Emerge into Forever

by Andrea Michelle

  I had been doing so well. Hopeful. Then one thing—one fucking thing sends my heart skittering to a stop—my blood freezing ice cold. He’s just stepped out of the drivers side of the moving truck and is talking to some guy I don’t’ recognize. “I want out by tomorrow. Let’s make it happen.”

  He hasn’t noticed me standing just feet away yet. He’s distracted with the guy walking around the truck to his side, but as if he can sense me, his head turns and dark eyes lock onto mine. Has he been sitting inside that truck? The truck we just passed? He had to have seen us.

  I swallow hard and beg myself to look away and run back inside, but my body doesn’t listen to my pleas because I stay rooted in my spot. His dark hair is hidden underneath a backwards baseball cap. The lights in the parking lot glow around him making him look dark. Dangerously dark in ripped jeans, a black t-shirt and combat boots. His gaze is intense, firm and staring hard at me as though I’m a problem he doesn’t want to deal with.

  He doesn’t speak. His mouth hasn’t curved up or down upon seeing me. He’s unreadable with the exception to the way his breath hitched when he spotted me. I feel like the fly that accidentally flew into the spider’s web. Trapped.

  I am wide-eyed, spooked and afraid to move. I’ve been his prey. He’s been my predator. If I move, will he pounce? If I stay still, will he ignore me? I don’t know what to do and I look away toward his door, wishing it would open, but it doesn’t. When I look back at Dean I find him closer now—too close, but also looking between me and his door, which makes me wonder if he knows Josh is inside of there.

  I’m like a deer caught in the headlights and completely skittish. “So, it’s like that now?” he asks in a low whisper that makes the hair on my body rise.

  “I don’t know what you mean,” I shake my head while taking a step back towards my door. His eyes track my movement and he frowns.

  “I’m not going to hurt you, Riley,” he says, lifting his baseball cap and running his fingers through his hair, down his face before placing it back on his head.

  Something happens in that moment with those words leaving his lips. I’m not going to hurt you, Riley. A memory slams into me of him saying those words to me before, little black lies he didn’t keep.

  “You already did,” I tell him, squaring my shoulders.

  His eyes are boring into mine. Drilling so deep I swear he can see all of my scars, all of my secrets and everything I hate. Something flickers in the depths I used to care about, something remorseful. His forehead furrows and his eyes shut as he turns away. “I’m sorry,” he whispers and then he walks away. He just walks away. Like literally turns his back on me and walks away.

  I watch him speak to the guy standing near the moving truck watching us. Dean’s mouth is moving and his hands are gesturing to me. Though, I’m close enough to hear him, I can’t…over the blood roaring behind my ears. The guy tosses Dean a set of keys and he walks around the back of the truck where I hear his bike begin roaring to life. He’s not wearing his helmet when he’s back in my view. The guy hops into the moving truck and starts the engine. Dean gives me one last glance, then toward his door and then back to me before revving the engine and sped out of the parking lot.

  I hadn’t even realized I had been holding onto the wall for support, or holding my breath until he rode away. The air left my lungs in a wheezing whoosh as the panic attack I pushed down wanted to swallow me whole.

  My nerves are zapping rapidly this way and that way underneath my skin. Shot to hell. Just like that. My eyes are squeezed shut and silent tears stream down my cheeks as I breathe in through my nose and out through my mouth. When I flutter them open, I blink a few times and I find hazel eyes zeroed in on me.

  Josh is staring at me and by the way he turns his head to look to the parking lot and then back to me, I know he saw Dean as well.

  “Are you okay?” I ask him wiping at my eyes and clearing my throat.

  He saunters forward with disbelieving eyes. “You’re asking me?”

  I nod as he steps right in front of me. “Yes, I’m asking you.”

  He looks down into my eyes, unwavering love emanating from him as his thumbs brush under my eyes. “I’m fine, pretty girl. He wasn’t in there, but you know that already.” His voice isn’t accusing, or full of suspicion. It’s knowing and concerned.

  I tuck my hair behind my ear and softly sigh. “Yeah, I know.”

  “Are you okay?” he asks brushing his fingertips down my arms.

  I can’t answer. I just shake my head and he pulls me into his chest where he holds me, giving me instant tranquility.

  “Let’s go inside and run a bath. K?” he says soothingly. All I can do is nod and follow him. A bath with him sounds like heaven.

  We’re squished into this white porcelain box. My tub is not the biggest and his long legs are wrapped around me. I’m not complaining. I love being wrapped up in his scent and touch. My back is pressed into his chest and he’s playing with my fingers in front of us. Palm to palm, his big hands aligned with my tiny ones. Interlaced they are a perfect fit. He touches my promise ring, twirling it around and around.

  “One day I want to see a ring on your other hand. Would you like that?” he asks out of the blue. I smile, but don’t speak just yet. I can feel his eyes on my face. He drops my hand and turns my cheek with his fingers. “Riley, I see your smile, but that’s not an answer. I see forever when I look into your eyes. Do you?” he asks in a low voice, which makes me want him right now.

  I bite my lip and grin at the same time, reaching up to touch his face. “Always. I want you now, tomorrow and always, Josh.”

  His smile builds slowly and when it’s beaming fully I fall all over again for him. He tells me he loves me and that we are going to have such a beautiful life together and I believe every word. Despite our awkward night, I believe in him and in us.

  We’re beginning to prune and get out of the tub where we dry one another off, which only makes me wet in other ways. He kneels down and rubs the towel up my legs, giving me ‘that look’ and once he’s standing, towering over me I can’t stand it. I grab his cheeks and our mouths begin devouring the other. I moan when he nips my lip with his teeth, he groans when I trace his mouth with my tongue. We are a mess of arousal again, neither of us sated for long.

  He turns me to where I’m facing the mirror and he’s behind me massaging my breasts. “You are so beautiful,” he says, looking at my reflection. “Do you know that?”

  “You make me feel beautiful,” I say in a soft whisper.

  His hands trail down my stomach and further down. “What else do I make you feel?” he asks knowingly.

  My head falls back when his fingers begin to dance with me. “Ah…you make me feel things I never knew existed. I feel everything with you.”

  He carries me to my bed and makes love to me slowly and sweetly. He takes care of my body like he’s cherishing it. I love all the ways he loves me.

  I’m thinking about it now as we lay peacefully side-by-side, tangled limbs and emotions when he says, “Tomorrow we need to talk about what happened tonight, but right now I just want to hold you and not think about it.”

  I sigh because I hadn’t thought about it. He had been my perfect distraction. I lean over and kiss his chest, not agreeing or disagreeing, and knowing sleep won’t come easy now that I am thinking about it.

  It's dark, cold and the strong smell of liquor nauseates me. I can't breathe. A hand is over my mouth, silencing my scream. My tears chase the other falling down my cheeks like a waterfall. Hot breath in my ear causes me to shiver and tremble in fear not pleasure. I'm terrified and disgusted as he whispers dirty things to me. His body is heavy and makes breathing difficult. I'm whimpering into the hand that won't release my mouth and he laughs. He always laughs at my fear. I'm pleading to no avail. He wants to hurt me. I squeeze my eyes shut and pray silently for salvation. I receive it when the voice of an angel saves me. The voice in my ear changes and it's the one I've mi
ssed for so long. The one I long to hear everyday. Josh. I flutter my eyelids open and the hand on my mouth begins tracing my lips, which causes them to part. I'm dizzy to the point of confusion. I must be dreaming. He asks me if I need him like he needs me. I do. I need him. His hand begins an adventure of my body. Exploring me. My breathing is just as fast as my heartbeat now. He asks me if I want him and I answer, "yes." I want him to take me far away from here and keep me forever. I want him to want me. I'm so confused. My mind isn't certain what is real and what is not. He begins to move inside me, making us one and I feel the pleasure build. He's so good with me. So good. I arch my back and moan. He trails his hand up my chest and to my throat. I gasp in surprise as he squeezes. Squeezes painfully tight until I can’t breathe. My eyes that were closed in pleasure are now locked with the devils. My angel is gone. It was never Josh. Oh, God. Dark eyes are delighted as they watch me struggle. I fight turning my head and notice Josh standing in the corner watching. Why isn’t he helping me? “I’m here. I’m right here,” he kept saying. Oh, my God…then save me. Save me. Dean turns my face forcefully back to him. “Say goodbye,” he says with a smirk, and then he tightens his hold on my throat until dark spots cloud my vision and everything goes black.

  I woke up with a heavy feeling on my chest after last nights fitful sleep haunted by my own nightmares…again. I’m so frustrated because I hadn’t had them in a few weeks. It wasn’t just any nightmare, either. Josh was in it. He hasn’t been in them before. Dean was on top of me, hurting me and Josh just stood there…watching me as I cried and attempted to fight. I was never strong enough and he didn’t try to save me. It was weird and I didn’t understand this dream at all. Josh would never allow Dean to hurt me, yet he was in my nightmare. In my dreams, Josh never calls and Dean never stops. He hurts me entirely. Ruining me completely. This time he ended me and made me say goodbye to Josh, as he stood to the side doing nothing.

  This nightmare is strangling me. I know it’s not real, but every time I look at Josh today, I see it. His eyes the way they were in my dream. I’m skittish and it makes no sense. I’m angry with him and that is irrational. He knows I’m in my head no matter how hard I try to hide it and shake off this ridiculous emotion. He knows me too well and is all too perceptive of my mannerisms.

  “Something is off, Riley. You’ve been kind of creepy quiet since this morning. You’ve been gnawing at your lip and picking at your hair. Something is on your mind. Wanna talk about it?” he asks with knowing eyes. We have just spent the entire day at our parents, enjoying Jellybean’s new skill of cooing. I haven’t been completely distant, just like he said…quiet and elsewhere.

  We talked some on the way over here to my moms. I told him what happened with Dean, which wasn’t much. He told me Preslee was very hush, hush, but did say Dean wasn’t the same Dean we all once knew. She claims that he’s a stranger to even her and that she’s sorry for what he did to me, and her part in it. Of course I don’t buy it. She’s a manipulator with words.

  That conversation and me seeing Dean last night will only heighten Josh’s suspicions of my quietness. If I told him what I dreamt then it would give my nightmare real claws. I want to ignore it and shake it off. So, I’m trying to not think of it. It’s just hard to wake up upset and unnerved and to just shut off those feelings. I’m a girl.

  I interlace our fingers as we walk to our spot by the lake. “I’m sorry. I didn’t sleep very well, so I guess I’m kind of tired. I’m okay, though.” He looks at me uncertain. “Promise, baby,” I reassure him and lean over, standing on my tippy toes to kiss his cheek. I feel his jaw clench when I make contact and eye him curiously. His eyes are shut and I notice the rigidity in his body, his hand squeezing almost painfully tight on mine.

  I force my eyes away and try to keep us walking, but he won’t budge and my hand is in his so it prevents my departure. I turn toward him taking a deep breath, finding his head tilted, his eyes penetrating to all of those hidden spots only he sees. “Don’t hide from me, Riley.”

  I shake my head. “I’m not.”

  He releases me and runs both hands into his hair furiously, looking up to the sky for patience. The muscles in his chest jump, and his throat bobs from his heavy swallow. He appears angry and exasperated. My mouth goes dry, my stomach curling into knots. When his eyes land back on me they are slightly cold and definitely narrowed. I don’t understand it.

  “You are,” he states. How does he always know what I’m hiding? It’s almost annoying the way he reads me sometimes. “I know you didn’t sleep well last night because I didn’t fucking sleep at all,” he informs me. “I thought you would open up to me this morning when we talked, but you said nothing of it.”

  Huh? I crinkle my forehead in confusion. “What do you mean?”

  He steps forward, looking down at his hand as his fingers brush against mine. Eyes doleful and dejected. I cast down my eyes to our hands delicately dancing around the other. His fingertips barely touch mine and needing our contact, that connection when we are touching, I interlace our fingers once again. Glancing up, hoping to find this lost and wandering look gone, instead finding him staring down at our held hands with despondency. He’s somewhere else and I don’t know why and I don’t like the sorrowful feeling that is washing over me. I need our happy back.

  “Josh, look at me. What do you mean you didn’t sleep at all?”

  His eyes lift and my heart constricts. Why is he looking at me like that? Like I’m broken and he’s broken—with sadness. We’re not broken anymore. He touches my cheek with the knuckles of his free hand and then pulls my head into his chest where he kisses the top of my head. His heart is frantically thumping beneath my cheek. I want to hold onto this, find tranquility for us both, but I can’t because it’s like he’s comforting me, soothing me of something and I don’t get it. I push him back and step away, his hands dropping to his sides. “Josh, what is this? What is that look you keep giving me?”

  His mouth dips down into a frown as he looks away for a brief second. “Last night was weird, and as much as I tried to act like seeing Dean and Preslee again was nothing and that you’re fine, I knew you weren’t really. He frazzled you.”

  “I am fine,” I say.

  He shakes his head with his mouth in a thin line. “No, no you’re not, Riley. You can act like seeing him again didn’t affect you, but it did. Last night, you uh, you said some things in your sleep,” he says gauging my reaction. My stomach plummets, but he can’t see that. “I…I tried to wake you. I tried to comfort you and tell you I was there. You were stuck in your head. You wouldn’t wake up. You cried out and it freaked me the fuck out, Riley. Why didn’t you tell me you were still struggling with this? I would’ve helped you.”

  My mouth falls open as shock slams into me like a wrecking ball. Shattering the shield I keep up to protect myself. That explains why he popped into my dream. He was talking to me and trying to wake me up. I squeeze my eyes shut and turn away as a tear slides down my cheek.

  “I wasn’t struggling anymore, not really. Honestly, I’m not now. Last night was just weird and out of the blue. Besides, I have you back. Everything is better and the way it’s supposed to be. I don’t know why I dreamt what I did last night, but I—,”

  “What did you dream?” he asks, interrupting me, his voice low and demanding.

  My eyes snap to his and I shake my head. “You don’t want to know that, Josh.”

  He steps closer to me. “I do. I know it was about that night. It’s always about that fucking night. I know it was bad because you cried and begged him to stop. You called my name. What did that mean, Riley?”

  I continue to shake my head. “Please, don’t make me say it. It wasn’t real. I love you. You love me. That is real.”

  He cups my cheek and wipes my tears with his thumbs. “It was real enough to scare you, right?” I nod. “Real enough to make you think about it today. You can’t hold these things inside. They will eat at you. Let me help you.”


  I take a deep breath, “Can we walk over there first?” I tilt my head towards our spot. I feel better there wrapped up in our memories.

  At the lake, at our spot—always ending up here somehow. I’m replaying my nightmares and the different ways they’ve changed, evolved into something worse. I remember them in vivid detail. I want to get it out somehow, tell him without telling him everything.

  Josh is sitting behind me now resting against the tree. I’m between his legs with his hands around me, our fingers interlaced. I turn my head and press my cheek to his chest, listening to his heartbeat and then I try to talk about it—the things in my head that I don’t know how to explain—or to express. Shit, I don’t even know how to feel it, but I try to get it off my chest because he knows when he looks into my eyes the things I try to hide. And I don’t want to hide things from him anymore. I’ve been doing so much better. Letting my layers melt away until only the real me is visible.

  I start, "You know how sometimes a memory can be buried underneath other stuff to be forgotten. Like the mind does it on purpose because it’s not something you can handle remembering, or think about without breaking. I wish that could be done with a lot of things, not just traumatic events. Like I could say, ‘this thing’ I don’t want to remember it. I don’t want to ever think about it again, and poof...it’s gone—never happened. Obviously, it happened...I know that. It’s just that...if I had a choice to not remember it, an option to skip ahead to the next happy moment and never replay that one thing I don’t want in my head—I would choose that, Josh. I would choose to never think about that bad thing because remembering it hurts more than it actually happening. Does that make sense?” I take a huge deep breath, feeling the weight dissipate from my chest if just a smidge. I’m rambling nonsense and the only person on this planet that gets my rambling is sitting behind me making sense of the words I have said and not said.

  He gently touches my cheek and I sit up, twisting around to sit criss-cross in front of him. His eyes are boring holes into my soul, digging deeply to find that wounded girl he loves so much and make her happy.