Skin: He wanted full contact Read online

  Skin

  He wanted full contact

  Johanna Hawke

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 1

  Roni

  I drove my beat-up sedan down the same Virginia dirt roads I’d traveled on since the day I turned sixteen, but it felt different this time. Maybe that’s because it was. My tiny town on the outskirts of Richmond was no longer home. The car I drove had not seen the road this much in years. Walking and riding the subway were ample replacements for driving while I was up at school.

  It was picturesque, this town of mine. Though I felt like an outsider here for the first time in my entire life, there was just something about this place. The old church on Maple Avenue stood where it had been for centuries, and Miss Marla’s flower shop was just as bright as I remembered. It had been a long four years. I was stuck somewhere in between graduation in New York and a life in Linfield, Virginia, and I hated it.

  As I stopped at the notoriously long red light at the corner of Front and Redden, I counted on my fingers, which were in desperate need of a manicure, how long it had been since I’d been back here. If I counted the times I spent less than twenty-four hours at my parents’ house during the holidays each year, it had been about seven months. Otherwise, the last time I’d walked the streets of my hometown was the day I said farewell and headed off to art school.

  When I decided to make my way back south, it seemed like such a good idea. Now, I wondered what on earth I’d been thinking. I spent every single college break cooped up in my parents’ house, trying to avoid the faces that haunted my high school memories, so why did I think it would make sense to come back and face it all head-on?

  This was the turn I always dreaded. Walker High School. I slowed my speed down to 10 MPH, partly because it was a school zone, but also because I was curious to see what had become of my old stomping grounds. With the exception of the new wing they’d added, everything looked exactly the same. This was where I’d taken art classes each year with that old bat Mrs. Flaherty. It was the site of Friday night football games, and pep rallies with my friends, and the homecoming game victory we spent weeks celebrating. It all came rushing back, like something straight from a movie. I’d never have guessed one glimpse at a building would bring up such a flood of emotions.

  2:38. The same time I’d counted down to so many times, and it was here again. I looked on as teenaged girls gossiped, walking to the parking lot reserved for juniors and seniors in the designer clothes they’d probably begged their parents for. I smiled when I saw a couple, definitely the football player and homecoming queen-type, hug and kiss goodbye before parting. High school sweethearts, I figured. They were sweet. “Roni, is that you?” a voice call through the open window.

  How the hell had someone recognized me so fast? I looked up through my open window to see Carla, one of the school secretaries. I’d spent more than my fair share of class periods hanging out by Carla’s desk with a hall pass instead of participating in gym class or dissecting gross creatures in biology.

  “Hi, Carla,” I said, faking a smile. “I actually go by Veronica now.”

  Carla laughed. “You’ll always be Roni here. What brings you back to town?”

  The dreaded question. I couldn’t decide which piece of information —my father’s illness or my new job— would bring less questions, so I decided on the latter. “I’m actually starting as the new art teacher at the middle school next week.”

  “Well, that’s fabulous,” Carla exclaimed. “You’ve always had such an eye for art!”

  I could feel my cheeks blush. “Thanks!”

  “And how’s Jesse doing?”

  Jesse. I figured the town had long forgotten about us, but, clearly, I was mistaken. “Oh…uh… we’re not together anymore.”

  Carla frowned. “I’m sorry to hear that. I have to get going, but it was nice seeing you.” I smiled and said goodbye, hoping she wouldn’t see the single tear that rolled down my cheek. Jesse. I had tried so damn hard to forget that name, and that face. This place had been the beginning and end of everything for us. Carla had always been one of those people just a tad out of the loop, but I was so certain that everyone in town had heard about Jesse. And me. And Jesse and me as a couple.

  The walls in front of me were filled with good memories, but all I could remember were the ones I prayed I’d forget. Sure, I was still in touch with some of my best friends from high school, but I’d been so caught up in my romance with Jesse that I spent a major chunk of my time with him. Now, I did everything I could to avoid him, and the memory of him. Being back was not going to make that easy.

  The way in which Carla had asked so casually about Jesse, as if it was a given that we were together, took me right back to 2013, to Peterton Ballroom. I could see myself walking through the doors to prom in that gorgeous, soft pink ballgown I spent months pining after, waiting for Jesse with a promise he would be there soon. Only he never showed up. What was supposed to be one of the happiest days of high school, maybe even my life, ended up being a horror. The twenty-four hours that followed had been made up of a phone call from Jesse saying he never loved me and a breakup with the man I thought I would spend my life with.

  That’s what I would take with me from this damn high school. It sounded like some cheesy chick flick from the nineties, but it was my sad reality. Even now, all this time later, I still couldn’t quite wrap my head around those few days. I regretted letting a boy command a good chunk of my high school years, likely why I could count the number of dates I went on throughout college on one hand.

  Jesse and I were voted “Cutest Couple.” It hadn’t even been a close race. There was a picture of us, giant teddy bear and all, in the back of the year book, with all of the other superlatives, where I also claimed the title of “Most Artistic.” The last day of high school was still clear as day. Jesse was nowhere to be found, locked up in a cell in the county jail. I spent the two nights before crying into bowls of rocky road ice cream while watching old episodes of One Tree Hill, but I was determined not to let Jesse ruin my last day in that school. I bought gel pens in all sorts of colors, asking each friend to sign either next to their picture or in the back pages, certain that this would somehow mend my broken heart. I spent that night with a bunch of my closest girlfriends, drinking too much booze and talking about how much we will miss high school. Those were the days.

  It was just too soon to look back on high school and be grateful for the love that had filled my years there. I was still filled with hurt, and rage, and disappointment, and I wasn’t sure that it would ever go away. That was a big part of the reason that, when the school district offered me the choice between teaching at the middle school or teaching at the high school, I hadn’t hesitated in my decision to work at the middle school. I was
here now. There was no looking back.

  I turned the radio on and flipped until I heard a familiar voice. “Another summer day has come and gone away in Paris and Rome, but I wanna go home,” Blake Shelton crooned. There was something about the timing, the lyrics of the song. Was Blake telling me that I should be grateful to be back home? Or was he saying that this town was no longer my home, and that my heart was right to be yearning for the fast pace of the city?

  “I don’t want them to think I failed,” I whispered aloud, surprising myself. I had no clue whether I was talking to myself, or God, or maybe even Blake. In this stupid small town, everyone talked. I wasn’t sure how many of them knew that my father was sick, but I was fairly certain that the ones who didn’t would think I was back because I hadn’t been able to make it—whatever that meant—in the big city. That’s how it worked around here. It was the same way when Sammy Mae went to Los Angeles to try to make it as an actress and came back to Linfield, broke and discouraged, two months later.

  Was working as an art teacher a failure in my eyes? I wasn’t sure I could answer that. When people asked me what I wanted to do for a living, I always said, “Anything to do with art.” By that definition, I was living my dream. On the other hand, the thought of sold-out galleries and making a name for myself in the art world was always the dream. Of course, there was always the secret dream of opening my own art studio. For now, I supposed I was just happy to have a job right out of college and be back where everything was familiar.

  Starting a new adventure in town was scary, but a small part of me was also relieved to have a second chance with the place I’d grown up. Maybe I could make some new memories, preferably less painful than the ones that haunted me every night. A job as a middle school art teacher wasn’t exactly where I thought my art degree would take me, but it was a hell of a lot better than working a dead-end job back in New York just to pay two-thousand dollars a month for a studio apartment. Besides, my dad needed me. And he was all I had left.

  This was a second chance. As long as I could avoid Jesse—or was he still in jail? — and all of the drama from high school, I was good to go. Oh, how I missed this high school. I missed this town, and the familiarity of it all… right? A long honk behind me jolted me back to my reality. I was home again, loveless and alone. Nothing could change that.

  Chapter 2

  Jesse

  “Alright, everybody! It’s show time!” The flamboyant voice behind me came from a man whose appearance was a stark contrast from my own. Standing up, Martin Page was only a fraction of my six-foot-two figure, but, in his director’s chair, he looked even smaller. It didn’t matter, though. Over the past few days, I learned that his appearance was no measure of his intimidation factor. The man was scary.

  Nonetheless, for the next eight hours, until my contract was completed, Martin was my boss. “You, tattoo guy, take your place please,” one of the production assistants said to me. I wasn’t sure if the nickname came from the fact that I was the one inking the pop star for her music video, or if it was because of the twenty-seven tattoos that coated my body. Before I could think it over, Martin gave me a look of death.

  I walked over to the tattoo chair and prepped my needles. They wanted to do something different, they told me. After all, what singer actually gets tattooed while filming their music video? I had my reservations, but the pay was more for three days than I normally made in a month tattooing, not to mention the contract included an all-expenses-paid trip to Los Angeles and I was surrounded by a bunch of hot models.

  Everyone back at home said I was living the dream. I still got to enjoy my small-town life back in Virginia, with bits of travel and excitement and city hustle and bustle thrown in. I owned the Pritchett House, a charming, old-fashioned mansion I had dreamt of buying since high school, while most of the kids from my graduating class still lived with their parents, working entry-level jobs. I suppose I was lucky. I’d be lying if I said this life didn’t get lonely sometimes, though.

  I focused my attention back to the needles that had become my big moneymakers. Truth be told, I had no clue who this pop star I was tattooing even was. The producers said she was the next big thing in pop music, going on tour with one of those boy bands, so I didn’t questioned it. The tattoo was already complete, and was some of my best work. “Stars Align,” the name of her new single, was surrounded by an outer space-themed piece I had sketched out. Everyone loved it.

  Show business, however, had become a heck of a lot more than what I’d bargained for. This was my ninth or tenth trip to California, and the actual tattooing had taken just a few hours of each trip. The rest of the time was spent filming, and re-filming, and still filming again until the guys in charge decided it was good enough.

  It was routine at this point, just another part of the job like the needle prep or tattoo sketching, but that didn’t make it any more exciting for me. I was all about the art. Sketching tattoos from scratch, creating a masterpiece from nothing, was my favorite part of the job. My actual work had long been completed, but no one seemed all that impressed. I supposed that was Hollywood.

  “Tattoo guy,” Martin called. “You need a hair touchup. You think we hired you to look like that? We want to see those sexy locks.”

  I wasn’t sure whether to be flattered or offended. I followed Martin’s eyes, which led me back to the hair and makeup chair I already spent an hour in. Who’d have thought this was what tattooing for the stars was like? Sure, I suppose it would be cool to see myself in the music video once it was released, but, right now, this was just a huge pain in the ass.

  Twenty minutes later, Martin was calling, “Action,” and I was pretending to complete a part of the tattoo that had been done for two days.

  “Open your eyes, follow the signs, you’ll see that the stars align.” I heard the overproduced, bubble gum pop song at least a hundred times over the past seventy-two hours. It was so terrible that I was certain it was going to be a radio hit. My watch told me my flight back to Virginia was in just under twenty hours, and I was glad to get back to the tattoo shop, where I was comfortable. I enjoyed life without the makeup powder on my skin and cameras in my face.

  The lunch buffet spread was filled with all of the fancy foods I expected to find on this trip—and more. Trays of sushi, kale salads, and weird vegan foods you couldn’t pay me enough to eat caught my attention almost as much as the group of four lingerie models standing beside them.

  One of the women, Poppy, as I’d heard Martin refer to her, moved closer to me. Her red, lacy outfit—if you could even call it that—was covered by nothing more than a thin, sheer robe. She made her way closer to me. “Jesse, right?”

  “Yup,” I said. “The one and only.”

  She stretched her arm over a tray of sushi and sashimi, revealing everything any man would want to see. “Where’d you learn how to tattoo like that?”

  “Prison,” I said without missing a beat. It was an answer I’d given dozens of times in the past. Half of the people I said that to had taken a step back, probably out of fear, while the other half laughed, as if the idea of prison was so absurd that I had to be joking.

  “Rad,” Poppy said, showing no sign of surprise. She pulled her plate from the table, held it up like a waitress, and pressed her body against mine. In a lowered voice, she added, “See you around.” As she strutted back to her friends, I admired her firm backside. In the past few years, since my trips to Los Angeles began, I spent many a night with asses like that. Lowering my eyes, I caught a glimpse of a tattoo on the back of her ankle. It was a flower. A sunflower.

  It had been five years, and I still couldn’t look at a sunflower without getting choked up. Roni. Roni and I played hooky the last day of junior year and went off to a sunflower field. I could still see the little pink dress she had worn, twirling about in the sunflowers as I took pictures of her. That was one of the best days of my life.

  Moments like these made me wish that I’d been a bit more selfish, a
nd that I’d have begged Roni to wait for me. She would love Los Angeles. I knew she would. With all of the street art, and museums, and culture, she would feel right at home. Every time I thought about Roni, I told myself it would be the last time. I knew that I needed to move on. But all of the tattoos, and models, and celebrities, and money could never replace true love. I suppose that was something I’d have to live with.

  I’ll call Poppy later, I decided. I could use some release.

  The hotel suite I regularly stayed in when I came to Los Angeles was the size of the entire first floor of the house I grew up in. From the California king-sized bed I was sprawled across, I could only see maybe a quarter of the actual room. Gorgeous pieces of artwork, mostly Monet, lined the walls, while elegant pieces of wooden furniture completed the room that was surely an artist’s haven. While I admit that some of me kept this hotel as my default Los Angeles hotel simply because the bed was comfortable and the room was huge, I also knew that a small part of me kept it because it reminded me of Roni. Roni, who admired Monet’s work more than almost anyone else’s, would be in heaven.

  Nonetheless, Roni was long gone, and I watched in the mirror-covered ceilings as Poppy bent over and bared her naked buttocks as she gathered her clothing. Another fabulous trip to LA was in the books. Poppy ranked up there with the best of them, not too much chit-chat but still an overall pleasure. This had become a routine, a way of numbing a void I knew I had, but I didn’t care. This was what made me happy for now. I was proud of who I’d become.