Waiting to Breathe: Book One of the Waiting Duet

by Alyson Reynolds

  He ripped the pillow away and threw it across the room. “Not happening. Are you finally going to admit that you’re more fucked up than you’ve been telling me about this whole Olivia situation?”

  “I’m handling it, Finn.”

  “If by handling it you mean you’re getting blackout drunk, than yeah, you’ve got a good handle on it.”

  “Fuck off.”

  He sat down in my desk chair and tossed a baseball into the air. The continuous thwack of the ball hitting his hand was like having my head slammed into a car door over and over again.

  “You need to leave or I’m going to kill you.”

  “Naw. Are you coming to lunch with us or not?”

  “Or not.”

  Finn slammed the ball down on the desk and I winced again. “Can you fucking leave?”

  “No, I want to make sure you’re okay. You had all of us worried because we’ve never seen you that drunk.”

  “I just needed to get it out of my system.”

  He stared at me for a minute. “Okay. I should probably be the last person to tell you this, but when you’re ready to fuck her out of your system, let me know.”

  The thought alone made me sick to my stomach. I leaned over the side of the bed and threw up everything I had drunk the night before into the trashcan someone had left me. God I was pathetic, pining after a girl that didn’t want me and drinking myself sick. At some point things had to change because I couldn’t keep this up.

  Two weeks later, I was still wallowing in the misery of being away from Nate. At least Cora was talking to me again. It had been a long week of her ignoring me and mumbling under her breath. The only other time we had fought like this was in fourth grade. She’d talked me into going into the coffee shop across campus. It had taken her calling Finn to see where Nate was before I would agree to go. When I found out he had went home for the weekend, I decided it was probably safe to leave our dorm. Caffeine was exactly what I needed.

  Between her and Finn talking to me, I couldn’t stand myself. Neither of them came right out and told me I was being stupid, but I knew they were thinking it. I ran my finger up the seam of the paper cup, lost in my dark thoughts.

  “You know what? Being an adult and talking about your problems is scary.” Cora looked surprised when I spoke out of nowhere. “What if Nate told me that yes, he had been with Lila, several times throughout the semester. I couldn’t take that, Cora. I love him and it would shatter me to hear that he didn’t love me as much as I loved him. After everything Christian did to me, I don’t think I could take it is Nate said he’d done the same damn thing. I know I’m wrong, and I know I should go talk to him, but I can’t fucking make myself.”

  “He loves you and you know that he didn’t actually kiss Lila. Are you ready to hear what actually happened?”

  I ignored her question. “I know he loves me, but how much? Is it as much as I love him? I’ve already been through this once before and I honestly never believed that I would ever trust another man. Nate changed that. He made me trust him, and one split second brought everything crashing down around me.”

  “Nate isn’t Christian and it isn’t fair that you’re comparing him to that asshat. You’ve been happier with Nate than I’ve ever seen you. Your brother loves him, I love him, you love him, he loves you. I’m failing to see why you think he would be capable of cheating on you with some skanky hoe bag like Lila Tate.”

  I ran my fingers over the plastic rim of my coffee cup. “I want to trust him.”

  “You do trust him or we wouldn’t be having this conversation; a conversation you’ve been avoiding for two months, I might add.” She patted my knee. “Just go tell him how you feel.”

  “Okay pot.” I gave her a pointed look and she flushed.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “I’ve watched you with Finn. You two have been more flirty than normal.”

  “You’re being ridiculous. There’s nothing going on there.”

  “Maybe not now,” I drawled.

  “I will cut you, even if you are my best friend.”

  Maybe it was time to let her in on what I had figured out. “So if you don’t have feelings for Finn, what would you think if he had feelings for you?”

  “It wouldn’t matter, but he doesn’t, so let’s drop it.”

  I sighed. “Okay, I’ll drop it. You guys would be bad for each other anyway.”

  “Why do you say that?” Her voice took on an edge that I’d only heard a few times with Cora. “We get along pretty well, even if he does drive me nuts. And we like a lot of the same things.”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe I’m wrong, but I guess it’s a non-issue anyway, right?”

  “Right.” She blinked several times. “So yeah, just go talk to Nate. It’s time.”

  I stared off into the park in front of us. “What if he tells me it’s too late?”

  “I don’t think that’s going to happen, honey. He’s been just as bad as you minus the whole bar fiasco. Well, there was the one party that he sat in the corner hoarding a bottle of whiskey. Finn had to carry him up to his room in a fireman’s hold.”

  I stared at her. “What? Nate never drinks that much.”

  “He missed you.”

  I blinked.

  “He… missed… me.”

  She nodded and took a sip of her coffee. “Just let me know when you’re ready to grow a pair and listen to what actually happened.”

  ____

  Sand crept between my toes as I walked in the surf. There weren’t many people on the beach, but most of them were in wet suits if they braved the water. I loved that the weather was changing. Warmth chasing away the last of the chill of springtime.

  My hair whipped around in the wind, tendrils pulling loose from the ponytail I had put it in before leaving my dorm. After my coffee date with Cora I decided to end my self-imposed exile. I wanted to think, and my favorite place to do that was at the beach. Maybe I would get the clarity that I needed.

  For hours I had walked, thinking and rethinking every decision I had made in the past few years. This wasn’t just Nate and trusting someone again, this was doubting my entire life and every decision I’d ever made. How many mistakes had I made and tried to put a quick fix on?

  My solution had always been to run, but I didn’t want to do that this time. Everything in my life had been built on smoke and mirrors. I wanted to be happy again. Truly happy.

  I knew that had to come from within. There wasn’t a band aid I could use to temporarily make things better. Being with Nate had given me the push I needed to really start healing, but I couldn’t rely on him to fix me.

  The sound of a male clearing his throat from behind me was the last thing I expected to hear.

  “I thought you were in Madison.”

  “I just wanted to get away without anyone following me.”

  He laid the blanket he was carrying out on the cool sand and sat down. Without a word, I sat down next to him. We watched the sunset in silence. A single tear slid down my cheek as the last few beams of light dipped below the horizon.

  I watched as he wrestled with himself about reaching over to comfort me. I was thankful when he decided against it. The resignation in his face told me the second he made his decision. We sat quietly until the sun dipped below the horizon. He stood up slowly, brushing the sand off his pants. I closed my eyes as he leaned down and kissed me on the forehead.

  His footsteps were silent in the cool sand as he walked away. He’d left his blanket, the same one we had used every time we came to the beach. Moving to the center, I wrapped the corners around me. The blanket still smelled like him, a spicy cinnamon scent that made me weak in the knees. Tears pricked at my eyes and it took everything in me not to bawl like a baby. I wanted to kick and scream at the injustice of everything, but it was my fault that we weren’t together.

  Nate deserved better than someone as broken as me.

  I was miserable an
d making everyone around me miserable too. Being with her for just those few hours had set me back to when she had first left. It was hard enough seeing her on campus. Now, I was terrified I was going to see her at the house when she came to see Finn. He told me she wasn’t visiting though and she had been pushing him away. She was probably avoiding him so she didn’t have to hear about me anymore.

  I wanted to be there for her even if it was just staying away, but anger was creeping in. It was eating up my insides each time I thought about how selfish she was being. We all understood she was hurting, but hadn’t I proven that I was better than Christian? All these thoughts were whirling around inside my head until all I could do was go sit at the beach and let the ocean calm me, until the day that I ran into her there. The one place that I could go to get outside of my head was ruined.

  I found a small house on the outskirts of campus and bought it. It was time to grow up and I wanted my own space to do it in. My grandfather was surprised when I called and asked if I could use some money in my trust fund, but he agreed that it would be a good investment and handed over a check.

  Everyone seemed shocked when I told them what I’d done. I guess it was out of the ordinary for someone to buy a house out of the blue, but I didn’t care. Finn helped me move my stuff out of the frat house into my newly purchased Colonial. He whistled when we drove into the driveway.

  “Fuck, Nate. Did you buy a big enough house?”

  “It’s only eighteen hundred square feet. It’ll be a good investment property when I graduate.”

  “And there’s the businessman side we all knew you had in you.”

  “Shut up asshole.” I ran my hand down my face. “I’m thinking of advertising for roommates.”

  He cocked his head at me, “Isn’t it late in the semester?”

  “Yeah, I meant for next year. Right now all I want is to get my head on straight and finish this semester. It’s hard to focus in the frat house and I need to be spending massive amounts of time studying for the MCATs anyway.”

  I unlocked the front door and we walked inside the huge entryway. Finn looked around in amazement.

  “I know you come from money, but it’s impressive that you just bought this thing.”

  I shrugged, unsure what to say. “It’s no big deal,” I mumbled. “Come on, bring those boxes in here. I don’t have much furniture yet, but what I ordered is going to be delivered this afternoon.”

  “If you want a roommate, I volunteer to move in this big ass house with you.”

  “That’s part of the reason I moved out,” I said slowly. We hadn’t really talked about what was going on because talking about our feelings wasn’t our thing. “Olivia’s avoiding you and it’s partly because she’s afraid that she’s going to run into me if she comes to see you.”

  I started digging around in the box in front of me trying to find one of my books I needed for class tomorrow.

  “I wish you would have brought this up before you bought a fucking house. She’s avoiding me because she doesn’t want to admit she’s wrong. Cora hasn’t barely said a word to her in over two weeks. Olivia’s being a bitch and avoiding everyone right now. They were supposed to go to lunch today, but I’m sure I’ll get a text telling me that Olivia bailed.”

  I was only halfway listening to Finn as he was talking. Listening to anything having to do with Olivia was painful. After two months of being cut out of her life, I’d finally accepted that we weren’t going to work things out. She didn’t need me or want me in her life, so it was time for me to choose a different path. Moving out of the house was the first way of me moving on with my life.

  “Shit, I left one my books back at the house.”

  “Let’s go get it and while we’re at it, we can grab some of my stuff so I can be an unwelcome house guest.”

  “Finn, you can move in if you want, but your sister is probably going to come around more when she finds out I’m gone.”

  “I’m telling you, she won’t.”

  I rolled my eyes and grabbed my car keys. We drove back to the house in silence. Finn didn’t want to admit that I was right and I didn’t want to admit I missed his sister more than my next breath. The house was busy when we got back and of course Christian was in the middle of the drama. Bottles littered the floor and the room smelled like stale beer.

  “There he is now,” Christian slurred. “The dumbass that picked Lila Tate over Olivia Crawford.”

  “Christian, I suggest you shut the fuck up” Finn said, crossing his arms over his chest. I pushed past and tried to ignore the taunting.

  “Why don’t you come in here and give us the blow by blow of who’s better in bed.”

  Finn took a step towards him, but I caught his arm. “Don’t do it. He’s trying to get you to start something.”

  “Awe, look at the cute bromance.”

  “What the fuck do you want Christian?” I hissed. “I’ll kick your ass again if you need me to. Was the first broken nose not enough?”

  He had a shit eating grin on his face that I wanted to punch right off of it. “Seriously, Nate. Give up the goods on Lila.”

  “How do you even fucking know her?” I asked suspiciously. Suddenly things started to make a lot more sense. The fog was starting to lift and I realized there was more behind Lila throwing herself at me than I thought.

  “She’s hot. I make it my business to know all the hot girls on campus.”

  “You’re in luck, she’s easy too. You two deserve one another.”

  “You just like my sloppy seconds.”

  “What?” I said with a deadly tinge to my tone. Christian stepped back realizing he’d made a mistake. “I’ll ask you one more time. How do you know Lila Tate?”

  He shrugged. “We hooked up a few times.”

  “Was this before or after she threw herself at me?”

  “What does it matter?”

  I took a step towards him and he relented. “It was before. She’s pretty gullible. You can get her to do anything you want if you just ask.”

  The look in his eye told me he hadn’t meant to say that last part. Finn crossed the room and pinned him up against the wall. The other guys in the room just stared. No one made a move to hold Finn back. “What did you do to my sister you stupid fuck?”

  “It was Lila’s idea,” Christian said, laughing in Finn’s face.

  “What was Lila’s idea?” Finn demanded, slamming his back against the wall when Christian took a second too long to answer.

  “She wanted to make Olivia jealous because she had stolen Nate from her.”

  I rubbed my hand over my face. “So she just happened to know when I went back to my room. Or even which room was mine?” Christian winced and I lunged for him. Finn grabbed at me before I knocked his head back into the brick behind him. “You screwed up my relationship because you wanted her back didn’t you? I’m going to kill you motherfucker,” I roared at him from behind Finn. Christian laughed again, and I tried to push past Finn to get to the asshole. Finn used his shoulder to keep me far enough away that I wouldn’t go to jail because if I touched Christian, there wouldn’t be anything left of him. I finally took a step back and Finn let go of me. He watched wearily as I eyed Christian.

  He pushed past Finn to get away from the wall and I shoved him from behind as went by me. “Too scared to fight me? Afraid I’m going to break your pretty face again?”

  He turned and swung, but I dodged it easily. My right fist connected with his eye and he went down easily. Finn grabbed me from behind so I couldn’t hit him again. Shoving me towards the stairs, he watched as I went to my room. I grabbed my book and stormed back down the stairs.

  “I’ll kill you if you try to fuck with me again, Christian,” I yelled as I left the house. “And leave Olivia the fuck alone. You’ve screwed up her life enough already.”

  I stood outside my truck and stared at the glossy black paint. My eyes were scrunched closed and I was trying not to scream and punch the fucking truck. I shou
ld have known that Christian was behind all of this. He wanted to hurt Olivia any way possible and he knew that playing on her insecurities was the best way to do it.

  “Nate, you need to tell Olivia about this,” Finn said from behind me.

  “What’s the point? She wouldn’t believe me anyway. I can’t even get her to answer the fucking phone, there’s no way she’s going to listen.”

  “Are you just giving up?”

  “Yeah, I’m done. I don’t have any other choice. You have to know when to give up Finn.”

  My phone started ringing from my pocket and I fished it out. I swiped the screen and said, “Riley, right now isn’t—“

  His insistent voice cut me off. My head started pounding as I listened to the nightmare my brother was describing. He was talking fast and some of what he was saying didn’t make sense.

  “Slow down! Is she okay?”

  Finn listened to my side of the conversation, and he understood something was incredibly wrong. I hung up the phone and looked around lost.

  “My mom had a heart attack.” My hands shook and I felt numb. “I have to go home. Like now.”

  “Go.”

  “Shit, the furniture delivery. I need to email my professors. Finals are next week.”

  “I’ll meet the delivery people at the house. Just give me the key and you go. There will be time to email everyone from the hospital. You have your laptop in the truck.”

  Finn took the keys out of my pocket and removed the house key. I took my keys back from him without realizing I was doing it. My mom had just started figuring her shit out. This wasn’t fair that I was losing her again.

  “Are you okay to drive?” I stared at him blankly. “Nate?”

  “Yeah, I’ll be fine.”

  I didn’t sound fine and he knew it. His brow furrowed with concern and he pulled out his phone.

  “Let me just call Cora, she can meet the—”

  “No, I’m fine. Really, it was just the shock of it. Stay here and move shit into the house if you want to. I’ll be okay.”

  “Text me when you get there and let me know what’s going on?”