Justin nodded, slowly poking out his bottom lip, as if letting me know he’d comprehended my answer, but didn’t agree.
“Just spit it out. I know you have something to say. I knew it when you texted me on my birthday, instead of calling.”
“I’m sorry about that. I should have called you. I wanted to. I just wasn’t sure I’d say something I’d regret later, and I didn’t want to upset you.”
“Exactly. So spit it out!”
“He cheated on you, Annie. And he has a kid with the same chick.” I eyed him. Justin waved his hands in the air. “Sorry, I hear that constantly from Alex. It’s contagious.”
I could imagine. I remember catching Lindsay’s swear word diarrhea of the mouth after spending too much time with her.
“You don’t like having a roommate?”
“Alex is fine; I just liked living by myself better.”
Realizing I had changed the subject, I brought it back to Ryan and me. “You think I’m making a mistake.”
“It doesn’t matter what I think. I know you’ll do what you want anyway.”
“I care what you think, especially when you’re not speaking to me—for whatever reason. I don’t like it.”
14
Justin
It would only confuse her if I said what I was thinking, which wasn’t all that clear because I was confused, too. I didn’t know what it meant that I couldn’t get kissing her out of my head. That I couldn’t stop thinking about being close to her, about my hands on her body... what did she just say?
“I want you to say whatever you feel.”
No, you don’t. I sighed. “I want you to be happy, Reynolds. I want you to do what you think is right. I just wish the other stuff hadn’t happened. It’s not going to be easy—getting along with Katie and helping Ryan take care of Jacob. You’re eighteen, and you’re going to have an instant family with uber rich baby mama drama. I just don’t want you to sacrifice too much of yourself so that you can have Ryan because he comes with a hell of a lot of baggage, and his mother seriously hates you.” I probably shouldn’t have said that last part, but it was true.
“That wasn’t so hard, was it?” Annie asked, her perfect mouth forming a hard smile.
“I guess not.”
“Don’t do that to me again,” she said.
“Do what?”
“Make me drive up here and force you to talk to me. You can say anything to me. You can tell me anything. I’d rather you be honest and say something you think I won’t like, instead of saying nothing at all.”
“Okay.” I looked at her for a long moment. “I’m sorry I didn’t call you on your birthday.” Not calling had made me feel like a real asshole.
“It’s okay.” She smiled, and gave me a look that resembled one Eve used to give me sometimes—a sort of dreamy gaze. I would have given anything to know what she was thinking. Unless it had to do with Mullins, which it probably did.
“Hey, we have an exhibition game tomorrow afternoon. When it’s done, I’ll take you to dinner to make up for being a dick on your birthday.”
She laughed. “Okay.”
15
Annie
“Mornin,’ sweet cheeks,” Alex said to me as I entered the living room. I grunted, shaking my head.
“You drink coffee?”
I gave a lethargic nod.
“She takes it with cream,” Justin said, going to the fridge for it. I smiled in response, still too groggy to speak. “You’ll need extra,” he said, as he poured me a cup.” Alex makes coffee so strong it could wake the dead.”
I snickered at Alex’s offended expression. “That’s what I get, huh—for making your coffee?” He fake pouted. “I feel so unappreciated.”
Justin ignored Alex, poured his own cup, and went to take a shower. I sat at the kitchen table with Alex.
“You know, you look just as good this mornin’ as you did last night.”
“Thanks.” I ignored his weak attempt at throwing me a line.
“So, you and Bishop. You two ever been more than friends?”
I rolled my eyes. I wasn’t answering him.
“What?” He held his arms out. “You didn’t expect me to ask?”
I shrugged.
“Y’all just seem close.” Alex winked.
“We are. Just not that kind of close.”
“Okay. What about Mullins, is it real or is he overhyped?”
“It’s real. The first time I saw him pitch, he threw three innings.” I sipped my coffee. “He threw twenty-seven pitches.”
Alex’s eyebrows rose. “In three innings—that’s impossible—the guy didn’t throw a single off pitch?”
“Nope—all strikes. He had a couple major league scouts after him, but he decided not to enter the draft.”
“He said no! To goin’ straight to the top! What’s wrong with him?”
“Nothing.”
“I don’t know, girl. I’m not so sure about that.”
“Trust me. There’s nothing wrong with Ryan.”
“TMI, girl—Too. Much. Information.” Alex shook his head.
I laughed. “Is your mind always in the gutter?”
“Mostly, yeah.” He shrugged unapologetically.
“Another reason you don’t have a girlfriend,” I presumed.
“Don’t think you have me figured out that easily. I have lots of girlfriends.”
“I bet you do. In fact, I bet you have the kind of girlfriends that don’t ever spend the whole night. The kind that show up drunk during booty-call hours and don’t expect anything more from you than that.”
“Yes, I do have plenty of chicks who like to visit me after dark.” He smiled. “What’s wrong with that?”
“Doesn’t it feel empty?”
“Naw, it feels pretty good, actually.”
“Not physically, do-do.”
“Oh, so you want to know if it makes me feel cheap when they show up, take advantage of my good nature,” he winked, “and then leave?”
“Yeah,” I confirmed, wanting to laugh.
“I like it like that. No strings. No problems.”
“You can’t really believe that there are no strings attached to sex—cheap or not.”
“Oh, so now my sex is cheap.”
“That was your word, not mine. I’d call it meaningless.”
“Still gets the job done.”
“You have no idea what you’re missing.”
“You offerin’ to show me?” The look on Alex’s face confirmed that he’d let me.
“No. I just—” I stopped mid thought. “Have you ever loved a girl you’ve been with?”
“No, I’ve never had to.”
“It changes everything, you know.”
“What’s that?”
“Love. The right girl. It’ll change you.”
Alex’s enthusiastic eyes met mine. He smiled. “Is that so?”
“Yep. Trust me. I’m going to be a doctor.” I smiled, calculating in my head. “In about two hundred years,” I joked.
“Well, I’m done letting you practice shrinkin’ on me for today. I’m gonna get dressed.” Alex got up and sauntered down the hall, turning back once to see if I was watching. Unfortunately, I was.
A couple hours later, there was an undeniably familiar knock at the door. Justin and I looked at each other and laughed.
“Did you tell her you were coming?” Justin asked me.
“No. I knew she’d tell you.”
He opened the door to an indifferent Larry and a squealing Pam. There go our plans, I thought.
After Justin’s game, which he won, Pam and Larry took us to dinner, and then we went back to his place. Pam got a buzz and made us watch Dirty Dancing after catching a glimpse of Patrick Swayze pointing his finger in Jerry Orbach’s face as Justin was flipping through the channels.
“Turn it back!” she hollered, almost jumping off the couch, pointing at the TV.
“Boo, Pam. We’ve seen that movie a hundred times. Even I�
�ve seen it a hundred times,” Justin smirked. “And I’m a guy.”
“Oh, come on. It’s the end. It’s the best part. “Nobody puts baby in a corner,” Pam complained. We laughed at her sad imitation of that iconic line. Justin sighed, turned it back for her, stood up, and dragged me away. “Sorry, Dad.”
Larry waved us on as if it were no big deal. Justin snatched a couple beers from the fridge and we went to his room. He closed the door to help drown out the noise from Pam cheering over the movie’s finale.
We sat on the edge of his bed and opened our beers.
“So, what’s new with you, besides dealing with your jealous girlfriend?” I joked.
“She’s not my girlfriend.”
Justin was inching his beer toward his mouth when Alex busted through his bedroom door and yelled, “Gotcha!” He froze in a knees bent stance with his fingers pointing at us and his eyes and mouth wide open.
Justin jumped and spilled his beer all over himself. He sucked in a jerky breath from the shock of the cold liquid on his skin. He stood up and looked down at his soaked t-shirt. “What the hell, Alex?”
Alex and I were laughing so hard. “Did he squeal?” I asked Alex.
“I think he did—like a chick being chased through the woods in one of those summer camp slasher flicks.”
“Go!” Justin pointed walking toward the door. I covered my mouth to help keep the laughter inside.
“Okay, all right.” Alex held his hands up. “I’m stayin’ out tonight, so I’ll see the two-a-yous in the morning.” He winked at me as Justin closed the door on him.
“I did not squeal,” Justin smirked at me before whipping his t-shirt over his head. I could tell he’d stuck with the whole working out thing. I knew I shouldn’t have been looking at him, but I sort of couldn’t help it. It made me think about how his skin felt when we were making out Christmas night. We had completely made it to second base. It was almost embarrassing to think that we’d felt each other up. That I’d had my hands all over the parts of him that were currently exposed.
When I’ve thought about it, that night has always felt like a dream, which is what I wanted—for it to feel like I’d dreamt and not done what I had with him.
Justin smiled at me. “What? Nothing’s funny now that Alex is gone?” It wasn’t that, but I couldn’t tell Justin I was daydreaming about his naked parts.
Finishing pulling his clean shirt on, he easily swiped my beer away from me. “You have to forfeit this now.” My grip had loosened to the point that the contents were on the verge of spilling all over my lap, because looking at him had distracted me.
Seeing Justin shirtless should not have affected my motor skills. At all.
I heard Pam call Justin’s name, which snapped me out of my trance. I was on my feet when she came through the door, looking everywhere except at Justin, which wasn’t suspicious at all.
“You have a guest,” Pam sang, looking at Justin, her tone leading. It had to be Natalie. Yay, clingy, jealous Natalie. How much fun that will be for me—watching her pet Justin like a dog for the rest of the afternoon. So much for my weekend alone with him, but at least he was talking to me now.
16
Ryan
I quietly backed out of the house, closed the door, and turned to leave.
“If you’re not here by six-thirty tonight, I will dissolve our agreement,” my mother threatened.
Startled, I jumped. “What are you doing here? It’s five in the morning.”
“You’re not holding up your end of the bargain, Ryan, dear. Be here at six-thirty tonight or the past fifteen days apart from Annie will have been for nothing,” she warned, got into her Porsche, and sped away.
I’d been ignoring her calls for a week and was surprised she’d let me get away with it for that long. She was mad that I’d disregarded her request to come home for dinner last week, but I didn’t want to play house with Katie. I didn’t want her cooking for me. I didn’t want her around at all, but because I knew my mother wasn’t bluffing, I made sure I was home by six-thirty.
Having no idea what was waiting for me on the other side, I stalled at the front door. Knowing my mother, anything was possible. She may have instructed Katie to set a romantic scene and be dressed in lingerie or worse, be dressed in nothing, lying in my bed, waiting for me to walk in and find her.
Not sleeping well was wearing on me. It’d been taking forever for me drift off, thinking about everything, missing Annie. I was exhausted, and all I wanted to do was take a hot shower and get some sleep. I decided that was exactly what I was going to do. I’d done what my mother asked. I’d shown up. It was six-thirty and I was home. End of story. I exhaled hard, turned the patina knob of the mission style front door, and dragged myself inside the house.
Katie was in the kitchen and thankfully, fully dressed. Jacob was close by, perched in a seat that rocked and played music. Katie was cooking—again.
“Hey, you hungry?” she asked as I breezed past her.
“No. I already ate.” I continued to my room where I began yanking off my clothes to get in the shower when I heard Katie’s voice behind me.
“I don’t want to be here, but my dad is making me, just like your mom is making you. I’m clear that you don’t want me here, and I get it why. If you’d bothered to have a conversation with me, you would know that. I’m used to being ignored at home, so I’m okay with it, but my son,” Katie paused, “our son deserves better from you. It’s been three weeks, and you haven’t touched him. You’ve barely been here while we’re awake. I don’t care if you don’t like me. You can even hate me if you want to. I’m not a real fan of yours, either. You shirk your responsibilities and treat Jake and me like we don’t matter. But we do matter. I’m sure you blame me for prom night, but you were there, too. Having a baby at eighteen with a one-night stand wasn’t in my plans, either, but Jacob is here and no matter how he came to be here, he deserves better from you. You’re his father. You need to start treating him like he’s your son,” Katie instructed and slammed my bedroom door so hard that it rattled in place.
Her words sounded like something Annie would have said to me. I knew she wouldn’t like how I was behaving. I suddenly felt ashamed of myself. I was responsible for this situation. I’d caused it, and now I had to reconcile it.
Katie was right; Jacob did deserve better, and so did she, really. She’d been taking care of Jake since he was born, and I hadn’t been appreciative of that at all. From what I’d witnessed, Katie was a good mother.
After getting cleaned up, I went back to the kitchen, stood in front of Katie, and forced myself to look her in the eye. “I’m sorry for my behavior. I’ve been so wrapped up in how this is affecting me and my life that I never considered how it was affecting you and yours. I shouldn’t have taken out my frustration on you or Jacob. I’ll do better.”
“Thank you,” Katie said simply and exhaled softly, sounding less angry. She swept her dark hair away from her face and gave me a half-hearted smile, which I returned. Then I held my son for the first time.
17
Justin
I felt like I was losing my mind. I’d been out with Natalie earlier tonight, and she’d come home with me. Alex had some girls over, hogging up the living room, so we went to my bedroom. I sat on the bed, propped up against the headboard, and turned on the TV.
Natalie took off her shoes, sat beside me and gave me a dopey, doe-eyed smile before kissing me.
I stretched out onto my side and pulled her closer. As I was kissing her, the scent I breathed belonged to Annie. She’d slept in my bed the two nights she was here. It was hard not to think of her—how she’d been lying where I was now kissing another girl.
When the thought hit me that I could pretend Natalie was Annie I stopped, disgusted with myself. I felt like dirt for thinking such a thing. Pam would have been furious. She’d always told me to be respectful to women and mindful of their feelings. Currently, I wasn’t doing either.
No matt
er how I tried, I could never turn Natalie into Annie, or any other girl.
“What’s wrong?” she asked warily.
“I don’t think tonight is the right time for this,” I explained, sitting up. “I’m sorry,” I said, although I knew it wouldn’t make her feel any better. Nobody liked being rejected.
I felt terrible, but my head was not in the right place to be with Nat, and honestly, I didn’t feel much for her.
“It’s because of Annie, isn’t it?” she asked quietly.
Women’s intuition so sucked for me at that moment.
“No,” I lied.
“Then what is it?”
“I just think it’s too early...”
Natalie got up, put her shoes back on, and then looked at me almost sympathetically. “Her shampoo—it’s nice,” she said, which dumbfounded me. She’d recognized the scent too, which meant she knew I had lied to her.
“I don’t think we should see each other anymore,” Natalie said calmly.
“I’m sorry,” I repeated.
“The first time I saw you look at her, I knew. You can’t help how you feel.” She pointed to the door. “I’m gonna go.”
“I’ll walk you out.”
“I’d rather you not,” she said, without looking back at me.
Once Natalie was gone, I lay back down, covered my face with my hands, and breathed out hard.
I should just give up on dating, I thought. I didn’t have time for it anyway. Regular season play was starting next week. I needed to concentrate on that, and my classes, instead of girls.
Rolling over, I inhaled Annie’s scent again. I closed my eyes and let the breath seep out as memories of us making out played in my head so vividly that I could almost feel her in my arms, her hands in my hair, her mouth on mine.
Hot, and drunk off champagne, the cold air that night hadn’t fazed either of us as we began undressing each other. Mine was almost off, and I’d undone a few buttons on her shirt when my dad interrupted us. We’d been so caught up in each other that we were oblivious to our surroundings and had no consideration for anyone else. No thought of consequences.
Breathe (Sway Part 2) Page 4