The bed creaked when she shifted onto her elbow to stare at me through the dark. “What’s wrong?”
“You can’t just stay here because of me.”
On a sigh, she rolled to her back. “I don’t want to talk about this again.”
“I don’t give a shit.”
“God, why does it matter? I’m studying philosophy, Bellamy. It’s not even a real degree. Cornell, Alabama….makes no difference aside from a piece of slightly more pretentious paper.”
“That’s not the point. How long have you wanted to go to Cornell, Drew?”
The hum of a motorcycle roared by outside, shaking the window. “That was before.”
Before me. I bite back a sarcastic laugh. Because before me, the only lifestyle she’d known was filled with trips to Saint Tropez and Barbie pink Porsches, and expectations of Ivy League. And she acted like that could all be disregarded.
“How long, Drew?”
“I don’t know. Years.”
“And how long have you wanted to go to Alabama State?”
“You want me to go to New York? Is that it?” An edge of hurt laced her voice. “Because if you don’t want me around, just say it, Bellamy.”
“Jesus Christ. That’s not it…” I wanted her to stay for me, and I wanted her to go for her. And I couldn't have both. “I didn’t get into Alabama State.” I turned on the pillow to face her.
All I had to give her was love, but love didn’t pay bills. It didn’t buy a house or put food on the table. And the thing she couldn’t possibly realize was how hard it is to come by money.
Love was easy. Money was hard.
“I’m sorry.” She placed her hand on my cheek, stroking her thumb along my jaw. “You deserved to get in,” she whispered.
“You need to go to Cornell. Don’t just stay here because of me.”
The bed shifted, and she sat up, raking both hands into her hair. “Why are you doing this?”
“Because you have no idea what you’re doing--”
“I know what I’m doing. Evidently, you don’t though.”
I sat up that time. If she had any idea the mental torture I’d put myself through trying to sort through this shit. Trying to put her first instead of myself. Trying to make sure she was doing what was best for her without giving a damn about my own dumbass heart.
“Oh, you know? Do you know what it’s like to be poor, Drew? Do you know what it’s like to have to choose between power or water? Do you know what it’s like to count pennies for gas? Because that--That is what you’re choosing over yachts and trips and a massive house.”
Her fist thumped my chest. “I’m choosing you!”
“And I’m choosing you, too.” Because this sure as hell wasn’t me choosing me. She was willing to sacrifice everything for me, and this is where I sacrificed for her.
“Go to Cornell, Drew.”
Her jaw set. Nostrils flared. “I’m going to freaking Alabama.”
“God, you are so stubborn!” I pushed off the bed, pacing the length of my small room. “And what happens if we don’t work out?” I stopped to stare at her, and it looked like I’d just shot her with a poison-laced dart. “You gonna regret your decision then?” I asked.
“Why would you say that? You think we should break up?” She pushed to her knees. “If you want me to go, just say it!”
“Answer my question. If we don’t work out, are you going to regret staying here?”
“Fuck you, Bellamy.” She got off the bed and snatched her jeans from the floor, which I immediately yanked out of her hold.
“Answer the question.” I just wanted her to look at the situation.
“I would never regret you. Clearly, we aren't on the same page.” Her pained expression swept over me. She went to move past me, but I pinned her to the wall.
“I’m not asking if you would regret me, dammit. I’m asking if you would regret this.” I jerked a chin to my room. “The shitty ass life you would have backed yourself into. Not going to Cornell. Not having fancy cars you can demolish anytime you feel like it because money means nothing.”
She shoved against me. “Stop putting your money complex onto me, Bellamy. This is your issue, not mine.”
A fire crackled to life inside me, and when she tried to break free of my hold, I only held onto her harder. “You’re about to make it your issue though. That’s the fucking point!”
Seconds passed. Her eyes searching mine, the slight glimmer of tears building. “You sound like a guy who wants his girlfriend to break up with him because he’s too pussy to just do it.”
My face heated. “If you think for a second, I’d put your feelings over mine if I didn’t want you...”
She closed her eyes, several tears breaking free before she dropped her head back to the wall. “Just stop talking.”
And now I felt like shit. I just wanted to protect her, and I didn’t know how the hell to do that when all I was trying to protect her from was me.
“Fine,” I said. Then I slammed my lips to hers, working her thongs over her hips. By the time I had her on my bed, I was mumbling how much I didn’t want her to leave.
At the end of the day, love makes a man selfish. And I was so in-fucking-love with her, I’d apparently turned into the most selfish bastard there was.
51
Drew
The streetlight from the window danced over Bellamy’s perfect face, casting shadows over his broad shoulders as he moved over me. I clung to him like I could keep him forever if I just held on tight enough.
“You feel so fucking good,” he whispered into the crook of my neck, fucking me deeper. Harder.
I needed this--him--and it terrified me that I could sense him pulling away.
Rejection burrowed into me like a disease, the symptoms of which hadn’t yet fully arisen. But they would. And I knew the feeling well because I’d suffered it my entire life.
What would happen if I went to Cornell?
Bellamy would stay here. We would have a long-distance relationship where we saw each other, when? Every other weekend? I knew how that went when people ran out of things to say in phone calls, and life went on without the person who was so far away. I’d done it with my parents when I first went to boarding school. At first, my dad called me every day and now look at us...
Bellamy would stop missing me because he’d learned to live with my absence. I’d learn to stop missing him because it hurt too much to be away from him all the time. And our lives would drift apart. Then there was the massive elephant in the room that I liked to completely ignore, while Bellamy was now pointing at it and shouting in my face. Money.
It meant nothing to me and something to him, and I hated that. Hated that it was a factor and love wasn’t enough to save us.
I loved him, of that, I was one hundred percent sure. But I wasn’t sure if he loved me. Maybe that’s why he wanted me to go to Cornell, because deep down he didn’t feel the same.
His lips brushed my throat on a groan. Each powerful muscle tensed beneath my fingers, and I met him right there, digging my nails into his back as we both tumbled over the edge together.
He pressed one last kiss to my lips, then rolled to his back, panting.
I laid in the darkness, listening to the heavy rasp of his breaths as a plethora of thoughts flew through my mind.
He wanted me, but he also wanted me to go to New York; to not live this life with him. Back and forth I went. It was like whiplash, and my panicked heart wouldn’t seem to slow. Like it knew what was coming, and bracing my body to run.
All my emotions felt like this messy, knotted ball inside me, and every doubt Bellamy had poured into my head earlier started to surface.
I waited until his breaths had evened out, until his fingers reached for me in sleep, before I got up and went to the bathroom and splashed cold water on my face, trying to calm down.
It would be fine. It would be fine.
When I slipped back into his room, the blue screen of h
is phone flashed and caught my attention. I glanced down at the ribbon of text still on the screen:
Nash: Did you figure out what to do about the girl with the pink Porsche?
Nash: I’m telling you. Resentment is a real thing.
Resentment? My chest tightened until I couldn’t catch a good breath. Bellamy resented me… He wanted me to go. I was an issue to be fixed, something he needed a solution to. He wanted to break up, and was that why he’d started a fight tonight?
Tears pricked my eyes, and the ugly, black tendrils of rejection set in. The familiar symptoms rising like a rogue wave and drowning me in an instant. I couldn’t stick around and wait for him to deal a death blow.
With tears silently streaming down my face, I forced myself to not get back in that bed, lay down, and pretend like everything would be okay. It clearly wasn’t. So I got dressed, then collected my phone and purse, leaving all my other clothes behind.
I cast a glance at Bellamy, the pain in my chest digging in like claws. I wanted to kiss him, but I didn’t want to deal with the mess of him watching me leave. Because I knew he wanted me. But he didn’t.
It was only when I passed Arlo’s ajar bedroom door that I realized I couldn’t leave him without a goodbye.
I tore a page from the notepad in the kitchen and scribbled out a note:
Peehead,
I have to go away for a while, and I couldn’t say goodbye. I’m sorry.
Look after your mom and be good.
I love you little guy.
Drew
I left it on his bedside table, taking one last glance at how peaceful he looked with his unicorn clutched to his chest. Then I placed the rest of my cash on the kitchen counter for Carol. I wouldn’t need it where I was going. Money wasn’t an issue there.
As soon as I pulled out of the drive, I called my mom, refusing to look in my rearview mirror at the ramshackle little house that felt more like home than anywhere else ever had.
“Darling. I’m just having my morning Mimosa. It must be late there...”
“Can you get me the next flight out?” Tears blurred the road in front of me.
“Of course. Dayton straight to Marseilles, first class.” She sounded far too pleased about my heartbreak. “I’ll send a car to pick you up once you land.”
I was running to the only place I could go, the only place I had left. Halfway across the world, and I wasn’t sure it would be far enough, because with each passing moment, I was cracking open, bleeding from the inside out.
For the first time, I understood why people married for money and not love.
52
Bellamy
Something hit me in the face, and my eyes popped open to the early morning light.
“I don’t like you!” Arlo shouted, then slammed my door.
I swatted his old, stuffed donkey from my chest to the floor. “What the…” And when I rolled over to grab onto Drew, she wasn’t there.
I sat up, raking a hand through my hair just as the door swung open again.
Arlo stormed in, a SpongeBob pillow lifted over his head. “You’re a butthole!” Then he lobbed the pillow at me.
I shot out of bed, snagging him by the back of his pajama top before he’d made it down the hall. “Hey, come here.”
He attempted to wrestle free, but I picked him up and threw him over my shoulder.
“What’s your deal?”
He pounded his tiny fists over my back. “You’re a Cockblock!”
Jesus…
“You didn’t tell me Miss Drew had to leave!” His fist kept slamming against me, and I just stared at the end of the hall. Leave?
Without putting him down, I went back to my room and opened the closet. Her clothes were still there. Her suitcases stacked at the top.
Then I went to the window, twisting the cord on the blinds. Her car was gone, Hendrix’s tarp that usually covered it, a messy ball on my hood.
“Put me down.” Arlo kicked his feet at me, and I dropped him to the bed.
She left? I glanced back through the blinds. Left for work or to grab breakfast maybe… “She probably went to get donuts or something, Arlo.”
“No, she didn’t. She left me a note. You didn’t tell me she had to leave…” His eyes watered before he threw himself face down on my pillow.
She’d left and gone where? Back to her dad’s? I mean, Jesus Christ, we’d gotten in a fight, then fucked and made up, and she left?
A soft knock sounded on my door, and I glanced back at my mom, standing in the doorway with a handful of cash fanned out like it was poker night. “Bellamy. Why was two grand in cash on the kitchen counter?”
It was Drew. The queen of overreaction. Of course she left.
I swiped a hand down my face and shook my head. “Drew...I guess.”
“She can’t just keep giving me money, Bellamy. She’s…”
“I know.”
Mom glanced at Arlo, sobbing on my bed, and frowned. “Why is he crying?”
“Because she…” And what was I supposed to say--Drew left, and upset Arlo even more.
She was having a Drew moment, and by the afternoon, I’d have her back over here, pinned underneath me. “Don’t worry about it. It’ll be fine.”
Mom stood there, glancing from me to Arlo, then back. “I promise, Mom. It’s fine, she went to work and…” I was going to kill her when she came back. Leaving Arlo a note was over the top.
Mom gave a half nod, then said she was going to start breakfast.
The second I heard her in the kitchen, I glanced at Arlo.
“Where’s the note, buddy.”
“In my room. On my dresser.” His muffled sob came from the pillow.
I went to his room and grabbed the note, skimming over it. Cryptic as fuck--but at least he got an I love you. I stormed back to my room and shot off a text: Seriously? Arlo’s crying. WTH are you?
Message not delivered.
And that--That made me chuck my phone at the wall.
Ten hours later, she hadn’t come home.
I was shitfaced at Hendrix’s house when she finally texted back.
Baby Girl: I didn’t mean to make him cry
Me: Where are you, Drew?
Baby Girl: France.
France? My grip on my phone tightened, my heartbeat pulsing behind my eyes. That was a joke. It had to be. How long did it even take to fly across the freaking Atlantic?
Me: You’re kidding. Right?
Minutes passed, my knee bouncing like a jackhammer.
We’d gotten in, not even in a fight. Not even a freaking fight, and she left and went to France? Not to Nora’s house. Not back to her dad’s or even a five-fucking-star hotel two cities over. France. Because that was Drew.
Me: Seriously, Drew. France!
Me: You want to get all pissy at me for trying to make sure you know what the hell you’re getting into with being poor
Me: And you just leave. And go to France
Me: France
Me: FUCKING FRANCE!!!!!
Hendrix handed me a shot of whiskey, shaking his head. “I tried to tell you, but you wouldn’t listen.” He stared down at my phone, then snorted. “Never have I ever had a demon spawn Medusa fuck off to France to break up with me,” He cackled, then kicked me. “Drink, you dickhead. Because that’s you!”
I slammed the shot, then chucked the empty glass at him before going back to my phone. I wanted a reaction. Something because this--This hurt like a bitch.
I was drinking so I wouldn’t cry, and my chest was all tight. All I could do was think about her, because I could still smell her on my shirt. And I almost, almost told her I loved her last night because I felt that bad that she thought I would want her to leave. And then she does this...
Me: So what, are you too pussy to break up with me, Drew? That what it is?
Me: Fuck off to France so you don’t have to break up with me?
Baby Girl: I don’t want you to resent me.
Resent h
er? For what?
Hendrix dropped beside me on the couch, this time handing me the bottle of whiskey. “There are two ways to handle this. Listen to Sarah McLachlan and cry like a bitch, or watch porn.”
I glared at him.
“Wait. Pink Floyd goes with The Wizard of Oz so maybe…” He grabbed the remote and turned on the TV, then the stereo. “Arms of the Angel” blared through the speakers as some muscled up guy took a girl in a nurse’s outfit, doggy style.
“If this isn’t art,” he said. “I don’t know what is.”
And I just stared at my phone, wishing I could hate her. But I never would.
53
Drew
The warm, Mediterranean breeze swept around me as I stood at the wooden door of Mom’s villa. And from the smile on her completely made-up face when she answered in her silk robe, she was far too happy to have me.
She passed me her glass of wine the second I stepped inside. “You look terrible, darling.”
I was broken-hearted and jet-lagged, what did she expect me to look like?
“Thanks,” I said, trying not to roll my eyes.
She handed my bag off to Marco, the butler, and guided me inside. I downed my wine before I even reached the kitchen, and Mom topped me right up.
That’s how that went for the rest of the evening.
I sat by the pool, on a sun lounger, next to my mom, staring out over the city that swept into the sea while I got drunk. And although she drank more than me, she didn’t get drunk because the woman had a ninety to ten wine to blood ratio in her veins.
It was sunset when Marco came back by the pool with a fresh bottle of wine. He filled my glass, then disappeared between the palm trees and Hibiscus.
“So, what made you decide to leave the lovely city of Dayton so suddenly?” She lifted her glass to her lips, her gaze set on the sun setting over the turquoise water.
No Good: A Standalone Enemies to Lovers Romance Page 30