoo then sit back and watch him create magic with a pencil. Forty minutes later, we say goodbye, and a part of me knows it will be the last time I see him. That hurts more than it should, but as I lie on the tattoo table with Blossom embedding my tattoo into my skin, I know that a part of him will always be with me.
“Now that you’re officially a badass, let’s go get a drink,” April says with a grin while grabbing my hand and leading me toward her car.
I do kinda feel like a badass. I now have a tattoo, a fricking beautiful tattoo I know I’ll never regret getting, and not just because Gareth designed it, but because it’s beautiful and exactly what I always wanted. “Where are we going?”
April stops as soon as the question leaves my mouth, and her head swings down toward me. “What?”
“What?” I repeat, frowning at her.
“You want to go get a drink?”
“Isn’t that what you normally do after you get a tattoo?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay... so like I said, where are we going?”
She studies me for a moment, and then her lips tip up into a smile and she mumbles, “Apparently to the bar.”
Beeping the car alarm, she lets go of my hand and I get in, feeling a slight twinge of pain hit my side as I twist to slide into the low seat. Once I’m settled and we’re buckled in, she starts the engine. Until that moment, I never understood the appeal of the loud rumble of her car, but apparently being a newborn badass, I’m able to appreciate it now. And I appreciate it more when she switches the song playing from the speakers from one I don’t know to “Welcome to the Jungle,” turning the volume all the way up and rolling down the windows. Even though it’s cold out, I relish the moment, and knowing the lyrics, I sing along at the top of my lungs.
We pull into the parking lot for one of the local bars, and April waits until the song comes to an end before she rolls up the windows and shuts down the engine. The smile on my face is huge as I get out, slamming my door. When we meet at the hood, she tosses her arm around my shoulders then leads me inside.
The place is packed. There are a few college kids, but most of the people are our age or older. We go right to the bar, and as soon as we reach the edge, April lets me go and leans over the top of the counter. I look around; the music and chatter is deafening, but every person seems to be smiling and enjoying their night out. Before I even have a chance to glance back at my sister, she’s shoving a glass into my hand. I take it then follow her across the room to a table that has free chairs but is covered with beer bottles and empty glasses.
Suddenly feeling out of place, I take a sip from my drink and start to cough. It’s vodka, and if I’m not wrong, nothing else besides ice. “Vodka?”
“You’re a badass, and badasses drink vodka straight.” She grins, finishing her drink in