I doubt I was ever fine.
Mavvy was never fine. I grew up broken; missing the most vital parts of me.
Parts that she returned to me.
Bethany glued me together with her patience and stitched me whole with her kindness.
I close my eyes and I can hear her pained voice as she yelled at me, her beautiful face smeared with the evidence of her perceived betrayal.
“I hate you.”
‘Who the hell does she think she is anyway?’ A part of me asks, rising up to defend me. I haven’t done anything wrong. I know that. If she had stuck around long enough for me to explain, she would have known it too. The other part of me though, a part that I didn’t know existed, erupts into flames and melts into the acid of her words.
“I hate you.”
“Well fuck you then,” I swear, hurling the words across the open room.
The anger in me boils, bubbling so damn high that it’s no longer just brimming the surface now. It’s the kind of anger that makes me want to turn this whole place apart. Yell and scream and smash every inch of everything to smithereens. I scan the room, wanting to reach for something…anything. But a broken heart sure knows how to suck the energy right out of your soul. Instead of wreaking havoc on all my belongings, I sit still. I don’t move. Don’t blink. Don’t breathe.
49
Morning rolls around and the sun screams into my eyes. I try to fight it, pulling a pillow over my face, but even that has no effect. I’m awake and I don’t want to be. My head is pounding, throbbing so hard that I can’t even hear myself think.
With my eyes still closed, I pull myself away from the sofa and put one foot in front of the other on the cold, tile floor. One step is all it takes for me to really wake the fuck up. The whiskey bottle that I’d almost drained crashes and splinters into a million and one pieces, the smaller shards swimming in a pool of brown liquid. I think about cleaning up, but before I can make my mind up one way or the other, a knock on the door steals my attention.
No one who isn’t Beth wakes up this early.
No one who isn’t Beth has the right to show up here this early.
That simple thought has me on cloud nine and far below it all at the same time.
I can still taste the whisky on my breath. This place stinks and I stink right along with it. I’ve never been happier about those two facts. She deserves to see just how fucking useless I am without her.
I rush to the door, cringing as my brain slams against my skull, but still determined because…she…came…back. When I pull the door open, however, it’s not her face that I see. I lose the hold I had been struggling to maintain on the raw emotions burning up inside me.
“May I come in?” Christopher asks and I have to tighten my grip on the door to keep my hands from shaking.
He knows. I’m sure he knows. My back stiffens as I wait for him to transform. I wait for the rage, but as usual it doesn’t come.
“I fucked up,” I manage to say, moving out of the way so that he can enter the barren wasteland of my life.
“Let’s take a seat, son,” he says with a calm firmness that unsettles me. I still don’t know how to handle his brand of self control.
His form of discipline.
His idea of strength with love.
It’s the same way with Beth. She has the kind of unreasonable capacity to see the best in every situation. To forgive.
Not last night, though.
Last night, I found her limit. There was no forgiveness in her voice as she fell apart before my eyes, refusing to let me cling to the quickly shattering pieces of what remained of us.
Last night, she left me. Last night she chose to run away from trouble. Perhaps I’d be better off without her. If only I could really bring myself to believe that.
“Are you alright?”
The question should be rhetorical based on the glaring evidence before him, but he seems to be waiting on a response anyway.
“I’m fine,” I lie and he nods slowly with a slight pout forming on his lips.
“Well my daughter isn’t.”
I cringe as his words land heavily on my chest and I can hear my breath coming out in stutters.
“And I’m not sure how you kids define fine these days, but you look and smell like fresh hell.” His face shows no real expression, but his voice is darker than usual. “What happened here last night?”
“What did she say?” I ask, desperate to know just how much damage control I have to do with my in-laws.
“I’m asking you,” he responds and I’m not sure why I expected him to say anything else.
I can feel a buzzing in my head as the whiskey runs a train through my veins. Leaning back into the sofa, with my legs sprawled out before me I close my eyes and think on everything that has gone down in the last few hours.
When the dark silence threatens to engulf me, I slowly open my eyes to stare at him. I’ve never had a heart to heart with any of my former bed fellow’s fathers, though I have had brief conversations with the barrels of their guns. Somehow, this is a heck of a lot more intimidating.
Most of those girls were more trouble than they were worth. Not Beth though. She was worth any heartache that came upon me, especially the one that I caused.
“She thinks I cheated on her,” I finally say.
“And did you?” he asks.
So direct. So matter-of-fact. I appreciate his lack of tolerance for bullshit and his obvious disdain for beating around bushes.
“No. I did not.”
“Then explain to me why my daughter is at home, crying herself to sleep. My daughter’s hurting. She wouldn’t be hurting for no reason.”
He doesn’t shout, but there’s an unmistakable hardness in his voice. Even with the clarity of my mind made blurry by alcohol, I can still see the lines in his face that crease the only thing that betrays his anger. He’s pissed at me and he has every right to be. I promised him I wouldn’t hurt her, yet here we are.
“She walked in on me with another girl in the bedroom.” The crease deepens. “You don’t believe me?”
Without saying a word, he stands, and walks into the kitchen. I can hear things moving around and I silently hope he hasn’t gone for a knife.
He doesn’t strike me as the homicidal kind, but today may be the breaking point for more than just Beth.
I look down at the photo on my screen and smile at her. ‘Please forgive me,’ I silently pray as he reappears. I’m relieved to see two glasses in his hands and no obvious weapons. He hands me a glass of something barely recognizable.
“Drink. You need to sober up. You have training tomorrow, right?”
I stare at him in quiet disbelief.
“That’s it?” I blurt out. He narrows his eyes and raises a brow at me.
“That’s all you’re going to say? Drink? I tell you your daughter thinks I’m cheating on her and all you have to say to me is drink? What are you? Why aren’t you trying to strangle me or punch me in the face or something?” I ask, frustrated and unable to accept this gift of understanding that he seems keen on offering me. Deep down, I want to deserve it, but I’m not a hundred percent sure that I do. Selina shouldn’t have been here in the first place. So whatever happened, even if I didn’t go seeking her out, it’s still my fault. I still allowed her to be in my dam condo.
“You’re already in pain.” Christopher says. “I needed to see for myself that Beth wasn’t the only one hurting.”
“And if I was okay?”
“Then I would have punched you in the face.” He smiles, taking a sip of his drink. I sit there with my mouth slightly open and my eyelids pulled back into a wide-eyed stare.
Christopher quietly studies my face for a few seconds before leaning back into the sofa across from me and crosses an ankle over his knee.
“I met Beth’s mother when I was twelve years old,” he says, a small smile spreading across his face. “She was as beautiful to me back then as she is today. I’ve loved t
hat woman my whole life, it feels like.” He nods and I nod back in respect. He’s already got me beat there. “She was my first love and I was her first everything.”
I’m warmed that he’s comfortable enough to be over-sharing with me, though I’m suddenly very uncomfortable with the general direction of our conversation. Still, I stay put, hoping that there’s a point to all of it.
“She’s loved me, stuck with me and has been loyal to me her whole life.” His face falls slightly and a look of shame bleeds into his eyes, darkening his features before he hangs his head.“I cannot say the same for myself.”
I can feel my eyes widening even further as his face grimaces.
“When I was about nineteen years old, there was a new girl in town who all the guys were going crazy over. And I mean all the guys. The jocks, the nerds, the musicians, the normals.” He smirks and I force myself to smile, still fearing that somehow his story could end with a proper thrashing for me.
“She played hard to get with all of them, but I ignored her because I already had my woman. If you know anything about women, then you know that when a guy genuinely has no interest in them it somehow makes them want that guy even more. She was that kind of girl.”
I cringe, all too familiar with the kind.
“Joanne was never the super jealous type at that time and she trusted me completely. She knew all the other boys were falling over themselves to get to this new girl but she also knew I only had eyes for her. Looking back at it now, I realize that for all the years that we were together, I had taken her trust for granted. Before the end of her first summer in town, I had made out with her, only once and there was a bit of fooling around. We never went all the way, but when Joanna found out about it, she was devastated. It broke us. It took months for me to win her back.”
“But you did,” I whisper, leaning into his story.
“You bet your sweet ass, I did,” he chuckles, draining his glass.
I lean my own glass to my head and empty the contents, feeling myself sober up a little as the last drop touches my tongue.
“We’ve been married for twenty-one years. That’s longer than you’ve been alive.”
“Congratulations,” I raise my empty glass to him, and he nods.
“Don’t miss the point, kid. If you love my daughter, and I suspect that you do, you’re going to have to win her trust back.”
“She hates me,” I say in a pathetic whisper. “She really, really, she hates me.”
“Of course, she hates you now. I hate you now, too. I’ve just learned the art of controlling my emotions, but that does not mean I do not feel them. They have to be there for me to have something to control,” he explains. “I’m angry with you. My wife and my daughter are the most precious things to me, and you hurt my kid. Whether or not you meant to has no bearing in the grand scheme of things. That was one of the morals of the story. I had good intentions in the beginning, and I did not mean to hurt her, but I did and I didn’t get to use my intentions or the reality of my feelings as an excuse. I used them as my reason to win her back.” He pauses to make sure I’m still with him. “The other moral of the story, Maverick, lies in the strength of our bond. We were able to move pass my indiscretion and I haven’t been that version of stupid since.” He smiles and I grin back at him. “If you hurt her, you can’t fix her pain with lies,” Hhe says and I tilt my head to look at him, as my vision clears up.
He stands and walks over to me, placing a hand on my shoulder and squeezes it.
I somehow manage to bring my legs into gear and walk with him to the door.
“Chris,” he cocks his head back and nods. “I’m sorry.”
He nods again, his gaze still fixed on mine. “Fix this, Maverick.”
50
My parents were unusually quiet as I got ready for school this morning. I suppose they don’t quite know the rules of how to deal with a daughter who ran away to get married only to return devastated.
My mind flashes back to the night before last night. Even now, as I hide inside the girls bathroom and think about it, I feel sick. There’s a burning sensation in my stomach and a general bubbling that has me queasy.
I can hear whispers outside the stall doors and I instinctively know that they’re all talking about me.
‘They weren’t even there when you came in Beth. They don’t know you’re in here,’ the calmer more rational side of me speaks up, but I douse her with a pitcher of frigid water and continue on the woe is me crusade.
Snobs whispering about me is nothing new, so it shouldn’t bother me.
Except today, everything seems to be bothering me.
I could barely sit still in class. I skipped lunch and hid in the book room just so I could be alone.
I’ve endured a lot since starting school here, and I think I’ve been pretty tough dealing with these bullies and persevering. That girl still exists within me. I know that. It’s just that I failed her. Stupidly, I walked into the cage of the head viper and didn’t have the foresight to realize that one way or another, he’d rip my head off. And then, instead of fighting to stick my head back in place, I’ve reduced myself to a ball of tears. A part of me is crying because he hurt me. The other part is wrecked because I miss him.
When the final bell rings, I wait for the dolls to clear out before stepping into the light. I could use a bit of makeup myself...if only I could bring myself to care about all that today.
When the hustle and bustle of screeching feet and shouting students die down, I sneak out of the restroom, checking the corridors for strays before heading out to the track. Ordinarily I would use my free time to do something academic, but not today. Today, I need to blow off steam. I have half an hour until I’m free to leave this place and I plan to use every minute of it clearing my head. I need to regain control of my life, of my emotions. I refuse to become that girl. I refuse to become Jessica. I will not have a meltdown over Maverick because I’m quite sure he’s doing okay wherever he is. I don’t imagine he’s lost sleep over me or shed so much as a tear. I was just a game to him. Obviously.
The hardest target. The one who didn’t want him. Now he’s had me, he can add me to his list of conquests and move on with his life, leaving me to pick up the pieces of the ruination he caused.
I take off jogging the moment I reach the track and I can feel the burn in my lower legs before I’m even on my second lap. It’s the burn that I’m after. I need it to distract me from the pain in my heart, so I go faster, pushing to a full sprint with my bag on my back. If anyone saw me, what a sight it is they would see. I’m sure I look like a maniac going around the field in full uniform with my bag strapped to me, but I don’t care how I look to anyone here. Not anymore.
After ten laps I’m close to collapsing, so I force my legs to carry me up to the stands. It hurts. My legs, my lungs, my heart. They’re all on fire. For right now, I’m okay with however hot they care to burn. Maybe all my thoughts will burn right away with them. I’m in the bleachers for about fifteen minutes before accepting that that won’t be the case. I also know that I need to leave. But where the hell am I supposed to go? Definitely not back to Maverick. And home? Somehow I can’t stand the thought of showing up there either. The silence, the whispers, the careful tone when my parents speak to me…I can’t handle that right now and so I sit. For one hour and then two. Two hours and then way too many more.
51
Christopher told me to fix things, but it’s impossibly impossible to fix things with someone who wants nothing to do with you. I’ve been like a zombie these past few days – if zombies could use phones.
Needless to say, I’ve shot over the point of pathetic, filling Beth’s voicemails with pleas for her to call me. She has done no such thing. Not that I’m surprised.
I’m sure I’ve also filled up her storage with messages of how sorry I am and that I did nothing wrong. Which is contradictory, to say the least. If I did nothing wrong, then there’s really nothing to apologize about. Exce
pt I know what it looked like and if she would just give me a minute or two to explain then she’d get it. Understand it. She’d believe me.
The teacher goes on about one thing or the other. I’m in science class, but I might as well be on Mars. My brain is so damn far away, in a universe where only Beth exists and then one where she doesn’t. If I’d never met her, I’d never have the bad luck of hurting the way I’m hurting now.
“Mr. Williams,” Miss McFarlane calls. Her voice sounds urgent – the way it should when she’s been trying to get someone’s attention for a while.
I lift my eyes to meet hers. “Your textbook. Do you have it with you?”
Looking around the class, I see that everyone’s got theirs open. I reach for my backpack about to do as I’m expected, but then change my mind. What the fuck’s the point of pretending.
“I’m not feeling so good,” I tell her and pull my backpack onto my shoulders as I stand up.
She’s looking at me like she wants to protest, but even she’s not blind. This isn’t me trying to skip class. She can see it in my eyes. Hear it in my voice. So can everyone in this damn room. They’ve got eyes of pity turned up at me. Thomas looks more worried than the rest. He’s also clueless when it comes to matters with Beth, though I think that’s about to change. I need to talk to someone. Even if it risks me becoming one of ‘those’ guys. Even if it proves that I’m just as human as the rest of them.
Head down, I exit the classroom and trail the halls. I’m about to pass Beth’s locker when a thought hits me. If I show up to her class, drag her out, it might cause a scene. But it’ll mean she has no choice but to allow me to explain what the fuck happened at the party. She won’t be as pissed after and all will be right in the world.
Phone now in my palm, I scan through our earlier messages to find the code for her combination lock. It takes me about five minutes, but eventually I come up with gold and open the locker in one beat. The inside is clean, organized, typical Beth. It makes me miss her even more. It’s been a few days and my bedroom looks like hell turned upside down. It never looked that way when she was there. Or when I had a maid. The former is a lot more appealing than the latter, however.
Vile Intentions: A Dark Sports Bully Romance Page 26