by H. Q. Frost
"You're seventeen!" She quickly wiped her tears, still walking backward away from him. "I can't." She turned around, headed out of the parking lot in humiliation.
"Show's over," a teacher said, ushering students back into the school. "Ms. Avondale, didn't you graduate last year?" Her stern look landed on Renee, who with a self-satisfied smirk, headed for her car.
"Shouldn't keep secrets, Dom." She winked at him as she walked by.
"This isn't a good way to start the year, Mr. Sestak. Come on. Let's go." The teacher touched his arm. "Don't ruin your GPA the first day of school."
He was a perfect student with perfect attendance and a B average. It was his senior year, he was guaranteed to graduate with honors. He couldn't fuck it up. But Nyla was his future and the means to writing a happy ending into his life, he refused to fuck that up.
Ignoring the teacher, he ran for his truck.
"Dominic!" the teacher shouted but he was in his truck. The loud rumble from his muffler roared as he floored it out of the parking lot.
"Nyla!" he screamed out the window as she ran down the street, not too sure where she was. "Dammit," he cursed and threw the truck in park, quickly getting out and chasing her. "Nyla!" His arms went around her, trapping her back to his chest.
"Let me go!" she shrieked as she kicked her feet in the air while he held her to him.
"Don't run," he said close to her ear as she squirmed. "Nyla, stop!" he demanded. "I'll fucking let you go, just don't run."
"Put me down, Dom." Her rapid breathing was no longer from running, but anger.
"Don't run," he carefully repeated while putting her on her feet.
Spinning to face him, she began to back away. "Go back to school, Dom." The wince across her face as she said school made him sigh.
"I didn't think this shit would matter to you."
"The fact my boyfriend's a kid and I'm an adult wouldn't matter to me?" She scoffed.
"I'm not a kid!" His deep voice took on a growl with his words.
"You're seventeen." Her hands covered her face as she whimpered. "Oh god."
"Why does age matter if we love each other?"
A horn blew as an angry driver sped around Dom's truck blocking the street.
Her tear filled eyes landed on his and her lip quivered making him reach for her, but she took a step back.
"Don't." The word barely broke free from her throat.
"You said we could overcome everything together, Nyla." The straining in his throat made him want to scream to keep from crying.
"Not something like this," she whispered, unable to support a confident tone as the tears started. "You lied."
"I didn't!" he insisted as tears filled his eyes. "I never fucking lied to you." With quick fingers, he swiped at his eyes.
"Omission is a form of lying."
"Bull shit!" His hands were in his hair as he fought not to grab her.
"I'm twenty-one, Dom." She wiped her cheeks. "I can't be in a relationship with… a kid."
"Okay, okay." He panted and slightly hunched, trying to catch his breath from the rising panic attack. "Let me drive you home. You shouldn't walk alone."
"It's midday. I'll be fine." She wiped her cheeks again and started walking.
"Please, Nyla!" he begged following after her. "Let me take you home and talk about this. Please. I'm begging you, La."
"Go to school, Dom!" she screamed over her shoulder, keeping her feet moving.
Another car honked as it sped around Dom's truck on the side street.
"Fuck!" he screamed as he got in his truck.
The rev of his engine and thunder from his muffler as he drove away made her startle and cry harder. He circled the block and when she heard his engine again, she started to run until she got to unfamiliar crossroads and he pulled up next to her.
"Get in the truck, Nyla. I'll just take you home and leave you there."
With no options because she was lost, she got into his truck.
"Baby," he breathed with relief and reached for her, but she pulled away.
"Please take me home, Dom. You said you'd take me home."
The crack of his knuckles seemed to echo in the silent truck, but he was trying to distract himself from touching her, holding her hand, pulling her to the middle like he was used to doing.
"Nyla," he calmly said as they turned onto her street. "You're really going to break up with me because of this?"
As she stared out the window, she shifted so her body was turned away from him. He reached out to touch her ringlets and a shaky breath exhaled from her while her eyes closed, dropping more tears.
"I'll be eighteen soon."
"Stop. Please," she whispered, and when he pulled into her driveway, he grabbed her hand before she could get out.
"I love you, La. You're the only girl I've ever loved."
"Because you're fucking seventeen!" She cried.
"Because there is no-one else like you. I'm your good book. We're writing this fucking story, La!"
"Dom." She sniffled and wiped her face while looking at him with a shake of her head. "You should be dating someone in high school."
"Fuck that, Nyla. You're not the oldest chick I know. I've fucked women older."
"Fuck you, Dom." Her sobs grew louder as she got out of his truck.
"Nyla! I'm sorry." Rushing to get out, he grabbed her arm.
She stared into his face with tears pouring down her cheeks until he pulled her into his arms, and this time she didn't fight it.
"I'm sorry. About all of it." His lips kissed her temple, her head, her cheek. "My age doesn't mean shit. We're in love. I love you," he said looking her in the eyes, not willing to let her arms go because he was afraid she'd run from him again.
"You have to go back to school." Her weak sounding voice made his heart crumble in his chest.
"If I go back to school, will you talk to me later?"
"Call me later." The step back she took made a familiar feeling of emptiness twist his gut. A feeling he often felt before they had met.
"I love you." Before she could turn, he grabbed her arm. "Nyla, tell me you love me, baby."
"Bye, Dom." She pulled out of his grasp and hurried up the steps to the front door.
***
Her phone rang at quarter after two and when she didn't answer, he showed up at her house. There was no answer and all doors and windows were locked. Unsure if she was there, he waited until Maleek pulled into the driveway at six.
"Dom." Maleek put his hand up before Dom could say anything. "I don't know what you did, boy, but she went to her mom's." His head shook in disappointment as he opened the front door.
"Mr. Wood, I have to talk to her."
"You fucked up, boy! Were you cheatin'?" He scowled at the boy he had grown fond of, a man he thought for sure would remain in his daughter's life.
"No." Dom closed the doors behind them and when Maleek walked to his bedroom, Dom went to Nyla's.
She left. She wasn't just staying with her mom for the night. By the way her things were cleared out of her room, it looked like she didn't have plans of returning. Yanking his phone from his pocket, he called her again and immediately got voicemail.
"Dom, let's go!" Maleek called out. "Let's hear it." He waited at the kitchen table; Dom took the chair across from him and Maleek held out a beer.
"No." Taking the bottle, he walked it to the refrigerator.
"I'll drink, you talk."
"She moved in with her mom?" Dom's gaze flitted back toward her empty bedroom.
"That's what she's telling me. I got the excuse you two broke up and she was moving back to Seattle."
"We didn't break up." He groaned pounding the table as he sat.
"Curb that anger right now, son." Maleek's stern glare made him huff.
"I'm sorry. We didn't break up."
"What happened?"
"She…" He looked away, unsure what he could say to make it seem less detrimental. "There were a few things she didn't know ab
out me. And not because I lied to her. This shit just never came up, Mr. Wood."
"Like what? Another girlfriend?"
"No!" he belted. "Stop saying that shit. I would never cheat on her. I love Nyla. I only want to be with Nyla."
"Well, I know my daughter, and I can't imagine what you could have done that would drive her out of town. You got a kid?"
"No." He chuckled with defeat and rested his forehead on his hands propped by the table. "She didn't know my age."
Maleek's eyes narrowed and one gray eyebrow cocked. "You ain't twenty-one?"
"No." Dom glanced away.
"Well shit, boy. How old are you?" He studied the guy across the table from him and knew he wasn't much older than twenty-one, but he didn't look much younger, either.
"I'm seventeen."
"Son of a bitch," mumbled from his lips while he looked at the bottle in his hand, trying to recall if Dom had ever accepted one of the many beers he'd offered. "You're a drop out?"
"No, Sir," Dom replied with confidence and Maleek's look of surprise turned to confusion.
"How do you work two jobs and go to school? Was that summer vacation?"
"Yeah, I was on summer vacation, but I work after school. That's why I work late hours."
"And them early hours ain't for work, are they?"
"They were, but now they're for school again."
"I'll be damned." Maleek studied him, and now knowing the truth, he could see the youthful attributes to Dom's face.
"We've never talked about my age. I never lied and said I was going to work when I was going to school. I didn't lie to her."
"But you kept it from her 'cause you knew she wouldn't date you."
"I didn't think it'd matter!" he blatantly lied and Maleek laughed, tapping the table through the laughter.
"Dom, as much as I like you, and shit, after finding this out I find you more admirable for being a young guy with determination and having dealt with a lot of bullshit, but I can't force her into anything. Give her a couple days." He gulped down his beer, avoiding eye contact.
"What about you, Mr. Wood? Would you stay with someone four years younger?"
"I don't think it's the gap, Dom." His hand tiredly rubbed over his gray stubble.
"Don't say I'm a kid," Dom muttered.
"You're a young man."
"Why does age matter anyway?" he snapped, getting to his feet.
"Because she's a young woman, but older than you. Look at it from the other way around. You're twenty-one, she's seventeen. Hell, never mind, that somehow never seems as strange as the man being younger." He sighed then brought the empty beer bottle to the sink.
"I just need to talk to her, Mr. Wood."
"I could get you in contact with her, but she'd just hang up the phone. Give her some time to get it sorted in her head." He headed for the bathroom but turned back. "You're welcome to stay. Not sure about dinner," he grumbled, having gotten used to Nyla making it for him.
"I have to go to work." Dom glanced at the clock seeing he only had five minutes to get there, but that didn't hurry his pace.
Maleek heard the door close and huffed, closing the bathroom door behind him, not expecting to see Dom again.
***
"Dom." Leo draped his arm over his shoulders. "Head out with us tonight."
He was the only one that knew it'd been six days since Dom saw or talked to Nyla. He'd been showing up for school and work, but his angry demeanor had people leaving him alone for the most part.
"Where to?" His usually smooth baby face was sporting a few days stubble. Dark bags under his eyes indicated sleepless nights. His disheveled hair promised lack of concern for his looks.
"The hill." Leo grinned at him. It was the most interaction he got out of Dom in a few days.
"Yeah," he mumbled pulling away, heading into a bathroom.
Alcohol, some pot, maybe a girl could distract him, because it was becoming more and more apparent Nyla was done with them. Her online profiles changed from in a relationship to nothing at all. All pictures of her and Dom were pulled from her pages. She denied his calls every time they came through. He went by Maleek's the day prior and even he didn't seem to have much hope she would be coming back. She took her money Maleek had offered her and she bought a car. Those were the only details Maleek would give him.
It would have been so simple to tell her from the beginning then make her fall in love. At that point she would have fallen in love with no plot holes. Their book would have been harder to write, but he knew he still could have done it. Even if he had to wait that year before he turned eighteen.
"Dominic, honey." Marilyn stopped him while he was on his way out the front door. "How's Nyla?" It was odd not to see her in over a week, and Dom hadn't told his worrisome mother the truth.
"Broke up," he mumbled, walking out without saying goodbye.
Letting him have his space, she didn't go after him for answers, or demand to know where he was going. After Jeff's death, she hated every time he left, headed somewhere other than school, but with Nyla in the picture, she hadn't been worrying as much. With her out of his life, she didn't know what to expect. She definitely hadn't expected the phone call from Boney at three in the morning telling her he had dropped Dom off at the hospital.
"What happened to him?" she urged the woman at the front desk.
"Let me locate your son, Mrs. Sestak."
Flashbacks of Jeff had her trembling in fear and she pulled her cellphone from her purse.
"He's on floor five. Room five-sixteen."
"Does it say what happened? This is ridiculous."
"I'm sorry, you'll have to get answers up there."
Marilyn ran for an elevator and when she stepped inside, she sent Nyla a quick text, telling her Dom was in the hospital.
"Please, help me," she pleaded with the woman behind the desk. "I was told my son is on this floor but I don't know why he's here! Is he okay?"
"What's your son's name?"
"Dominic Sestak."
"Sestak," the woman said to a nurse next to her.
"That's the teen that was dropped at the emergency doors," the nurse responded, grabbing a folder. "Your son has a severe case of alcohol poisoning and could have died, Mrs. Sestak." She stood and walked around the desk while Marilyn kept her hand over her mouth to muffle her cries. "Where was your son tonight? We need to know what and how much he drank."
"He went out with friends," she quietly replied, her eyes not meeting the nurse's.
"Your son's a minor, this is going to become a police case."
"I know." She exhaled a shaky breath. "Can I see him?"
"He's unconscious, but I'll take you to his room."
"Is he going to be okay?" she asked following the nurse down the hall.
"Yes. If he hadn't been dropped here, you wouldn't have had a son in the morning," the nurse said to shake her with more fear.
***
Dom woke up to a burning in his throat and his stomach in knots, and not until his eyes focused and he noticed he was in a hospital room, did panic set in. In an abrupt move, he attempted to sit up but the IV tube became tangled and tugged at his arm in a painful yank.
"Careful," his mom's voice came from his side and he jerked his head to look at her.
"Mom."
"Dom, calm down before you hurt yourself," she sternly grit out while he attempted to sit up and untangle the tube all while in a panic because he was confused.
"Dom," Nyla's voice came from his other side and he froze, slowly turning, not really expecting her to be there.
When the visual proof that he wasn't dreaming stood at his bedside, he sat immediately and grabbed her, pulling her into a hug as a fountain of tears let go.
Marilyn frowned and watched Nyla hug him back, then she left the room, knowing they needed a minute.
"Dom, what are you doing? Why'd you do this?"
He couldn't talk through his tears. They hadn't poured that heavily since the day
he sat at Jeff's side in the hospital.
"You could have died." Her grip tightened and she squeezed her eyes closed.
He didn't know how or why. The last thing he remembered was accepting the dare to finish a fifth of whiskey in a steady stream of gulps. But at that moment with her in his arms, he didn't care. She was there and he couldn't let her go.
"God." She huffed and pulled away, wiping her running nose that leaked with her eyes.
"I'm sorry," he kept repeating, apologizing for them, not him being in the hospital.
Managing to calm him down, she sat on the edge of the bed and took his hand. "You can't do this. Promise me you won't do this again."
"Come home, Nyla," he practically begged.
"Dom, just shut up a minute and let me talk. Promise me you won't turn back into who you were before we met. That wasn't you. You're a good book and you're going to get your diploma and get the hell out of this city. If you do shit like this, with people like Boney, you're going to be next to Jeff." Her eyes closed and her chest bounced while she strangled back a sob. When his arm went around her, she lay her head on his shoulder. "I'm sorry I left, but I'm not coming back. I enrolled in classes and found an apartment I can afford with the money my dad gave me until I get a job." Lifting her head, she let his hand go and stood from the bed.
"You're only an hour away," he said with so much hope in his tone, she had to look away. "I'll come see you every weekend. We can do this long distance until I can move."
Looking into his face, she clamped onto her upper lip wanting to break down in a sob again, but instead she shook her head. "No, Dom. I'm sorry."
His mouth hung open as he watched her walk out of the hospital room. When his mother returned, he didn't move from the position he was in, staring out the window in uncertainty. What was out there for him if it wasn't a future with Nyla?
"Falling in love is easy," she softly said and her hand lay gently on top of his. "But letting go of your first love is one of the hardest things you'll have to do." She kissed his forehead. "Let's get you checked out."
His mom's words haunted him for the first two months, and because of that, he didn't stop trying to talk to Nyla. She wouldn't take his calls. She wouldn't accept any contact on social media. And she wasn't visiting Maleek.