by D T Dyllin
“I just wouldn’t be a very good mother if I let my eighteen-year-old daughter have her eighteen-year-old male friend stay over in her room.” She had taken on the “there’s no point in arguing with me” tone that all mothers seemed to have in their bag of tricks. Even I knew when the battle was lost, so I decided to change the subject away from Bryn completely.
“Jeremy texted me earlier. He wants to go out again.”
“Really?” Hope danced in my mom’s eyes. Yep, my subject change was a success; I had my mom hook, line, and sinker. “So what did you say?” She sat back down on the edge of the bed and looked at me expectantly.
“Well, nothing yet. I kind of passed out and forgot about it until now.” Not to mention Bryn’s mini-meltdown in between those two things.
“You said he was nice, right? And he’s cute, so you should definitely say yes. Where’s your phone? You should text him right away.” She swiveled her head around, scanning all the surfaces in my room for my cell.
I really didn’t like how excited she was. I was determined to be with Bryn, but it was going to kill me to disappoint my parents so much. If only there were a way we could all be happy. I sighed. “It’s probably still in my purse.”
“Oh, of course.” My mom scurried over to pull my cell out of my bag in a blur of excited movements. She handed it to me and sat back down on my bed only to resume her expectant stare. When I didn’t move to immediately open my phone, she sighed impatiently, “Well, go ahead, peanut.”
I thought about how Bryn had reacted in the woods, and I scowled at my phone. Even though I didn’t like being told what to do, I most definitely could be motivated by guilt. If I said yes to a second date with Jeremy, no matter how hard Bryn tried to hide it, I knew it would hurt him. And that was something I wasn’t interested in doing. “I think I’m going to say no,” I mumbled.
“What? Why?”
“He was nice and all, like I said, but there didn’t really seem to be a spark with him, you know?” I raised my gaze to meet my mom’s, silently pleading that she would let the issue drop. But of course, I should have known better.
“Oh, is that all? You said he didn’t even kiss you yet. How can you know?”
“Because I don’t want to kiss him, that’s why. I also don’t need to kiss Jenna to know that there’s no spark between us. Should I just go around kissing everyone I see to find out who I have a spark with? Hell, why not go a step farther, why not—”
She scrunched her face up at me. “There’s no need to be crass, missy. I just think you should try kissing him before you dismiss him so easily.”
“I don’t want to,” I said.
“You’re going,” my mom said back, motherly determination etched into her face.
I narrowed my eyes at her. “No, I’m not. And you know you can’t make me.”
“No, but I can make you wish you did. You’re grounded until you set up a date with Jeremy.”
“You can’t do that!” I screamed at her rapidly retreating back.
But the closed door staring back at me said she could. I stood and shrieked my fury. I couldn’t believe my mom was trying to punish me into going out with Jeremy again. She’d never done anything so unfair before. Why was she behaving so crazily?
Anger fueled my next decision. I wasn’t just going to sit in my room and take that kind of abuse from my mother. Oh hellz no. I was going to sneak out to find the comfort in Bryn’s arms that she was trying to deny. I opened my phone and texted him.
Meet me—now.
I didn’t wait for his response before I popped the screen out of my window and scrambled out and down the drainpipe. I skulked across my front yard, trying to keep to the shadows created by the oncoming dusk. I heaved a huge sigh of relief as I made it into the cover of the woods across the street from my house. I only had to wait a few minutes before I saw Bryn jog into my line of sight. I rushed over to him, wrapping my arms around his waist. “She grounded me until I say yes to going out with Jeremy again.” I sobbed into his muscular chest.
“But I thought you were gonna go anyways.”
“No. Not after”—I struggled to catch my breath—“not after how you reacted. I couldn’t stand the thought of hurting you.”
His arms tightened around me. “I know why you have to go. You won’t hurt me. None of this is your fault.” He pulled away from me, cupping my face in his huge hands, dipping his head to kiss my tears away. His lips were soft yet firm against my skin, and I longed to lose myself under his sweet caresses.
“It’s just not fair.” My lower lip trembled as I stared up into Bryn’s beautiful blue eyes. “I don’t understand what’s wrong with being with you. So what if our kids are all Guardians; I can’t bring myself to care as long as I’m with you.” People often ask what the meaning of life is. What’s the point in all of this? As far as I can tell, life is pretty much pointless without love. If you have it, then you’re truly rich, and if you don’t, then nothing else really holds any value. What would my life mean if I married a Gatekeeper or Seer descendent for the sake of duty? It would mean nothing to me, even if it did to others. Bryn gave my life meaning; he made everything else worthwhile. He always had, and hopefully, he always would.
“Because you’re special, Peej—so special. You deserve to be with royalty, not a Guardian like me.” I opened my mouth to protest, and he silenced me with one of his long fingers. “But I’m not stupid, although I am plenty selfish. I want you all to myself. I’m not going to walk away from you so you can be with someone else, someone born into the right family. Somehow I got lucky, and you love me back. I’ll fight for you as long as you want me.”
“I’ll always want you,” I whispered.
“Then I’ll always be yours,” he said gruffly, his lips meeting mine in a brutal kiss, the taste of him helping to sooth my nerves. My hands slid into his silky black hair, and I moaned as I found my back pushed up against a tree. It seemed to be fast becoming me and Bryn’s thing. Or maybe it was because we didn’t have any other place to go.
“Take your hands off of my daughter.” My father’s deep voice boomed across the clearing, making me gasp with fear. We were caught—oh God, we were caught. Bryn and I separated quickly, but it was too late.
“Sir, I—” Bryn started, obviously flustered.
“Sir nothing.” My father’s voice seethed with anger, making me cringe. He stood across from us with his reading glasses still perched on his nose. He must have come after me in such a hurry that he hadn’t even bothered to remove them. I watched as his fists clenched and unclenched, and his face turned the shade of a boiled lobster. “How dare you take advantage of my family’s trust like this? And how dare you take advantage of the sacred trust being a future Guardian affords you?”
“Daddy, please!” I interjected. “It’s not Bryn’s fault. Don’t—” When he turned his withering stare onto me, I temporarily lost my ability to speak.
“You, young lady, have disappointed me. We’ve raised you better than this. Never in a million years when I saw you sneaking over here did I expect to find you in this kind of situation. I don’t even want to look at you right now.”
“I love your daughter, sir,” Bryn stated, his voice filled with raw emotion. “All I want is to love and protect her. I never meant to disrespect anyone.”
Ignoring Bryn’s words completely, my father spoke to me. “Get your ass over here right now, P.J. You’re not to be alone with him for one more second—ever.”
Fear snaked up and wound itself like a boa constrictor around my heart. My worst fears were coming to fruition. My family was going to tear me away from Bryn, and I wouldn’t be able to see him for nearly a year. I flung myself at Bryn and wrapped my arms around his waist. “No!” I screamed. “Don’t do this to me, Daddy! I love him! I love him! I love him!” My volume increase
d to the point where I was practically shrieking. I’m really not sure what I was going for, maybe I thought if I yelled long and loud enough, I could get through to my father.
“You just turned eighteen years old. You don’t know what real love is yet.” My father’s face and eyes had grown as hard as stone, and his sudden calm scared me more than his anger.
“Don’t tell me I don’t know what real love is yet!” I continued shrieking at my father. “I would die for him! I would lie down and die for him!” My chest heaved as I struggled to catch my breath. “If you take him away from me, I might die, too!”
“Teenager dramatics,” my father grumbled as he stalked towards me. “You better let her go, son.” My father, even though he wasn’t as tall as Bryn, definitely had the intimidation factor down. He leveled his stone cold stare at Bryn, practically daring him to disobey. Bryn tightened his grip on me as I tightened my grip on him. My father eyed us both with annoyance scrolling across his face. I’d never hated my father more. He was threatening to rip my whole reason for living away from me, and he was annoyed.
“I hate you,” I seethed. “I fucking hate you.”
“Don’t you dare talk to me like that. I’m your father,” he snapped.
“That’s why I hate you so much. You’re my father, and you should want me to be happy more than anyone else does. You shouldn’t be treating me like a child.” I hissed every word with vehemence.
“Fine. You want to be treated like an adult, then you come back to the house, and we can talk about this like adults. Stop cowering in the woods, refusing to let go of him.” He spat the last word out, not even bothering to say Bryn’s name.
I peered up at Bryn, and he nodded his encouragement, although I could see the tension lining his mouth. I slowly let go of him and stepped towards my father. “Fine,” I said as I stalked towards the house. The truth was that if my parents wanted to keep me separated from Bryn until I was out of their house, there was nothing I could do about it. I would be lying to myself if I thought I had any real control over anything in this situation. My father followed close behind me, not saying a word. When we crossed the street and got to the house, only then did he react. As soon as the front door was closed behind me, he grabbed me by my arm and pulled me upstairs, shoving me into my room and locking the door from the outside.
I pounded my fists against the door. “You said we were going to talk!” I screamed. “You lied to me!”
“You lied to me first,” my father said through the door, “and don’t bother trying to sneak out again. Your mother has Eric watching for you now.” Great—there definitely wouldn’t be any escaping now that my mother had put her Guardian on the job—her Guardian, but also Bryn’s father. It would be like trying to escape from Alcatraz.
“Daddy, please.” I softened my voice, trying a different tactic. “I love him. Don’t destroy me like this.” The only response I got was my father’s footsteps walking away from my door and down the stairs.
I turned and sank down on my bed in despair. My only hope was that maybe my mom would side with me and convince my father to let me be with Bryn. So yeah—I had absolutely no hope at all. I curled into a fetal position and sobbed until sleep overtook me.
I awoke to the sound of my door creaking open. My room was completely dark now that it was night. My bedside lamp switched on to reveal that visitor was my mom. She looked down at me with a pained expression and sat down on the edge of my bed. “How could you?” she whispered. “You know you can’t be with him, peanut.”
I sat up and looked at my mom beseechingly. “Why? Why can’t I be with him? I love him—so much—more than anything. How can I be with someone—someone like Jeremy—after I’ve discovered I can have that kind of passion with someone else?”
My mom reached out to touch me, but I shirked away. “Sometimes I forget how young you are. You’re growing up so fast, and yet . . . you know nothing of the world.” Her face held a sadness I’d never seen before.
“I know enough. I know that I love him. Mom, please.” Fresh tears began to slide down my face.
“Bryn’s going to be sent away—to train elsewhere. He’ll be assigned someone to guard when he’s ready.”
I read between the lines. “Someone that’s not me,” I croaked, not wanting to say the words out loud.
She looked away when she responded. “Yes.”
“No!” I wailed, dropping to my knees and grabbing my mom’s hands to beg. “He’s my best friend, too. He’s not only my lover, but my best friend, too.”
Only when shock and horror spread across her face did I realize what I’d said. “Your lover?” she breathed.
“No—that’s—um—that’s not what I meant. I just meant that—” God—what did I mean? Why had I said that? Why couldn’t I have said boyfriend? Because he’s more, so much more, my mind whispered.
My mom visibly paled. “Have the two of you—did you—did you have sex with him?” Her voice was trembling, and I almost felt sorry for her if not for the rest of the situation. I swallowed hard, not sure how I should answer. Maybe if I told the truth, she would take our relationship more seriously; or maybe a lie was the way to go? I was too frazzled to think clearly. My unhelpful mind conjured up an unbidden image of Bryn and I wrapped in each other’s arms, and I flushed.
Her hand flew to her mouth. “Dear Lord, your face just told me all that I need to know.” She stood abruptly, heading for the door. “I thought we’d raised you better than that. I thought you’d know better than to let a common Guardian defile you.”
“Defile me? But I thought you said the forbidden fruit was the sweetest—I thought you’d maybe understand—”
“To daydream about, to look, but not touch, not to slum with. You gave your most valuable gift to a common Guardian. I would never have even considered you doing such a thing—even after what you’d said to me before. Especially because of what you said before—you knew it was wrong.” She meant when I’d asked her about wanting someone I knew I shouldn’t.
“No, I know no such thing. I gave it to him because I love him.” I started sobbing again. I couldn’t believe the things she was saying. Who was this woman standing before me? Certainly not the caring, loving mother I’d grown up with. My mom would never say such things. Bryn and my family had always been like one since we were little; at least that’s what I’d thought. Maybe to my parents they were just beloved servants. Maybe I’d never really understood the true class lines that were drawn within my society. How could I when I was at the top of the tier? I’d always thought of Guardians and Speakers as different, no better or no worse . . . just different. Maybe that’s why Bryn put me up on a pedestal. I thought my people would be upset and angry about me not having a Seer child if I chose Bryn—maybe I’d become sort of a social pariah—but now I was beginning to see that I might truly be shunned. So much more was at stake than I’d ever really understood . . . but I still didn’t care. I’d give up anything and everything to be with Bryn.
“We’ll be lucky to make you a good match after this. With him being sent away, people will assume the worst, whether or not it is the truth. No decent Gatekeeper or Seer descendant will want you after you’ve been with a Guardian.” Her face scrunched up as if she were going to cry. “I wanted so much for you . . .” Her voice was swallowed by a sob as she left and relocked my door.
I sat in stunned silence. The things that my mother had just said sounded like they were pulled right out of the 1800s, maybe a Jane Austen novel. We’ll be lucky to make you a good match after this. Was she kidding? There had to be some kind of mistake. I must have fallen and hit my head, and this was all some kind of huge nightmare, a coma-induced nightmare.
My phone beeped, and I dashed for it, hoping it was Bryn—and it was.
Remember, I’ll come 4 u—1 yr, was all it said.
I hasti
ly hit send to call him, and he answered on the first ring. “Peej,” he whispered, his voice holding the same kind of desperation that was currently seeping out of all my pores. “They’re sending me away—now. I won’t have my phone, and I don’t know if I’ll be able to contact you anytime soon. I’ll come for you, I promise. Don’t lose hope—I love you.” He paused as if listening to something. “I gotta go,” he said hurriedly. “I don’t want them to know we talked—to know about our plan.”
“No wait—Bryn—I love you, too.” The phone went dead. I stared at it in shock. It was really happening; I wouldn’t see Bryn until after we graduated—almost an entire year.
I threw my head back and screamed at the top of my lungs in utter agony. I was on the edge—I know that now; hysteria like I’d never thought possible was taking over my entire being. I began to wildly smash everything in my room that I could get my hands on. Anything that wasn’t nailed down, I destroyed. Things I’d had since childhood, things that I cherished, were ripped apart in an outpouring of agony because none of it meant anything anymore without Bryn. I continued smashing and screaming until my voice was gone, my eyes were blurry, and my legs could no longer support me. I sank down to the floor right where I was and curled into a ball. The only sounds that registered in my ears were my own heartbeat and my ragged breathing.
Eventually, the sweet oblivion of sleep overtook me.
10
“Well, what do you suggest we do with her then?” My mother’s strained whisper reached my ears from the hallway just outside my door. Did they really think I couldn’t hear them? Not that I really cared what they were saying anyways, but that wasn’t the point.
