Scarface (original novel)

XV

Olivia didn't know why she kissed Scarbucks. All she knew was that she turned around and Scarbucks was utterly normal. He looked real. Through the light drizzling, she saw his jet black hair plastered to his angular face and his luminous blue eyes rimmed with red like he'd started crying, his acne scars blurred away by the rain. Yes, he looked like someone real, not ethereal like her friends. But he had an aura of sorts. How individual. How infuriating.

She couldn't stand him. The way she wanted to indulge in him and the way she wanted to know if his eyes could be as deep as she wanted them to be. She wanted him, and Olivia Camille wanted no one.

It was difficult for Olivia to remember the last time she'd kissed someone she had feelings for. It was difficult for Olivia to remember the last time she kissed someone who'd made her head fuzzy, and she hadn't planned on changing that until Scarbucks pressed his wet, trembling lips to her's. Then the dragons came back but this time it wasn't a few, it was a whole fucking herd tickling her heart with their wings and using their hell fire breath to warm her up like a furnace, despite the storm she'd stood in the middle of with him.

When she pulled away with burning lips and heavy breaths, their arms were locked around each other like they'd never let go. And then he did. First his grip on her waist loosened, then he softly nudged her away, and then he turned away, and if Olivia had never known how it felt to be crestfallen before, she did now.

"We can't- I can't- You are.." His voice faded and his eyes were dim and Olivia knew she was confusing him and killing him and wanted to stop but didn't know how.

"I can't do this to you, lov- be with you," he sighed. "Like this." Olivia nodded because she didn't know what else to do. She wanted to kiss him again and feel alive again but at the same time she wanted to run as far as her legs would take her, but he turned around and gave her a head start.

Then she ran, just like she was supposed to. When Scarbucks couldn't see her, she turned around and ran through the streets looking for a familiar face to banish the image of Scarbucks' arms around her and his dilated pupils because if she couldn't see it anymore, then she could pretend Scarbucks didn't make her feel human.

And then she left Eden Plaza.

Jackson had backed the hearse into a clump of trees and had popped in one of his Swedish House Mafia CDs. He was on his phone and looked up at Olivia Camille's approaching form with bright eyes. "Hey, Olli. Weren't you with Scarbucks?" He cocked his head to the side innocently. Ah, how innocent he seemed. Like a bunny. It made the wolf in Olivia rear it's ugly head.

She climbed into the driver's side of the hearse where he sat in the passenger's, and turned the music down, although it was already quiet. "I know you don't like Scarbucks as much as the rest of the gang," she mused. Jackson laughed softly. "I don't know, he just gives me bad vibes."

Olivia Camille and gave him the look. The look like there was nothing dangerous about her, like she could give all of herself to you if she wanted to. The look like she was normal and good hearted. It was completely fake and she'd been perfecting it for years, but Jackson didn't know that. He saw the look and he turned to mush, just like Olivia needed.

"Is he giving you bad vibes or do you hate the fact he likes me?" She murmured almost soft enough for a whisper. His pale cheeks ignited with pink and he looked away. "Uh- no. I don't, don't care," he stuttered. Olivia reached out a hand and took his chin and brought his eyes back to her. She could see his walls crumbling.

His eyes were on her lips. "I don't like him, you know." Lie. "Everyone else does, but he's pretty boring." Lie. "You're better." Lie.

Jackson reached out to cup her face with his slender hand and his eyes black eyes searched her amber, looking for rejection he wouldn't find. When he realized that, he pressed his thin lips to her's and Olivia Camille internally groaned.

The kiss wasn't bad, but it made her feel wrong. There was dread in her stomach, and it wasn't the same as kissing Brent or Scarbucks or the other people she'd kissed. But Olivia never stopped. She didn't want it to feel wrong, because if it felt wrong that meant there was something right, but Olivia had a sneaking feeling what it was and she wanted to be all wrong if it meant HE was right.

She leaned into the kiss and gave it everything she had. Knotted her long fingers in his hair, grabbed his cheeks, and when she still felt nothing, she climbed over the center console and onto his lap.

But her mind didn't get foggy and she didn't feel any better. She just felt breathless and frustrated. Wrong, all wrong. She pulled away to take a breath and her long hair fell forward like a curtain. Jackson's shadowed face gazed up at her with so much affection she felt a twinge of guilt in her chest.

"I love you."

Fuck.