Panic (The Flaw Series)

by Ringbloom, Ryan

  She giggles. “Honestly, with how amazing this night is, if you tell me you love me and you can’t live without me, you might just get laid after all.”

  Our laughter mingles together before dying out as we both look around, taking in deep breaths of the salty air. I put my hands in my pockets and dig my heels back into the wet sand. A gust of air gently sweeps her brown hair into her face and she reaches up to contain it. The way she looks in this moment is mesmerizing. I’ve never seen someone more beautiful.

  Freeing my hands from my pockets, I reach for her again. Maybe it’s because I’ve never been with someone who was my own age that’s giving me all this assurance. This time I’m the one in control. I can be the one who make the moves.

  I meet her eyes, which are reflecting under the moonlight. “I’m up for some pretending if you are. Want to give it a try?” My lips graze hers softly for a tender kiss. I pull back and trace the side of her face with my thumb. “I love you, Shayna. I can’t live without you.”

  Chapter Four

  Shane

  Pretend or not, my heart just twitched. A funny little cross between a laugh and a giggle comes out as I feel my skin warm at the fake words. He kisses me again, pushing us back a few steps so that we’re out of the water. The first kiss was soft, this one is more intense. The taste of cigarette hits my tongue. I’m almost glad for the unpleasantness. It helps balance out the pleasant sensation of hearing the words, ‘I love you,’ even though they weren’t sincere.

  His hands put pressure on my shoulders, guiding us down onto the sand with our lips still locked. The sand attaches itself to every wet part of my exposed legs and feet, getting in between my toes. Bailey breaks away and lifts up his shirt over his head. Oh, no, that was fast. Is this really gonna happen? Am I gonna let it? To my surprise, the shirt gets rubbed over my sand-filled skin. He wipes away the wetness and the sand starts to flake off.

  “Is that better?” he asks. His eyes are so warm and inviting, my heart starts racing. Looking at the little mark underneath those deep brown eyes only makes it beat faster.

  “Are you really this much of a gentleman or this still part of the whole pretend-movie thing?” I ask, watching him work the shirt over my toes that are painted with black nail polish. He stretches back up and I see a tattoo on his toned chest. Even in the dark I can see the inked “S” is a little sloppy, but I know good tattoos tend to cost quite a bit. Actually, everything costs quite a bit. I know all too well.

  “This is what a guy in love does. He takes care of his woman.” Bailey tosses his sand-filled shirt aside and grins.

  “Oh, okay, we’re still doing the pretend-movie thing. Hmm.” I think out loud. “Well, is that a tattoo? Or are you actually Superman?” I say, and then close my eyes in embarrassment at how stupid that just sounded.

  “That was pretty bad.” He laughs and when I start to get up, he reaches for my wrist, keeping me sitting down next to him. “Keep going. I want to see what else you come up with.”

  “No, you’ll just make fun of me.” I cover my face. “I’m not good at this pretending like you are.”

  “Come on, sweetheart, I just told I love you and you can’t think of anything to say back to me?”

  Oh, my God, what have I gotten myself into? I just felt my body react to that stupid, ‘I love you’ again. I need to say something and just end all this. “Even in a movie people don’t say ‘I love you’ when they first meet.”

  “Sure they do. It’s called love at first sight. And from the moment I laid eyes on you, baby girl, I fell so deeply in love I thought my heart would burst open.” His voice is deep and rich, sultry. He slides onto his knees in front of me and his hands grab hold of my burning cheeks. “What about you? What did you think when you first saw me?”

  This is insane, I feel myself turning into putty every time he opens his mouth. He certainly wasn’t coming across this mature and sexy a few moments ago. What changed? This game of pretending we’re in some movie? As fake as this may be, I’m almost ready to give into him. Even if I did fall in love, I don’t think my first time would ever be in a romantic setting like this and I can almost guarantee sweet words like these would probably never be said.

  He moves in close, his lips a mere breath away from mine. “Tell me, Shayna, tell me you love me to,” he whispers, pushing me back against the softness of the beach. The waves continue their alluring rush, crashing in the background. My fingers are relaxed against his tight chest. His soft brown eyes lock on mine. The way his hair lifts in the breeze only adds to the romance of the moment. He slides his hand to the hem of my shirt and his thumb skims over the smooth skin of my stomach. I know once I say it, playing into this whole façade, there’s no turning back. This moment just feels so right. A little voice inside is telling me to go for it.

  “I love you, Bailey,” I say to him breathlessly, knowing exactly what comes next.

  “I want to make love to you, Shayna.” His hands explore under my shirt. Soft lips and hot breath land on my neck. “Are you gonna let me make love to you tonight?”

  “Hmm,” I say, my quivering voice betraying me, just like the rest of my body.

  “Is that a yes?” His hand unbuttons the top button of my jeans. I can feel his hard-on pushing up against me through the thickness of his own jeans. I reach down and cup my hand over the bulge, giving it a firm squeeze.

  “Yes,” I say. This is happening so fast. I can’t control myself, but I also don’t want to.

  He brings his lips to mine for one more sweet kiss and then he’s up on his knees undoing his jeans, while I scramble to peel my own damp jeans down my legs. He comes back down and his hand lowers, rubbing me softly. “I need to get you turned on, make sure you get wet. You’ve never done this before and I know it might hurt a little.”

  I’m not sure how he knows I’ve never done this before. I’m relieved, though, hoping he’ll be gentle. Wait, did he just say wet? That sounds so dirty. He’s obviously experienced and I only know a few moves. Mostly just boob stuff. I lift my shirt up and undo the front clasp of my bra, exposing my breasts to him. Hopefully that makes me look like I know what I’m doing a little. He eyes my chest with a hungry look and gives a low groan. It’s working. I lift my shirt a little higher and arch my back so my breasts appear more prominent.

  “You are beautiful, sweetheart.” His mouth connects to my nipple and his tongue loops around in small delightful circles. That feels a million times better than I ever thought it would. It’s my turn to let out a little moan and my body reacts. His fingers linger just a few moments more and then he repositions himself over me.

  “Wait. Do you have a condom?” I stop him from going any further, placing my hand protectively down below.

  “We don’t need one. I’m good.”

  “What do you mean? How are you good?”

  “I know when I’m gonna come, so I just pull out.”

  “Um, but what if you don’t?”

  “Trust me. Once I feel it, I’ll pull out in plenty of time. Nothing will get in you, I swear it.” His face relaxes into a very trusting grin. “Remember, I love you, I won’t let anything bad happen to you, ever.”

  Damn those stupid words. But I guess he’s right, if he doesn’t actually come in me than I don’t need to worry about anything. Slowly, I move my hand away. His hand returns for a few more encouraging rubs and then I feel it working its way inside.

  It hurts, feels a little rough. That could just be from some of the sand. From this perspective, it doesn’t feel quite as soft as it did. My arms wrap around him and my hands rest on his back because I guess that’s where they should be. I’m not really sure what to do besides just lay here.

  I don’t feel anything special. I was more turned on from the talking and the touching. It’d be nice if he went back to kissing my breasts a little more, cause that felt really nice.

  My expectations for sex were a bit different than what this feels like. He moves, thrusting into me, building up s
peed, and I wait for the good feelings to kick in, but they don’t. Watching his face contort it’s easy to tell that he is definitely turned on.

  “Are you okay?” he strains to ask.

  “Yeah,” I reply quickly. What else can I really say? This hurts. I feel sand in places I shouldn’t. Your face looks funny and I’m nowhere near achieving the amazing sensation of an orgasm that I assumed would come with sex.

  “I’m almost there.” He groans, his face scrunches tight and after one last deep thrust, he pulls away from me, turning his back to me. Oh, um, that was it. It’s over already?

  I bring my legs together quickly and before he’s even had a chance to collect himself, I’m shimmying back into my jeans and zipping them up. He looks back over his shoulder and I drop my head so we don’t make eye contact.

  With his jeans back on and the sandy, wrinkled shirt clutched in his hands, he nods over towards his car. “You ready to go?”

  Okay. The movie is over. And it was a bad one. I don’t know if I feel worse that we just had sex or that we pretended to love each other. Holy crap, what did I just do? Fake love is not real. Where was this logic ten minutes ago? I don’t bother with my socks or sneakers, carrying them in my hand across the beach, following behind him. The shameful walk back to the car seems like miles.

  “Ouch!” I stop and grab my foot. Bailey turns around and I bend over to see what just stuck me. I don’t believe it. “Oh, my God, I found a seashell!” I exclaim proudly, holding it gingerly to examine it.

  Bailey just laughs and shakes his head. A seashell is no big deal to him. I’m no longer a big deal to him. I’m just a stupid girl who fell for some stupid lines. Lines he openly admitted were false. I cringe from humiliation as I climb over to the passenger seat.

  On the drive back, I focus all of my attention on examining the perfect seashell I found. I run my finger over the ridges. I can’t tell for sure but it looks like it might have some purple in it.

  “This has been a big night for you — the ocean, sex, and now a seashell.” Bailey flicks a lighter and takes a long drag on a cigarette.

  I stiffen up in my seat. “Yeah, a lot happened tonight.”

  “That pretend thing we did before, is that gonna be weird for you?” he asks. “Cause maybe that was a dumb thing to do. I don’t want you thinking that — you know.”

  “No, I know.” I cut him off, tugging nervously at the seatbelt. “I’m fine. It’s not weird. I know you don’t actually love me. You know I don’t love you, right?” I ask with a big fake laugh.

  “Oh, wait, you don’t?” His laugh sounds just as forced as mine.

  This has to be the most uncomfortable moment of my life. We’re undoing the words but we can’t undo the actions. The romance of the ocean absolutely blinded me. I grasp the perfect shell in my hand as we pull back onto the street with the small run down houses.

  He climbs out of the car first and then I clumsily follow out the driver’s side door. He holds my hand until I’m steady on my feet on the gravelly blacktop. Tony’s house is still showing signs of partying and drinking. We walk through the potent scented house to the back room. There’s no sign of my cousin or her boyfriend. I have to pee but at this point, I think I’d rather just hold it.

  “You want me to wait with you for your cousin?” Bailey asks, pulling out yet another cigarette and lighting up. I was wrong before. Smoking is ugly. There is no longer anything sexy about the cigarette in his mouth.

  “No,” I say, just a bit too quickly. I’m not sure if he looks confused or angered by my declining his offer to wait with me. I don’t really care. I just want him to go. “Really, you can go hang out with whoever or go home. I’m fine right here waiting by myself.”

  “All right, then,” he says breathing out a cloud of smoke.

  I cough and take a step back. “Thanks for the whole ocean thing,” I say, waving my hand in front of my face to clear the air.

  He gives me a wink, the cigarette hanging from his lips. “Thank you for the whole ocean thing.”

  My face burns. I twist a piece of my hair and stare down at the ground until he walks out of the room.

  What the hell was I thinking tonight? I thought I was smarter than that.

  Bailey

  What the hell was I thinking tonight? Am I really this stupid?

  Guys are capable of pretending. Girls are not.

  I reach down and adjust my jeans, letting the screen door slam behind me. Sand is covering every inch of my nuts. Every step I take down the street back to my house, the gritty texture punishes me for the mistakes I made tonight. I bet this girl is totally believing that I’m in love with her. Stupid. I can forget going to Tony’s from now on. I’m sure she’ll be there hanging all over me. She’ll be desperate and needy, begging for me to take her on some other great adventure, wanting to act out more movie scenes.

  I rub the back of my neck as I walk up the stairs to the bathroom. The sand covering the floor after I remove my clothes makes it seem like I brought half the beach home with me. Lather, scrub, rinse, and repeat. Now I remember why I don’t go to the beach more often. This sand is a bitch. It’s covering the bottom of the tub, probably gonna clog up the drain. At least I’m home and getting all this shit off me.

  Shayna’s probably stuck over at Tony’s, still damp and covered in sand. She’s probably itchy as all hell right now. The sand rinses clean from my body and I start feeling kinda bad that I left her. After everything happened, it just got real weird. I can’t believe all the shit I let myself say to her. The last thing I need is some girl getting the wrong idea.

  Although on thinking about it, I realize it wasn’t so much that I left, it was more like she told me to go. I rub a towel over my head, drying my hair. The movie thing was actually my idea. I was the one who kinda coaxed her into playing along. I dry off my tattoo, laughing at her Superman line.

  The sex wasn’t bad. It was actually pretty good, for me at least. Sandy, but good. I think back to the way she lifted up her shirt, showing off her tits. That was hot. I rub the towel over my dick, feeling it firm up again. The weirdness with tonight definitely had nothing to do with the sex. The weirdness had to do with all the shit that was said beforehand.

  But she knew we were pretending. On the way home she didn’t try holding me to anything. We were laughing about it. She’s fine. I can keep going to Tony’s and if she’s there, she’s there. We can laugh about it some more. It’s funny.

  I throw on some fresh clothes, head downstairs, and step onto my porch. I look down the street trying to figure out what cars I recognize. Are any of them Tammy’s? Is Shayna still there?

  “Should I go back?” I mumble, thinking out loud.

  The porch creaks and I hear a grunt. I turn, noticing my dad sitting there. He’s only forty two, yet he looks frail, hunched over, rocking back and forth like some old man in his rocker. I didn’t technically ask him the question, but I look to him for an answer anyway. All I get is a blank stare.

  I make the decision on my own to go back down the street. If she’s still there I can offer to drive her back to her cousin’s place. That’s probably what I should have offered to do in the first place, rather than just dropping her back off at Tony’s to sit and wait around. Geez, I’m no better than her bitch cousin.

  The house is quiet. Most everybody’s already gone home. Some lifeless bodies lay scattered, passed out on the floor. I see Marybeth, the group whore, coming from the bathroom, adjusting her skirt. I don’t even bother looking at who it is coming out behind her. Tony’s alone in the back room watching TV. He takes a sip of beer and looks up. “What’s up, Kid? Where were you tonight?”

  “Nowhere.” I look around. “Is Tammy still here or did she leave already?” Asking for Tammy is my shifty way of finding out if Shayna’s still here. If Tammy’s gone, than I know Shayna is, too.

  Tony frowns, bringing his beer up to his lips and draining it. “Tammy’s not here. In fact, that bitch is no longer welcome here
.”

  “What are you talking about?” My voice hits a high note.

  “Apparently, going to a titty bar and gettin’ a lap dance from someone we went to high school with is considered cheating to her.” He scrunches his face and shrugs. “Unfuckingbelievable. In what way is that cheating?”

  No more Tammy means no more Shayna. The whole Shayna thing that happened tonight, I’m off the hook. Which is great. “Yeah, having some girl rub on you isn’t cheating.” There’s a funny taste in my mouth as it goes dry. “You try telling her that? Maybe you guys can work it out.”

  “Hell, yeah, I told her that. But she didn’t want to fucking listen. She just kept crying, saying I broke her heart.” Tony runs a hand over his head. “It don’t even matter, I was tired of her, anyway. Besides, I can get another girl like that.” He snaps his fingers.

  I gulp before nodding my head in agreement. “Yeah, forget her. Time to move on to the next girl.”

  Chapter Five

  Shayna

  Tammy’s been inconsolable since the breakup. Tears and misery over the crushing heartbreak of her scummy boyfriend, I know I should feel bad. But since the breakup, things have become so much better between us.

  For the first time, we’ve actually really hung out together. We even spent a day at the beach. I went to Target and splurged on a brand new colorful bikini. Now that I’m a Florida girl, I need one. Even though it’s March and my cousin insisted it was too cold, I got her to swim in the water, and also to lay out in the sun with me. For which I paid dearly later with tight red skin that hurt when I moved. Still, totally worth it.

  The one downside is she talks about Tony nonstop. Maybe I’m overreacting? Does it count if he said he didn’t jiz? Should I call him? Ugh, her questions never end and I don’t have any answers for her.