The Body

by Arabella Abbing

It was downright exhausting.

  But if she said she had it covered, I could only sigh and hope that she really did. Because while my offer to give her money was still valid, I knew she would never ask for it. The one time I’d tried giving her a physical check, she’d torn it up right in front of me.

  Money was a touchy subject in my family. Well, at least for my mom. No one else seemed to have an issue calling me up out of the blue for a ‘loan’.

  That one made me laugh every time. Like the assholes in my family really believed that I would buy into the lie of them ever paying me back. Bull-fucking-shit.

  “Did you have fun last night?”

  Memories of Brianna’s soft body pressed against me instantly flooded into my mind and I honestly said, “More than I expected.”

  “So you met a nice girl? Or—well—I guess you probably already ‘met’ her before.”

  I chuckled and rubbed a palm across my jaw. “Yes and no. We obviously went to the same high school and Brianna was in college with me as well. But we never... met. So to speak.”

  “Really? I didn’t think there were any girls left in town for you to meet.”

  I rolled my eyes. “You’re being a little overdramatic, don’t you think?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe one day you’ll be a parent and have to deal with dozens of angry calls from other parents about how your son ‘violated’ their daughters. You see how it feels and let me know if I’m being overdramatic.”

  “Shit. People actually did that? Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked, leaning forward against the table and frowning at the thought.

  When she turned around and slowly nodded, something was… off about her expression. I instantly put my guard back up as I reminded myself of how she operated.

  It was truly sad that I couldn’t trust a goddamn word out of my mother’s mouth. I still remembered the day she told my principal in middle school that my grandfather had passed away just to get me out of trouble after starting a fight. She let me believe he was really dead until we got home that afternoon, where she cracked open a bottle of wine and laughed at my tear-stricken face before admitting the truth.

  With a smile sweet as saccharine and as fake as a porn star’s tits, she smoothly lied, “More often than you realize. But your father and I always took care of that and we made sure that you never heard anything about it. Besides—none of the girls ever complained. It was only the parents with sticks up their asses.”

  A cup of coffee was set down in front of me and I picked it up to hide the grim line my mouth had set in. I wasn’t going to bother to call her out on that lie and instead moved on to what I considered a far more pressing issue.

  “Did Kyle come by while I was gone?”

  She put her mug down and let out a disappointed sigh. “Why would you even ask me that? I told you I was just going to watch my shows and read.”

  “So which did you do?”

  “Both.”

  “What’d you watch?”

  “Adam.”

  “What book did you read? How many pages? Chapters? What were the character names?” I demanded, raising my voice as I rose out of the chair and walked around to stand in front of her. “Or had you not bothered to think that far ahead yet? I imagine you didn’t expect me home so early.”

  She slapped me hard against the cheek—her eyes swirling with rage as she spat out, “Don’t talk to your mother that way! I didn’t raise you like that.”

  “You barely raised me at all,” I said, seething. “Did he come by or not? Tell me the fucking truth for once in your goddamn life!”

  “It’s none of your business!”

  Which was pretty much her simple way of saying—‘Why of course he did. And he brought some damn good drugs with him.’

  I didn’t even want to mentally indulge the possibility of something else going on between the two of them. That was a whole new level of fucking disgusting—so much so that my stomach churned at the thought. But something about it rang true and memories of Brianna started to fade—replaced by mental images of my mom trading sexual favors to Kyle for drugs.

  “I can’t deal with this shit,” I said, throwing my hands up in the air and officially surrendering. “I’m done, mom. I’m not going to police your choices if this is really how you want to live your life. But don’t expect me to stick around and watch you throw it away.”

  “I didn’t ask you—”

  “But you did!” I shouted, cutting her off and closing my eyes. “You keep asking me to come back. You call me and swear up and down that you’re doing better and you beg me to come see how much you’ve changed—but you aren’t doing better and you sure as hell haven’t changed! How can you keep lying to yourself like this? How can you keep lying to your son?”

  Where most people would have hit their limit and broken down at that point, my mom just wasn’t that kind of person. She was where I got my stubborn streak from, after all. Her eyes and mouth went flat as she folded her arms across her chest.

  “Then go, Adam. Get out. If you don’t want to be here with me—then get the fuck out.”

  “Fucking gladly.”

  I stormed out of the kitchen and towards my bedroom, pointedly ignoring the random pieces of clothing and furniture that were out of place in the hallway and living room. I clenched my jaw as I grabbed my bag, grateful that I hadn’t bothered to unpack it. I had somehow known I wouldn’t need to.

  It was just like when she failed to pick me up at the airport. Not a surprise, but still somewhat disappointing.

  On my way out, I stupidly stopped at the kitchen and watched as she leaned over the sink and let out a long, shaky sigh. She spun around when I cleared my throat, her mask of indifference slid firmly back in place.

  “I’ll stay at a hotel until Sammy gets back.”

  “All right.”

  Even though we were mid-fight, she was still my mother.

  “If you need anything—”

  “I’ll call.”

  I waited for a beat to see if she was going to make a move to hug me or say goodbye, but I think we both knew this wasn’t the end of it. Just because I wasn’t staying with her didn’t mean that I was leaving town and even in a city this large, we were bound to cross paths again.

  “I’ll see you around,” I said as I hoisted my duffel bag on my shoulder and spun around on my heel.

  It felt rather strange that she just let me walk out so easily, although I couldn’t really fault her for it. I had said some pretty fucked up things to her. They might have been the truth, but I was sure that didn’t make it any easier for her to hear. Especially not from her son.

  After I backed out of the driveway and pulled away from the house, I wondered what the hell I could do with the rest of the morning. Most hotels didn’t allow check-in until late in the afternoon and it wasn’t even eight o’clock yet. As I began to aimlessly drive, my thoughts alternating between Brianna and my mom, my cell phone rang.

  I didn’t particularly want to answer it—but I figured it would at least kill a few hours. I swiped to accept the call and pressed the phone to my ear.

  “What do you want, Dale?”

  Chapter Eleven

  Brianna

  By ten o’clock that morning, I had long since showered and gotten dressed, but I hadn’t been able to bring myself to strip the dirty sheets off the bed and take them down to the washing machines. Instead, I decided to curl up beneath the blankets and spend the morning sulking.

  But when I got back into my bedroom with the intention of doing exactly that—something out of place caught my eye. I frowned as I walked towards my desk and lifted up the black strip of fabric that had been left beside my laptop.

  Adam’s tie.

  I recalled him shoving my underwear into his pocket the night before and I supposed he left his tie behind in exchange. I clenched it tightly between my fingers as I crawled back into bed.

  A few minutes later, I heard the apartment door open and close and the showe
r started running not long after. I propped my pillows against the headboard and shoved the tie beneath them, sitting up while I waited for the inevitable questions that would be coming my way once Stacy finished up in the bathroom.

  Less than ten minutes went by before there was a timid knock on my door followed by her soft voice.

  “Bri?”

  “He’s gone,” I called back.

  The door opened and Stacy came in, her smile growing once she fully stepped into the room. She paused—taking a deep breath before she began to laugh.

  “It smells like sex in here!” she happily exclaimed. “You did it, girl!”

  I smiled and nodded, but the way her face fell told me that I hadn’t been very convincing.

  She immediately lunged forward and crawled up the bed, sitting beside me as she carefully asked, “Are you okay? Did he... He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

  “Only in the really good kind of way,” I joked, even though it wasn’t particularly funny to either of us. “It’s just... I think it was a mistake.”

  “How so?”

  “Because I’m not going to be able to stop obsessing over him now,” I admitted with a sigh before I buried my face in my hands and mumbled, “I think it’s just going to get worse. It was so good, Stacy. I don’t even have words.”

  She pulled my hands away and gave me a dry look as she said, “That’s the benefit of hooking up with guys who sleep around. Trust me—it’s the only benefit. You got to let him go, honey. He’s The Body, remember? The guy who slept with probably half the campus. You can do better.”

  “What if I don’t want to do better, though? What if I want to know more about him before I make that call?”

  Stacy’s smile got even sadder right before she said, “Then you’re in for a hell of a heartache. What did he say when he left? Is he going to call you?”

  I swallowed hard and shook my head. “I never gave him my number and he... He kind of left when he thought I was sleeping.”

  “That really doesn’t bode well for a blossoming relationship.”

  I had to agree with her there for obvious reasons. Even though I was still fixated on the tender touch on my cheek and the brief kiss he gave me before he left, there was a strong possibility that he did that with every girl he took to bed. Maybe he was a gentlemanly kind of player—the one who truly appreciated every woman that he slept with, but without any kind of desire to take it further.

  Fuck. Why in the hell did I want to be the exception to that?

  That’s when I remembered something he said last night—something that required further evaluation.

  “He said something to me last night that I didn’t understand.”

  “What’s that?”

  “He... Well, he told me that he noticed me back in school. I didn’t believe him at first—I thought he was just trying to get on my good side—but he remembered things about me. From high school and college. And later on, I asked him why he never made a move.”

  Her eyes widened in disbelief. “You seriously asked him that? What’d he say?”

  “He said he thought I was too smart to get involved with a guy like him. At first, I thought he meant a player—but when I pointed that out, he said that wasn’t what he meant. What the hell did he mean? I feel like I missed something important.”

  “You didn’t ask him to elaborate?”

  “He, uh—He kissed me and I kind of got distracted.”

  Stacy turned over and laid down, staring up at the ceiling with a frown as she also mulled over the possible meaning behind the words. After a long few minutes of silence, she finally rolled onto her side and propped her head up on her hand.

  “I don’t think this is something we’re going to figure out on our own. But I do think that I was right when I said you shouldn’t judge his life by how it looks to an outsider.”

  “Do you think that his home life might be bad? He seemed pretty touchy when I asked him about his family.”

  “Ten bucks says that would be the best place to start.”

  I raised an eyebrow and sat up on my knees, turning to face her head-on with a wary expression. “Are you actually encouraging this?”

  “Answer me honestly, Bri. Did you get him out of your system? Are you ready to move on and stop obsessing?”

  “No,” I replied, not missing a beat.

  Stacy shrugged. “See? You’re going to obsess about Adam whether I’m involved or not. Might as well do whatever I can to help you out—even if it’s just helping you figure out where to begin.”

  “So… start with his family?”

  “My thoughts exactly,” Stacy agreed with a nod before she rolled off the bed and unplugged the laptop sitting on my desk. “Fire this thing up and let’s start digging.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Adam

  Over three years had passed since I last stepped foot into the diner Dale asked me to meet him at, but it was like stepping into a time machine. Nothing had changed—not even the employees behind the counter.

  “Hey, sugar. You want a table or a seat at the bar?”

  I turned to the eerily familiar waitress and shook my head. “Neither. I’m meeting someone.”

  She popped her gum loudly and jerked her head back towards the corner of the building. “If it’s Dale you’re looking for, he’s in the back booth.”

  “Thanks,” I muttered, passing by her and scanning the occupied booths.

  Dale was easy enough to spot from the side profile alone and I slid into the booth, waiting until he finally looked up from his newspaper.

  I swear—it was like a punch to the gut every time his eyes met mine.

  “Nice of you to finally take my call,” his low voice rumbled as his eyes glanced back down at the paper. “I was starting to think you’d forgotten who I was.”

  He began to fold up the paper and put it to the side, drawing my attention to the holstered pistol sitting on the table.

  “It’d be kind of hard to forget you. Especially after our last conversation.”

  He chuckled. “Sorry about that, kid. But you needed to hear it.”

  “It was unnecessary. I left that shit behind before I even went to college.”

  “I know you did, kid. And I’m proud of you for it.”

  I didn’t respond. I couldn’t. Not to words I used to be desperate to hear come out of my father’s mouth. Hearing them in his voice but coming out of the mouth of his identical twin brother was both a moment of pride and also completely heartbreaking.

  Before I allowed myself to forget everything that happened between Dale and me over the years, I shoved away the mixed emotions and fixed him with an irritated scowl.

  “Why have you been calling me? Is this about mom?”

  His eyebrows raised. “No. What’s going on with Linda?”

  Fuck. She must have been right when she said Dale didn’t know and my gaze briefly flickered down to where his badge was making the pocket of his shirt slightly protrude. I needed to backtrack before I ended up getting her thrown in jail.

  Again.

  “Just tell me why I’m here, Dale.”

  I could tell from the look in his eyes that he wasn’t going to forget my little slip-up and I made a mental note to warn mom to get rid of any drugs she was keeping in the house. Thankfully, Dale said nothing else about her, instead moving on to a topic I wanted to discuss even less.

  “I need to know if you’ve seen or spoken to your dad lately.”

  If I had made a list of things I expected Dale to want to talk to me about—my father wouldn’t have ever made the cut.

  “You know I haven’t,” I ground out from between my clenched teeth. “Is this some sort of joke?”

  Dale was unfazed by my irritation and took a long, slow sip of his coffee before he folded his hands together on the table and shook his head.

  “I’m afraid not. Word on the street is that he made his way back into town when he heard you were coming home.”

  What i
n the actual fuck?

  “Have you told mom?” I asked, shocked by the news.

  “No.”

  “Why the fuck not? What if he goes there looking for me?”

  “I’ve been having someone keep an eye on the house,” Dale casually said before he narrowed his eyes and glared hard at me. “Been getting a lot of reports about a black pick-up. Kyle, I presume?”

  I lowered my voice and leaned in as I said, “If you already know, why haven’t you done anything to stop it?”

  He shrugged. “I was hoping Linda would come to her senses and kick him to the curb. They’re supposedly dating. Or is that just a cover because she’s using again?”

  I swallowed hard and leaned back against the booth, giving a tight smile to the waitress who came around to top off Dale’s coffee. I waved her off when she asked if I wanted anything, waiting until she was out of range before I spoke again.

  “I’m not answering that.”

  “That’s not the biggest issue here anyways. It’s your father. He’s going to go after you, kid. You know it—I know it. I need you to keep your eyes peeled and whatever you do—do not fucking engage.”

  I nodded absent-mindedly, before I suspiciously asked, “You got eyes on me, too?”

  “Yeah. Mine,” he confirmed with a solemn nod. “Sorry if you feel like that intrudes on your privacy or whatever, but this is fucking serious.”

  “How long?”

  “I been tailing you since you stepped out of the airport, bud,” he admitted with a sigh. “Didn’t feel right assigning someone else to watch you that close.”

  Even though I didn’t tell him, I did appreciate that. The idea of a random member of the police force following me around made my stomach twist. Not because I was partaking in any illegal activities myself—at least not anymore—but because of all the shit going on with my mom.

  For the time being though, I needed to get her out of my head. While I was here with Dale, I needed to focus on the most important thing.

  “What do you think he’s gonna do?”

  Dale let out a disbelieving snort. “The man may be my brother, but that don’t mean I can read his mind. He’s a loose cannon with a grudge. Your best guess is as good as mine.”