I was sure I memorized the patterns of his tattoos, like the veins of a city on google earth. Faded but prominent all at once. His couldn't compare to the others, not like the man I went home to each day, I couldn't memorize those if I wanted. In the sheets of that ship wreck and in the arms of a troubled heart, I envisioned them. Petty I know.
He opens his eyes and stares back into mine, "Should I go?"
"Why?" I whisper.
"I don't want you to get into trouble." I caress the shaved portion of his skull and bring my finger back down to trace his lips.
"I won't, just stay a while longer?"
"Anything you want." He smiles.
I know that in his mind, even though it feels perfect to be here together, with one another this is wrong. Not because of the constant lying that circulates between the two of us but the sneaking around, which he claims "adds another adventurous aspect to me." I can see he hates it and it kills me.
"Adam will not find out." I tell him.
"That's not what I'm thinking about."
"Then what are you thinking about?"
"You." I blush as he brings his lips to mine and we stay locked together like that, with his hands on my face, my hands on his and our eyes discovering love again.
I remember meeting him when I was still a senior in high school, at one of Adams band meets he used to host in his basement. He grabbed my attention the moment his lips touched that mic and all his emotions poured out into one single measure. At the time I was with Adam, I had been for a year by now, but something made me second guess that. So I ignored him for a while. Two years. But somehow Matty found his way back.
And I was hooked.
It started New Year's Eve. After emptying the trash I saw him on the staircase outside, a cigarette to his lips. I stepped out.
"Hey." I said taking two steps at a time.
"Hey,"
"What are you doing?" I asked as he flicked his cigarette away.
"Smoking." I looked down at the butt slowly fading in the snow. "It's so cold why are you out here?" He adjusted my coat, smiling.
"Checking on you."
"How sweet of you."
"You got another cigarette?"
"You smoke?"
"No but we can buy more time to talk."
"To talk?" He questioned still going in his pocket and pulling the pack out. "About what?"
"Your day?" He gave me a smile, one I saw frequently when he would sing.
"My day? You don't want to know about my day."
"Why not?" He lights his second cigarette and inhales.
"It was a shity day."
"Yeah but why?"
"I can't tell you that."
"Matty!" I pry, "you can tell me anything. I'm your friend." Exhale. The smoke drifts through his nose colliding with smoke from my breath.
"Yeah but it ruins the whole friend thing." I reach for the cigarette and he pulls back. "I am not introducing you to cigarettes."
"We'll then at least tell me." He crushes the end if the cigarette on the banister and steps closer to me.
"This will ruin everything I've tried to build, with them and with you. When I tell you this it might all be over. "
"Just say it." I told him, hoping that he was thinking the same thing I was.
"I spent all day looking at you two touching and laughing and kissing and I couldn't help but think of me as the man you loved." He grabbed my waist with one hand and took my face in the other. "And it's okay if you don't think of me that way but don't quit talking to me because that would be to much."
I grabbed at his hair, pulling his lips to mine.
"I could never dream of it."
And it was true.
Now as he lays in my bed, I do not regret my decision. But telling Adam I do.
