The knocking sounded again.
“Just a sec!” I let out a deep breath and I headed toward the door, taking a few moments to compose myself. With a deep breath, I pulled on the handle with a smile affixed to my face. “Hey, Mads.”
“Hi,” she replied, adjusting the tote bag on her shoulder. “Let me in. It’s raining harder than a cow pissing on a flat rock out here.”
“Now, that’s a visual I could’ve gone through life without.” I glanced back at the window, a wave of sadness washing over me that Adam was gone and out in the bad weather because of me.
Madelyn took off her rain jacket and draped it on the back of a chair before she eyed my shirt. “You know, they make irons, right? Unless you’re trying to start a new trend. And if so, don’t.” Her long blonde hair clung to her shoulders from the relentless rain, yet it was still the color of lustrous glass. “Since it’s my turn to buy, I brought Mario’s. They had a half-off special on lasagna tonight, and I don’t get paid for another week. So, Italian we get.” She flopped down on the loveseat and started unloading cardboard boxes from her sequined tote bag. “What’s new?”
“Not much.” I unhinged a clamshell container full of salad and popped a crouton in my mouth. “Just been trying to hide out with the whole election thing coming up. The usual.”
“Has your momster been that bad?” She offered me a pained look with bright green eyes.
I shook my head. “Always. What about you? Did you hear back from that college you’ve been waiting on?”
“Not yet. They technically have until tomorrow to reply.” She absentmindedly poked at a pool of grease on top of her dinner. “Oh! Do you know who I saw when I was waiting for you to answer the door?”
I raised an eyebrow. “Please tell me it wasn’t the campaign caravan. I can’t deal with any more—”
“Not even close. Adam Rockwell was walking down your street.”
“Nice,” I said, thumbing my way through a magazine at breakneck speed, not taking time to look at the articles.
She arched an eyebrow. “Do you always read fashion mags upside-down?”
“Huh?” I blinked and focused on the words below, realizing she was right. “Out of it today, I guess. Sorry.” I flopped the fashion magazine closed and tossed it in a basket next to the TV.
“What do you think of him? Is he seeing anyone?” Madelyn looked down at her reflection in the glass of the coffee table and applied a layer of lip balm.
“Who?” I asked.
“Duh. Adam. I mean, I know he’s a little older and all. But who cares, right?”
I blinked quickly. “How would I know who he dates?”
“I dunno.” She shrugged before taking a bite of lasagna. “He’s always so withdrawn and keeps to himself. It’s mysterious. Plus, he’s got that tall, dark, and handsome thing going for him. Thought maybe you’d heard something around town.”
“Around town?” I felt my heartrate speed up. “Is there something I should know about?”
“Man, you’re acting weird tonight. Relax.” She giggled and started the process of braiding her hair. “He’s…he’s fucking hot. I mean, you’re not interested, right? I thought I saw him checking you out last week when we were down at the beach. Maybe I was wrong.”
“No!” I blurted. Suddenly, my heart was as heavy as the lump of pasta sitting in my stomach. As happy as I was Adam was mine, no one knew. And that killed me. It broke my heart Mads didn’t know what was going on in my life. We’d told each other everything since we were kids. “Nope. Not interested.”
“So, you’d be cool if I asked him to dinner? Like on a date?”
I hesitated for a few seconds and bit my lip. Forcing that smile onto my face was one of the hardest things I’d ever done. “S….sure. Doesn’t matter to me.” The words were bitter as they crossed my tongue.
“Good.” She studied my expression and then grinned. “Maybe I’ll get up the courage to talk to him when I’m back home in a few days.”
“Fantastic,” I replied, jamming a massive bite of salad into my mouth to keep myself from saying anything I’d regret.
“I’m probably wasting my time.” She undid the braid, dissatisfied. “He’s not going to be into someone like me.”
“Come on, Mads,” I replied. “What guy wouldn’t want to date you? You’re perfect. Smart. Funny. Thoughtful. Plus, you have that cutesy blonde hair, green eyed, freckled look. And those years of soccer practice left you with an athlete’s figure. Guys around here go bananas for that kind of stuff.”
Wait a minute. What am I doing? Was I actually encouraging her to ask out my boyfriend? Abort! Abort! I needed more salad to occupy my mouth.
“Hey!” Her eyes lit up. “Maybe we could double. You and my little brother could—”
“Huh-huh. No way,” I immediately cut her off. “You’re my best friend, and I love you to the moon and back, Mads. But I have to draw the line somewhere. That’s like incest. Not happening. Ever.”
“Fine.” She closed her box of lasagna. “So, I’ve been thinking about cutting my hair into a bob. You know, something drastic. What do you think…”
Her lips moved, but I didn’t hear what she said. Thankfully, the topic of Adam Rockwell had been dropped. At least for the time being.
Life was getting complicated, and each day seemed to have more enormous hurdles for us to clear. I had to find a way to tell Madelyn about my relationship with Adam, but there hadn’t been a good time. Okay. There had been plenty of opportunities. Probably hundreds. But I was a chicken shit. With what I knew, I needed to protect him by any means possible, even if that meant keeping my best friend in the dark.
The rest of the night fit our standard hangout protocol. It entailed hours of watching old movies on the freebie channel, laughing at inside jokes, attempts at amateur manicures, and my downing a couple of bottles of wine. Madelyn was slightly younger than me, and miss straight and narrow always turned down the booze since she wasn’t twenty-one yet.
At ten o’clock, the second movie had ended and so had the rainstorm.
“I should get going.” Madelyn yawned. “I’ve got a headache, and I have to work tomorrow.
“Want some ibuprofen?” I reached into a cupboard.
“No!” she exclaimed and then calmed her tone. “I mean, I’m good. Call you tomorrow?”
“Sounds good.” I wiped down the counter with a wet paper towel where a blob of lasagna had landed earlier in the evening. “Drive safe.”
“Always.” Madelyn slung her tote bag on her shoulder as she closed the door.
I continued cleaning up the mess of paper plates and wine bottles when I heard a tapping at the back window.
Butterflies flitted in my stomach as I dropped the paper towel and darted across the room. As always, it took mega-force to jam the warped window upward with the heels of my hand. “You’re soaked.” I looked at the dark-colored shirt clinging to his frame while he crawled through the window. “Wasn’t this thing light gray when you left?” I tugged on the sleeve.
“I think so.” His teeth chattered as I peeled it off him, letting the weighted material drop into a soggy pile on the floor. “It’s kind of hard to avoid the raindrops on foot. Two more car-free days to go.”
“And you’re freezing.”
“I’ll bet you could warm me up.” His icy fingertips trembled as they greeted my face, leaning down for a kiss. Adam’s cool lips met mine, and I fell into his embrace. As he pulled back, his coy smile took hold of my heart. “See? With your help, the chill will be gone in no time.”
He grabbed a spare shirt from the bottom dresser drawer along with a pair of his athletic pants. Our relationship had been kept so hidden, we’d both started stashing clothes at each other’s houses to avoid extra trips out in public.
“We need
to talk about something.” I fought to focus on my words and not on Adam’s abdominal muscles.
He grabbed a breadstick from the foil bag on the table and took a bite. “About what?”
“Please put a shirt on. I can’t concentrate with you standing here half-naked.”
“Why not?” He smiled, flexing with his biceps in an overdramatic pose.
“I dunno.” I blushed and glimpsed his tattooed arms. “It makes me want to do stuff to you.”
He waggled his eyebrows. “Ooh! What kind of stuff? Kinky stuff?”
“Stop!” I covered my eyes with my hands. “Not looking at you. Otherwise, I’m going to get distracted again. And this is important.”
He laughed. “Fine. I’m decent. You can look now.”
“If I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a million times, you’re more than decent.” Peeking through the gaps between my fingers, I lowered my hands to my sides. “Thank you.” I let out a deep sigh of relief.
“What’s up, blue eyes? You look worried.”
I chewed my lip. “I think Mads has a thing for you.”
“A thing?” he replied. “What kind of thing?”
“A romantic thing. She likes you.”
He swallowed the mouthful of bread with a pained look on his face. “Blue…”
I spoke quickly, like ripping a bandage off a hairy arm. “Heads up, she’s planning to ask you on a date after she gets back from some vacation next week. We need to find a way to tell her about us before this all backfires.”
“Tell me about it.” He rubbed his face. “Maybe it’s because we only have two more days to go and victory is on the horizon, but I swear this relationship is getting harder to keep quiet by the minute. Fortunately, you’re worth every second of the struggle.”
Heat crept into my cheeks while I fiddled with a stray string on my shirt. “She asked if I was interested in you.”
He got quiet and the mood shifted from playful to serious. “What did you tell her?”
“I was on the spot. Of course, I told her ‘no’.”
A flicker of pain showed behind his eyes and it was like I’d been sucker-punched in the stomach. He was the one person who I vowed to never hurt. He’d been dealt enough of that in his life, and I’d deemed it my job to not let it happen again.
“Adam,” I touched his arm and swallowed the lump in my throat, “the lie burned like hell, but I had to protect you…us. This asinine six-month thing is almost over. I can’t risk losing either—”
“Shhh…” Adam wrapped his arms around me. “You don’t have to justify anything, and I’m not going anywhere.”
“I know. But I feel…”
“You feel what?” Adam lifted me up and I instinctively wound my legs around his waist, his hands cupping my ass before he engaged me in a deep kiss. “Tell me what you’re so afraid of.”
I braced my hands against his pectorals and moaned. “I don’t remember.”
“Good,” he whispered. He slid one hand under my shirt, his flat palm inching its way up stomach, the coldness making me flinch. His grip around my waist tightened with the other. It was a reassurance he’d never let go. Our kiss only broke long enough to let the annoyance of fabric pass between us before my tongue sought his out again.
“God, I want you,” he murmured as he fumbled with the clasp on my bra one-handedly.
A knock and a click caused my eyes to open.
The front door creaked and we froze mid-kiss, mid-half-nakedness, and mid-passion.
“Hey, I forgot my rain jacket, and I’m not talking about condoms…Blue?” It was the ultimate let down, both figuratively and literally. Madelyn’s hands dropped to her sides, her tote bag landed on the floor, and her jaw fell. The color drained from her face, her expression crushed.
“Mads, this isn’t what it looks like.” I squirmed from Adam’s grip and scooped up my shirt from the floor. The damn thing was inside out with one sleeve wound through the head hole, so diving my way into it wasn’t nearly as graceful as I’d hoped.
“Do you have him on speed dial or something? You couldn’t wait long enough for me to get turned down before you swooped in?”
“You don’t understand. It’s complicated,” I replied.
“It’s only complicated if you make it complicated. Some friend. Not interested, my ass.” She snatched up her belongings and bolted out the door.
“Fuck.” I grabbed my tennis shoes, jamming my feet in without bothering to unlace them first. “I’m sorry, Adam. I need to talk to her.”
“I get it,” he said. “I’ll stay here. You go.”
“Madelyn! Wait!” I yelled as I raced through the open doorway, leaving Adam in my wake.
For hours that night, I looked for her all over Steele Falls and into the outskirts of Ocean Shores. I continued my search until the sun began to rise the next morning before I finally gave up.
She wasn’t at home.
She wasn’t at either of the local parks.
She wasn’t drowning her sorrows in ice cream at Chilly Philly’s.
She wasn’t driving down the 101.
Regret flooded my stomach, and I threw up half-digested lasagna on the sidewalk twice. I could have avoided the entire situation unfolding by telling her the truth, but I didn’t.
Over the next three days, I sent thirty-seven texts—none of them ever marked as read. I also phoned her fifty-two times—each call immediately sending me to her peppy voicemail greeting until the mailbox was full of messages from me. It was borderline stalking, but I was desperate. Begging her to talk to me. Begging her to yell at me. Begging for anything. Any type of attention I could get, I wanted it. Scratch that. I needed it. Needed to know she was okay. Instead, I was left disappointed because we never spoke again.
The drive home from Mario’s was a blur I didn’t remember. Standing in the entryway of the mother-in-law house with the door wide open was difficult as I tried to let my walls down. My fingers quaked as I lightly touched the brass handle Madelyn gripped when she walked in on us that night. The sharp pangs of disappointment and bitter betrayal she experienced were nearly palpable if I closed my eyes.
Across the room, there was complex history between Adam and I, so many emotions swirling together in an invisible cloud of desire and lust. And that was one night out of many—the memories took my breath away.
I could almost see us in our past fiery embrace.
I could almost taste the whisper of his soft kiss on my lips.
I could almost hear the sound of my pulse racing when I caught him staring at me.
I could almost feel the echo of his hands claiming my body.
I could almost smell the comfort his aftershave gave me.
But “almost” wasn’t enough. Every sense failed at giving me absolution if it ever existed.
That situation haunted me like no other. But all of it was only a tainted memory, a ghost. None of it was real and never could be again. All I was left with was lack of closure and a sense of inescapable loneliness. And for the rest of my life, those demons would be shackled to me without a skeleton key. It was my own damn fault, and I’d earned that punishment.
I took a deep breath and closed the door behind me, resting my back against the heavy wood paneling. It was fortunate I was separated from the rest of the house. With heaving sobs escaping my chest, I let myself sink to the floor, my cheek pressed to the cold linoleum. The wails were relentless and took hold until there were no more tears left to shed.
* * *
The next day, I woke up to the sound of my phone vibrating on the night stand, dancing its way toward the edge. I fumbled for it with one eye open, waiting for the red numbers on the alarm clock to come into focus. Three minutes after eight o’clock. My uncle’s name popped up on the screen of my cell w
ith a text message.
Ty
Reply to this when you have a chance. No rush.
I drummed my fingers against the itchy comforter, wondering if I should respond immediately to express interest or if that would make me look too desperate. I bit my lip. Maybe waiting an hour would be better. Ehhh. Desperation won the battle while my fingers flew across the keys.
Ty
What’s up?
Sorry I had to bail last night. I talked to Adam this morning. Are you available to come in and chat? I’d rather have this conversation in person instead of over text.
My heart lurched in my chest as the prior evening came flooding back and smacked me in the face with brute force. It was over. Adam ratted me out and provided Ty with his unsavory opinion, sealing my fate on not having a job at Brennan Construction.
Reluctantly, I replied.
Ty
Sure. Does 10am work?
Sounds good. Don’t bother getting dressed up. Jeans are fine. What I have to say won’t take long.
Okay.
See you then.
There it sat. My future employment opportunity was about to be flushed down the toilet like a giant wad of toilet paper, and it took less than two minutes of text messaging with Ty and one fucked up dinner with Adam Rockwell. I was left to anticipate scolding and disappointment for another hour and fifty-five minutes. Make that fifty-four minutes. No matter how I spun it, confidence in my uncle’s wording was absent. Especially after I saw the look on Adam’s face when he sped off from Mario’s. Nothing good could come from it.
I thought back to our heated words, fully-aware my temper had gotten the best of me. It wasn’t pretty. Storming out of the restaurant was a newfound skill that probably wouldn’t make it onto my résumé. As much as I didn’t want to admit it, I could’ve swayed the evening with Adam in a different direction, but I didn’t. I beat myself up, asking why. Maybe it was self-sabotage.
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