by Holly Hood
Slade laughed at me, running his hands down the length of my body, from my back to my hips and then all the way down my legs. It made my heart quake.
It couldn’t be any more perfect, I thought to myself, letting out a sigh.
Stronger
I smiled as I opened my eyes and found Slade sleeping peacefully beside me in bed. He looked calm. And he kept his promise to not leave me alone to fend off Ezra.
I kissed his bare shoulder, nestling my head against his skin.
“Morning,” he said, waking up the minute I touched him. He ran a hand through my hair, stroking my head lovingly.
“Morning to you too,” I said, accepting his warm kiss.
He smiled, his tired eyes up lighting up, even showing some teeth this time as he stared at me.
“What’s that smile for?” I asked him, feeling a bit unsure of myself all of a sudden.
“Nothing. You’re just really beautiful to look at in the morning.”
I scrunched my nose, feeling my cheeks warm. Giving him another kiss, which lead into an even heavier make out session. We were too into each other to realize Dad was standing in the doorway with my door wide open. That was, until he cleared his throat and shoved the door into the wall.
“Dad,” I screamed, drawing my blankets over Slade and me.
“I knew I heard something strange going on last night!” Dad said, his face as red as a tomato as he gripped the doorknob.
Slade sat up, making it to the edge of my bed, he cupped a hand over the front of himself trying to hide the excitement his man downstairs had just went through after kissing me.
“I’d get dressed a little quicker than that, buddy,” Dad warned him.
Slade stood up, locating his shorts. He threw caution to the wind, dropping his cover and pulling his shorts up. Dad let out a sickened groan at the sight of Slade’s anatomy out for all eyes to see.
Slade wasn’t shy as he gazed around the room for his t-shirt. Dad snatched the black t-shirt off of the floor, balling it up and hurling it at him. Slade tugged it over his head, heading for the window.
“How about you use the door like somebody with a little decency?”
I stood up, wrapping my comforter around me. “Dad, please stop. It’s not Slade’s fault.”
Dad chuckled. “Is that your best argument, Hope?”
I dropped my mouth open, flabbergasted. What could one say after being caught by their parent in a bed, naked, with their tattooed boyfriend?
“I want to see both of you in five minutes in my kitchen, with more than just your birthday suits on. If you’re bold enough to have sex in my house with my daughter, you’re big enough to talk to her father about it.” Dad watched Slade for any signs of refusal.
Slade ran a hand through his hair. “Sir, I have no problem talking to you about this.”
“Is that right? Are you some kind of pervert?”
I bit my lip, hiding the smile that was creeping across my face. Dad was not thinking rationally and now thought Slade wanted to talk about our sex life with him.
“Dad, he meant talk to you. Not about this,” I interjected.
“Hope, put some clothes on. And I mean it, if you and your boy toy aren’t in my kitchen in five minutes, I will make you both regret ever playing show me yours if I show you mine,” Dad warned, his finger wagging in front of my face, his breathing audible.
“Dad—” I began, but his fierce look cut me off mid-sentence. He took a look in the wastebasket and around the room.
“You didn’t happen to have enough common sense in that tattooed vessel of yours to wrap it up?” Dad crossed his arms, waiting for an answer.
Slade moved quickly to the bed, tugging it away from the wall. He lifted not one, not two, but three condom wrappers from underneath my bed on the floor.
I wasn’t sure I ever saw Dad’s face as white as it was at that moment.
“I’ll be out here trying to get my heart restarted,” Dad said, slamming my bedroom door shut.
I ran a hand through my hair, dropping the blanket back on my bed and rummaged through my dresser for some shorts and shirt to quickly clothe myself in. Slade came up behind me, pressing his groin into my rear.
“That’s a hot look, you bent over like that.” He palmed my backside, sending shivers through my skin. But I fought against them.
“My dad just caught us in bed together. That means he knows what we have going on. Now is not the time to be cute,” I said, slipping on some panties. Slade slid a finger between them and my skin teasing me more.
“He’s your father, he is supposed to show distress when you let someone like me in your panties.” He stared down as his fingers ran across my stomach.
“Slade, he is probably going to kill you,” I warned.
“No, he won’t. He just wants to put the fear of God in me. Tell me that I better not hurt you. The usual.”
I ran a brush through my hair, watching him in my mirror. “Oh, really? Well, you don’t know my dad then.”
“I know what to do,” Slade told me.
“And what is that, all knowing one?”
“I tell him that I’m in love with his daughter and I would be the last person to ever let anything bad happen to her, because the thought of something bad happening to her makes me as sick as it would him.” Slade smirked.
I felt lightheaded, excited, and ready to jump his bones all at once. But I settled on a quick kiss on the cheek. “That’s clever.”
He touched my cheek. “That’s the truth.”
I backed up. “How could that be?”
“How could it not be?”
Love. He had said he was in love with me. That was all I could think about as I sat at the kitchen table with Slade. Dad screaming for Elliot and Easton and even Crawford to get out of the house, because according to him, he had a lot to talk to me about.
Love. He said love. I couldn’t believe it.
Dad pulled up a seat. “Slade how old are you?”
Slade cleared his throat. “Nineteen, sir.”
“Don’t call me sir. You have lost the right to call me sir.”
“Dad,” I said. He needed to see that he was being really rude.
Dad raised his eyes brows, warning me to push him further and see what happened. “Slade, what is it you want out of life? Out of my daughter? Out of anything?” Dad crossed his arms, preparing for Slade’s answer.
“I want a happy life. And I hope that includes your daughter. That, I think, would make my life happy.” Slade gave me a glance.
Dad clapped his hands bringing Slade back to the matter at hand. “You hope that includes my daughter. What does that even mean? Remember, I’m a man and I said and did it all.”
I rolled my eyes. Dad married his high school sweetheart. He did nothing.
“Well, it’s not up to me to decide that. So I say I hope. I hope that I’d be good enough for someone as great as your daughter.”
My heart pitter pattered, my insides shook. It was the most powerful conversation I had ever been a part of.
Dad fell silent, running a hand back and forth against his neck.
“And what do you think about all of this, Hope? We just discussed this. You told me you had no plans on becoming sexually active.”
I pursed my lips. The way Dad described it made it seem a lot less attractive than it was the other night.
“I really like him. I wouldn’t have done all that I did if I didn’t like him.” I smiled at Slade.
“I don’t want to know about all that you did. I’m blown away by your behavior, Hope. I am disappointed that you would bring this guy in my house and have sex under my roof. You lied to me.” Dad looked away, clearly upset with me. And this made my chest ache.
“Dad, I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“Disappointment is not upset. I am not upset as much as I am disappointed. You are focused on the wrong things. You’re still a young girl, you have the whole world in front of you, and you’re alrea
dy choosing to make adult decisions when you’re still living a child’s life.”
His words stung. They angered me. How could something that felt so right be so wrong to my dad? I was seventeen. I knew what I felt as much as an adult. When did age fall into play when your heart opened up and allowed someone in?
Slade kept his eyes straight ahead, not looking at me.
“Slade, I am only going to tell you this one time. It would benefit you greatly if you stayed away from my daughter. She’s too young to involve herself with a guy like you,” Dad told him.
I wiped at the tears that quickly spilled from my eyes. Out of words, completely crushed by Dad’s unexpected demand. Of his complete disapproval.
“A guy like me. What kind of guy am I?” Slade asked.
“The kind of guy that sneaks into a girl’s home to sleep with her knowing her dad is right down the hall. The kind of guy who covers his body in tattoos and fancy piercings to gain attention. The kind of guy who didn’t last at Ashwilder and now runs around with a bunch of kids who want to be in a band and play rock star. That kind of guy.”
Slade stood up. “That kind of guy, sir, is not me. And I care about her more than you know. I made some bad choices and I apologize, but I’d never hurt her.”
“You got what you wanted. It’s time to hit the road. Find someone else willing to warm your bed at night, Slade.” Dad opened the door.
“Dad!” I cried, my heart pounding in my chest. I took hold of Slade’s arm, trying to make him stay.
“Hope, you’re seventeen. What I say is what goes around here. If you decide later on that you want to be with him, do that when you’re out of school and have a better mindset. Now let him go,” Dad warned me.
Slade gently kissed my forehead, touching my face with a small smile that I knew he was wearing only to try and make me feel better. “I’ll see ya.”
My heart shattered into a million pieces. I screamed out in pain as Dad shut and locked the door.
“How could you do such a thing!” I yelled. “After all I did for you. I stayed with you because I worried about your well-being, and you forbid me from being with someone I really care about. Someone that has been nothing but wonderful to me since I got here!”
Dad stayed in front of the door keeping me from taking off. “I did what was best for my daughter. You don’t have to like it, but it’s what’s best.”
I stomped my foot, enraged. Nothing about this was best. It was cruel.
“Slade is not for you. You’re not the kind of girl that can handle a guy like him, Hope.”
I cringed. “And what, Tucker is!” I yelled.
Dad shook his head in disbelief. “I’m not saying that. I’m saying I don’t want you getting mixed up with the wrong kind. Tucker is a nice kid. He comes from a great mother.”
My whole body went rigid with fury. “This is because you slept with Tucker’s mother. Now you think I should hook up with her son because you have a thing for her!”
“Hope, you need to cool it right now!”
I took off to my room, using every ounce of energy in my body to slam the door shut.
“And if you try and take off after Slade I will alert the authorities. And you know how well that went for him the other times,” Dad said from outside my door.
I pulled my hair in frustration. I was completely sure Tucker’s mom had filled Dad in on Slade. And now he had hopped on the bandwagon with the rest of the town.
Prove You Wrong
There was no way that I would survive the night alone. I knew that. Ezra wouldn’t let me. Sex was a lot different than the confession of love. And Slade had confessed to having feelings for me, feelings so strong they made him believe that he was in love with me. So strong that I, too, believed it. I felt the same way. Love was this enigma that I thought I would never know, feel or have to deal with.
We all wanted to love someone. Especially girls. Boys were more fighting against love. But when they felt it, I figured it was genuine. Why else would they want to admit such a thing, unless they were convinced they were, in fact, in love?
I stared at my window, the curtain fluttering against the central air’s breeze. I wasn’t going to sleep because if I did, Ezra would find a way in.
I had figured out Ezra only came around me when I was tired, sleeping or caught off guard. I wasn’t letting her win. I was going to find a way around this dead girl’s loophole.
I sat down at my desk, turning on the monitor. My IM chimed right away, notifying me that Karsen was online and wanting to talk.
Hey where have you been?
I sighed, how much more could I lay out there for Karsen before she thought I was nutty? I slowly typed a response.
It’s only been a couple days. I’m right here. Dad went postal.
Why? How?
Because he caught Slade in my room...and let’s just say we were in a very compromising position.
What?! I thought you were done with him!
I was. But he showed up and said all the right things. I guess I’m a sucker for hot guys with lip piercings.
Witches with hot piercings, Hope. So….did you give him the letter for Kidd? Oh, how I miss him.
No. Like I said, Dad went postal. He threw him out and forbade me to ever see him again. I feel like Rapunzel locked in a tower.
That’s what you get for bumping uglies in your dad’s home.
I got to go. Life just keeps getting better and better. Bye, Karsen.
I turned off my computer. Life sure kept getting better and better. I snapped off my light, getting into bed. My head was pounding and my stomach hurt. I guess along with being banned from love, I was also given the gift of the flu. I coughed, clutching my chest in pain.
“You can’t go to sleep. You can’t go to sleep,” I reminded myself, forcing myself to get out of bed. I let out a dry cough, pulling out some clothes and heading to the bathroom. Maybe a shower would make me feel better, if only physically.
I dropped my clothes to the bathroom floor, pushing a hand through the shower curtain to turn on the water. Humming a tune as I busily brushed my hair out in front of the mirror as the shower warmed up.
I set the brush on the counter, pulling back the curtain, billows of steam hurrying past me, whirling around the bathroom.
“What the…” I gaped at all the rose petals collecting at the bottom of the shower. I stepped in, noting that they weren’t there before, I was sure of it. I picked one up, breathing in the fragrance of the red petal. A shower of petals fluttered down from the ceiling all of a sudden, surprising me.
What a way to take a bath, I thought, batting the petals away from the drain with my toe. I smiled at the idea of Slade communicating with me from far away.
I closed my eyes, dipping my head back into the stream of warm water. My muscles loosening up as I immersed myself, all the nervous tension rolling away from me.
When I opened my eyes the petals were gone. I sighed, how beautiful was it to encounter beautiful things that made no sense.
Things like magic.
Finally, I felt sort of normal again after my shower. I headed down the hallway to get something to eat. I was starving so I knew I had to come out sometime. I didn’t anticipate Slade conjuring up any kind of feast for me.
“What are the flowers for?” I asked my dad, noticing the vase with about two dozen roses on the kitchen table.
Dad handed me an envelope that had already been ripped open. It had my name on it. I swallowed down my temper. He had no right opening my mail.
“He says he’s thinking about you,” Dad said wryly, going to the sink. He started the water, turning his back to me.
I slid the small white card out.
Doing more than thinking about you. If your dad only knew. Hope you enjoyed the petals in the shower.
I smiled at his inscription, and just as swiftly as it appeared, it disappeared, returning with more divine scrawls of magical writing for only my eyes to read.
; Remember I told you to give me some time? Well, I hope you meant that. Still working on something. Don’t give up on me. Find a way out, maybe we can meet up.
Dad grabbed the card from my hands. He gazed down at the paper, his eyebrows gathering in the middle. “I don’t know why this guy wants to keep pushing me,” he mumbled to himself, tossing the card down.
I gave it a fleeting look, the only words now on display were thinking about you again. And this made me smile even larger that I was in on a top secret that no one else knew anything about.
I poured a bowl of cereal, sitting down at the table. I looked at my flowers, focused on only that as I ate my food. I didn’t bother talking to Dad. And he didn’t bother talking to me.
He finished the dishes, going out into the living room. “Lynette and Tucker are coming for lunch. We are going down to the shore to grab a bite to eat. And you’re coming. This is the only way I can keep an eye on you.” Dad flipped the channel, acting like this was no big deal.
I chucked my bowl in the sink.
“I don’t feel good. I don’t want to go out to eat,” I said, resentfully. And it wasn’t really a lie. I really felt like I was coming down with a cold.
“You will live, Hope. I don’t want another argument. If I leave you here I know the first thing you will do is call up Slade and have him over.”
I glared at him. “Fine. Whatever,” I said, stomping off to my room.
If Dad was going to ruin my life, I was going to show him that Slade wasn’t the only boy out for one thing. I was going to prove to him that Tucker was just as bad as all the rest.
I threw open my closet, pulling out a little black skirt and a black tank top. I swiftly changed into the new outfit, shoving my feet into the chunky heels Karsen had left behind. I shook my hair free of the rubber band, letting it fall skillfully around my shoulders. And last but not least, I spritzed on some Love Spell and swiped on a red lipstick. I was ready for combat.
