by Jay McLean
“That’s not what I meant,” he mumbles, his finger on my chin forcing me to look at him. Then he smiles. “The rest of your life?”
“Huh?”
“You said the rest of your life. So you plan on being with me forever.”
I roll my eyes. “I thought that was obvious, Dylan, and that’s not the point. The point is—”
“The point is you love me and I love you and we really suck at talking.”
I laugh. I can’t help it. “We really do.”
He grasps my shoulders, bringing us both back to our lying positions. “Dad told me he showed you some letters—the ones my mom wrote him while he was deployed but never sent?”
I nod against his chest.
“I never got any letters from you.”
I sit up slightly. “Were you expecting them?” I ask, my heart dropping.
He smiles, moving the hair away from my eyes. “I was. But now I know why and I get it.”
“You do?”
He nods, pulling me back down to him. “Did you write to me?”
“Maybe.”
A smile pulls on his lips. “Are you going to show me?”
“One day. Maybe.”
“That’s good enough,” he says, then changes the subject. “So what’s the plan for tomorrow?”
“I have work—”
“No you don’t.”
“What?”
“I didn’t tell you?”
I roll my eyes again. “Tell me what?”
“Eric organized for you to have the time off while I was back. They were all in on it, too.”
I sit up quickly, pick up my pillow and throw it at him. “Shut up!”
He groans, his eyes shut tight. “Quit throwing shit at me.”
“Are you serious?”
“Yes,” he says through a chuckle. “But I don’t know anymore. Maybe you should go to work.” He puts the pillow back in place. “I think my life’s safer in Afghanistan.”
“Dylan,” I deadpan. “Seriously? I don’t have to work?”
“No. For the third time. I wanted you all to myself.”
I pick up the pillow again because, obviously, I do stupid shit when I’m excited.
Before I have a chance to throw it, he takes it from me, throws it across the room and grasps both my hands, flipping me onto my back at the same time. His entire body covers me, his hands holding mine above my head. “I told you to quit throwing shit, Riley.”
I giggle and try to squirm out of his hold, knowing full well it’s useless. He’s too strong, too demanding.
“Quit fighting it,” he says, using his knees to spread my legs apart. He settles between them, his hard-on rocking against my center.
I lean up and kiss him quickly. “What’s my punishment, Lance Corporal?”
He groans from deep in his throat, dipping his head. “Aren’t you sore?”
“A little,” I admit.
“Need me to kiss it better?”
I nod.
He smirks.
Then his phone goes off.
Dave: What are you doing, handsome?
Dylan: Gettingxmoney and ducking bitches.
He throws his phone across the room.
Then he kisses me better.
So much better.
Thirty-Eight
Dylan
I can’t tell you how many times I tried to remember her exactly the way she is; sleeping peacefully on her stomach, her hair a mess, her mouth parted, her breaths even.
So many nights I’d try to picture it.
And my memories didn’t do her justice.
The second I saw her yesterday sitting on a chair, the flames of twenty-one candles lighting her beautiful face, eyes closed and her entire body tense with the strength of her wish, something in me switched. I’m not exactly sure what it was or how to describe it, but somehow, saving the world didn’t seem as important as saving her.
I lean down and press my lips to her temple. “I’m going to take Bacon for a walk,” I whisper.
She mumbles something incoherent. Then a second later, she sits up, fully alert. “I thought you were a dream,” she says through a smile.
“No dream, baby.”
She stands quickly and moves to the bathroom. “Twelve days and counting. Give me five. I’m not missing out on a second with you.”
We take Bacon for a walk to Dad’s house. We have breakfast with Eric and Dad and catch up on everything that’s been going on since I’ve been gone. Not a lot has happened, apart from Eric taking over my old room again and Sydney moving in. I guess that last one’s kind of a big deal. Apparently Sydney had been living with her ex (awkward), which was something Eric wasn’t too happy with. They argued for a long time about it. In fact, it was the only thing they argued about. Eric wasn’t willing to leave Dad so he asked her to move in. Eric says she’s been slowly making the house a little homey. You know, besides the two recliners and frozen dinners. Her and Dad get a long well. They always have. And I’m glad Eric thought to stay with him because honestly, Riley wasn’t the only reason I chose to stay so close to home. I’d hate to think what his life would become if we were both far away.
Bacon sits at the table. Literally at the table. He’d come with Riley to visit often and now they have a baby’s high chair all set up for him. His favorite food? Bacon.
“Doesn’t that make him a cannibal?” I ask.
Eric laughs. “It’s not like he’s a pig eating pig, D.”
“Oh yeah.”
Riley smiles up at me on the walk back home. “Have I mentioned that I’m happy you’re home?”
“A few times.”
She squeezes my hand tighter. “It doesn’t seem like enough.”
“It is, babe. I’m just glad you’re not shacked up with some other guy.”
“Shut up,” she says, her head throwing back with her laugh.
“Seriously, Ry. Were you tempted?”
“Not for a second.”
“Anyone try?”
Her face falls, her nose scrunched a little.
I stop walking and turn to her, eyes narrowed. “Who?”
“Dylan, it’s so not important.”
I know it’s not, but watching her squirm and seeing the blush form on her cheeks is fun. Regardless of how I felt when I left her, the time away had given me perspective. I trust her with our love. I trust her with my life. It won’t stop me from acting like a dick just for shits and giggles though. I dip my head, looking into her eyes. “Riley. Name and address?”
She looks away, her cheeks getting redder. Fuck, she’s cute. “He’s just that student vet who volunteers at the shelter. You met him yesterday. Bryce…”
I keep a straight face, feigning an anger that doesn’t exist. “He asked you out?”
She nods.
“And what did you say?”
“I said I was yours, Dylan.”
I suppress my smile at her words. “And he left it alone?”
She nods again, her throat bobbing with her swallow. She’s so nervous. So cute. “Swear he never brought it up again.”
“And you still see him?”
“He’s a volunteer, D.”
“Right.”
She grabs her phone from the pocket of her sweatshirt and starts typing away.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m sending him a text to warn him.”
“About what?”
“I don’t know. That he’s probably going to wake up one day with a dildo glued to his ear.”
I can’t help but laugh. She puts the phone away and a second later, my phone chimes with a text from her—his name and address.
“He asked Heidi out at my party.”
“He did?”
I nod. “And I like Heidi and I like him, so just don’t do anything permanent, okay?” She leans up and kisses me once, and when her feet find the ground I just stare at her. At her perfect smile, her perfect messy hair, her perfect eyes, her perfect
everything.
“You’re being very understanding,” I tell her. “And very forgiving of my future actions.”
She shrugs. “It’s because I know you, flaws and all, and I’m madly in love with you anyway.”
We spend the rest of the day at home while I take in everything new about the place since I’d left. She’d chosen a color for the kitchen cabinets and had unscrewed, unhinged, cleaned, sanded and painted them all on her own thanks to something called Pinterest. I’d heard Cam talk about it in the past so I asked her what it was.
Guys.
This is really important.
If you ever read this… Never, under any circumstance, and I mean ever, ask your girl to show you her Pinterest. Ever.
Six hours later, my eyes are bleeding. Not literally. But come on. There are only so many different techniques a throw can be thrown on a bed before it just looks like a fucking piece of fabric thrown on a shitty fucking bed.
I wonder if she ever thought that about cars.
“So you’re into all this stuff now?” I ask, shutting the laptop screen to aide my bleeding eyes.
We turn to each other from our seats at the kitchen table. She shrugs. “Not really. I just do it when I’m bored. I thought you were into it!”
“What?”
“Yeah. You were asking all these questions and telling me to google stuff,” she says.
“I was just trying to sound interested, Ry. Like you did with my car stuff.”
“What?” she says.
“Huh?”
“Did we just waste…” she looks at the clock on the wall. “… six hours!”
I laugh. “I was trying to be nice!”
She stands quickly and stomps her foot. “You know what we could’ve been doing in those six hours?”
I get up, grab our mugs off the table and put them in the new dishwasher. “What would you rather be doing?” I ask, leaning back on the counter and facing her.
“Anything.”
“Anything?”
“D. Seriously. I’ve puked stuff better than some of the prints on those boards. I’d rather wallpaper the house with Bacon. The dog and the food.”
I laugh, my hands finding her waist before pulling her between my legs. “You know what I love most about you, Riley?”
She smiles “What?”
“Everything. You’re so damn perfect.”
Sighing, she says, “I’m far from perfect, Dylan.”
“You’re perfect for me.”
“Then that’s all that matters.”
Riley
I’d love to say that we made the most of the two weeks he was back. We spent most of the time at home, in the bedroom or garage, keeping to ourselves. We did make an effort to see our friends and family, but mostly, we just wanted to be together. Alone. We drove, a lot, and we talked. He told me about what he’d done, leaving out details I’m sure would be too much for me to handle. And he told me about Dave—about the shenanigans they’d get up to. He did mention that Dave had changed a little while he’d been gone on medical leave. Most likely because he wasn’t as close to any of the other guys as he had been with him. It makes sense, I told him. It would be lonely out there and without the presence of your best friend, it would be hard. I knew that first hand.
I told him about the brownie incident with the girls and how Heidi and I had gotten closer that night. He gave me a weird look that had me asking what he was thinking. “You guys didn’t like… compare notes or anything?” I gagged a little, and then smacked his gut. He laughed. “I was just making sure,” he told me. He may have found it funny. I didn’t. In fact, I was pretty upset over it. I think maybe because the thought of him being with someone else, as long as and as often (puke) as him and Heidi… I can’t even finish that thought. He knew how unsettled it made me feel—which, honestly wasn’t hard to work out considering I didn’t bother hiding it. He held me in his arms, and told me he loved me, and only me, and that I was being dumb. I waited until he was in the shower on his own and threw a bucket of cold water at him, followed by glitter. Because glitter solves everything. It sure as hell solved my bad mood.
He paid me back though, of course. Because the first rule of Mayhem is retaliation. He asked me to go out and get him something from the hardware store to fix our jammed windows. Want to know what it’s like to walk into a hardware store and ask for a tube of Slip Airy Deep Sock-It? Trust me, you don’t. I repeated it for the fifth time, my eyes moving to the note in my hand and back up at the three guys with confused faces staring back at me. Then it clicked for the youngest one. He repeated it over and over again. He even announced through the store speakers, “Rodney, please come to the front desk. We have a Slip Airy Deep Sock-It enquiry.” They all seemed to be in on some kind of private joke as they typed on their computers, repeating the word over and over again, smirking and chuckling to themselves. It wasn’t until the hundredth or so repeat of the product’s name that it finally dawned on me.
Yeah.
I’m slow.
Slip Airy Deep Sock-It = Slippery Deep Socket = Wet vagina.
I kicked his ass when I got home.
He didn’t stop laughing.
Not until he had my pre-flailing arms held behind my back, my chest sticking out in front of me. “We even now?” he asked, smiling down at me.
I called a truce. I had to.
Hey, don’t judge. You’ve never been captured in the arms of Dylan Banks while his perfectly blue eyes looked down at you like he was ready to devour you. And devour me, he did.
* * *
Time is an asshole, I’ve decided.
The ticking and the consistency of it.
Because as much as I wanted it to slow down, it doesn’t. In fact, the harder I wished, the faster it went. Until we’re back here, standing hand in hand saying goodbye to each other. Only now we’re at the airport. “I’m going to miss you, Banks.”
“I’ll miss you more, Hudson,” he says, stepping forward and wrapping his arms around my waist. He lifts me off the ground, kissing me as he does. When he places me back on earth, he pulls away. “I’ll be back before you know it, Ry.”
“Promise?”
He nods.
I nod.
He kisses me once more.
And then he’s gone.
Thirty-Nine
Dylan
The time away from Riley isn’t as bad as it was the first time because a lot of it’s on base, which means I have more contact with her. Still not as much as I’d want, which is every second of every day, but hey… it could be worse.
For some reason, I’m not really sure why, but I’d become the target of all the guys’ pranks. It started off as them streaking behind me on one of my many Skype calls to Riley, and then it kind of just escalated. I guess I’m a good target because I’d get unjustifiably pissed off after each one. I’m not used to being the target. I’m used to aiming the grenade, so to speak.
They could happen any time, anywhere. Some were stupid. Some were smart. Some were on the fly and some were planned. They included, but were not limited to: honking the tank horn while I was working under it, equaling a gash on my head. They put shaving cream over my clothes and then set it on fire—while I was sleeping. This one wouldn’t have been so bad had they chosen anywhere else besides my dick because what’s the first thing you do when you realize you’re on fire? Try to put it out with your hand, that’s what. This subsequently led to my new nickname: Flaming Battered Cock. They also poured hot sauce in my mouth while I was sleeping—the consequences of that are self-explanatory. They wrapped my bed in Saran wrap—while I was in it. They did a lot of things while I was sleeping, hence why I don’t sleep much any more. There were a lot of water ones. You know… open doors… bucket of water. Open tank doors… bucket of water. Eat… bucket of water. Sleep… bucket of water. Breathe… bucket of fucking water. The worst one, though, just happened recently. There I was, sitting on the toilet, minding my business, pants down to my
ankles, picture of Riley in one hand… you can imagine what was in the other when FLASH BANG.
A flash bang is exactly what it sounds like. It’s a device that goes off with a flash and a bang… it’s meant to be used to stun and disorientate the enemy. But when you’re in fuck-knows-where, Afghanistan, in the middle of a warzone, a flash bang could easily be mistaken for many other things.
So, while my eyes tried to refocus and my ears rang, I did what anyone in my situation would do, I ran out—pants still around my ankles wondering what the fuck was going on. It’s not until I heard the laughter of eleven men when realization set in.
So for three months I’ve been constantly looking over my shoulder. Well, more than I normally would.
Also, that last prank is on YouTube now. I’ve watched it. Conway was the mastermind; Leroy was the leader. One guess who was holding the camera. Yep. Dave.
Swear, there’s no shame greater than running out of restroom, tripping over your pants and falling on your face while trying to hide your still semi-erect cock.
“It’s not funny, Ry!”
Through the screen, she covers her mouth attempting to stifle her laugh.
“Ry!”
Now she’s on her back, her hands on her stomach. Her laptop shifts, making the camera tilt so I’m looking at the ceiling, her laughter filling my ears.
“Ry!” I shout.
Slowly, she sits up, wiping her eyes as she does. “I need the link, babe.”
“Not a chance.”
She grabs her phone from the nightstand and crosses her legs beneath her. “I’ll just get it from Dave,” she says through a smile.
I shake my head, succumbing to the inevitable.
“Do me a favor, okay? Watch it when you’re alone. I have enough shame to deal with.”
