Held A New Adult Romance(9)

The cocktail was just known as The Pink Stuff. I'm not sure exactly what was in it but I think I spotted the bartender pouring in vodka and white rum. It was a pretty motley crowd. There were guys with popped collars and girls with too much tan, but then I saw a girl with a shaved head and a t-shirt printed with a René Magritte painting - not the pipe, the other famous one. The one where the guy has an apple where his face should be. Another girl was in intense conversation with a bearded guy whose t-shirt bore a twelve sided D&D dice and the legend 'That's How I Roll, Baby'. Seems like all tribes were well represented.

I held onto Everglade's hand as we made our way through the crowd, past the pool table and into a back room that was dark but for the bar and a bunch of weird, luminous sculptures hanging from the ceiling. They looked like someone had tried to make rib-cages and other bone structures out of crappy papier maché and then painted them neon glow-in-the-dark shades - pink, green, electric blue. The plastic cups were the same colors and also glowed in the dark, which was probably the only way anyone could even find their drinks.

In the distance, above a sea of darkened heads and bobbing, glowing cups, I could see the moving spotlights of a dance floor. The music was deafening - Industrial, I think - the chalkboard outside the door had said 90's Night.

"Do not," Everglade bellowed in my ear "I repeat - do not tell my mother about this place."

I laughed. If she came in here would we ever get her back out of the door? I finished my drink and went to find another. The bar in here wasn't nearly so crowded as in the other room. It was also about the only place I could see my hand in front of my face without the aid of a glowing cup of beer.

"What d'you get?" said a voice at my elbow.

I turned round, ready to act snotty like you were supposed to when a strange guy hit on you. There hadn't been many boys in my life, save for a mopey, largely platonic affair with the son of a well-known rock star. So maybe that was why he caught me off-guard. Maybe that was why I was like a deer in the headlights the moment I saw his face.

Somehow I said, "I can get my own drink, thanks," even though he was perfect. His eyes were blue - ice blue - but his hair was black. His eyelashes were longer than any I'd ever seen on a man. High cheekbones, full lips. His nose was wide-bridged and when I saw him side on, a little flattened, giving him a sulky, feline look. His hair was a tangle of curls, falling almost to his shoulders.

"No," he said, smiling. "Your tatt. What did you get?" He indicated the fresh dressing on the back of my shoulder.

"Butterfly," I said. "Boring. It's henna anyway."

He curled his lip. "Pfft. What's the point?" he said, coming very close to make himself heard. He smelled of sweat, leather and something sweet. Or maybe I imagined the last. He was the best looking boy I'd ever seen.

"Tattoos are permanent for a reason," he said. "They tell you who you were, who you are, what you might regret and what you don't."

He was wearing a black wife-beater and I couldn't see any tattoos on him beyond the pitchfork of a little devil poking out above his collarbone. "You talk a big game for someone with so little ink," I said.

He laughed. "Oh baby," he said. "That's where you're wrong. So wrong."

And right there he peeled off his shirt and turned his back to me. It was a huge piece, and one I recognized - the Tarot card depicting Death.

“Kind of morbid,” I said, determined not to be impressed, a pose that slipped away from me the moment he turned back around. His chest was sculpted and I was sure my jaw was on the floor. Maybe Rose-Tattoo had it nailed – the death of my childhood. I’d had my crushes and my pin-up boys before, but he was the first man I ever really wanted to fuck.

"It's not morbid," he said. "In the midst of life we are in death - ain't that what the Good Book says?"

"I wouldn't know," I said, flipping my hair. Realizing his effect on me had only made me more aloof. "I'm an atheist."

He smiled. His teeth were white, the eyeteeth a little sharp. My very own vampire - wouldn't Everglade be jealous? "You a freshman or something?" he asked, like my lack of faith was some kind of adolescent pose.

"No." I was on the defensive and the half-truth just popped out of me before I could help myself. I felt my face turn hot at the thought that he might find out I was still in High School.

"You ever pray, cher?" he said, his lips hot on my ear as he yelled. Cher - it was then I noticed his accent, even over the blast of the music. Louisiana - a breath of Bourbon Street and Spanish moss, voodoo and Mardi Gras. He was all my Anne Rice novels come to life. "You should pray. It's a big, bad world for a little thing like you."