As soon as she rounded the corner and stepped into the den, she realized Noah wasn’t alone. “Oh, sorry. I just…” She was getting used to all the different girls. There were even several girls that he used on a regular basis. Emery had learned quickly when she needed her earbuds.
Noah’s face brightened when he saw Emery. “Em, this is Vanessa. Vanessa is my tutor, because I’m not as smart as I should be.”
Vanessa was petite and pretty, perfect for Noah, with long reddish-brown hair. It was beautiful and it made Emery ache for her real hair, her long hair. She’d finally gotten it cut and recolored a deep brown. It made her feel like Emily but the length had taken a lot of getting used to. She’d also bought a ton of new clothes after Rachel delivered the first ten grand from Phil.
Emery walked up to her and shook her hand. “Hi.”
“Hi,” Vanessa said and looked at Noah with such longing it broke Emery’s heart. He didn’t seem to want to be with any one person, but with whomever could keep his bed warm at night. One seemed as good as any other.
“Noah, I’m going to head back to my room, but I just wanted to make sure everything went okay.”
He nodded and pulled the pitcher of tea out of the fridge. “We’ll talk later.”
“Okay. It was so nice to meet you, Vanessa. I’m assuming you’ll be around a good bit this year with all of Noah’s economics classes.”
“We’ll see,” Vanessa said, her eyes widening in surprise that Emery knew Noah’s schedule. “It was nice to meet you too…Em?”
“Oh, it’s Emily, sorry.” Noah walked their glasses over to the table next to the kitchen and let his backpack drop off his shoulder. Then he looked up to give Emery another bright smile.
Emery went into her room and put her earbuds in, grabbing her book and sinking into the world of a girl who loved hard and enjoyed sex. She’d been reading a good bit of really messed up stories, but she’d stumbled into a couple that ended up with a happy ending. She’d found she sort of dug that; it gave her solace that maybe things would be okay. That she’d be okay.
Lost in the world of hunger, sex, and despair, she felt the bed depress behind her. Her heart flew out of her throat and she couldn’t control her scream as she jumped from the bed.
Noah sprang from the bed and stood there, stunned at her reaction.
Emery’s earbuds fell out during the display of terror. They stood staring at each other, each one’s chest heaving as if they’d run a marathon.
Noah broke the tension first. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. I called your name a bunch…”
“No, I’m sorry. I didn’t hear you and my earbuds were in and I was lost in…” Emery raised her hand to her chest to try to calm her racing heart. “I don’t know.”
“Are you okay?” Noah asked, sitting on the edge of the bed.
“I guess. You just scared me.” Emery lowered herself to the bed, but very far from Noah. “Sorry.”
He put his palm over her right hand, which was pressed into the bed. Emery pulled it quickly out from under his and ran into the bathroom. She shut the bathroom door after her and locked it. His touch scared her, even though she was sure Emily wouldn’t have done that. She couldn’t help it. Emery slid down the door and wrapped her arms around her knees.
CHAPTER TEN
Don’t Break Anything
Emery, Rachel, and Noah were sitting at Jack’s, a BBQ restaurant on Music Row in downtown Nashville. It was a Sunday and they’d been relaxing all day since Noah was tired from his game the day before. It was October and Rachel was on her fall break from school; she planned to spend all week with Emery.
“So Noah, you never told me what happened with the scout?” Rachel asked, her mouth full.
“It went fine. They want me to do the combine this year. I just think it’s too early.” Noah leaned back in his seat and crossed his arms.
“They want you to leave school?”
“I mean, it was just one person’s opinion. My dad and I talked and I’m going to stay in college. I’m actually thinking I’ll play the fifth season they allow.”
Emery didn’t realize he’d decided he wanted to stay longer.
“Hmm,” Rachel murmured. “My cousin the NFL star.”
“No, I’m pretty sure it would be your cousin the sideline performer for the NFL.”
“Well that’s still pretty awesome, right?” Rachel looked from Emery to Noah.
Emery shrugged. She thought it was great, but Noah was competitive and didn’t want to be in a league where he wasn’t the best. He didn’t think he’d do well.
Noah excused himself to the bathroom and Rachel glared at her.
“What?” Emery asked.
Rachel had just gotten in with another ten grand from Phil. “What did you do to Noah?”
“What do you mean?” Emery thought Rachel was talking about the NFL conversation. She was baffled.
“He’s devastated that he scared you. What happened?”
Emery shook her head and stared at her Coke. “I just freaked out a little bit a few weeks ago. He’s been walking around me like I’m going to break since then.”
“Are you?” Rachel asked, picking at her ribs.
“What?” Emery looked to where Noah disappeared.
“Are you going to break?”
Emery snapped her eyes to Rachel. “No, Rach. I’m not going to break. He just did something that triggered memories for me.” Her voice was harsh. If she was going to break, she would have done it by now.
“You can’t break, you know. I won’t allow it.” Rachel pointed at Emery with her rib.
“Oh,” Emery giggled in spite of her annoyance, “you won’t allow it?”
“Nope. We’re going through this. Me and you.” She moved the rib bone in Emery’s direction to emphasize her point.
“I know. Me and you,” Emery repeated. “Hey, have you talked to Ashley recently?”
“Yes.” Rachel straightened up in her seat and pulled out a note. “She told me to give this to you.”
Emery took the note from Rachel’s hand. “She just gave this to you?”
“Well, no…” Rachel looked around to see if Noah was headed back yet. “I gave her the bracelet you told me to and told her that I knew where you were, but that she had to keep it a secret. She asked me what your middle name was… She’s smart, by the way.” Rachel reached in her purse carefully due to the fact that she still had barbeque sauce all over her hands. She brought out Emery’s bracelet, the pink and teal one that Ashley had made for her.
Emery took it from her and put it on her wrist, fighting to keep the tears at bay. Then she leaned in closer to Rachel, absorbing everything about her sister.
“After a few minutes of talking, she wrote that for you in her notebook,” Rachel finished. “What’s it say?”
“What, you didn’t read it?”
“Of course not!” Rachel exclaimed, scandalized. “It’s for you.”
Emery looked down at the paper and tears threatened to form just seeing her sister’s words.
“What’s it say?” Rachel asked again.
“She says she hopes I’m happy and that she loves me.”
“Ugh, she’s amazing,” Rachel said before ripping more meat from her rib.
“I bet you pick up a lot of men that way, Rach.” Noah laughed as he sat back down. His leg grazed Emery’s and she fought everything in her being not to move her leg from his.
Emily Sanders wouldn’t move her leg, so she didn’t move her leg, even though his leg hair tickled and he looked at her with an expression she didn’t understand.
Saturday night, she and Rachel sat in the stands at the very top of one of the end zones. Emery squinted against the retreating sun. There wasn’t a cloud in the azure sky. She shielded her eyes, trying to see Noah on the field. The sun was just dropping and it was directly in their line of sight; they could hardly see anything.
“I wish I would’ve worn my sunglasses,” Emery w
hined.
A hiccup escaped Rachel’s lips and Emery burst out laughing.
“It’s not funny, bitch,” Rachel slurred. She’d been drinking at the tailgate with some of Noah’s friends all morning.
“It really is.” Emery laughed again. She was the designated driver until after the football game, but part of her was regretting the decision to be responsible.
Rachel reared back and punched Emery in the shoulder, making her drop all of her popcorn on the person in front of them.
“Oh shit,” Rachel murmured.
“I’m so sorry,” Emery quickly apologized.
“It’s okay,” a guy in a University of Georgia shirt said once he looked at Emery and Rachel. “It happens.”
“I mean, it’s only popcorn, Emery,” Rachel said in a voice that was not her own.
Emery’s eyes widened at Rachel’s slip.
Rachel leaned against Emery’s shoulder and talked to the guy in front of them. “You know how I can apologize? You,” she pointed her finger at him, “are invited to the after party at my cousin’s house. He’s the quarterback. You should come.”
“Rachel…” Emery warned.
“No, it’s cool,” Rachel brushed her off. “Come by and I’ll make it up to you.”
“Where’s your cousin’s place?” the guy in front of them asked politely.
“Just off campus, in Hillsboro. The Village.”
Emery pulled Rachel from their seats and smiled at the guys in front of her. “Rachel, I can’t believe you did that.”
“What? Why are we leaving the game?” Rachel asked, moving slowly down the bleachers.
“We’re leaving because you invited those people you don’t even know back to Noah’s!” Emery led Rachel down and around to where they could exit the stadium closest to where she’d parked.
“Noah’s cool, he won’t care.”
“Rachel.” Emery stopped walking and looked at her friend. “I care.”
Realization spread through Rachel’s eyes and she nodded. “Oh…I’m sorry. I didn’t think.”
“No, you didn’t.” Emery started walking. “And if we stay here, you’ll invite every idiot in the stands.”
“I’m drunk. They probably won’t show up anyway,” Rachel said as she followed.
“And you called me Emery,” she whispered.
Rachel stopped. “Really?”
Emery kept walking until she saw Rachel’s car, then finally turned around. “Come on!” she yelled at Rachel, who still hadn’t moved.
Emery was uncomfortable with all the people at Noah’s place, but she couldn’t really say anything. It was past midnight and she was finally buzzed, thanks to the sweet tea vodka they’d purchased with the fake ID Derrick had given Rachel.
She’d locked her door. Noah didn’t seem to mind if people were in his room, especially different girls, but she didn’t want anyone besides Rachel in hers. Emery was locking her door after she and Rachel had smoked a joint in her room, when she stepped back into him. Noah. She leaned into his chest. “Sorry,” she giggled.
“I like that you’ve stopped jumping away from me, Emily,” Noah said.
Emery smiled over her shoulder at him as she followed a stumbling Rachel to the kitchen for a refill.
“We’re looking for Rachel and Emery!” a loud voice boomed from the open door of the condo.
Both Rachel and Emery’s eyes snapped to the voice, thinking the worst. What they saw sent Emery into hysterics. She leaned over and put her hands on her knees.
Rachel stomped across the room and stood in front of the guy they’d dropped popcorn all over. The guy she’d told to meet them. “Well, it took you long enough,” she teased.
“Well, baby, you didn’t give us a lot to go on.” The guy was wearing red chinos with a black Georgia polo and garnering dirty looks from all the football players.
“Us?” Rachel asked.
“Yeah, us.” The guy pointed to about ten other guys standing behind him, waiting to get inside.
“Oh shit,” Rachel muttered.
“Hi, I’m Emily, we met at the game.” Emery stood next to Rachel and tried to take control of the situation, since she was more sober. Not that that wasn’t saying much.
Rachel sagged against Emery. “Sorry I said the wrong name,” she whispered into Emery’s ear.
“You’re fine.” Emery smiled. “Why don’t you go get some drinks for our friends?” She let the guys into the condo and tried to keep things light, but Vandy football players didn’t appreciate a loss or people from the other team at their party.
Noah appeared and took Emery’s hand gently, like she would break. “I need to talk to you,” he said, looking at the guys.
“Noah, these are some guys that we met at the game. Rachel invited them back for a drink,” Emery said evenly, trying to play it off as nothing. She was hoping they would leave, and soon.
“Yeah, well they need to leave!” called a player from behind her in the den.
“It’s not like we like to hang out with losers,” Popcorn Guy said in response. “But Rachel here said she’d make it up to me tonight and I was intrigued.”
“Oh shhure,” Rachel slurred. “Let’s go outside and I’ll give you sssomething to apologize for what shappened earlier.”
“Everyone calm down,” Emery announced, feeling like she was in some sort of bizarre standoff. “These guys are going to have a drink and accept our apology and I’ll walk them to their cars. No harm, no foul.”
Noah took a step closer, his foot stepping in front of her and his back nudging her behind him making it clear that he would handle it.
“Noah, it’s fine,” she whispered and because she was high, she stumbled. Before she caught herself, her lips grazed his ear as he turned to help her and his eyes flew to hers.
“Emily, right?” Popcorn Guy interrupted what would’ve been a very awkward moment with her roommate.
She tore her eyes from Noah and looked at him.
“So look, are you going to come out with us or is your friend?”
Emery was finally upright on her feet. “Excuse me?”
“Does your apology entail your lips or hers around my dick?”
Before Emery could blink in response, Noah’s fist flew into the guy’s face. There was a cracking sound and blood burst from the guy’s nose. Football players began pushing to be a part of the fight and started forcing all the intruders out the front door. Emery lost Noah in the melee, but Rachel grabbed Emery’s hand and they pushed out the door with everyone else.
“Rachel, I can’t have the police here,” she whispered.
“Oh fuck,” Rachel moaned. “I’m just full of good decisions tonight.” She straightened up, sobering quickly, and walked right into the middle of two really big men. “I need everyone who wants to get arrested tonight to raise their hand!” she yelled.
This got a ton of the guys’ attention.
“Nobody?” Rachel pulled out her phone and started taking a video of the crowd. “Then we’ll just need you fine gentlemen that requested blow jobs in exchange for some spilled popcorn to be getting the fuck out of here.”
Everyone was frozen, thinking over her words.
“No one’s moving yet,” she pointed out, “but I’ll call the cops in thirty seconds if you guys don’t move your asses.”
This got the Georgia guys moving toward the parking lot, still talking shit and calling Rachel a cock tease.
“I’m usually not a tease!” she yelled. “I just don’t like the exchange rate.”
She came back to Emery and slung her arm over her shoulders. Together, they walked inside to finish their sweet tea vodka.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
A First of Many
Emery couldn’t remember ever being so happy in her own detached bubble. In the year that had passed since she’d left Atlanta, she’d created a world that was solitary in most ways, but she wanted it that way. She was hiding, after all.
She’d gotten her grad
uation equivalency degree and had started attending online college courses. Her days were full of studying and her nights were full of reading, Noah, and his antics. Nothing had changed in the way of the revolving door of girls that he had in his bed, though there had been a few nights where his friends hadn’t filled the den and they’d watched movies together from their respective La-Z-Boys. He taught her how to play Grand Theft Auto. She sucked at it, but she liked hearing him laugh at her attempts to play.
Some days her face hurt from smiling so much. Other days the silence threatened to drown her.
Rachel put on music and started shaking her hips to the beat, her long tresses covering her face with each shimmy. Her tank top, which read For Fox Sake, rose and exposed a perfectly flat stomach. She lit up her joint to the beat of the song and thrust her arm in the air, shaking her hips around and dancing over to where Emery was moving to the beat on the couch.
“Happy seventeenth and nineteenth birthday to my best friend in the entire world!” Rachel yelled in a mock cheerleader voice as she handed the joint over to Emery.
“Thanks,” Emery said, taking the joint between her lips and pulling in the sweet smoke. She still felt lost, confused, and relieved, but she wasn’t numb anymore. Emily Sanders had been feeling everything she could since she left Atlanta. Sometimes she was overwhelmed with the emotions, even if it was just being comfortable.
“So everything is set up with the Facebook page, right?” Rachel asked.
“Yes. Romona Hicks is our lifeline if I have to run,” Emery recited.
“If anything happens, just leave and we’ll use that to communicate a meeting or to set up what you need,” Rachel confirmed.
Emery was pretty sure she would die without Rachel, especially if she didn’t see her on a regular basis. Rachel religiously came to see her in Nashville once a month, but Emery wished her visits were more frequent. Rachel’s dad thought she wanted to hang with her cousin. He was just happy she wasn’t getting arrested.
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