Love Burns

by Adrian J. Smith

  Once more, Kimberly smiled against her, and Becca’s heart gave one deep thud, forcing the air from her lungs. She was drowning in a sea of Kimberly, and she didn’t even have the wherewithal or the desire to try to swim back up. No, she was exactly where she wanted to be.

  She dug her fingers into Kimberly’s hair, making sure she had a tight hold and pulling Kimberly into her even more. She didn’t want this moment to end. She slid her tongue around Kimberly’s, drawing circles and teasing each time Kimberly squeezed her breast. Becca pushed away from the wall and flipped them so Kimberly’s back was against the stone, and she pressed delicately into her.

  Fear coursed through her at the thought of their kiss breaking, and she tripled her efforts to keep Kimberly exactly where she wanted her—with their lips locked. Becca reached under Kimberly’s shirt, sighing when her fingertips touched warm, smooth skin. She heard Kimberly’s sharp intake of breath and dug her nails in slightly in response—their old dance coming alive again no matter how much time had passed.

  “Mama?”

  Becca jerked away sharply and wiped her fingers over her lips as she stared wide-eyed at Kimberly, who was still heaving against the wall.

  “Kim, are you out here?” Bradley’s voice covered Michael’s soft one.

  “Yeah, I’m right here.” Kimberly shoved her shirt into place and sent a longing look to Becca.

  Becca couldn’t discern what Kimberly was trying to tell her, but her heart was back in her throat and words had escaped her. Kimberly put herself together and looked up as Bradley rounded the corner beside the back door and stopped short. His gaze made quick work of the both of them before he grinned and turned around, stopping Michael in his tracks with a hand.

  “Mama will be right in, bud. I think she just needed some fresh air.”

  He started toward the door, and Kimberly shot Becca another sharp look, her lips parting as if to say something. Becca shook her head and closed her eyes as she held up a hand to stop Kimberly. In a rush of air, Becca confessed, “I’m seeing someone.”

  “Oh,” Kimberly answered, her gaze not wavering from Becca’s face. Disappointment filtered through her eyes, and Becca’s heart broke a little more. “Guess she can’t be too great then.”

  With that comment, anger flared in Becca’s chest. She focused on it, rode it out and used it to escape. She rolled her eyes, crossed her hands over her chest and glared. “Like you would even know how to be a girlfriend.”

  Kimberly put her hands out in surrender, but Becca brushed by them as she took a step onto the sidewalk, her shoulders stiff and jaw tight. She straightened her shirt again before she headed to the front door of the classroom. She left the wake of emotions behind her and ignored everything she could, focusing only on her anger for Kimberly and her joy for her students.

  Bradley and Michael were back in the classroom, playing with one of the sensory tables Becca had set up after school and before she had met with Jessica for a meal. Her stomach twisted hard. Jessica. What on earth was she going to do about Jessica?

  They had ridden out a relationship neither seemed to have too much interest in. The sex was okay, and the company was passable. Why are we even together in the first place? Sighing, Becca rubbed her temples and focused on work.

  It wasn’t too much longer until the students and parents were gone, and she and Miss Knorr were cleaning up the classroom in preparation for Monday. They could have come in early, but both of them were night owls and decided they’d rather be done Friday and sleep in on Monday. They worked mostly in silence, exhaustion seeping into the room.

  Unfortunately, it gave Becca time to think. Jessica wasn’t her soulmate, that much she knew, but their relationship was going well enough and served its purpose for both of them. Jessica had a date to tote around to different functions, and Becca had the distraction she was looking for. Whether or not she and Jessica would break up was not the question. It was just a matter of when.

  Becca gathered the rest of the cookies and divided them into two containers. She didn’t want to break up with Jessica. That was the point. That was the deciding factor, so she wouldn’t. She would wait and ride it out as long as she could and as long as Jessica would let her.

  But Kimberly… She sighed as she snapped the lids on the containers. Kimberly was going to be the death of her. She confused her. One minute they were yelling at each other, the next they were practically screwing against the wall behind her classroom in the middle of the school’s open house. One minute Kim was her boss, and the next, Becca was Michael’s teacher.

  Everything about Kimberly confused her, but there was no way Becca could deny the attraction the two of them felt for one another, the tenuous pull of one of them to the other—and the inappropriateness of it all that felt so exactly right. Setting the cookies down, Becca turned to look around the room and see what else needed to be done. Miss Knorr seemed to also be making that assessment, and when their gazes locked, Miss Knorr nodded.

  “I think we’re all done for the night.”

  “Thank God. I’m beat,” Becca answered. “I bet you are, too.”

  “Yeah. Open houses, while fun, also take their toll.” Miss Knorr smiled and started for her jacket and keys.

  Following suit, Becca grabbed her things. She handed Miss Knorr one of the containers of cookies and headed out of the door. She waited for the door to be locked, and together they walked to the small faculty parking lot at the side of the school’s campus. They got into their vehicles, and Miss Knorr drove off.

  Becca stayed put. She closed her eyes and put her head on her steering wheel. The scent of Kimberly’s perfume lingered on her clothes, and even the smells of the clear evening or the cookies in her lap couldn’t make it go away. Her lips tingled from the memory of Kimberly’s mouth against hers, and her body ached, truly ached, for the woman she didn’t think she could have.

  Brushing away a single tear, Becca put her car in reverse and headed for Jessica’s house with one thing on her mind. Forgetting.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Each time at drop-off, Kimberly would walk Michael to his classroom, even though she didn’t have to. She wanted to see Becca. Each day that she saw Becca, Becca would immediately look somewhere else or walk to the far end of the classroom. Kimberly’s hope faded.

  She finally decided they had to talk. It was her day off, and she was supposed to pick Michael up from school, so she parked her car and headed toward his classroom. He was already outside playing and ran over when he saw her. Kimberly gave him a hug and a kiss.

  “Kiddo, I’ve got to talk to Miss Kline for a minute, so you just keep playing here, and I’ll be back to get you. Okay?”

  “Miss Kline wasn’t here today.”

  “What do you mean?” Kimberly’s eyebrows drew together as she bent down to be eye level with Michael.

  He shrugged. “She wasn’t at school today. Miss Knorr said she was busy or something.”

  “Was she sick?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Kimberly clucked her tongue and stood up, rolling her shoulders. She looked around the playground and toward his classroom, hoping her son was wrong and Becca was somewhere inside the school’s campus. After staring and looking for a few minutes, she didn’t see her. Sighing, she glanced down at Michael and ran a hand through his hair.

  “Come on, then. Let’s go.”

  He grabbed his backpack and slung it over his shoulders. Kimberly walked with him right by her side until they reached the car. After he got into his seat and buckled in, Kimberly pulled out her phone and bit her lip as her thumb hovered over Becca’s name in her text messages.

  She hadn’t deleted any of the texts Becca had sent her, the personal ones or the professional ones, the photos and videos of Michael. Nothing. She clicked the message thread open then closed it again.

  “Let’s go, Mom!”

  Rolling her eyes, Kimberly started the ignition and threw the car into drive. She pulled out onto the road
and headed toward their house. After they’d arrived and gone inside, Michael sat down at the table and worked on his homework, asking her for help on math when he was trying to learn how to add. She gladly sat down and ran through each problem with him until he understood what he was doing and sent her on her way.

  Kimberly headed for the kitchen to start dinner and pulled out her phone again. She’d sent Becca a few texts here and there since she’d quit, but she’d never gotten a response. This time, she hit the call button and listened as the phone rang. And rang. And rang.

  Suddenly Becca’s sweet voice filtered over the speaker. “Hi, you’ve reached Becca Kline. Leave a message, and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.”

  With her stomach flipping flops she didn’t even know were possible, Kimberly waited until the beep echoed. Her throat was dry and her voice failed her, so she hung up. If Becca were to question it, she could play it off as a pocket dial, but she didn’t want to. One glance at Michael gave her the courage to call again, this time preparing herself for what to say.

  When the final ring ended and Becca’s voice came over the line again, requesting her to leave a message, Kimberly swallowed and wet her lips. “Hey, I know you probably don’t want to talk to me, but I really do think we need to. Please, call me back.”

  Hanging up, Kimberly set the phone on the counter, glancing at it every two seconds to see if Becca was calling or texting back. She was so distracted by the phone that the steak burning in the cast iron didn’t register until the smoke alarm went off and Michael screamed at the top of his lungs with his hands over his ears.

  Cursing, Kimberly pulled the pan off the stove then ran to grab a chair from the table, standing precariously on it to reach up and hit the button on the alarm, effectively silencing it. As soon as the blaring was done, Michael stopped screaming and uncovered his ears.

  “That was loud, Mama. Don’t do that again.”

  She gave him a wan smile, pulling her lips tightly together. After opening as many windows as possible and the front and side doors, Kimberly went back to the kitchen to survey the damage. There was no salvaging the steak. It was completely black on one side and mostly raw on the other. She picked it up carefully between her thumb and forefinger, flipping it back and forth.

  “Damn it,” she muttered and flopped it heavily onto the pan. “Some chef I am.”

  “You’re a great chef,” Michael interjected.

  “Thanks, kiddo, but I’m not tonight. I burned dinner.”

  “Oh no!” Michael skittered around the island and toward the stove. “Lemme see.”

  She lifted him up so he could have a good view of the burned meat and her failed attempted at dinner. Her buzzing phone shook her out of her reverie. She sent Michael to go wash his hands with an intention of ordering out for dinner. She grabbed her phone, and her heart skipped a beat when she saw the caller ID.

  Becca.

  She answered the call, pressing it nervously to her ear.

  “Hey,” she said, her voice wavering with a mix of nerves, joy, excitement and fear. There was no response. Confused, Kimberly asked, “Becca?”

  She could hear breathing on the other end of the line. It was light at first, but it got heavier after a few seconds. Kimberly stared down the hall to make sure Michael wasn’t coming back yet. He yell-sang his favorite nursery rhyme like Becca had taught him to time how long it took him to wash his hands.

  “Becca, can we talk?” Kimberly tried again.

  This time, without warning, the call ended. Kimberly pulled the phone away from her ear and stared at it, not sure what to make of it. She was about to call Becca back when Michael came into the room. She set her phone down, deciding it would be a better conversation to have in private when he wasn’t around.

  Instead, she got down on his level. “Kiddo, since I burned dinner, what do you say we order out?”

  “Yes!” He pumped his fist up and then down, squinting his eyes with joy as he did so. “McDonald’s?”

  Wrinkling her nose, Kimberly shook her head. “Something a little better than that. I was thinking pasta.”

  “Mac ’n cheese?”

  “Sure, if that’s what you want.”

  He nodded his head. “Thanks, Mom! You’re the best.”

  He gave her a hug and went on his way to the living room. Kimberly placed the order then waited impatiently for it to arrive and even more impatiently for Michael to go to bed. She really wanted to try to call Becca again, maybe she would answer this time.

  Finally, Michael was asleep, and Kimberly retreated to her bedroom. Lying on her bed, she opened up her phone and dialed Becca’s number. It rang twice before it went straight to voicemail. Determined, Kimberly dialed again. This time it only rang once before going to voicemail.

  After sending a text message, Kimberly closed her eyes and rubbed her temples. Her hope of ever being able to talk to Becca again was rapidly fading. She was obviously avoiding any calls, and perhaps it was time for Kimberly to take the full hint that Becca didn’t want to talk to her, didn’t want to see her.

  But the kiss…

  Brushing her fingers over her lips, Kimberly could still taste Becca on her tongue. That kiss had been something else entirely, something she had never experienced with Becca before. Complete unrestrained, Becca had let herself go in a way she had never dared. She’d taken control, and even then, two weeks later, just the thought of the kiss and the power Becca had wielded over her made Kimberly shudder with licks of pleasure at the edges.

  She was near asleep when her phone rang. Grabbing it, she saw Becca’s name and pressed it to her ear after answering. On a breath, she said her name. “Becca.”

  “Stop calling this number.”

  Confused, Kimberly tensed and sat up, wide awake. The voice didn’t belong to Becca, and the anger laced in the tone was beyond what she would ever imagine coming from a wrong number. “Who is this?”

  “I am Becca’s girlfriend. You are not. Stop calling this number.”

  Swallowing, Kimberly paled. Becca had told her she was with someone, and it had completely slipped her mind. Nodding to no one but herself, Kimberly finally answered. “I will. I’m sorry.”

  She hung up. Staring at her phone, she let out a breath before tossing it to the far corner of her bed. She rolled onto her belly, pulling the covers with her, and buried her face in the pillow. Calling Becca had been a mistake. Now not only had she risked their relationship, but she had potentially ruined a good relationship for Becca. It seemed that no matter where Becca was concerned, Kimberly couldn’t stop putting her into positions that compromised Becca’s integrity.

  Vowing to never do it again, Kimberly lay awake in bed for the rest of the night, wishing for morning. She wanted a new start to a new day to a new life. She had to move on. Becca was obviously not interested, and even though her hope had been rekindled by the open house, she had to back off and back away.

  * * * *

  Something had shifted in their relationship, and Becca couldn’t put her finger on it. Jessica was colder toward her. She wanted to be with her less often, and their date nights often turned into bickering before dissolving into unsatisfactory sex as a resolution.

  Becca had picked up more hours at the grocery store in hopes of finally having enough to move out on her own and not have to share an apartment with Drew. That had put a severe limit on her already limited time with Jessica, and Jessica had seemed to recoil at the thought.

  When Becca arrived at Jessica’s house that evening, she could truly say she didn’t want to be there. In any relationship, that did not bode well. Forcing herself from her car, she dragged her feet going up to Jessica’s apartment, using her key to get in. Jessica sat on the couch with her laptop balanced on her knees as she read something. She barely even looked up when Becca entered.

  Bending down, Becca pressed her lips to Jessica’s for a greeting kiss, and it hit her. She didn’t love Jessica. She’d known that for months. She’d known that
pretty much since they had first started dating.

  She plopped herself down onto the couch and mulled over exactly how she wanted to bring it up. Jessica had a temper, and Becca certainly didn’t want to end up in an argument with her. She’d had a long couple of weeks preparing for parent-teacher conferences and working extra hours at the store. She was bone tired, not just physically but also mentally. She had hardly anything left to give.

  Thinking she could perhaps push it off a few more weeks until she was in a better state of mind, one glance at Jessica told her it wouldn’t be worth it. No matter how she brought it up, there would be a fight, and she would be the one who would have to hastily pack her things and leave the apartment she’d refused to move into. It had been for the best in the long run.

  Deciding to head off the insanity before it began, Becca stood up and went to the bedroom. She grabbed a tote bag and put her things into it one at a time while Jessica was distracted with whatever it was she was doing out there. It took her nearly ten minutes to have everything packed.

  When she went back to the living room, she set the bag down by the door and went to sit next to Jessica. “Can we talk a minute?”

  “Sure, what’s up?” Jessica barely took her eyes off the screen.

  “No, really talk.”

  Jessica scrunched her nose in disgust, but she did put her computer down and turned to focus on Becca. “What?”

  “This… I didn’t really have this planned, but I think we both know it’s time.”

  Confused, Jessica shook her head. “It’s time?”

  “For this to end. We’re not… We just don’t really like each other.”

  Sighing, Jessica crossed her arms and closed her eyes. “Yeah. We don’t.”

  Letting out a nervous chuckle, Becca held out her palm with the apartment key in the center. “I guess you’ll need this back.”