The Body

by Arabella Abbing

  “I love it,” she said. “What do you think?”

  I tapped my chin thoughtfully before I said, “I think that even though I may not have anything to brag about at the reunion, having you as arm candy is going to help soften the blow.” I added a wink for good measure, laughing when she waved a hand in front of her face and batted her eyelashes.

  “Oh, you sure know how to flatter a girl,” she joked with fake breathlessness. “Okay. Let me change back and we can go.”

  After she got redressed and we made our purchases for the reunion, Stacy led us back into the mall and stopped at the food court. I managed to stifle my groan, but she still sensed it and shook her head.

  “I want a smoothie and you’re going to sit here with me and talk about Adam.”

  “Can’t we do that at home?” I whined.

  “No. You’ll just hide in your room with that damn laptop as soon as we get there. Now sit. I’ll get the smoothies—you watch our stuff.”

  She dropped her bag on a free table and I plopped down in the chair to wait for her return, idly playing with the edge of my own shopping bag until a strawberry banana smoothie was placed in front of me.

  “My treat,” Stacy said as I began to reach for my wallet. “In exchange for some Adam talk, of course.”

  “I don’t know what you expect to hear. It’s not like I’ve ever spoken to him.”

  “Yet whenever you see him mentioned or sit in a class with him—he sticks with you. You obsess, Bri. It’s kind of weird.”

  “All right, fine. Maybe I do.”

  The look on her face softened when she saw how worked up I had already gotten and she quietly said, “Just let it out, girl. Be honest. You won’t get any judgement from me and you know that.”

  “I... I guess I feel jilted—if that makes any sense. I didn’t have a ton of friends in high school, but I swear to you—he slept with every single one of them. Same thing in college.”

  “With the exception of me.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Obviously. It just... It just pisses me off that he never even looked, you know? I mean—what the hell don’t I have? I’m attractive! Aren’t I?”

  “Hell, yeah!” Stacy easily replied. “And don’t you dare let some jackass make you question that. You’re a knockout.”

  “Then why didn’t he look my way? The funniest part is that I’m not entirely convinced that I would have done anything with him. It just irritates me that he didn’t even try.”

  Stacy hummed thoughtfully as she took another sip of her smoothie. “Did you ever try to send him a signal? You’re pretty terrible at flirting—no offense. Maybe he had no idea that you wanted him to make a move.”

  “Well... no. I guess I didn’t.”

  She shrugged. “Maybe that’s all it was. But it doesn’t really explain why he gets under your skin so much.”

  It was my turn to shrug. “Well, I suppose I can admit that I’m interested—was interested—and so it kind of hurt to feel so rejected. But on top of that—he’s just had it so easy, you know? I’ve watched him for eight years. It seems like everything gets handed to him. He was never lax for money, girls, friends, opportunities. Nothing. I’m just... I was so focused on him that I couldn’t help but notice how charmed his life is. And it made me fucking bitter.”

  When I ended my ramble, I finally looked up from the spot of dried ketchup on the table to Stacy’s face. She was frowning, but slowly nodding her head in understanding.

  “But you admittedly don’t know him. Right?”

  “I mean, I guess I don’t really know him. But I have spent the better part of eight years in school with him.”

  “Yeah, watching from a distance,” she pointed out before she seriously said, “Bri, you can’t keep judging this guy and his charmed life if you don’t even know him. Things are hardly ever as pretty on the inside as they appear to be on the outside.”

  I considered her words, but something about them felt... odd. I wasn’t sure if it was because they felt totally false considering what I knew about Adam... or if they rang so true that it made me question everything I thought I knew about him.

  “So you think he’s had it bad or something?” I asked for clarification, wondering if she possibly knew something that I wasn’t privy to. “You think his life has been just as rough everyone else’s?”

  Stacy shrugged again. “I don’t know him any better than you do, girl. But you of all people should know better than to judge a book by its cover.”

  She stunned me silent with her words and I wished that I had opened up to her and had this conversation years ago. Maybe the perspective would have been enough to drive me to talk to him. To find out for myself if my assumptions were correct.

  “Come on. I’ve got one more stop to make and then we can head back home.”

  I swallowed around the lump in my throat and followed her through the mall, trying my hardest to focus on her rambling but finding the task impossible. All I could think about was the possibility that I had been wrong about Adam this whole time.

  But on the flip side, the devil on my shoulder was whispering that I could very well have been right and there was really only one way to find out.

  I needed to get to know him.

  Which meant that I needed to talk to him at the reunion.

  My palms began to sweat and I gripped the shopping bag tighter, hoping that Stacy wouldn’t notice the oncoming panic attack that the thought had induced.

  Chapter Three

  Adam

  I scanned the crowd of people waiting in the airport lobby with a frown. I stepped further out into the open, sweeping over the group multiple times before I accepted the reality of the situation.

  It wasn’t exactly a surprise, but it was disappointing nonetheless.

  I checked my phone—no missed calls—before taking a look at the time. The flight had arrived right on schedule, which meant my mother hadn’t shown to pick me up as promised. I considered calling just to double-check that she hadn’t left late and was currently on the way, but what would be the point? I knew better.

  So I headed to the nearest rent-a-car area and pulled out my credit card and driver’s license. The clerk hesitated when he saw my age, but luckily, the manager on duty recognized me and shooed away the employee to serve me himself. After signing an autograph for his son, I walked out with a set of keys for a silver sedan.

  My phone rang during the drive to the house, but one glance at the name flashing on the screen was all I needed to see. I swiped to ignore it and let out a groan of frustration.

  Fucking Dale.

  I knew what he wanted, but I wasn’t about to deal with his bullshit not even an hour after stepping off the plane. I knew that spending a few weeks in my hometown meant that running into him would be inevitable—but it wasn’t going to be today.

  Not if I could help it.

  Today, I just wanted to see my mom and just get some fucking sleep. It had been quite a while since I felt so completely exhausted and I wanted to be a little more put together for the reunion.

  Which, a reunion after five years? Who did that? I imagined that it would mostly be a parade of ‘Oh, I went to college here,’ which was pretty much exactly where we left off at high school graduation. Bragging about what schools had accepted us and where we were going.

  I ended up declining the bigger schools where I was accepted and quickly discovered that going to college in the same city where I went to high school was both a blessing and a curse. It was sometimes a good thing to know so many people in town, but it also meant that having a fresh start was an impossible task.

  But back when I was making the choice of which school to go to, I had refused to be too far away from my mother in case she needed me. These days, an ocean between us wouldn’t have been enough distance. Which was why I wasn’t the least bit excited about staying with her, even for a short period of time.

  Sammy, my best friend from high school, had been excited about the prospect of
me coming back to town for a while, so he had offered to let me stay with him for as long as I wanted. Spending a few weeks hanging out with old friends and just relaxing sounded like a good way to spend my time off before training camp began, so I accepted without a second thought.

  He later informed me that he would be away for work on the week of the reunion. After I had accepted the invitation and confirmed my attendance with the girl who was putting together the event.

  Which meant that I’d be staying with my mother until Sammy got back. I could have booked a hotel room for the week—and I would have—if word about my arrival hadn’t traveled through the grapevine and gotten back to my mother’s ears in record time. When she called and practically demanded that I save my money and stay in my old room, I couldn’t find a valid reason to refuse.

  To say I was dreading the next week would be an understatement. I was already going through a mental list of people I might see at the reunion who I could crash with for a night.

  Which had sadly been a common occurrence for years now. I’d pick up a girl and find a way to convince her that going back to her place was a better option than mine. The sex was usually good—but the night spent out of the hell that was my home was the best part.

  I pulled up to the house a few minutes later and frowned at the unfamiliar black truck parked in the driveway. I parked the car on the street so I wouldn’t block the truck in and dug the house key out of my pocket as I walked up the sidewalk.

  If I had recognized the truck before I stepped inside—I probably would have turned the car around and gotten right back on that fucking plane.

  As it was, I was already here. Confronted with a situation that was entirely too familiar for my liking.

  “Kyle,” I said with a flat voice, hoping that he wouldn’t take it as a fond greeting. “What the fuck are you doing here?”

  The grin he shot me was missing multiple teeth, but he still somehow managed to make a whistling sound as he sucked in a sharp breath.

  “Hey, boy. Long time,” he acknowledged with a short chuckle. “How’s the big league treatin’ ya? You gotten one of those big checks yet?”

  I stalked over to the couch to loom over him, hardening my voice as I repeated my question. “What are you doing here?”

  He sniffed and subtly rubbed his nose before he began shaking his head back and forth while rolling his eyes, like it pained him that I was too stupid to already know the answer.

  “What do you think I’m doing here? I’m visiting your momma since you’re apparently too good to do it anymore. Someone’s got to keep such a nice lady company.”

  With a low growl, I bent down and gripped the front of his shirt with both hands and hauled him to his feet. I practically carried him to the door, ignoring his indignant cries of protest as I pushed him out onto the porch. If I wasn’t so pissed off, I might have laughed at the way he stumbled back and fell down the steps.

  “You little shit!” he shouted as he pushed himself back to his feet and dusted off his filthy pants. “Don’t make me call the law on you, boy! Dale won’t be happy!”

  “Dale won’t be happy to know that you were here,” I fired back. “Stay the fuck away from my mom.”

  With that, I stepped back inside and slammed the door shut. I watched him leave through the peephole—making damn sure that the asshole didn’t key the rental car or some stupid shit before he left.

  Once his truck was tearing down the road and I was sure the rental was safe and untouched, I spun around and slowly walked to my mom’s bedroom. She hadn’t been in the living room with Kyle, which could only mean that he had shown up early and she was already passed out.

  “Mom?” I said quietly as I pushed the cracked door open and laid eyes on her curled up form. I moved closer to the bed, sighing with relief when I saw her chest moving.

  Most people hugged their parents when they first saw them after a long absence.

  I had to make sure mine was still breathing first.

  “Mom.”

  “Hmm?” she mumbled, turning over and cracking open an eye. “Oh. You’re home.”

  “No thanks to you,” I mumbled, sitting down on the edge of the bed after she rolled over to make room for me. “I kicked Kyle out.”

  “That’s good,” she drawled, the scent of alcohol on her breath strong enough to smell even from where I was sitting. “He’s such a prick.”

  “Maybe you should stop having him over then.”

  Mom hummed thoughtfully for a moment before looking up at me with sad eyes. “I was supposed to pick you up.”

  “You were.”

  “I forgot.”

  “I can see that.”

  The silence that followed stretched on for a long while. I knew what I wanted to say, but had no idea where to even begin. As the adrenaline of seeing Kyle in my house wore off, the exhaustion I felt in the car returned tenfold.

  I was too tired to have an argument with her at the moment, so I simply turned away to stare at her bedroom wall as I quietly said, “I thought you were done with this shit.”

  The warm palm on my back did nothing to ease the myriad emotions I felt. Guilt, anger, disappointment. If anything, the motherly pat she gave me only amplified them.

  “So did I.”

  “So, what’s new? Got a special girl in your life?”

  After our brief moment in her bedroom, I opted to retreat to my old room and take a nap while she slept off whatever it was she had taken. I was silently praying that she had only been drunk, but I knew that if Kyle was present, that was highly unlikely.

  Now, hours later, I was staring at the coffee pot as it brewed and she just breezed into the room like an entirely different person and began to ask questions about my life like she was a real mother.

  “Are you serious?” I asked incredulously, glancing over my shoulder to raise an eyebrow in her direction. “You’re really going to do this?”

  Mom’s smile faltered. “Do what?”

  “Act like I didn’t come home to find you high and drunk off your ass when you were supposed to be picking me up at the airport,” I heatedly accused. “You told me you were sober.”

  There was a brief flash of guilt, but it disappeared as she shrugged and said, “Things change, Adam. I was sober the last time we talked.”

  “Sober at the time or sober altogether?!” I shouted, closing my eyes when she winced. But her guilt-ridden expression and lack of verbal response was the only answer I needed. “For fuck’s sake, mom. Does Dale know?”

  Her eyes hardened. “Dale isn’t welcome here.”

  “That’s not what I asked.”

  We stood in a stalemate for a long moment, but when I folded my arms across my chest as a sign that I wasn’t going to back down, she sighed and broke.

  “Not that I know of, no,” she admitted with a sigh. “But I’m doing better, Adam. Better than I was a few months ago. Can we just drop it for now? Can you just let me be happy to see you for a little while?”

  I knew that even if I declined her request, I wasn’t going to get very far. The missed call on my phone from Dale was nagging at me, but I decided not to mention it. If she wanted to just enjoy feeling like a mother for a little while, I supposed I could give that to her.

  Especially considering I was already thinking of ways to avoid being in this house as much as I possibly could.

  She could have today.

  “Fine. We’ll drop it. For now,” I pointedly added.

  “Thank you. So are you excited about tomorrow?”

  I let out a humorless laugh. “Honestly, I’d already forgotten about it.”

  Mom frowned. “But that’s why you’re here! You aren’t the least bit excited to see some of your old classmates? You’re on the road so much now that I imagine you don’t see them very often.”

  Couldn’t argue with her there.

  “Yeah, I guess I’m a little excited,” I said, turning away to pour myself a cup of coffee. “Even though it’s probabl
y just going to be a glorified ‘who’s-got-the-biggest-dick’ contest.”

  Mom snorted at my choice of phrasing and stepped up beside me to fix her own cup of coffee. I held my breath when the scent of her hit my nostrils, wondering how long it’d been since she last showered.

  “I think all the kids you went to high school know that you won that contest,” she dryly stated.

  I wasn’t entirely sure if she was referring to my job or making a smart remark about my promiscuity, but knowing her, I figured it was probably a little of both.

  “Then I guess I have nothing to worry about,” I said, subtly taking a few steps away from her to clear my nose. “How’s the money situation around here?”

  She glanced over at me for a brief moment and shook her head. “Don’t, Adam. Just leave it alone.”

  “Mom, I make a lot of money. I can—”

  “Keep it in the bank because I don’t want a damn dime of it,” she said for the millionth time, a hard edge attached to her tone that told me not to argue. “You worked hard for that money. I don’t want you spending it on me.”

  I couldn’t stop myself from accusingly stating, “You mean you don’t want the temptation of spending your son’s hard-earned money on drugs.”

  She went quiet, the only sound in the room the clinking of her spoon against the coffee mug as she slowly stirred in the sugar. I waited patiently for whatever retort she was going to come back at me with, but she only turned to me with a tight, detached smile.

  “You should go have a drive around. They changed some of the roads since you were here last.”

  I frowned, drawing my brows together as she took her mug and headed into the living room.

  “Mom, I’m sorry. I—”

  “It’s okay, honey,” she stated in that weird, out-of-body tone. “It’s not like you’re wrong.”

  After she admitted to my assumption being correct, she flipped the television on and totally shut down. I could tell just by looking at her that anything I would say at this point would fall on deaf ears, so I shook my head and went to my room to grab the keys to the rental.