by Ann King
“No teeth, baby,” he moaned, his eyes still closed. “Don’t use your teeth.”
I would always remember that conversation we’d had in the middle of our first real hot make-out session.
“Well, honey, what do you want me to do? Have my teeth removed so I can give a good blow job?”
His eyes flashed open so fast, it was almost funny. He had this look of astonishment in them and before long he tilted his head back and gave a deep, hearty laugh. We both ended up giggling. The sex mood was somewhat gone by then. But he’d instructed me how I should do it the next time we…did it.
“Remember to cover your teeth with your lips,” he’d told me. It was supposedly what guys wanted. The best way to give a good blow job—and keep your teeth, too. So after that night, I’d practiced curling my lips over my teeth. I knew it sounded pretty lame but it worked. I practiced sliding my finger in and out my mouth and what a difference it made to my new found skill.
I chuckled at the memory.
I thought I’d only be with Peter. We’d been so intimate. We were so comfortable talking about anything and everything. We’d shared all kinds of stuff. He taught me all kinds of new things. He always shared little ‘guy’ secrets with me. I’d never spoken so intimately about anything with anyone before Peter.
I could bare my soul to him and not worry about it going any further. We had revealed our deepest darkest fantasies with each other.
God, I missed Peter. My life would never be the same again without him.
We had agreed to see each other in secret so as not to fuel any stupid rumors in the hallways of Rexton High. The next thing I knew I was invited to his posh house in the burbs. More like a mansion, actually. It was freaking intimidating. He had a maid and everything and marbled floors.
This was so unlike my upbringing in the low-income housing project.
Peter really lucked out with his adopted parents. I guess you could say that I also lucked out, too. His parents accepted me as his girlfriend. His Dad had really taken a liking to me and would often pull me aside to ask me how we were doing?
“You know, Peter is really serious about you. You’re the first girl he’s actually brought home to introduce us to.”
I wanted to say, “really?” but instead I replied, “Well, Peter is great. We really get along?” I felt stupid saying that but I didn’t know what else to say. I wasn’t the most articulate person in the world. Sometimes when I got nervous my words would come out all jumbled and incoherent. I felt like a contestant in a pageant screwing up her answer to the question given by a judge. Only there were no judges here. And I was no beauty queen.
A year later, we were sort of going steady. We rarely saw each other though. I was working my butt off like crazy trying to save up enough for college and he was always playing some football game. But he’d told me he wanted to live with me someday. To marry me. I knew it seemed premature then but that was how we’d felt about each other. We were going steady after all. There was no other girl or guy involved in our relationship. That I was sure of.
Back to the present moment.
My eyelids felt heavy with tears as I stared inside the casket of my would-be future husband. My one true love and what would never be. When Peter died, my dream of having a happily ever after died with him. My life would never be the same again.
A hand on my shoulder caused me to jolt back to reality. I turned around to see Jasper, his brother there. His eyes were red and swollen from all that crying. Much like mine. He said nothing. He just squeezed my shoulder. Moments like these required no words. Because there were no words to describe how we all felt then. Jasper moved away after taking one last look at his brother before the casket was to close, leaving me alone with my thoughts, my pain, and my guilt.
“Would you like to take a seat, ma’am?” the usher whispered to me.
“Oh. Um. Yes.” My voice was so hoarse it was unrecognizable to me.
I sat down behind Peter’s immediate family in the second row. Not far from me, I caught a glimpse of Cory Knights. The last guy to see Peter alive. To talk to him. To know what really went down. The last guy I wanted to talk to. His handsome face looked bleak with sorrow. He gave me a weak, discreet smile. The type of half-smile one gave at a setting such as this. Raw hurt glittered in his eyes yet his skin radiated. My heart flip-flopped in my chest and my breath stopped momentarily. I had to breathe. I needed air all of a sudden.
I turned my head away and pretended I didn’t see him. But I could not ignore the heavy beats of my heart pounding inside my chest. I could not bring myself to acknowledge Cory after that night. Even if he had the most penetrating dark, sexy eyes I’d ever seen, just like Peter. Cory knew something I didn’t know about that night and he wasn’t going to let me in on it. He’d made that clear.
Fuck Cory!
Cory denied my one chance at having some closure by filling in some details about that night Peter died, but he wouldn’t do it. Well, I wasn’t about to let him rob me of my dignity at Peter’s funeral.
No guy had ever made me feel the way Peter did. Okay, so I wasn’t eligible for any beauty pageants or America’s Next Top Model because my thighs were on the heavy side and I carried a little more weight. I wasn’t even popular at our high school. People rarely noticed me. But Peter did. He took an interest in me at a time when I was most vulnerable and it made me feel so loved. We were supposed to share a future together. He chose me. As popular as he was, Peter chose me. Nobody could understand why but that was their problem wasn’t it? Not mine. I was so happy with him. He understood why I wanted to wait before becoming intimate. He waited so long, unlike many other guys in high school. He was my first real true love. My first experience with intimacy…and now my first real death of someone close to me.
I was too little to remember when my mother died. And my dad? I had no idea if he was alive or dead. Never knew him. My grandparents pretty much raised me the best they could on their fixed income. I wanted to make a good life for myself for my own sake and for theirs. My dream would be to take care of them in their old age as they had taken care of me when I was young and vulnerable in my young age.
I squared my shoulders and sucked in a deep breath, my chest rose and fell drastically. I was going to make it through today. Even if it were the last thing I could do.
For Peter’s sake.
For my own sake.
I surreptitiously turned my head slightly and could still see Cory out of the corner of my eye gazing towards me. The heat of his gaze was so intense it almost stifled me. I started to feel as if I could not breathe again. Why was he looking at me like that? Did he expect me to talk to him after what happened? After the rumors that went down after Peter…passed away.
No. I will not entertain any thoughts that could drag me down. I mentally shoved any notion of fear or betrayal from my mind for the moment. I refused to get worked up over anybody. I don’t hate Cory either. I refuse to. Hate was like drinking a vile of poison and expecting the other person to get sick. Poisonous thoughts would not enter my mind today or any other day. I squeezed my eyes shut as the choir started singing Amazing Grace and I imagined what could have been. It was then that my heartbeat restored itself to a normal pace.
I would get through this because failure would not be an option for me. Peter always shared some crazy poetic words with me. God, I missed his texts. He would text stuff like:
I’m always with you
No matter where I am
Remember that
I’m just a call or a text away
I’ll be there
Peter told me a few lies when we were together but my favorite one was ‘I’ll never leave you.’
I would never believe those words again from anyone.
His last text to me was:
I’m with Cory n’ the guys
Keep being beautiful
U make it so easy to love you
U make it so easy to be…with you
See u so
on
Hot tears spilled down my cheeks faster than I could stop them. I reach into my purse to grab a tissue to dab my eyes and wipe my nose. I needed all the inner-power and emotional strength the universe had to offer me. And I needed it like yesterday.
“Dearly beloved,” the young pastor began as he stood in his black suit at the podium, “We are gathered today to pay our final tribute of respect to that which was mortal of our deceased loved one and friend, Peter Brentwood. To you members of the family who mourn your loss, we especially offer our deep and sincere sympathy. May we share with you the comfort afforded by God's Word in John 14 verse one to three for such a time as this: "Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. In my Father's house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am…”
The rest of the sermon and the service was a blur to me. Everything went dark in my life after that.
Everything.
CHAPTER TWO
Six months later…
“You sure, you’ll be okay? The storm is supposed to hit by evening,” Grandma shouted from the front porch as she huddled in her pink flannel robe. She stood at the door to see me off. God bless her. She was always worried about something happening to me and always wanted to protect me. But I loved her so much. And Gramps, too. If it weren’t for them, I’d be bouncing from foster home to foster home. An orphan. An abandoned child nobody wanted. I owed them my life.
“Yeah, I’ll be fine, Grams,” I said as I lugged my suitcase into the trunk of my old ’98 Escort and slammed it shut. It was silver and rusty on the bottom but it was what I worked hard and saved for. My first and only car. Bought it second hand and yeah, it conked out of me one too many times but it got me to where I needed to go. And it was what I could afford…for now. “My position at the school starts Tuesday but I need to get the keys to my new apartment tomorrow. I should be okay. Besides I’ll stop at a motel on the way if the roads get bad.”
“The drive from Buffalo to New York is so long. I wish you could have found a teaching job near by.”
I playfully rolled my eyes and grinned. “Grandma, I’ll be okay. Really. Besides all the good jobs are in the city.” I saw the look of despair on her face and added, “It’s only a one-year contract. I’m sure I’ll find something close by after it ends.”
A smile of relief touched her lips and she pressed her lips together giving me a warm look of appreciation. As Betsy (yeah, I nicknamed my car) continued to warm up I walked up the steps to the porch, the snow crunching under my boots and gave Grandma one more hug. A good bear-hugging squeeze.
Her eyes were misting up again. I did not want to see her cry. That must have been the first time I had to leave her for so long.
I had attended the college near by and had planned to do my grad studies there, too. But money didn’t grow on trees. I needed work. Real work. A career that paid more than my part time job working at the hotel changing bed linen for housekeeping. A job that often resulted in my taking aspirin before climbing into bed at night after getting a sore back, bending and stretching while changing a hundred guest beds.
“I love you, now get inside before you catch a nasty cold, Grams,” I scowled playfully. White puffs of air departed my lips against the frigid temperature.
“I hope Betsy is ready for that long ride,” she teased me.
I growled. “She’ll be fine. Don’t worry, Grams.”
She tilted her head to the side and smiled, though her eyes had a touch of melancholy in them. She was afraid. I could tell. But there was nothing I could do to take away that fear.
Nothing.
I really didn’t need to carry that feeling with me as I headed out on my long journey into the city. The drive from Buffalo to New York usually took six hours tops but because of the icy road and blowing snow, I was looking at twice the time to make it in.
The time was eight o’clock in the morning on Saturday. The blizzard wasn’t supposed to begin until in the early hours of the night. By that time, I should be in my new warm apartment just on the outskirts of the big city. I had seen the place beforehand. It was a rental from one of the teaching staff at the new school. They were renting out their property but wanted someone reliable in the unit.
Of course, I packed an emergency kit in the trunk of my car including a thermos with steaming hot coffee, a thick blanket, water bottles, flashlight, First Aid kit, energy bars, extra clothes, small shovel, scraper and snowbrush. Oh, and a candle in an empty tin can with matches. I was always told to carry that to ignite and keep warm just in case I got stranded in an ice storm. It was better than risking carbon monoxide poisoning by leaving the car running to keep warm.
I also carried a whistle.
Okay, that was Grandma’s idea but it was a good tip. If I ever needed to attract attention I could just blow with all the breath I had and hope that someone somewhere would hear me in distress. I wore a thick red scarf around my neck and matching hat, a gift from Peter. It meant so much to me. I thought it was the most ridiculous thing he’d bought me last Christmas but I cherished it now. It was the last thing he would buy for me. He wasn’t the best gift-giver but he was genuine and had a good heart. He always meant well. God rest his soul. My dark, honey blond hair blew into my face as I scraped the last bit of ice off my windshield. I knew Grandma and Grandpa wanted to help me but bless their heart I had forbid them to do anything strenuous. The last thing I needed was for them to having a coronary while shoveling snow or scraping ice.
I had shoveled their driveway earlier that morning. I could still hear Grandma’s words, “My dear, darling. You do so much around here. Look at you shoveling all that snow. You deserve a nice man to take good care of you. I pray you’ll find happiness darling.” I’m sure she’d meant to say “again” at the end of that sentence.
A flash of loneliness stabbed at my heart when she had uttered those words. “I’ll be alright,” I had told her. “Really.”
Before long the wheels on my car grinded along the snow-packed road towards my destination. Cars parked on the street were blanketed in white from the heavy snowfall overnight. There weren’t many cars actually driving on the road this morning which I had anticipated since the severe storm warning was still in effect. I didn’t blame other motorists from keeping off the roads today unless it was absolutely necessary. Luckily I had just gotten my new snow tires on my old car. I had filled my tank at the local gas station and was ready to go.
I was on my way to the yellow brick road to a new beginning. Only, it was more of a slushy white snow-filled road towards the Big Apple. I must have been crazy to choose today to go. But I had no choice. Louisa, my new landlord was supposed to be out of town and she wanted to give me the keys before she went.
Anyway, I was determined to make it to my destination safely. I had everything covered. I couldn’t wait to get there.
I was going to find myself by losing myself in my work. And forget about all the pain and memories of my hometown. I was going to start anew. I thought about Peter and what he would have done if I had told him I was moving away to teach. On second thoughts, I probably would have stayed in town just to be with him and take any job I could get while hoping for an opening in my field.
Hot tears stung my eyes again. I had to blink them away and swallow the hard lump in my throat. It had been six months now since Peter had died under mysterious circumstances and time hadn’t really melted the memories away.
An hour later, I drove on the hard snow-packed road through a rural area near cottage country. According to my GPS this would be the best route to take. I switched on the radio and blasted the volume to keep me company when I realized I had forgotten to pack my freaking car charger for my cell phone.
Shit!
“Severe snow storm warning is still in effect for later this evening,” the radio DJ anno
unced, “winds in excess of thirty-five miles per hour and low visibility will also play into effect. If you don’t have to be outside today, stay home cozy by the fireplace.”
“Yeah, right,” I murmured to myself, “like some people have a choice.”
The windshield wiper swished back and forth on my window pushing blowing snow from side to side. The storm wasn’t supposed to hit for another eight hours or so but it looked as if it would come earlier than forecasted. That wasn’t unusual these days with all the crap going on with the environment, weather conditions had become less and less possible to accurately predict. Sometimes it was a hit or miss with meteorologists. I surreptitiously hoped they would be wrong and the storm would blow over the area instead of cripple it.
I narrowed my eyes at the road, looking for a store or the nearest strip mall where hopefully I could find a charger for my cell. I bit down on my lower lip, my heart pounding hard and fast in my chest. I needed to have a working cell or I would be screwed if the snow storm struck earlier than anticipated. I had a checklist and everything so I couldn’t understand how I managed to miss my charger. Crap. I had so much on my mind, that must have been what it was.
Oh, God! The last thing I needed was to be stranded in the middle of nowhere under some dangerous storm with no means of communication to call AAA or emergency. I’d read about a woman who was caught in the storm and they’d found her body the following day, frozen in the ice bank. She’d died from hypothermia. Alone. She’d also been robbed by some idiot drifter who must have found her body first. It was crazy and very depressing. The report said that she should have stayed in her car because it was easier to find a car than a body in the snow banks during a storm if emergency personnel were driving by.