Jessie couldn’t figure out exactly what Mia did for a living — but did it matter? Her cousin was barely twenty-two, and even if it was shabby, she already rented her own place, lived alone with Nick, and drove a sweet (if slightly dented) baby Benz. She claimed she was studying to be a graphic artist and had helped design some of the event posters for the strip club.
“I’ve been taking computer classes over at COD,” Mia told Jessie, meaning the local campus of College of the Desert, a community college. All Jessie knew was that Mia spent a lot of time puttering on her Mac laptop, sometimes drawing animations and logos, but more often shopping online.
Despite Jessie’s visions of deep midnight and flowing lingerie, on the night she bumped into Nick in the dark hallway outside the bathroom it was barely after eleven and she was wearing only a musty old Mott the Hoople T-shirt over her frayed cotton underwear. As she turned off the light, stepped out of the door, and bumped into Nick, two weeks of daydreams clouded her vision as much as the sudden black. She stumbled and Nick caught her arm.
“Oh!” said Jessie.
“Whoa there, steady,” he said. “What are you doing up?”
“Um, I had to pee?” she answered, and her cheeks burned under the cover of darkness.
“Me too,” said Nick, and they laughed in relief. Her eyes were adjusting, and she could make out his features and the white flash of his teeth.
“Well...” she began.
“Yeah.”
“I’ll see you in the morning, then.” She stepped aside to return to the living room and her sofa bed, but Nick moved with her and blocked her path.
“Listen, Jessie, I’ve been thinking about you,” he said.
“Yeah?”
“Mm-hmm.” He edged closer, and she sensed the full weight of his body. In an instant the shadow of possibility had become flesh. A worthy reply stalled in her throat.
“I’ve thought about you a lot too, Nick.”
“Is that right? C’mere.” He took her elbow and drew her closer, back toward the bathroom door. He looked to be thinking hard and stroked his beard with his thumb and forefinger. Jessie wanted to put those fingers in her mouth. He reached behind her, pressing against the front of her shirt to flip the light switch back on. They blinked at each other in the yellow light.
Nick sighed. “What I’ve been thinking, see, is that I may need to kiss you.” And then the electric burr of his mustache was pricking her upper lip and there was only the soft suck of his mouth on hers and the sly tip of tongue that flicked and retreated too quickly. He pressed harder, pushing her spine into the doorframe.
She shut her eyes and tried to remember to breathe as Nick’s hand crept down the back of her shirt, then under the fabric, his calloused hand warm against her skin. A thick finger wormed under the elastic of her underwear and she pulled her mouth away.
“Hey,” she gasped.
“Sorry. I couldn’t help myself.” He ducked his head to smile into her eyes.
They were whispering. They breathed quietly, the house still except for the constant hum of the air conditioner.
“But Mia...”
Nick put a finger to her lips. “Don’t worry. Believe me, she sleeps like a rock.”
“Okay — but she’s your girlfriend, after all.”
“Yep, and you’re her kissin’ cousin. After all.” He grinned. “So, who’s really the bad guy now? You want me to kiss you some more or what?”
She closed her eyes and leaned in toward him.
The rest happened in a blur: they were on the floor, on the thin blue patterned rug in between the sofa bed and TV stand. Nick was everywhere, on her, in her, and then out again almost as quickly, hitching up his athletic shorts and running a hand through his hair.
“See you tomorrow, kid,” he whispered, then walked to the room at the end of the hallway and the bed he shared with Mia, humming a tune that Jessie couldn’t quite place.
The morning after that first time, Jessie overslept. When she opened her eyes sunshine filled the apartment, bouncing off the shiny surfaces of the cheap lacquered furniture. She listened to Mia running water in the kitchen and the grass-blower roar of the community gardeners. The night before felt like yet another daydream. She kicked off the sheets and stared up at the popcorn ceiling.
She sat up, pushed the hair from her eyes. “Where you going?” she asked when Mia walked into the room, nodding at the open map on Mia’s computer screen.
“A tattoo shop Nick’s mentioned, over on Ramon. His buddy works there.”
“You’re getting a tattoo?”
“How do you know I don’t already have some?” Mia smirked. “But no, this is for Nick; it’s his birthday surprise. He wants me to draw the Led Zeppelin logo so his friend can put it on his shoulder.”
“Zeppelin, huh?”
“He really likes that old stuff.”
“So do I,” Jessie said, lifting the front of her concert shirt.
“Well, I guess you two have something in common, don’t you, chica? But listen — Nick and I were talking this morning, and... ugh, this is embarrassing...” Mia grimaced and rolled her eyes.
“Wha—?” Jessie felt her heart thump hard in her chest.
“It’s just — well, we’re running a little short this month. I mean, we’ve been buying all of your food and stuff and — look, I noticed you have a debit card. So, you have your own bank account?”
Relief washed through Jessie. Money? It was only money? “Yeah, my mom’s got access to my account, but it’s mostly my dad, depositing his divorce-guilt money. I can help out, for sure. What do you guys need?”
Mia hugged her, said, “Damn, cuz, I knew you’d be cool,” adding that if Jessie could lend them a hundred, maybe one-fifty, Nick would repay her soon in triple.
Yeah, he will, Jessie thought, trying not to smirk to herself.
She thought of their childhoods together during holidays and vacations. She pictured the framed photo in her mom’s hallway, of her and Mia on a family hike up in Cathedral Canyon, right above her cousin’s neighborhood. She and Mia were standing beside each other on big rocks, both smiling and wearing neon sunglasses. In the background, the valley sprawled, dusty brown against the cobalt-blue sky, like their whole lives, wide open and waiting. The photo felt like a world ago, but the trail, and the same rock formations the town was named for, were all still there, across Highway 111 and a few miles away.
She thought about how Mia had always wielded the power of her years over her with pinches and mild slugs, and how, on the few occasions when Jessie tried to fight back with a half-hearted punch of her own, Mia retaliated by landing a sly hard one on her arm or thigh, leaving a bruise that lingered after she’d returned home. Mia had always been mean.
So what would she do if she found out now, and what kind of mark would it leave? Jessie tried not to think about it. When she felt guilt swarming her head like angry wasps, she thought of her friend Samantha, how blithely Samantha had once said that if a chick couldn’t hang on to her man, that was hardly her problem, was it?
The days passed in a haze of pool chlorine, vertical blinds snapped tight against the sun, and an endless Spotify mix of classic rock in her ear buds. She scrolled through Instagram, checking out images of the strip club. The dancers were sexy and lithe and awfully flexible. Jessie wondered what Nick saw in her, surrounded by all those bodies every night. She wondered what he even saw in Mia, compared to those strippers.