Graceful Scars Read online

  “Oh, no,” his tongue darted out and ran across my bottom lip. “I fucking loved it.”

  I moved to get up so we could put our clothes back on when the sound of ripping material caught my attention. I had moved my legs too far apart and torn my panties completely in half. “That’s just great.” We both broke out in laughter. I tossed them in the trashcan beside the swing and started getting clothed once again.

  The drive home had my mind spiraling so much; it was like I hadn’t had an amazing getaway with the man I love. As the city limit sign came into view I found myself biting my nails nervously about being back. We pulled into the parking lot of Talon’s apartment just after sunset. I let out a large breath and mentally told myself that I could handle whatever would be thrown at me in the days to come. I had left Adalynn without making amends from that night at the studio when Heather was attacked; it was time for me to be the one to smooth things over between us. The last thing I wanted was to have tension hanging over my best friend and me.

  We grabbed our bags from the trunk–this time I wouldn’t allow him to carry mine–and headed for the entrance to the building. It was colder in Chicago than it was at the cabin previously, but after so long you get used to the weather in Chicago. Talon dropped his bag on the ground as he unlocked his apartment and held the door open so that I could pass by him. The silence inside was odd. Usually Zoey would be bouncing off the walls and Adalynn would be doing something in the kitchen, but the living room and kitchen were both vacant. We shared a curious look as he locked the door behind us.

  “Anybody here?” Talon called out, but no response.

  “That’s odd.”

  “Yeah, neither of them said anything about going anywhere.”

  “I didn’t notice if Adalynn’s car was parked outside either,” I replied. “I’ll see if I can tell from the window.” I walked over to the double windows in the living room and pulled the curtains back. “It’s too dark to tell what car is what.” The parking area was dimly lit, making it hard to tell any of the darker cars apart.

  I left my bag by the windows and headed down the hallway after Talon. He stood in the doorway of Zoey’s room with an amused look on his face. “What?” I asked. He turned and placed his index finger over his mouth to tell me to be quiet. I arched an eyebrow at him as he motioned me to move into the doorway with him. As I stepped into the doorway I saw what had him so amused, Zoey and Adalynn both stretched out in the floor with their studio clothes spread all over the floor around them. They were out cold. I covered my mouth with my hand to try and stifle my laugh as Talon smiled widely at the scene in front of us.

  “Come on,” he whispered and stepped out of the doorway. I pulled my cellphone out and snapped a picture of them fast asleep on the floor before following him back down the hallway.

  Talon was sitting on the couch by the time I made it into the living room. “I think I’m going to head on home,” I told him as I walked toward my bag over by the window.

  “Your car isn’t here,” he reminded me. I was mentally slapping myself because I had forgotten about him picking me up for our getaway. “I can take you if you want, but I really think you should just stay.”

  I wanted to go home because of everything I had to tackle the next day. I had planned on talking to Adalynn once we got back but she was sleeping and I was having second thoughts about doing it that night. My mind was back to being a jumbled mess, but I should have known better than trying to run away to my place so that I could be alone. Talon wouldn’t allow it. He sees right through me, and he knows when I need someone to talk to or someone to just hold me. So I gave in, I was staying at Talon’s.

  “I’ll stay.” I smiled as I flopped down on the couch beside him and laid my head in his lap. He began running his fingers through my long hair, relaxing me and making my eyelids feel heavy. It made me think of when my mother used to play with my hair whenever I had a nightmare and needed to go back to sleep. She was my safe haven as a child, and now Talon was it for my adulthood.

  Chapter Sixteen

  “I think we need to talk about everything.” I finally broke the silence of the ride home with Adalynn. We were halfway to my house and the sound of the radio was harassing me to say something to cut the tension in the air between us, so I broke down and did.

  “Okay,” she replied without taking her eyes off of the road.

  “I’m sorry,” I blurted out. “I shouldn’t react to things the way I do, but I honestly can’t help it. Ever since that son of a bitch took my normal life and turned it upside down I’ve been different, you know that. It’s not an excuse, it’s the truth. I struggle with negative aspects of life and when something dramatic happens all I can think to do is run or close myself off from the people around me. I always blame myself. I need to learn to deal with things differently because I hate hurting the people around me, mainly you. With that being said, what needs to be taken care of with the studio and where do we go from here?”

  Adalynn kept her eyes on the road as silence hung thick in the air after everything I had gotten out. My nerves were shot and the longer she sat there the worse they became.

  “I think you need to sell the building.” Her words were like a massive blow to the chest, they knocked the air right out of me. I gasped a couple times as I tried to process what she had suggested.

  “What—why?”

  She turned into the parking lot of my building and turned the car off once we were parked. Adalynn sighed heavily before turning towards me in the seat. “Almost every student has been pulled from class. It isn’t smart to keep it open with the amount of students we have now. What happened to Heather put a huge hit on the studio’s safety. I know it wasn’t your fault, and I’m honestly the one to blame here for the girls being out back alone in the first place, but there isn’t anything we can do now.” Adalynn got out of the car assuming I would follow, but I didn’t. I sat there in complete shock from what she had told me. I was losing Graceful Moves, it was going to close.

  I sat there in stunned silence for several minutes before I could finally force myself out of the vehicle. I walked slowly up the sidewalk to the front entrance. Usually I would hold the door back and close it softly, because it slammed loudly otherwise, but I couldn’t bring myself to care about that. The sound of it slamming shut echoed down the hall as I continued my dazed walk to my front door. I turned the knob and pushed it open. I hung my coat up on the rack behind the door and took a seat beside Adalynn at the kitchen bar.

  “I’m sorry this has happened, Tegan. I know how much you love Graceful Moves and just how important that studio has been for your life. Even with the horrible things that happened there, you found a way to push past it and continue on with keeping it open. I hate to see it close, but the reality is upon us and I am all out of options.” She covered my shaky hand on the counter with one of her own.

  “I’m losing everything,” I whispered as tears began to run down my face.

  Adalynn wrapped her arms around me, pulling me into her chest. “You’re not losing everything. You have me, Zoey, and Talon. We all love you. This might be a major bump in the road but it too can be overcome. Just don’t give up.” I took in her words as I cried into her chest. My life was changing yet again.

  We spent hours going over the finances of Graceful Moves once I got over the initial heartbreak of it all. So much needed to be taken care of, paid, and sold before everything was all said and done. Adalynn was the one to call the last few students that we had to let them know we were closing the doors. Every time I heard her say those words my throat tightened and tears clouded my eyes. I hated the fact that that bastard was forcing me to let go of the business that had helped me become who I was. But all good things eventually come to an end, right?

  “Okay, it looks like we have one round of utility bills left to pay and the refund of the remainder of the month to the students, which is less than a week’s worth of time,” Adalynn spoke as she typed away on the calculato
r before her. I was seated on the floor of my living room, going through my legal papers, trying to decipher what I’d have to do to sell the building and dissolve the business. Adalynn suggested that I should keep the corporation for a while, since I had paid my fees a few years out, but I wasn’t so sure I wanted to keep it. Eventually I would have to dissolve it anyway.

  “Well that’s a good thing at least,” I replied about the bill payments and refund we were giving the students. Many people closing their doors wouldn’t do refunds like we were; I felt it was the right thing to do since they’d had no part in what happened to Graceful Moves. Why should they be penalized for it?

  “You’ll have a good amount of money left over, and since the building is paid for, you’ll get almost all of the funds from its sale.” I hadn’t even thought about that. Maybe it wasn’t going to be as hard on me as I thought.

  “So you’re saying I will have plenty of time to figure out what the hell I am going to do about a job once the building is sold?” I stopped what I was doing and gave Adalynn my full attention.

  “That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

  “It’s like a silver lining.”

  “I told you there is always something good buried in the bad.” She smiled happily at me.

  “Yes, you did,” I sighed and leaned back against the bottom of the couch.

  Placing the for sale sign in front of Graceful Moves made my heart hurt. Talon offered to do it without me having to be there, but I couldn’t do that. I had to do it; I had to learn to move forward when things knocked me down. Adalynn, Zoey, and Talon were all at the studio with me to help pack up my office and all of the trophies and memorabilia. The bleachers and everything else was going with the building.

  I stood in the center of the dance floor and stared at my reflection in the tall mirrors before me. The sadness I was feeling was all over my face. I didn’t want the studio to close. I didn’t want any of what had happened over the past fifteen months to be real, but it all was. I walked over to the mirrors and ran my hand across the balance bar. The memories this bar held brought tears to my eyes, not to mention the memories the entire building held. Good and bad.

  “You okay?” Talon asked as he stepped up beside me threading his fingers through mine so our hands were interlocked.

  “I will be.” I looked over at him as a tear slid down my cheek.

  Talon pulled me into his arms and held me tightly as I tried to gain composure. “Give it time, Tegan. You’re a strong woman who built Graceful Moves from the floor up, you can accomplish so much. I have faith in you.” He kissed my forehead.

  “I appreciate that.”

  “It’s the truth.” He dropped his hand to mine and linked them again. “Let’s finish loading up the boxes and go grab some lunch and milkshakes.”

  “Sounds like the perfect plan to me.”

  It didn’t take the four of us long to finish loading the boxes into the box truck Adalynn had managed to borrow from her father. Adalynn and I walked around the studio, making sure we weren’t missing anything, but it was more like we didn’t want to let go of the place. “Well, looks like we got it all.” She sounded as sad as I felt.

  “Yeah…” We both stopped right in front of the main doors.

  “I guess this is it,” she sniffled.

  “I guess so,” I countered, trying to hold my tears at bay myself.

  “It’s the end of one era, and the beginning of something new, right?” We looked at each other as I placed a hand on the light switch.

  “Right,” I replied as I flipped the lights off one last time and we stepped over the threshold to the sidewalk outside. The door shut behind us and I slid the key into the lock to officially close the place down.

  Talon and Zoey had already left for the café where we always liked to meet. He thought it would be best for Adalynn and me to have the final moments at the studio alone. It was a bittersweet occasion, one that would forever be instilled into my brain. But I was determined not to let it get me down for the long haul. Adalynn and I piled into the box truck and headed towards the café.

  “So what are you going to do now?” I asked Adalynn.

  “I’m not really sure.” An unsure look crossed her face. “I have some money saved, so I think I’m going to take some time to enjoy life.”

  “That sounds…interesting.” I gave her a knowing look.

  “I’m not disappearing again. I promise.” She held out her pinkie finger towards me.

  I wrapped my pinkie around hers. “I would hunt your ass down if you run off again.”

  “I’m not going anywhere, at least not for good.” I let go of her pinkie as she turned into the parking lot of the café.

  As soon as I opened the door to get out of the box truck, the cold Chicago wind hit me in the face. “Why does winter have to be such a bitch?!” I shivered as we walked fast to the doors of the café.

  “On second thought, I’m leaving Chicago for a tropical paradise,” Adalynn joked.

  “You’re taking me with you then,” I warned.

  “Pack your bags,” she countered.

  Talon spotted us scanning the place and waved us over. He and Zoey were tucked away in a booth towards the back of the café. Four chocolate milkshakes sat on the table; his and hers had an inch or so gone out of them. My stomach rolled with happiness as Adalynn and I slid into the opposite side of the booth and took big swigs from our milkshakes.

  “Mmm…” I moaned.

  “Why are these so damn good?!” Adalynn asked. “It’s too damn cold to be drinking these, but I can’t help myself.” She continued to ramble between slurps.

  Zoey was giggling about something on her phone as Talon watched me drink the milkshake through my straw. “What?” I smiled at him.

  “Nothing,” his grin grew larger, “Just watching you is all.” His eyes softened as I diverted my eyes to the glass my milkshake was in. Talon’s love and admiration made me feel giddy like a school girl at times, and this was one of those times.

  “Did I miss something here?” Adalynn cautiously asked and I smiled. “Never mind! It’s that lovey dovey shit the two of you have going on. I’m completely fine not knowing.”

  I couldn’t control my laughter, and once I got started Talon and Adalynn started too. Zoey lifted her head up from being glued to the screen of her phone. “What’s going on?” She glanced at the three of us with curiosity.

  “You don’t want to go there,” Adalynn warned her. That was all Zoey needed to make a disgusted face and drop her head back down to her phone.

  “What’s so interesting on your phone, anyway?” I leaned across the table to try to see, but she hid it.

  “Nothing.” Her cheeks lit up like a red bulb on a strand of Christmas lights.

  “Looks like nothing,” I teased.

  “She has a boyfriend.” Talon rolled his eyes.

  “What!” I over exaggerated the shock from the news.

  “I do not…” Zoey groaned as her face flushed even more.

  “Don’t let her lie. She’s been talking to some boy in her class that runs every time I show up to pick her up from school.” Talon chuckled, “I think he thinks I’m going to beat him up or something.”

  “He’s just a friend!” Zoey argued.

  “I’m just Talon’s friend,” I teased.

  Talon gave me a heated look that could have turned my milkshake into complete liquid. “She better not have a friend, like you are to me.” He narrowed his eyes as he snagged Zoey’s phone away from her and started scrolling through her messages.

  “Hey!!” Zoey tried to grab it back from him. “Talon!!! Give it back!! This isn’t fair!!” She punched him in the arm repeatedly until he gave in and handed it back to her.

  “All innocent conversation,” he informed Adalynn and me as he wiped his hands together.

  “I’m so glad I never had a big brother,” Adalynn joked. “Because I would want to murder him on numerous occasions I’m sure.”

>   Talon’s smile started to fade, I knew he was thinking about his baby brother and parents dying. Adalynn’s statement made me think about that too, even though she hadn’t meant it to hurt anyone. I reached across the table and grabbed one of his hands. He brought his eyes up to mine and I mouthed ‘I love you’ which brought that gorgeous smile of his back.

  After lunch Adalynn and I dropped the stuff in the box trunk off at a storage unit I had rented. I didn’t want to clutter up my house with it until I decided what was next. Adalynn dropped me off at my apartment so she could take the truck back to her dad. It was the first time I was home alone in a while. I dropped my bag and keys on the counter and hung my coat on the hanger behind the door. I kicked my tennis shoes off and headed straight for the bottle of wine that had been calling my name all day. I popped the cork and filled my glass to the rim. I took a seat at the bar and smelled the aroma of the sweet red wine before taking a large gulp. The smoothness of it was nice, and the slight burn was even better. I closed my eyes as I took in the taste and sat back in the chair. My mind was actually quiet for once.

  I opened my eyes and took another large gulp. I looked around my apartment. Everything screamed Tegan Carter, the girl who had a successful dance studio. That girl didn’t exist anymore. A large painting of a dancer hung behind my couch; I always adored that painting. Anymore it made me sad. How could one person alter others’ entire lives? Why would someone do what he did? I shook my head to try and get rid of the thoughts and downed the remainder of wine in my glass before refilling it back to the rim. This bottle wasn’t going to last through the night.

  After finishing my second glass I decided to take a shower. The dust from going through the studio made me feel grimy, and my muscles were tense from all of the lifting. I turned the faucet to a medium-hot temperature, discarded my clothes, and stepped inside. At first my skin burned from the heat, but soon became used to it. I closed my eyes as the shower pelted down on me, massaging my shoulders and back. I hung my head and allowed the water to run down me. It felt nice, relaxing even. The solace I was feeling made me happy. I had thought shutting down my studio would be a lot tougher than it actually was. Maybe it hadn’t set in that I wouldn’t step foot into Graceful Moves again, or maybe relief would take over and allow me to move forward with all aspects of my life. Just like everything else, only time would tell.