Second Chances

by Younker, Tracy

  It feels like my blood has turned to shards of ice inside my veins as I step back and bump right into the bed, falling down on my bottom. For a moment, I am completely frozen and numb. My eyes are wide and dry, and then it's as if my heart starts up again and the pain begins to squeeze my every organ. My eyes fill instantly with tears as I stand up. I have to get out of here. I'm not sure I can walk; my legs are trembling so badly. I have to concentrate to even get my hand to grasp the doorknob. Shakily I pull it open and pause for a minute. I have to go out the front door so that they won't see me. I can't see them. I can't see him. Like a fool, I glance back into the room at the bed where we just made love. Where my heart felt happy and complete. Now it's lying in a million pieces at the bottom of the lake. I squeeze my eyes shut to tear my gaze away and a gasp escapes my mouth. I need to get out of here quickly or I'm not going to be able to hold back the sobs.

  I hear a car door slam and the back door to the house bang shut just as I start down the stairs. My shaking grows worse as fear grips me and I almost slip and fall down the rest of the way. Suddenly Chase is standing at the bottom of the stairs and I drop against the wall as a sob slips past my lips.

  “Haylee! What's wrong?” he sounds panicked as he takes the steps two at a time to reach me. Does he think he can just rush back up here and have me again after that? At the very least he had been my friend once upon a time. How can he do this to me?

  I freak out. “NO!” I scream before he can touch me and he freezes wide-eyed in front of me. “Don't touch me,” I pant. My whole body trembles like it's twenty below in the house as I try to ease my way past him, shrunken against the wall so that he won't touch me. He looks terrified and confused. I'm sure I look absolutely ridiculous but I don't care. I am beyond heartbroken.

  “Haylee, what's going on?” he asks as he raises his hand. I shrink back even farther and he gets the hint, resting his hand on the back of his neck instead.

  “I saw you with Lexi, Chase! You just fucked me upstairs and then you go out there and kiss her!” I practically shriek and use his moment of utter shock to slip past him and down the rest of the stairs. He thinks he can get away with this shit with me? No fuckin' way!

  “Haylee, wait!” he calls just as I burst through the front door and run as fast as I can up the hill with no shoes on. My bag, towel, and shoes are all down at the dock, but I am not about to go down there. I keep stepping on stones and twigs and pine needles so it's a slow, painful climb. The tears are pouring down my cheeks but I don't let go completely. I can't let Mom hear me when I come in. My heart is pounding so fiercely I think I'll have a heart attack for sure before I even make it home. I'm just coming out of the tree line along the road when I hear my name being called. It's a woman's voice and it's coming from the right or I wouldn't have even looked. The silver car that had been parked in Griff's driveway a few minutes ago is now parked along the side of the road and Lexi is calling out to me.

  I'm too stunned to even move as she gets out of the car and comes over to me. I shoot a look of pure evil at her and turn to head across the street but she grabs my arm and stops me. “Haylee, wait,” she insists. “I tried to warn you that this isn't what he wants. I'd check his glove box if I were you.”

  She releases my arm and struts back to her car on her stilettos. She climbs inside and drives off like nothing has happened. 'I'd check his glove box if I were you.' What the hell is she talking about? I look to my left and see a rental truck parked along the road there. Chase must have parked up here in order to surprise me. A whimper flies out of my mouth as I remember seeing him standing there on the dock. How thrilled and excited I'd been. What a fool I'd been.

  Just like the car wreck from earlier, I find myself walking carefully over to the truck. Do I really want to look? How can I not? Are there naked photos of the two of them in there? I would throw up on the spot. The passengers' window is down so I climb up onto the kickboard beneath the doors. Hopefully nobody drives by right now because I look completely shady. My hand is shaking like an addict trying to go cold turkey, but I manage to get the latch undone and the glove box drops open. A light has snapped on and I peer inside. Rental papers. I reach in and feel around and there is something underneath the papers. I slide my hand beneath them and pull out a ziplock baggie filled with a white powdery substance. I gasp and drop the bag back inside like it has burned me. He's still using coke too! I slam the glove box closed and sprint across the street with no concern for my bare feet anymore.

  I heave into the bushes in front of my house before I can even get inside. I won't survive this. He hasn't changed at all.

  Chapter 21 - Chase

  My whole body is buzzing with energy when I spot the boat heading this way. It feels like forever before they are close enough to actually see Haylee's face. Yup, she's shocked! Her mouth hangs open until she throws her hand over it and her almond-shaped blue eyes are as wide as saucers. She turns to say something to Griff and then turns back to me. She must have figured out that he knew I was here. I laugh when she dives off the boat to swim the rest of the way. She isn't known for her patience. She pops up out of the water with her hands on the edge of the dock staring up at me with a huge smile on her gorgeous face. I'm not known for my patience either, so I lean over and haul her right up out of the water. Finally she is standing before me and her beautiful body is gleaming with droplets of water. I want to lick each and every one of them from her skin.

  Holding her, kissing her, making love to her then had been surreal and mind blowing. I never had any idea that being with someone you actually love could be so much more than just sex. Knowing that I have her to come back to has driven me to get everything finished up in Califonia as quickly as I could and I hate that it had still taken a month. Being here in her arms is straight out of a dream. She makes me want to be a better person. I want to love her with all I have and give her the world if she wants it.

  I really want to kill the idiot who is knocking on the door downstairs. I'd had to break away from Haylee and come down here to. . .Lexi? No fucking way!

  The last couple of weeks have been long and grueling. Ending the business relationship with Lexi had been downright ridiculous. She still had this idea that we were together and I had been relieved to finally be free of her. To say she had flipped out on me would be putting it mildly. Now, here she stands at Griff's fuckin' house!

  “What the hell are you doing here?” I demand as I step out onto the deck with her, not even inviting her inside. She doesn't belong here.

  “Chase, you've only just started out in the ameteur circuit. You could go pro easily with my help. Don't just give up now,” she insists, going as far as putting her hands up on my chest. Shit, I should have grabbed a shirt.

  “I already told you, I don't want that anymore. I had fun doing what I did and it's just time for me to be done with that part of my life. Not everything is about money or a title. Here in this town are the things that are really important to me,” I explain with emphasis on the part of about wanting to be here.

  “All that aside though Chase, I still love you. Don't just walk away from us like this.”

  “Lexi, I've told you over and over again, there is no us! I made a mistake a long time ago and it's over now. I appreciate all you did but I'm moving on now.” It hits me at this moment that Lexi doesn't know what real love is. She's trying to hang onto something one-sided.

  When she reaches out and grabs me, planting a kiss on my mouth, I am beyond shocked. She is unreal! I shove her away just as quick. “We're done, Lexi!”

  “Whatever, Chase. I know you. I'll be staying at the Falls Lake Motel for a few days if you change your mind,” she calls over her shoulder as she walks away. Unbelieveable! She is completely delusional!

  “Don't wait up, Lexi. It's not gonna happen!” I call after her. I take a deep breath and rake my hands through my hair as I head back inside. I don't even want to think about Lexi anymore. I just want to get back to Haylee.

&nbs
p; I come around the corner and I'm just about to take the stairs two at time when I look up and find Haylee coming down. Something is off though; she looks like she's crying, with a deer-in-the-headlights expression.

  “Haylee! What's wrong?” I shout and hurry up the stairs to help her or whatever the hell she needs. I have no idea what could be wrong with her.

  “NO!” she screams and holds her hands out to stop me. I freeze. “Don't touch me.” Those words are like acid poured right onto my heart. It feels like someone has just kicked me in the gut, hard, and all the air has been forced right out of my lungs. I can't breathe. I'm so confused. What has happened to her and why does she look terrified of me?

  “Haylee, what's going on?” I ask, my voice trembling with concern. I've never seen her look so scared and lost before. I just want her to tell me what is going on.

  “I saw you with Lexi, Chase! You just fucked me upstairs and then you go out there and kiss her!” she shouts at me with pure hatred in her beautiful eyes. She may as well have slapped me with her words. I hadn't fucked Haylee. I made love to her. How can she think. . . ? She must have looked out the window and seen Lexi kiss me, but then she must have also seen me shove her away from me. She can't possibly think I had wanted that. Clearly she must have turned away before she saw me shove Lexi off of me because she is shaking with hurt and anger, and she's sliding down along the wall as far away from me as the stairway will allow. She looks like she's afraid that I will hurt her and I realize then that I have. At least with what she believes she's seen.

  Once she's down the stairs, she bolts for the front door which none of us ever uses. “Haylee, wait!” I shout after her, too shocked to have even moved from the fourth step on the stairs. I need to catch her. I need to tell her what really happened. She needs to know that it isn't what she thinks. I burst through the front door next and with one hand on the railing, I leap right over the front porch. She is halfway up the hill by then and almost out of my sight in the thicker trees.

  I am ready to sprint up the hill when a hand reaches out and snags my arm. “Chase, what the hell is going on up here?” Griff demands. “Who was that in the silver car?”

  I'll be too late now to catch her before she's barricaded inside her bedroom. I drop my chin down onto my chest and let my body drop down onto the grass with my knees up in front of me in the middle of Griff's front lawn. I run my fingers into my hair and grip it in tight fists out of frustration and the fact that I have no control right now. Haylee is up there crying and thinking that I'm a shitbag.

  “What happened?” Griff asks again as he crouches down in front of me. When I look up, his face is filled with concern and surprise when he realizes there are tears in my eyes.

  “A big fuckin' misunderstanding!” I cry and slam both of my fists down on the ground on either side of me.

  “Who was in the car?”

  I sigh heavily. “Lexi Forbes, my manager,” I start and Griff furrows his brow. “She gave me a hard time in LA when I told her I was done. I made the huge fucking mistake of getting wasted one night and sleeping with her once a few years back. It meant nothing and I regretted it the next morning. She was convinced from then on that we were something more than just employee and employer no matter how many times I explained I wasn't interested in that. So, I'm upstairs with Haylee a little while ago and there's a knock on the back door. I assume it's you guys dicking around with us, so I come down here ready to bust your balls. But no, it's fucking Lexi! She must have followed me here. She is giving me the same old sob story and then out of the blue she grabs me and kisses me. I shoved her away and told her to get the fuck out of here. Haylee must have looked out the window and saw her kiss me but she must have turned away before she saw me push her off of me.” Griff purses his lips and nods with understanding now. “I was headed back upstairs, but I found Haylee already coming down. I've never seen her look the way she did. She hates me. She's terrified of me. She took off before I could even explain. . .” I drop my face into my hands. I am devastated. Haylee is my best friend and I can't stand that she is hurting and that I am the reason for her pain.

  Griff puts his hand on my shoulder. “Just give her some time to cool off and then you can explain everything. I'll go see if she'll talk to me.” I just nod and watch for a minute as Griff makes his way up the hill. I'm not sure that Haylee will even talk to him right now. She had looked so utterly broken. It's exactly how I feel right now. I hate Lexi with every fiber of my being. Her timing had been the worst possible. She's just one of the many mistakes of my past that I am still paying for.

  Finally I stand up. I can't just sit here. I need to be closer to Haylee. I know she won't see me yet, but I just need to be closer. I walk up the hill and across her front lawn. Her mom's car isn't in the driveway and I assume that Griff is inside with her. I slump down on the front porch next to the front door and let my arms hang over my knees. My head lolls forward as I think about how things must have looked to Haylee. She doesn't believe yet that I won't ever hurt her like this. The person that I had been is in the past and she is all I want now. What will I do if she doesn't speak to me again? What if she's never able to forgive me? I can't imagine my future without her in it. I feel lower right now than when I awoke alone in the hospital and I didn't think that was possible.

  Chapter 22 - Haylee

  My head is pounding, my eyes burn, but still more tears come. My insides feel like they've been puréed in a blender and dumped out in the trash. I'm lying on the floor of my bedroom. I hadn't been able to make it all the way to my bed, but I managed to lock my door knowing that he would follow me.

  There's a knock on the door and I pull myself tighter into the fetal position. I can't see him. I just can't.

  “Haylee, it's me,” comes Griff's voice, but still I don't answer. I don't want him to see me like this either. I feel like a fool. I threw myself right into things with Chase and believed him when he said that he changed, but he hadn't changed at all. “If you don't unlock this door, I will bust it wide open,” Griff warns, his voice firm and determined. I know he will do it too. That would just cause my mom more worry and I can't have that. I peel myself off the carpet and flick the lock on the doorhandle. He turns the knob and bursts inside like a force of nature. I glance behind him to make sure Chase isn't with him.

  Griff reaches out and pulls me into his arms. I just stand still for a moment, my arms at my sides beneath his arms. His strength and comfort seep into my bones and I find myself wracked with sobs. I slide my arms around his waist and hang on as I cry. He doesn't say anything, just moves us over so that he can sit on the edge of the bed and pull me onto his lap.

  Once I am cried out again, I feel like a child sitting here and carrying on like the world is ending. Mine has though. I sit up and wipe my cheeks with the back of my hand. I'm trembling like mad and still wearing just my bikini. Griff reaches over and pulls a blanket up around my shoulders as my teeth continue to chatter.

  “It's not what you think, Haylee,” Griff says softly and I close my eyes. “I talked to him. He's an absolute wreck. I've never seen him so distraught.”

  I'm shaking my head though. I don't want to hear it. “Of course you'd take his side,” I chatter. They are guys. They stick together on this shit.

  “I'm not taking anyone's side!” Griff's tone is stern. It's so unlike him that my eyes fly wide as I look up at him. “I love you both and I don't want to see either of you like this! He loves you, Haylee. It's plain on his face and in every word he speaks. And you love him or you wouldn't be this wrecked. You need to calm down and let him explain when you're ready. I wouldn't throw you into a lion's den if I didn't think you were the perfect lioness.”

  “What if I'm never ready? What if I can never face him again?”

  “You can,” he insists. “What you saw wasn't the whole story.”

  “Did he tell you the rest?”

  “He told me that she caught him off guard when she kissed him and that he shoved
her away. You must not have seen that part,” he replies.

  “Did he tell you that he's still using?” I say through clenched teeth. I absolutely hate the very thought of it. No matter how badly he hurt me and I want him to hurt in return, it's certainly not with drugs.

  “Why do you say that? Did he tell you that?” Griff sounds surprised.

  I shake my head. Of course he hasn't told me any of it. “Lexi was still in her car along the road when I came running up here and she called to me. She told me again that she had warned me that I was too 'small town' to keep someone like Chase's interests and that I should look in his glovebox. I did, and there was a bag of white powder in there.”

  Griff sets me down on the bed beside him and is up pacing the carpet of my room as he always does when he's thinking. “Wait a second. . .how would Lexi know what was in his glovebox? He just got the truck a few hours ago at the rental place at the airport.”

  “I don't know. Maybe she flew here with him or gave that shit to him. Who cares?” I shout.

  “Or she put it in there.”

  I roll my eyes at him. He's so quick to try and get Chase out of this shit.

  “Think about it,” he insists, still pacing like a tiger around a pit. “She wants him back. She knows he's in love with you. She comes here after him and figures that if she gets you out of the picture, then maybe she has a better chance with him. Did she see you in the window upstairs?”