by JP Summers
“You think you’ve taken advantage of me?”
“Yeah. That’s kind of how I see it.”
Carson propped himself on his side to directly face me, candidly responding, “Let me fill you in on a little secret. Usually when someone doesn’t want something to transpire, they’ll put a stop to it. Trust me when I say I had no intention of stopping you. It might have been a little dramatic of me to say I could die if we didn’t have sex, but your barely clothed body pressed against mine made me want you so damn bad. If anyone should apologize, it should be me.”
I was relieved. His admittance about wanting to sleep with me did make me gloat just a little. Okay, I wanted to jump up and down out of excitement.
He took me by surprise as his arms snaked around me to hold me against him. Both of our body temperatures had risen from the previous activities that I wouldn’t have minded a repeat of. Judging by the way Carson’s groin was pressed against the inner part of my thigh, I could tell he was definitely ready for another cardio workout.
A small ray of light peeked out of the gray clouds and shone through the window. Even with the blizzard conditions escalating, the sun had managed to send us a message. There was still hope this storm would let up and we would make it out of here alive.
I held onto Carson’s arms, relishing how we’d managed to physically and emotionally become this close in the past twenty-four hours. I didn’t want to risk making things awkward between us again, but a small part of me needed to hear the truth about why I deserved to lose the only person that meant everything to me. I deserved to know why my best friend turned against me and so abruptly took off to make the worst decision of his life knowing I would have done anything to make things right between us.
Before I had a chance to back out of the most idiotic, bold thing I was ever going to do, I gripped on even tighter to Carson while asking, “Why wouldn’t you say how you truly felt about me in high school?”
Carson’s chest muscles contracted against my back. His breath heated and quickened, lingered near the nape of my neck. I closed my eyes, worried he might retaliate with more unpleasant words. Ones I wouldn’t be able to handle this time around. My fretful heart pounded so hard I was certain it would bruise the insides of my chest. As much as I hated to admit it, Carson managed to control every one of my emotions.
A few more minutes of dead silence passed between us until Carson pressed his mouth to the ridge of my ear divulging, “After all this time, how could you not have known?”
“Known what?” I curiously prompted, looking for the truth.
Carson let out a frustrated sigh as he continued, “How I really felt about you?”
I twisted my head around facing Carson. With our lips perfectly aligned, I asserted, “It became almost impossible to tell anything with you. You spent most of your time being in love with Erin, and then you pushed me into dating other guys because you said it just wasn’t the right time for us to consider dating.”
One of Carson’s hands removed itself from my tight grasp, then placed itself on the bottom of my chin, firmly holding onto it as he expressed, “Haven’t you ever heard of actions speaking louder than words? I figured you knew exactly how I felt by the way I would come to your house to cheer you up if you were upset, spend the day going to mall after mall holding your bags while you tried to decide what looked cuter on you, or sit through a stupid chick flick just because you wanted to see it and I didn’t. I wouldn’t have gone through any of that trouble for someone I didn’t care deeply about.”
“So you’re saying that you…”
“Yes, Tia, I am.”
“Then why not say it at least once to me? I didn’t have to hear the words all the time, I just wanted you to confess you felt the same about me as I felt about you.”
“I tried so hard to say it, but my fear of losing what we had kept me from saying so.”
“But look what happened from not telling me? We destroyed one another. I would have never done anything to hurt you if you hadn’t hurt me first.”
“So this was all about payback for something I did to you?”
“No… no… it had nothing to do with revenge. What I meant was…”
“You know what, Tia, let’s just focus on staying warm.”
He dropped his hand from my face, then loosened his grip on my body. Though he may not have wanted to bring up the past, I was far from dropping the topic. We had to resolve everything before it was too late. We had to fix things between us or we’d never be able to move past what happened five years ago.
I know Carson didn’t want to discuss anything, but I had to apologize. I turned my head back around to see Carson with his eyes all red. He had tears forming in the corner of his eyes, making me feel like shit. I shouldn’t have prodded for an answer that clearly upset him. Guilt ridden, I swallowed thickly. “I’m sorry for asking if you ever loved me, but most of all, I’m sorry for opening my big mouth and causing you to run away from your life in New Holston.”
Carson clenched his eyes shut, making it obvious he needed to distance himself from me, figuratively speaking. I know I’d blamed him numerous times for causing the whole mess between us, but I was just as guilty. If I were any kind of friend, I wouldn’t have gone behind his back and done something so foolish it would ultimately start the domino effect that took me, him, our friendship, and our futures down one piece at a time.
I turned my head back around to hear a huge sigh. “Tia, what happened at the end of our senior year was one of the worst things I ever had to go through, but that’s not even the part that hurt me the most.”
I felt Carson’s trembling hands on my stomach. I used the weight of my fingers to steady it, but he forced my comforting grip away. I placed my arms at my sides, not wanting to upset him any more than he already was. I could feel his body tensing up, alerting me that what he was about to say wasn’t going to be pleasant.
Carson’s hands finally stopped shaking as he completely removed his arms from my body and erupted, “When I saw you with Evan on the night of our first date, it was like taking a knife and stabbing it into my heart.”
Rage coursed through my veins. Hearing that name opened up so many old wounds. Of course, Carson didn’t mind rubbing salt in them. I couldn’t believe the nerve of him getting pissed at me about our first date. I had every right to be the one pissed off about him being the one who ruined it.
I rolled my body around to face Carson and gritted my teeth, spitting out, “I’m sorry, but weren’t you the one who went home with someone else first?”
Anger filled the air around us. If looks could kill, we would be in the middle of a duel, ready to pull the trigger. The storm was getting more intimidating on the outside, but not as much as it was inside this kitchen.
I no longer feared Mother Nature. I was afraid of what it was going to be like going through another night with an outraged Carson.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
I sure do know how to turn a terrible situation into a much worse one. It might have been wise on my part to keep my mouth shut and never have brought up anything, but I had lived with my past regrets for way too long. I was tired of being a coward.
I needed to stand up for myself once and for all.
I continued staring at Carson, waiting for him to open his big mouth. He was using the silent treatment and knew it was bugging the hell out of me. It wasn’t until I tried to pull the blankets up to cover the bottom part of my face that was starting to get cold that Carson stopped his silent treatment, asking, “Are you getting cold again?”
I nodded my head as he leapt up from beneath the blanket and put on the wool sweater he had taken off what seemed like only moments ago. I turned onto my back, watching Carson demolish the opposite side of the kitchen in his boxers and the ridiculous sweater Mira bought for Cruz thinking it was the cutest thing ever.
Six cabinet panels filled the sink as Carson doused them in vodka to start another fire. Pulling out several bottles of w
ater from the fridge, he poured their contents into a small pot he had found when he was ripping apart the cabinets. He steadied the pot over the small flames and after a few minutes removed it, then found two coffee cups along with packages of hot chocolate. Carson placed a full cup next to me, then walked back to the sink, pouring more alcohol over the wooden panels in order to keep the fire going a little longer than last time.
I was amazed at how fast he worked to do all these things in order to help keep me warm. It was gestures like these that had always made it difficult to stay upset or mad at Carson. Damn him for being nice after making me want to rip his head off for being a total asshole a few minutes before. I cautiously placed the edge of the cup next to my lips, saying, “Thank you!” as I took a few sips.
His face was expressionless as he commented, “I can’t have you getting cold again.”
I put on some of the sweaters I had on earlier while keeping myself underneath the blanket. We remained quiet while I took my time enjoying the heat from the cup in my hands as I sipped my drink. Carson sat back down next to me, keeping himself occupied by doing a crossword puzzle he found in one of the drawers.
The small window above the sink gave us enough light from the brightness of the snow, but we could tell it was getting dimmer outside. The winds were way too strong for any person to be out in this dreadful weather. Soon it would be nightfall again, making the probability of anyone coming to rescue us very unlikely.
I drank the last of the hot chocolate Carson gave me just as he got back up to make something to eat. As he waited for our cans of soup to warm up over our makeshift fire, he seemed a little disturbed about something. He started mumbling some words, making me wonder if he was becoming delusional and starting to show the early signs of hypothermia.
Carson brought over a bowl with chicken noodle soup in it, then joined me with his bowl of clam chowder. He handed me a sleeve of saltine crackers and a bottle of water from the fridge, saying, “We have to continue drinking more liquids to avoid dehydration.”
“It’s kind of hard to think about food when I’m freezing,” I stated as a gust of wind blew into the kitchen, probably dropping the already dangerously low temperature another few degrees.
“I know you’re cold, Tia, but please just do this one thing for me?” Carson commented with a pouty lip and sad, puppy dog eyes, hoping to convince me.
He did.
I breathed in a heavy sigh while shoveling a spoonful of soup into my mouth under Carson’s supervision. I ate all of my soup and a few of the crackers, waiting for Carson to touch his food, but he didn’t. Instead, he tightly gripped onto the bowl, mumbling under his breath while nodding his head in disagreement about something. I tried my best to pretend I didn’t notice, but it proved impossible.
When I set my empty bowl down, Carson immediately snatched it up. He carried his bowl along with mine to the counter while exhaling a heavy sigh. As his hands gripped the counter, I probed, “What’s wrong?”
Never turning around to answer me, he stared out of the window, replying, “Am I that easy to read?”
“I just was curious why you barely touched your soup.”
“I lost my appetite.”
“Well, you just gave me a speech about the importance of avoiding dehydration. Don’t you think you should follow your own advice?”
Carson slowly turned around, wearing a wretched look across his face, confessing, “I have been living with so many regrets since I left New Holston, but there’s one major regret I have beat myself up over these past five years.”
“What is it?”
It took a minute before Carson felt comfortable enough to comment, “Leaving town all because I was pissed off at the piece of shit I had become. I didn’t want to be an everyday reminder to my family and friends that I was a major fuck-up.”
I looked down at my hands because looking at him would make it too hard to confess, “It practically killed me once I found out you left town for good and that you were going to marry Erin.”
“Why do you think it was so easy for me to do it? I knew it would destroy you and make me feel vindicated in some way.”
As much as it pained me to hear him admit how running off so abruptly had been to punish me, I couldn’t help but be glad he was opening up to me now. I always said I’d give anything to get a second chance to have Carson in my life. I knew I was getting that chance.
There was no reason to keep anything from Carson as I turned to look at him, admitting,
“After messing things up between us, I blamed myself so much that it’s impossible to have a decent relationship out of fear I’d screw it all up.”
“You mean, because of what happened to us, you never had a serious relationship?”
“Yes,” I sobbed. “I never fell out of love with you. I tried. God, did I try. I wanted to keep hating you so that maybe, just maybe, that would make me stop all of my feelings for you. It didn’t. Even if I had found someone that I could have possibly fallen in love with, I wouldn’t want to. The agony of not loving you was too painful, so why would I bother giving my heart over to someone else?”
His eyes looked intently into mine as more regret resurfaced from him. He walked over to me, knelt down, and placed his hand on my face, gently wiping away the stray tears. Carson’s eyes were red again. His lower lip quivered, “Tia, don’t torture yourself like this.”
“You would torture yourself, too, if you knew you would never see or talk with your best friend and the person who meant everything to you.”
“SO many times I thought about contacting you, but I just couldn’t find it in myself to go against Erin’s wishes,” he replied, running his hands through his hair.
I jumped up from the floor, darting to the opposite side of the kitchen. My chest felt like a wrecking ball had slammed right into it. Suddenly, my lungs weren’t getting enough air. I needed more space between myself and Carson. I seriously thought I was about to spontaneously combust from all the rage building up inside of me.
Carson got up from the floor to walk in my direction. He grabbed my hand as I turned away from him. I couldn’t bear to look into his eyes, or I thought I would for sure lose my mind.
I felt Carson’s other hand grab my shoulder as he revealed, “She begged me to forget about you. I knew if I didn’t, it would have terribly upset her.”
I pushed Carson out of my way and walked over to where the fallen trees were blocking us from getting into the living room. I wanted to hit something, anything, if it meant I’d be able to rid myself of the excruciating pain pent up inside of my heart.
Standing in the doorway of the kitchen, blocked off from the rest of the house except the dining room, I spotted one remaining intact chair that used to sit next to the table. I walked into the freezing cold room and yanked the beautifully crafted piece of furniture toward the windows. With every ounce of strength within me, I lifted the chair by the bottom and swung at the windows, breaking out the remainder of the glass.
With each swing, I felt exonerated. I had no idea if any pieces of glass were on me, but I didn’t give a damn. I was enjoying every second of taking out my frustrations on something while imagining it was a person getting the brunt of that damage.
Panicked from my unruly behavior, Carson ran out, yelling, “What the fuck are you doing, Tia?”
I ignored him while I made sure not a single piece of glass remained inside any of the windows. What the hell do I care? I’m going to die here anyway, so it doesn’t really matter what gets broken.
Carson reached around me, trying to grab the only part of the chair that had survived my brutal attack on the windows. I fought against him as he held onto me as tight as he could. “Stop before you really hurt yourself.”
My tears blinded me as I ended my vehement rampage and dropped the leg of the chair onto the floor. I didn’t care how psychotic I acted in front of Carson. He had seen almost every side to me. Vandalizing property would just add to the list of things I
was capable of doing whenever I was pissed off.
I was completely out of breath when Carson attempted to drag me back into the kitchen. I wouldn’t allow it. I wanted to wallow in my own self-pity. Somehow, Carson didn’t get the memo. He made one last-ditch effort to pull me back into the kitchen where I could be near some heat again.
Carson wrapped a blanket around me, then led me back to the kitchen with his arms draped around me. I cried into his chest as he questioned, “Are you going to tell me why you suddenly went all psycho back there and started beating the shit out of those innocent windows?”
My throat was raw from bawling as I muffled out, “It always comes down to what Erin wants… Erin gets!”
I finally regained my courage after my moment of weakness and continued, “I hated that you were so damn blind to how she played both of us! She used you because you’re a big pushover. Everything she did was all an act.”
“Erin was there after things got bad between us. She even loved me enough to accept all of my faults.”
“Excuse me? Am I going partially deaf? It kind of sounds like you are justifying her actions all because she was there for you. Carson she was part of the reason things became bad between us.”
“Yes. Erin played us both for a fool, but you were my best friend. You promised to keep my secret and didn’t.”
“I know… I know. But as your best friend, I was only trying to help you.”
“Well, I never asked for any help, just your promise, which you had such a hard time keeping.”
I plopped myself down on the floor, exceedingly nauseated from not being able to cope with all that I had lost over the years. I seriously think I’m on the brink of a mental breakdown. Raw emotions surfaced, making me relive every ounce of pain as if I were seventeen all over again and my best friend was gradually breaking me from the inside out.