by A. D. Ellis
“Or what?” Kendrick challenged, although his voice held a lot less force than he meant for it to.
“Or we come back with reinforcements. And we don’t leave. Plus, I know the guy who owns this house will be back in just over two weeks, so it’s perfect timing.” Decker smirked knowing he had the upper hand.
“So, I can spend the next two weeks having sex, drinking, and partying. Then I have to submit myself to the six of you or face the entire Morgan-Jordan-Martin family? Gee, when you put it like that I guess I have no choice. Although, it could be fun to have the grandmas over here. I could tell them about my recent sexcapades with a guy.” He knew exactly what he was doing. If he could get them distracted enough, maybe they’d stop pushing at him.
Unfortunately for him, the whole group also knew what he was doing.
“Nice try, fucker. You can’t use the shock and awe in hopes of distracting us.” Zach shook his head.
“While we won’t take the bait of distraction, we will take a momentary break from the serious to ask for details of the guy-on-guy action.” Luke winked at him, and Kendrick was grateful to the man for offering a brief reprieve.
“Not a whole lot to tell. I’m not sold on kissing a guy. It’s not unpleasant, but I think I prefer the softness of a girl. I was too drunk to remember the first time, but the second time was pretty enjoyable. He’s bi, so he’s into her, but I think he’s a lot more into taking cock if you want to know the truth.” Kendrick hesitated in a rare moment of uncertainty. “Truth be told, if I’m being honest, I was really glad he got off first, because then I could focus more on her.”
“Yeah, you’re definitely not gay.” Sawyer and Luke laughed.
“And, while we’re taking this break before diving back into the whole ‘get Kendrick over this and back home’ plan, let’s hear about this girl.” Katie wagged her brows.
“Not a whole lot to tell. Her name is Jay. Totally not my type, body-wise or personality-wise. Tiny little thing, no huge anything on this girl. Not a complete bimbo or flake either. Completely detached. She’s a waitress at The Café. I’m guessing she may keep me around for another couple weeks before she moves on. Tony says that’s her usual M.O.” Kendrick let his mind wander to Jay. Was she alone? Getting ready for work? Planning another night of fun? Would it include him?
“Be careful. You don’t need the added drama of a girl while you’re trying to get through this shit. Speaking of this shit, you plan on telling us about it?” Decker challenged.
Kendrick leaned forward, taking his head into his hands. It would be so easy to just open up, tell them all about it. But opening those flood gates meant pain and anger and fear. He just wasn’t ready.
“I’m just not ready. It hurts, and I don’t especially feel like ripping that particular band-aid off right now.” Kendrick stood, effectively shutting down the conversation.
The rest of the group stood as well.
“Well, prepare yourself to rip that band-aid off, because we’ll expect you home in two weeks. Home for good, or we’re coming back with the rest of the group.” Decker squeezed his shoulder.
“And we know it hurts, Kendrick. Bad stuff always hurts. But it will never stop hurting if you don’t open it up so it can drain and heal. Look at us. Between the seven people standing here, four of us aside from you have gone through some hard shit, but we’re healing. Why? Because we let others in; we told our story; we let it hurt for a while. And we let our family and friends hold us while we cried.” Sawyer hugged him close.
“This will happen, Kendrick. It will be hard. It will hurt. And it likely will get worse before it gets better. But, you’ve got this, you’ll survive and thrive. You just have to make that first step and be willing to make yourself vulnerable.” Zoey let him hug her tightly.
It will likely get worse before it gets better.
Yeah, that was the shit he was most afraid of.
**********
Two weeks later, after several late night booty calls and hookups with Jay, Kendrick found himself sitting at what had quickly become his favorite table at the Torey Hope Café. The place had charm, as did so many establishments in his beloved little hometown, and the food was great. But what made him keep coming in for lunch each day wasn’t the ambiance or the menu. It was Jay. He knew the little fling they had going would end soon. He knew she wasn’t looking to settle down. And he knew he had way too much on his plate to seriously contemplate a real relationship. But none of that stopped him from coming in for a meal each day since he’d met her. She’d obviously noticed his sudden love of café food, and his perfect timing to always show up right when the rush was over and she had more time to devote to serving his food and talking to him.
Today was no different.
“I’m going to sit with Kendrick and take my break.” Jay called to her boss when the last of Torey Hope’s lunch munchers had bustled out the door.
“Hey there, sexy guy. What brings you by? Just can’t get enough of the turkey on rye and some tasty apple pie?” She delivered her rhymes with barely a smirk.
“Aww, my little Pixie is a poet who doesn’t know it.” He reached out to tweak her nose.
“Don’t call me Pixie.”
“Sorry, can’t help it. It just fits.” Kendrick finished his sandwich and took a swig of milk.
“I can’t believe you drink so much milk.” She wrinkled her nose.
“What? It’s good and healthy. Better than soda, right?”
“I guess.”
“Speaking of names, what’s your full name?” Kendrick had been wondering, assuming Jay was a nickname.
“I don’t think we were really speaking of names, but it’s just Jay. I don’t tell people my whole first name. Too personal.” She shifted in her seat looking unnerved.
“Hmmm, maybe I’ll play Rumpelstiltskin and try to guess it. If I ever guess will you tell me?”
“Fine. But you’ll never guess. I don’t mind telling my middle name. It’s Marie. Speaking of names, I am embarrassed to admit this, but I don’t know your last name.” She cocked her head, looking at him curiously.
“Kendrick Robert Jordan. Middle name after my grandfather. And since I’ve slept with you several times, Miss Jay Marie, may I know your last name?” He teased, but felt a bit slutty to know they were just getting to the name business after so many intimate encounters.
“Keller is my last name.” She blushed as if she were feeling the same as him.
“Well, now Jay Marie ‘Pixie’ Keller…I’m not giving up on the first name…Julie? Jane? Jamie?” He tried to think of as many J names as he could.
“Nope, nope, and nope. Listen, my break is up. You want to come over tonight? No worries if you’ve got plans.” She stood and straightened her apron.
He did his best not to run admiring eyes up and down her tiny little body, but he failed miserably. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure I’m free tonight. I’ll be over around 6:00.”
**********
Rolling to his side, pulling her close to him even though he knew she didn’t like to cuddle, he tried to catch his breath.
Jay sighed heavily, sounding very satisfied. “Damn, sexy boy, you’re pretty good at that.” He heard the smile in her voice.
“Why, thank you, ma’am. You’re not half bad yourself.” He chuckled.
When she didn’t roll away from him, Kendrick decided to press his luck a bit. “Jazmine? Jessie? Jezabel?”
“No, no, and no.” She laughed against his chest. After a few moments she spoke again. “You know I’ll have to end this pretty soon, right?”
“I wouldn’t be upset if it didn’t end right away.” Kendrick kept his voice steady.
“I think I’ve let it go on a bit too long already. I’ve never kept a guy around this long. I mean, I kept Tony around, but he was more like bait.”
Kendrick laughed, “That’s flattering.”
A few more moments of silence passed. Kendrick tried to think of ways to persuade her to keep their p
seudo relationship going a bit longer, Jay cuddled into his chest.
“I’ve got a ton of crap in my past. It’s caught up with me. I sort of ran away from it, but my family is waiting on me to come back and face it. I’m moving back to the house I share with my cousins this weekend.” He paused.
“And you’re telling me all of this because?” Jay leaned back to look up at him.
“Just to say that I’m going to have a ton of shit going on, but having a friend to spend time with would be really nice. I would be happy if it were you I was hanging out with when things are rough.” He tried to sound nonchalant, not too needy, but damn he wanted this girl to stay in his life.
“What about your cousins?”
“Well, they all got the good looks of the family, but I’m really not interested in having sex with them. Incest and all that you know…” He ducked quickly away from the hand that swatted at his head.
“I didn’t mean it that way, you dork.”
He leaned in to kiss her, “I know, Pixie, I know. Just joking around.”
“Okay, we can keep this going. But I need a couple parameters.” She paused to look at him, waiting to see if he would agree.
“Parameters would probably be good. Lay’em on me.”
“First, I can call it quits at any moment if I feel like either of us is getting too attached. Second, I am the only one who invites in a third. If you find someone you’d like to invite, just let me know. Guys only. Third, we keep it light, fun, and detached. If you can handle those, I’m in. At least for now.”
Too late, Pixie, I’m already attached. But, if you need to believe it’s detached, so be it. For now.
“Sure, sounds good. We can hang out at my place or yours. No ‘meet the family’ relationship stuff, but I think you’ll really like my cousins. Actually, you’ll like my whole family.” He noticed the extreme panic in her eyes. “I mean, if you were to ever meet them. Like randomly, not like me introducing you to the whole clan or anything like that.”
Her eyes calmed and she sagged in relief.
Not now, but someday. Count on it, Pixie.
Chapter 5
“Honey! I’m home!” Kendrick sing-songed as he walked through the front door of the house he shared with his cousins.
Coming home on a Sunday afternoon guaranteed most of them would be home. He’d known that, but he decided it was time to stop hiding, stop pussyfooting around, grab this thing by the balls and face it head on.
When Zach and Zoey came from the bedroom, hair mussed, cheeks red, Kendrick felt a little bad for interrupting them. But when Decker and Katie came to the living room looking the same, and Sawyer and Luke ambled in with that one-and-only glow, he just shook his head.
“Well, I’ll be damned, I go away and come home to a fucking brothel.” He tried to sound disgusted, but he really just wanted to laugh.
“What the hell are you talking about? We were all together when you left, it’s not like you didn’t know we were having sex at that point.” Decker rolled his eyes.
“You’re right. I was just momentarily stunned by the glaring ‘I just got fucked’ glow which radiated from the six of you. Damn, who ever thought you’d be getting more action than me?”
The group laughed, and Kendrick instantly felt his heart swell at being back home where he belonged.
“Can we go to the kitchen?” Maybe a drink would sooth his parched throat and help him get through what he was going to say.
When everyone was seated, Kendrick looked around.
“Thank you all for getting my ass in gear. I’m sure I would have stayed away for a lot longer if you’d left me alone. And while I still want to bury my head in the sand, I’m also feeling anxious to get past this shit.” He drained the water. “I want to talk to the whole family. We still having family dinner at someone’s house tonight?”
The Morgan, Jordan, Martin families, along with Captain Decker and Janie, had been getting together for weekly dinners since Kendrick’s older brother, Beckett, was a little boy. As the families grew, the family dinners continued. These dinners were often where big news was shared. Several pregnancies had been announced over the years. Drama sometimes ensued when things were brought up. They were a very large family. When lots of people are mixed together, you can expect differences of opinions. But, Kendrick knew he owed it to his parents, grandparents, cousins, and the rest of the family to tell them what had been haunting him. Might as well do it when most of the group was together. He’d have to share with Beckett and his wife, Kenja, and his older sister, Megan, when they were home. Or he could call them. But he knew the family grapevine would likely reach them first.
“Yeah, we’re at John and Cindy’s tonight. I think we’re doing stir-fry. The grandmas plan on having a huge pot of rice, along with three woks for different meats and veggies.” Zoey offered.
“Okay, well, can you guys wait until dinner then? I’d rather tell everyone at once if that’s okay.”
“Sure, man. No pressure. You don’t even have to tell us. We just know if you talk about it you can start healing from it.” Sawyer clapped him on the back.
“No way I’m telling a stranger about this shit before I even tell my family. He may have a license, but my family has been with me my whole life. You guys deserve first dibs on my fucked-up-ness.” Kendrick joked, but his tension was evident.
**********
Kendrick knew his family had all heard he was back home. He’d gone to see his mom and dad before he’d gone to his own place. He struggled against the overwhelming anticipation and nervous anxiety that rippled through him as he climbed the steps to John and Cindy’s home. The elder Morgans were blood related to Zach, Decker, and Sawyer, but he’d grown up with them as his grandparents his whole life, it didn’t matter there was no actual blood relation.
Entering the house, he was immediately greeted with warmth. Warm smiles, warm hugs, and an overall warm feeling of being loved and welcomed. He’d enjoyed his four years at college, but the feeling he got when he came back to Torey Hope, the feeling he got when he spent time with those most important to him, those feelings were what grounded him and kept him rooted where he’d grown up.
“Kendrick. It’s good to see you, son.” John Morgan, and Kendrick’s paternal grandfather, Jack Jordan, clapped him on the back and hugged him.
“’Bout time you dragged your ass back home. It’s time to face this shit head on.” Captain Robert Decker, his maternal grandfather, had a bark worse than his bite, but Kendrick appreciated the man keeping it real.
He didn’t mind being fawned over by his three grandmothers, in fact, if he stopped to examine it long enough, the fawning made him feel loved, cared for, needed.
“There’s my baby boy.” Audrey gathered him in a hug.
Kendrick knew his announcement tonight would be hard on everyone involved. He’d tried to warn his mom and dad earlier in the day that he’d be talking about some things regarding information they already knew, but also some new information.
After a delicious meal of stir-fry, the dishes and kitchen were cleaned up quickly. With both the men and women helping, the job was done in no time.
“So, since you all know I wanted to talk to you about some things, I guess we can head to the living room.” Kendrick cleared his throat.
In the living room, Sawyer immediately pulled the ottoman front and center, and indicated Kendrick should sit on it.
One-by-one, the parents and grandparents took seats on comfy sofas around the room. Kendrick would have expected his cousins to do the same, but they didn’t. With his heart in his throat, he waited as all six of his cousins/friends gathered around him. Decker and Katie at his back. Zach and Zoey to his right. Sawyer and Luke to his left. They built a shield, a wall, to protect him. Not that they needed to protect him from his family, but the cousins stood in solidarity to show their unending support for whatever was to come.
Grasping the hand Katie laid on his shoulder, Kendrick began.
“So, I’m guessing most of you remember Sarah at least a little bit. I dated her when I was about fifteen. She was a sweet girl, but she was having a lot of issues at school and home. Her parents were worried about her, thought maybe our dating was causing some of the trouble. They felt we were too serious. Looking back, we probably were way too involved for that age.” He paused and looked at his youngest cousin, Asher, pointedly. Some chuckles traveled around the room. Asher hadn’t yet shown interest in dating anyone, but they all knew it would be coming soon.
“Anyway, Sarah was having a lot more bad days than good days. We tried to see each other as often as we could, but her parents had started making it harder and harder for us to get together. Sarah wanted to have sex, said it would make us closer and help her know that I loved her.” He winced as he spoke, knowing no mother or grandmother ever really wants to hear about one of their boys having sex, especially at the age of fifteen. “I was worried about how up and down Sarah’s behaviors were, but I was also a horny kid, and I loved her as much as a teenaged kid can love another, maybe infatuated is a better word. We worked out a way for us to get together a few times when her parents were away. She lied to them and told them we had completely broken up.”
He stopped and rubbed his forehead.
“At some point, Sarah started skipping school. I couldn’t go over and check on her because we had supposedly broken up. But I was worried. When I’d catch a few moments with her here and there she’d lost weight, looked terrible, and was just sad and quiet. I couldn’t tell anyone about what was going on because she needed her parents to think we’d broken up.”
Another pause sounded as he gathered his thoughts.
“When she didn’t show up to school for a whole week, I couldn’t stand it any longer. I went to her house. Her parents met me at the door, red-eyed. They told me Sarah had killed herself three days earlier. They made me come in and sit down, and they called my mom and dad. I got the feeling they wanted me to suffer, and hoped that my parents would shame me.”