Craving Redemption

by Nicole Jacquelyn

  She was silent for a moment before wrapping her arms around me from behind and squeezing. “Not a big deal, Asa,” she told me quietly before climbing out of the shower.

  Chapter 38

  Callie

  Asa was quiet for the rest of the day, and I knew it bothered him that he couldn’t pay for my braces. I wasn’t sure how to snap him out of the funk he was in, so I didn’t say anything more about them. It was stupid; I didn’t want them anyway. They made me look like a twelve–year-old, they got food stuck in them, and they cut the shit out of my cheeks if I wasn’t careful. Besides, it hadn’t been my idea to get them in the first place. My teeth hadn’t been that bad—the top ones had a little gap between them and the bottom ones had been a little crooked, but it hadn’t bothered me. It was my parents who’d decided that they suddenly had enough money for orthodontia, so I had to get them fixed.

  I wished I hadn’t even brought it up to Asa; I could’ve just had them taken off and then told him I didn’t need them anymore. Unfortunately, there was no way for me to get the appointment without telling him I needed around five hundred dollars to pay for it. I hadn’t gotten to that part before he’d gone weird, and I hadn’t wanted to say anything else. I decided to wait on that conversation, hoping to talk to my Gram and see if she could pitch in before I said anything more about it.

  Instead, I walked on eggshells around him that day and jumped him at bedtime.

  By the next day, things were back to normal—well, normal for us.

  We spent the weekend like an old married couple and I loved it. We went to the grocery store and bought a ton of food, rented a Western TV series from the movie store, and spent the rest of the time curled up on the couch watching it when we weren’t fucking on every surface in the apartment.

  I didn’t answer my phone except to let Gram know that Asa was with me for the weekend and to let Farrah know that he hadn’t killed me and dumped my body somewhere—her words not mine.

  The only downsides to our weekend were the discussions about my job. Asa didn’t want me working—though his reasons changed with each conversation until he’d compiled a list that was as long as my arm. I’d be out late on nights I had to close. School was more important. I’d have to work when he or Gram came to visit. I’d come into contact with tweekers and who knows what else. People robbed fast food places all the time. He’d even tried to say that I’d get sick more often because I’d be coming into contact with too many people—which made me comment that maybe I shouldn’t be going to school, either—that shut him up for about ten minutes.

  I worked my first shift on Monday night after school while he sat at a table in the front of the restaurant, glaring at anyone and everyone. It was funny, and a little embarrassing, but having him there also settled my first day nerves so much that I dreaded when he wouldn’t be there anymore. I also began to understand his argument about working while he was visiting. I resented the time I had to spend away from him at school and work when I had so little time with him to begin with.

  Our disagreement never came to a resolution before it was time for him to leave, but we were both unwilling to make it a huge deal. The fight that had goaded him to visit had given both of us perspective, and neither one of us wanted to end the weekend on bad terms. We didn’t know when he’d be able to visit again—and having a tantrum wasn’t going to get the same reaction the next time. He couldn’t just drop everything to deal with me, and it wasn’t fair of me to expect it.

  On Tuesday morning, we stood outside while he stuffed a few things into his saddle bags. The scene seemed eerily familiar. It made my stomach turn as I remembered how he’d acted after he left last time. My arms were wrapped around my waist, and I was trying not to cry, but my throat had a huge lump in it and I could feel my nose tingling with repressed tears.

  “Hey, Sugar,” he called gently, pulling me against him with a hand at the back of my neck. “I’ll be back as soon as I can, yeah?”

  “Okay,” I answered, tucking my face into his chest. “You’ll call, right?”

  “Yeah, baby, I’ll call.” He pulled my face away from him and kissed my forehead, then reminded me, “You call, too. None of that bullshit like before.”

  I snorted, and then started giggling as his brows rose in surprise.

  “Did you just snort?” he asked me with a grin, wrapping his arms around my waist and lifting me off the ground. “Like a little piglet?”

  “I’ll call!” I screeched as he swung me around, his beard tickling my neck as he pressed his face in.

  When he finally put me down, we were smiling, but it didn’t last long before both our faces fell. I wasn’t sure how I looked, but his jaw was tense and his eyes stony as he reached over to grab his helmet.

  “Call me tonight and let me know you got there, okay?” I asked softly.

  He gave a nod, watching me closely. Suddenly, his hand shot out and grabbed my jaw tightly, pulling my face to his. He kissed me hard, biting at my lips urgently while his hands grabbed and pushed at my clothes. I ran my hands through his hair softly as he practically inhaled me, trying to calm him down, but as soon as he grabbed the backs of my legs and lifted me until they were wrapped around his waist—I lost my calm.

  We were frantic. One of his hands fisted the back of my shirt while the other went up the front, ripping the cups of my bra down so he could pinch at my nipples. I fisted his hair in response, causing him to groan, and reached the other hand down the back of his hoodie so I could dig my nails into the only skin I could reach. It didn’t matter that we were standing in front of the apartment complex where anyone could see us—we were desperate.

  He started back toward the stairs while we kissed, but he hadn’t made it to the first step when his phone started ringing and vibrating in his pocket.

  “Shit,” he mumbled into my mouth, sliding his hand out of my shirt to pull the phone out of his pocket.

  I moved my mouth to his neck as he answered.

  “Grease,” he barked, tilting his head to the side and squeezing my ass with his free hand.

  “Dragon, don’t do anything stupid.” He paused for a few moments while I continued to grope him. “Brother, I fuckin’ warned you who she was.”

  He was quiet for a moment, and in the silence I bit down hard on the skin where his shoulder met his neck. He inhaled sharply and started rocking me against him, stumbling backward until his back met the wall, and then groaned deeply as I started to suck.

  “I’m on my way. Don’t do anything fuckin’ stupid before I get there,” he snapped before closing his phone and stuffing it back into his pocket.

  “Fuck me,” he groaned, pulling me harder against him as I used my teeth again.

  He grabbed the back of my hair and pulled me away from his neck, tipping my head back so far that I had to look down to see his face.

  “You’re fuckin’ trouble, you know that?” he rasped, squeezing his fist so my hair pulled sharply again.

  “Let’s go back upstairs,” I whimpered, pulling against his hand so I could get my mouth on him. “I’ll ride you so hard.”

  I wasn’t even sure what I was saying, but I didn’t care. I’d say or do anything at that point, I was so turned on. My hips were frantic against him, sliding and rubbing but never hitting the right spot to get me over the edge.

  “Sweetheart,” he groaned, stilling the movement of my hips with his hand, “I gotta fuckin’ go. Shit’s about to hit the fan in Oregon.”

  My mouth dropped open and my eyes popped wide as he pushed at my legs. When I dropped them down, I almost tripped as I tried to move away from him.

  “Seriously?” I griped at him, slapping at his hands as he tried to catch me.

  “Fuck, Callie!” he roared, grabbing one of my hands and pressing it against his very hard cock. “It’s not like I want to ride my goddamn bike like this!”

  “Well, then don’t!” I snapped back, trying to pull my hand away.

  He let go of me, but quickly wr
apped his arms around my waist before I could storm off.

  “Sugar, I’ve got a friend that fucked up. His shit is so fucked up, he’s lucky if he sees daylight again,” he told me seriously, the tone of his voice causing me to pause in my struggle. “I gotta get up there and help him figure his shit out.”

  Dammit. He wasn’t going to stay.

  I slumped against him dejectedly and hit my head against his chest repeatedly as he rubbed my back, calming down my overheated body. Once both of our heartbeats had slowed, I tilted my face up to him, still pouting. He immediately swooped in for a kiss with a small smile on his face.

  The kiss was sweeter and deeper than it had been before. It wasn’t full of lust and desperation.

  It was a kiss goodbye.

  “It’s you and me against the world, yeah?” he whispered, smoothing my hair away from my face. “We won’t be doing this shit forever. Just gotta be patient.”

  He let me go, and it took all of my willpower not to beg him to stay just one more day. One more day wouldn’t have helped anything, and I knew that we would have to go through the exact same thing all over again. So I gave him a trembling smile and got in my car, unable to say a word past the lump in my throat.

  This time when I drove away, he didn’t follow me to school. His mind was already focused on whatever was happening to his friend, and I was thankful for it.

  I cried the whole way to school, but as soon as I got there, I wiped off my face, pulled up my big girl panties, and acted like I was fine.

  Eventually, I was.

  Chapter 39

  Callie

  Asa was true to his word and called whenever he had the chance. He never brought up the problem with his friend and I assumed that he had gotten it all straightened out. I was the queen of burying my head in the sand, refusing to deal with anything outside of my own little world.

  Thankfully, there had been a little left over in my parents’ bank account when it was transferred to Gram, so she’d been able to pay for me to get my braces off. She drove up to visit me when I had my appointment even though she didn’t agree with what I was doing. It was silly, I didn’t mind going by myself, but I think she was afraid that I’d feel bad that my mom wasn’t with me. Even though I hadn’t kept them on as long as I should have, we still celebrated with caramel apples and popcorn—two things that had been forbidden—once they came off.

  Gram knew just how to cheer me up without even trying. With my parents gone, she was the one person who knew me better than anyone else. She knew what my reaction would be before I did, and she went out of her way to make sure that nothing within her power had the opportunity to upset me. Thus, the visit when I had my braces taken off. The braces that my parents had saved up for and been so proud of. I hadn’t been able to brush it off like I’d pretended.

  After her visit, Asa came to see me again and was able to stay an entire week. He had something going on with the Sacramento Chapter, so he was gone a lot of the time, but I didn’t care. Knowing that he was just minutes away for an entire week had me practically dancing through work and school. Even the drama with Farrah that week hadn’t brought me down.

  Farrah’s mom had a falling out with her man, and apparently had gone off the rails. She was partying like it was the end of the world, and Farrah had to deal with junkies and drunken assholes pounding on her locked bedroom door at all hours of the night. There must have been a breaking point—something must have happened—because soon after, Farrah was hot and heavy with Echo and staying with him more than she was home. I tried to talk to her about it, but she was shut up tighter than a bank vault. She’d just roll her eyes and tell me she couldn’t deal with the drama, changing the subject before I learned anything worth knowing. I was a shit friend, because when she changed the subject? I let her.

  Because I wasn’t willing to upset the life raft I was on by taking on her problems.

  I was an asshole.

  That time, when Asa left, I wasn’t as lost. I’d made a pretty steady life for myself in Sacramento, and I was finally comfortable in my surroundings. I knew the neighborhood I was living in, I had a best friend that hung out at the apartment almost every day, I had a decent job that gave me a little bit of spending money, and I knew that Asa and I were solid.

  I got good at paying bills and taking out the trash. I figured out which Laundromats always had wet clothes in their washing machines for hours on end and which ones were the cleanest. I figured out how to buy groceries on a budget without living on ramen noodles, and I cut coupons and filled a box in my bedroom closet with free toiletries that would take me years to use up.

  I figured out how to take care of myself.

  I finished out my junior year of high school, and instead of taking a break, decided to take a few classes that summer. I’d taken extra credits in San Diego, and it left me with a surplus that, with the help of a few summer classes, had me graduating a full year earlier than I was supposed to. Farrah was irritated that I wasn’t going to be able to spend the summer laying out by Echo’s apartment complex’s dilapidated pool, but I knew if I had too much time on my hands, my carefully constructed life would crumble. I couldn’t allow myself to slow down for fear that I would start thinking about things that were better left forgotten.

  Once she realized that I couldn’t be swayed, we settled into a life not unlike the one we’d had during school. She was usually at my apartment by the time I got home, and hung out until I had to go to work. I ended up making her a key, and a lot of nights I’d get home to her sleeping on my couch. She rarely went home anymore—the only time she made herself go there was during Asa’s visits, which left me feeling both ecstatic that he was there and guilty that she wasn’t staying.

  My life became a monotonous schedule, broken up only by my graduation from high school and Asa’s visits. I planned everything around them, eventually making every visit an event that I spent weeks planning for. I began waxing my legs, armpits and girly bits the week before I knew he was scheduled to come. I cleaned the house from top to bottom and filled the fridge in preparation for another person sharing my space.

  We became more and more comfortable with each other, bickering about stupid things and feeling free to vent our frustrations. “The Fight”, as I remembered it in my mind, was slowly forgotten as we settled more into our relationship. I was no longer worried that he would forget me once he was in Oregon, and he no longer stressed about how I was handling life alone. We turned into a couple like any other long-distance couple, spending time every day to talk or text each other, and fucking like rabbits when we were in the same zip code.

  Over time, my life became measured by how long it had been since I’d seen him. It was a sequence of, “two weeks until Asa comes” or “only two days since Asa left”.

  My world revolved around him, even when he was hundreds of miles away.

  If I still woke up occasionally from nightmares, I pretended like I didn’t. When Cody called and didn’t sound right, I bolstered him until he sounded normal, and when I hung up I pushed the conversations to the back of my mind. I didn’t think of my parents, or the worst twenty-four hours of my life. I didn’t wish for things I couldn’t have.

  I refused to worry about how deep Farrah was falling in with Echo.

  I refused to get upset when Gram visited and she had to go back to San Diego, leaving me alone once again.

  And I absolutely refused to acknowledge that over the course of that year, Asa’s visits became further and further apart.

  Chapter 40

  Callie

  My eighteenth birthday began like any other day of the year. I had a hard time making a big deal out of becoming an adult when I’d already been one for so long.

  I’d been promoted to manager of the restaurant I worked at right after I’d graduated. I thought the owner was an idiot for making a seventeen-year-old a manager after a few months, but I wasn’t about to argue with him. The boob ogler had been caught grabbing the asses of o
ther employees and was fired, and I think the owner just didn’t want to deal with hiring someone older. All of the employees were in high school, or drop outs, and I was the cream of the crop—as sad as that was.

  So I spent my birthday at work, figuring out time sheets for the coming weeks. It was a freaking headache to do. This girl wanted certain days off to go to school functions, that one wanted to only work Tuesdays and Thursdays because she had church shit on the others. It went on and on until figuring out the schedule was like putting together a puzzle that never quite lined up.

  By the time I arrived home, I had a headache from hell and I was sweaty from the drive since my car’s air conditioning was busted and Asa hadn’t visited in almost three months to fix it. I was irritated and tired and I just wanted to strip down to my underwear and pass out with a fan pointed at my bed.

  I almost missed the motorcycle parked at the end of the parking lot.

  Almost.

  I ran up the stairs, cursing that while I’d had my monthly waxing session the week before, I hadn’t cleaned up the house or packed the fridge. My heart raced as I opened the door, and my jaw dropped when I saw the amount of people in the apartment… and the other shit.

  There were streamers crossing the ceiling, posters on the walls, and balloons hooked to anything heavy enough to hold them from flying to the ceiling. It looked like a party store threw up.

  Farrah.

  I stopped in the doorway, and no one noticed me as I searched the crowd for Asa. Farrah was sitting on Echo’s lap on the couch, Michael was smiling down at some girl I’d never seen before, and a few of my co-workers were in the hallway making out. I was going to have to rework the entire schedule to make sure they weren’t on at the same time. Dammit.

  I found Asa standing in the kitchen, laughing with a pretty girl with blonde hair that hung down almost to her ass. She was pretty, really pretty, but the minute she put her hand on his chest she looked like a haggard bitch from hell to me. I saw red.