Stories from the Back of His Motorcycle

Dinner. Dinner wasn’t so bad. Normally it was Nick and I sat around our recently replaced kitchen table, eating whatever fast food he’d brought home or whatever scraps of food I had managed to not burn. It was us chatting awkwardly about our days, never bringing up the taboo subject of our parents or our brother’s imminent wedding. It was certainly not formal and not a ceremony – we ate when we were hungry not at a prescribed time.

Dinner with Vaughn and his parents, however, was a different matter entirely.

“You shouldn’t worry about it so much. They’ll either like you or not and it makes no difference to me either way,” Vaughn said soothingly from where he was perched on the edge of my bed. “It won’t change how I feel about you.”

“Thanks for the pep talk,” I muttered, fiddling with the black dress I had found somewhere in the depths of my wardrobe.

“Look at it like this – it can’t be as awful as my first meal here.”

I smiled at him in my mirror’s reflection, remembering how Ross and Vaughn had practically brawled in my kitchen and splattered lasagne all over the room. Vaughn was right, nothing could top that night, surely nothing could go that awfully wrong. I caught the thought in my brain before it could materialise into circumstances where everything went wrong.

“No broken tables?” I asked in a teasing voice.

“Definitely no broken tables. In fact, I think it’s impossible to break my dining table – it’s made of marble.”

“Who has a marble dining table?” I scoffed, smirking at his reflection.

“It wasn’t my first choice, that’s for sure.”

We shared a long smile, unable to tear our eyes from each other. The lights in my room were dim, dim enough to cast small shadows under his cheekbones and make his eyes blacker than night. I felt something stir within me, something that Vaughn had made me well acquainted with. I blushed at just the thought of him knowing what he was doing to me.

“Are you going to put that on then, or are you just going to hold it all night? Kind of like an accessory?”

I fingered the soft material and watched the black velvet shimmer. It probably wouldn’t fit; I didn’t even remember buying it. And the last dress I had worn was the disgusting bridesmaid dress for El which didn’t exactly inspire confidence as far as my image was concerned. A frown spread across my face. I hated how quickly the insecurities wormed back in.

“Maybe you’re right. Maybe I’m making it a bigger deal than it is. If I show up in a dress they’ll think that I’m some stuck up snob, or that I’m a wannabe who’s trying too hard,” I bit my lip and was already thinking out the next outfit I could wear. “Maybe if I kept it to jeans and a nice shirt…”

Warm arms wrapped around my stomach and took the dress from my hands. I felt his breath wash over the back of my neck, making me shiver in the best way possible. Vaughn dropped a soft kiss on my shoulder, those sneaky hands of his folding out the dress and holding it against my body. We both observed it in the mirror, only all I was looking at was his face, seeing it twist into a contented smile and finding myself smiling in return.

“Wear the dress Alice,” he murmured into my ear “go on and torture me.”

I laughed and leant my head against his “are you sure that’s such a wise idea? We’re going to be eating with your parents at your house, not around your friends in a bar.”

“Sweetheart I wouldn’t let you wear that around any of my friends, I can promise you that.”

“Why? Afraid of a little competition?” I smirked.

“Yes,” he said seriously “with you in this I’ll barely be able to keep my hands to myself, so think about how my Neanderthal friends would react.”

I rolled my eyes, “maybe I should stick to jeans.”

“Just put the damn thing on Alice,” his eyes were smouldering in the mirror, making me take the dress into my hands and push him back with my shoulder blade.

“Close your eyes.”

I turned to face him as he did as I asked, scrunching up his face theatrically and closing his eyes so tightly it looked like they would never open again. He couldn’t see the silly expression on my face, or the way my eyes were telling him that I loved him, which was just as well. I still wasn’t comfortable with that kind of endearment or for Vaughn to know that I was so far out of that comfort zone for him.

“I don’t hear the rustling of clothes being removed,” his voice half-sang “if you’re struggling I’d be more than happy to help you.”

“Har-har,” I still couldn’t stop smiling but I focused my eyes onto the dress instead. I pulled my baggy top over my head and dropped my sweat pants, catching sight of myself in the mirror. Seeing the girl I had become in nothing but her underwear with a peeking Vaughn behind her set off the feeling in my stomach once again.

“Stop looking,” I squealed and folded arms over my chest as if this covered me up any. He just smirked and raised his hands up to cover his eyes, making even more of a show while I could still see his dark eyes flashing behind his fingers.

Hastily, I pulled the dress up and over my hips, adjusting the single strap and smoothing my hands down the material. It fit me like a glove – surprising really since I couldn’t remember buying it let alone trying it on. My make up was already finished and I pulled my hair out of its bun so the brown mass fell only by shoulders and half way down my back.

“You can look now,” I smirked, pretending he hadn’t been doing so already.

He dropped his hands and took me in with wide eyes. I couldn’t fight back the blush – though I tried – and almost melted when he stepped closer, resting hot palms on my cheeks.

He let out a low groan and kissed my lips quickly.

“You have no idea how crazy you drive me,” he breathed as his hands slipped down to my waist. I did know, though, because he drove me just as crazy. Feelings I only now understood filled me up to the brim and threatened to overflow. I was treading dangerous waters as he held me in his arms and looked at me straight with those smouldering eyes.

“I really don’t want to go to dinner anymore sweetheart,” he said softly.

“Well…” I swayed, teetering on the edge of an abyss. I was seconds away from caving in, from giving him things I hadn’t known I possessed, and that is exactly why I put my hands firmly on his chest. “That’s just too bad Vaughn; we’re going to your house for dinner whether you want to or not. I’ve been psyching myself up all day and no way am I going to have to do that again. It’s always worse the first time, after this dinner with your parents will look like a piece of cake and I’ll wonder why I was such an idiot for getting myself so worked up. Which means,” I swatted his wandering hands away “that you’re going to have to control yourself tonight.”

“Is that a promise that tomorrow night I won’t have to?”

I narrowed my eyes and pushed him away “it’s a threat actually. Keep your hands to yourself or else.”

He just smirked, holding out a hand for me to take. Cautiously, I took it\, his large hand covering mine completely, rough fingertips curling softly into me. Vaughn pulled me along, through my hallway, down the stairs, past the living room where Nick was watching some baseball game, and to the front door. We both shouted out vague goodbyes to my brother who grunted something about bringing me back before tomorrow began.

Vaughn had taken his father’s car to pick me up – either knowing ahead that I’d end up in clothes less than appropriate for the back of a motorcycle or having been nagged to death by a parent about how young ladies shouldn’t be escorted around on death traps. I didn’t mind this one time, mostly because I didn’t want to freeze in my dress. And sitting shotgun meant I could stare at the driver without a helmet impairing my vision.

“Stop it,” he moaned “I’m trying to concentrate on driving this thing.”

I snorted – his driving in a normal car was appalling – but didn’t stop watching him.

“You’re playing dirty Alice.”

“We’re not playing a game.”

“It sure feels like it,” he sneaked a glance over at me, eyes lingering for longer than necessary on my bare legs.

“It’s not my fault you wanted to torture yourself,” I smiled wistfully and finally looked away to focus on the world tearing by. The houses were slowly dissolving into buildings you could hardly call a home. Large and elegant and expensive. Show houses like Vaughn’s.

My heart thudded within my rib cage, and for once it wasn’t exactly for him.

“I wish we could just go home and order some pizza,” I sighed, hating how nervous I was.

I’d never done this before. Never formally met the boyfriend’s parents with a nice home-cooked meal, never even had a boyfriend’s parents to meet My flings were just that – flings. They were few and far between and never got past the first date.

“You’re blowing it all out of proportion.”

“The last time I met your mother she basically said that we shouldn’t be together and I haven’t even met your father before.”

“He’s pretty cool,” Vaughn shrugged, still not understanding how nerve wracking this experience was for me. He just saw it as a meal with the three people he cared about most. Instead of being nervous he was happy – I could see it in how his eyes were smiling and his grin never left for more than a second.

“And my mother will learn to love you; she’s just… a bit protective I guess. She’s worried that you’ll do what Katerina did.”

I scoffed because there was absolutely no way that was happening. The chance to run had long since passed and yet I was still here with my head resting back on the car seat. Like a crazy person who didn’t know when to jump ship, or maybe I was the drowned person who’d already gone down with it. I was happy either way, albeit scared, but more happy.

I was a teenager about to formally meet her boyfriend’s parents. Like a totally normal couple who were taking the next step. It was as if we had forgotten that there was no chance of Vaughn seeing my parents, because they had disappeared and abandoned me. Or that Vaughn was far from any normal teenager and as a result his family had had to become abnormal too. Sure, they had their show home but how much of it was staged and fake?

We were on Vaughn’s drive before I had the chance to completely change my mind. We were out of the car before I had the chance to lock myself in. We were ringing his doorbell before I had the chance to turn back.

My hand was caught up in his and he squeezed reassuringly, letting me know that he was going to be there. Or that he wasn’t going anywhere. That he’d smile for me and eat the food I couldn’t manage just in case. I squeezed back because I was too chicken to say thank you.

The door swung inwards and there stood Vaughn’s parents. His beautiful brunette Mom who had worn a nice dress, as I suspected she would, and a large, white smile. His father was little more casual, like he’d just returned from work a few minutes ago but hadn’t gotten changed. He was handsome in an old movie-star way, like once upon a time he’d been someone akin to Vaughn. I could see the resemblance.

He reached forwards and grabbed my free hand before we’d even blinked. He was all jolly smiles and crinkled skin around his eyes. Laugh lines. The nervousness drained down my body, into my feet and then into the ground. I allowed Vaughn to formally introduce me, although the way his father said my name assured me that I’d been spoken of long before.

“It’s good to finally meet you Alice. I felt a bit left out there, being the only one not to have had the pleasure.”

Charmer. Definitely related to Vaughn. Unmistakable really.

“I was beginning to think you weren’t real and Vaughn here had let his daydreaming run away with him.”

We were sat at his marble table, plates dotted around as if more guests might suddenly burst in at any given moment. The décor was as I had suspected – showy and expensive – and even Vaughn’s hand resting on my knee and his father’s continuous jokes couldn’t dissipate my unease. My unease stemmed back to be the visible war of thoughts raging on Vaughn’s Mom’s face. I had been right about her being unable to hide her emotions. Maybe the house and the décor were all just to make up for the fact that anyone could read anything in her expression.

I couldn’t tell whether she liked me but it was obvious that she didn’t know herself. She was stuck, and remained stuck throughout the appetisers and main courses. Vaughn’s father kept the conversation flowing and Vaughn kept me entertained by brushing his feet against mine under the table – typical discreet flirting. She barely said a thing. Judging by Vaughn’s fidgeting figure it was starting to bother him.

“Hey,” I whispered to him, looking over to my left at where he sat. I would have lost my breath if I hadn’t been so concerned with keeping his mind off of his Mom, giving him a distraction. I would have lost my breath at how wonderful he looked, giving me a cheeky little wink and rubbing circles into my thigh under the tablecloth.

“Are you alright?” I asked tentatively as his father lurched into another comic monologue.

“Of course I am sweetheart, why wouldn’t I be?”

Your mother’s sitting over there radiating vibes like a big storm cloud Vaughn, I felt like saying, that’s why you wouldn’t be so alright. But I didn’t because she was too close and I didn’t want to make something small into something big. If he was playing it cool then so was I.

“Baby,” he whispered, leaning over to me close enough for his word to burn into my mind like his touch burnt my skin. My insides lurched at the endearment. I’d never been anybody’s baby; I’d barely been my mother’s. “Are you going to eat all of that?”

We both glanced down at the half-finished plate before me. I couldn’t finish it now he’d called me that; butterflies were beating at my insides like they were trying to break free. Maybe they were. I shook my head and hid behind my mass of hair, suddenly feeling shy.

“Mind if I finish it?”

I shrugged, still hiding my smile.

“Mind if my girlfriend looks at me and tells me why she’s gone all shy?” he continued.

Vaughn’s Dad was just wrapping up his story that I had only been half-listening to but I turned myself completely towards him. As if I’d been engaged the whole time. As if I wasn’t still trying to beat down my stupid smile before Vaughn saw it. I felt fingers fiddle with my hand before bringing it up and out of my lap.

When his lips pressed softly to my knuckles and silence descended around the table, I really had no choice but to turn to him. I couldn’t help but laugh, at the sensation and at his cheekiness, and at the whole situation. I was so in love with him that I was surprised it didn’t all come tumbling out of me, making me fall apart.

But then there was a high pitched cough coming from across the table and my thoughts stopped dead. What was I playing at? Thinking such ludicrous things and laughing so freely at someone else’s table? Vaughn’s Mom had every right to be annoyed, even if it sent a sharp stab of something straight through my chest.

“Mom?” Vaughn eventually broke what had become an awkward silence and addressed his mother. I squeezed his fingers tightly, silently asking him not to do what I knew he was about to.

She looked up from the plate of delicacies she’d no doubt spent all day on, at her only son. I leant back into my chair as if trying to make myself smaller, inconspicuous. I knew that look on her face. I’d seen it before. It was my own mother’s face right before a fight, reflections of my brothers when they got worked up trying to protect me. She was ready to say something awful and she was ready to say it for Vaughn.

“Sweetheart,” she cooed “what is it?”

“You’ve been strange all night. Do you have a problem with something?”

And by something he meant me. They were about to argue again about me.

“Nothing, I’m just tired is all. I’ve been sleeping awfully worrying about you. What with you finally at the top of the…” she trailed off as her eyes connected with mine, remembering I was still there. “Oh… I forgot about her.”

“Her?” Vaughn shifted, tone already like ice.

“Does she know all about you now Vaughn?”

“She has a name,” he said through gritted teeth “and yes, Alice knows all about my illness.”

“Oh.”

“Yes mother, oh. Can’t you believe that she’s still here, sitting down civilly and eating dinner with us? Can’t you believe that Alice hasn’t run away yet, or are you just waiting until she leaves me?”

“Sweetheart,” she half moaned.

“Vaughn, stop it now,” his father warned in a voice I hadn’t heard him use yet.

“Seriously Dad? You don’t tell her to stop when she’s sitting there moping around like I’m on my fucking deathbed.”

“Vaughn,” his Dad’s eyes flashed “your mother cares about you; she just wants you to be healthy and happy.”

“Happy? Really? When she won’t even let me live my own life and make my own decisions. Can’t you see how disrespectful she’s been all evening just because I’ve brought back a girl?”

I felt like crawling under the marble table and hiding, hoping that its steadiness would shield me from their words. From the atmosphere my presence had created.

“It’s because I think you’re being selfish Vaughn,” she said surprisingly softly, rising from her chair to turn big eyes onto him. I flinched away from them. I hadn’t known eyes could hold so many different emotions in them, bottomless.

“Selfish?” Vaughn spluttered, clenched fists shaking.

“Denise,” his father turned warning eyes onto his wife before flashing them over to me.

It seemed as if he was the only one in the room still aware of my presence and how I was dying inside at the tension. I’d sat through enough meal times like this to know someone was going to cry and someone was going to end up saying something they couldn’t take back. Vaughn had been wrong earlier. This night was turning out to be worse than his first time.

“Yes, selfish. Do you spare a thought for me and your father when you’re off cavorting on your motorcycle like some delinquent? When you don’t come home do you ever sit and wonder how worried I am, how I’m picturing you dead in a ditch somewhere?”

“That’s all you ever worry about Mom, my death.”

“Yes, yes I do because you’re my baby boy! Imagine if someone you loved was ill and dying, wouldn’t you want to do everything in your power to make them better? To make them safe?”

I almost spoke up then, to tell him that she was right. She and I both shared that at least. The overpowering desire to see Vaughn better, no matter what. In that moment I understood Denise, his mother. It wasn’t me that she hated, that was making her uncomfortable, but the thought of me hurting him just like Katerina had. Vaughn’s illness wasn’t just killing him but his Mom too.

I became aware that both of them had their eyes on me then - all of them were watching me. I saw in Vaughn’s eyes how he was picturing me in his position and by his face’s sudden collapse how much it broke his heart.

“Alice didn’t know that you were ill before you pursued her Vaughn. You didn’t give her a chance at total happiness when you should have. That was selfish Vaughn because she doesn’t have a choice now. You’re going to be in and out of the hospital, you’re going to get real sick before things get better, and she’s going to have to watch you go through it all. You’re my son and I love you more than anything else but it’s going to kill me watching you. Just think what it’s going to do to Alice,” her voice never raised, not like my own mothers would have.

If you didn’t know what she was saying you would almost assume it was something pleasant. I had been wrong about her words – they weren’t awful. I had been right about the tears though – the tears I found myself blinking away. I reached up a hand to scoop them away but it was too late. Vaughn had seen.

The worst part of all that she had said was that it wasn’t the first time I had heard these words. I’d said them to myself too at the beginning. Just after he’d told me. When I was vulnerable and distraught and there seemed like no hope. It was hopeless talk.

And I knew they would undo all that I had been trying to achieve with Vaughn. He would revert back to feeling eternally guilty as if his wanting to love me was anything to be ashamed of. I was glad that he had come along, despite the worry and heartsickness, I was glad that he had showed me what life – real life – could be about.

The few tears left over were caught by Vaughn. He leaned down to me after he’d stood and gave me that look with those eyes. God, I almost died. I had to do something otherwise I’d never shake off that feeling and he’d never shake off that look. I didn’t want his pity. I didn’t want him to be sorry for being with me.

“No disrespect meant Mrs Hart,” I started up with a few wobbles “but I don’t think it was selfish of Vaughn to hold his secret from me. We all have them – secrets – and it shouldn’t matter that his are so much worse than others because I didn’t have the right to know them before.

“I wasn’t a very nice person when I met your son. In fact, I probably would have run if he’d told me about his illness. In a perfect world I would have known and I would have stayed and I would have dealt with it but I’m certainly not perfect and neither is this world. I admit that I don’t know what it’s going to be like watching Vaughn wither away, and I’m sure it is going to be hard, but I can’t leave him now. I couldn’t leave him even if I desperately wanted to.

“And it’s not out of guilt,” I turned to Vaughn sharply because I knew he was thinking that. I couldn’t have him believing that.

“You’re selfish sometimes only because you’re human and that’s perfectly fine. Heck, I’m a million times more selfish than you are. I only look out for myself most of the time and before you I barely put Delia before me. I haven’t told you yet that I love you because I’m scared you’ll leave me, I haven’t thought of how you feel or whether I trust you. I do trust you though and I know you love me. I love you too Vaughn. I’ve loved you for a long time and I’ve been too selfish to tell myself let alone you.”

I’d barely finished before Vaughn was kissing me, completely oblivious to his gaping parents and the shaking hands of mine which wrapped slowly around his neck.

There. I’d said it. And it felt amazing to get it off of my chest. I was sick of treating the revelation like a secret when it should have been a declaration, I should have shouted it to the world. I wanted his parents to know how I felt about their son but most of all I wanted Vaughn to know. I did love him, as crazy as it sounded to my own ears. He was nothing like my Dad and I’d never treat him like my Mom had treated him.

“It looks like we have nothing to worry about Denise,” his father said happily to his wife. “Vaughn here’s in good hands.”

Vaughn pulled away from me but still held me close, twisting us to face them with an arm draped tightly around my shoulder. Proudly. He was proud of how I’d stood up for myself but mostly he was proud that I had finally said it. He must have known all along that I loved him; he was just waiting until I was finally ready to accept it.

His Mom was staring at me, unabashed, trying to read exactly where that had come from. I couldn’t have told her. I didn’t know myself. It felt right, though, it felt right and it was the right moment.

“I love her, Mom, Dad, and she loves me. We’re happy.”

“Then we’re happy for you, right Denise?” his father laughed.

She slipped back slowly into her chair, posture straight and proper. Her big, readable eyes closed. Her emotions hidden.

“Right,” she said in a straight voice “we’re happy.”