Free Give Me Strength by Kate McCarthy

took the call, talking quietly, yet I
still heard him say he’d been held up and would be there in a
minute.
    He hung up and Rick narrowed his eyes, obviously
hearing the tail end of the conversation as well. Because Lucy had
no idea why Travis was here, Rick must have assumed he was here for
personal reasons because he asked, “You’re not staying for
dinner?”
    Travis paused in the act of sliding his phone in
his back pocket.
    I felt his eyes on me, and my stomach hardened
against the hurt I shouldn’t be feeling. A one night stand was
supposed to be about never seeing the other person again. The
distance in his eyes should have been expected. Frankly, I should
been welcoming it, encouraging it even.
    “I have to be somewhere,” he told us.
    I smiled, not letting it reach my eyes. “Well,
we won’t keep you any longer. Thanks for dropping off the
paperwork.”
    My dismissal was obvious and Rick frowned at me,
not understanding my cool behaviour.
    Travis placed the envelope down on the counter.
“I guess I’ll see you later,” he murmured and with a nod at both
Rick and Justin, who offered a brief salute from the couch, he
left.
    My eyes watched his retreating back, remembering
the eagle wings that splayed the width of his wide, tanned
shoulders. My mind had pondered the meaning of that tattoo all
afternoon. The eagle was a creature of purity, beauty, and a
powerful force. When I looked at Travis, I couldn’t think of
anything more fitting. When the door clicked shut behind him, it
felt like I’d just lost something that had never been mine.
    Justin rubbed his hand through his overly long
black hair, leaving it mussed. “Who’s Travis?”
    “What? You don’t know?” Rick smirked at Justin,
smug because for once he was in the loop and knew the gossip.
    Shaking myself out of the unwanted feelings
Travis had evoked, I cut Rick off. “Rick! Do you want the damn
sugar or not?”
    I jammed the bag of sugar at his big chest and
he grabbed it before it dropped to the floor.
    “No?” Justin said in response to Rick.
    “He’s the guy that Quinn hooked up with last
night.”
    I rubbed my forehead, sore from today’s anxiety.
“Thanks, Rick,” I muttered under my breath. Thanks very much for
making it known that I took a paddle through the skank pool last
night. I checked my watch. Surely we must be hitting the next
episode of 24 by now— The hour between seven pm and
eight pm —because it felt like a lifetime ago that Lucy had
dragged me out to that bloody bar.
    ***

 
     
    I whimpered unhappily
when my alarm went off at six the next morning, desperate for
another ten minutes before madness descended. My arm reached out
and smacked the snooze button before returning to wrap around my
pillow.
    My front door opened and then slammed shut,
madness finding her way into my room in her workout gear. A bright,
cheery smile adorned her face that my tired body wanted to stomp
all over.
    I hadn’t slept well but nightmares weren’t
designed to be pleasant; they spun fear dizzily through a painful
slideshow of memories. Last night was different though. The usual
shadowy images had been replaced by skin the colour of liquid gold
and the slide of rough, hot hands on my skin. Apparently visions of
Travis could also ensure a sleepless night for me. Not only that, I
was usually able to savour my own space, but I’d woken to a bed
that felt too big for my small frame and entirely too empty.
    I grabbed my pillow in one hand, my blankets in
the other, and prepared to burrow deeply into the thick, warm
covers, but Lucy snatched the pillow from my grasp.
    “No,” I moaned unhappily, making a desperate
grab for it.
    “Come on, Quinn. It’s exercise time!” Her wide
eyes, and her words for that matter, were manic.
    My slitted eyes raked her over. “I hate
you.”
    “And I love your face.” She held the pillow
aloft. “Get up.”
    “I can’t. My feet fell off last night, and I
can’t find them.”
    “Har har.” She