Wheels of Steel, Book 2

by Pepper Pace

  Then Amberly explained about their first kiss and the pact.

  “It was the most wonderful kiss in the world. At first…I did like Jason a little.” Amberly explained. “But I wasn’t crushing on him. But after we kissed; it was like magic. I just, couldn’t stop thinking about it or him.” She wiped away the last of her tears as Robin sat listening.

  “We have that pact and yes, I know he’s not going to honor it now, and I don’t expect him to. But it’s like…I don’t want anyone else to take my virginity. Jason is perfect for me. How did I not ever see it before?” She sniffed and looked at Robin. “And I do love him.” And there was a hatred in Amberly’s eyes, and an anger, but there was also a defeat. “But he doesn’t love me. He loves you.”

  Amberly dug into her purse for tissue, then she blew her nose. “How did this happen?!” She laughed bitterly to herself. “I used to look at Top and think; will that boy ever comb his tangled hair? He was just like…a bratty kid brother. And then something changed and it was like; there’s Jason but where’s Top?” Amberly just sat there for a long moment seeming to think about that and then she seemed to remember that Robin was there.

  “I’m sorry, Robin. Jason is right. I didn’t even try to give you a chance. I think…I knew or saw something in you that Jason would like; something that the other Aids never had. Like, I could see that you cared.” She twisted her fingers together and sighed. “I suppose, it’s probably not a smart thing to have some girl that is crushing on your boyfriend hanging around.” She sniffed. “I just wished that day…when I was feeling so lonely, that I hadn’t said, ‘hey Top, let’s kiss’ and he hadn’t said, ‘okay.’ That just screwed everything up!” Amberly wiped away the tears that had collected under her chin. “I thought it was a great kiss, but after I saw the way he kissed you today at school…I know that it was nothing.”

  Robin stood tiredly. “Let’s go back.” Amberly gave her a curious look. She felt vulnerable but at the same time…well she had been honest. She had placed her cards on the table with both Robin and Jason and the pieces would fall where they fell. They walked back to the parking lot in silence and then Robin stopped and looked at her.

  “I guess I’ll see you at school tomorrow.”

  Amberly’s mouth opened. “Yeah.”

  “What are you wearing to the party Friday? Belinda just bought a corset. Not sure if she will have the guts to actually wear it out in public, but you know her better than me. Do you think she will actually wear it to the party?”

  Amberly’s face broke into a surprised smile. “Patt-Belinda is a nut; so yeah, she will wear it Friday. God a corset? She’s been talking about getting one for ages. I guess hooking up with Link is giving her all kinds of courage. I was going to wear black to the party. Hey you know what?! We should all wear black; like a theme!”

  “I can go for the black theme as long as I don’t have to wear a corset.”

  “Hell no.” Amberly agreed. “I can’t see my crooked body trying to rock a corset. I’ll go through my wardrobe and you go through yours and let’s coordinate our look tomorrow at school.”

  “Sounds like a plan.” Robin replied while walking to Jason’s apartment.

  “Robin.” She turned back to the girl. Amberly limped to her and hugged her slowly. When she pulled back Robin saw that her eyes were glistening in unshed tears and Amberly was trying to say something. “You are very cool.” She whispered before turning away and climbing into her car.

  Chapter 8

  Robin watched her drive away and then Belinda opened the front door and stormed down the walkway until she was standing next to Robin watching Amberly drive off.

  “What the fuck??? Were you two just hugging??”

  “Yep.”

  Jason was in the doorway in his chair watching them both.

  Belinda frowned. “We thought you drowned her in the lake.” She wasn’t joking either. Belinda was preparing to come find them.

  Robin chuckled. “God…you guys gotta learn me. That’s not how I operate.”

  “Is this about keeping your friends close but your enemies closer?” Belinda asked before they reached the front door.

  “Yes…for now, but I hope not for long.” Belinda thought she understood what that meant. Robin hoped that she wouldn’t have to think of Amberly as an enemy for long. Belinda hoped so too. Amberly was cool people and so was Robin and they each just had to figure that out.

  The three of them returned to the apartment. The plan had been for Belinda to call Peter and maybe the four of them could work on beats for the party that was to happen the very next day and then Belinda would just go home with Peter after. No chance of that happening now so Belinda was cutting out.

  “I’m going to call Peter and tell him to pick me up at the corner-”

  “Don’t be silly.” Robin said quickly. “I’ll take you home or to Peter’s.” She reached for her purse while Jason sat in his chair watching in surprise.

  Patty was shaking her head. “No, you don’t have to do that…” But Robin was giving her a meaningful look, her back to Jason. She wanted to talk to Belinda; alone.

  Catching on Belinda quickly changed “I mean, I’d appreciate it if you can drop me off at Peter’s. I want him to see my new do…I think I won’t show him the rest until Friday.”

  Jason muttered. “Your hair looks nice, by the way. Robin, can I talk to you-?”

  Robin turned to Jason. “I’ll be back. I’m just going to take her to Peters.” The two girls headed out of the apartment before Jason could respond.

  “Are you mad at him?” Patty asked even before they reached her car.

  “No.” She peeked at her new friend. “A little.” They got into the car and Robin pulled out quickly.

  “Well I didn’t see him doing anything but defending you.” Patty replied.

  “It’s not that.” Robin pulled the car to a stop as soon as they were out of Jason’s complex, parking quickly. She took a deep breath and looked at Patty, car still idling. “Did you know about that pact?”

  Belinda frowned. “Pact?” Robin could tell that Belinda had no idea what she was talking about.

  “Jason and Amberly have a pact for him to take her virginity if she didn’t lose it on her own.”

  “What the-? And she didn’t tell me about it?! After I told her all about me and Peter!” Then Belinda scratched her newly shorn hair. “A pact?” She seemed at a loss.

  “Amberly said that she fell in love with Jason because a few weeks back she went to his house feeling lonely, whatever. And they kissed. After that-”

  “What??? They kissed?!” Belinda’s eyes were bugging. But she then calmed down and looked out the window. “Robin, I had no idea. I’m pretty sure that if she has feelings for Jason then it just developed recently. Years ago I asked her; cuz they were such good friends. But she wanted a ‘normal’ guy.” Belinda made quotations as she spoke the word normal. “I can’t tell you what to think but if she said that it just developed then I believe it.”

  Robin was watching her closely. “It’s not her. I don’t care what she feels. It’s Jason. Is he in love with her?”

  Belinda gave her a surprised look. “No way. Get that out of your mind now.”

  “But he kissed her. When I first met Jason I thought he and Amberly were a couple. I just felt their closeness. Belinda…I think Jason might be in love with Amberly; maybe just a little.”

  “Oh my god. Robin, we all love that nerdy, goofy girl, but it’s not like that between them. We just take care of each other. And yes, they both have CP and there is a special connection based on that-”

  Robin was nodding. “That’s what I mean! I see how they look into each other’s eyes; when she’s on his lap and he’s just watching her like she’s the center of the world, the way he holds her. There is a link between them.” She felt hot tears fill her eyes.

  Belinda turned to her. “Robin listen to me. Jason doesn’t have a tenth of the feeling for Amberly that he has for yo
u-”

  “But he has something.”

  “No, just friendship; he cares about her, but only as a friend.”

  “If that’s true, then why did they kiss? Belinda, Amberly said that he is her best friend. She asked me not to take her best friend from her.” Robin felt the tears spilling. She didn’t doubt for a moment that the love she felt for Jason was what Amberly was feeling for him. And their link ran further than the one that she and Jason were developing. “I asked Jason if he and Amberly were together and he told me no. But I could feel that there was something else there. I know what I feel! Maybe it’s the pact, or the kiss…but he has feelings for her!”

  Belinda frowned. “You’re so wrong. You don’t know Jason yet. You think you understand, but you don’t. You’ll come to see that Jason is special. He loves hard, once you crack that shell. He is more vulnerable than you can imagine. He has been hurt so much in his past. Did he tell you about the way his caregivers abused him? One used to tie him up and leave him for hours sitting in a chair or in his bed while his mother was off at work. And not just her; others that he should have been able to trust—like that sick fuck of a father. He learned to put a shell around himself and to not let people in. But once you are in; he will love you so hard.”

  Robin was clutching the steering wheel, staring at it, picturing the things that Belinda described. Yes, she could sense these things about him. And it was true that she didn’t know much about him. And he’d hinted at the abuse; it made her sick to her stomach to think about someone doing those things to him—to any child. She took a deep breath, trying to see things from a different angle; the pact, the kiss…His first kiss with Amberly. It just all meant something! She could not dispel that feeling.

  “Robin, you need to go back to the house and talk to him right now. Peter will pick me up. You go home.” Belinda had already opened the door of the car and was preparing to step out when Robin stopped her.

  “Belinda! You’re not going to tell Jason what we talked about, are you?”

  Belinda gave her a hard look. “Are you going to talk to him about this?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know because, if I hadn’t come along…maybe they would have ended up together. Maybe it’s about them two-”

  “Girl, don’t just hand your man to her-”

  Robin flashed her an angry look. “I’m not going to hand him over. But I need to know if I’m just the…’normal’ girl that walked into his life and took up his attention away from her--and that the real connection isn’t between us but between them.” Belinda gave her a disapproving look. “So don’t tell him or Peter what we just talked about. Promise me.”

  Belinda scowled. “Fine. I won’t tell him or Peter!”

  Robin gave her a severe look. “You said you wouldn’t tell about the vomiting, and you did.”

  “I didn’t promise I wouldn’t tell. I don’t break a promise…which is why I don’t make them. And besides, it turned out good that I did tell. Maybe you wouldn’t have gone to emergency if I hadn’t said anything and now you’re getting treated.” She got out of the car with her packages, digging for her cell phone.

  Robin hoped she wasn’t leaving because she’d doubted her word. “Belinda, I’ll take you to Peter.”

  She waved her away. “Peter doesn’t live far. Go; you two need to talk.”

  Robin pulled away reluctantly. She returned to Jason’s parking lot and then took a deep, fortifying breath before heading to his apartment and unlocking the door. Jason was holding his cell phone to his ear and his head swung to look at her.

  “I gotta go. Yeah, yeah. Bye.”

  Robin wondered if that was Amberly on the phone, but the answer came immediately.

  “Robin! You think that I’m in love with Amberly?!”

  Robin’s eyes got wide. What the hell?! Belinda told. She’d only dropped the girl off less than five minutes ago! She freaking told that quick??

  “Sweetheart, I am NOT in love with Amberly.” Robin walked into the kitchen to get away from his stare. She opened the refrigerator and grabbed a bottled water.

  “Ugh.” Jason groaned. She looked at him quickly but he was just sitting in chair with a lost look on his face. “I…that pact. It was stupid. That kiss was so bad that I felt sorry for her and then the next thing I know I was making that pact. It was stupid-”

  “The pact was stupid. But you kissed her. I mean…I thought our first kiss was your first kiss.” She tried unsuccessfully to hold back the accusation from her voice. He looked down in guilt. “You shared your first kiss with her. You have a pact to have sex and she sits on your lap having meaningful conversations with you…and you’re saying that none of that means you have special feelings for her?”

  He looked at her. “I don’t have feelings for her other than just friendship.”

  Robin looked at the evidence of their meal at the table. She sighed and began cleaning it up.

  “Well…” He said uncertainly. “I wish she wouldn’t have mentioned it. She should have never said anything. Now you think things that aren’t even true.”

  “You should have told me, Jason!” It was the first time that she’d shown her anger at him. “I mean, god; your first kiss!” She threw away the food and angrily wiped up the mess of rice that hadn’t made it onto Jason’s fork or into his mouth. And then there was Amberly’s mess. She wasn’t the neatest person in the world, evidently, or else they’d had a food fight!

  She felt Jason moving behind her and then he bumped the back of her knees, lightly boxing her in against the table with nowhere to go but to sit in his lap. She fell into him, attempting to brace herself against the arms of the chair and not looking very lady like as she flopped down. His arms snaked around her.

  “Jason! Let me up.”

  “I will.” He said. “In a minute. Just…look at me.” It took a moment before she could. “You have every right to be mad at me. And you’re right about one thing. Do you want to know which one thing you’re right about?” She nodded reluctantly. “There is something special between Amberly and myself.”

  He stared at her deeply. “It’s called friendship. Until you, she was my best friend. I love Amberly and Link and Patty; but I’m in love with you. Now you asked me last night why; and I’m going to tell you right now. I love you because you and I are the same. None of my friends is more like me than you are. Link and I are both in wheelchairs, Amberly and I both have CP, Patty and I have our anger. But you and I, Sweetheart, we have pain.” He swallowed and watched her eyes closely. “You and I have pain. I want to take yours away, and you want to take mine away. And I want to open up to you and let you see me, and I feel like you want that too. Like…you want to drop the exterior, that protective coating that you use to get through life. Yeah. I love my friends; very much. But I’m in love with you.”

  Robin felt herself sinking; sinking deeper into Jason; being so connected to him that she and he were suddenly just one. It was such a scary thing to feel love saturate you. She leaned in and placed her lips on his. He kissed her with more than lips and tongue, but with his breath and his soul and his heart.

  “I love you, Robin.” He pulled himself away. “People don’t say it. But I have to say it, and touch you. I just have to. Even though we’re so new…and-and…other’s might think it’s too soon.” He was shaking his head and trying not to stutter. “It’s not. Because I say what I feel. Sometimes I’m stupid and I don’t think first. But when I knew I loved you, I told you. If I was in love with Amberly; I would have told her. Don’t you know that yet?”

  She nodded. “I know it now.” She hugged him, holding him and not wanting to let him go, not even to put her lips back onto his and to kiss him. She just wanted to hold him and to feel his arms around her, holding her so tight that it almost hurt. But how did he know that she needed him to hug her so hard that it hurt? How did he understand that it was what she wanted?