Right Now, I'm Anyone's

The dark, cold street was spinning as we walked down it, and I could feel my eyes going fuzzy every couple of minutes. Craig and I had dragged Johnny from the pub a good couple of minutes earlier, before stumbling our way up the street in search of the alleyway that cut straight to the back entrance of Flux. A couple of words were exchanged between Craig and I; our main focus was on dragging Johnny back safely.

“Almost there,” Craig said, patting Johnny on the back. He grunted in response and retched like he was going to throw up as he dragged his feet along the pavement and clutched onto my shoulder for support, which was actually really starting to hurt a lot.

Craig stopped walking, making me and Johnny both stumble slightly. I realised we were at two white doors, which I then took to be the two double doors of the bands Transit van. He let Johnny’s arm fall from his shoulder, leaving me to take his entire weight and pulled on the latch to open the doors. He pulled it open as quietly as he possibly could, revealing a small bundle – which I took to be Edie – asleep on a small mattress, next to the much larger one that Dean had occupied.

He had been lying awake on his mattress, on top of the cover with his shoes on and his earphones in. He jumped up when the door opened and came out of the van door. I rested Johnny against the remaining closed door while Craig and Dean exchanged some words. They both turned and heaved Johnny into the van.

I turned, walking to stand alongside the van. I leaned against the side of it and tried to focus on something, anything to stop my vision blurring again. Eventually, I started rummaging through my bag for my phone. I went through my contacts and dialled Georgia’s number, which went through to her voicemail. I tried Dimitri; his phone was off.

I tried the both of them another three times and tried calling Jake once, but each time it went straight to voicemail. I sighed and gave up, closing my phone and putting it back into my bag. I let my head drop backwards and felt the cold metal of the van underneath it. I closed my eyes and breathed deeply, willing the air to sober me up a little bit more.

“Hey, you.” I practically jumped out of my skin. I clapped my hand to my chest and snapped my eyes open, looking in the direction the voice came from. My bag had dropped at my feet in my surprise, the wooden latch on it clacking on the floor.

Dean was standing near me, leaning against the side of the van with his right side pressed against it. Despite the cigarette between his lips, I could see him laughing at me. He lifted his left hand and lit up his cigarette while I got my breath back.

“Hey yourself; thanks for the heart attack,” I muttered resentfully. He laughed as he blew out a lungful of smoke, letting it drift up into the night sky. He turned his back to the side of the van and put his head back. I laughed and did the same.

It was a beautiful, clear night; there were no clouds around and approximately five stars visible up in the velvety darkness. Everything I looked at spun in circles still whenever I tried focussing on it properly, but I kept my eyes on that sky. In the back of my mind, I kept praying that Georgia would call me back at some point. But, the rest of my mind focussed on that gorgeous night sky. I took hold of the front of my coat and pulled it tighter around my body, shivering from the slight cold.

“Is Johnny alright?” I asked, disappointed to break the silence.

I saw Dean nod from the corner of my eye. “Yeah, he’s just passed out.”

I laughed lightly and shook my head, tearing my eyes down to the black tar road. The smell of the cigarette Dean was smoking was slowly creeping into my nostrils, but I couldn’t find myself caring too much.

“Are you going to be able to get home?” Dean asked after he’d taken another drag off of his cigarette.

I shrugged my shoulders. “When Georgia answers her stupid phone, then yeah.”

I heard him chuckle. I watched Dean very carefully after that. I watched him raise the burning cigarette to his full, pink lips and suck on it very slightly. Then he pulled it away and took another breath, before he exhaled more smoke out into the cold night air. He put his head back against the side of the van and I watched as the muscles in his shoulders flexed under his black polo shirt.

“You shouldn’t smoke.” There’s the speaking before thinking thing. Again.

“Why not?” he laughed, shooting me a small amused glance while his head remained tilted back against the van.

“Because, it’s not good for you, at all.”

“There are a lot of things that aren’t good for you,” he said. “Alcohol, for one.”

I narrowed my eyes at him and laughed. “Like you’re the poster child for straight edge.”

“Didn’t say I was,” he laughed, holding his hands up in defence. “Just saying, don’t knock it till you try it.”

“I’ll live a lot easier without trying it, thanks, Dean,” I said. “I’m addiction free.”

He laughed and pushed the cigarette towards my lips. “You won’t get addicted on your first go.”

I shook my head vigorously and kept my lips clamped tightly together. I tried to move my head away as he tried to force the cigarette between my resisting lips. I turned my head the opposite direction to him, but he just used his free hand to turn my face back towards him, managing to push the cigarette between my lips. I caved in and took one, small reluctant pull, immediately coughing and spluttering.

He patted my back until I stopped coughing, but I could still hear him laughing at me anyway. “You’re a massive wimp.”

“Shut up!” I gasped. “That just made me feel really, really sick.”

“Because you took it back wrong.” He smirked as he spoke. “I’ll teach you how to do it someday, yeah?”

“I think I’ll pass on that offer, thanks Dean,” I said, leaning forward once I’d finally stopped coughing. I stared down at the tarmac and felt my stomach churn as the ground spun beneath me. I inhaled deeply, trying to gulp as much fresh air into my lungs and calm down my stomach.

“You okay, Leila?” Dean asked. He crouched down beside me and put his hand gingerly on my back. He started rubbing slow, soothing circles there. I focussed on his hand moving on my back and kept my breathing in time with that, eventually calming my stomach down.

“I’m going to have to call a taxi,” I mumbled as I stood upright and bent one of my legs at the knee, balancing my foot on the side of the van behind me. “Georgia isn’t answering her phone and Dimitri’s going to be far too drunk to drive by now.”

“Don’t be silly,” Dean said, leaning back against the van also. “It’s too late for you to try getting home drunk.”

“Dean,” I sighed, turning my head to look at him. “I have to go home.”

“No, you don’t,” he insisted. “I’m not letting you go home when you can barely walk properly.”

“I can walk properly!”

“Prove it,” he said. “Walk along the yellow line at the side of the road.”

I just kept staring at him, checking he was being completely serious. It seemed he was when he inclined his head towards the curb of the pavement, where the yellow line was painted alongside it.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I grumbled as I walked over to the line. I put my left foot on it and felt my vision sway again. I tried as hard as I could to just put one foot in front of the other, but the line seemed to move out of my way every time I put my foot down. I could hear Dean snickering at me, and eventually I stopped trying and just sat on the curb, making sure to cross my legs in front of me so I wouldn’t flash him my underwear.

“You’re not going home,” Dean stated in finality. I sighed as he walked over and sat next to me on the floor. He brought his cigarette packet out of his pocket and offered it to me. I could see him stifling his trademark smirk. I watched his face for a couple of seconds with narrowed eyes, before sighing and taking a cigarette from the packet. I heard him tut at me and I gave him the finger.

“So, where am I going to stay tonight, then?” I asked as Dean leaned over to light up my cigarette. I clumsily raised it to my lips and mimicked what he had done earlier; taking a drag on the cigarette, another breath of air in, then expelling the smoke into the night. I heard him pop his lips after he took a pull on his own cigarette.

“There’s a spare mattress in the van that Zara used while she was with us. You can have that for the night.”

I nodded my head. I really wanted to just go home, but at the same time, it was nice being around Dean again. We talked and smoked until our cigarettes reached the filter tips. He threw his to the ground first and hauled himself up off of the floor. He held his hands out towards me and lifted me off of the curb. I stumbled forwards into his chest.

“Whoa, alright there?” Dean asked as his arms reflexively wrapped around my body. I looked up at his blue eyes – still bright even in the darkness – and felt my stomach churn again. Not with the alcohol or the sickness from the alcohol, but with something I hadn’t felt since I met Levi. Huge, genuine butterflies, zooming around in there, as cliché as it sounds.

“Yeah,” I murmured, placing my hands on his arms. We stayed still and silent, watching each other – bright blue staring into dull green. As I stared at him, I saw him six years ago – same face, his black hair longer and that smirk permanently etched into his face. I felt his hand move very slowly up my back and bit my bottom lip very slightly.

His hand moved and touched my chin, slowly moving up to caress my cheek lightly. His fingertips traced my skin; I could feel his breath wash over my nose and lips. I wanted to close my eyes, but I couldn’t tear them away from the shocking blue of his eyes. When I looked closer, I noticed there were tiny, almost imperceptible flecks of yellow towards the pupils.

The next thing I felt was the coldness of the side of the van pressing against my back. Dean and I kept our eyes locked together and his hands moved away from my body. He put a hand either side of my shoulders, palms flat against the van. My heartbeat increased as he moved – breaking our eye contact – and brushed his lips ever so slightly against my neck, so I only just felt it. He moved upwards very slowly and I closed my eyes.

I must’ve been far drunker than I thought I was, because not once did I tell him to stop what he was doing. Not when he pressed one of those slight kisses to my cheek, then hovered over my lips before moving to press one to my forehead. Not once did anything come to mind to remind me that I still had a boyfriend, regardless of what stupid argument we’d had that day.

Dean’s body was pressed flush against my own then, while he brushed his lips over my face; only ever letting his breath and a tiny part of his lips brush against my own, teasing me, taunting me. I opened my eyes to see his perfect blue ones staring back at me. I could picture what I looked like at that point, with my eyes half-open in lust.

I saw Dean’s eyes closing and felt mine do the same. I could feel his mouth brushing millimetres away from mine as he opened it very slightly and drew closer. I could feel the heat from his face getting closer, his breath becoming shallower along with my own. Yet nothing told me to stop what was going to happen.

The second I felt his lips come into full contact with mine, I groaned. I wrapped my arms around his neck and clung on as tight as I possibly could. His lips moved against my own in a pattern I remembered perfectly, but my memory still didn’t do it justice. His hands slid down the side of the van and wrapped around my waist, pulling me closer to him. The kiss was wrong, in the sense that I and he were both jeopardising something. But it was so right in other, better ways. For me, the kiss felt right.

It felt like home.

*****

A loud, painful cough ripping from somewhere near my throat was what woke me up from my dreamless sleep. It took my eyes a couple of minutes to adjust to the dim lighting, but I remembered that I wasn’t at home in my own bed anyway. The mattress underneath me – being a hell of a lot softer than my own at home – reminded me that I wasn’t. Plus, the last time I checked, the walls of my bedroom weren’t metal.

I sat up, feeling my throat ache slightly. I also felt something warm tighten around my hand, like a living glove. I felt stupid for feeling a tiny pang of fear in my heart in case it was some kind of animal. I looked to my left and saw Dean lying on his side on a mattress next to the one I had been sleeping on, facing me. His hand tightened around my own whenever I moved, or tried to pull it free. My lips pulled into an involuntary smile and I reached my other hand out to stroke his cheekbone.

Just before my pale hand came into contact with the toffee coloured skin stretched over his cheekbone, I stopped.

It hit me like a truck going eighty miles an hour down a motorway would hit that one unlucky rabbit that hadn’t quite made it across the road. My jaw dropped and my hand fell limp by my side. The memory of his kiss. The kiss that could’ve only happened a couple of hours before I woke up. The kiss that shouldn’t have happened at all. Oh, what’ve I done?

I plucked my hand from his and felt myself recoil slightly from him, shifting to the end of the mattress so that there was no chance of me touching him, even though that’s what I wanted to do. He remained curled up on his mattress, his face blank in his sleep. I pushed both of my hands through my hair and scolded myself over and over, feeling like I was about to cry. Thing is, I didn’t feel like crying because I’d cheated on the man I claimed to love; I felt like crying because of what it brought back.

The kiss brought back all the pain that’d happened six years ago; how he had hurt me. It told me that I was lying to myself when I said I felt nothing for him now, of course I did. I didn’t love him, not then, but I don’t think there could’ve ever been a time after that point where I didn’t feel at least the smallest bit of attachment to him. I felt about an inch tall.

A tear came to my eye and I scrubbed it vigorously away, folding my arms over my chest and crossing my legs in front of me afterwards. I refused to cry, not while he was there anyway. I went through different scenarios in my mind of how I was going to explain to Levi what had happened. If I was even going to tell him about it. I shuddered. Great, I’m a cheat and a liar.

I swore under my breath and looked around the van – my excuse not to look at him. Next to the mattress I was on was another, which Edie was curled up on, fast asleep with her thumb in her mouth. I stretched out a hand and smoothed back her brown corkscrew curls, smiling very slightly. Close to one of the van doors was Craig, with Daniel next to him. Johnny was asleep on a mattress on the far side of the van to where I was, face down on his mattress, snoring.

I finally looked at Dean again and felt sick. I wished I hadn’t looked at him again, because I felt repulsive if I did for longer than twenty seconds. Eventually, I just clambered as silently as I could, out of the back of the van and making sure I had all of my belongings on the way out while I tried to control my breathing.

I closed the van door slowly, until I heard the barely audible click, telling me that the door was closed properly. I leaned against it lightly and sighed, before taking more deep breaths to stop myself from going into hysterics. I closed my eyes and focussed on the grey morning around me, feeling my head ache from all of the alcohol.

When I’d gathered myself together enough, I opened up my bag and took my phone out. I clumsily unlocked it and went through the contact list hastily, finding Dimitri’s number in seconds. I pressed call and waited.

“Hello?” he answered, sounding like I’d just woke him up.

I couldn’t keep the panic from my voice. “Can you come and get me?”