by Stella Rhys
And till the day she shattered me to pieces, we kept at our game. It started when Elena got sick and Lake’s Aunt Paula, came to take over cleaning. Unlike fiery Elena, she was boring. Presented no challenges. She did whatever we asked, gave us whatever we wanted. She was so dim she reached right up to hand us whatever we pointed to, too absent to realize she was giving say, a full bottle of Ketel to a pair of fifth graders.
So we started the game of truth or dare.
What naughty little thing would finally get Paula’s attention? Stealing the joint from her purse? Lake dared me to swipe it and I dared her to take the first hit. The next year, our dares graduated to sneaking out of the townhouse with Paula’s cash, running down the street to buy soda and candy and condoms just to see what they looked like. Years later, I’d let her watch me put one on. I dared her to give me something to look at, to get me hard enough to show her how a rubber worked. And Jesus fuck, did she come through.
Yeah.
The challenge had most definitely taken a turn by high school. It had nothing to do with getting in trouble, but pushing each other past our furthest physical, emotional and sexual boundaries, the lines of which grew fainter with every minute we spent together. It helped that we always picked dare.
Because for every “truth” you uttered, the other person could pass a turn for free, and that made for a boring day with no scandal or shame, which was everything Lake and I grew to fear. We needed those things. Thanks to each other, we grew up fucked in the head, living off the daily adrenaline of shocking, arousing and one-upping each other. I dared her to streak down Sixty-First Street in just her schoolgirl skirt. She dared me to jerk off in front of the window. I dared her to flash Mr. Price her tits. She dared me to start an affair with Miss Kane. I said she couldn’t seduce my girlfriend. She proved me more than wrong. By college, we had a handful of threesomes under our belt. But I always favored having Lake to myself because that was how it was meant to be. I was the first to see her body naked, the first to touch it, the first to show it pleasure. I was the one who took her virginity when she was finally ready and the one who knew every part of her, inside and out. That body belonged to me.
Growing up, that was my truth.
By the time we turned twenty-one, I’d fallen in and out of love with Lake at least a thousand times. And she knew it. But she still chose to disappear one day, without a word to me or my mother, who took only a couple months to turn grey and spiral into depression. She had invested love and time into Lake, chosen this exceptional girl over her husband. Over me. And Lake had shown her gratitude by vanishing into thin air one rainy Sunday morning. She had taken several things of ours with her – things worth a small fortune – but we didn’t blink twice over that shit. All we wanted was to find her but after she sent that one message asking us to stop, we did.
And I went back to hating her, with a passion a million times deeper than any one I’d ever loved her with. On top of that, I went on to accomplish every last goal that, depending on her mood, she said I would or would never achieve. I broke all the hearts she claimed I was going to and I became the cruel, powerful man she declared I’d be when we were only thirteen. And I managed to do it all without missing her once. I wouldn’t let myself so much as think of her. Lake was a bad lifestyle choice. An addiction. And I had to stay sober to build my empire, make my fortune and care for my mom. Which is exactly what I did. I found a way to love my life stripped of the twisted girl who made me, who I made.
But as of this morning, she’s back in Manhattan. And despite the war I went through to forget her, I have to have her.
In every way that exists.
DARE ME (a standalone romance) Available 9/30/15
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