My heart stopped beating. “What are you talking about?”
“You and Andy.” She said happily as she beamed up at me.
“Andy’s not my boyfriend.” I said.
Fleur paused for a second. Her shoulders dropped as she put her head down. “Oh man, I did it again.” She said.
“You did what?” I asked bending down to be eye level with her.
“Nothing good night.” She said quickly.
I grabbed her robe and stopped her from running off. “How did you know Andy wanted me to be his girlfriend?” I asked. “Did he tell you?”
Fleur shook her head violently.
“Fleur…” I threatened.
“He didn’t.” she insisted. “I just heard him and mom---” Fleur stopped talking. “Nee-nee I’m gonna get in trouble for eavesdropping.”
“Fleur…” I said.
“I don’t mean to do it, it’s just people talk so loud, and they didn’t see me.” She protested.
I turned her body around to me and grabbed her shoulders. “Tell me what you heard Andy tell mom.” I demanded.
Fleur’s face fell and she whimpered.
“Now, or I’m going to be really mad, and you know what that means.” I said holding her tighter.
“Fine.” Fleur said dropping her head. “Yesterday I heard Andy and mom talking in the kitchen and he asked her if it was okay with her if he asked you to be his girlfriend.” She said sadly.
“And?” I asked.
“And momma said he could do better than you.” Fleur said.
“Really?” Of course she would.
“But he didn’t listen.” Fleur said quickly speaking up. “He said he really liked you and he’s been thinking about it for awhile. That’s why when you guys took forever to come back, I thought he asked you….but I guess I jumped to conclusion. He didn’t ask you?” she asked surprised.
The look on my sister’s face…I couldn’t answer.
Fleur put her hand over her mouth. “Oh no, I think I ruined another surprise.” She said remorsefully.
Cece opened the door to her bedroom, hearing her two sisters just outside of it.
“Oh Nee-nee, when he asks you, you have to be surprised okay…and you have to say yes, because I really like him. Oh and he’s a good guy. Also he makes you smile a lot, so I like him. Are you going to say yes? Of course you’re going to say yes. You have to tell me okay. And don’t tell him I told you. Don’t even bring it up, just be surprised.” Fleur said excitedly. “Say yes! You have to say yes so you can be happy forever and get married and I can have kids to play with.”
I swallowed hard as I forced a smile on my face. “Of course I’ll say yes.” I said my voice cracking.
Fleur gave me a big hug. “He’s the coolest person you ever brought home…better even than Nico.” She whispered excitedly. “Okay I have to go to bed now, I was just waiting for you.” With that Fleur ran to her room and closed the door behind her so loudly that Bubbles barked at her.
I stood up slowly.
“Mom is right. You do fill her head with empty promises and false hope.” Cece said leaning against her door.
“Shut-up.” I said softly as I turned to her.
“I love you a lot sister but you’re a cold hearted bitch.” Cece said calmly. She walked into her room and I walked in behind her, my heart heavy and the happiness I was feeling earlier like vapor in the air. Untouchable. I closed the door behind us and leaned against it.
Cece went to sit on her bed and looked up at me. “You make them love you and then you hurt them…isn’t that how it works?” she asked.
I looked away from her.
“Oh come on Nee-nee…I know you, I’ve seen you in action.” Cece said. “You’re this perky, loud, lovable person, everybody loves you…right everybody has to love Ornelia Jones, and you won’t have it any other way.”
“Stop it.” I said sinking to the floor.
“So these poor souls are blinded, not knowing they’re being pulled into your intricate web of lies, they fall deeper and deeper in love with you.” Cece continued. “But the trick is you don’t want to love them…you have no intention of loving them…so when you start to feel something you break it off. Because God forbids one lucky soul may just be able to pierce through that heart of yours.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” I yelled weakly. I hugged my knees. Stop it Cece, that’s not fair. Stop.
“Don’t I?” Cece asked sadly. “That kid down the hallway is in love with you.”
I shook my head. “He’s not.”
Cece gave off a sad laugh. “And then you’re going to keep stringing him along until you can find the perfect opportunity to hurt him, not because you want to hurt him oh no, because you wouldn’t know what else to do but to hurt the guy you’re falling for. Same story every time.” Cece remarked miserably.
I wiped the escaped tears from my face. I won’t hurt him. I won’t. I won’t. I won’t.
Cece stood up and made her way to my side and sat down next to me.
“Get away.” I whispered.
“Even though I know how fucked up your mind works, I still love you.” Cece said softly. “And I’ll always be on your side.”
I buried my face in my head. I hated this. I hated when my emotions overtook me and I had absolutely no control. I hate feeling. Cece wrapped her arm around me. I tried to shake her off, but she didn’t let go. Tired I rested my head on her shoulder.
“I like him.” I whispered. “I like him a lot…but I don’t know how to love him.”
“I know.” Cece said. “That’s what’s breaking my heart.”
I lifted my head to ask her what she meant when her phone vibrated. I looked down at her because she jumped a little.
“Who’s calling you at two in the morning?” I asked her surprised.
“Nobody.” Cece said quickly. She reached into her pocket and quickly silenced it. Curious I snatched it out her hand.
“Nee-nee!” She yelled trying to grab it back. But I pushed her away and held up the phone.
I looked at the name and stared at her in shock. “Why are you getting a booty call from a professor Matthew?”
Chapter twenty-one
I guess it’s every girl’s dream that their father is actually superman in disguise. At least for those who didn’t have a father growing up. By father, I definitely do not mean Steven. I guess when I was younger I wish he’d been my father, I wished he’d loved me as he did my other siblings. But deep down inside, I knew it would never happen, no matter how much I tried to be perfect. So I would make up this imaginary dad in my head. He was tall and handsome and funny and he loved me with all his heart. He would never leave me, never disappoint me, he would show me what a true man was like. I would love all the things he did just because he was my dad. Don’t get me wrong, I love my mom, but I knew had my father been around, I would have been the number one daddy’s girls.
All these feelings and emotions and longings, I kept bottled up deep inside. I never let anybody know what was going through my mind. Why would I? None of it would ever come true. But now…what if it did? Little sparks tickled my heart as I thought of the significance Dr. Honsu could have in my life. What were the odds of him knowing my mother, what were the odds of him coming to teach my last year in college and lastly what were the odds of him being my father?
I know I always jump ahead and that is one of my many faults, but with the opportunity of somebody of Dr. Honsu’s grandeur to actually…even remotely have the same genes as me, blew my mind. Of course I could just be making everything up in my head and he was nothing more but a friend to my mother…but a girl could dream right? Was my dream about to become reality? Could I just possibly…maybe have this weight lifted off my shoulder? What I would give to have my dreams come true.
But let’s do a quick intermission on my life. For the first time in my life, I am not the hopeless-troubled-God save this child-daughter anymore. For once, my s
ister actually managed to take the whole fucking cake in this case. She’s fucking her teacher. Yep, there I said it, right out in the open. You want my opinion? She’s on drugs. Plan and simple. There is no way my perfect older sister could be having an affair with her married professor, who mind you has two kids. Oh but he said he was going to divorce his wife. Oh fuck me in the eye, divorce his wife my foot. I can’t believe it. Celine is not dumb, no she’s not! I can acknowledge that my sister is the smartest human on the planet….so why is she making the dumbest mistake in history. I mean…I would never…oh my gosh…I don’t even know.
She’s confused, she’s hurt, and she doesn’t know how to stop…let’s be honest she doesn’t want to stop. She believes him, everything he tells her…this fucking adulterous asshole has my sister wrapped around his little finger. I’m telling mom! Well I won’t but I should right? But then again our mom has been on a whole different wavelength for a couple years now. Everything remotely involving a scandal or disaster, she just couldn’t deal with it. I think we learned to deal with shit on our own in some way. We grew up just letting our mom see the tip of the iceberg, because she has issues and headaches of her own even though she never tells us.
I admit that I loved taking people’s problems and coming up with solutions in a heartbeat. (Whether they wanted me to do it or not). But this one just hit too close to home. It was my own fucking sister for Christ sake, she shouldn’t be going through this, and I couldn’t even wrap my mind around dealing with it. I’m still in the confused stage of disbelief that Celine isn’t perfect. And you know what? That fact does not make me happy. I needed her to be perfect, she has to stay perfect Celine… something in my life has to make sense. But one thing for sure, I had to convince her to drop that low life bastard she deserved ten times better. I mean yeah she was annoying, she was snobby, she was bougie, she ran around like little miss perfect, no matter how much I didn’t like Celine, She was still my sister and that meant she deserved better. Nobody came in and tried to mess up our dysfunctional family. I just couldn’t let that happen.
But alas even as I drove back to my last semester as an undergraduate, I was elated and confused at the same time. Andy wanted to make things official, Celine was about to be nominated the heathen of the century, and I possible just might have found my dad. Something in the back of my mind told me this was about to be one rollercoaster of a semester.
******
“Whoa he really does have balls.” Jazmine said in awe as she crossed her legs underneath her as she sat back down on the couch. “He seriously asked you to be his girlfriend.”
Don’t worry this was a topic we’ve been discussing almost every day since we began the new semester. The only reason why I kept bringing it up, is this kid kept asking. He wouldn’t say it outright, just subtly drop little comments on how this or that would be different if I was his girlfriend. I just…I don’t know, I was confused. He made it look so appealing….but we all knew it was an end to something perfect. I mean I had tons of examples to back me up.
I nodded and sighed. “Why would he do that?” I said remorsefully. He was really putting a curve ball into my life. I didn’t need that right now. Everything was so perfect, why try to change it. Why Andy? Why?
“Well technically you are his girlfriend, I mean he’s like the only guy you’re messing around with exclusively.” Brittany said taking a bite of her apple as she opened her bio book.
“You would think he would be satisfied with that.” I exclaimed. “I mean, I’m already acting way out of my usual self, and I have no idea why ….why can’t he just accept that?” I asked. I mean I’ve accepted it. Sometimes in life there are better things left unsaid.
I mean from the very beginning wasn’t he the one who said well I don’t want you to fall in love with me and that crap and I established love was not even in the equation. Wait…I don’t think he’s in love with me is he? Is that why he wants to make things official so fast?
I shook my head and laughed out loud. Andy in love with me? That wasn’t even….I turned to my friends my eyes getting bigger as some of the conversations and situations over the past few weeks popped into my head. I mean that could just be Andy being Andy right? I mean…what was….
“Do you think Andy’s in love with me?” I asked in awe. “No right?” I answered for them.
Jazmine and Brittany looked at each other and then looked away giving a loud exaggerated sigh each.
“What?” I asked.
“Oh I don’t know ORNELIAAAA.” Brittany said stretching my name. “Why don’t you just go out with him? I mean it’s not like you’re not already halfway in love with him.” Brittany shrugged. “Plus you have to hand it to him for persistency.”
Jazmine smirked.
“In love?” I asked confused. “I mean I like the kid…but love is such a big word.” I said honestly.
My best friends were quiet.
“I mean what the hell is love anyways?” I asked. “An excuse to fuck?”
“And here comes the cynical O.J. that we don’t miss at all.” Brittany said cutting me off.
“God just admit that you two are in love with each other!” Jazmine said throwing a pillow at me.
I dodged it and shook my head. “We’re not.” I mean we’re not. We like each other, we really do. But once you start adding love to the mix, everything always go downhill.
My phone rang and I jumped to answer it as my friends giggled. I knew it was Andy. “Hey.” I said breathlessly as I answered the phone, grabbing the couch before I fell off. This kid hadn’t seen me for four days into this new semester. Unfortunately I didn’t have any classes with him and I was a little bit peeved about that. But every time I wanted to meet him, something, I mean something always came up. When did this guy become so popular and busy? He had no time for me? I refused to believe it. And I will let you know that every time we did manage to speak…yep he brought up our conversation from winter break. This kid, I tell ya. It was cute though, I’m not gonna lie.
“I’m almost there. Want me to come in---”
“No!” I said cutting him off. “The girls are being annoying.” I said sticking my tongue out at my friends. I didn’t want them anywhere near Andy, lest they start up with some sort of conspiracy. I got up and headed to the door.
“Oh I love you Andy!” Brittany said in a high falsetto voice. I covered my phone.
“I can’t stay long though.” Andy asked.
“What?” I asked my hand pausing on the doorknob. Why can’t he stay long, he’s the one that said he had time to stop by.
“I’m here.” He said into the phone. He didn’t need to let me know because I heard his red truck pull up.
I yanked the door open. This was not the time for Andy to start acting brand new. These next weeks were crucial to my existence. I needed him. I was on the verge of finding my dad all thanks to him and he was distancing himself like this? What was going on? This was not a good start to the semester. I’ve been on edge ever since he left my house over break. Overreacting much? Yeah I thought so too, but I couldn’t help it. Things were different now, I sensed it…but I couldn’t place my finger on it.
Andy pulled up behind my car and I ran to him. I hit the front of his truck playfully. He stopped the engine and got out his truck, his arms outstretched towards me.
“Does it make any sense to you that you have no time for me?” I asked rolling my eyes as I wrapped my arms around his neck. I missed holding him like this.
Andy didn’t say anything as he wrapped his arms around me and pulled me into a tight hug. That’s the thing I hated about winter. The bulky coats and clothes stopped you from truly feeling the other person. But at least I could sense his heat through my sweatshirt.
“I’m busy.” He whispered against me. I felt his warm lips press against my exposed neck and I grinned as I held him tighter. He always smelled so good and fresh. And his hair smelled good too. I remembered the smell of my shampoo and conditioner. I co
uld possibly buy him some more. You know white people always wash their hair, he was probably running out. I closed my eyes and just rested against him. Who knew four days without seeing this kid would have such an effect on the balance of things.
I ran my hands through his hair playfully and pulled my head back and leaned up so we were nose to nose. “Well you need to make time for me handsome.” I said smiling as I rubbed my nose against his. He made me happy.
Andy squeezed my hip and let go of me. He shook his hair out of his face and leaned against the door of his truck. I watched as he shoved his hands in his pocket and absently played with his lip ring with his tongue. He looked away. “Well….” He started and gave off a small cough. “The funny thing about that is…” He ran his hand over his hair. “I always seem to make time for my….” He placed his piercing eyes on me. “Girlfriend.” He shrugged. “Too bad you’re not right?”
O.J. Page 48