by Sophie Stern
“I didn’t think I was good enough to come back.”
He says the words plainly, as though nothing could be more obvious, but unfortunately for Cage, I’ve been in therapy for the last five years, and I know that what he’s saying is a total and utter cop-out.
“Bullshit,” I say.
“Excuse me?”
“Bullshit. You heard me. Bull. Shit.”
“Uh, okay?”
I shake my head.
“That’s a total cop-out. You couldn’t come back because you weren’t good enough? It sounds like you didn’t want to come back because you were ashamed. It had nothing to do with being good enough. You’ve always been good enough: for me, for your mom. I know she wasn’t the best mother, and I don’t pretend to have been the perfect girlfriend, but both of us would have loved to have seen you, Cage. You didn’t even give us a chance.”
What I mean is that he didn’t give me a chance.
He didn’t give me a chance to say goodbye.
He didn’t give me a chance to say I was sorry, or that I loved him, or that I wanted that thing between us to last forever.
He didn’t give me a shot, and part of me still feels just the tiniest bit broken because of it.
What would my life have been like if Cage had come back?
What if he’d never left in the first place?
What if, instead of running off, he’d come to me and talked about what he wanted?
Would things have been different?
Would they have been okay?
“Maybe you’re right,” he says. “Maybe it is a cop-out. That’s how I felt, though.”
“You felt alone.”
“Yes.”
“But you were the one who left,” I say, agitated.
He was the one who chose to walk away.
He was the one who didn’t give me a goodbye.
It was all him, and yet, he has the audacity to say he felt alone, scared, worried. He says he felt horrified and afraid, but he was the one who chose that path. Now I’m just supposed to forgive him and move on? I’m just supposed to get on with my life?
It doesn’t seem particularly fair, if you ask me.
Not at all.
“I know.”
We look at each other for a long time. Orlando seems completely unbothered by our intense discussion, and he heads into his room to look for a train he wants. He’s got about a million of them, so chances are that he’ll be in his bedroom for awhile. That’s good. It means that right now, I can just look at Cage. Right now, I can totally focus completely on him, and us, and this moment because all of a sudden, it kind of seems like everything is going horribly wrong.
And this hurts.
Everything about talking to him hurts. Is it supposed to hurt? Is having this sort of discussion supposed to make me ache on the inside? I don’t think it’s supposed to ache, but oh, it does.
It does.
“I started writing to cope with my feelings,” he says.
“You did.”
“I did.”
“And how did that work out for you?”
“Well, I made six figures last year,” he says carefully. “I have a lot of money now.”
I’m not sure whether he’s trying to brag or not. I don’t think he is, but I barely made enough to be considered above the poverty line, so that feels like a lot of money to me.
It seems like an unimaginable amount of money.
“Good for you,” I say carefully. “It sounds like you’re very successful.”
So that’s where he’s been.
He writes stories for people. He writes dreams. He imagines far away places and beautiful worlds, and he writes it all down and sells it for money.
What a life.
“I am,” he says, and now I’m certain he’s not bragging. There’s something beneath the surface of his words: something he isn’t quite telling me.
“So, what’s the problem?”
He bristles, just a little, but shakes his head.
“No problem.”
“Liar,” I whisper, and he looks at me. His eyes search mine, begging an important question: can he trust me?
Am I the type of person he can trust with his feelings?
Does he feel safe enough to share?
“What happened, Cage?”
He sighs and shakes his head.
“I told myself I was only coming back here to get the house.”
“You thought there was a mistake.”
“I thought you were trying to steal it,” he says. “Now I know better.”
“Your mom wanted to leave it to Orlando. She didn’t want it tied up in a trust, though, so she put it in my name. It’s his, though. Everything’s his.”
“Are you going to move in?” He asks me quietly.
“I don’t know,” I say carefully. “We don’t have a lot of space here, but...I mean, Cage, she only passed a month ago. I haven’t even finished going through her belongings. It’s hard, you know, being in the house. It feels wrong.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s like it’s still her space. I feel like I’m invading it even though I know I have permission to be there.”
“You have permission,” he says, affirming me. “But I know that it must be strange.”
“It is.” I shake my head and look around at the sparse décor of my home. I kept things simple: not like Betty. Every inch of her walls is covered with pictures of Cage, of her, and of their adventures together. She has pictures of Orlando and pictures of me, and pictures of the three of us spending time together.
Everything in her home is busy.
Everything in her space is meaningful and important and valuable.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t here,” he whispers.
“She never stopped loving you,” I tell him.
“Thank you.”
“It’s true.”
“That means a lot.”
I look over at him, and it feels like the first time. I look at him, and I wonder what he’s thinking about, and I wonder if he’s thinking about me. Is he thinking about that night so very long ago? Is he wondering what would have happened if we’d only made different choices?
The world chewed us up and spit us out, but part of me believes that everything happens for a reason, and part of me thinks that we’re back in each other’s lives for a purpose.
I don’t know if that’s cliché or dumb or whatever...
All I know is that right now, I want him.
More than anything else, I want him.
I kiss him before I can stop myself. Before I can tell my brain to cut it out, I lean forward and press my lips against his. His mouth is soft, and his lips are gentle against mine. I know that I should pull away, and that doing this is wrong, but I don’t. Instead, I kiss him even more deeply, and to my total shock, he kisses me back.
Only, Cage isn’t gentle.
He isn’t sweet.
He’s changed since he’s been gone. The kiss he gives me is anything but sweet and gentle.
It’s wild.
Dominating.
Passionate.
He kisses me like he fucking means it, and then he kisses me just a little bit more. He pulls my hair, tugging my head back so I’m looking up at him, and his eyes are blazing like they’re on fire.
“Make sure you know what you’re doing, princess,” he growls. “Because once I have you again, I’m never letting you go.”
Chapter Nine
Cage
Making a mating claim, a promise, isn’t a good idea.
I shouldn’t be making this sort of promise to a woman like Alicia. Oh, she’s perfect, all right, but she’s perfectly wrong for me, and I’m absolutely certain that I’m wrong for her. I fucked up any chance of getting to be with her long ago and this...
I don’t know what this is, but I’m going to take it.
It’s the wrong choice. I know that. She really does deserve someone better, sweeter. Sh
e’s the kind of woman who deserves to be totally worshipped and cared for. She deserves to be protected, and I...I didn’t protect her.
Now it’s as though I’m being given a second chance, though. I’m being given a shot at making her feel loved, and important, and cared for.
And I’m not going to blow it this time.
I can’t.
So I kiss her.
Over and over, I kiss Alicia as though no time at all has passed.
I kiss her with a silent promise, that somehow, everything is going to be okay.
Somehow, we’re going to make this work.
When she pulls away from me, breathless, her hair is a mess, and her lips are swollen, and her eyes are happy, but confused.
“What does this mean?” She asks.
“It means we want each other, princess.”
“But it’s been forever.”
“Did you ever stop missing me?”
It’s a dangerous question: a loaded question. I learned long ago not to ask questions I didn’t already know the answer to. When you ask surprise questions, things that you aren’t quite sure about, you never really end up where you want to be.
Either you get amazing information, something that makes your heart soar, or you find out something you really didn’t want to know, and it’s always something you can’t ever get out of your mind.
But I can’t help myself.
I want to know.
No, I need to.
There’s a part of me that wants to know if I screwed up so badly that she’d never take me back.
There’s a part of me that wants to know if there’s any chance I could be the one who gets to love her.
But she’s saved from answering because Orlando starts crying. Instantly, we pull away from each other and hurry to his bedroom, where he’s sitting in the middle of the floor with his trains, but he’s sobbing. He’s holding a red train in one hand and a green train in the other.
“What’s wrong, muffin?” Alicia hurries to his side and squats down beside him. Our little boy looks up at her and shakes his head.
“I don’t have a blue train,” he says, sobbing.
“Sweetie, you have a blue train right here,” she says, picking one up from the floor.
“It’s not in my hand,” he cries, shaking his head. “I’m not holding it.”
“Do you want to hold the train?”
“No!” He yells, crying louder.
Alicia looks over at me and rolls her eyes.
“And this,” she says, hoisting Orlando up and carrying him over to his bed. “Is why we go to bed on time.”
Okay, burn. Yeah, she was definitely right about the entire “send-this-kid-to-bed-on-time” thing.
I’ll be the first to admit that.
I definitely shouldn’t have even tried to get him to stay up. I know that it just made things harder on all of us. Orlando is tired now, and cranky, and he’s not going to get to play as much because he’s got to sleep, and Alicia...
Well, now she has to worry about her kid’s mood and his attitude and his feelings, and...
“I’m sorry,” I whisper. She tucks him carefully into bed.
“Go to sleep, Orlando,” she says. “I’ll come get you when naptime is over.”
I think he’s going to protest, but he doesn’t. Instead, Orlando just rolls over, closes his eyes, and reaches for his stuffed teddy bear. He pulls it close to himself, wraps his arms around it, and gives it a big kiss.
“Teddy,” he whispers.
Then Alicia and I leave the room.
“I shouldn’t have pushed for him to stay up,” I admit.
“I know.”
“This dad stuff is all new to me,” I whisper.
Alicia reaches for me, pulls me close to her, and kisses me.
“Then we’ll figure it out together,” she tells me. “Now let’s go upstairs.”
“Upstairs?”
“Unless you want me to suck your dick right here,” she says, gesturing to the living room.
“Excuse me?”
“Cage, get your ass upstairs before I strip down right here,” she says. Then she turns and walks upstairs, leaving me staring at her tight, curvy but as she moves.
What the hell just happened here?
Did Alicia really just proposition me?
And am I really standing here like an idiot because I don’t know what to do next?
I need her.
Want her.
I’m craving every bit of her body, heart, and soul, and she’s handing me herself on a silver platter.
Making a silent promise to myself not to screw things up, I hurry upstairs after her and find myself standing in the middle of her loft.
It’s a tiny, cozy space. I should know: I’ve been crashing here the last few days. She’s been gracious enough to let me sleep at her home, and even though there’s a part of me that thinks I should refuse the offer, the reality is that I’m not going to.
I do want this.
Her.
All of it.
And when I walk over to her sitting on the bed, I know that everything between us is about to change.
“Are you sure?” I whisper to her.
“I’m sure.”
But there’s something I have to tell her first.
“I’m clean,” I say. “I don’t have anything.”
“I’m on the pill,” she tells me. “And I’m clean, too. I don’t have a condom, anyway.”
Okay, so that doesn’t really bother me. Even if she were to get pregnant again, I’m a lot older now. I’m different. I’m wiser and smarter and I would like to think that I’m a little bit braver than I used to be.
If she got pregnant, I wouldn’t leave this time. I won’t leave, anyway, but I certainly wouldn’t run off again when she’s just so perfect and wonderful. It breaks my heart that she went through that last pregnancy alone, but there is simply no chance she’ll ever have to do that again.
“There’s something else,” I whisper, and suddenly, I see her hope deflate. Her shoulders slump and her eyes droop.
“You’re married,” she whispers, shaking her head. “Shit. I should have known.”
She sighs, grabbing a pillow, and she wraps her arms around it.
“What?”
“Married, dating, live-in friend-with-benefits,” Alicia shakes her head. “I should have realized it sooner. Sorry,” she says. “I never would have, you know, come onto you.”
She blushes, and I can suddenly scent how she’s feeling. She’s embarrassed, and she’s anxious, and she’s reeking of frustration.
But there’s been a misunderstanding, because it’s just her.
It’s only ever been her.
“I’m not married,” I tell her. “It’s something else.”
“You’re gay?” She whispers, eyes going wide. “Because that’s fine, Cage. I totally understand.”
She places her hands in her lap and closes her eyes.
“Sweetheart, I’m not gay.”
“What is it?” She asks quietly, and she looks up at me with so many different emotions playing in her eyes that I’m worried my heart might just crack.
I take a deep breath and try to force the words out of my throat. It’s harder than it should be. This should be a simple confession, but the truth is that it’s a little bit embarrassing and a whole lot of strange.
What if she judges me?
What if she doesn’t want me after this?
I have money, sure, and we share a child, but...
What if this is the final straw?
“I haven’t...since that night.”
She shakes her head, confused.
“What?”
“I haven’t, you know.”
“Cage, what are you talking about?”
“For dragon’s sake, woman! I haven’t had sex since we were together!” I blurt it all out in a huge rush, and Alicia’s eyes go wide.
Chapter Ten
Alici
a
“Me too,” I whisper, but I can’t tell if he’s being serious right now.
He is, isn’t he?
He’s totally for real.
What are the chances, though?
What are the odds that neither one of us would have had sex in the last five years for no reason at all except that we didn’t?
“You haven’t?” He blinks, looking at me.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“I mean, I have a kid.”
“So? Lots of single mothers have sex.”
“Oh, and you have experience with this?” I ask drily.
“No,” he shakes his head. “I literally have no experience with that. I just told you that like, a second ago.”
“Oh, right,” I blush, swallowing hard.
Shit.
This is going to be harder than I thought. Neither one of us has had sex in years, and for me, I’ve only ever had sex once. He asked me a question though, and I feel like I should give him an answer.
A real one.
“I, um...well, you were my first. After you left, I was hurt, and then I found out about Orlando, and then I guess I just got busy.”
“Didn’t you get lonely?” He asks gently, but his voice holds no judgment.
“Yes,” I whisper. “But I didn’t want to bring anyone around that might not love him the way I loved him, or that might hurt him, or that might leave and then hurt him,” I tell Cage. “Orlando is my whole world, and I guess I’ve just been trying to protect him as much as I can. You know, from everything.”
“You’re a wonderful mom.”
“Thank you.”
“He’s lucky to have you.”
“Thank you.”
Cage sits down beside me and places a hand on my thigh. He strokes my skin softly, gently, touching me.
“It was my first time, too,” he says.
“What?” I look up at him sharply, and he laughs.
“You don’t have to look so surprised.”
“I am, though.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re...well, just look at you,” I gesture to his body. Cage is handsome as hell. He’s always been attractive, but in the time he’s been gone, I think he’s gotten even more good looking.
Somehow.
It doesn’t really seem fair, if you ask me.
How has someone like him managed to become so absolutely fucking beautiful?