Love's Secret Torment

by Stacy L. Darnell

  “You know, I want you to meet Alison and Tamron, too. They’re driving me nuts about meeting you.”

  I saw him relax into his seat and breathed a sigh of relief. I didn’t want to upset him.

  “Cool. Maybe I could come in and meet your parents when I take you home later. And I’d love to meet your friends.”

  “Yeah well, meeting my parents will be easy as pie. It’s the girls you have to worry about,” I teased.

  “Nah, they’ll be fine. The way you talk about them, I am sure they’ve already stalked me around town to make sure I’m not a serial killer or something.” He laughed in a fake nervous way.

  I smacked him on the shoulder. “They’re not that bad. Just . . . okay, well maybe borderline.” I giggled.

  The movie started, and I leaned over and rested my head on his shoulder as we watched. He held my hand in his and gently rubbed his thumb over mine. I relished in the feel of his touch.

  When the movie was over, we passed a Starbucks on the way back to my house. Alec took the drive-thru and ordered us lattes before continuing on to my house.

  Mom and Dad were sitting out on the front porch when we pulled into the driveway. Alec parked and dashed around to my door, helping me out of his truck. As we walked up the front porch steps, I saw my parents watching me with expectant eyes. I guess this meeting was going to happen whether we’d planned it or not.

  “Hey, Mom, Dad.”

  “Hey there, Princess,” Dad said.

  As I leaned into Alec’s side, he gave my hand a light, reassuring squeeze. I felt relieved when I looked up at his soft smile, and turned back toward my parents.

  “This is Alec Morris. I’ve been meaning to introduce you for a while. Just . . . you know me. I keep getting distracted.”

  Mom and Dad smiled as I laughed nervously.

  “He said he wanted to meet y’all tonight, so we came back early.”

  “Yes, we’ve been wanting to meet him, too.” Dad looked at Alec and raised his hand. “Alec, it’s nice to finally meet you. This is Sam’s mom, Maggie, and I’m Vance.”

  “Hello, Mr. and Mrs. Lang. It’s a pleasure,” he said, shaking my dad’s hand and kissing the top of my mom’s.

  “Maggie and Vance is fine. There’s no need for formalities here,” Dad said.

  “Okay, sir,” Alec said with a nervous smile. “I mean . . . Vance.”

  We sat and talked with my parents as we sipped sweet tea and snacked on some Mom’s famous ginger snaps.

  Gage came out and met Alec. He kept trying to sit in our laps while we sat on the porch swing. But it wasn’t working since he was eighty pounds of crazy puppy. He finally settled on lying at our feet.

  “Well, Mr. and Mrs. Lang—Sorry . . . I mean, Maggie and Vance.” He smiled. “It’s been nice meeting you both.”

  “For us, too Alec,” Dad said.

  “Yes, come see us again sometime,” Mom added.

  “Yes, ma’am.” Alec smiled.

  My parents went inside the house. I walked Alec down to his truck wrapped my arms around him. “Thank you for a wonderful evening.”

  “You’re welcome, Samone,” he said as he pulled me into his arms. His lips gently pressed against mine. His fingers wound through my hair. My mouth opened to his, the kiss was warm and caused shivers to run down my spine.

  “I had fun, and your parents are really nice. I’m helping my Aunt with a few repairs around the house tomorrow, but I’ll see you at school on Monday.”

  “Okay. Drive safe going home.” I lightly squeezed his hand.

  “Will do,” he said then climbed into his truck and drove away.

  The following Saturday, we made plans to meet up with Alison and Tamron for lunch at Reveille Café. I was excited for Alec to meet the girls. I loved him and hoped they would, too. He was that guy, the one you can’t help but like. He was sexy, funny, caring, and always made sure I was happy.

  We got there early and had the hostess seat us at a booth. I slid in on one side and Alec scooted in beside me. He put his arm around me and kissed the top of my head.

  “Relax, Samone. There’s no need to be so nervous.”

  “Easy for you to say,” I murmured.

  The waitress came and took our drink order while we waited for the girls to join us. I smiled nervously when they walked around the corner toward our booth.

  “Hey, girls!” I called.

  “Hi Sam, Alec,” Alison said, looking from me to Alec and back.

  “Hey there,” Tamron replied as they slipped into the booth and got settled. The waitress returned with our drinks and a couple extra ice waters for the girls.

  “Would you like anything else to drink?” she asked them.

  “Yeah, I’ll have a Coke,” Tamron said.

  “Do you have Diet Pepsi?” Alison asked with hopeful eyes.

  “I’m sorry, just Coke, miss,” the waitress said.

  “Just Coke products? What kind of a country are we living in when one of its citizens can’t exercise their freedom of choice in their local eating establishment? How dare you discriminate against my beverage of preference? I know we’re in Atlanta, the epicenter for Coke. But the last time I checked, Atlanta was still a part of America.”

  “Relax Alison,” Tamron urged. “It’s not the waitress’s fault. Geez.”

  “Right. Sorry. I’ll have a lemonade,” Alison deadpanned.

  The waitress walked away and the girls looked across the table at us and smiled.

  I cleared my throat. “Girls, this is Alec. Alec, this is Tamron and Alison,” I said, motioning to them in turn.

  “It’s nice to meet you both.”

  “Thanks, Alec. It’s nice to finally meet you, too,” Tamron retorted.

  The table jolted as Alison kicked her under it.

  Alison smiled. “It’s nice to meet you, Alec.”

  “I know, girls. I’m sorry. Things just kept coming up. He just met my parents last week.”

  “Well Sam, you can’t fall off the face of the earth just because you met a hot guy,” Tamron scolded.

  I looked at Alec and could have sworn he was blushing. I smiled to myself. “I know. We’ve just been doing so much on the weekends.”

  “It’s okay, Sam,” Alison said. “We’re meeting him now.”

  After the waitress came and took our orders, the girls swung their heads in unison to look directly at Alec.

  “Okay, Alec, we need to have a talk,” Tamron began.

  I inwardly groaned as I twisted at the cloth napkin on my lap.

  “Okay,” he said.

  “If you hurt her. At all. Ever. You will regret it,” Alison said.

  “I won’t hurt her. There’s no need to worry. In fact, I’m finding myself falling madly in love with her,” he replied, looking at me with a smile.

  Heat flooded my cheeks as my head snapped up to his then slowly turned and stared doe-eyed at the girls. They looked back with approving amusement.

  “Well then. That’s settled. Let’s catch up,” Tamron said matter-of-factly.

  Junior year was one of the happiest years of my life. Alec was always sweet and made me laugh. We spent hours talking and it seemed like we learned something new about each other every day.

  We dressed up as Jack Skellington and Sally from the movie A Nightmare Before Christmas for Heather’s Halloween party.

  When Thanksgiving came, we each had dinner with our own families, and the next day, Alec took me Black Friday shopping for one of those digital photo frames for my parents for Christmas, earning him “The Most Patient Guy Ever” award.

  We were talking one afternoon during one of our park dates under the shade of our tree. The sun was peeking through the clouds as I lay on the blanket with my head in his lap. He played with my hair, one of my favorite things. I loved the feel of it as his fingers twirled around the long strands.

  I enjoyed going to the park with Alec. I brought a small, insulated basket with bottled water, pastrami sandwiches, and fresh fruit
I bought from Mrs. Barrett at the street market that morning. Every free day we had was spent at the park. We never went to his house.

  I’d heard that he lived with his aunt. I wanted to ask about his parents, but I always felt his profound sadness on the rare occasion when he mentioned them, which was always followed by a quick subject change.

  “I love nature and being outside. It’s my favorite place to be. What about you?” he asked as he lifted my hand to his mouth and kissed each finger, making me feel lightheaded.

  “Oh, you know, I love nature, too. Breathing in the fresh air and seeing the birds fly and listening to their songs. Lying under the stars and dreaming. My favorite part of the day though, is walking Gage around the neighborhood or taking him to the dog park.”

  “What’s your favorite subject in school so far this year? Mine is definitely English.”

  “Hmm, how about any class with you?” I giggled. “So I guess that means English and Algebra are tied since we have them together. You know, I could see you as an English teacher someday.”

  When he didn’t respond, I looked up at him. He was staring straight ahead like he hadn’t heard me.

  “Alec? Did you hear what I said?”

  He finally looked down at me and smiled, but it didn’t look like his normal smile. “Yeah, sorry. I guess I was . . . lost in thought.”

  “It’s okay, I, umm, need to head back home to study for a science exam I have this week,” I murmured.

  “Okay.”

  We packed everything up and headed back to my house.

  Sometimes I wasn’t sure what to make of him. He liked to have fun and was the most carefree person I knew. But other times, he seemed guarded. Like there was a piece of him he wasn’t willing or ready to share. It showed at school in the way he acted when teachers thought he wasn’t paying attention. I knew full well he was, but he was also somewhere else in his mind or heart, somewhere he kept closed off from me. I hoped that he would trust me enough to let me in someday.

  During one of our afternoon park dates, we had eaten lunch, and were lying under our tree. Alec finally asked me the question he’d evaded answering during our first date at the café so long ago.

  “Why did you decide to make and donate your jewelry to the charity auction?”

  I curled into his arms as we lay there. Birds were chirping in the trees as I gathered my thoughts.

  “A few years ago, my cousin, Jolie, was driving home from a party drunk. She blew through a stoplight and hit a car head-on. The accident was indescribable. I still don’t know how they were able to separate the cars. The couple in the car she hit had been celebrating their first wedding anniversary. The husband lived, but his wife died instantly. Unlike in most drunk driving accidents, so did Jolie. I miss her terribly.”

  Alec handed me a napkin from the basket and I wiped at the tears as I cried.

  “We’d always been close, more like friends than cousins. She never made me feel like a little girl the way everyone else did. Anytime we had the chance, we’d watched movies together, or she’d style my hair and do my make-up. My mom and Aunt Olivia, Jolie’s mom, always laughed at the mischief we got into.

  Aunt Olivia tours the country, speaking at high schools. She talks about the consequences of drinking and driving. About Jolie, and the couple she hit. How it changed the husband’s life and affected the families of all those left behind. I lowered my eyes so he couldn’t see the hurt and inhaled deeply. “I miss her so much. I wish she never got into that car. There’s never an actual ‘okay enough to drive,’ ya know. I mean, if someone’s been drinking then they just shouldn’t drive. Period.”

  Alec was so sweet, he hugged me close. “I’m so sorry for your loss, Samone.”

  But when I asked him the same question, his answer stole the breath from my lungs. “So why were you helping set up that day at the charity?”

  His eyes lost some of their light, and his mood turned somber. It was so slight, I would’ve missed it if I hadn’t been staring at his handsome face. He reached down and caressed my face with one hand, while the fingers of his other played in my hair. It felt like he was seeking comfort or strength. I think he needed both.

  “Samone, do you remember when our sophomore year started, and I wasn’t there at the beginning?”

  “Yes, you came after Labor Day, I think. I remember Heather talking about ‘the smoking-hot, new guy’ in her English Lit class.” I giggled. “Hadn’t you just moved here?”

  “Yeah . . . but it wasn’t a good move. Believe me, I’m happy we did move here, specifically because of you. But my older brother, Emjay and I moved up here from Southwest Florida. Just before my sixteenth birthday, my mom and dad were . . .”

  He paused and looked down at me, caressing my face. His brow scrunched together and his chin began to quiver. I knew this wasn’t going to be good, and I didn’t want to cause him pain.

  “Hey, it’s okay. You don’t have to tell me if it’s going to upset you.”

  “No, Samone, I want to tell you. I want you to know all about me, because I want to know all about you, too. I don’t want us to have any secrets.”

  He pulled my hand up and pressed his lips to the top of it, weaving his fingers through mine as he continued his story.

  “My parents were on their way home from the airport. My dad had gone to pick up my mom. She’d been visiting her sister, my Aunt Robin, here in Atlanta. She had a late flight. They were at a stoplight when a drunk driver going eighty-five miles an hour hit their car.”

  I couldn’t believe my ears. It felt like a bag of rocks had settled in my stomach. I lay there frozen in his arms as he went on.

  “The coroner said that Dad died instantly. But Mom didn’t. When the ambulance got there, she was alert and begging my dad not to leave her and their boys.” He leaned his head back and pinched the bridge of his nose. “They had to use the jaws-of-life to get to her, and by the time they did, she was gone, too. My best friend’s dad was one of the EMTs on the scene, and he told my brother and me later that she died holding Dad’s hand.” His breath caught. “And her last words were ‘Tell my boys I love them.’” He squeezed my hand and looked up to the sky. “The drunk driver lived and is now serving a sentence at a state prison in Florida.”

  I couldn’t breathe, and my chest hurt as I watched the tears flow freely down Alec’s face. As my own tears fell, he held my hand tighter.

  “Since Emjay was eighteen, I was able to stay with him. Mom and Dad both had hefty life insurance policies. Our inheritance was enough to get us moved up here with Aunt Robin. We still each have money for college with savings left over.”

  He gazed down at me as I gently rubbed my thumb over his fingers.

  “But we both had to get the hell out of that town. Everyone was nice and helpful, but everywhere we looked, we saw pity in people’s eyes. Just when we’d have a day we were able to get through without falling completely apart, all it took was those sorrowful looks from neighbors or the postman. It would bring it all crashing back. It made the pain of losing Mom and Dad even worse.”

  Alec startled me when he jumped up and leaned against the tree.

  “I’ve never been able to talk about this with anyone before.”

  “I’m so sorry, Alec. You must think I am such a baby for being so sad and missing Jolie like I do since she was the drunk driver in her accident.” I choked on a sob.

  “No, no . . . definitely not,” he said as he sat back down and held me close, kissing the top of my head.

  “In life, no matter the cause or who’s at fault, all deaths leave wounded hearts and broken loved ones behind. People make mistakes; it’s part of living, Samone. But it doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t mourn them when they’re gone.”

  His words choked me up. They reached into my soul and made me feel whole and hollow all at the same time. It was like he spoke out of one of his old English poetry books. But I knew the words came from his soul directly to touch and heal mine.

 
; “I love you, Alec,” I whispered.

  He smiled down at me. “Love you always.”

  How he could have experienced the devastating loss of his parents and still hold compassion in his heart amazed me and left me in awe of him. I realized then that this incredibly sexy, sweet guy was also a beautiful old soul, and I was so grateful that he was mine.

  Our love continued to grow with each day. As the summer before our senior year came to an end, Alec surprised me with something I’d always dreamed of. The sound of tapping woke me up. I cracked my eyes open, waiting for everything to come into focus. The sun peeked through my bedroom curtains. It was such a beautiful morning. Shaking my head with a wry smirk, I crawled off the bed, knowing only one person would be plinking pebbles at my window.

  I shuffled to my window and spread the curtains wide. Smiling up at me was my Alec. I didn’t know how it was possible and had never experienced anything like it in my life, but damn, I loved him.

  He waved me down, and I noticed he had a Starbucks cup in his hand. He knew me too well. I was a coffee and hot tea junkie and thanked God every single day that we had a Starbucks within five miles from anywhere in town. I threw my bathrobe on over my sleep shorts and tank top and ran downstairs to see what my sweet guy was up to.

  “Hi baby,” I said as I wrapped my arms around him and my body molded into his.

  “Good morning Samone,” he said back as he smiled. “I have a surprise for you,” he chuckled, knowing how I loved surprises, especially from him.

  “Tell me please, please, please. Alec, don’t make me wonder this time. I’m dying to know.”

  He handed me my crème brûlée latte, bringing a smile of appreciation to my face.

  “How about I just give you a hint?” He smiled down at me and squeezed me tight.

  “Oh, okay” I drew out the last word before I took a drink.

  “It’s such a nice day, and the sky is so clear, I thought looking at the mountains would be amazing from a higher vantage point.”