The XOXO New Adult Collection: 16 Full Length New Adult Stories

by Brina Courtney

“Fine. Give Nicole my number and tell her to give it to Brooke. Tell her that I want to talk to Brooke—no, tell her I need to talk to Brooke!”

  “I will.”

  Avery left me standing in my kitchen, looking out the window and thinking about Brooke. Men are supposed to be strong, but around Brooke, I was wearing my heart on my sleeve. I wanted to show her how much I wanted her. The way she kissed me, I knew that she wanted me. I thought Jared was the hurdle, but the tumor might be the hurdle I can’t jump over.

  “Daddy, are you ready to go?” Cheyenne and Courtney came out of her room, bringing me out of my thoughts.

  I turned, pushing down the lump in my throat, putting a smile on my face and masking the pain I was feeling in my chest. “Yeah, Peanut, let me go change real fast.”

  *~*~*

  As I drove my Peanut to the field, I came to the conclusion that if I didn’t hear from Brooke, then she didn’t want me like I thought. There was a reason why she didn’t give me her number and a reason why she left without a goodbye. She said it wasn’t goodbye, but when going through a major health issue, I could imagine wanting to disappear from society.

  I didn’t want her to go through it alone, but I would check in with Avery and see how she does through the process. If she were to call me, I would be there for her. I wanted to tell Cheyenne about Brooke, but I didn’t want to bring her up if we would never see each other again—or at least in a relationship aspect.

  The way Avery’s brain worked, I wouldn’t be surprised if he and Nicole were married by the new year.

  I stuck my phone with my wallet and keys in the bat bag that carried the equipment that I bought for Cheyenne. Before we left for vacation, we threw the ball around, and I also took her to the batting cages. We still needed to work on her hitting since that was her weakness. She had never played any sports before and was jumping into fast pitch softball.

  “Girls, gather around.” Courtney’s dad, Phil, motioned for us.

  After introductions of Phil and myself, practice was underway. There were some girls who couldn’t throw, catch or hit a ball. It was understandable, but after seeing that Cheyenne wasn’t the worse on the team, she relaxed and started to play really well. She even went as far as trying to teach a teammate how to throw like a boy.

  I laughed as I watched her in her new element. Whenever I was teaching her how to throw, I would pick on her, telling her that she was throwing like a girl. She would stomp her foot and tell me that she was a girl.

  After the girls warmed up by throwing the ball in pairs, we broke off into two groups. I hit soft infield balls to the girls that wanted to play infield, and Phil hit popups to the girls that wanted to play outfield.

  I don’t think any of them really understood what each position did. I went around the horn, hitting a grounder to each girl and then telling them where to throw it. Some of the girls were picking it up while others still didn’t understand.

  I explained to them that it was only the first practice and that they would all understand the rules by our first game.

  “I think I’m either going to choose third base...or short stop. One of the two. Daddy, what do you think?” Cheyenne asked, buckling her seatbelt after practice. I thought she already decided on third, but women are always changing their minds.

  “Your mom played both. I think either one will be perfect.”

  “Yeah, but I can only pick one, right?”

  “No, not at all. It’s better to learn every position. Then you can be very valuable when you get to high school or even college.”

  “That’s true. Okay, let me think about it.”

  I laughed as she said that. She had all the time in the world. She wouldn’t be in high school for at least three more years, and with me and Avery coaching her, she was going to be the best girl in town.

  *~*~*

  Once again, I couldn’t get a good night’s sleep. I tossed and turned, thinking about Brooke. I hadn’t heard from her, and I had half a mind to stalk her on Facebook—but I didn’t.

  I got up at six, made breakfast for Cheyenne and then took her to school. After grabbing a cup of coffee from Starbucks, I met Avery at the gym and then we went to Halo after a good workout. The bar was still standing, and believe it or not, Bethy did a really good job managing. All the cash and credit cards were accounted for, a list of what we needed to order was on my desk, and everything was in tiptop shape.

  “Let’s promote Bethy to full-time manager,” I said to Avery as we both counted money.

  “I was thinking the same thing. I think we should get someone else, too.”

  “Why? I think one person will be enough.”

  “Not if we are both spending our weekends in Boston.”

  “Brooke didn’t call me. I scared her off. So looks like it will just be you going to Boston on the weekends.”

  “Fuck—okay—look, you’ve been my best friend my whole life. I’ve seen you fuck around with a shitload of chicks. If you’re really serious about Brooke, I’ll give you her number. Nicole gave it to me because Brooke does want you to call her, but if you’re just going to hurt her, I’m not giving it to you. She’s in a really bad place right now and doesn’t need you fucking with her life more.”

  I leaned back in my black leather office chair, looking him straight in the eyes. If he would have focused his attention on something other than Nicole’s pussy during the cruise, he would’ve seen that I was in love with Brooke. We both fell in love on the cruise, but he was enjoying his relationship while mine was being dangled in front of my eyes like a carrot for a fucking mule.

  “You’re right, we have been friends our whole life and you know what? I love her more than I’ve ever loved anyone in my whole life—except Cheyenne, of course. You know what I mean. Anyway, I won’t hurt her, I promise. If anything, Jared is hurting her. I want to save her. I want to be there for her—to take care of her. Av, I need her. She needs me.”

  “Jesus, who’s the lovesick fool now?”

  “I know,” I said, hanging my head.

  “Alright, here,” he said, handing me a piece of paper.

  I took it from him and stared at her number for a few seconds. “Thank you.”

  I glanced at my phone, checking the time and knew that she was at work, so instead of calling her, I sent her a text:

  Me: Hey Superwoman! Avery told me about your tumor...I miss you, but want to give you all the time you need. I'm here if you ever need ANYTHING! X -Easton

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Brooke

  Jared came home after he got off work the night before, and I was too emotionally drained to fight with him. After Doctor Sam told me about the X-ray, she made me take a series of other images to determine how big the mass was and where it was located in my shoulder.

  I didn’t go back to work after my appointment, and frankly, I didn’t care. Being told that you have a tumor is one of the worst things you could possibly hear from a doctor. Of course, there were other things, but none of us knew if my tumor was cancerous or not.

  After Doctor Sam and Nicole told me about what the X-ray had shown, I cried in Doctor Sam’s office until Nicole got off work at five. She followed me home and then dragged me to Yogurtland for dinner. Yogurtland wasn’t a healthy choice since I piled on the candy—and since it was basically ice cream, but Nicole was a firm believer that after a doctor’s appointment, you should get ice cream or in our case, frozen yogurt.

  I got more chocolate and candy than actual frozen yogurt. I didn’t want to be in public with my tear-stained face, so we got our dinner to go and headed back to my apartment. As we sat in my apartment, drinking vodka and eating our yogurt, I told her to give Easton my number. I should have never left him the last morning of the cruise. I should have never stopped the kiss that I desperately wanted.

  Fucking Jared. He was a lying bastard and an asshole for forgetting us at the airport. On the cruise, my heart was telling me to give in to the temptation of Easton, but my head was
telling me no. I should have known to always listen to my heart.

  After an hour of being home, and getting a little tipsy from the vodka and lack of food, Jared came home, and Nicole left me after she gave him an earful of how much of a loser he was. During her rant, I left and went into my bedroom, locking the door behind me. I didn’t want to talk to him.

  All I wanted to do was take a hot shower and go to bed. I stood in front of my bathroom mirror, staring at myself and thinking of everything I could have done differently in my life. I didn’t know what caused tumors, but there was a reason I had one.

  I slowly peeled off my clothes, turning so I could see my shoulder blade as I stood in front of the mirror naked and imagined the tumor that was growing inside me. The radiologist said that the mass was the size of a little bouncy ball that kids play with.

  Ironically growing up, Bailee and I would buy the miniature bouncy balls when I went grocery shopping. She would beg me for a quarter, and she would always get a ball so that we could bounce them off walls, tables, floors—anything—and count how many times it would bounce.

  We made a game of going to the top of the stairs and seeing who could get it to bounce on the most stairs as it went down. Now I had a fucking mass the size of one in my shoulder.

  As I stared at my backside, Jared tried to talk to me through the door, but he should know I was mad at him and didn’t want to talk to him—especially after the text I sent that morning. I actually didn’t want to talk to anyone but Easton, and I hoped he called soon since I told Nicole to give Avery my number for Easton.

  After a long shower and crying my eyes out as I sat on the floor of the tub, I crawled into my bed with my bedroom door still locked. Jared could go back to wherever he slept the night before. He tried pounding on the door more, but I didn’t respond. After a while, he stopped. I didn’t know if he slept on the couch like he said he did the night before or if he left. I didn’t care.

  I fell asleep clenching my phone, waiting for Easton to call.

  He didn’t.

  *~*~*

  When I woke the next morning, I dressed for work, not putting any makeup on or drinking my usual morning cup of coffee. My mind was elsewhere, and I didn’t care if I got fired. No amount of coffee would give me enough energy to give a shit about anything.

  I arrived early to work and slipped in without anyone seeing me and shut my office door and locked it. After two hours of staring out the window at nothing and not doing any work, I got Easton’s text:

  Easton: Hey Superwoman! Avery told me about your tumor...I miss you, but want to give you all the time you need. I'm here if you ever need ANYTHING! X -Easton

  I stared at it for a few minutes. He texted me, and he missed me. I missed him, too. I wanted to go home to Easton and cuddle with him until my tumor magically disappeared. But that wasn’t reality. He had his own life in New York and had Cheyenne to take care of. He couldn’t leave her and take care of me. He had responsibilities, and I had nothing but a stupid tumor growing inside me and a lying boyfriend.

  Me: Thank you for the kiss. I really need it and I miss you, too. I’m sorry for the way I acted the last night...and the next morning.

  A few seconds later, he texted back:

  Easton: I’ll always want to kiss you.

  Me: You say that to all the girls, huh?

  Easton: Actually no...you’re the only one. You’re MY Superwoman.

  Me: I haven’t broken up with Jared.

  Easton: I understand. You got some big news yesterday. Is he at least taking care of you?

  Me: I didn’t tell him, yet.

  Easton: Can I call you?

  Me: I’m at work.

  Easton: Can I call you tonight?

  Me: Yes, I would like that.

  Having Easton text me put a smile on my face. He made my worries disappear for a short time; he was my distraction. Knowing that he missed me made me want to fight the tumor—made me want to live even if it was cancer.

  I tried to focus on doing some work now that I had something to look forward to. Before I could get engrossed in all my work emails that I had missed from being on vacation and going to the doctor the day before, Nicole called on my work phone:

  “Hey, it’s me. How are you holding up?”

  “Better. Easton just texted me.”

  “I see how it is. Hot men always win over yogurt. Sorry I didn’t cheer you up more last night.”

  “Stop being a bitch.” I laughed slightly.

  “Yay! That made you laugh.”

  “Get to the point,” I said, twirling the cord of my office phone. “I’m at work, and you know Ian doesn’t like us to take personal calls.”

  She sighed before she began. “Doctor Sam talked to the radiologist and a surgeon. They want you to have a CT.”

  “Okay, when?”

  “Since it’s in-house and I work magic, I can get you in tomorrow.”

  “Maybe I should just take the rest of the week off.”

  “I’m sorry, B. Doctor Sam and I are pulling all the strings since you’re my best friend.”

  “I know.” I sighed.

  “Hey, hold on for a second.”

  “Okay,” I said, resting my head on the back of my office chair.

  She put me on hold, and elevator music played in the receiver. I knew I would need more testing, I just didn’t know I would have it so soon. I was angry with my first doctor who told me that it was a pulled muscle and didn’t even touch my shoulder. If she had just taken the time to get an X-ray, I would know if I had cancer or not by now. I would probably already have the damn thing removed!

  Not only did she not touch me when I went to her after I first hurt my shoulder, but she just kept prescribing medication to mask the pain. No matter how much I told her that nothing was helping, she wasn’t listening.

  “Sorry, B. Doctor Sam just came in, and she wants you to have a biopsy done, too.”

  “Okay, just schedule me for whatever.” I sighed again.

  The last few days, I noticed that I did a lot of sighing. It was as if the more I sighed, the more the weight on my shoulders would disappear. I didn’t want to deal with any of it. If I hadn’t gone bowling, would I not know about the tumor? So many thoughts were running through my head. Things I could have done different. I couldn’t imagine if I had cancer. The mention of a biopsy scared the shit out of me.

  Nicole placed me on hold while she did—something. After about five minutes of being on hold and Michael Buble serenading me, she returned to the line. “I scheduled your biopsy for Saturday.”

  “Saturday?”

  “Yeah, it’s at the hospital, not here. That way, I can go with you.”

  “Thank you,” I sobbed, and started to tear up. No one took care of me, and just the thought of Nicole coming with me and also being there for my procedures made me cry happy tears.

  I didn’t know how she was getting me into everything so fast, but I didn’t care. The quicker I had everything done, the sooner I would be pain free.

  *~*~*

  I wasn’t much use as an employee with all the medical procedures rolling around in my head. After I told Lucy about the tumor and assured her that I had been in the office the whole time, I went home for the day—well, the week. If Ian had a problem with me taking sick time, he could go fuck himself.

  As I sulked towards my front door, I heard giggling on the inside. I thought that maybe Nicole called Bailee and told her about my tumor, but when I opened the door and saw Jared sitting on the couch with Tramp Tarah, I lost my shit.

  “What the fuck?” I yelled, slamming the door behind me.

  “Brooke, it’s not what you think,” Jared said, standing and putting his hands up defensively.

  “Really? You have another girl in our apartment and it’s not what I think?” I asked, placing my hands on my hips.

  “I should go,” Tramp Tarah murmured.

  “You might as well take this asshole with you!” I shouted, pointing to Ja
red.

  “Brooke, let me explain,” Jared said, stepping towards me.

  I took a step back. “Explain what? Explain that you’re fucking cheating on me? Explain that you were with her when you were supposed to pick me up at the airport? Explain that you were with her when I found out I have a tumor in my shoulder and might have cancer?”

  “Tumor? Cancer? Wait. What are you talking about?”

  “It doesn’t fucking matter. Just get the fuck out!”

  “I live here. too!”

  “You have some balls if you think I’m going to stay in the same apartment as you when you’re a lying cheating bastard!” I said, turning his X-Box on.

  “What are you doing? Put my shit down,” Jared said, reaching to turn the X-Box off.

  I nudged him out of the way. “No!”

  “Brooke, just let me explain. Tarah’s my friend.”

  “Do you think that I’m an idiot?” I said, pulling Call of Duty from the slot.

  “Seriously, put my shit back!”

  I looked up at him as he hovered over me, holding the CD in my hands. Without a word, I snapped the game in half.

  “What the fuck? You didn’t seriously just break my game!”

  “Oh, I did. And I’m not done!”

  “I’ve never put a hand on a woman before, but if you break my X-Box, I’m going to kill you!”

  “You wouldn’t...” I said, looking him in the eye.

  Something inside me snapped more. I ripped the X-Box from the wall, and threw it on the carpeted floor. It did nothing but bounce a little. I was so pissed off that I started to stomp on it. It crushed beneath my black ballet slippers, and I continued to jump on it, hurting my feet in the process, but I didn’t care.

  The X-Box was his heart, and I felt like crushing it.

  I didn’t love Jared like I thought I did, but walking in on your boyfriend with another woman isn’t a fairytale worth living no matter how unhappy you are with him. He had no idea that I wanted to break up with him and that I was in love with Easton. and it felt good watching him freak out and gather the pieces of the crushed box.

  “You’re fucking crazy, and you’re going to buy me a new one.”