Choosing Henley

by Anne Jolin

  She has her arms wrapped around Jami’s neck, licking the shell of his ear. My blood runs as cold as ice and I’m paralyzed in place as I watch her paw all over him. It doesn’t take me long to realize that neither of them heard me come in the front door. My legs feel like lead as I slowly back out of the foyer and into the yard.

  “Shit,” I curse under my breath when I reach the front lawn. My palms are starting to sweat and my heart feels like it’s jackhammering in my chest. The grocery bags crash onto the lawn as I drop to my knees in the snow. “What the fuck?” I gasp, trying my best to breathe.

  It feels like I’m having a panic attack. It’s never been this bad before. I literally can’t get air into my lungs, and my entire body is shaking. My stomach lurches, so I lean forward, pulling my hair to the side.

  I was lied to. I was cheated on. I was betrayed. He begged me to trust him, he sneaked his way into my heart, and when I finally bought the whole damn con hook, line, and sinker, he kicked the stool out from under me. What the fuck was I thinking?

  Not only did I just have to see the entire fucking thing, but now, I was either going to pass out or vomit in his front yard. Considering my luck, I’d likely end up doing both. And yes, in exactly the shitty order you’re thinking of.

  I remain like that—on the front lawn, in the snow, trying not to toss my cookies—for what seems like hours. In reality, I’m certain it’s been a minute, maybe two. When I’m sure I’m not going to be sick, I pull my legs out from under me and sit down on my ass, putting my head between my knees. I’ve never actually had a panic attack before, but that’s what people do in the movies when they have one. Either that or they breathe into one of those paper bags… But I don’t have one of those.

  I know I need to move. The very last thing I need would be for them to see me like this. At the very least, I can keep my pride intact. Even if my heart is in a million broken pieces at the bottom of my stomach, at least I’d have my pride. Fucking stupid. I stand slowly. I’m a little lightheaded, and it causes me to sway on the spot. I look like a mess. My ass and knees are wet from the snow and there are groceries all over the lawn, littering the white snow.

  I start to clean it up, putting everything back inside the bags, when I finally decide, Fuck it! I walk in on some skanky bitch who wears too much fake tanner with her hands all over my man and I have to clean up the mess? Fuck that! I throw the items I started to pick up down onto the grass before marching back to my car. I feel sick to my stomach thinking about her, about them. Did he not expect me home this early? Was everything he said a crock of shit?

  “I deserve better than this,” I growl to myself as I yank open the car door. The second the words leave my lips, steel engulfs my spine. “I do fucking deserve better than this.” I slam the door before turning around to walk back towards the house.

  His betrayal may hurt like fucking hell. It may cripple my chances at every finding love again, but I am not going to let another man wound me like this. Not without standing up for myself. I am not a weak twelve-year-old girl anymore. This time, the asshole on the end of my heartbreak is going to get a fucking mouthful.

  My fists clench and unclench at my sides as I storm back up the walkway. I momentarily wish that I had the lacrosse stick I keep under my bed at home with me. Not because I think I’d actually hit one of them with it, but it sure as shit would make me feel more badass.

  When I step onto the patio, I take one last deep breath and straighten my spine before walking in the front door for the second time in less than five minutes. I open my mouth to make way for the stream of unladylike profanities that is about to fill the room when I stop cold—again.

  Jami has his hands out in front of him, almost in some kind of protective stance, and Kelsey is circling him like a deranged predator. She’d probably be a tiger with all the fake tanner she’s wearing. Instead of barging in crazy-bitch style like I planned, I stay where I am, watching the scene before me play out.

  “Jamison, baby. You know you miss me,” Kelsey coos, walking around him again.

  “I really don’t, Kelsey,” Jami argues, backing into one of the couches.

  “I could make you miss me.” She grins at him, reaching up to palm her very fake double-D boobs.

  “I’ve told you this a million times, Kelsey. We’re done. We’ve been done for a while. It was never serious. You know that. I know that. Let’s not pretend otherwise,” he snaps at her, moving around the couch, putting it between the two of them as some kind of shield. “I’m in love with someone else now.”

  This is what none of those girls in the books and the movies get a chance to see. None of them get a chance to see this moment. The moment where the guy pushes the whore off him. The moment when he does everything he’s supposed to do, even though he thinks no one is watching.

  Up until a few months ago, I would have been one of those girls. I would have bolted, never once giving Jami the benefit of the doubt. I almost did, but I am stronger now. I may have come in here ready to fight him because of his deceit, but I am sure as shit equally as ready to fight this skanky Barbie doll for him. He is mine.

  “This because of your whore?” Kelsey hisses at him. “She can’t make you happy like I can, Jamison. You know how good we were together,” she says, dipping her hand into the front of her neon-pink thong, fingering herself slowly. “You should see how wet I am for you, baby.”

  Oh, hell fucking no. I’m across the room before I even know what I’m going to do. She’s still touching herself, but when I’m about five feet away, she notices me. Her eyes go wide with panic before she narrows them at me. The bitch doesn’t even have a clue what’s coming her way. I wouldn’t say that I’m a brawler, but I’ve been known to lose my temper a time or two, and when I do, it is far from pretty.

  “Speak of the whore and it shall appear,” she taunts, trying to back away from me.

  “Kelsey,” Jami warns from somewhere else in the room.

  I put my hand up to silence him before he says anything else. I’ve had it with this cunt. Yes, I hate her so much that I used the motherfucking C word, but it suits her nasty personality.

  I continue to pin her with my stare, and when I finally reach her, she’s backed herself up against the wall, flanking the fireplace. “Tsk, tsk, Barbie. First rule of a catfight: don’t back yourself into a corner,” I mock.

  “He’s mine, you fucking bitch!” she screams in my face, reaching out to claw me with her ugly-ass nails.

  I’m faster than she is, grabbing her by the wrists so I don’t get any of her on me and slamming her into the wall. I momentarily find myself hoping that I don’t pop her fake tits in the process. That would be hard to explain. But the look in her eyes shifts from confrontational to downright panic.

  Good. She finally realized that I’m not fucking around anymore.

  “Listen up, sweetie.” My voice drips with sarcasm as I put my face right in hers. “I’m not sure if all that time under UV lights is messing with your little brain, but let me clear a few things up for you.”

  She tries to squirm out of my hold, but it only serves to piss me off further. I slam her back into the wall again, getting even more up in her painted-on face. Our bodies are so close now that I can feel her naked chest pressing into my coat every time she breathes. Nasty.

  “First of all and most importantly, he’s not yours. He’s fucking mine. Let me make that abundantly clear. Second of all, I know they taught you this in school, but it looks like you need a little refresher.” I cock my eyebrow at her. “No means no. I don’t care if you think he wants you. He doesn’t. I can assure you his needs are absolutely satisfied.”

  Jami stifles a laugh behind us before he tries to disguise it with a cough.

  “Help me, Jamison. Please,” she whines. “She’s fucking crazy.”

  Bet your ass I am, Barbie. The best way to fight crazy is with crazy.

  “Third”—I move my face again so close to hers that our noses are now touching—
“if I ever see your Doritos ass in this house again—with or without clothes on—I will mess up that face. Do you understand what I’m saying?” I ask her with the same tone of voice you’d ask a child.

  She nods, and I smile an award-winning bitch grin.

  “Good. Now get the fuck out of our house.” I drop her wrists, backing away two steps before turning around.

  Jami, standing a few feet away by the couch is smirking. I narrow my eyes at him but wink at the same time. I’m about to speak when I see his gaze moves over my shoulder and his eyes go wide. I don’t have time to see what he’s looking at before my hair is yanked viciously, snapping my head backwards.

  “Everything was perfect until you!” Kelsey’s shrill voice rings in my ear.

  I spin around quickly, wincing when I do because her fingers stay wrapped in my hair and it fucking hurts. Any and all self-control I had towards this bitch is gone. Long fucking gone. I’m only seeing red now. My temper in full flare.

  Jami doesn’t have time to stop me when I pull back my right arm and let my fist connect with Malibu Barbie’s jaw. She teeters in her high heels before crashing to the ground, taking some of my hair with her.

  She starts to cry, tears staining a path through all the concealer she has on. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” Well, that’s a long list. She wipes some of the blood coming from her lip off and whimpers.

  I smirk, dropping to squat down in front of her crumpled-up, naked body. “Second rule of a catfight, Malibu Barbie? Don’t fight like a girl.”

  When she groans, I decide that I ought to repeat myself one last time to ensure it goes through her thick skull.

  “Now look at me, bitch,” I hiss. “Don’t go after things that don’t belong to you.” I stand, quickly locating some of her clothes before walking over and tossing them out the front door. Then I lean against the foyer wall and point. “Get out.”

  She looks at me and then at Jami before slowly standing and walking towards me, trying to cover up her naked body along the way. It’s a little late to be humble now, twat waffle. She walks past me and out the door, scurrying to pick up her clothes before they get soaked in the snow.

  “You’re a crazy fucking whore!” she hisses at me from the front lawn.

  I’m in full killer mode now and launch forward, but strong hands wrap around my waist from behind, pulling me back into the house.

  “Easy, Tyler Durden. No more fight club for you,” he says, kicking the door shut with his foot.

  “Tyler Durden is hot,” I tease.

  Jami growls in my ear before he helps me out of my coat and shoes. Then he leads us into the kitchen. “Let’s take a look at your hand, slugger.”

  He winks over his shoulder before digging around in his freezer. When he finally finds what he’s looking for—a frozen bag of peas—he lays it across my knuckles. I wince. Less because it hurts and more because the bag is really fucking cold.

  “Lennon, I—”

  I cut him off, looking up at him and shaking my head. “You don’t need to explain, Jami. I saw most of what happened. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

  He looks relieved, and I thank all my lucky stars that I didn’t bolt. That I didn’t almost ruin what we’ve just started because I was running scared again.

  “I still want to though,” he says. It looks like it’s important to him that he tells me, so I nod my head, signaling that he should continue. “I was working in the kitchen. I’d left the front door unlocked for you and didn’t hear her when she came in. By the time I noticed she was even inside, she was naked in the living room. I told her to leave, but she wouldn’t, and when I tried to grab her to lead her to the door, she fucking pounced on me.” He runs his fingers through his hair, letting out a frustrated sigh.

  “I’m guessing that’s the part I first walked in on.” I confess. He’s being honest with me, so it’s only fair that I give him the same in return.

  He furrows his brows in confusion. “First walked in on?”

  “I came in and saw her wrapped around you with her tongue basically in your ear and I panicked. I left,” I tell him, hanging my head a little at the confession that I ran—again.

  “But you came back. Why?”

  “Ha.” I laugh, biting down on my bottom lip and looking up at him. “Well, actually, I came back to tear you a new asshole for cheating on me, but when I came back in, I saw you pushing her off. I saw you telling her no and realized I’d assumed wrong.”

  He smirks. “And that’s when you decided to go Fight Club on Kelsey?”

  I glare back at him. “Malibu Barbie got what she had coming to her.”

  He raises his hands in front of me in surrender. “My knight in shining armor, Lennon. You saved me!” He dramatically puts a hand over his heart. “How can I possibly repay you?”

  I swat him away, laughing the entire time. “Don’t worry, princess. I’ll always protect you.”

  “Princess?” he scolds, raising his eyebrows. “Princess?”

  I start to move when I see him coming for me, but I’m not fast enough. Jami throws me up over his shoulder, smacking my ass as he stalks towards the hallway.

  “Where are you going?” I shriek. “Your parents will be here soon!”

  “Not for another forty minutes. That’s plenty of time for princess here to show you what he can do,” he taunts.

  “Is princess also talking in the third person now? ‘Cause if that’s what we’re doing now, the knight in shining armor has something to confess,” I say, hanging upside down on his back. “The knight in shining armor may or may not have spilt all the fancy groceries for dinner all over the front lawn.”

  He smacks my ass again. “Princess will make do with what she has.”

  I laugh, firmly grabbing his ass while he walks. “You’ll make the perfect housewife,” I tease him.

  Jami tosses me down on the bed, crawling over top of me. “Mmm, I think the sex we have is too naughty for fairytales, Beatle,” he says before devouring my lips.

  THE DINNER WITH Jami’s parents went better than I could have expected. They were amazing. Jami is so much like his dad in almost every way. They are both so manly and adventurous, and they love everything to do with the outdoors. His mother is quite possibly the sweetest woman on the planet. I adore her, and it’s easy to see where Jami got his soft side from.

  It was almost too much for me to spend time with Jami’s dad. I was used to Olly, Hannah’s dad, but this just felt different. The way he embraced me and the things he said to me went straight to my heart. John Henley is an amazing father, and every second we spent with him that night made me realize that, even if my dad did come back, I wouldn’t want him. He would never be this kind of man, and I feel at peace with that now. The empty hole in my chest is slowly filling up.

  Jami starts to sing along to the radio from the opposite side of the Jeep, which breaks me from my memory. I’ve become quite the daydreamer lately. It’s Sunday and we are headed to our monthly friend dinner—this one being all the more important because we are finally going to meet Beth’s new boyfriend, Kyle. Hannah and I are almost completely certain that we don’t like him, but we haven’t met him yet, so we are trying to keep our judgments to the side until we’ve given him a chance.

  When we pull into the driveway behind Greyson’s truck, it looks like we are the first to arrive, and that never happens to me. I’m usually the last one to show up or the one running a little bit behind. It’s only another thing that’s changed since Jami and I have become an item.

  “Thank you, handsome.” I say when he opens my door for me, wrapping my arms around his neck after he sets me down in the snow.

  He kisses me on the lips as he shuts the Jeep door. “I love you, Beatle”

  I still haven’t been able to say it back to him yet. I will soon. I just need a little longer. Instead, I kiss him again in response and drop my arms from around him. Then we lace our fingers together before heading towards the house.

&nb
sp; I knock loudly on the front door before opening it and calling out, “We’re here!” I will never walk into this house again without making it known that I am there. Once is more than enough. I don’t need to catch them in the act again.

  Jami covers his ears and looks over at me. “I think the entire block heard you,” he teases.

  “If you’d seen what I’ve seen, you’d yell too,” I say, swatting him on the shoulder before taking off my coat.

  “You’re here!” Hannah grins coming to stand at the top of the stairs.

  “Oh good. You heard us.” Jami chuckles. “Lennon here wasn’t sure she was loud enough.” He leans in to kiss my cheek.

  I glare at him. “Don’t mind him. He thinks he’s a comedian or something today,” I say, climbing the stairs to hug my best friend. “How are you feeling?”

  “I’m okay. The morning sickness has been a real bitch.” She sighs.

  Greyson walks up behind her, placing a hand on her belly from behind. “I don’t know why they call it morning sickness.” His words make Hannah laugh. “It is absolutely not limited to the morning, but my girls been a trooper,” he praises, kissing the top of her head.

  I smile. For once, I don’t feel absolutely disgusted while watching the two of them in all of their lovey-dovey glory. I feel nothing but happiness now. I’ve changed, and the more Jami and I do together, the more I know that it’s one hundred percent because of my guy. My guy.

  Hannah grabs my hand, pulling me down the hallway towards the bedrooms. “Want to see my nursery ideas?” she asks, turning to look at me over her shoulder.

  I laugh because she already has me halfway down the hall. I’m not sure I have a choice in the matter anyway. “Absolutely,” I tell her.

  She drags me into the room across from the master bedroom and stands in the middle of the room, telling me where everything will go. She’s months away from her due date, but this is typical Hannah. Always organized and never missing an opportunity to decorate.