CHAPTER 10

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"BEAUTIFUL IN MY EYES"

- JOSHUA KADISON -

*THEME SONGS FOR: A LOVE SONG FOR A LIARS*





You're my piece of mind,

in this crazy world.

You're everything I've tried to find,

your love is a pearl.



You're my Mona Lisa, you're my rainbow skies,

and my only prayer, is that you realize,

you'll always be beautiful, in my eyes.



The world will turn,

and the seasons will change.

And all the lessons we will learn,

will be beautiful and strange.



We'll have our fill of tears, our share of sighs.

My only prayer, is that you realize.

You'll always be beautiful, in my eyes.



You will always be, beautiful in my eyes.

And the passing years will show,

that you will always grow,

evermore beautiful, in my eyes.



And there are lines upon my face,

from a lifetime of smiles.

But when the time comes to embrace,

for one long last while.



We can laugh about it, how time really flies.

We won't say goodbye, cause true-love never dies.

You'll always be beautiful, in my eyes.



You will always be, beautiful in my eyes.

And the passing years will show,

that you will always grow,

evermore beautiful, in my eyes.



The passing years will show,

that you will always grow,

evermore beautiful, in my eyes...







---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


I brush past her to where Emily's standing next to Frat Boy.







Sure enough, he's grinning at her like she's sex and chocolate all wrapped up in a single package.







Emily's gaze lights on me, and her smile dims a few watts at whatever's on my face. "Hey, Babe!"







"Hey, Tim." I slide a hand around Emily's waist, brushing her hip with my fingers as I bend toward her ear. "We're going."







Frat Boy's face falls, and I memorize the moment he realizes she's not his.







Still, the regret in Emily's voice as she says goodbye annoys me all the way out the front door and down the steps.







"What is wrong with you, Timothy?! Why were you being a dick to that guy?" she demands once we're on the sidewalk. Drunk people stumble past us, laughing and carefree.







"Because he was working to get in your pants, Emily! Are you numb!?"







She cocks her head. "Then he didn't need to work so hard. I'm wearing a skirt!"







"Oh fuck, Emily! You being a hard headed now?!"







I'm seconds from ripping into her with some uptight tirade about college guys only wanting one thing, but my phone rings before I can.







The number has me stopping in my tracks. I let it ring, and when the phone goes silent, the world suddenly feels too still.







"It's your Dad, isn't it Tim?" Emily's voice fills the night air around us.







I haven't talk about it with anyone because if I don't say it out loud, it doesn't matter so much.







"No," I hear myself say. "He was my father but not anymore."







I rub a hand over my jaw, the stubble I didn't have time to shave this morning. Weather it's a surprise phone call or the way Emily's looking at me, non judgmental and patient, I continue.







"The money I saved from working with Wicked in Philly was supposed to pay for college. I had two year's worth. My Dad thought I owed it to him."







Her shiny lips curve, incredulous. "He locked you out. You owed him nothing." Her voice is soothing, but under the surface, there's an echo of anger.







"He has his reasons for thinking I did." My chest contracts as the memories wash over me, things I've buried deep down where they belong. "I told him if I did that, we were even and he could never ask me for anything again. He promised."







"So, on my eighteen birthday, we went to the bank and I signed over every penny. I haven't talked to him since."







My phone dings once more with a voicemail notification. I hit delete and shove the phone in my pocket.







"Aren't you going to listen to it?" she asks.







"No. Either he's saying everything's great now that I'm out from under his roof, or he's blown through the money and wants more."







I start walking again, my motions stilted, and she follows.







"I don't blame him." I say after half a block. "You get too dependent on people, they find a way to take from you. It's human nature."







"But relationships aren't one way. When you say no to someone because you're afraid they'll take from you, you're also saying no to what they could give you."







'Which is what?"







The little noise in her throat makes me look over, and I'm surprised to see her smiling. "You have to say yes to find out."







I turn that over as we come to a little dive bar tucked into a strip mall at the corner.







She stares at it longingly. "My car's right behind that building, but it seems like a waste to go home. I shaved my legs and everything."







My attention drags down her body. Her strappy shoes with fuck me heels. The black dress that hugs her curves. The hint of makeup lining her eyes, the gloss making her lips shine.







It's a bad idea, but whether it's the look on her face as if maybe she needs this or a feeling in me like maybe I do, I can't say no.







"I missed out on dinner too." I admit. "Maybe they've got cheese fries."







Her face lights up like I just promised her to fucking sun.







Inside the dive restaurant are a dozen students and a few older people. There's an arcade at one end with a billiard table.







Emily makes a beeline for the billiard table. "Oh yeah. This is it." The desire in he voice has the hairs lifting on my neck even before her gaze finds mine. Wanna play pool?







Adrenaline hits me, a rush that's too intense given her innocent question.







Fucking yes, I want to play pool. After the call from my Dad, I want it so badly I ache.







"We need stakes." she decides, glancing at the chalkboard menu over the bar. "Loser buys cheese fries."







"Not enough." I argue. "Whoever sinks a ball gets to ask a question."







We go to the bar to order sodas, then set our Cokes on the edge of the billiard table. I reach for the cues on the wall as she leans over the felt and racks up the balls. "Are you dating that girl who was at the pool house and the party?" she asks casually. "or is it only sex?"







The light hanging over the table casts her face half in shadows. That coupled with her low, confident voice, has me doing a double-take.



"My bad." Emily takes a cue from me and breaks, and one ball drops into the corner pocket. She smiles, slow and satisfied, before lifting her gaze to mine. "So, is it only sex?"







A voice deep down tells me I should lie, that it's better for all of us.







But she won and she asked, and I can't reward her with anything less than the truth.







"She's my tutor."







Emily's smile melts away as she straightens. "But I walked into the pool house that morning after Carla's party and she was there."







I take a drink of my soda, eye her over the cup. "I met her my first week here. Knew I'd need some help in chemistry and physics, and she tutors both."







"She came over at midnight?" Emily arches a dark brow, and I mimic her in response.







"I wanted someone to talk to without a stake in all this. It was a fucked-up week. She came, then she crashed."







She stares at me a long moment, and I nod to the table, impatient. "It's still your shot."







Emily misses.







I circle the table before lining up my shot across from her.







I sink the five.







There are a million things I could ask her, but the one I'm most interested in is. "Tell me why you're really pissed at your Dad?"







She screws up her face. "Because he won't let me anywhere near music."







"You can't blame him for that."







"I don't. I blame you."







Surprise has me stiffening.







"You were better at everything, always, than I was." she continues. "Since you moved here, all of his time that he's not working, or with Sofia, or with Haley, he's with you."







It's still my turn, but Emily circles the table, never lifting her attention from the possible shots, even when she has to step sideways to avoid me.







"But I realized something tonight." she goes on. "It's not your fault. He wouldn't have let me in anyway."







"I couldn't come between you if I wanted to." There's a sense of urgency beneath my words.







She chalks up her cue, oblivious, and I step between her and the table.



I take the cue from her hands so she's forced to meet my gaze. "You have to know that." I press.







Her expression shifts from determined to resigned. "It's not only about the music. At my Dad and Haley's wedding last summer, a woman approached me and said she was my biological mother."







My stomach ices over. "What the fuck?"







"She handed me a letter that's Saturday unopened in my drawer for a year. I haven't told anyone except for you right now. Maybe it's like the voicemails from your Dad. I want to believe it says that she loves me, that she's proud. That we should get brunch sometime in New York or wherever she lives." She shrugs a shoulder, the simple movement conveying way more than apathy. "But what if it says something terrible? Some secret I can't unknown?"







The confusion in her voice rips at me. I hate that she's had this burden for a year, even if it's partly my fault.







"Why didn't you tell me?" I murmur even though I think I know the answer.







She puts a hand on her hip, cocking her head. "You were busy being too cool for me."







"Maybe I'm done being too cool for you."







Emily sucks in a breath but recovers fast, angling her chin up. "Maybe I'm done caring."







She starts to step away, but my fingers wrap around her upper arm, and her gaze flies to mine. She's close enough I could pull her into my arms, and against my better judgment, I want to.







"She can't say anything that changes who you are." I tell her. "Who your Dad is."







I release her arm, brush a thumb over her cheek, and watch the conflicting emotions scroll across her face.







The scratches has healed, like my hand, but we can't go back to the way we were before.







There was always a connection between us, and I'm starting to see why.







We have the same pain even though we've never talked about it. Even though we deal with it differently.







I bury mine so deep it can't get surface, but hers...




She breathes it every day. Lives through it, makes the world more beautiful despite all of it.




Emily grabs her cue back from me but doesn't step away. "I don't want your pity, okay? I want to play pool. And laugh.