TAT Box Set

by Emjay Soren

  I want to scrub my eyes and my memory of that night. That was the night I let him in and told him I loved him. It was Christmas and he was still freshly screwed over and destroyed by Tayla.

  It was also the night he said he wanted me in his life and asked me to be patient so he could figure it all out. He didn’t want to lead me on, but was clear he wanted to see what would happen...

  I was overjoyed and couldn’t have written a more perfect story of us to tell Axe one day, to prove happy endings were real.

  But, as the days turned to weeks, and weeks to months I was forced to watch the Tayla and Cal show. I had to force myself to move on when it became too much.

  So, I gave CD my number when he asked. I listened to both Noah and Sully tell me how amazing he was. It felt like they might have had a man crush on him. Once I saw CD though, I got it.

  Now here I was. Twenty-six and single trying to make a name for myself in the PIT world as the piercing and branding specialist while crying myself to sleep every night wishing for shit I could never have.

  Me: I know you're crazy that’s for sure

  Before he could respond I hear a knock on my door and take the phone with me so that when CD texts I will open the door and save him the trouble. This is his new routine and though I like his effort and hanging with him, I am scared he will end up hurt chasing someone who is unavailable.

  But, as I open the door it isn’t CD I see. No, it’s Cal and he looks stressed and worried and mad as hell.

  Cal

  I wait for that damn text she sends me every night and after twenty minutes I call Skin and her supervisor tells me she left over an hour ago. Skin is seedy as fuck and I don’t trust a single mother fucker that sits in that shithole.

  I get in my Jeep and head over to her place and see her Escalade in her stall. Everything goes a hazy shade of black as I picture her with that CD dude that’s up her ass. So here I sit and contemplate the bullshit brewing inside me, planning my next move and talking myself out of it at the same time.

  I don’t deserve Jen, hell I am the one person who doesn’t deserve her. Not a lot of people see my opinion the same, but fuck them and their judgement. I was the main factor in what destroyed the once innocent and sweet hometown Gig girl.

  I used her, more times than I could count. It started in eighth grade when seven minutes in heaven turned into an all of thirty second blow job the summer of eighth. My first and still I think back to it as a damn near spiritual moment.

  From there it was always a little further. A ton of that third base grind and I recall with absolute clarity that first orgasm I gave her with my fingers and tongue. I felt like a God and it only fueled the asshole inside that wanted more. In eleventh grade, I took her to bed and continued to fuck her for four years, then destroyed her and called her the worst things imaginable. I never once looked at my part in who she became. I don’t take all the blame, but my reluctance to be anything but her booty call is what lead her to our lifestyle. And she didn’t have the cred to keep herself safe. No managers or labels, she fell down the rabbit hole I left her at. She was sucked into a life she didn’t deserve...

  And in it all I still used her. My friends used her. We passed her around like a joint, then called her a whore and a junkie.

  My stomach rolls when I see her on the bus, legs spread as I cum in her mouth and Noah cum’s on her pussy. What was deviant and crazy hot back then, is disgusting and cruel now. I cannot think of her in that perfect pink prom dress dancing with James Denahee at the dance, and fucking me in my car that night after we both ditched our dates for not being fun enough... and then picture her behind the stage six years ago as Noah, Myself and the members of Sinners of the Slipstream took a vote on who wanted to party with the hottest redhead there.

  I didn’t take her back to the bus with me that night, didn’t care that anyone did. I was fucking Tay that night and Jen was sent to party with the others. I would be lying if the look she gave me, this sad and disenchanted sorrow as she left with the guys from Sinners. I knew she wanted me and I had some sick joy in knowing she wished it was me and most likely thought of me as they railed her.

  Shit like that only served to boost my ego and destroyed her as well as countless others I am sure.

  We were all good to those we knew and loved, to our families and friends. We were grateful for the fans and the devotion, but behind the scenes we were womanizing bastards.

  Despicable.

  Loathsome

  Arrogant

  And now I am left with the memory of the damage, the knowledge I had part in it and I watch her hate herself for what I excused as ok, then used against her when I found out about our son.

  I know the majority of what caused his issues. DCFS reports and a shit load of counseling to tell me what I think I always knew deep down inside. Jen wasn’t a fit mother, but she had the intentions to be one. Had I known she had my child, I would have provided for them and that is what rests on Jen.

  I hate her for that because I missed so much and could have helped to keep him from seeing shit and going through shit no kid deserves. She didn’t neglect him in the junkie whore mom way we all accused her of. In fact, it was Tayla of all people who finally sought the truth. Jenny was working double shifts to keep the roof over their head and food in their bellies. She was using, but Jens addiction was the life not the drug. She still had to detox and get it out, but she was just a part of the seedy world we lived in and thought we were better than.

  Now I watch her excel at motherhood and I have no fear. I have watched her take in my darkest days and not flinch. She is my rock and my home and everything I should have always protected. I lead her to the life and she dove in headfirst thinking I would see her. I saw her and I turned a blind eye.

  I look at the clock for the hundredth time and I loosely convince myself she is in grave danger and I should just make sure she is ok. Chances are she is in there with my replacement, CD and I am about to be a major cock block.

  That has me smiling as I slam my door.

  How fucked up am I? It isn’t if I want her, I do. It is an issue of having her and that I can’t. My world is in shambles as is our sons. I cannot risk hurting Jenny and Axe both in my need to seek comfort. That’s all it is, its comfort and I need it from her like my next breath. I am a thief for it and I accept it, accept the dirt bag I am for it.

  I knock on her door, hands stuffed in my pockets as I pace waiting for her to save me from my own mind. By the time she opens it, the worst possible images of thrusting and skin and cries of pleasure have assaulted me and I am barely breathing.

  "What are you doing here?" She asks me and looks ten shades of worried.

  I instantly realize at seeing her fresh from a shower and wearing some tight ass pink pants and a black tank top (sans bra, god dammit) I know I have over reacted. Luckily for me this was a first on my crazy train tour and hadn’t appeared in the middle of the night claiming concern.

  But having convinced myself halfheartedly that she was dead or being hurt, I proceed like the insane mother fucker she has made me. "I didn’t hear back from you..." I trail off feeling like a tool.

  No, I am not crazy, just unhinged and obsessed with her and I am torn between thinking it is guilt or true interest. Both are inappropriate.

  "I texted you back before I got in the shower?" She says it as a question and pulls her phone from her tank top and I want to bite my knuckles to keep from taking her mouth.

  She holds the door open for me to come in. As my night goes on, well it doesn’t suck. I step in and take a seat at her crappy counter. Jen has done what she can with the shithole she rents. That isn’t me being a snob or judging. It is a shithole. Nothing about this place is legit accept for the fact it is a dump.

  I admire her for owning it and making it hers. She won’t ask me for money or Noah even and we both have tried to get her to move. She says this is her budget and that’s it. If I can say anything about this place, the one renting it
is tough as nails and can handle her own.

  Doesn’t mean I have to like it though. I am vocal about my distaste for her skid row apartment. I refuse to let Axe come here unless I am with him and Jen luckily agrees. She spends her time at our house more than here because that is his home. It would be hers too if I could figure my shit out.

  "I can see you judging..." She says and pulls two bottles of water from her shit brown fridge.

  I look at my phone and see the message she sent me. I was so busy convincing myself I needed to check, I didn’t bother looking to see if she responded. "I have to Jen. This place isn’t good." I look at the chipped counter as I hand her my phone.

  "Told you." She says, referring to her response on my phone. She sips from her water as she scrolls through my playlist until she comes to a song she likes. 'Until then' by Sully Erna comes on and I smile. "This song reminds me of you."

  She points at me with my phone, handing it back. I am still processing this new development. "Really?" I ask and thank God, I can play off the emotional turmoil I am in constantly these days. I learned to hide my entire life. Emotional shit freaks me out and I tried being honest with her last Christmas after fucking her all night in between my emotional outbursts. She said she would wait me out. Said she wanted me, like we were that night.

  That following night proved us both wrong though when Tay showed up and begged me for a chance to see what she wanted. I saw the look on Jens face... know she saw the look on mine... Still didn’t matter. I spent the night in my soundproof studio fighting with Tayla and telling her to go back to the piece of shit she cheated and left me for. Robert Black was the head of our label, Heshen Aggression and a true narcissistic son of a bitch.

  I blink the memory back and play with the label on the water bottle so my face won’t give away my regrets.

  She nods, responding to me asking about the song and I am pulled to listen to it. I have to hear it and see it through her, and though I have played it a thousand times it’s like this is the first. "Start it over, let me hear this shit."

  She picks up my phone and restarts the song. I keep my head down as I listen to every word, every inflection of his voice as he sings it. All I see is Jen and I fall to the music for the answers.

  I listen to every word and place them as best I can into our past and it shreds me. I am trying not to assume this is about us and a history of sex, love and neglect.

  I say nothing as it plays. I watch her mouth the words as she watches the video and not once does she look at me until the last notes of the song fade. When she looks up, my eyes are fused to her.

  "Explain." I say and keep my eyes on her. I need to see it to know if I am right. It will be in her eyes.

  "What’s there to explain?" She asks nervously and hands my phone back to me, breaking eye contact. "If you don’t know already, I won’t be explaining it to you."

  I nailed it.

  "That’s your answer for everything Jen. When you don’t want to answer anything that could be telling you give me that horse shit. You pass the buck to me like I haven’t been paying attention." I stand from my stool; my fear and anxiety are gone and I walk to her with purpose. "But, see, I have been paying attention."

  She looks up at me when I box her in to the counter, my arms caging her so she can’t run. "Have you?" She asks and licks her lips.

  "Acutely." I say and let the tension fill what space is between us. I can hear her breath quicken and see the faint blush on her chest. She's nervous and she should be.

  "So, what was it about then?" She asks and still turns it on me. If she wants to fight this thing all sketchy, I won’t fight fair.

  "You and I from eighth grade to right this very second." I lick my lips and lean in close, so close to her lips. I could kiss her right now and she would let me, but I need her to understand that I see her. I see her from back then and I see her now. Though they aren’t the same, they still mean something. "Look at me."

  I watch her look just beyond me and bite her bottom lip but the moment is interrupted when her phone chimes. She looks away as she reaches her back pocket to retrieve her phone with a nervous laugh.

  Fuck that, this is too important.

  I stop her by grasping her wrist. "No, look at me Red. Fuck him whoever he is."

  She flinches at my words and it proves I am right. Some dude, probably CD is texting her.

  Not when I am here though.

  Hell fuckin no.

  She looks at me then, frustrated and hurt. I can see it and I know it hurts her when I go caveman. I do this shit to her too often. I give an inch and get her in my sights then I am pulled twelve back. Whether it be band business, our son or even Tay more often than I would like to admit. But, something always gets in my way and now it's this new guy.

  Tay toyed with me once making me think the other guy in her life was my friend Sully and it made me mad with jealousy. It was never Sully though, she was fucking Robert Black the head of our one-time label. For months she fucked him behind my back until that Thanksgiving over a year ago.

  It was then my world tilted on its axis for the eleventeenth time.

  But it is also what lead me here and I want answers.

  I press my body against hers, letting her feel all of me. My heat, my breath and my now hardening dick. Let her deny me now that I am in her face.

  It hits me then that I would never impose on Tayla the way I do Jen. We would fight and fuck, but it was never a need like this. I crave Jen like a junkie to his pipe. I cannot get enough of this drama. This need and desire. It is the most intense thing I have ever experienced and the shit turns me on.

  "Pick me..." I say and try to kiss her but she pushes me back.

  "Pick you?" She almost screams and I jump back from the contempt in her voice. I opened a wound somehow and I immediately hate myself for doing it. But she is infuriating in her rage and it pisses me off.

  "Yeah!" I yell getting just as pissed off as her. "Pick me and stick around this time instead of chasing after some fucking British smurf!"

  She looks at me like I am crazy, and honestly where she is concerned I am fucking certifiable. "I stuck around God dammit, and that hurricane you keep running into ruins any chance!" She screams and slams her hand on the counter. "Any chance!"

  Tears stream down her cheeks now and I am floored by the accusation and disregard her pain. "I have never went looking for her, she crawls to me for answers and it takes everything in me not to kick her when she is down!" I yell and push from the counter, grabbing her wrists and pressing her to the ugly ass fridge. "I don’t want her."

  I try to cup her face in my hands but she turns her head and slaps my hands away. "Yes! You do!" She starts to sob and I step back, lost and thrown by her words.

  It isn’t that she said them, they are words and I can roll them off. It's that she knows they have truth in them. Some sick and twisted part of me still wanted her, for months. I have no answers.

  "I have given you space. I wanted for you to come to terms on your own, but I can’t watch it anymore. I waited for you Cal, waited for you to see me and you never saw me. You saw bits and pieces of this new me and confused it, twisted it into some redemption love spell so you could sleep at night knowing you wanted to fuck me..."

  I am still reeling from her statement before, but what she thinks and what is are two different things. I realize the fight I have had with myself over her and Tay and my place in it all is one I have no handle on.

  None.

  "I know I fucked up Jen." I can hear my voice cracking and I need to get my shit together quick.

  She nods but is cold and detached. "It's fine." She says and wipes her cheek. "We can’t ever do this, this fighting and angry sex thing whatever it is. I own what happened last year on Christmas, I wanted it as much as you did and its buried now. Axe needs us to be the strong and ever stable parents he deserves. He is the best surprise of my life, but I didn’t choose you any more than you did me. This thing between us chose
us and honestly it’s like the worst too be continued ever."

  I can feel my eyes burn with unshed tears at her words. They piss me off for equal parts truth and bullshit. Both are present in that speech. "I am here now Jen, right fuckin now." I slam my hand on my chest trying to impact what I feel and the flurry of it all in my chest.

  I take a deep breath and close my eyes; my next words are the truth she needs and the rest of this shit was hopeful filler. It is right now that matters. "I fought like hell to win Tay. I ate shit and I kissed her ass endlessly and there is no way you can possibly understand the lengths I went to learn it was all just a fallacy. I won’t, will not do it again. If you don’t want me- fucking look me in the eye and tell me that shit, but don’t wrap it up in bullshit and try to see if Ill notice the lie. You don’t want me Red, I’m gone."

  She looks at me, tears rimming her eyes and I have no clue if I made a huge mistake or not.

  She places her hand on my cheek and steps up, close...so close. Her hand cups my neck and pulls me to her lips. She kisses me softly, like a lover too scared to admit its love. Once, twice and pulls back after the third and looks me in my eyes.

  "I can’t." She says and keeps her eyes on mine.

  "Tell me you don’t want me Jenny." I demand, but she shakes her head no.

  "I can’t." She says again and I know she wants me, she loves me. I know I burned her, but I just offered the world so it’s a no brainer.

  "No drama, no excuses. Yes or no Jen." I cup her face in my hands one last time and I kiss her. I put everything I feel in that kiss. It is hate and love, betrayal and forgiveness. It is everything. I pull back and watch her, breathless as she fights it.

  "I can’t..." She almost whispers.

  And that’s that.

  "Fuck this shit..." I say and storm out her door. I ignored my name being called as I left.

  So fuckin done.