by C C Monroe
“You made love to me all morning, rocked my world and then when I came in the bathroom you didn’t even fight to have me get in the bath with you. Instead you just shrugged and moved on.” Okay, am I fucking high or is this some real bullshit?
“Oh my fuck, L. What do you want from me? I beg you to be my girlfriend, beg you to let me in, beg you to give me an inch and you always turn it down. I knew you wouldn’t get in with me, you tell me no every time I ask. I didn’t want to piss you off and push you away. Fuck, all we’ve done this trip is fight and fuck. We haven’t even laughed or done anything fun like we use to.” I take off my hat, run my hands through my hair and reposition my cap.
“All you talk about or want to do is fuck, Kingston!”
“Because that’s the only way you will let me have you!” The earth must have felt my wrath because the breeze around us stops and even though we’re outside, I feel like we’re in a tiny box, suffocating with the palpable tension. Her eyes drift across the water behind me, growing wet with her own tears.
“Kings...”
“You know what Lana, I’m done. We leave tomorrow, I’ll sleep on the couch and give you your fucking space.” She didn’t ask for it, but I need it. Deflecting is what they call it, right? I can’t do this, we just made up and already we’re fighting again less than twenty-four hours from our last one. California did the complete opposite of what I wanted, throwing me off balance, because the fights are coming closer than far between.
I move around her, making sure I don’t even make physical contact. If she even touches me, I will lose it, I will be sucked back into our vortex.
“Kings!” she yells after me and I fight with everything in me to ignore it. Maybe when we get home I will give her even more space. This trip was supposed to unite us again, strengthen our bond and rebuild our relationship. As far as I’m concerned, it did the fucking opposite, where the fuck is the woman I knew?
“Your turn and don’t you dare peak!” Lana threatens me. Her hand over my eyes shields my sight but I can still see her perfectly in my mind. Her hair is pulled back in a loose pony, her glasses are on her cute little face, my oversized sleep shirt and boxers adorn her petite body. My beautiful Queen.
“I won’t and guys you better fucking stop her if this shit is something that’ll make me barf.” It’s a typical Friday night in the Donovan household. After work Trey and I came home and waited for Lana and Shay to get home from whatever they were doing. Trey is my best friend, has been for years. We do all kinds of crazy shit together, I’m surprised we haven’t been arrested...yet.
Anyway, here we are, Friday night, having our ‘guess what I put in your mouth’ challenge. Yes, it sounds perverted and yes that was the whole reason I named it that.
“Ok, shush and open up!” Lana yells over our laughing. I feel the cold tip of the spoon hit my lip and I open, letting the substance hit my tongue. Instantly, my taste buds reject the sour, thick taste of something I can’t fucking name. All I know is it’s gross. I spit it out and Lana’s hand leaves my eyes as she jolts back to avoid getting hit with my spit up.
“What the fuck, Lana! What was that?” I lap at my tongue with a paper towel, trying my best to get rid of the awful taste. Her giggle sounds like music to my ears and I can’t help but smile at the guilty look on her face. She looks perfect in my clothes, she looks stunning always, even with the black eye she’s currently wearing. That fucker hit her today. When she came over and I saw her eye, I almost killed him. Rage boiled deep in my blood, never truly cooling down, only simmering. Lana begged me not to do anything and I was the coward who obeyed, caring more about keeping her alive.
She cried in my arms for a couple hours tonight and then I picked her up and carried her to the bathroom, starting her a bath and leaving her some fresh clothes, then I left her like the gentlemen I didn’t want to be.
“It was cottage cheese, your favorite.” I knew I knew that taste, gah I fucking hate cottage cheese!
“That’s it!” The spoon in her hand drops, she knows what’s coming. Jumping down from my place on the counter I reach my long arm out and yank her back before she gets too far.
“Kings! No, I’m sorry!” She’s laughing, I love that laugh. I love that I can make her laugh like this when she was just crying a few hours ago.
“I bet you are, come here!” Pulling her flush against my chest, she begs for someone to help her. Instead Trey, Shay and my dad just sit back and let us play.
“You want to play dirty, I’ll give you dirty, baby!” Grabbing the cottage cheese, I dig my hand into the cold tub and pull it back out. “Open up, L!”
“No Ki...”
Slosh!
I wipe the cottage cheese all over her mouth and face, causing her to laugh louder and struggle against me harder. After I cover her a few more times with cottage cheese and it’s dripping down her shirt, onto her tan legs, then sliding to the floor, I wave the white flag. Letting her go, she bends over trying to catch her breath. I walk to the sink and turn on the hot water, washing off the remaining slimy, repulsive shit from my hands. Turning it off, I move to dry my hands when I’m caught off guard. My arms are yanked up and out to each side of me by Trey and my dad while L jumps on me wrapping her legs around my waist and her arms around my neck. I only have on my sweats, so the cottage cheese on her shirt rubs off on my chest and abs. They plotted against me and helped her cute little ass.
That isn’t the worst part. Lana grabs the back of my head and slides her covered face up and down mine. Spreading the cottage cheese on my cheeks, my neck, my nose, my forehead, all of it. I won’t lie, I don’t struggle to get loose because having her wrapped around me like a monkey and her face all over mine isn’t the worst thing to happen to me. In fact, it’s the best thing to date.
“You little shit!”
“You love me.”
“Yeah, I do.”
I’m jolted awake by a high-pitched scream bellowing from upstairs. My perfect dream state completely forgotten. Jumping off the couch, I dash up the stairs, taking two at a time.
“Lana! Baby!” Opening the door in a panic I see her sitting in the corner of the room shaking, holding her thighs tight against her chest while she rocks back and forth. I know what happened, she had another nightmare. She has nightmares about Joel quite frequently—especially after we fight, which in turn makes me feel like a complete fucking dick.
Rushing to Lana, I console her. “Baby, it’s okay I’m here.” She looks up at me, her eyes red, fear marking her startled face. I swoop her up and lay her down on the bed. Climbing in next to her, I enclose my arms around her shaking form.
“Shh, Lana it’s okay, shh.” I rock her, her shakes and sobs are powerful, I can feel them moving me with each one.
“I’m sorry, Kings. I’m so sorry,” she cries.
“Lana, don’t apologize. I shouldn’t have left you like that. I shouldn’t have let us go to bed fighting again.” I should know better, I know damn well when we fight it can trigger her nightmares.
“I pushed you to get angry. I don’t know why I keep doing this.”
“I wasn’t angry, I was hurt.” She turns and nestles into me. “You don’t deserve this, you deserve someone who isn’t damaged goods.”
I hiss, “That wouldn’t ever happen, you are not damaged goods. You’re mine, my woman, my goods.” She flinches at the mention of being mine. A trigger she associates with violence and a word I use to show my devotion.
“I’m my own person, not anyone else’s,” her whisper is low and as much as I wish I didn’t hear it, I did. But arguing with her or trying to prove my point would be a total asshat move right now.
“Want to talk about the dream?” I feel her head sweep back and forth against my chest, pushing me out.
“Okay.” I don’t press her farther. I keep thinking we may round a corner, but there’s always a road block waiting to destroy us around the bend.
Kingston and I haven’t talked much today, just sh
aring quiet awkward glances and one word acknowledgments. Our fight was just another reminder why I need to see someone or learn to cope better with my post-traumatic stress.
Joel’s attack. When I think about it for longer than a few seconds I can start to feel the pain in my side and the copper taste of blood flooding my taste buds. It’s such a potent memory, something that scarred me for life. I will never be able to undo or unfeel anything he did to me that night nor all those years.
I look at Kingston’s still form next to me, the flight isn’t completely full today, so we don’t have too many people near us, just a cute old lady on the other side of the aisle. She has to be hard of hearing, the flight attendant practically had to yell in her ear to get her drink order. She’s adorable.
Kings won’t say much to me, he’s stayed completely still the past thirty minutes, taking small sips of his water before going back to playing with his lip, lost in his own thoughts. We never made up, he only held me through the aftershocks of my horrific nightmare. I woke up this morning to him packing and getting ready to leave. Still, Kingston took care of me. He may be ignoring me and pissed as hell, but I woke to see my stuff packed and a fresh pair of clothes set aside for me.
I look over my attire and any woman looking at me would know I either wore this with a man in mind or a man picked my outfit. I’m wearing a pair of frayed daisy duke shorts and V-neck black t-shirt that fits too tight. I smile knowing even upset, he still takes care of me, then instantly I fall down the slope of regret because he deserves better, better than what I can give. I’m such a coward. A tease. Joel did always say I was a slut who loved being a cocktease, maybe he was right this whole time.
A cold shiver harasses my spine at the thought. “Baby?” I look to Kings, who finally breaks his ice stone posture.
“Hmm?” He looks over to me, still resting his cheek against his palm, where his poor large arm barely fits on the small armrest.
“I’m cold. Can I have your sweater?”
Questioning me with the twitch of his brows he nods his head ‘yes’ after a few seconds. Reaching his hand behind his head and giving me a show of those sexy tatted arms, he pulls his light weight zip up hoodie off the seat and hands it to me. He watches me lift my legs and cross them in front of me on the seat and cover myself in his jacket.
I wield him in my mind to go back to whatever he was thinking about before I stopped him, but he doesn’t. Instead he stays looking at me, with purpose.
“You’re killing me, baby.”
“I know Kings. I know.” He doesn’t mean it in a good way. I’m not playing fair and I know that. “I wish I was like other girls. I wish I didn’t live every day with reservations.”
“Me either.”
“I think we need to take some time apart.” I chew on my lip and avoid direct eye contact with him after I deliver the blow. I expect him to scoff and tell me to dream on like he has in the past, but instead he just nods.
“Okay,” he replies.
“Okay.”
What the fuck just happened? How did he agree to that so easily? Did I even want that to happen or am I just playing part of the game? All these questions are left unanswered because I’m completely blindsided by the reality of what this time apart means or what it could do to us. So I guess the more important question is, what did I just do?
The rest of the plane ride is me internally screaming at myself for being such a monster and him spending it quiet with his headphones in ignoring me, while I beg for him to beg for me. I’m sick.
“I missed you, you look all tan!” Shayla says, taking her place next to me while I dress the mannequin. This is her first day back from her honeymoon in Paris. Kingston and I have been home for nearly a week, we still are not talking much. He will text me at night to make sure I’m okay, but there has been no contact physically at all. I miss having his body keeping me warm at night and his funny one liners and cocky attitude engaging me.
“I know, I laid out a ton your wedding weekend.” She passes me the jeans I want to add on the mannequin.
“How are our little nuggets doing?” I gesture to her stomach, she looks so happy—beautiful. Finally she has found her peace with Trey.
“They’re good, we can’t wait to find out the sex, we find out in three weeks.”
“How exciting! I think they’re boys.” She giggles, carefree.
“No, I think they’re girls.” She blushes rubbing her belly. I envy her, wishing so badly I could just be with Kingston without any drawbacks—I wish my past could be water under the bridge. The light in Shayla’s eyes when she talks about her babies and Trey makes the pit in my stomach hollow out, the pain in my heart weigh heavy.
“Speaking of babies, have you told my brother?” she interrupts me and I get flustered, shrugging my shoulders. I told her I would tell Kingston and I haven’t.
Damn it.
Note to self, if you date your best friend’s brother, don’t tell her anything you don’t want him to know. Shayla has been pushing me to tell Kings about the baby and I’m not ready. Plain and simple. Call me selfish, call me a bitch, call me narrow-minded—I don’t care. With where him and I are right now, neither of us are ready to have this conversation, we are barely hanging on by a shredded thread as it is.
“No,” I answer, walking away.
“Lana. You need to tell him. This isn’t fair to him or you. And you pretty much had this same conversation regarding me telling Trey about my infertility, so it’s only right I have this with you.” Turning back I shake my head back and forth, warning her to not start with this whole thing.
“I know that but I think I would rather do anything else, shit, even wait for the baby to come.” I shrug and Shayla snorts, fucking snorts at me.
“Really?” she questions, shaking her head in disbelief. “You know L, I told you I would let you tell him and wouldn’t go behind your back. Well, things change and I don’t need you blaming me or getting mad at me later.” She waits a brief moment until I concede. Letting out an audible sigh, I take the bait.
“Fine.”
“Good. Now, I love you like a sister, you mean the world to me, you know that. However, you seem to be neglecting that love. Kingston is my brother, my best friend, and I can’t hide information like the woman he loves is carrying his child. Don’t ask me to do it anymore. If you don’t tell him within the next twenty-four hours, I will.” Her threat is crystal fucking clear. I guess now wouldn’t be the best time to tell her him and I are on a break. Shayla is a fiery angry redhead and I don’t want to see her wrath today.
“Okay,” I answer in defeat. Her squinted eyes try to assess if I’m lying.
“Good. Now we have customers and it’s your turn. I made a huge sale on the phone this morning, try and keep up.” She winks at me and pats me on the ass.
Days like these make me wish I wasn’t pregnant so I could drown my issues in a bottle of vodka.
By the end of the day my feet are dragging—not only am I physically exhausted, I emotionally can’t handle any more stress. I just can’t. Baby and I need a nap.
Lana fucking James ripped open my chest and tore out my fucking heart like a man-eater. I didn’t fight to stay, I didn’t fight to make us work. I got off that plane and drove us home, she went to her apartment and I went to mine.
I contemplated twenty different ways of going to her and begging her to stop all this bullshit and fucking have me, let me have her. Let me be her King so I can cherish and protect my fucking Queen. Instead, I spent my week away from her at work— and spent my nights alone.
My office door swings open and the tornado that is Trey hops through the door all fucking smiles. Dick is lucky, he has my saint of a sister as his wife and two beautiful babies coming soon. He’s experiencing life and I’m experiencing death.
“Alright, shithead, you’ve been moping around all day and ignoring me. I’ve been gone all week, talk to me. What’s your deal?” He plops down on the chair in front of me and I
stare at him, envisioning my fist meeting his face, wiping that pretty boy smile right off. I’m beyond bitter, envious and green because he is so fucking happy.
“Lana and I called it off last week, that’s my fucking deal.” No longer smiling, he loses his humor, a frown setting deep.
“Shit man. Well, at least you can move on from all that. No way is fighting that much and then just covering it up with sex healthy.” Hold that thought, I might just hit him. Fuck my sister’s feelings, she’ll understand.
Practically leaping out of my chair, it slams back against the wall with a loud crunch. I don’t need to look back to know I dented the wall or caused it to fucking crack.
“You can be a real asshole. I never told my sister to leave you when you were crying all the time like a little bitch. You don’t know Lana and me, you don’t understand how much I love her and trust me, I’ve fucking tried to leave her, but I can’t. I fucking can’t!” Trey has no idea how hard this whole thing has been on me. How arduous it is to be with Lana, and how terrible it is to be without her. I’m in a gladiator rink with a lion, I stand no chance of winning.
“Dude, I’m sorry I didn’t mean to piss you off, it just sucks to see you so miserable all the time.” He surrenders, backing down a little. I appreciate his effort, but I’m still riled up.
“I’m not miserable. I’m fucking torn into two pieces. Being without her is like being in a drought waiting for rain, being with her is like being drowned in the ocean completely consumed by her. That, Trey, is fucking torture.” My voice deepens, losing its edge as I knock myself down a few pegs. I’m on high alert right now, between missing my lady and feeling like shit for just walking away, I can’t seem to control myself.
“Alright, step back then, what happened? Why’d you guys break up—I mean whatever you were calling it since you weren’t together.” I couldn’t glare at him more sideways if I fucking tried.