Girls Who Travel by Nicole Trilivas Page A

Bettencourt, came out whistling.
He’s probably drunk again
, I judged.
    Meanwhile, on the phone Lochlon proceeded to tell me in meticulous detail what it was exactly that excited him: “. . . thinking of you lying down on the bed under me, your wrists above your head—”
    â€œLochlon, I’m in public,” I muttered into the phone, making accidental eye contact with Aston. He caught my eye for a moment and looked as if he was trying to place me. Maybe he was too drunk to remember me from the last time.
    â€œYou in public, eh? That makes the fantasy a wee bit hotter, doesn’t it now?” Lochlon breathed. “And then tugging off your—”
    â€œShh!” I hissed loudly into the phone.
    Thinking I had shushed him, Aston stopped whistling and whipped around to shoot me a disbelieving look. He sneered and rapidly stalked off down the street before I could let him know I hadn’t meant him.
    â€œLochlon,” I begged, “I just can’t take it,” I mock-cried into the phone. “Stop right now.”
    But he was unrelenting. “Oh, you can take it, I think.”
    I swallowed hard to compose myself and then changed the subject, because I could feel myself coloring in hell-hot lust. It had been far too long.
    He snickered on the other end of the line. This was just how he liked me: squirming and impatient for him.
    â€œSo how is everything else?” I asked, clearing my throat. He already told me he didn’t want to talk about his dad, so I ducked around that subject. “Have you seen your old friends?”
    â€œI have, and you know what’s really at me?” he asked rhetorically. “Everyone and everything”—he stopped to give his words weight—“
is exactly the bleedin’ same
. Nothing changes, so. Everything is just as it was. Bit depressing, that is. At least they’ve stopped taking the mickey out of me, so I’ve nothing to complain about.”
    â€œI felt like nothing changed when I first came home, too,” I said. “It was almost disappointing. But also comforting, don’t you think?”
    â€œI suppose. Places don’t really change, but I suppose if you’re gone long enough, you’re the one who’s doing the changing,” he said.
    I reflected on the unique alienation I felt when I first returned home from my year of backpacking. I was a stranger in my birthplace, feeling as if I had lost all sense of belonging there. And that was weirdly okay. I used the sensation to underscore the belief that I
didn’t
actually belong there. It was then that I understood the mixed thrill and isolation of belonging nowhere and everywhere.
    â€œI couldn’t ever live here again. It’s arse-backward,” he complained. But then he upped his mood. “So, gorgeous, when am I to come and see you?”
    I pulled the speaker away from my mouth so that he didn’t hear my girly reaction. I had been waiting the whole phone call for this to come up.
    â€œYou mean visiting me? But what about your dad? You just got there,” I said, keeping my pitch level.
    â€œYeah, sure, not straightaway. It would be best to wait until it evens out. But maybe in a few weeks’ time I may come to London and see you, yeah?”
    â€œHow long are you going to be home for?” I asked in a breathy voice.
    He brushed off this question again. “I’m sure I’ll be back on the road in no time. So, what’s the story? Am I to book tickets?”
    â€œThat sounds great.” I tried not to come off as too enthusiastic. “I have weekends off,” I said with nonchalance, like I wasn’t planning the most important weekend of my life or anything.
    â€œBrilliant.”
    I could sense his smile on the other end of the line. I loved his unshakable smile. It was so authentic and contagious.
    â€œIt’s done, gorgeous. I’ll give you a ring back when I get