by Nicole Thorn
Wilson faced me now, and he was still asleep. He looked adorable when he was asleep. I wanted to touch his face, but somehow I didn’t think he’d like that. He didn’t really want me doing anything with him.
It hurt when he rejected me, but he did it in the sweetest way he could have. It was for me in the end. Maybe he had a point. We might work better as friends than something else. I didn’t know how to be anything else anyway. Still… I would miss the kissing. And the feeling I woke up to before. The memories were almost clear enough for me to feel it again. It did leave a little tingle where it counted. I wish I’d been fully awake when his hand was between my legs. I wanted to feel it at all it could be. Not through the fog that was being half asleep.
I know that it wasn’t fair, but I was a little irritated with him for making the decision for me that I wasn’t up for anything like that. Of course, I might not be in my right mind for a lot of things. Did that mean someone else had the right to make choices for me? I guess since he was involved in this, it did.
I could have just gotten out of bed and went home. It was still dark, but the sun would be out soon. My mother would be awake and wondering where I was. Would Wilson care if I didn’t stay to say goodbye to him?
I didn’t want to risk it.
My hands went to his chest. “Wilson? I have to go home now.”
He did nothing.
“Wilson,” I said a little louder. “Unless you want my dad to kill you with a baseball bat, I suggest you wake up.”
There was a grumble from him, but he didn’t open his eyes.
I went for try number three. My hand went to his shoulder, sliding down his back. “I’ll feel really bad if I just leave without—”
And he rolled over onto me with another grumble. His head was tucked under my chin and he had me completely pinned. Well… this wasn’t what I thought would happen.
Breathing wasn’t easy anymore, but I carried on. “Um, I take it you’re asleep?”
Wilson did nothing but adjust on me. At least he seemed comfy.
Okay, so a boy was sleeping on me, and I didn’t know what to do about it. Hitting him was an option, but it seemed a little mean. What happened when words didn’t work?
“Um,” I said. “You’re on top of me.”
Nothing.
I sighed. I liked this better when he was awake for it. Like last night, when he was pushing himself against me and making me feel better all over. At the moment, he was dead weight, and I was pretty sure I was going to die like this.
“Wilson!” I said, the loudest I’d gotten so far.
Slowly, his eyes opened. I watched him figure everything out, slowly but surely. His hand slid down my arm as he pushed himself up. He smiled sleepily at me before he realized that he shouldn’t be on me. Then he rolled off and onto his back next to me.
I sat up while he rubbed his face.
“Sorry.”
“It’s fine.”
“Stop saying it’s fine when I do stuff to you that I shouldn’t.”
“Stop ignoring me when I say I like the stuff you do to me.”
He eyed me sideways. “Are you saying that so I won’t feel bad for last night?”
“Yes, but that doesn’t make me like it any less.”
He sat up too, keeping a distance. “Of course you liked it. It was a natural reaction to stimulation. It has little to do with me.”
Well, now he was just trying to convince himself. I had little patience for it. “Don’t make me do something to you to prove that fact wrong.”
The thing about Wilson was that he wanted to do what he thought was the right thing. He also seemed to like playing.
“What might you do?”
That was obviously an invitation to get on top of him. Which I did. I laid on him, keeping my knees on either side of him and my hands on his pillow. “Maybe something like this.”
I could see the fight in his eyes that the rest of him was losing. Real hard. His hands found my hips, and he pulled me to a better place on his lap. Hmm. I seemed to recall a positive reaction to something I did the last time I was sitting on this particular body part. This did nothing but prove that he was pliable.
I smiled at him, looking down at his lap. “You’re giving me mixed messages.”
“And you can’t take a hint.”
I leaned down, putting my lips to his throat. I repeated the act in different places as I spoke. “If I were one to take hints, what should I make of you moving me so I could feel this?” I rubbed against his lap, making him groan just a little bit. At the sound, I kissed his jaw.
“I shouldn’t have done that,” he breathed. Yet he didn’t move.
In his ear, I asked, “Do you want me to move?” I pulled back to look at his face.
His hands moved up my thighs, yet he said, “Yes.”
Because he wasn’t stopping, I wanted to buy time to see how far he would go. “Why?”
When he sighed, I knew it was over. He pulled my nightie back into place and sat me next to him. “Because if you keep pushing me, I’m going to stop fighting you.”
“So it’s a win-win.”
He smiled while scowling at me. Impressive.
“Or, I get to have sex and you get to spend your whole life regretting something I can’t take back.”
“Because you assume I can’t want normal people things. I’m broken, so I’m not suitable for a regular life, right?”
“That’s not what I’m saying.”
I crossed my arms, resting against the bed. “That’s exactly what you’re saying. Unless you’re just suggesting I find another boy to help me out with this.”
I couldn’t read anything in his blank face before he looked away from me. “I’m not sure you should be with anyone right now.”
I scoffed. “So, you won’t touch me, and I’m not allowed to let anyone else?”
“I didn’t say that. I’m just saying you need time to figure things out. You missed out on so much in your teen years. It’s the time where you start slow and figure out what you like and what to do. You’re almost twenty. You need to find a guy who’s willing to go slowly with you. That’s not easy to do.”
“If you don’t want to be with me, that’s fine. But don’t use what happened to me as an excuse. How about you just be honest and tell me what you’re afraid of? And don’t say you’re afraid of me getting freaked out and panicking. If I were going to, then don’t you think I would have by now?”
I waited and waited, but all he did was stare. I couldn’t even tell if he was trying to think up something to say or if he was waiting for me to talk again. Either way, I was done.
I got out of the bed, fixing my clothes. “I need to go home now.”
When I turned and started walking, Wilson called after me. I didn’t stop moving. Why should I? Why should I listen to one more person telling me what’s good for me?
I think most of the morning was wasted by my fuming. Through my shower and breakfast. Through a hundred pages of a book. Through cleaning my room. I was angry, and I didn’t have anyone to take it out on. I wanted to punch something in the face.
I wanted to call my sisters and talk, but this was so small. How could I complain about a boy when there were much worse things going on? Kylie was dead. Nothing else should matter, and I was selfish for getting upset over something like this.
Indoors wouldn’t work for me today. Not when the sun was out and the air was clean. I pulled on a pair of jeans and a big sweater before I left my bedroom and went down the stairs. I lazily said hello to my mother before I went outside.
The tree looked all too tempting to me, so I stuck my foot between the split in the trunk and started climbing. I found solace at the top of the tree when I could see into the backyard of the houses all around me. Birds and cats and little children played in their yards. It helped me remember I wasn’t the only person in the world, and everyone was hurting. My pain was the center of me, not anyone else.
My eyes c
losed, and I started singing to myself as the icy cold wind blew. I was quiet, because it was just for me. Some song from my phone that Wilson gave me. I think it was from a movie. The build was wonderful, and that was all I cared about.
Instead of pouting about some stupid boy who was trying to run my life, I decided to think about the sky above me. It was perfect today. Blue and wide open. It was the kind of sky that a person should stare at in wonder. How can such an ugly world have beauty like this in it? It didn’t seem right. Why did some people get to see the sun while other people were locked in darkness?
“Honey?” Mom called after God knows how long.
I looked down at her from my tree and found my father at her side.
“You need to come inside for a minute.”
I put my hands on a branch and leaned down. “Am I in trouble?”
Mom laughed. “Oh, no. We just wanted to take you out for ice cream before your brother gets off of school.”
My ears dropped. “Why aren’t you bringing Welly?”
Dad cut her off before she got the chance to talk. “This was gonna just be for you.”
I stood in my tree, which I named Harold, and then hopped to the grass below. I stuck the landing like a champ, but my mom freaked out anyway. Her fingernails dug into her hips, and she chewed on her lip enough to make me worry she’d bleed.
“Are we leaving now?” I asked once Mom stopped praying.
“Yeah,” Dad said with a pat to my shoulders.
I ran inside, throwing my shoes on and getting my phone. I didn’t check it, but I saw it vibrating when I picked it up. Wilson, obviously. I wasn’t interested in what he had to say. He rejected me, and that was the end of it.
Or so I thought.
I was outside before my parents were, and Wilson was pacing his driveway. I thought he might not see me if I ran and ducked behind my dad’s car, so I tried it. With a mouse-like scurry, I flew down my driveway and hid at the front bumper. I crouched down, heart pounding and my lips turning into a smile. I think it was adrenaline. It’s the same kind of feeling I had that horrible night, but this was different. The stakes were lower now. Still, I loved the feeling of my heart going mad in my chest.
When I dropped to my knees, I went to peek over the edge of the car. I leaned as far as my body would let me, and I couldn’t see Wilson anymore. He must have been pacing lower on the driveway.
“Riley?”
“Ahh!” I shouted, falling on my face.
At least nothing felt broken.
Wilson picked me up and sat me back down, looking utterly disappointed in me. “What are you doing?”
“What are you doing?” I bit at him. “Awful creepy to sneak up on people.”
His black eyebrows moved up on his forehead. “Almost as creepy as a person bolting and hiding behind a car.”
“Bite me.”
I heard him sigh, and he sat beside me. “Riley.”
“Go away.” I still wouldn’t look over. “I don’t want to talk to you.”
“Too bad.”
I think I was blushing because I felt warm all over and I just wanted to run away from the awkwardness. “I already know your point. I’m in no shape to do the kind of things we were doing last night. You can go now.”
Wilson shot me a look, his eyebrow cocked and no amusement on his face. “I feel like you’re thinking that I’m trying to tell you how to live your life. I’m just suggesting that you may be trying to do too much all at once. You might even like it for a while, but one day, it’s going to come back and overwhelm you. You need to take baby steps.”
“Like?”
Wilson pulled his legs up, resting his hands on his knees. “What do you want out of life? Like right now? What do you want to do right now?”
I thought about it, feeling my heart as it slowed down in my chest. I wanted it to race again. “I want to feel like I’m alive.” It was the simplest way I could put it.
Wilson nodded. “We can work on that. There’s more to life than sex, so I’ve been told.”
I rolled my eyes. “Oh, I’m so sure you’re the picture of purity. I bet you lost your virginity when you were fifteen.”
He smiled, but not at me. “Do you want to know?”
No. “Sure.”
“Seventeen. To a girl I didn’t know because I was wasted and I didn’t want to feel alone. It didn’t feel good the next morning. I was still miserable, and nothing could change that. It would kill me if you did something like that with me because you thought it would do something for you like that. It can’t. I don’t want to be someone you can’t stand looking at because you made a mistake with me. Can you really be mad at me for that?”
I smiled at him, trying to make it better. “I never actually said I wanted to have sex with you, by the way. I just liked the kissing, and the other things.”
His fingers twitched on his knee. “Is that all you liked?”
I shook my head, blushing. “I liked waking up with you this morning. Both times. But especially the second time. You look really dopey when you’re sleeping.”
That didn’t seem to comfort him. “Thanks…”
I rubbed his arm. “In a cute way. But you did almost suffocate me when you rolled over on me.”
“Sorry about that. I’m a heavy sleeper.”
I laughed. “Um, yeah, I remember.”
Again, he broke eye contact. He groaned instead of commenting on that. Then he shook his head. “Maybe we should work on some platonic things that we can do together.”
“Boring. But I guess so.”
We smiled at each other at the same time. That stopped when a shadow crept up on us.
“Wilson.” My dad frowned. “And you’re here because…?”
I narrowed my eyes. “Be nice, Daddy.”
He ignored me. “Don’t you have some skirts to chase?”
Wilson smirked up at my dad, and I knew for a fact he was just trying to make him mad. “Just the one.” Then he turned to me. “I’ll see ya later, baby.” He got up off of the ground, dusted himself off, and walked back home.
“Please, Riley, don’t let that boy touch you. He just wants one thing from you, and he’ll be done.”
He took my hands and pulled me up to my feet as Mom locked the front door.
“I promise you, Wilson won’t take advantage of me.”
“Don’t believe that.”
“I do. He’s not the way you think he is. He’s sweet and kind to me, and he has no desire to get mixed up in the mess that I am.”
Before Dad could say anything, I got in the back of the car. My parents exchanged a look before joining me. As we started driving, I glanced over my shoulder and back the way Wilson came. I just barely caught sight of him pulling a cigarette out of his pocket and sticking it in his mouth.
I was in my own head when we got to the drive-thru ice cream place. I told Mom what I wanted, and she gave it to me. An Oreo and vanilla cup. I thought we’d be parking to eat, but Dad kept on driving. I started in on my ice cream without commenting. I picked away at it, watching the roads we were taking.
About twenty minutes into the drive home, I realized that we were not actually going home. I leaned forward. “Um, what’s going on?”
Mom smiled nervously. “Oh, well…we’re going for a drive.”
“To?”
Dad glanced over at her. “Just tell her. We’ll be there in five minutes.”
The pit that formed in my stomach gave me a sinking feeling that had me strongly considering pulling a tuck and roll out the car. We weren’t on a major highway, so I might actually survive.
“Honey.” Mom looked to the rearview mirror instead of making real eye contact. “You’ve been through so much.”
Oh, dear. “And what are you about to add to that?”
Mom frowned, finally turning around. “We all talked about it and agreed. You girls need to talk to someone outside of this. Better than that other woman. It’s great that you have each other,
but you need a completely unbiased party. I think this is going to be healthy for you.”
They were sending my sisters and me to another shrink… this wasn’t a shock from my parents, but the fact that Layla’s and Adalyn’s parents went along with it was more than disappointing. Was this just what happened when a parent was as lost as mine? Let someone else take care of it?
When I was silent, Mom said, “Someone close to you died, and you saw it. I think that’s something you should talk with someone about.”
I shook my head. “I spent three days talking about nothing but that day. Why are you doing this to me?”
We made a turn, and I saw a massive building. Cold and made of brick. White block letters labeled the different areas of the place. There was an iron stairway up the sides, and I could see a man in a suit walking up the right side. He had a brown leather briefcase in his hands, and I wondered what was inside.
Dad parked while he spoke. “Listen, kiddo. You do it this once, and if it’s just awful, you never have to go back again.”
“Mike,” Mom said between her teeth. “This is something she needs.”
“I’m not going to put her through torture.” He turned back to me. “Your friends are going to be with you the whole time in a group session. We all thought it would be better for you guys that way. Strength in numbers and all that.”
I took a very deep breath. “And I don’t have to come back?”
“Not if you don’t want to.”
Well, what choice did I have?
We all got out, and I was still eating my ice cream, even thought my appetite was gone. I followed behind my parents like the good little girl I didn’t want to be, and wished I’d made different choices. I wished I’d taken Wilson’s hand and ran away with him. I don’t know where. Just not here. I wish I told him I wasn’t scared like he was. That I liked the danger and the fire and the joy he made me feel. I wish I’d kept kissing him last night.
We were on the top floor, and the first things my eyes landed on were my sisters. They were the only people in the room other than a lady behind a desk. My parents went to her, and I went to the girls.