"You just have deeper scars, maybe. Or maybe they're just more visible. But you're not fucked up, Rory. Not any more than the rest of us, okay?
I slide my thumb over each of her cheeks in turn, brushing away what's left of her tears, and to my deep satisfaction, her eyes fall closed, and she turns into my touch. I can sense her body relax, feel her let go of her anguish, her anger, still upset, but back in control.
She didn't even panic. She didn't need a pill.
Fucking badass.
And i'ts goddamned hot.
Then her lip quivers. "I'm so sorry," she whispers, and I frown in confusion, unable to guess what she would have to be sorry for. "For what I said before. I didn't mean it. Not all of it anyway. I just... I don't know what I'm doing."
I love her honesty. I've loved it since day one. I've never known someone – specially a girl – who so easily admits when she's in the wrong, who apologizes without prompt or incentive. Or even actual guilt. It's interesting looking at her and Chelsea side by side. They're perfect opposites.
Chelsea isn't unattractive. By most standards, she's pretty hot. She's tall, probably an inch taller than Rory, and thin with small curves. Her nose was sculpted courtesy of a top Nassau County plastic surgeon, and she looks like she's been airbrushed considering the expertise with which she makes up her face, false eyelash extensions – according to Bits – lining her light green eyes. Her long hair is always pin-straight, and her nails are always perfectly manicured. She is, she's an attractive girl.
She's just never done anything for me.
Rory on the other hand, I couldn't look away from her if I tried. But then again, I'm not trying. But it's their characters that are really night and day. Chelsea is self-serving, egotistical, and vindictive. Rory… she's thoughtful and kind, honest and real. She's a breath of fresh air in a world full of smog.
"I don't understand why you're such a good friend to me," Rory admits. "I don't understand why you stand up for me. And it scares me, because… I care about you, and I've just… I've been hurt or abandoned by every man I've ever cared about. My boyfriend, my father, my best friend… and some of it, it was my own fault… Maybe everyone else is fucked up too, but I'm fucked up more, and I… I don't know what I'm doing," she repeats.
I love it when she's so forthcoming. And I love that it's not with anyone else. Maybe she tells things to Carl, but no one else, I'm sure of it. And I'm humbled by the fact.
I want her to trust me – to be worthy of that trust.
I've never been in a relationship. Never cared about a girl I've hooked up with. Not more than a friendship, and even that was only really with Kendall. And Kendall is very pretty. Hot, too, but not like Rory.
I've never thought of myself as having a "type", but Rory – there isn't a thing I would change about her. It's like she was tailor made for personal physical preferences I didn't even realize I had. The perfect body – full in all the right places, just the right amount to fit her slim frame. She's about eight or so inches shorter than me, which puts her at about five foot six, which isn't short for a girl. It's in the contours of her bone structure, the shape of her eyes, that unnamable something that shines within them. It's in the exact curve of her waist, and that tight little ass – the first thing I ever noticed of her… it does something to me that no girl ever has before.
But it's so much more than physical, too. She fucking inspires me.
She's the toughest girl I've ever met, and Bits – who's usually pretty judgmental of other girls – happens to agree, as does my mother. And who wouldn't? Rory's fucking perfect.
It makes me not only want her, but want to have her. For her to be mine. To be hers in return. For us to be us. And it's a bittersweet thing to want something I never imagined myself wanting, and at the same time, to know it isn't possible.
And it means the world to me that she's apologizing. Even now. She could have easily let this thing with Chelsea overshadow that earlier argument of ours, and I probably would have never brought it up again. Even though it'd been lingering in my mind.
I rub my face and then rest my hand on the back of my neck, if only to prevent myself from reaching for her again.
"I'm not gonna lie to you, Rory, that hurt. What you said at lunch," I admit.
But I also understand why she was upset. I get that it must seem like I've been pushing her. By telling her she didn't need a pill that evening in the library, and by my obvious frustration over her having had to take one this afternoon. By telling her she shouldn't let Chelsea get to her when I know I would have reacted far worse if it were me in her place. I blow out a deep exhale and sigh.
"But look, you were right," I tell her.
Her brows pinch together and she looks too damned cute like that. It's distracting.
"I still think you're stronger than you realize, but… I shouldn't try to tell you what to do. I shouldn’t have said you don't need your medication. I don't want you to think I'm judging you, I just… I think you're the one judging yourself. And way too harshly. The way you talk about yourself - that you're fucked up, that you're broken…” I hate that she thinks of herself that way. She doesn't deserve it. I don't know how to make her understand, so I take a page from her book, and just tell her exactly what I think about the matter.
"I know you've been hurt, and I don't pretend to know the details. But you're just you, Rory, and there's nothing wrong with you. You're fucking perfect, okay? The way you are."
"Why? Why do you say these things to me? Why do you defend me? Why did you tell me about your dad, about your sister?" She holds my gaze, fierce as ever, demanding an explanation for what I was sure she already understood.
"You know why."
She stares at me, as if she really doesn't know. But she must.
But it appears as if she's going to make me try to articulate it anyway.
I sigh. "Come on, Rory. We're kindred, aren't we?" I don't have a reason for it, I just know it's true. "I don't know why, but we are - you and me. The first day I saw you have that panic attack, I was just drawn to you. At first maybe I thought you reminded me of Bits, but it took only a second to see that wasn't the case. That you were nothing like her." I remember that morning with utter clarity. My every thought, at every moment. I knew even then that this girl was going to change things.
"I love my sister," I tell her. "I'd kill for her, but she's fragile, meek…” Nothing like Rory.
"You… you always insist you're fine, because you always are, even when you're not. You're tough. You protect yourself when you feel threatened, you beat triggers, you even beat a full-blown panic attack without taking a pill. I was there. I saw it, remember? And you just kicked Chelsea's ass when she accused you of hiding something that wouldn't be anyone's damn business even if it were true, which it isn't."
Rory glares at me, her gaze somehow defiant. I know she's reluctant to accept her virtues – her strengths – the same way other people are reluctant to accept their flaws. But she's a fucking badass, and as much as she thinks she's broken, in reality, she's the bravest person I've ever known.
"How do you know?" she demands. "How do you know I'm not exactly what she says – some slut who had a baby in high school and moved away to hide it? How do you know I haven't been lying to you since the day we met?"
I want to laugh. Rory isn't some slut. Rory isn't some anything. She's one of a fucking kind, and I wouldn't think an ounce less of her if she had had a fucking baby. Nor would it make her a liar. She doesn't owe me a damned thing, and every piece of her she's chosen to confide in me has been nothing short of a gift, and I treasure her confidence more than she knows.
I take the small step that separates us, until I'm right in front of her, close enough that she has to look up at me. She swallows anxiously and I hope to God it isn't because of me – that she knows by now that I would never hurt her.
"Because, Rory, even if it were true, it wouldn't make you a slut. And not telling me something personal doesn't m
ake you a liar. But the thing is, Rory… this," I brush my fingers over the top of her scar.
Rory gasps so faintly I almost think I imagined it. Because it was definitely not a gasp of fear.
It's the most intimately I've ever touched her, and my fingers itch for more, but I'm careful not to cross a line. "This is not a C-section scar."
"Oh yeah?" she challenges. "Seen a lot of Cesarean scars, have you?" Little smartass. Her hoarse tone is in direct contrast with her snark, and I wonder if there's even the slightest chance that she's as affected by my proximity and touch as I am by hers. My lips quirk up into a half-smile
"Just the one. And only when my mother wears that skimpy swimsuit I hate. Because it's hidden by all the others. Because it's tiny – her scar. Much smaller than yours. And the thing is…” I move my fingers down and toward her middle, over the waistband of her leggings, to the approximate location of my mother's scar from delivering Bits via emergency C-section. But I move them back after the shortest moment, and I stroke the top of Rory's scar with my thumb, feeling the slightly raised tissue, and it amazes me just how sexy I find something that's supposed to be considered an imperfection. But it's a part of her, and it doesn't nothing but turn me on even more.
"So, Rory, unless you managed to grow a baby in your hip, and then had some quack cut it out of you with a jagged kitchen knife, something else gave you that scar."
She stares at me, and I give her the chance to speak. I will her to tell me how she got it. To confide in me again. To tell me if whoever it was that hurt her did it, and how. The thought infuriates and crushes me at once. But she doesn't say a word, and I decide to brave the question, despite the fact that I'm terrified it will shut her down.
"Someone cut you?"
Her eyes fall to the floor, but she nods. Rage surges through my body, boiling my blood stream and tensing my muscles. I grit my teeth.
"Is this the person your father didn't protect you from?"
She nods again. But I need her to look at me. I clasp her chin and bring her gaze back up to mine, but when I retract my hand, there's a small amount of blood smeared on my index finger.
What the fuck?
"She scratched me. Chelsea," Rory murmurs.
Of course she did. I take a deep breath, needing to calm myself from my outrage toward everyone who's ever hurt Rory.
"Let's get it cleaned. Who knows where those nails have been," I say, only half-joking, and it peeks out - her faint smile.
It only slightly relieves my distress, but I distract myself with the task at hand. I grip Rory's waist and lift her onto the counter with ease. I clean the scratch carefully, and I decide to keep talking. Because she was answering.
"Was it a friend of your father's?" I ask her. She's already said that it wasn't her father, that he hadn't protect her, but he wasn't the one who hurt her. I think about her issue with the locker rooms and I wonder if maybe it was a coach or trainer or something. I've thought about this so much since I met her. But I've never felt like I could ask her about it before.
I dry her chin and move on to my shirt, which hangs loose over her bra, and start buttoning.
"I think she stole my tee shirt from my bag while we were walking the track. Chelsea I mean, but I have my gym tee, I could—“
"Just keep my shirt Ror, okay? It looks better on you anyway."
Still, the girl just hates accepting any kind of help, and she's making me feel useless again.
Sure, I stopped the fight, but it was a fight she was winning. Rory didn't really need my help as much as Chelsea did. It was instinct that made me grab and restrain her. I didn't want Rory in a fight, hurt or in trouble, even if it was the latter that was more likely. She didn't want to accept my shirt in the first place, and now she's trying to give it back to me again. Well, at least she let me clean her scratch. So I'm not completely useless, or so I tell myself.
And I won't lie – I like the way she looks in my shirt. I like seeing something of mine on her. Like that she's wrapped up in me. However corny that might sound. I continue on buttoning it down, and she doesn't try to get out of it again.
But then her voice startles me, so low it's practically a whisper. "His friends, son. My ex." I'm half in shock that she actually told me this, and I cling to this bit of information.
So it was a boyfriend, and their dad's were friends. I know I should probably quit while I'm ahead, but I can't seem to help myself.
"Is this the boyfriend you mentioned before? Who hurt or abandoned you? The bad breakup one, or someone else?" She'd mentioned a boyfriend when we'd first started hanging out. But she also mentioned someone else, and I don't know if there were more guys in her life. A girl that beautiful… she must have had no shortage of fucking admirers.
I look down at her, and rest my hands on either side of her hips, our legs touching.
"I've only ever had one boyfriend," she replies.
Then how does this "best friend" since she was a kid play into this?
"And he's an ex…? I ask her. She said she didn't have a boyfriend, but sometimes she looks so lost that I wonder if her heart is still with someone else.
"I already told you I don't have a boyfriend," she says, and I feel like the world's biggest idiot.
"I know. I just thought… maybe you did have someone," I admit. Or maybe I'm just looking for excuses for why she doesn't want me.
She shakes her head. "I have no one," she says matter-of-factly. And she's not just talking about boyfriends anymore. God, I hate that she says that. I hate that she thinks it.
How doesn't she see that she has friends who care about her? Carl, Tina… How doesn't she see that she has me?
And then she lets out a short laugh. "Although, if you ask him, he probably wouldn't agree. When we broke up… he says I belong to him no matter what I say, that I'll always be his," she murmurs, her sweet southern drawl whipping around her vowels.
"Ah, but I heard you say you, uh, 'aint anyone's," I remind her in my best Rory impression that sounds more like a cartoon cowboy.
But there was a whisper of uncertainty in her words, like maybe she's scared he might be right.
Fuck that asshole. This baddass girl? She isn't his. She doesn't belong to anyone. Not unless or until she wants to. I know it. Everyone knows it. So why doesn't she?
"That's right," she says, the confidence creeping back in. I take my chance.
"He cut you, Rory?" I lean down closer to her, and she swallows nervously and chews on her bottom lip. I can't help but stare at them. Red from her worrying them between her teeth. So full and beautiful, and I can't stop wondering how they would taste, how they would feel sliding against my own.
Suddenly she looks away, and I break out of my lip-induced trance.
"It was an accident," she lies. Last time she chewed her lip red she was thinking up a story, too, and I take note of that.
"I don't believe you," I tell her.
"Me neither," she admits.
I stare at her. I want to beg her to tell me everything. To explain why she's hurting so bad. And fuck, what I can do to help her. I just want her to let me help her. But I can't keep asking her question after question – at some point she needs to just tell me what happened, and my eyes plead with her to just trust me. I would never betray her.
Suddenly, Rory's name rings out from outside the bathroom, and Rory and I both turn toward the door just before it flies open to reveal an extremely worked up Carl. She's beside us in a second, and starts wailing about how everyone is talking about Rory and Chelsea's fight.
Rory looks to me, so I hold out my hand to help her down from the counter, and decide to answer for her.
"Chelsea's a crazy bitch. She came at Rory, Rory kicked her ass." I can't help the swell of pride I feel at reporting this. My little badass.
"Um, if I remember correctly, haven't you and Chelsea been friends since, like, birth?" Carl says a little obnoxiously.
So fucking what? That doesn't mean I fucking endorse
her. I was as shocked by her behavior as anyone.
"Yeah," I reply carefully, "we were."
Now Carl looks confused, and I feel bad. She's just looking out for her friend -- I shouldn't get irritated with her. I want that for Rory. Carl's a good friend to have, and honestly, she's a good friend of mine. I just really didn't like the implication that I'm on anyone's side but Rory's. And truthfully, that isn't the only reason I'm irritated. Rory was opening up to me, and we were having a moment, and Carl's intrusion has left it unfinished. And now I feel unsettled. Like there's something I want to say – need to say – though I haven't a clue what that might be, but now I can't, not in front of Carl.
Rory sighs before launching into her explanation of what went down with Chelsea. Carl reacts accordingly, and I just look between the two of them, simultaneously resenting Carl's presence, and appreciating her loyalty to Rory. That is, until she turns her attention back to me.
"And you saw all this, Cap?" Carl is skeptical, and I realize she's wondering why the hell I would be in the girl’s bathroom.
"No, no. I was walking toward the lot when people started shouting about a fight between Chel and Rory so I-"
"Came to the rescue, of course," Carl interrupts, matter-of-factly, and I'm a bit taken aback. What the hell is that supposed to mean? I instantly worry that Tucker's been running his mouth about his suspicions about my being "into" Rory. But I can't believe he would say anything, even to Carl, whom he's closer to than he'll admit. Tucker comes across like he has a big mouth, but I know from experience that he keeps it shut when it counts.
"Come on, Rory, I'll drive you home," Carl offers, and I resent that, too. Because I wanted to drive her. To be alone in the car with her. To watch her beat that trigger all over again, with me.
"I have my car," Rory murmurs, but I know she's still unsettled by the whole ordeal, and I don't want her behind the wheel.
ReCAP: A NORMAL Novella Page 5