Healed

by Rebecca Brooke

  “Is your dad still giving you a hard time about wanting to move in with Andrew for senior year?”

  She knew exactly what the problem was. We’d been through it before. The first semester of sophomore year I’d wanted to move off campus, but my father was having none of it. His belief was that campus was there for a reason, and as a student, I should take any advantage of any amenities offered by the school. But not living with Andrew was starting to get annoying.

  “Yeah.” I let out a sigh. “He’s worried that my grades will drop because I’m spending all of my time with Andrew.”

  Looking around the room, I realized that everyone but Morgan already lived on their own. Some had the help of their parents for some things, but my parents still paid for everything, and while that was partly my fault for letting them, it didn’t make me feel any better that they did that for me—or the fact that they got to choose whether or not I lived on campus.

  Looking down at my hands, I confessed my fear to my friends. “He makes it so hard. He’s my dad and technically they’re paying for all of this, so I kind of feel bad going against his wishes. On the other hand, I think of how much more studying I could get done if I didn’t have to travel between two different places.

  “Oh, sweetie,” Angie said as she came over and sat next to me. ”Why don’t you just talk to him? That was two years ago. Now you’re engaged to be married. It’s not like you want to move in with some random person.”

  “I know, I know. Mom pulled me aside at brunch this morning and suggested the same thing.”

  “Em,” Andrew said in a soft voice. “You don’t have to move in with me now if it’s going to be a hassle, but if your mom’s right, I would love you to live with me all of senior year.”

  My head snapped up to look at him. “You think I should? For the last few months you told me that we’d figure it out when school was done. You said there was no sense in upsetting my dad. What changed your mind?

  He shrugged his shoulders, but his eyes never left mine. “What you just said about your conversation with your mom, because she said the same thing to me this morning.”

  “Maybe I will try talking to my dad again.”

  Andrew wrapped his arm around me and squeezed. “That’s my girl.”

  “Now I’m excited.”

  “Why?” Andrew’s brow furrowed.

  “I thought we wouldn’t live together until we got married.”

  He wiggled his eyebrows and I smiled as he said, “I like this plan better.”

  “Here’s another question . . . where will we live?”

  “Umm . . . here?”

  “I thought we’d find a place of our own.”

  “We could, but since we haven’t seen anything we’ve liked, I think this is the next best option.”

  “Well, you live with Nick. I thought the soonest we might actually live together would be after graduation, not before. So I never really thought of the where aspect and worried that much about the apartments we did look at.”

  “So you don’t want to move in with me?” Even though he was trying to hide it, I could see the hurt in his eyes.

  “No, that’s not what I’m saying. I want to move in with you, but what about Nick?”

  “Nick and I already talked about it. If you don’t mind him staying, we can do what Caleb, Angie, and Josh do. If not, he agreed to find another place to live.”

  The last thing I wanted was for Nick to be forced to take me on as a roommate. Well, at least until the wedding—then he was on his own.

  I turned to Nick. “Is that true?”

  He looked at me, excitement in his eyes. “Absolutely. You guys are practically living together already, but if you want me to go, I will. There are always places to stay.” He gave me a quick wink that let me know there would be no hard feelings either way.

  “And if I said I didn’t want you to leave, would you mind living with the two of us?”

  “No, Em, I wouldn’t mind at all—especially since you can keep this asshole in line and off my back.” He laughed, gesturing toward Andrew with a flip of his middle finger.

  “No, I don’t want you to leave,” I said to Nick, and then turned my attention back to Andrew. “And, yes, I would love to move in with you.”

  Andrew pulled me closer to him and whispered, “Think of all the fun we can have when you’re in my bed every night.”

  Other girls might have giggled at that statement, but for me it just sent heat racing along my nerves, making me want to take Andrew back to what was now our room and have my way with him.

  “And now we’ll be able to spend our nights together, even when I have to be at the office all day for my internship.”

  There was the relief. My chest felt a little lighter. I didn’t want Nick to feel like we were kicking him out of the apartment because that definitely was not the case.

  But all of this was dependent upon my conversation with my dad. Even though I was an adult, I still felt like I owed him since he was paying for school. Either way, I was going to try and talk to him later.

  From there on out, the night was pretty calm. We finished eating and ended up watching Transformers—the boys’ pick, not mine. I’d never tell them that Angie and I actually loved that movie. It didn’t matter that the lead guy wasn’t hot, the soldier in charge most definitely was.

  Morgan and Nick didn’t say a whole lot throughout the night. Instead, they kind of kept to themselves, giving each other eyes every so often. Knowing Nick, they’d probably already slept together, but for some reason there was something different about the way he treated her.

  Whatever. That was a problem for another day.

  Once everyone left, Andrew and I cleaned up the trash. Nick had taken Morgan home and without Lauren there, we were pretty confident that he planned on spending the night. Andrew took the bottles down to the recycling bin at the end of the stairs and while he was doing that, I went down to our room to get ready for bed.

  It was weird to think of it as our room, but I guess that’s what it was now. From here on out, I would fall asleep and wake up every day next to Andrew. There was something so right about that. It also gave me the opportunity to worry less about where I was staying for the night, and what I would need to bring with me. If Dad was okay with it, I’d be able to get much more work done, something I was going to need to do during my senior year.

  Even though I’d had such a long nap earlier, I was still tired from all the sleepless nights. Grabbing a brush, I pulled it through my hair. Looking in the mirror, I realized how long it had gotten. It was more than halfway down my back and the color of dark chocolate. I needed to get a trim soon or before I knew it, it would be past my ass.

  There was a tank top and a pair of shorts, I’d left at the end of the bed earlier, that I threw on and climbed under the covers. Curling up so that my knees were pulled up a bit closer to my chest, I leaned into Andrew’s pillow, taking in the smell of the cologne that covered it. The scent of his pillow was always so comforting to me—a reminder that he wasn’t too far away. There had been a lot of nights when he was up studying that I’d buried my face in his pillow to go to sleep. He always accused me of being a bed hog. Not that I wasn’t, but had he been in bed with me I would have covered myself with him, instead of his pillow.

  “Hogging the bed again I see,” came a voice from the doorway. I opened my eyes a crack.

  “Nope, just waiting for you to come to bed so I could snuggle with you.”

  “Well we can’t leave you waiting too long.” I closed my eyes again but heard his clothes as they hit the floor in his rush to get down to just his boxers.

  First it was his shoes. They made a clunking sound as the dropped near the end of the bed. Next came his clothes. They sailed over my head on their way to end up in the laundry basket. Finally, he crawled into bed next to me and when he’d gotten comfortable on his back, I lay my head against his chest and he wrapped his arm around me. The gesture was warm and comfortin
g. His hand slid up to my hair, where he played with it. I let myself just lie there, enjoying the calm and the quiet.

  “I’m so happy you agreed to move in with me,” he said, so quietly I almost didn’t hear it.

  “Me too. And I’m glad Nick’s okay with it. I’m not sure I would’ve said yes if he wasn’t.”

  “He would have survived.”

  “Except he’s your best friend. Whether you guys like admitting it or not.” Usually the two fools spent more time busting each other’s balls than talking, except when it was just them. They were really close, almost like brothers. It was one of the things I got to see when I spent time with them here in the apartment. When they had an audience, especially Caleb and Josh, they acted like complete idiots.

  “Yeah, he is. I would have told him first, but he can’t keep a secret to save his life. He’s probably worse than you.”

  “Hey!” I said, slapping him lightly on the chest. “I’m not that bad.”

  “Oh yes, you are.”

  Rolling my eyes, I giggled. He was right, though. I was horrible at keeping secrets, but only the good ones. Anything personal that someone didn’t want everyone to know, I was great at those. It was just, when I got excited, I found it harder to keep my mouth shut. Nick couldn’t keep any secret, making him worse.

  “All right, all right. At least there is someone worse than me.”

  The quiet returned for a few more minutes, when Andrew spoke up again.

  “When do you want to move your stuff?”

  Hmm. That was something I had to think about. I still had to explain to my parents that I was going to move off campus. Once they found out I was moving in with Andrew, I knew they were going to offer me the money they would save on room and board for rent. Mom had mentioned it when she told me to talk to Dad again. This was something I had to do on my own, though. It would be comforting to know that I could go to them if needed, but I’d never learn if I kept relying on Mom and Dad.

  “I don’t know. Maybe we can pack throughout the week and move everything this weekend?”

  We were only about halfway through the spring semester. I knew Heather and Jillian, my roommates, wouldn’t mind if I moved out, especially if they could keep the three bedroom apartment without getting anyone else to move in.

  “We can do that.” He placed a kiss on my forehead. “Now get some sleep. You definitely haven’t been getting enough lately.”

  Snuggling into his embrace, I agreed and closed my eyes. He was right. I hadn’t had enough sleep lately and it would be nice to catch-up. My eyelids were heavy and it wasn’t long before I felt myself falling under, Andrew still stroking my hair.

  Eight months later . . .

  Andrew

  EMILY MOVED IN THE weekend after I asked her. After a long conversation with her dad, and promises that she’d keep her grades up, he’d given her his blessing to move in with me. I had been concerned that living with Nick might cause some problems, but the two of them got along great. They always had, but you never know when people are actually living under the same roof. Nick and I did get in trouble when we left a mess, though.

  Emily was an absolute neat freak—and I mean a make-your-bed-every-morning kind of a neat freak. The few times we’d left our football equipment out, or dishes in the sink, we got to see her famous temper. The apartment was normally pretty clean, but sometimes when we finished football practice we were too tired to put everything away. We usually did it the next day, but Emily wanted no part of that, and we learned very quickly to clean up after ourselves the minute we got home!

  I could have gotten pissed, or given her a hard time about it, except it just didn’t seem worth it. This was who she was, and we were going to have a lifetime of living together. Like her dad had told me, it was better to pick my battles than to fight them all. That one just didn’t seem all that important.

  The other bonus was that when we did keep everything clean, she was more likely to cook for us. Emily was an amazing cook, but said she hadn’t cooked much on campus, saying it was hard to cook for only one person, and much easier to walk down to the food court and get something.

  So far, she’d done really well with living off campus and staying here all through the summer. She’d decided to take a job over the summer, and convinced her parents to let her pay for things herself. It was a good experience for her, and we still got to spend a ton of our off time together.

  In my opinion, a lot of it had been in her head. She was worried about the unknown, and didn’t realize how much she already did while living on campus. Either way, I was happy that she’d calmed down and reduced her stress levels. She was sleeping much better, although, I still wasn’t sure if that was the lack of stress or the new sleeping arrangements, spending every night cuddled up with me. I knew I slept better when she was there. It felt like a sense of security and peace. When that first semester of our senior year had started, time became a little more strapped, especially since our fields were so different. Our classes were scheduled at all different times—not to mention practices and games. As much as I loved football, it was hard to get everything done.

  We’d finally reached the break between semesters, something we both needed more than anything. Emily had been going crazy, working on all of the research for her thesis, and there were many nights when she was at the library until it, collecting all of the materials she would need for when it came time to write the paper.

  And that didn’t even include all of the work she had to do with her other classes. Every night I stayed up and waited for her, making sure she ate at some point. Emily had a bad habit of forgetting to eat when she got absorbed in whatever she was doing. There were many days when I’d drop something off to her when I was leaving campus for the afternoon. It was my job to take care of her and that was what I was going to do.

  For the most part my classes hadn’t been too bad. They were mostly about preparing us for our internship that would start in the New Year, long before the semester actually started for everyone else. Excited wasn’t even close to describing my feelings about the placement I’d been given. It was with one of the best engineering firms in the area. Caleb, also an engineering major, got a different firm, but still a terrific one.

  Last week, I’d gone down to the office to meet with the partners. When I walked in and saw the walls surrounding me decorated with pictures of all the projects they’d completed it was a bit intimidating, to the point where I trembled as I went to shake the partners’ hands. However, after a long talk with them, I felt much more confident in my abilities, and there was a lightness in my chest as I left the office. With only that meeting as a guide, I decided that was the place I wanted to work when I graduated. Although, the pressure to do well so they would consider hiring me at the end was pretty high, I had an entire semester to prove myself.

  Thankfully winter break was here, and I’d have at least two good weeks to spend with Emily without the pressures of school. Unfortunately, that didn’t excuse me from Christmas shopping. I still had to get some things for my family for the holidays.

  Who was I kidding? I had to do all of my shopping, so we decided to head out to the mall—one of my least favorite places, especially at Christmas time—and then meet up with Caleb and Angie for dinner. Nick had left for his parents’ house the night before, claiming that he needed a break from school. My only guess was that the something he needed a break from wasn’t school, but from Morgan—Lauren’s best friend and roommate. Who the hell knew what was going on between those two? I had no desire to get in the middle of it.

  Emily’s tap on my arm snapped me out of my thoughts.

  “I think we should get this one for Jess,” she said, holding up a light-pink sweater.

  It looked good to me, then again, so did everything in the store. I was terrible at shopping and usually just gave gift cards to everyone, but Emily was having none of that. In her mind, everyone deserved to open something on Christmas morning. Arguing with Emily wa
sn’t the best idea, but I tried to convince her that they’d have other stuff to open that day, but that only got me into the doghouse. The look on her face that day had me reluctantly agreeing—but only if she came to help me pick everything out. It helped that I’d already gotten her present and had it in our room, wrapped and waiting for Christmas morning.

  “Sure,” I said with a shrug.

  “Don’t ‘sure’ me. Do you like it or not?” The hands on her hips didn’t bode well for me, except she was sexy as hell when she did it. The one thing about Emily and her temper was that most of the time I could diffuse it.

  Taking a step closer to her, I bent down as if to whisper in her ear, the sounds of her breathing picking up pace letting me know I was getting to her. Slowly, I let my tongue slide across the outside of her ear. Her skin was so soft and smooth. If we hadn’t been in a crowded mall I’d have ravage those gorgeous lips of hers. When a soft moan left her lips I knew I’d succeeded, but that didn’t stop me from placing a kiss behind her ear before pulling away to gaze into her eyes.

  “I think that it’s a nice sweater, and if you like it and think we should get it then I’m going to trust your judgment.”

  Her chest was still rising and falling as she tried to get her body under control. “Okay.”

  After a few deep breaths, the smile returned to her face and she bumped her shoulder into my side. “You did that on purpose.”

  “Maybe I did, and if you’re really good, maybe I’ll continue my journey later,” I said with a wink.

  She gave a brief giggle, trying to cover up the tremor that ran through her body at my words. After that we continued to make our way through the mall, double-checking that we had everything we needed for the holidays. This year would be the start of a new tradition for us.