by CE Ricci
“That’s such horse shit, and you know it. You had my cock down your throat not ten minutes ago—” he glances to my crotch— “and you’re harder than fucking steel as we stand here screaming at each other, yet you don’t want me?”
My fingers on both hands latch onto the strands of my hair. Partly in irritation, but mostly so I don’t do something insanely stupid, like touch him. Or fucking kill him.
Lowering my voice to a deathly soft level, I force myself to toss out insults. It’s the only way I can think to get him to leave, to forget about me and what we had while up in the mountains. “Here’s the thing, Abhainn. My cock might want you, but he isn’t the one in charge. Even if he was, all he wants is that tight ass and warm mouth. But the thing is, he can get that just about anywhere.” Ripping my fingers from my hair, I press my palm to my chest. Speaking in staccato, slow and deliberate, I hope he gets the message. “I, on the other hand, do not want you.”
The lies keep piling up, but I hold my ground, daring him to challenge me again. Part of me, hell, all of me wants him to keep fighting, if only to keep him here in my apartment and in my life for a little while longer.
But I can’t stand knowing I’m hurting him and inflicting damage to the bond we share with every word leaving my mouth.
River spins away from me, walking through the living room to the wall of windows. He leans his arms against the glass pane, resting his forehead against them, causing the muscles of his back and shoulders to ripple under his shirt. “You can sit there and pretend nothing happened in that fucking cabin, but we both know you’d be a fucking liar. So what? Now since we’re back, you’re done with me?” Turning back to face me, he slants his body back against the wall. The fire in his eyes is burning me from across the room as a bite is mixed in with his tone. “You told me you didn’t want to lose me. But what you’re doing right now is making sure you do just that.”
Holding my arms out to the side, I let out a quick huff of agitation. “What did you think would happen? We’d come back from our fuck fest in the mountains and magically be a couple? Live happily ever after?”
Because yes, that is exactly what I thought.
I don’t let my thoughts derail me. I advance on him, pinning him in place with a vicious stare as I release the most blasphemous words to ever leave my mouth. “You were nothing more to me than a place to stick my cock. That’s all it ever was, and that’s all it will ever be.”
Nausea started overwhelming my senses a while ago with each and every lie I threw his way, but that one causes bile to rise in my throat. I think I might actually be sick.
I hate this. I hate myself for having to push him away. I hate River for not letting me. I hate these circumstances we’ve found ourselves in. I hate Ted motherfucking Anders, and the rest of the goddamn world.
I hate that I can’t love him the way he deserves to be loved.
River winces, tears starting to well in his eyes as he searches mine. “Is that really how little you think of me?”
No baby, I think the world of you. I’d give the whole damn thing to you, if only I knew how.
But instead, I go in for the kill. “And therein lies the problem,” I smirk, my voice tainted with calamity. “Because I don’t think of you at all.”
River pushes me, spitting mad and boiling with rage. His hand comes to my throat, gripping me there firmly before spinning me so my back hits the wall.
I don’t make any efforts to fight him off. Even I am self-aware enough to realize the shit I’m spewing is more than enough reason to be knocked the fuck out.
Only he doesn’t deck me.
He slams his mouth to mine again, his soft and supple lips attempting to coax the truth from me, and it’s physically painful not to cave and kiss him back. I know he’s trying to pull some emotion from me, to get me to reveal my lies to him.
Which is why I don’t kiss him back.
I let his lips mold against me, not giving an inch, even when his tongue slips along the seam of my lips before prying them apart. Something like a moan, or maybe a sigh of frustration, leaves him at my compliance. His teeth nip at my mouth and his hands roam my still naked chest. All of my willpower is being focused on the fact that Ted will kill him without batting an eye if he ever found out what River means to me, giving me the strength I need to resist his onslaught.
River breaks away after a moment, realizing I won’t give him what he’s seeking, before leaning his forehead against mine. My eyes slide closed at the contact and I simply breathe him in, filling with disappointment that our last kiss was an empty one.
“If you put half as much effort in trying to make us work as you are in trying to rip us apart right now, we could be fucking unstoppable,” he mutters softly. “We’d be everything.”
His words hit me like a bullet to the chest.
We already are, my love. You are everything. I only wish I could tell you that.
For a moment, the tiniest of a nanosecond, I debate giving in and telling him everything. Not just about Ted, but about every dark and depraved thing I’ve done, that has been done to me, that was beyond my control.
Not just the half-truths I’ve given him about the molestations, and the drug and alcohol use. There’s also the full story of Deacon’s death. The cover-up. The suicide attempt.
The flinch.
All the sources and subjects of my nightmares, laid on the table for him to see.
But instead, I simply sigh and forge down the road I’ve already paved for myself. “We don’t fit, River.” For once, the words leaving my lips are the cold, hard truth. “We’re water and oil, and those two things never fucking mix. You have to accept that.”
His eyes search mine, green as the tree we cut down for Christmas, and every part of me is breaking at the pain in them. “How can I accept something that isn’t true?”
Goddamnit, mo grá. Please don’t make this harder than it already is.
I lick my lips and sigh. “Just because you don’t want to believe something doesn’t mean it isn’t true.”
“But it’s not true,” he urges, pushing off my chest and putting space between us. “You and I both know it! And I can’t sit here and let you lie to my fucking face anymore!”
My teeth sink into my tongue so hard the taste of copper fills my mouth. Tossing my hands, my exasperation back with a vengeance, I shout the words at the top of my lungs. “Then fucking leave, River! Get the fuck out of my apartment and my fucking life!”
River’s teeth latch onto his bottom lip and he nods his head absently. When his eyes flash up to mine, they are brimming with resentment.
Good, Abhainn. Hold onto that.
“I swear to God, Rain. If I walk out that door, there’s no coming back from this.”
My jaw ticks at his threat because fuck me that is the last thing I want, but the one thing I know has to happen. I clear my throat, forcing a bored expression to slip on my face. “Do I get bonus points if I act like I care?”
How can it be so easy for me to verbally abuse him like this? If I really love him, how can I treat him like this? When you love someone, aren’t you supposed to fill them with that feeling, rather than force hate and disdain down their throat at every turn?
It’s then when I remember what River once said to me in the cabin, before we agreed to our arrangement.
Better be careful, Rain. Love and hate are two sides of the same coin.
And while those words ring home, it was what he followed up with that is the real kick in the nuts.
You’ll be falling in love with me before you know it.
Fuck. He made us a self-fulfilling prophecy, ensuring we really did blur the lines between love and hate after all.
His scoff brings me back from my reverie, forcing my eyes to rise and clash with his. Harsh and gruff, he spits his next words at me, seething. “Far be it for me to expect you to give a shit about anyone but yourself.”
The words hit me like a freight train, and I almost fucki
ng laugh at the irony behind them.
I’m doing this because I care, mo grá. I care about you, about your safety, more than I do about my own happiness.
I only wish he could see that.
Tears prick behind my eyes, but I force them back, looking up at the ceiling.
I have to do this. There’s no other option anymore.
No matter how much I want to drop to my knees and beg him to stay. Tell him I was lying before. None of it is true. Every word I’ve spoken, every look of disgust or indifference, was just another wall I know he’s strong enough to break down or climb. He has to know I would gladly give my life if only to make sure nothing bad ever happens to him.
But. He. Can’t. Know.
If he did, he’d only fight for us harder, demand more truths I’m not willing to give him. Pieces of me I might never be able to reveal.
But even so, he has to be blind to not see I’m in love with him.
My eyes flick to his and I bite back a sob when I see how fucking shattered his expression is right now. “Just go. Go, and don’t come back.” It’s the last thing I want, the furthest thing from what I need. Which is why the next words leaving my mouth might be the most colossal lie of all. “I can’t do this anymore. Not with you.”
His eyes search mine, for what, I’m not sure, before running his tongue across his teeth. River scrubs his palm over his face, then through his hair, before gripping the back of his neck.
Over the course of knowing each other, I’ve seen him take hits on the field that would send lesser men packing. Watched him get harassed by his father because of his sexual orientation. Personally made him my very own punching back to use and fuck and fuck with whenever I deemed fitting.
But I’ve never seen him look this defeated.
Something inside me fucking snaps, causing me to turn away like the coward I am. I can’t do this.
I can’t look at him as I break his fucking heart. Not when I want to be the one he trusts to hold onto it forever.
The tell-tale sound of the door opening signals he’s finally learned to listen and is leaving, but the sound of his footsteps pause. His relenting sigh fills the room before he speaks, effectively cutting me with his words.
“I didn’t want to fix you, only save you from your nightmares. Too bad I didn’t realize the real nightmare is you.”
And then he goes, like I fucking asked, the door slamming shut behind him. Leaving me in the empty space surrounding me like I once left him in that shower.
Bloody and fractured beyond repair.
My hands shake and my body ripples with rage as I storm down the stairs of Rain’s apartment building, making a run for my car.
How fucking dare he?
Treating me like shit before, when we didn’t know each other the way we do now, I can get over it. But tossing me to the side, insinuating all I was to him was a convenient way to pass time? Just another hole to get off in? That what happened up in the cabin was anything less than fucking fate intervening and handing us the person we’re meant to be with...maybe even forever?
That’s unforgivable.
How can he think we don’t work, that we don’t fit? Jesus Christ, what does that even mean?
He can compare us to water and oil until his dying breath, but it’s not true.
He and I… hell, we’re fluid in motion. Moving together in waves, synchronized at the molecular level, rising and falling as a single entity. Just like any body of water does.
It doesn’t matter if it is from a mountain spring or the city gutters. Pure enough to drink or salty like the ocean. Clear and beautiful or dark and murky. A lake or a stream.
A river.
The rain.
When all’s said and done, water is just that…water. It will always mix.
After a devastating flood. After brutal hurricanes.
After rain falls.
Water will always fuse, and you would never have known it was anything but one.
So I don’t understand how he doesn’t realize…we’re one in the same.
Wrenching open the door to my Range Rover, I hop in and floor it back to campus and the parties on Sorority Row before classes resume tomorrow. I know full well I’m too pissed off to be driving right now, but it’s only a five minute drive, and I need to get somewhere with booze as fast as fucking possible.
Maybe find Abbi and see if she would be down for a quick…
Goddamn. I can’t even finish the thought without my stomach threatening to revolt.
What have you done to me, baby? What the fuck have you done?
Pulling up to the Tri Delt house, I throw my car into park and sprint to the entrance where a red haired girl I recognize from the cheer team is manning the door.
“Well if it isn’t our very own QB one,” she smiles in a way of greeting before handing me a cup and ushering me with her hand to go inside. “Don’t have too much fun in there while Abbi isn’t around. You know how territorial she gets over you.”
Well, shit. Abbi isn’t even here.
I guess this is Jesus’s way of keeping my dick in my pants, even if I could stomach the idea of fucking someone other than Rain at this point.
“Thanks,” I tell the girl as I step through the threshold, popping my dimples with a smirk. It feels flat and wrong on my face.
Inside the house, I find a blur of bodies dancing and grinding to a cover of “Talking Body” by Five Hundredth Year as if they have no fucks to give about classes resuming tomorrow. I don’t blame them, because I’m most definitely in the same boat at the moment.
Spotting a couple linemen from the team near the keg, I head over and start up conversation, pouring myself a beer. Then another. And another, before I realize cheap ass beer isn’t going to give me what I need tonight.
Andrew notices me staring into the bottom of my third empty cup before pulling a handle of Jameson from a pantry cabinet. Uncapping it, he pours three fingers worth into my solo cup before discreetly returning the bottle to its rightful place.
“Bottom’s up, Len. You look like you need it,” he nods, motioning for me to take a swig of the amber liquid, a shade lighter than Rain’s eyes.
Fuck me. Everything always comes back to him.
Tossing back the whiskey, I down the contents of my cup in two gulps, relishing the smooth liquid coating my throat before sending a warm burn into my stomach.
I gesture to Drew for a refill, to which he simply laughs and refills me yet again.
And soon, I’m surrounded by bodies on the couch, finally buzzed enough for my liking…or maybe I’m just drunk? I don’t know anymore, nor do I care. I’m reveling in the freedom intoxication brings to my senses, loving that I can’t see straight, let alone find it in me to give a flying fuck about Ciaráin motherfucking Grady and the vile shit he spews from his mouth.
No, no, no. Don’t think about him, I chant internally, but it’s too damn late. I should have known I’d never be able to escape him, even when I’m drunk.
My brain fixates on thoughts of him, especially his damn mouth. His mouth I can’t seem to get enough of, no matter how fucking shitty he seems to make me feel every time he opens it.
I’m finally starting to realize everything about him is that way.
He tastes immaculate, like he came straight from heaven, yet all he ever does is try to send me to the deepest pits of hell. Like an addictive poison, he’s in my blood and I’m hooked. I can’t seem to quit, even though I know it will send me to an early grave.
Groaning, I rise from the sofa and amble my way to the bathroom, where I lock the door and lean against the wall in a drunken stupor. Loathing engulfs my senses as the room spins around me, and I find myself stewing in its toxicity—in hate. Hating Rain, hating myself, the entire goddamn world.
But the one thing I despise most of all?
Love.
Who the fuck needs that shit anyways? Apparently not Rain, because that’s what I was ready to offer up to him. I was willing to
put everything, my heart and fucking soul, on the line for him. To give us a chance and be with him though all the bad shit that’s about to come hurling at him faster than a freight train.
Hell, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t already give him those pieces of me. We both know I did. It was obvious, from the very beginning, I was in this. I gave him all of me, and instead of giving me all of himself in return, he just engraved his name on my heart, claiming it as his, but never truly wanting to own it.
And my soul? Our souls?
When they touched, it was nothing short of divine, and for a moment, I thought this is it. This is what it feels like to find your other half.
Your soulmate.
The person you’re meant to belong to for as long as you walk this earth. The person who can mend the fractured portions of yourself with one look, one touch, one kiss. The being who holds the key to the parts of you that you never knew were missing.
But with us, that isn’t what happened.
Our souls tore each other apart rather than healed the broken and battered pieces. But oh, how they loved the chance to dance together in a tangle of passion and destruction.
For the first time in the history of my academic career, I skipped class due to overindulging in alcohol. My body aches from sleeping on the bathroom floor, I’m hungover as fuck, sick to my stomach, and wishing, more than anything in the world, I could punch something.
Unfortunately for me, the University pays for my education on the contingency that my left hand be viable for four years of football.
Asshole higher ups and their fucking semantics.
I can’t wait until after next season when I actually have the ability to toss a few punches into a bag. Or someone’s face. Whichever at this point. But I suppose a workout in general is the next best thing, even if I’m literally sweating out Irish whiskey as I do it.
Irish. Goddamn it, Rain.
I shake my head, trying to clear my thoughts of him as music blares around me in the weight room, but instead of picking up the lyrics by The Word Alive, all I hear is Rain’s voice, whispering Abhainn to me that last night at the cabin, over and over in my ear as he worshipped my body with his own.