by L. P. Dover
Slowly releasing her shirt from my grasp, I stepped back and took in a calming breath, hoping it would help me think of the right things to say. I never knew she felt that way, but whatever she felt was not my fault. That was her own insecurities and jealousies.
“Hayley,” I began more smoothly, keeping my voice low and hushed, “I hate you feel that way. I never once wanted or thought Lexi followed me around like that, because honestly, I enjoy walking around in her footsteps. She’s shown me so much and became more than just a friend; she’s my family. As far as your mother’s concerned, I know she’s proud of you and that she loves you.”
Hayley wouldn’t make eye contact with me because she knew she was in the wrong, and in my mind I wanted to lash out and hate her for trying to ruin my life, but in my heart she was still the spunky Hayley I’d met and watched grow into an accomplished woman over the past ten years.
Matt waited for me by the door with Josh, who stood there wide-eyed and confused, glancing back and forth between me and Hayley. She still hadn’t lifted her gaze, even when she knew Matt was standing right there in the room, and why would she, knowing she made herself look like a fool.
Before turning and walking out the door, I glanced back at her one last time. “If you think you’re second best, then you might want to take a good look around. Sabotaging people to get ahead is bad, but doing it to the people who love you is one of the saddest, pathetic things anyone could do. If you want to continue to fuck with me, then go ahead … because there’s nothing you can do that would hurt me more than the knowledge of you betraying me. That cut deeper than anything you could ever imagine.”
Hayley sagged to the floor and I stared at her for a few more seconds, watching her cry silently, before glancing over at Josh. “What’s going on?” he thundered.
Whether Hayley planned on telling Josh the truth I didn’t know, but I definitely knew it wasn’t my place to. “Josh, I’m sorry for barging in this morning. I’m hoping the issue Hayley and I have is just a misunderstanding. However, I’ll leave it up to her to decide.”
With those last words, I walked out the door with Matt by my side. Even though we knew who was responsible for helping Kyle, it still didn’t help because we knew that Kyle would keep pushing until he got what he wanted. He wanted Matt to fail so he could take back the title. I hated not knowing what was going to happen next.
THE RIDE BACK TO MY house was silent. Matt didn’t exactly know what to say to make me feel better, and I didn’t know what I wanted to hear. I was still in shock.
“What do you want to do today?” Matt asked. He turned the key to shut off the ignition and sat back, watching me nervously as if I was going to break.
I wasn’t going to break; I was far from it.
Sighing, I turned to him and said, “Don’t you need to go back home and train with your coach? I swear, he’s going to forbid me to come around if you start slacking.”
He scoffed. “Hey, I’m the one who calls the shots. I train when I want. How about we do something today, just me and you? Surely your boss won’t mind, would he? After all, you’re working on my article.”
If I had any qualms about taking off another day of work, they were just erased by the smile on his face. He had the slight indention of a dimple on his left cheek, which made his face look almost boyish underneath the rugged stubble he had yet to shave off. I loved it when he let the hair grow in on his face for a few days; it tickled when he’d graze it across my skin.
Running my fingers through his hair, I smiled. “What did you have in mind?”
He shrugged, his grin growing wider when the first sign of rain started to drop onto the windshield. “Do you have any bananas?” he asked.
“Bananas? What do you want to do with those?”
As soon as I said it, I felt like an idiot. How could I have forgotten about one of our favorite things?
“I think there might be a couple left in the kitchen,” I told him. “Don’t tell me you finally mastered the art of flipping pancakes. You kind of sucked at it when you tried making them before.”
Chuckling, he shrugged his shoulder. “I don’t know. I got kind of good at it over the years.” He pulled the keys out of the ignition and opened the door. “But if I suck, I know that you’re the expert so I can always watch you make them.”
The first time we skipped school together we were in the tenth grade, and we did something that ended up beginning a whole new trend for us; it even led us to our favorite song by Jack Johnson, “Banana Pancakes.”
The rain started to come down harder, so we both rushed out of the car and up the sidewalk to my house. Before we could get under the shelter of the front porch, Matt held onto my waist and pulled me to him, both of us getting drenched.
We stared at each other in the cool California rain, wrapped in one another’s embrace while everything continued to move all around us. Matt brushed his thumb along my cheek, to my chin, and across my lips before leaning down to press his own lips to mine. The rain tasted a little bitter and salty mixed in with the sweet taste of his tongue. The smell of his skin as I breathed him in was intoxicating, and I couldn’t see how I survived the last ten years without him.
“Do you believe in fate?” I whispered against his lips. “That two souls no matter where they are in life will always come back to each other if they were meant to be. Do you believe that’s true?”
Matt brushed the wet hair off my forehead and cupped my face in his hands, gazing down at me with a humorous twinkle in his eyes. “What is it with you and your philosophical bullshit? You used to ask me this stuff all the time.”
“Hey, I was being serious.”
Sighing, he rolled his eyes and held me tighter. “Okay, let’s see … soul mates. Before, I would’ve said no, I don’t believe in fate or soul mates. I think we choose our own fate, our own destiny, but with you standing here before me now it’s kind of hard not to believe in it. We just have to do it right this time because I don’t think fate’s going to give us more than a second chance.”
“What if one of us screws up?” I asked hesitantly.
My secrets would be the death of me if I didn’t get them out. I needed to tell him everything and pray that he could forgive me. If we were strong enough, like he thought, then I had to believe we could get through anything.
Matt chuckled and tilted my chin up. “I’m not going to screw up, angel. You might get pissed at me from time to time, but I’m not going to do anything to hurt you.”
Wearily, I nodded and stared up at him. “I know you’re not going to hurt me, Matt. There’s just something that’s been bothering me and I really need …”
I was just about to tell him everything when my phone buzzed in my pocket. “Perfect timing,” I hissed.
Grabbing my elbow, Matt hauled us up the steps so we’d be out of the rain. “Who is it?” he asked.
I was almost afraid it would be Kyle wanting to stir up more trouble, but when I glanced down at my phone it was Bryan. “It’s my boss,” I told him, “and he’s probably wondering where the hell I’m at. If you want to get started on the pancakes I’ll just handle this and be in there in a second.”
“Hopefully, I won’t burn your house down,” he teased. Kissing me on the lips, he grabbed my keys and walked away, disappearing inside once he had the door unlocked.
Surely, Bryan wasn’t calling me to yell at me for not coming in. He was pretty reasonable as far as my schedule, and for the first time in seven years, last week was the first time I had ever taken off. Dripping wet from the rain, I was freezing cold and trying hard to keep my teeth from chattering when I answered his call.
“Hey, Bryan,” I sputtered into the phone.
“Good morning, Shelby. I see you haven’t made it into the office yet. Are you feeling okay?”
“Oh yeah, I’m fine. I’ve been working on my article and following Matt around. The sport is very intriguing.” That was putting it mildly considering all of the crap that h
ad been going down. As far as working on the article, it wouldn’t take me long to actually write it; maybe a few days.
“That’s great news. I’m glad you like it. That means it’ll make for a great article. The reason why I’m calling is that Lexi’s really sick and I didn’t know if you knew or not.”
Oh, no I hope she’s okay, I thought to myself.
Lexi hardly ever got sick, and when she did it was usually minor. She must really be bad to be calling out of work. “Yeah, she left here last night not feeling good,” I told him. “I figured it was from all the pizza she ate. I’ll give her a call and check on her.”
“Great. Let me know if it’s something serious. Since it is almost the weekend, I told her to take tomorrow off as well. I didn’t know if you and she caught the same bug.”
“So far I’m okay,” I claimed, knocking on the wood of my front porch.
“I also wanted to let you know that I’m leaving for Las Vegas in a couple of hours and I’ll be gone until next Tuesday. If you need me call my cell phone.”
Basically, what he meant was that since he wasn’t going to be there I was safe to stay at home. Usually, when he went out of town I’d go into work anyway, but since I didn’t have to I figured I’d take full advantage.
“Have fun, Bryan. One of these days I’ll go there myself.”
After we said our good-byes, I rushed into the house and stripped off my dripping clothes once the doors were closed. Matt had already changed into dry ones and was searching through the kitchen cabinets for the pancake ingredients. He glanced over my way and did a double take when he noticed I was naked and shivering trying to get my socks off.
“I think I could get used to you coming in like that, all naked and wet,” he teased, raking his gaze up and down my body.
“Ha-ha,” I snapped, teeth chattering.
My feet made squishing noises on the hardwood floors the whole way to my bedroom. Grabbing the towel I had left on my bed this morning, I dried myself off and put on a pair of underwear and a bra, along with a pair of my gray lounging pants and a Berkeley sweatshirt. My hair was hopeless, so I dried it as much as possible with my towel before joining Matt in the kitchen.
By the mess on the counter, I knew it would be a disaster to let him cook, so I pushed him out of the way and took over, pointing the spatula right at him. “If you mess up this kitchen Jace will kick your ass,” I stated seriously. “He absolutely hates it when I mess things up in here.”
Guffawing, Matt sat down on one of the bar stools and started unpeeling the bananas. “Is it not strange living with another man?” he asked. “It would be like me living with a lesbian.”
I stirred the pancake batter in the bowl, and pushed it toward Matt so he could add the bananas. “No, it’s not strange living with Jace, and for some reason I don’t think you can compare me living with a gay guy to you living with a lesbian. A lot of the lesbians I know will swing both ways. I think there would be too many complications with that.”
“So there haven’t been any complications with you and Jace? There was never a time when you or he tried anything?” he asked curiously.
When I first met Jace it was hard not to think he was gorgeous, but at that time I was still in love with Matt. Not to mention he told me he was gay from the very beginning, so I never even allowed myself to feel those types of feelings toward him.
“No, he’s never tried anything with me, and I’ve never tried with him. He’s been a good roommate. I’m going to miss him when the time comes for us to separate.”
Turning toward the stove, I poured some of the pancake batter in the pans and set the bowl aside. When I turned around to face Matt he had a serious, yet determined, look on his face. “What are you thinking about?” I asked.
He paused for a second, as if contemplating that question. “When do you think that time will come? You know, for you to move away from him?”
Grabbing the spatula off the counter, I shrugged and turned to flip our pancakes. “I’m not sure. I guess whenever I decide to marry someone.”
My heart was racing ninety miles an hour; therefore, I took my time in flipping the pancakes so I wouldn’t mess them up. Thinking of getting married, or even living with someone else, hadn’t crossed my mind in so long that it almost seemed out of reach for me.
“So are you saying you want to be married before you move in with someone?” he asked incredulously.
Snickering, I turned back around and smiled at him. “No, I didn’t mean it like that. I definitely want to live with someone before I marry them, but I wouldn’t just move in with any guy unless I knew it would progress to something more … like marriage.” Matt lifted his brows and waved around my house. “Okay, fine, this situation is different. Under normal circumstances, the next guy I live with will have to be someone I’m really serious about.”
Getting to his feet, he walked around the kitchen counter and joined me in front of the stove. He took the spatula out of my hand and laced my fingers in his. “What about me, Shelby?”
My heart beat thumped faster. What was he asking?
“What about you?” I whispered nervously.
“Would you ever consider moving in with me?”
My eyes went wide and I gulped. “As in now?” I gasped.
Chuckling, he rolled his eyes. “Yeah, maybe, if that’s what you wanted. We’re practically doing it now.” He glanced over at our banana pancakes and smiled. “I know a lot has changed in the years, but I’m still the same guy you knew before. Do you think you’d consider it, moving in with me?”
For once in my life I could actually see a future with me and Matt, our own house, a family. Could it possibly be real?
“What about my job? I would have to drive over an hour every day to get to work from Santa Rosa, and if we lived down here you would have to drive the same amount to Carter. Don’t you think that would get a little tedious?”
He smiled down at me and tapped my chin with our clasped hands. “We would get our own place, angel. A place where you and I both can be happy. We can pick somewhere in the middle.”
Tears immediately sprang to my eyes and I flung myself into his arms, holding him as tight as I could. “Really?” I squealed happily. “You honestly want to do this?”
It almost seemed too good to be true.
Holding me just as tight, he chuckled and I could feel him nodding his head beside mine. “Yes, I want to do this. We’ve wasted too much time and I’m tired of wasting anymore. If you want we can start looking tomorrow. All I need is to hear your answer, angel,” he murmured in my ear.
With tears streaming down my cheeks, I loosened my grip so I could look into his eyes when I answered him. I kissed him firmly on the lips, over and over, until I could taste the salt of my own tears.
“Yes, Matt. Oh my God, the answer’s yes,” I screamed.
Yes!
THE NEXT MORNING I FELT like I was floating on air. Matt had gotten up early and was about to leave to go train with his coach while I started the search for houses. I could barely sleep because I was so excited, but yet I still couldn’t get out of bed.
Matt sat down beside me and leaned over to tie his shoes. “Are you going to call Jace and tell him today?” he asked.
Stretching my arms out over my head, I laid back down on my pillows. “Yeah, I probably need to do that. He’ll most likely want to stay here and just the pay the rent once I’m gone. He likes this place, so if he wants it I’ll let him have it.”
Leaning over, he caged me in his arms and kissed me softly on the lips. “Well, you have fun today while I’m gone. Do you want to drive up to Santa Rosa this afternoon and stay at my place for the weekend? The fight’s in Stockton tomorrow night, which makes it a little longer drive from my place, but I didn’t think that would matter anyway.”
I ran my fingers up and down his muscular arms, feeling his muscles flex as I passed over them. “Yeah, we can do that. I’ll pack a bag and head out your way this afternoon
. I’m going to call Jace and Lexi, and probably my mother, to fill them in on everything. I haven’t exactly kept in touch with her as much as I should.”
“Sounds good, angel, I’ll see you this afternoon. Tell her I said hello.” He kissed me again and leaned his forehead against mine. “Be careful on your way up.”
“I will,” I told him. “I love you.”
He looked back at me one last time and said, “I love you, too,” before walking out of my room and out the front door. Grabbing my phone, I slipped out of bed and put on my gray lounging pants I had thrown over my writing chair in the corner of my room. My stomach growled in protest, so I ventured off to the kitchen and poured a glass of orange juice and fixed a bowl of cereal. I loved eating breakfast while looking out the windows toward the bay, and soon I wouldn’t be able to do that. Maybe my next house would be with a beautiful view of the mountains. There were so many choices and I couldn’t wait to start searching.
After I finished my cereal, the first person on my list to call was my mother. Not only was I going to tell her about me and Matt, but I really needed to know what exactly she said to Hayley. With everything going on I hadn’t talked to her at all except the one phone message, but I knew she was busy. My dad and I talked about once a month when he wasn’t out trying to impress his girlfriend who wasn’t much older than me. My mother worked long hours at the hospital and I never knew when she was on call. It was rare she was ever around when I actually called her.
After dialing her number, I waited as the line rang, over and over. I was about to hang up when she finally answered, sounding breathless yet excited, “Oh, Shelby, I almost missed your call. I had an emergency surgery late last night and I just got in and was about to take a shower. Are you doing okay? How’s work going? I got your message the other day, by the way.”
“It’s going good, Mom. I thought you would call me after I left you the message about Matt.”
“I know, and I’m sorry, sweetheart. I can’t believe it took this long for the world to get you two back together. Is everything going okay with him?”