I could hear her audibly growl and then sigh heavily. “Well, Preppy, it’s been real. Until we’re forced together in the same social situation again, which hopefully isn’t any fucking time soon,” she said clinking the neck of her beer to mine with a fake smile plastered on her face that dropped before she even turned back around. She stomped passed Nolan, catching his attention, his head spinning in her direction while she muttered, “Pussy, can’t take torture like a fucking man.”
I responded with a muttering of my own, “Aeropostale Assassin.”
“You know,” I said to Nolan whose buddy had just walked off toward the house. “Sometimes I think the reason she’s so hot is because of that flaming poker shoved up her ass.”
Surprisingly, Nolan chuckled instead of punching me in the face as he watched Rage stalk off, his focus primarily on her swaying ass. “Hot. Yeah, she most definitely is,” he said, biting his bottom lip and rocking his weight from one leg to the other. “I ummmm... I gotta go...” his words trailed off as he chased after Rage who I’m sure was on her way toward whatever circle of hell she usually crawled into to seek solace from her bruised ego.
I took a deep drag of my cigarette. In a way Rage and I hating each other was the most normal thing I’d experienced since I’d been back and for a brief moment I felt a little better. Slightly lighter. Like all wasn’t right with the world, far fucking from it, but maybe, just MAYBE it could be.
Someday.
I felt so good that I almost believed my own lie and that to me was progress.
It also might have been the blow.
Blow or progress, either way I was starting to feel pretty fucking good.
That is until I tipped up my beer up to my mouth and caught a glimpse of a feminine figure through the green glass of the bottle. A figure, although distorted and blurred, the orange glow of the burning torches glowing on both sides of her, I would recognize anywhere. I kept the bottle to my lips a full thirty seconds after I’d drained it, thinking that what I was seeing was a figure of my imagination as it had cruelly been so many times before. Slowly, I lowered the bottle and I was able to see her clearly for the first time in a long time.
My breath hitched in my throat. She was still the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen.
Dark hair, short tight skirt, and bright red fuckable lips.
My wife was home.
****
“Attention everyone,” King said, standing on wooden bench butted up against the brick edge surrounding the bonfire pit. The flames rose at least five feet above his head. He reached down and pulled Ray up to stand with him on the bench. Even in the dark I could see her face turning bright red with embarrassment as she hid her face in her hands, peering out through the spaces between her fingers before covering back up again. King pulled her hand from her face and took it in his own. He held up a bottle of whiskey to the party-goers who had all gathered around to hear what he had to say. Public speaking wasn’t exactly King’s thing. SPEAKING wasn’t exactly his thing, but as he looked down at Ray and spoke to the crowd there were none of the mutters or grunts that I remembered King using to communicate. In fact, the motherfucker was downright articulate, albeit I detected a tad bit drunk as well.
“We have a lot to celebrate tonight,” he started, his eyes scanning the crowd until they met mine. “The first thing being that my best fucking friend in the world has come back from the fucking dead!” He took a swig from his bottle and raised it in the air, pointing it toward me and I did the same.
The crowd clapped and screamed, their voices swirling around me like a tornado of noise, pushing me back and forth. I wobbled on my feet, trying to stay upright. I was about to fall over when King raised his hands and got the crowd to die down, oblivious of the state I was in. I opened and closed my mouth, moving my jaw around in an attempt to get my ears to pop but it wasn’t working. Nothing was working. I was a prisoner to the noise that assaulted me like toxic arrows shot into my fucking eardrums. “The second thing we have to celebrate is that now that I have my best men here with me. My family. It feels right now. So Ray and I here are getting married in two weeks right here and you are all better be coming to our fucking wedding!”
The crowd erupted even louder than before and I felt like a cannon had exploded next to my ear. King picked up Ray who wrapped her legs around his waist as he kissed her for all to see, claiming her with his mouth. Someone whistled from behind me, the sound piercing through my skull. My vision shifted from blurry to clear then back again. I swayed on my feet. When the attention was off of me I stumbled through the crowd toward the house, tripping over people who probably thought I was just drunk as I barreled through them like a blind bull charging.
The world was spinning. I covered my one ear with one hand and felt for the wall of the house with the other. A pair of hands grabbed my shoulders and my fight instincts kicked in. I shook them off and jumped back, raising my fist in the air. It was then my eyes chose to focus again, but the pressure behind them was unbearable. I looked the ground at tiny feminine bare feet with red toe-nail polish. I traveled up bare calves to the black skirt that stopped right below her knees and I nodded, trying to let her know she could guide me. She got the message and again touched my shoulders. I flinched but realized as her hand slid down my arm and she guided me to the front of the house. Away from the crowd. Away from the noise. Away from the nightmare that both of those things brought me time and time again.
“I was lost,” I said, breathlessly, not exactly sure what I was trying to say, although Dre seemed to understand. She gripped my arm tighter.
“You were, but I found you.”
DRE
“Just give me a minute,” Preppy said, breathing heavily. He leaned back against the thick trunk of a huge banyan tree on the far corner of the front yard. The furthest away we could get from whatever it was that had caused Preppy to break down in the middle of the party. He was rubbing his eyes and temples, wincing and baring his teeth.
“Are you in pain?” I asked. “Where?” I looked him over and couldn’t see anything obvious. No tears in his hoodie or jeans, no blood stains of any kind. In fact, besides how he was responding to whatever it was causing him such distress, he looked good. REALLY good.
He’d filled out since I’d seen him last. His cheeks weren’t nearly as hollow as before. His face was no longer clean shaven and was a few days past being able to call it ‘stubble.’ Where the hair on his head was always a few shades lighter than his face, as it grew they looked to be a perfect match, both being a lighter shade of brown. His hazel eyes weren’t as glazed over but they still look unfocused.
“I’m fine!” Preppy said, blinking rapidly several times. He looked up at me.
He was anything but fine.
Just when I thought he was calming down he grabbed the sides of his head and dropped to his knees in the grass. “Aaaagggrrrrrr,” he yelled as if something inside was clawing it’s way out.
I knelt down beside him, unsure of how to help him especially since I didn’t know what it was that was hurting him so badly.
Distraction, I thought. So I did the only thing I could think of. I got right in Preppy’s face, I grabbed his shoulders... and I pressed my mouth to his. At first his entire body jumped like I’d stung him but at least he’d stopped screaming. I didn’t do a damn thing. I went perfectly still and waited as I felt his entire body relax, his lips soften against mine. A tingling bolt of desire hummed in my clit as I pressed my chest against his, packing him up against the tree.
He pulled back just far enough to speak, “What the fuck was that?” he asked, his cool breath against my lips as he panted against me. His pupils were wide and dark, barely any of his beautiful hazel eyes were visible. Wherever he’d gone, he’d come back.
“Distraction?” I asked, sounding breathless.
“Huh?” he asked, making no move to push me away.
“Distraction,” I said, suddenly second guessing myself and thinking that maybe
I’d done the wrong thing after all. “When I was little and I broke my arm falling out of a tree I was climbing, my dad, he distracted me when the doctor was putting the cast on. He jumped around the ER making these loud monkey noises.” I laughed at the memory. “I thought he was insane until I realized the cast was on and I hadn’t felt a thing.”
“So that kiss was meant to be a distraction?” Preppy asked, amusement dancing in his eyes. He leaned in closer and my nipples pebbled in awareness. My panties were damp as he grabbed my arms and ran his hands down to my hips and around to my ass.
I nodded.
“Well then Doc,” he said, running the backs of his knuckles down my cheek and jaw. I leaned into his touch. “I think we can do better than that.”
I was about to ask him what he meant when his lips met mine. It was nothing like the first kiss which was practical and tight lipped. It was soft and hard all at the same time. He molded his mouth to me, his tongue connecting with mine in a way that made me feel a vibration between my thighs, like his tongue was licking right at the entrance of my pussy. I moaned into his mouth as he gripped the back of my head and held me in place as he assaulted me with his mouth, and I opened for him.
I heard something in the distance. My name being called? But I was too far gone to care, too lost in the high that was Samuel Clearwater to care who needed me or why.
Because I needed that kiss that moment and I was going to take it while I could.
“Dre!” Brandon shouted. Preppy pulled back and we both looked into the yard where Brandon was frantically searching for me.
“Who the fuck is that?” Preppy asked, holding me against him tighter.
“Brandon.” No sooner had I said it that Brandon spotted us and started jogging our way.
“Brandon?” Preppy asked, we were both breathing hard, my nipples rubbing against his chest and the fabric of my tank top as we breathed in the same air. “Who the fuck is Brandon?” he asked. That’s when he looked down between us, his eyes grew furious. His arms stiffening. I glanced down to see what he could be looking at and that’s when I saw Mirna’s ring on my finger, the diamond glistening against the reflection of the moon.
Preppy growled and let me go abruptly, side stepping me, and without him to hold onto and my thighs shaking with weakness I fell against the tree. He met Brandon halfway between the yard and the tree but before I realized what his intentions were his fist was flying and Brandon was flailing on the ground, clutching his bloody nose.
“Preppy!” I called out, but he’d already disappeared into the crowd. I ran to Brandon and started helping him up. “Come on, let’s go get you some ice.”
“Fuck,” Brandon moaned, standing with a wobble and holding onto my shoulder. “Was that who I think it was?” he asked.
“Yeah, it was.”
“Well I think your boyfriend just broke my fucking nose,” Brandon said sounding like he was speaking through a drive through window at a fast food restaurant.
“He’s not my boyfriend,” I argued as I led him over to the coolers for some ice. I reached in and grabbed a few cubes, wrapping them in a napkin and pressing it to his face. He hissed. “Actually, I think he saw my grandmother’s ring and thought you gave it to me.”
Brandon started laughing. Full out belly laughing. “Oh my shit I have to call Ralph right fucking now,” Brandon said reaching into his pocket for his phone.
“Why?”
“Because, your boyfriend thinks I’m straight. Who better to appreciate the humor in that than MY boyfriend?” Brandon said. He smiled as his thumb clicked across the screen.
He had a point. The situation would probably be funny to me.
Someday.
Brandon was just about to hold the phone up to his ear when the crowd erupted in cheers once again. I looked to where Thia and Bear were in the front and he was planting a big kiss on her mouth.
“Preppy, you’re fucking next!” someone shouted, and I realized it was Billy. His mason jar now only half of what it had been ten minutes before. “Don’t drink the water over here or you’ll be getting hitched!”
At the sound of his name my stomach flipped. Brandon had finished dialing and was holding the phone to his ear. I heard Ralph on the other end saying “Hello? Baby is that you?” Brandon opened his mouth and was about to speak but stopped when someone on the other side of the crowd chimed in.
“Actually, I got married before these two beautiful big fucks,” the voice slurred.
Preppy.
The crowd was quiet. A few people in the front shuffled around and parted and that’s when I saw him again. This time he was standing on the edge of the fire pit where Bear was standing only seconds before. “In fact, my wife’s here tonight,” Preppy said. He looked around and spotted me with Brandon. Our eyes locked and he pinned me in place with his gaze. He lifted the bottle in his hand in my direction. He swayed slightly. “This is for you, Doc. Isn’t my wife beautiful folks?” I felt a hundred set of eyes shift toward me. “Don’t worry about the bleeding guy. That’s just my wife’s finance who I just punched in the fucking face.” He threw the bottle into the fire which cracked against the brick. Flames shot higher into the sky as he jumped down and disappeared from view.
Several people were calling out his name, including myself.
Brandon might have been the one Preppy hit, but I felt as if he’d punched me square in the gut.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
PREPPY
Life was fucking loud.
And Doc was fucking engaged.
She kissed me.
Noise was everywhere and anywhere.
Whispers, laughter, chattering, music, tires on the gravel, birds in the trees. Even the low buzzing of King’s tattoo gun in the next room had jack-hammer-esque quality to it that made my pulse pound in my head.
With each passing moment the noise grew louder and louder until I was face first on the mattress covering my head with a pillow and screaming into the sheets over the ear torture of everyday life.
I’d come to the apartment so that Doe, I mean RAY, and King’s kid could have her room back but also because I thought it would be quieter.
I was wrong.
The last straw was a motherfucking cricket sitting just outside the open window. I jumped to my feet and darted from drawer to cabinet, discarding contents to the floor. I was so focused on my search I didn’t hear Bear come in until he spoke up from the doorway. “Something I can help you look for?”
“My gun. Do you know where it is?” I asked without looking back at him. “Did you keep it or throw it away like the rest of my shit.”
“Fuck you. We kept your shit for a long time and you know we don’t throw away guns.” Bear tilted his head. “You got someone to kill?”
“Fuck yeah I do,” I corrected.
“You gonna tell me who?”
“Why is it all so fucking loud!” I shouted, opening the last cabinet in the kitchenette, pushing aside the pots and pans with no luck. I slammed the door and headed to the bedroom to start on my search there.
“Uhhhhh hear what?” Bear asked, following me into the bedroom and then the bathroom.
“Fuck, it,” I finally said, giving up my search. I turned to Bear and held out my hand. “Let me use yours.”
“First tell me who it is you thinking of killin’,” Bear insisted, placing a protective hand inside his cut over his gun.
“You really don’t hear that?”
Bear looked around and even briefly closed his eyes before opening them again. “I don’t have a fucking clue what you’re talking about.”
“Close your eyes again. Fucking LISTEN,” I snapped, growing frustrated. My mind racing.
The second Bear closed his eyes and removed his hand off his gun I reached inside his cut and before he could stop me I shot through the open window, blasting the little green bug into smithereens and in the process exploding the piece of faux marble covering the window sill and shattering the glass of the window w
hen it fell from its locked position.
“Much better,” I said, tossing the gun back at Bear before he had a chance to grab it back from me.
“You don’t grab another man’s gun, asshole,” Bear growled, anger lacing his every word as I climbed back into bed. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”
“Getting rid of some of the god-damned noise around here. That’s what I was fucking doing.”
“Preppy, you’ve lost your goddamned mind is what you’ve done,” Bear barked over me. The door to the apartment slammed open and King burst into the room, a frantic look on his face.
“What the fuck was that?”
“Preppy sentenced a cricket outside the window to death by firing squad of one,” Bear remarked.
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” King shouted, pulling me up and holding me in front of him, his face only inches from mine. An angry vein thrummed in his forehead as it had always done when he was pissed. I missed that vein.
“What the fuck is your problem?” I asked.
“Are fucking kidding me right now? My problem is that we have kids and women who fucking live here and you’re firing a gun outside the god damned window like it’s the wild west. Fuck, Prep. I know shit’s different around here now, but that shit you just pulled wouldn’t fucking fly before you went away either.”
“I’m so fucking sorry that I don’t live up to your new family man standards,” I said, grabbing his wrist and tossing it away from where he had gathered a handful of my shirt in his hand. I grabbed a duffel bag from under the bed and tossed a few pairs of shorts and shirts into it.
“You need help?” King asked, his anger turning into frustration. “Do we need to send you somewhere? Just tell me what you fucking need, Preppy!”
“I need the noise to stop. I need the light to stop burning my fucking eyes. I need my fucking cock to work instead of lying limp between my fucking legs.” I zipped the bag and tossed it over my shoulder. I looked back at King who was standing there with that look on his face that I was tired of seeing. “I need my friends to stop looking at me like I’m some dog who got hit by a fucking car.”
Preppy, The Life & Death of Samuel Clearwater, Part TWO (King) Page 10