by Ella Fields
Birds tittered up high in the trees as a few cars drove down the street. Renee’s hair was a mess, her makeup smudged to hell, and something crusty was down the front of her dress.
“So you’re okay?”
She nodded, waving the cab down once we reached the curb at the end of the street.
The drive back to our apartment was quiet, the cabbie chewing on tobacco and hitting radio stations every thirty seconds, which was hell on my pounding head.
When he pulled over outside our building, I gave him a twenty, then helped Renee out. “Wanna go get something to eat?”
She glanced down at herself and winced. “No, I just want to shower and sleep.”
Fair enough.
Once inside, I stripped my clothes off, about to follow her into the shower when the door was shut in my face. I turned the handle, but she’d locked it. “I’m too tired.”
“Okay, but we don’t have to—”
“I’ll be out soon.”
Frowning, I shrugged, heading to the kitchen and tearing into an apple while I waited.
She emerged ten minutes later, hair wrapped in a black towel turban and her face so clean it looked red. She opened the fridge, grabbed a bottle of water, then retreated to our room.
I tossed the apple core and made quick work of washing as much of the hangover from my body as possible before joining her in bed.
Looping my arm around her waist, I pulled her back into my chest and kissed her neck. “You sure you’re okay?”
A long pause before she whispered, “Let’s not do this ever again.”
I smiled. “Agreed.”
We spent Sunday sleeping. Well, I did. Renee had a paper due that she labored over, complaining about the lack of pain relief we had until I went to the tiny drug store on Main Street to get her some.
I grabbed some of the tampons she usually used too, just in case that beast was on its way. I had a feeling it was, due to how she was acting.
Monday morning, I left her in bed sound asleep, wishing I could wake her and slip inside her from behind. But I didn’t want to poke the bear unless she wanted me to.
I had a feeling she didn’t, so I took my shit for class with me and decided I’d shower at the gym.
My phone rang just as I was walking to training, and I saw I had three text messages I hadn’t read yet.
Ignoring them, I hit answer. “Cal,” my dad said.
“Hey.” He must’ve been overseas, calling me before six in the morning. He was a workaholic, sure, but never one to start making phone calls until he’d had three shots of straight coffee.
“How was the game? Sorry I couldn’t make it. I’m out of town until the end of the month.”
I didn’t know why he still bothered to apologize, considering he stopped making my games in high school after merging the firm with Damon’s, Renee’s dad.
Though I supposed I should’ve been grateful he cared enough to apologize. Should’ve.
“We killed it; the team is a great mix.” I went on to tell him about the preseason game that was two weeks ago, some of the guys, and the celebration after, to which he made grunting noises, probably while he was going over emails on his phone.
“Sounds good. Listen, we’ve got a charity gala when I return. It’s one we sponsor, and your mother is putting in a lot of work …”
I zoned out, approaching the gym and flicking my fingers at Paul who was already hitting the weights. Overachiever if there ever was one. After the weekend we’d had, I was surprised everyone had shown up.
They were there, half passed out in the locker room, drinking shakes, or slowly getting their shit together.
“…Friday night. So you’ll need to maybe head home right after class.”
Whoa. I stopped him when I connected the dates. “Dad, I have a game then.”
“So? This is business, Cal.”
I gritted my teeth, ignoring the urge to hang up. “Yeah, but I’m not in high school anymore. This is my …” potential career, I didn’t say.
He knew it anyway. “This firm is your future, Callum.”
“Dad,” I said, my voice a whisper as I unlocked my locker. “The season has just started, so there’s no way I can skip a game. I’m sorry, but I just can’t.”
He sighed, letting me hang for a moment. “Fine. But you can’t keep doing this. Family comes first.” He hung up, and I sneered at my phone before tossing it into my locker and grabbing my gym shorts.
Coach walked in just as I was tugging them on over my sneakers. “Heard you ladies had a jolly old time this weekend.”
Toby smirked from where he was reclining on the bench. “You could say that.”
“Fifteen laps, Hawthorne.” When Toby just gaped at him, he barked, “Twenty. Beat it.”
Toby shook his head, mumbling under his breath as he made his way out of the room.
“I don’t know what you’re all smiling at. You’re joining him. Then, if you’re lucky, I might sit you down and give you hell.” At everyone’s frozen stances, he cursed. “What are you waiting for? A fucking written invitation? You think one win makes you God’s gift to the football universe and you can slack off? Get out of here.” His eyes bulged. “Now.”
We bailed, trying to muffle our laughter as we ran laps around the field.
“Holy hell, I’m gonna die. I just know it,” Burrows whined once we hit lap twelve.
“Remember that next time you decide to drink your body weight in beer,” one of the seniors, Heath, said with a laugh.
“Fuck you. Like you haven’t.”
“Difference is, I can drink you under the table and still run laps around you, pig boy.”
“You fucker.” Burrows was off, chasing after Heath with way more energy than I thought he had. “My daddy ain’t even a pig farmer anymore!”
“Yeah? You sure talk like he is.”
Quinn caught up with me, smiling and shaking his head.
Coach sent us back into the training room once we hit lap seventeen, and I was extremely fucking thankful. My lungs were burning.
There was no reprieve. We hit the weights instantly while he barked about all the damage we’d probably done to our bodies and how long it’d take to repair it.
“Fucking brutal,” Paul said, wrapping a towel around his waist once we’d all hit the showers.
Some of the guys were laughing in the corner, but I paid them no attention. I didn’t have time if I wanted a huge meal before class. I needed fuel to keep from collapsing.
“Welsh, your girlfriend sure is pretty.”
I frowned at Heath’s mocking tone, then glanced at Mike beside me, who shrugged and shouldered his bag before walking outside.
“Yeah, wish I had a friend with a girl like that who didn’t mind sharing,” Jason, one of the other seniors said, eyes on the door Mike just walked out of.
“I don’t know what you fuckers are talking about, but I’m out.” I left to the sound of their laughter, pulling out my phone once I hit the parking lot.
I almost skidded over the asphalt when I opened the text from an unknown number.
The ability to breathe ceased to exist as I saw the photo of Mike.
Who was in bed with my wife, wrapped around her naked body like he had every right to do so.
Thoughts swam and knitted together, then unraveled before I could bring them to the surface.
What have I done?
It was the ever-present question that’d followed me around since I woke up in that stranger’s bed Sunday morning. Everything was a blur. The last thing I remembered was Mike’s lips on mine as he moved us to the bed.
Lips on my neck, callused fingers trailing up my legs. “Always wanted to do this …”
Everything after that … well, I’m not so sure I wanted to remember. It was one thing to have done something that terrible but another to remember it. To be able to torture myself with it over and over.
But not knowing was some kind of fucked-up torture in and of itse
lf.
In the minutes and hours since, my stomach constantly churned. I’d turned my brain inside out for more memories, searching and waiting for them to appear. Even if I didn’t need them to know how astronomically I’d screwed up, I couldn’t stand that some horrible part of my life, whether it was minutes or hours, was just missing.
I’d awoken with Mike’s arms around my waist, his breath stirring my hair as I slowly blinked back into reality.
Comfortable, intimate. As though he had every right to touch me.
And it was me who’d given him that right.
Yet when I’d sat up, looked at him, and breathed the words, “We didn’t,” only to see panic pinch every inch of his face …
I couldn’t believe it. I refused to. And I’d said as much, but my words had shattered in the stale air of the room at the shake of Mike’s head and the remorse filling his eyes.
I’d scrambled off the bed, trying to keep the tears from arriving as I’d hastily thrown on my dress and looked for my shoes.
Mike’s, “I’m sorry,” stalked me all the way out of the room and hadn’t left me since.
Bile was a permanent taste in my mouth.
I had to talk to Callum, yet every time I tried, my throat would close and the foggy memories I contained suddenly became so unclear. What could I tell him when I didn’t even know the answers to all my own questions?
I never thought I’d cheat on someone, let alone someone I loved. But I had. I’d kissed Mike enough to end up in bed with him. I remembered that much, and apparently, we’d … no, I couldn’t let myself even think about it.
I couldn’t tell Callum. I couldn’t not tell him, either. For all the ways my decision felt justifiable at the time, it wasn’t. I’d made a mistake. Acted out of anger and hurt when I was in a stupidly vulnerable state.
As it turned out, I didn’t need to tell him.
I hadn’t seen Kristy all morning, but judging by the sneers and the whispers that threatened to engulf me in their razor-sharp teeth, everyone else knew the answers I sought.
Late that afternoon, I sat in a corner of the library, tears streaming silently down my cheeks as I tucked my knees to my chest and pretended to read. Waiting. I couldn’t put it off any longer, but I couldn’t bring myself to rush home to … what?
What would I find?
It was Callum. He loved me. He knew me. He’d know I never meant to do this, and that I’d never let myself make the same mistake twice. He’d forgive me, if not right away, then eventually.
He was my husband.
I needed to get my shit together and remember that. He knew me better than I knew myself. He’d know that no matter what I did, I wouldn’t have done it under any other circumstances.
Pathetic.
It all seemed so stupid and pathetic.
Sniffing, I swiped beneath my eyes and kept my head down as I exited the library to a dark, twinkling sky.
You’re a queen.
The voice had my head snapping up, shoulders tilting back, and my steps evening out. I could do this.
I was Renee Welsh.
And I was more than the sum of my mistakes.
Confidence bloomed inside me like a flower slow to unfold, petals gleaming with every bit of new strength I found. Those petals scattered on a phantom breeze, disappearing as I stepped out of the elevator and inside the doors to our apartment.
Boxes sat in the hall and the living room. My clothes, purses, shoes—everything, tossed haphazardly inside them.
I felt my face drain of color as my heart thumped and skidded. “Callum?”
Nothing.
Stepping around the boxes, I walked down the hall to our bedroom and found him sitting on the side of our bed.
He looked down at his hands that were between his knees, his voice tight. “You can stay here tonight, but after that, you’re on your own.”
“Wh-why?” Asking why was redundant when we both knew, but I couldn’t find any fucking words. I laughed nervously. “Shouldn’t we at least talk first?”
His eyes blazed as he stared up at me. He stood, taking a step toward me, then stopping. “Talk about what? How everyone on this fucking campus knows that my friend, my fucking teammate, had his way with my too drunk girlfriend?” He stopped, letting out a clipped laugh. “No, wait. My fucking wife.”
Unable to help it, I flinched. “I don’t know what you’ve heard, but I can’t even remember what happened.”
His jaw clenched. “Right. That’s convenient, isn’t it?”
My chest was going to cave in, my breathing too shallow, my eyes stinging with too many unshed tears. “It’s the truth.”
“The truth? So you don’t know if you got too drunk to say no? Huh? Did he rape you, then?”
I flinched once more, and he swallowed but didn’t apologize for the harsh words.
“He didn’t.”
His hand raked through his hair in a vicious sweep. “Jesus Christ.”
“I didn’t mean—”
He snapped, growling, “Shut up and fuck off.”
“No, you can’t just throw me out. Aren’t we worth more than a drunk mistake? A misunderstanding?”
Callum grabbed his phone, planting it in front of my face for me to see a picture of myself. In bed. With Mike. I looked naked even though I’d woken up with my strapless bra still on. My panties, though, were nowhere to be found. My head was on Mike’s chest, and his arm was around my waist. “How the hell is that a misunderstanding?”
I swallowed over my panic; I wouldn’t let it win just yet. “It’s not. But it’s also just a picture, Callum.”
“A very telling picture, wouldn’t you agree?”
“Who sent it to you?”
A bitter laugh left him. “Not that it matters, but it just so happens that your new friend did.”
The pounding of my heart stalled, faltering as the blows seemed to never end.
“Callum,” my voice wavered, “I don’t know what happened, all of what we did exactly, but—”
“I think it’s pretty obvious, don’t you?” he sneered. “And you’ve hardly denied it.”
“Because I know I messed up. We …” I paused. The disgust and confusion in that piercing gaze made me want to shrink into the corner of the room. “I can fix this.”
He shook his head. “You really can’t.”
I took a step toward him. “I can, just—”
“I don’t even want to fucking look at you!” he roared, forcing me back three steps. My throat swelled as I watched his chest heave, and he scrubbed his hands down his face roughly. “There’s no coming back from something like this. Please, I mean it, just get out of my sight.”
He wasn’t my Callum anymore. My husband or my friend. No, in a matter of hours, we were swept back in time to a place where he was filled with nothing but animosity and distrust all over again.
And looking into his dark eyes, the tension rolling off him like a brewing thunderstorm, it became obvious that he’d made up his mind. Nothing I said or did would change it.
Not tonight.
“I’ll sleep on the couch.” I walked over to my side of the bed, grabbing a pillow and keeping my eyes trained anywhere but on him as I strode out of the room.
Sleep, something I easily fell into before arriving at Gray Springs, was elusive.
My alarm rang once before I turned it off, eyes crusted with tears and my head throbbing.
Callum had left for practice an hour and a half ago. I’d heard him in the kitchen briefly before the door slammed shut.
I got up, staring at the boxes, the huge TV, my magazines that were once scattered all over the coffee table now in a pile in the foyer.
He didn’t waste any time.
I showered and collected miscellaneous items from our bedroom that he’d forgotten in his haste to add with my stuff. Including his birthday present, which he never got around to opening.
If he wanted me gone, fine. There was little I could do about that right
now. Hopefully, with a bit of time, he’d realize I never set out to intentionally hurt him or ruin us. That it was all a giant mistake.
Opening my nightstand drawer, I pulled out the picture I’d had framed after we’d gotten married. The one that woman had taken for us where we were smiling into one another’s faces.
Happy. Whole. Complete.
He knew me. Knew my heart. He should know better than to think one drunken night could break what we have.
Resolved, I tucked the picture back into the drawer. We’d been careful not to tell anyone. No one knew but us.
Would this be the same? I wondered as I tried to mask my puffy eyes with some concealer. Would this be something our parents couldn’t find out about?
Maybe I was clutching at straws, but Callum wouldn’t want to face that kind of music.
I smiled the first real smile I’d smiled in days, quickly putting on some mascara before taking my makeup bag to one of the boxes out in the living room.
I poured myself some orange juice, then proceeded to make some calls.
I’d stay in a dorm. My parents might check my spending habits, and they’d see if I were leasing an apartment elsewhere or staying in a hotel for a prolonged period.
Luckily for me, a few girls in the dorms had a room to themselves. Unlucky for them, one of them would now be sharing with me until this mess got straightened out.
As I was putting the juice away, a large piece of printer paper stuck to the fridge snagged my attention. Words hurriedly scrawled across it in black marker said to be gone before he got home.
I sucked in a sharp breath, then I grabbed my purse and made my way to student housing.
I skipped classes that day to finalize my housing and secure a room in a hotel five minutes away from campus. I paid in cash and ate a whole bag of pretzels and a small bag of strawberry licorice.
The tears tried to escape, but I wouldn’t let them and did my best to push them back. I still had enough hope and enough shock left to desensitize myself for the most part.
For the most part.
They made silent tracks down my cheeks while I was sleeping. I woke to find my cheeks damp and my nose blocked, feeling betrayed by my own body.