Full Count (The Catcher Series Book 1)

by Bri Izzo

  “She’s drowning, and I have to save her, but I can never get to her. She always ends up face down with blood in the water surrounding her head,” I summarize, avoiding his sympathy eye contact.

  “Shit, Sky,” Benny sharply draws in a breath. His entire demeanor completely softens from when we were playing cards and he was trying to defend himself. “Does B know?”

  “No,” I firmly state. “I don’t want her to fucking know. I need her to get better and worry about herself, not me.”

  “Sky-” he tries, but I cut him off.

  “I’ll be fine. I can’t risk it,” I affirm, staring him down intensely. I really wish this wouldn’t have happened in his presence. “Don’t you dare fucking tell her.”

  “I thought you were going to therapy with her now,” he says.

  “I am. I’m working on it.” The therapy sessions are supposed to be for Buzz, and I’m just the support. What no one knows is that I’m actually seeing Buzz’s therapist, Samantha, on my own in addition to going with Buzz. It’s easier to go to a therapist who already knows what happened with the accident. After the first time I went with Buzz, Samantha suggested I come in for a private session. Once she heard about my intense dreams, we made regular appointments once a week for eight weeks. I’m only on week two. No one but my mom knows about it, and that isn’t about to change anytime soon.

  35 Bianca Ferrari

  With Halloween, parent-teacher conferences, freshmen testing, and Thanksgiving, we have four four-day weekends in seven weeks over the span of October and November. Rex makes me do my algebra homework with him watching me the first night of each of those weekends, but after that I’m free to do whatever I want, which really doesn’t consist of much. I still have to attend my therapy sessions, and thankfully Skyler always comes with me. It allows us to grow closer to each other as well as overcome the post-traumatic stress from the accident.

  The weekend before Thanksgiving is the most perfect four-day weekend I could ever imagine. On Wednesday night I’m sitting in my room about to pop in a movie when I hear a knock on my bedroom door.

  “Come in!” I call out.

  “Should you really be yelling like that?” Skyler’s scratchy voice criticizes the raised inflection in my tone.

  “Am I puking right now?” I question him and give him a silly “it sucks to be wrong” face. I didn’t even raise my voice that much; I know my limits.

  “I don’t know. Are you?” he presses back.

  “Did Savannah teach you the comebacks she uses? Because that’s not one of her best qualities,” I giggle sarcastically.

  “I was going to take you up to the cabin this weekend, but now…” His voice trails off as he pretends to exit my bedroom. I can tell by the look he’s giving me that no matter what I do, he’s still going to take me. His eyes are so broody, and I know he just needs to get away.

  Playing along to his little charade, I start begging him to reconsider. “Please, please, please, Sky!”

  He turns back towards me and picks me up, letting me wrap my legs around his waist. “My Jeep’s running on the driveway. Pack a bag and let’s go.” The adventurous adrenaline immediately starts pumping through my veins, so much that I don’t even bother packing anything but a bag of toiletries.

  “No clothes?” he questions me.

  “I have a feeling we’re not going to be wearing clothes very often this weekend,” I smirk, meeting his eyes to affirm my statement. His eyes totally agree with me. All I can think about is it’s going to be a long two hour drive to the cabin staring at his messy, already sex-y hair and gorgeous smolder. “Plus if I really do need clothes, I have some in my room there.”

  Slinging his arm around my shoulder as we walk down the stairs, he whispers in his deep voice, “You’re not going to need clothes, sweetheart.”

  The entire car ride I’m fidgeting with the window, glove box, radio, or my hair. I do a fishtail braid first but give up when it doesn’t look like Lauren Conrad’s tutorial video and do a French braid instead. But then Skyler gives me a weird look like I’m a ten year old, so I untie the rubber band and run my fingers through the crisscrosses to undo the braid.

  I’m not nervous to be with him or to think about being naked with him; I just hate being cramped in a car and I’m so damn excited to be alone with him tonight. Sometimes half the fun is getting somewhere - the journey - but right now I’m ready for the destination. I’ve dreamt about being with him, like really with him, for years, and for the first time in my life I think the reality might outdo the dream.

  By the time we arrive to the cabin, my hair looks like I’ve already had sex. The last twenty minutes I had my head out the window like all those stupid bunnies I’ve seen while riding down the highway in Wisconsin. People are crazy about their bunnies up here.

  As we walk up the driveway to the cabin, I ask him, “You told your parents you were coming here, right?”

  “No, why the fuck would I tell them?” Skyler answers, reaching for the key to the front door to unlock it and hold it open for me to go inside.

  “Um, maybe because last time you came here and didn’t tell anyone, gee, I don’t know, there was an accident,” I sneer, raising my eyebrows at him. It’s my favorite thing to do with my face besides smile. Sometimes I do it in the mirror so I can see the railroad tracks across my forehead zigzag like everyone else can when I do it in public.

  He angrily closes the door and drops our small bags on the bottom stair before continuing into the kitchen to turn on a light. I’m a total bitch. I noticed last week at therapy that I seem to be making more progress than Skyler, and I’m worried about him but then go say something stupid like that.

  The mood in the room shifts like a seesaw, and I’m determined to level it out immediately. “Hey,” I softly speak, reaching for his hand.

  Stopping as he approaches the fridge, Skyler rests his head on the door and intertwines his fingers with mine. I feel horrible for my snarky comment. I guess I didn’t think about it being both of our first times back at the cabin since the accident. The motive for this weekend has suddenly deviated from just swiping each other’s v-cards. It’s a true opportunity to move past the accident once and for all.

  “I won’t let anything fucking happen to you again,” he promises, fighting with the movie reel playing in his head as he still can’t look at me. I’ve never seen him like this except for right when I woke up in the hospital and felt like I didn’t know him. In this moment it’s like he’s made no progress in forgiving himself whatsoever.

  With my free hand, I grasp onto his arm and lightly tug so he’ll open up to me. He doesn’t at first, but eventually he concedes and looks deeper into my eyes than he ever has. “I know, Sky. I shouldn’t have said that. I trust you.”

  Slowly he picks me up, and I suction him in between my legs as he presses me up against the pantry next to the stove. He’s holding me so tightly that I’m certain I’m going to have handprints on me tomorrow. The desperation is so apparent in his breathing, but it isn’t for me or for sex. It’s a desperation for forgiveness from himself. I thought coming to the cabin was going to be light-hearted and adventuresome, like both of us, but right now I realize he needs it to be something more.

  To him, the cabin is the scene of the crime. I can see it in his eyes that that’s all he’s feeling as soon as we entered it tonight. He didn’t expect it to affect him like this either; it’s obvious.

  At first, Skyler waits for my cue to start kissing me, which is me playing with his spiky and messy hair. I pull on it, and he swoops in for a strong kiss that further presses me into the cabinets. Luckily his hand is padding the back of my head so it doesn’t hurt me at all, but it just means I have to squeeze my legs around him even more to stay afloat. He grabs my butt and clutches it in his hand, causing me to let out a deep breath.

  “Skyler,” I say as we exchange a new trench-deep look. I whimper unexpectedly, but I know his eyes are asking me if I’m ready for sex. And I am.
But I have another plan. And he isn’t going to like it. But I need to do this for him.

  “B,” he acknowledges that he’s heard his full name, but his eyes never leave mine. Our bodies are having three different conversations: one with our lips, one with our eyes, and one with our hands.

  “Where’s your wallet?” I ask coolly, trying so hard not to smile.

  His eyebrows raise at me, and then he chuckles, “Sweetheart, I brought the whole box.” I love that he read me perfectly.

  “Good,” I sigh, still feeling him in the sweet spot between my legs that is already aching for him. I’m looking forward to depleting the box he brought. I know I have to pitch my idea quickly while we’re still in the heat of the moment, otherwise he’s going to take me in this kitchen.

  “What? You look like you’re thinking,” he quietly notices. He’s talking like we don’t have the entire cabin to ourselves, but it’s so sweet.

  “You’re going to think I’m crazy, but there’s somewhere specific I want to go,” I tease a little without giving too much away.

  “Right now?” he wonders. He clearly has no idea what I’m thinking because to him, my timing is so unbelievably questionable. But it’s important to me that we go there for us and for him.

  “Yes. Right now,” I confirm. I start heading into the basement and out the back door, and he follows me even though he’s still in doubt.

  “B, it’s dark and fucking freezing. Why don’t we just stay in the house tonight?” Skyler suggests. He swiped a blanket from the couch, so he’s prepared for me to put up a fight.

  I turn around as we’re walking down the steps in the yard, causing Skyler to run into me from his momentum pulling him down. “I need you to trust me, okay?”

  “I do,” he hesitantly tells me.

  “I love you. This… is for us and for you. And I don’t want another word until after we get there,” I demand calmly. I take his hand in mine as I lead him the rest of the way down the stairs to the jet-skis that are stowed away in the shed next to the dock. “Can you help me get one of these out?” I request of him.

  “You’re lucky the lake isn’t frozen over yet,” he snickers but complies with what I want. I take the key out of my pocket that I swiped from the hook in the cabin and hop onto the jet-ski in the driver position. “You’re going to drive? How safe is this? You don’t even have your driver's license.”

  “We’re on water. This is easier,” I laugh. I’ve driven a jet-ski a hundred times but never with Skyler as my passenger. He’s always driven us except when he was teaching me how to drive it a few summers ago. Since he doesn’t know where I want to go and if I tell him he’ll deny me, I have to drive.

  Because it’s well after sunset, I have to drive slowly into the lake so I don’t make a wake with the jet-ski. Skyler makes us wear lifejackets, but he purposely places his hands underneath mine as he holds onto my waist. I slow when we get to the high dive, and I literally feel his hands trembling above my shirt.

  At first we just sit here staring at the wooden block with the high dive planted onto it. The dock is stationary; therefore the little waves I do create with the jet-ski crash into it creating the teardrops we’re both holding inside. I tie up the jet-ski to the railing on the wooden dock and climb onto it. When I reach for Skyler’s hand, he’s hesitant again, and I can’t blame him. He witnessed the accident that happened in this exact spot, and here I am dragging him back to the actual scene of the crime in the middle of a cold November night.

  “This is where you wanted to go,” he states, and I know he doesn’t like it, just like I predicted. But he doesn’t argue with me. He knows my plan will help both of us.

  “Yeah,” I admit, and suddenly looking into his eyes is too overwhelming for me. I have never seen Skyler this emotional before. He’s struggling with being so distraught and I feel horrible for making him relive those critical moments. I can’t imagine how devastated he must’ve felt that summer day, but it means everything that we can come back here together. Guiding me to the tall ladder in the middle of the dock that leads to the diving board, he lightly holds me against it so my back has some support. He takes me in his arms when my body begs for him, and I have never felt safer in my whole life.

  “It’s hard to fucking be here,” he whispers to me as I wrap my arms around his neck. Skyler holds me the tightest I have ever experienced, and I can feel the need being squeezed out of me. It’s nice that after all the time of me needing him, Skyler actually needs me back.

  “I know,” I whimper. “But you know what? I’m here… and we’re here together. And we beat this. Because we always win. You and me.”

  His shoulders fall into a relaxed state as he sighs and starts massaging the back of my head. “You’re unbelievable, you know that?” he says, never taking his eyes off mine.

  “I hope that’s a good unbelievable,” I innocently say as I smirk at him in the darkness surrounding us. Before he can answer, I command, “Kiss me.”

  “You don’t have to ask me twice,” he adds before pressing his lips against mine. Every time he kisses me I lose myself in him completely; it’s my heaven on earth, my own little perfect world. The memory replays in my mind of when I sneaked out to jump off the high dive during the night and Skyler followed me. After I jumped in he almost gave me my first kiss in the water right below. I still hate the lake patrol for taking that away from me. The same bubbly feeling is in my stomach, only intensified by an infinite degree.

  In between one set of kisses, I quickly ask Skyler, “You have your wallet with you right now, right?”

  His head jolts back in surprise as he questions me being bat shit crazy. “You want to fuck right here?”

  “Yes,” I firmly answer. But I’m so anxious to see if he will deny me this.

  “B, you’re serious?” he asks me again.

  “Yes. So we can close that bad memory and open a new one,” I plead.

  After a very long moment of him torturously silently inside his own head, he seems to accept my idea but then suddenly defers. “I don’t have my wallet,” he sighs. Really, Sky? I’m so disappointed. I want to do this so badly so he can finally feel closure from the accident and-

  “But I did bring a condom in my pocket,” he adds, interrupting my thoughts. Instantly I jump up and kiss him on the cheek. “I knew wherever you were bringing me it was because you wanted to fuck there.”

  “Thank you,” I smile. Then I flip from sappy to sexy, kissing him slowly from his collarbone up to his ear where I lightly bite his earlobe. He lets out a small moan, alerting me that that move affects him. “Sky, are you ready for this?” I hope flirtatiously.

  “We’ve waited long enough,” he thinks aloud, reaching to roll my shirt over my head, exposing my boobs to the brisk air. Thankfully it’s too cold for mosquitoes to still be out by the water. Within a moment I’m already shivering, so he throws off his shirt and puts it around my shoulders. The blanket lays on the dock a few feet away from us. “Lay down.” I follow his command as he fluffs my shirt like a pillow beneath my head. I’m not even sure how both of our pants come off, but soon I’m left in just my panties that read, “I dare you.” What? I had a feeling we were going to fuck this weekend; I had to be ready.

  Skyler kisses the words but then removes my panties so fast I’m certain they had to have ripped. He brings his hand against me, and I’m already wet enough that I could’ve filled the whole lake if it had been empty. But he wants to make sure I’m ready before he completely fills me, and I appreciate that. I really don’t want it to hurt.

  “Sky… Skylerrrrrrr,” I barely breathe as he works his fingers in me and his lips on mine. I’m conscious about keeping my voice at my absolute quietest so the lake patrol won’t fucking ruin this moment, too. When I start feeling a cool sensation between my legs, I can’t control the noises I’m making.

  “Shhh,” he coos. That sends me over the edge. He isn’t even inside me yet, and I’m already satisfied. With his free hand Skyle
r combs through my long straightened locks and gives me a short head massage. I internally coach myself to come back down to reality and look at him as he towers over me. For a moment he’s smiling, like almost ear to ear. That, on top of the satisfaction he just made me feel, forces a smile to sneak out of my expression, too. He becomes serious again when he asks, “You ready, sweetheart?” All I can do is nod. I can’t form words for what I’m feeling. I’ve dreamt of this happening so many times in so many different places, but nothing compares to being in this moment with him. “It might hurt at first, but tell me if it’s too much,” he requests.

  “Wait!” I gasp, sticking my hand out to his tight chest.

  “What? What is it?” Skyler asks, examining my naked body underneath him.

  “Why are you talking like you’ve done this before? I thought you said you were a virgin and waited for me,” I panic.

  “B, look at me and relax,” he directs me, using a finger to brush the hair out of my eyes from when I jolted forward. With his forehead resting on mine and our eyes almost touching, he whispers, “I’ll be a virgin for another ten seconds… I love you, and I didn’t bullshit you. I waited.” He kisses me with his warm and secure lips, but then further convinces me, “I actually read my health textbook and paid attention in class when they covered sex so that when this moment came I knew what I’d be doing so I didn’t fucking hurt you. Plus I’ve seen a lot of movies since then to know the girl’s first time isn’t always the most comfortable.”

  “Oh,” I breathe in, closing my eyes and clawing at Skyler’s abs for assurance. A wave of relief rushes over me. “You thought about having sex with me when you were in seventh grade health class?”

  He smolders at me as he realizes this fun fact. “I guess I’ve been in love with you a lot fucking longer than we both thought,” Skyler chuckles. “You still want to do this, sweetheart?”

  “Yeah,” I lose my breath from the way he’s looking at me like he would actually be okay if we stopped this right now - even though I know that’s not what he wants. Clearly he’s thought about this for a while, too. The amount of respect and love we have for each other is overwhelming enough to continue through this milestone, so I bring his head down to meet mine and exchange a long kiss.