"Tuck, over here!" I call out as I land another solid punch to the piece of shit's jaw. But my pure, unadulterated fury makes me unbeatable, and though he gets a couple in, I have him down on the ground in barely a couple of minutes. I pounce, throwing hit after hit, not giving him even a moment to breathe.
I hear Tucker, but I don't stop. I am enraged, and I've never wanted to do damage like I do right now.
But Tucker's presence reminds me that I can't fucking kill him. No matter how badly I want to, how much he deserves it. Not here, not now. Because I need to take care of Rory. My heart sinks into my stomach. Oh, God, Rory.
"What the actual fuck?" Tucker demands.
"He attacked Rory," I tell him, getting off of the motherfucking bastard, now beautifully crimson with his own blood. "Keep him down. He doesn't get up," I instruct Tuck.
I make my way to Rory with caution. I'm so scared for her. I'm terrified he hurt her past what she can handle. I'm terrified she won't want me to touch her. That she fucking hates me. Because of our earlier argument and my letting this happen to her. Because I was right fucking there, watching it go down, and I turned my back on her. I almost throw up right there.
I crouch down in front of her, but I can't think of any words. Her eyes meet mine, and then suddenly she launches herself at me, flinging her arms around my neck, and I catch her. I squeeze her tight.
"He found me," she sobs into my neck, and I hold her even tighter. My guilt is all-consuming, and I know I don't deserve to be holding her right now, but I can't let go. "I don't know how, but he found me, he found me…"
"I'm sorry," I tell her, but it seems so inadequate. "I'm sorry, I'm so fucking sorry." I say it over and over, but no matter how many times I repeat the words, they feel so fucking worthless.
But she keeps sobbing and repeating that he found her, and I want to tell her that I know. That it was my fucking fault. That I am a bastard, and I don't deserve her, but I can't do it, because I need her. I'm not man enough to give her up. I won't do it.
Minutes pass, and she sobs and I apologize, until slowly, her body stops racking, her tears dry, and her breathing calms.
When she lifts her head, I don't release her. She looks over my shoulder at her attacker, but still, I don't look away from her for a moment. I look her over; there's scrape on her cheek. It's swelling. Fuck. Fuck, he really hurt her. I brush my thumb over it and we both wince. I can feel every bit of her pain mirrored and magnified in myself, but I know it doesn't ease any of hers and I wish it could.
"I'm sorry," I whisper again. I check her arms, cataloging every scrape and bruise, and hating myself more with each one I find. I continue my survey downward, and I pull her skirt down to cover her thighs.
"Tell me you're okay," I beg her, and, please, mean it, I add silently.
She nods. "I'm okay," she breathes.
"I'm so sorry, Ror." I take a deep breath. "I'm such a fucking idiot. I came outside to look for you and… I saw you with him, but I didn't realize – I just thought you were with some guy and I just…” I rake my hair in frustration and self-disgust. "I'm so fucking sorry," I say again.
But my words are meaningless. They fix nothing. They don't undo her suffering, so I do the only thing I can – I scoop her up and begin to carry her from the God forsaken alley.
"Some guy?!" the motherfucking bastard growls from below Tucker's shoe. "I'm her fuckin' boyfriend! You're fuckin' mine, Rory! You hear me, you—“
Tucker finally cuts him off by digging his shoe into the fucker's windpipe, and I glare at him to ask him what took him so fucking long.
"I'll be right back," I say carefully to Tuck. "Keep him down."
Tucker nods, and then looks at Rory with sympathy. She looks away in shame and it guts me. She's not the one who should be ashamed. I am.
"I can— uh, walk," Rory murmurs, and it stabs me in the gut. But it doesn't surprise me. Why would she want my help when I'm the reason she's here right now? But she's tougher than anyone I've ever known, and even after this night from hell, she is exuding a strength even I couldn't fake.
I reluctantly set her on her feet, but I can't not touch her. I place my palm on the small of her back, and lead her from the alley.
Tina, Andy, Dave, and Carl stand at the mouth of the alley, confused and concerned. Carl grabs Rory and hugs her.
"My God, Rory! What happened? Where did you go? What's going on? Where's Tuck?! No one will tell me anything!" she rants, but Rory only hugs her back.
"Call the cops," I tell Andy and Dave. "Tell them you need to report and assault. Then stay here with the girls, and make sure one of you lets me know as soon as you hear a siren, okay?"
My boys nod meaningfully. I don't doubt them for a second.
"You got her?" I ask Carl. Because I need to take care of that motherfucking bastard, and I need to make sure Rory is taken care of.
Carl nods, and I turn to go back.
"Wait! Where are you goin'?" Rory asks desperately, and it guts me all over again. She wants me with her. It means fucking everything to me, but it also kills me, because I have to leave her right now. I have to make sure this never happens again.
"Please just stay here with Carl. Okay, baby? Please."
But my strong girl nods, and I know she can handle this. Because I already know she can handle anything. Hell, she already has, and I go back to the alley to make sure that motherfucking bastard will never come near my girl again.
****
Everything To Me
It’s been the longest night of my life, and for the second time today, I find myself sitting out on a balcony of my hotel suite, thinking about what a bastard I am. I only come to the same conclusion. That I don’t deserve Rory. But that I can’t bring myself to give her up.
If she doesn’t want me, she’ll have to be the one to decide that, because I won’t lose her if I can help it. I’m far too selfish for that.
I listen to the waves crash on the sand. I know I won’t sleep tonight. I can’t rest until I talk to her. I haven’t since I asked her to stay with Carl outside the alley. But I still don’t know what the fuck I’m going to say when I see her in the morning. Because the only words I can think of are the ones I’ve already said what feels like a hundred times – I’m sorry – and they not enough.
What happened tonight was my fault, but more than that, it was my insecurity that put her in that precarious position. Rory has a choice. She’s either still wants me, or she doesn’t. And that’s entirely up to her. But if she does, I can’t go on like this. If we’re going to do this something more thing, I need to know there’s no one else. I need to have no doubts. It fucks with my judgment. It made me push Rory into an argument earlier, and tonight, it put her at risk, and I’ll have to live with that for the rest of my life.
“Sam.”
I startle and turn to her. I was sure she’d be asleep. I make to stand but she stops me.
I blow out a deep exhale and shove my fingers through my hair, and then rest my hand on the back of my neck to keep from reaching for her. My gaze is weighed down with so much shame I can’t even meet her eyes.
“Can I, uh, sit?” she asks nervously, and I hate that she’s back to being anxious with me.
I nod, and she settles on the foot of my chaise lounge. I scoot back, to give her room, though what I really want is to pull her into my arms, and never let her go.
My fingers rake my hair again, and I lean forward, finally meeting her gaze. “I’m so damn sorry, Rory,” I tell her again. “I fucking saw you. I know you, and I know you would never do that even if we—“ I take a deep breath and sigh. “I know you wouldn’t just go hook up with some guy. You couldn’t. But—“
“Sam—“
She tries to cut me off, but I shake my head. I can tell from her tone that she’s going to absolve me of my guilt, but I don’t deserve it.
“Rory, I don’t even fucking recognize myself anymore. I don’t want to be this guy. I don’t want to give ultimatums, and the last th
ing I want is to cause you any more stress, but I can’t do this with you.”
Her eyes go wide, and I fear I’m going to push her too far, and she’s going to tell me she’s done. But I have no choice. I can’t half have her.
“I want to give you all the time you need. I know this isn’t easy for you, and I know how hypocritical this is, especially after everything you told me about him – how possessive he was…” I scoot closer to her, and take hold of her hand, lacing our fingers together, if just hoping to remind her how we fit. “But you don’t know what you’re doing to me – how I felt when I thought you were just with some other guy. I felt sick, Ror.
“I can’t do this half way, not with you. It’s messing me up, you know? Everything I know about you tells me you would never do that, and yet when I came outside looking for you and saw you with him—“ Just the memory of the sight of it gets me all worked up, and I have to take a second to recompose myself. “I turned into an insecure, jealous little girl,” I confess.
I look down, needing to organize my thoughts, because this is it, and I’m terrified this is going to go the wrong way, and I’m going to lose her for good. “If you can’t handle it, then just tell me. We’ll go back to being friends – I understand, okay? But if you still want me, Ror, I need to know that it’s just you and me. I’m sorry if that makes me possessive, but I can’t help the way I feel. I want—no, I need, for you to be only mine, if we’re going to do this, I mean.”
There it is, I’ve laid it all out. My heart is on the line, where I never thought it would be, and Rory has the power to destroy me, just as Kendall said, and she was right, I’m fucking terrified.
Rory’s mouth opens, and then closes again, before she takes a deep breath. “Do you know why I left the bar tonight in the first place?” she asks. She sounds exhausted, and I feel even more guilty for doing this now, after the night she’s had.
But I just look back at her in confusion, because I have no idea what this has got to do with anything.
“When I got there, I was looking for you, and when I saw you, you had your arm around some pretty girl, and… I couldn’t take it. I left.”
I shake my head. It isn’t true. “Rory, I’m not interested in any other girls, the only girl I was even talking to was my cousin—“
“Thea, yeah, I know that… now.”
My lips quirk up into the beginning of a smile, but it fades quickly. Because as much as I love hearing she’s as jealous as I am, it’s what put her in danger, and I can’t be glad for that.
“This is my point, Ror. You left a bar alone, walked right into his trap, and I saw you! Believe me, I wanted to beat the living shit out of him just for touching you, before I even realized who he was – what was happening. I should have known, I could have stopped it right away, but this jealousy… this not knowing whether—“
“I know.”
I swallow my nerves, and take a deep breath. “So you don’t want anyone else?”
She glares at me as if I’m insane, but she’s the one with the secrets, not me, and I won’t push her to tell them. Not again. But I need to hear from her lips that whatever the deal is with her and that Cam kid, there’s nothing going on. That he won’t get in the way of us.
Suddenly she deflates. Her shoulders sag, and I wait for her to either tell me she can’t give me what I need, or that she will.
“You don’t understand,” she whispers.
I don’t say anything. I don’t need her to tell me details. I just need to know she can be with me, and me alone. If she says it, I’ll believe her, no questions asked.
“I don’t’ talk about him with anyone. Cam I mean. Not to Dr. Schall, not even my mom.”
Well, that sounds ominous. “You don’t have to, Ror, I should never have pushed you. I feel like a huge dick for it; I’m sorry.”
“No, Sam, I’m sorry. In fact, I was looking for you at the bar tonight so I could apologize—“
But she owed me no apology. “Rory—“
“Please, Sam, just let me explain, okay?” She’s pleading, and I won’t stop her if she wants to tell me. I just don’t want her to feel as if she has to.
“Okay, baby,” I whisper, tightening my hold on her hand. “But not over there.”
I scoot back and to the side and pull her beside me so I can hold her. I slide my arm around her, and she cuddles into me, making my world right again.
I nuzzle her hair, and breathe deeply. She showered since she got back to the hotel, and she smells of the hotel’s conditioner again.
Then Rory tells me exactly what happened between her and her best friend, and I listen intently, absorbing each word, and feeling more and more like the world’s biggest asshole with every revelation.
It shocks me that he’s dead. And as her story unfolds, I understand her earlier hesitation. Her friendship was complicated at the end, but it’s not her fault, none of it was her fault, and I hold her tighter and tighter with each passing moment.
She’s had to endure even more than I knew. More than I ever imagined. And adding the grief of losing the best friend she loved more than anything so tragically, it’s a wonder she handled everything as well as she did. That all she walked away with was an anxiety disorder.
The idea that she ever saw herself as weak boggles my mind.
She is the epitome of fierce strength, and I couldn’t be prouder of her.
She snuggles into me and I hold her as tightly as I can without hurting her, and whisper to her how brave she is, how incredible, and for once, she lets me.
“I’m so sorry about earlier, Ror. I had no idea. I don’t know what I was even accusing you of – I was just being jealous and paranoid. And possessive…” I trail of, feeling so impossibly inept at this. I hope she knows I’m trying. That I’ve never done anything like this before.
“You should know, I have no fucking clue what I’m doing,” I confess. “I’ve never been in a relationship – never had a single jealous feeling over a girl. But with you…” I shake my head I self-reproach. “I overreacted when I should have just trusted you. It helps knowing we’re on the same page, but look, I shouldn’t have pushed you.”
Rory shrugs. “It was my fault, Sam. I should’ve just told you. I just… It’s just… hard to talk about.”
Well, of course it is.
I brush her cheek with my fingers, tracing the outline of the bandage there. I want more than anything to kiss her, but I wait.
“I’m glad you told me,” I admit.
“Hey,” she says suddenly, “tell me somethin’ about you no one else knows.”
But she already knows everything about me. Except one very important thing. I definitely hadn’t planned on telling her this tonight – I’m not sure I planned on actually telling her ever, in fact. But it doesn’t matter anymore. I’m so fucking lost to her there’s no coming back. I bite my lip, and pretend to mull it over.
“How about I tell you something everyone else knows… apart from you, apparently,” and she blinks at me. But I’m pretty sure my closest friends knew it before I even did, and there’s no hiding it now. “Rory…”
“Yeah?”
“I fucking love you.”
There it is. I can’t take it back now. And fuck if I even want to.
Rory gasps in unfathomable surprise, because how could she not know?
Her eyes widen and her mouth gapes open, but I don’t need her to say anything. This was about what I needed to say.
My fingers creep into her hair, tentatively, afraid to push her after the night she’s had, and I slowly pull her face to meet mine. But she suddenly crushes her mouth to mine, and her swollen lips bring me back home.
But she pulls away abruptly, looking somehow startled.
I watch her process her own thoughts, anxious and afraid. But there’s nothing to fear. It’s not a selfish thing. I didn’t say it to gain anything from her. It’s just a truth I’ve known a while, that I needed to verbalize, that’s all.
&nbs
p; “Ror?”
“You… you can’t,” she decides, and I don’t understand her meaning.
“I can, baby girl,” I counter. And I do. My mouth twists into a small smile at her doubt. She judges herself so harshly. It shocks me that she’d believe, even now, that she’s somehow unlovable to me, but I won’t let her believe it for another moment.
But she wrenches out of my arms and stands, like she can’t get away from me fast enough.
I’m overcome with fear. Worried I’ve made a terrible mistake in my confession. What if she can’t handle it right now? What the fuck was I thinking?
Or maybe she’s just worried because she doesn’t feel the same. But that’s not what this is about. I knew she probably didn’t. I’ve made peace with that.
“No, Sam—“
“It’s okay if you don’t feel the same, Ror, I didn’t mean to pressure you, or—“
“No, it’s not that! Of course I love you, Sam!”
My jaw drops. It’s the last words I expected to come out of her mouth. And the fact that she looks horrified at her admission only solidifies their truth. She hadn’t meant to say it.
Rory loves me.
Rory really fucking loves me.
My chest practically explodes.
“Damn it!” She rubs her face in frustration, and takes a deep breath. But I wait patiently.
I can handle anything she throws at me right now. Because she fucking loves me. I want to shout it from the balcony.
“Sam, I… I do love you,” she admits again.
A thrill runs through me. She’s not backtracking. I want to grab her and kiss her again, but first she needs to work through whatever is fucking with her head right now.
“Which is why I can’t do this. Why I can’t let you do this. You – you’re amazing. You deserve a normal girl, with a normal life, and normal problems. Not…” she gestures to her perfect self, “me. A broken mess.”
I want to scream in frustration. I can’t listen to this again. It’s complete and utter bullshit. I stand up, reigning in my anger at her words. “Don’t you talk about yourself like that! We’ve been over this!” How many times do I have to explain this?
ReCAP: A NORMAL Novella Page 12