by DC Renee
I kept using the excuse that Amanda needed me—“girl issues.”
He couldn’t argue with that and just kept saying things like, “I hope everything is okay” or “Let me know if there is anything I can do” or “Amanda is lucky to have you” and even “Can’t wait to see you when you have the chance.”
I saw Amanda’s look of disapproval every time she heard his words or read his texts over my shoulder. Sometimes, she would just take my phone and scroll through our text messages.
“So what’s the plan?” Amanda asked after I finally caved and agreed to go over to Cam’s place to make up for that lost dinner and some TV.
“Just flirt, touch his arm, and bat my lashes?” I said more like a question than a statement.
“You’re hopeless,” she responded.
“But that’s what you said I needed to do,” I cried.
“Back when you were trying to draw him in,” she said as she rolled her eyes. “You’re past that now. You need to up your game.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“If I’m in, I’m in,” she mumbled to herself. I knew that was her way of a pep talk since she didn’t want to. “If he doesn’t know by now that you like him, at least in the most basic sense, then he’s hopeless. We’re going to assume he’s not completely clueless, especially since you guys have had a moment or two. That means he needs the okay to act upon his feelings.”
“What does that mean?” I asked.
“It means you need to make a move. Put your head on his shoulder, cuddle into his side, tell him he needs to try your dish, and then feed it to him.”
“I can’t do that,” I told her.
“You want to play, Gen? Then put on your big girl panties and play properly.”
When I got to Cam’s place, I was awkward at first, but he has a way of putting me at ease—when I didn’t think about the face that he was Tyler. When he ordered Chinese, I contemplated doing that “try this” thing Amanda had said, but I chickened out.
It took me an entire five-minute pep talk to finally put my head on his shoulder. I felt him stiffen beneath me for a minute before his body relaxed. Amanda hadn’t told me what to do after that, though. I waited for him to make a move, and then I waited, and then I waited, and the next thing I knew, I opened my eyes, and I realized my head was in Cam’s lap. I froze, not sure what to do. I looked up, and he had his head thrown back, mouth slightly parted, clearly asleep. He couldn’t have been comfortable. I admired his features for a moment before it finally hit me that my head was in Cam’s lap. My head was in Cam’s freaking lap.
I jerked up, which caused him to wake up.
“Hi,” he said a bit groggily. If he was someone else, I might have found it all endearing. But he wasn’t someone else—he was Cam, who was Tyler.
“Hi,” I responded. “Sorry I fell asleep on you,” I told him.
“You looked too peaceful to disturb. I guess I fell asleep too,” he said with a shrug.
My body was still close to his; so close I could smell his scent—a little woodsy, a little spicy, and all male. I waited for the moment to come, the one where he looked at my lips, licked his own, and then inched closer because our mouths were like two magnets and the strength of the pull was inevitable. I wanted that to happen so badly. I needed it to happen. I needed to jump to the next level already. I didn’t think I could take much longer of playing this game.
I licked my own lips, and when his gaze followed, I gave myself an internal high-five, but then it stopped at that. He didn’t lean closer; he didn’t make some breathtaking move. He just sat there, his breathing slow and even as his eyes moved back and forth between my eyes and my lips. I thought that was a major sign but still nothing.
I finally gave up, told him I had better head home, thanked him for dinner, for the lovely evening, and apologized again for falling asleep on him. He walked me to the door, but that was it.
“Just keep doing that kind of thing,” Amanda encouraged when I told her. “He’s got a backbone; I’ll give him that,” she said. “But he’s only human. Eventually, you’ll wear him down, and he won’t be able to get enough of you.”
So I did just that. We hung out just as often as we had before Spring Break, but this time, I found ways to be even closer to him. I even did that whole, “try this food” thing, but nothing seemed to work. Absolutely nothing. Either both Amanda and I were reading the signs all wrong, Cam was sending signals he didn’t mean to send, or he had a will stronger than I could imagine. Amanda figured it was the latter, but I had no clue what would stop him from making a move, especially when I’d made it so obvious I wanted him to do just that.
“I hate to say it because I don’t want you to chew my head off, but I think that means he’s truly a great guy. He doesn’t want to jeopardize your relationship,” Amanda told me. “He cares about you so much that he doesn’t just want you to be another one of his girls.”
“If he liked me that much, he’d want me to be his only girl,” I responded.
“Maybe he’s afraid he can’t do that, and he doesn’t want to risk it. Actually, I’m sure that’s the case. I mean, he’s a player; he’s never had a girlfriend, so maybe he doesn’t know how to have a girlfriend. He doesn’t want to ruin things with you.”
“Well, we need to get him to want to ruin things with me.”
We tried everything for the rest of the semester. But with only a few days left before finals, and then I was headed back to my parents for the summer, I was at a loss.
I just hoped Amanda and I could pull off a miracle or we’d have wasted the entire semester. But more importantly, I hoped we could pull it off because I needed Tyler Haywood to understand the destruction he bestowed upon me. I wouldn’t rest comfortably until he did.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Past
Cameron
Six years earlier …
I WAS A FRESHMAN in high school. I had heard horror stories about how hard high school was and how if you were unpopular, you were screwed, but I was coasting through. Though I was still lanky and not quite built after my growth spurt in junior high, compared to the other guys, I was like a brick wall. Girls noticed me; they really noticed me—even the older ones—and I fed off that. It was like crack fueling something missing deep inside. Many people didn’t realize that they have a hole in their soul, but I realized a long time ago I did. I didn’t have the love I needed growing up, I didn’t have the type of happy family life that would have made things more smoothly, and I didn’t have the support system that my friends had. I had a mother slowly withering away and a stepfather who hated me.
My friends never came over, and we never talked about why. My mom didn’t even seem to notice I never had even so much as a study buddy over to the house. And God knows Charles would have probably scared them away and then taken it out on me.
I walked through the halls at school as if I owned the place. Even the older guys showed me respect, though I knew it was because I played football. I would take this school places and make things happen for the community that regarded high school football so highly. I was okay with that because I had worked hard all my life for that.
I needed to have control somewhere in my life. Even as a freshman—a newbie—I was “the man” at school. But at home, I was nothing. Literally nothing. I felt like one of Pavlov’s conditioned dogs hardwired to salivate whenever they thought they were getting food. I would have been okay, but my conditioning was different. I cringed and turned into a scared little boy whenever Charles was around. And no matter how many ways I talked myself into standing up for myself—not taking shit from Charles and not letting him get to me—the minute he opened his mouth, I cowered.
But at that moment, I didn’t care. I had learned I would be on the varsity football team that year. It was virtually unheard of for a freshman to make it, but I had been the exception to the rule. I felt like a king.
And like a dumb, little kid, I couldn’t wait to tel
l my mom—to have her praise me like I hoped she would. It wasn’t that she didn’t. Whenever I would tell her great news, she congratulated me, patted my hand, and told me she was proud. It was so routine, though, so automatic as if she was playing a part rather than being invested in the entire play. It didn’t stop me from hoping the next time she would react more enthusiastically.
I should have known no good thing could ever come without something bad overshadowing it.
When I made it home, I knew. The air was different; the tension in the room was obvious even though it was empty.
“Mom?” I called out.
“In the bedroom,” she responded.
Charles was nowhere to be found, which was not surprising. He was probably at some bar getting drunker by the minute. He had started going to dive bars after work about a year before.
The minute I walked into my mom’s room, the pit of my stomach dropped. I didn’t know what she would say, but by the look on her face, I knew it wasn’t anything good.
“Come here, honey. Come sit by me. We need to discuss some things,” she said.
Like a light bulb went off, I understood everything in a flash.
“How long?” I asked.
“You were always a smart boy. My smart boy,” she said softly as she patted my hand. I saw the regret in her eyes, the pain etching her features. It wasn’t physical pain that caused that; it was the emotional kind. “The doctors think maybe a year, give or take,” she said without sugarcoating it. She didn’t have the energy to make it sound nicer than it was.
“How? Why?” I asked.
“We didn’t catch it in time,” she said about the cancer. I didn’t know what kind, and I didn’t care. All I knew was that my mom was dying and I only had a year left with her if I was lucky.
“Why? Why didn’t you go to the doctor? Why didn’t you take care of yourself?” I asked her, more like pleading with her to go back in time and change things.
“I couldn’t,” she whispered, and a single tear fell from her eye. “But I would change it if I could,” she said.
“It’s too late now,” I whispered back.
“Yes,” she responded with a nod. “It’s too late.”
And I knew with certainty that everything my mom had done until that moment had been deliberate to bring her closer to my dad, and now, as she gazed at me adoringly for the first time in a while, she had changed her mind. But like we both knew … it was too late.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Present
Genevieve
“DO YOU REMEMBER what happened when you got drunk on my birthday?” Amanda asked.
“Yeah,” I responded with a groan. I wished I could forget that night. Getting drunk was not my style, and sporting a hangover was most definitely not my style. Add that to the fact Cam had taken care of me … yeah, not one of my finest moments.
“So that’s the idea!” Amanda exclaimed.
“What the heck are you talking about?” I asked.
“What better way to cozy up to Cam than to need him in your drunken stupor? And anything you say out loud during said drunken stupor can’t be used against you later. So maybe you could drop a few hints about wanting him, or ask him if he likes you, or something like that.”
“I am so not getting drunk again. And I am so not getting drunk with Cam again,” I told her.
“Who the hell said you have to get drunk?” she asked like she hadn’t just suggested it.
“Uh … you did,” I pointed out.
“Gen,” she said and rolled her eyes. “You don’t actually have to get drunk to play drunk. Just pretend to have a few more drinks than necessary, make it obvious you need him to take care of you again, and then, bam, putty in your hands as you sidle up to him in your drunk state. But not too drunk or he won’t believe you. You have to pretend to be just walking the line of buzzed and drunk.”
“You’re rambling. I don’t even know how to act drunk or buzzed or whatever line I’m supposed to walk.”
“Just be extra happy, and wobble a bit, and fall into his side like you can’t stand, and make googly eyes at him.”
“Googly eyes? Really?”
“That’s so he knows you like him.”
“This is a bad idea,” I said.
“Do you have a better one?” I didn’t respond. “And we’re running out of time. The semester is almost over. You’re gone for the summer. And poof, just like that, all the magic moments are gone. You need something big. You need to spend the entire night with him, even if you have to discuss stupid shit while you pretend to be drunk. And we’re going to the Delta party this Saturday. It’s like a sign.”
“This had better work.”
“It will.”
*****
It was surprisingly easier to fake being drunk than I thought. All I had to do was study a couple of the sorority girls at the party and act like them. They did exactly what Amanda had suggested I do. They looked extremely happy like everything was really funny. They laughed a lot, which actually made them more appealing. That wasn’t so bad. The wobbling, though, that didn’t look like much fun. But the more I “drank,” the more “unsteady” I got.
I hadn’t even seen Cam yet.
“Why am I already pretending to be drunk?” I whispered the question to Amanda.
“Because it needs to be believable. And what if Cam is around here somewhere watching you. It’s not like you can magically become drunk in seconds. So keep going.”
So I did, and what had apparently become a routine for me and Cam came true an hour later. A fairly cute guy who actually didn’t seem creepy this time—had I not been on a mission, I might have actually given him the time of day—came to talk to me. Although, since I was pretending to be drunk when the cute guy hit on me, maybe that was saying something after all. It didn’t matter; I talked to him to pass the time. But when I felt a presence behind me and a look of slight apprehension on cute guy’s face, I was truly not surprised that Cam had appeared. He seemed to only come out when a guy was around.
“She’s with me,” Cam said, and the cute guy looked at me for acknowledgment. That made me feel a tad bit good—that the guy hadn’t backed down just because Cam had all but said to. I gave him a slight nod. He said it was nice to meet me, hoped he’d see me around, and left.
“Saving me yet again?” I asked, trying to sound extra cheery while letting my words come out slowly.
“You’re drunk,” he stated, his tone half-amused and half-angry. Why he sounded angry was beyond me.
“Me? Psshh. No. I’m fine,” I said and waved my hand around. Damn. I was a good actress.
“Guys who talk to you when you’re drunk want to take advantage of you,” he stated.
“You’re talking to me.”
“That’s different. We’re friends,” he answered with a furrowed brow. If I didn’t hate him, I might have appreciated how adorable he looked slightly confused by his own answer. I took that as a positive sign.
“Okay, friend,” I emphasized. “Let’s go get another drink.”
“I think you’ve had enough.”
“Nah, I’m good,” I said, and then I saw Amanda from the corner of my eye, nodding her head toward Cam. I wasn’t entirely sure what that meant, but I had a feeling she was telling me to do something. So I teetered as I turned and fell right into his solid chest.
“You most definitely are not good,” he said as his arms wrapped around mine to steady me.
“Yet another saving moment,” I teased.
“Come on; let’s go outside and get you some fresh air.”
“Air. Hmm, okay,” I said after a beat.
I leaned into him, and he pulled me through the throng of people to the front of the house.
“Whoa, stop moving,” I said, trying to think of what a drunk person would say after we had stopped moving.
“Maybe we should get you home,” he said as he scanned my face, looking concerned.
“No, no home,”
I said and shook my head. “Amanda isn’t coming home, and I don’t like to be alone. I’ll just sit down here for a bit.” I made a motion like I was about to sit on the grass, but Cam’s arms held me in place.
“Okay, we’re getting you home.”
“No, no home,” I repeated. “No alone.”
“I’m coming too,” he told me.
“You’ll stay with me?” I asked in a small, shy voice.
“Yeah, Gen, I’ll stay until you fall asleep.”
“Okay.”
And as Cam walked me home, me leaning into his side, his arm around my shoulders like he was keeping me tucked into him, I smiled inwardly to myself because I knew Amanda was right. This would be the tipping point. It would work. And then Cam’s heart would be mine to break.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Past
Cameron
Four years earlier …
MY MOM SUFFERED for two years. No … she suffered for much longer … much, much longer. She suffered the minute my father died. She suffered the minute she realized she couldn’t join him. She suffered the minute she decided she needed another man in her life to keep her afloat. She suffered the minute she realized Charles hadn’t been that man. She suffered the minute she understood she had given up a long time ago, and it was too late to change her mind. She suffered the minute it dawned on her that she would leave her son behind. She suffered the minute she comprehended that Charles would be the only parent left for me. Too many years of suffering.
And two of those were spent battling cancer. She shouldn’t have even made it for two years. She only held on as long as she did because she wanted to be there for me.
Those two years were bittersweet because it was like my mom had woken up from a deep fog. She was interested in me, in my sports, and in my schooling. She showed me the affection I had longed for all my life. She asked me questions—things she should have already known, but I was grateful nonetheless.