Thirty Nights (American Beauty #1)(87)

I force my lungs to inhale. This I can explain. “Well, I was upset because we had a misunderstanding. He wanted to distance me because he thought I deserved better. I thought he didn’t like me, and it all fell apart from there. But then he came over and explained. And now, here we are,” I say, blushing head to toe, the way I imagine I would have blushed if I admitted this to my dad.

“The part about him thinking you deserve better is what worries me.”

I shake my head. How can I explain that without betraying Aiden? “Most good men are biased against themselves. Sound familiar?”

He smiles. “A man knows himself better than anyone else, Isa. Anyway, so now what—he has declared himself and wants to be with you?”

This is the question. This is what I ask myself each night on those last blissful seconds of consciousness after being Aiden’s completely. Does Aiden really want to be with me? Not to save me, not to make love to me, but to really want me by his side?

“Well, no…not exactly. We’re just spending some time together.”

“Some time together?” I have managed break through Javier’s calm exterior. “Sweetheart, you may not have time! A whole team of lawyers is telling you that. And you want to spend it with someone who can’t even spare two hours to come to your party. Even if you had all the time in the world, that would not be okay.”

“It’s not like that,” I whisper but my stomach is churning so violently that I’m afraid I will vomit. “He’s a really good man.”

“If it’s not like that, then why do you look like you just overdosed on paint fumes?”

I look up at the deep wrinkles on his forehead despite his twenty-three years, wishing I could smooth them away. “What really worries you, Javier? What do you think is happening?”

He takes a deep breath. “Honestly, I have no clue. But I think he’s dangerous and I worry that he’s going to try to take you away from us.”

I don’t touch the dangerous part. “Take me from you? Javier, look at everything he did just so that we can be together and have a good time!”

“Yeah, but he’s not here! How soon before you have to choose between him or us? Even if you can stay?”

“He wants me to have all of you. He wants me to be happy. Why don’t you believe that?” I say with as much strength as I can muster. The problem is that he cannot be part of my life and I want him to be. I want it badly.

Javier looks at the painting, stabbing a finger at the Spartan. “Because I don’t know what’s going on in your picture. Is he with you because whatever you give him is like this shield over here? Or does he love you?”

My knees almost buckle at his questions. I never thought of Aiden’s feelings that way. That he is not really choosing to have me, he is just captive to his memory and addicted—as he said—to the calmness I give him. He wants to save me, yes. He wants me to have my own life because he is a good man. But when it comes to his desire for me, is that all it is—addiction, not love?

Javier pats my shoulder. “You love him,” he says. It’s not a question.

I look up at him. How does he know?

He smiles as he reads the question in my eyes. “You didn’t think I would notice? I see the lighter eyes, the shy, drunk smile you’ve never had before. Even your blush is different. And now you look like you’re about to faint.” He speaks softly, searching my face. “Just be careful, okay? I don’t want you to be like this woman here. Scared to death but even more afraid to show it. I’m here for you. All of us are.”

I throw my arms around him, hugging him tightly. Hugging him with all the fear he has seen and all the fear he is taking away. “How can I ever thank you, Javier? I’ve never deserved you or your family but I love you all with all my heart.”

He ruffles my hair. “Well, if you really want to thank me, just be happy. And don’t let Hale drive a wedge between us. Yes, you need us, but we need you too. You’re the only one that believes in my art, in my genius, as you call it. Everyone else I know sees it as a means to food. But you, you’re vicious. You think I’ll make it. Over the years, your nagging has kept me going. And, despite myself, you’ve made me believe. Or at least dream. You can’t take that away.”

“I won’t,” I promise, my eyes drifting back to the Spartan in the painting. “Do you think he will come home?” I whisper after a while.

Javier smiles, looking at the painting too. “Artist opinion or Javier opinion?”

“Both.”

“Well, lucky for you, they’re the same.” He waits for me to look at him. “Yes, I think he will come home.”

I smile, swallowing the stupid tears. “Are you sure?”

“Positive. Look at the sunlight streaming through the window. His face is bathed in it. And also, he looks like a total badass.”

I laugh and sniffle at the same time. “He is.”

“Come on, let’s go to your party. You’ll freak out when you see it.”

*

At the gallery’s double doors, Javier grips the knobs with a smile.

“I have to give him this. He does surprises well. Happy everything, Isa!” He opens the white doors.

I brace myself because I know by now that when Aiden is involved, I will lose my breath and even my balance. But the preparation is futile. The moment I take in the intimate white marble gallery, I still gasp and wobble. Beyond the checkered dance floor, the buffet of Mexican food and the happy faces in the center, are the gallery’s illuminated walls. On each of them, in vivid, colored photographs, hang my last four years in chronological order. Some enormous, some the size of the double frame I just gave to Aiden. Not only from my camera but also from Reagan, the Solises, and even Denton over the years. I search every frame hungrily, looking for a picture of Aiden. At first I panic that he has excluded himself but then I find him. On the fourth wall, in a small frame toward the end of my time here, are his otherworldly eyes watching me with a smile. Under his gaze, one by one, every part of me stands at attention: my skin, my blood, my bones and that little spot between my lungs that responds only to him.