Page 69 of Tailwhip
Ashlynn
Meet Me Here Later - Astronautalis
After the girls and I finish up in the hot tub, I grab a towel and head back to Avan’s room to shower. I open the door and Avan is sitting on the bed, looking up at me. “Hey Peanut!”
I smile over at him while I walk to the bathroom. “Hey you, what are you doing?”
He reaches out and grabs both my hands, pulling me into him, and wraps his arms around my waist with his head on my stomach. “Have I told you yet how much I have missed you, P?”
He leans back just enough to look at me. “No, you haven’t! We can talk about this after I shower, though!”
Letting go of me and smiling, he says, “Fine!”
I take a quick shower because I got back inside a little later than I wanted to and don’t want Avan to be up all night since he has an early morning plane to catch. I get dressed and open the door, but Avan isn’t in the room anymore. A part of me feels almost relieved, but also disappointed. I want to catch up with him and see how his life has been. We haven’t seen each other in years. I don’t even know anything about him anymore. Cora never really talked about him to me, for good reason–I am sure of it. I sit down on the bed and lean against the headboard and check to see if I have any new messages from Heath, but the only new message is a video from Cora. She recorded my jump today and my lovely face plant, which I would give a full 100% if you could grade a face plant in the snow. I say screw it and upload it to my Instagram. My followers should get to know me and see my life. I get it uploaded and type in “Landed my first jump on my snowboard today along with the ultimate faceplant!”
After I upload my short clip to Instagram, I go and check my emails. I have a new itinerary from Heath, just showing me a couple of our flight times have changed. As I am reading over everything, I hear music moving down the hallway and Avan pops his head in the room. “Do you remember this song, P? I bet you haven’t listened to it since me!”
I smile so big because I haven’t heard this song since Avan. “Meet me here later and we’ll make out!”
Avan throws his head back, laughing that I just quoted some of the lyrics. “I haven’t heard it since you, but I remember it. We listened to it all the time!”
Avan comes over and sits on the bed, picking up my legs to lay them across his lap and he starts massaging my calves. The hot tub helped, but the massage feels good as well. “I thought you left for the night when I got out of the bathroom!”
Smirking, he says, “I’m not leaving this time without saying goodbye to you. Plus, I wanted to give you privacy after you showered. I know you were out all day, but I was wondering if you would be up for a late-night walk like we used to do?”
I get off the bed and change into much warmer clothes. We get into Avan’s car and drive down to the village, which is still crowded with people, but I guess it’s not as late as I thought it was.
Avan comes to my side and helps me out, closing the door behind me. Turning back to me, he intertwines our hands and leads the way. As we walk around, we catch up on each other’s lives. He tells me about how hard of a time he had breaking into snowboarding compared to Cora. I tell him about my first book being published and how, when I get home, I am going on a small tour for book signings. He stops and turns toward me. “I bought your book! I saw it the other day at the airport when I flew in!”
Avan has never read anything I wrote, but that makes me smile that he bought it. “Thank you for supporting me, I guess!” I tell him.
“I’ll always support you, Ashlynn.” Avan smiles at me.
We make a turn toward what looks like a park with Christmas lights everywhere. “Avan, what is this place?”
He swings his arm around me and pulls me into his body. “This is a new attraction called ‘Vallea Lumina’. I saw it earlier, and I thought to myself, I want to take Ashlynn there, so here we are!”
We continue to walk through the attraction, our hands still intertwined.
After walking through the lights, we stop and buy some hot chocolate; it is freezing out here. We find a bench to sit on and just watch all the lighting. We sit in comfortable silence, when Avan asks, “Did she really burn all our pictures? I tried to see you before we left, Ashlynn. I never wanted to leave without saying goodbye. Hell, I wanted to take you with us.”
I set my cup down on the ground and turn to Avan. “She did, Avan. I have nothing from our relationship anymore, just the memories we made. She never let me out of her sight after that night. I couldn’t even say bye to Cora. I had to do it on the phone with her standing right next to me to make sure you wouldn’t get on the line.”
Avan takes a big breath and lets it out into the cold night. “I’m sorry you had to deal with all of that, but it sounds like you found someone who filled more than that void in you.”
I look at Avan because as far as I know, he wasn’t around while we were talking in the hot tub. “Avan, were you eavesdropping on us?”
I get a cocky smirk from him. “Guilty! I know I shouldn’t have, but when I heard you tell Neha about us, I wanted to hear it, too.” I push him on the shoulder, which doesn’t even make him budge.
Putting his hand over his heart, he says, “I got to say, I’m a little hurt you gave your heart to someone else, ouch!”
I can’t tell if he is being serious or not, so I play his game. “I didn’t know you wanted me to wait for you.”
Grabbing my hand and kissing my gloved fingertips, he says, “I would never ask you to wait for me. I didn’t know if I was ever going back to Colorado, and once I made it into snowboarding, that became my life. That’s all I cared about. I’m not really hurt. I’m happy you have somebody.”
Before I can stop myself, I say, “Had somebody. I don’t anymore.”
Avan swings his head in my direction; he probably just pulled a neck muscle. “Wh... what? Had somebody? You and Anthony aren’t together anymore?”