I found it harder to be with Callie. She was a nice girl but was expecting more, and the intimate ‘bird shit’ moment with Malia had confirmed that I was stringing along a nice girl who deserved better. She deserved to be someone who could make her their priority. Our time was coming to a natural end. We were both destined for different colleges and if it was hard enough for her to keep my attention when she was right in front of me, thousands of miles apart would be impossible. The long-distance thing was simply not an option for us. I would do the right thing and end it sooner rather than later.
My next step was to talk to Dean, come clean about my feelings for Malia, and then tell her that I wanted us to be together.
I’d been the one to force the stupid friendship agreement on Dean, and since that time on the beach, I knew it was time to break it. I had to be with her. She was mine and even I couldn’t deny how whole I felt when I was around her. Dean would be fine; he had Charmayne.
Malia Kyler was good for me, right for me in every way, and I couldn’t go to college with my best friends hiding how I felt for her. If we were to have any chance, I had to be upfront about it.
I was nervous as fuck at school all day. I couldn’t stop looking for her, looking at her, and I felt guilty with Callie. When I took her to one side and suggested that we should probably cool things off, she did her best to hide her how upset she was. “You knew things were going to go this way. We’re headed for different places and neither of us need the pressure of long distance.”
“Is it really about college?” For the first time, meek and mild Callie who I’d enjoyed fooling around with, showed some stones.
“Of course,” I lied.
“Well, I guess you’re right.” She reverted to normal Callie, backing down when she got the answer that settled her head easiest. “Maybe we can, you know, hook up when you come back for holidays?”
“If you’ve nothing happening and I’m the same, then sure.” I smiled, and so did she, happy that the door wasn’t completely closed.
One down… two to talk to.
School went on and I knew I’d struggle to get Dean away from Malia during recess. Then we’d be surfing together after school, so I decided to go and see him after Malia went home. Her mom was home today, and I figured she’d be sleeping there tonight.
On the ocean, every time one of them asked me if I was okay, I nodded and said yeah. On the final time, I could tell Malia was worried about me so I caved and gave them the only excuse I could come up with. “I called it a day with Callie.”
Malia gasped and Dean looked both confused and worried.
“Nothing to worry about, dude,” I answered quickly, desperate to remove the worry from his brow. “Just time to think about the future. We’re heading for different colleges and I don’t want her thinking long distance is an option.”
“Is Callie okay?” Malia asked.
“Yeah, I guess. She was a bit upset, but we both knew it was coming.”
“Are you okay?” she asked.
I looked her square in the eyes. “I’m good. Life is changing and I want something better. Someone who means more to me than Callie.”
“Sounds like you already have.” Dean glared at me, no doubt pissed that I’d been keeping a new love interest from him. We shared everything. Brothers didn’t have secrets.
“Kinda, but early days. Anyway, wasn’t fair to her to be in something I wasn’t in completely.”
Just then I spotted my mom waving from the back of the house. “Fuck, better go. Promised her I’d open the acceptance letter on the kitchen table.”
“Dude, thought you had your Hawaii acceptance the same time as us?”
“Uh… yeah, this was a backup plan. You know, just in case. Hence why there’s no rush. I know where I’m heading.”
Malia looked relieved and Dean looked bothered by that. There was a weird dynamic between us, but I suppose that was to be expected. Dean didn’t handle being kept in the dark well.
“Catch you both later.”
I didn’t go back after dinner. I opened the acceptance letter and it was for my backup plan. I’d already been accepted to Hawaii for a major in medicine with a minor in physical therapy. I figured I could learn medicine, keep surfing and combine the two together. I would never be a professional surfer, but I could still be involved. My backup plan was something entirely different, something that my art and tech professor had suggested I had the ability to do. I hadn’t even told my parents I was applying, but they’d encouraged me to apply to more than just one college and they were right. It made sense.
With a letter of recommendation and some submitted artwork, I’d been accepted at my second-choice, a prestigious art college in Florida where I could study automotive engineering, with a minor in automotive design and styling.
An hour before I usually hit the sack, I figured I’d left it late enough to go and talk to Dean. I walked via the beach and stopped at Malia’s house. Her bedroom was in darkness, and I wondered what she’d say when I finally came clean and told her I wanted to be with her. Did she still think of me in the same way I thought about her? With my hands in my jeans’ pockets, I went to move towards Dean’s place and saw the flicker of a light in the downstairs kitchen.
Malia walked into the room, her hair piled haphazardly on the crown of her head. I could only see the tiny strings of a vest top. She picked up the kettle and filled it from the faucet, rubbing exhaustion from her eyes as soon as she’d plugged it in.
Fuck, she was stunning. Simply stunning.
When God made her, he really broke the mold. Malia’s beauty was so classic that she didn’t need make up or fancy clothes. What she wore showed her personality, showed how she was at one with herself. Malia’s skin routine of sun, sleep and sea air could have been bottled and sold.
As I stood transfixed, I watched her head pitch up and look towards what I knew was the entrance to the kitchen. I stepped back into the shadows of a palm tree, desperate not to be caught creeping by her mom, and felt my whole body solidify when Dean appeared next to her, shirtless, running his hands through his hair and yawning.
“What the fuck?”
My heart began to hurt, and my stomach felt like it had traveled up my body and lodged itself in my chest cavity, leaving my heart no room to beat.
Dean rounded the counter and stepped up to her, his body flush against hers as her head fell back against his shoulder. I reached for the trunk of the palm tree that now kept me upright and watched as he put a hand around her throat, encouraging her to give his lips access to her.
My heart was fucking breaking.
The kissing didn’t go on for long before I saw him whip her top over her head.
“No,” I said to no one but the wind in the trees around me. The chill of the night seeping through my skin took ahold of me bone deep.
I could see his hands on her tits.
My best friends.
I’d always dreamed of seeing her tits, but I’d never thought my first real glimpse of them would be while he was touching her.
My heart begged me to walk away from the pain I forced it endure, but my brain was right there with them. Imagining the noises he drew from her body. Imagining the desire coursing over her skin with every touch he made.
Dean pushed her torso down against the counter top until Malia was out of sight. It was clear what they were about to do as my eyes, which refused to look away, clouded over with water. I saw the sheer pleasure on his face as he pushed himself inside her, his head thrown back as his hands grabbed the mess of curls on her head to give him extra purchase, extra control.
I begged my body to take me away from it, to end the suffering and utter betrayal.
But it didn’t. I slumped down the tree trunk and stayed put, rubbing at my eyes to clear them in the hopes that what I’d seen wasn’t true.
I was sure I loved that girl. I was sure I’d loved that girl since the moment she’d strutted her sassy ass across the sand. I’d
done the decent thing and put our friendship first. Malia was having a shit time with her mother in a new place, and I put her needs before mine. I wanted her to be happy here.
But Dean.
My best fucking friend.
His betrayal of the pact we’d made and his disregard for our friendship hurt more than I knew what to do with. I would have put him first in a heartbeat, every damn time. We weren’t just friends; we were family. We shared a bond that was thicker than any blood connection. We were family by fucking choice. I was prepared to walk away from Malia if Dean wasn’t on board. I would have done that for him.
The tears ran down my cheeks as I sat and stared at the floor. The next time I looked up, Dean was breathing heavily from the strain of having fucked the girl I loved against a counter top.
I put my head in my hands, unable to look at them and see Malia again. I knew I wouldn’t be able to cope if I saw her all mussed up from sex.
The light that once shone out into the back yard changed, prompting me to look back at the house. The scene in the kitchen was over, the room now in darkness.
I sat there for hours, unable to move, knowing that my two best friends were inside playing house.
I was the stupidest fuck for not figuring it out.
But, how would I? They weren’t the ones who were different in the group; that was me. I was different because I knew my feelings for Malia were growing and I was trying my fucking best to protect the friendship we had.
Anger soared through me at their betrayal, at the fact that I knew Dean was still fucking Charmayne. Did Malia have so little self-esteem that she was happy to be his side piece?
Whatever the answer to that question, during the unintended viewing of their intimacy, I’d seen the truth. Malia didn’t want me; she wanted my best friend. I’d been some fucking sap who’d believed in trust.
In the course of one night, my life had changed.
I hated them.
I hated how they’d made me feel.
I couldn’t go to college with them. I wouldn’t go to Hawaii and be reminded of their betrayal every day.
My tech teachers had offered me a lifeline, like fate thought I’d need one, because they helped me create a backup plan. A plan I never thought I’d need because I was set on going to Hawaii with my best friend and the girl I loved.
I could go to Florida early, which meant I had one week left here and then I was off.
One week to get through, and maybe with some distance I could forgive or forget everything.
Reef
“You okay? You look awful.”
I didn’t bother surfing. I couldn’t. I hadn’t slept a wink and the only thing I saw when I looked at the ocean that morning was a very vivid visual of me holding Dean’s head under the surf until he drowned.
“I’ve never known you to a miss a surf,” Malia tried again, but looking at her made it all very real. I saw her throat where he’d kissed her. I looked at her cheek and wondered whether it was that one or the other that she’d laid flat against the counter top while he’d fucked her.
“Have you been sick?”
“Yeah,” I replied, not even looking at her.
“Dude, you gonna be able to play? You look like you’ve been up all night.”
“I have.” I found the ear pods I’d been desperately surfing for. I needed some solitude. If I had to sit on the bus with these two, I wasn’t prepared to listen to their lies as well as having to look at it.
“Have you—”
I cut her off. Her voice was like someone scratching their nails down a chalkboard.
Four days to go.
Just four days to survive and then those pair could fuck themselves stupid in Hawaii without me around to cramp their style.
“Bryant! Changing rooms, now!” Coach balled.
My tackle on the player was a yellow card at best. It was the punch to his kidneys that pushed the referee to give me a red. I didn’t even remember what he said to me. It was just the fact that he said something that had tipped me over the edge.
On the way down the hall to the changing rooms, I lashed out and kicked a locker, my boot leaving a dent that would have put me in front of the coach on report if he’d seen it.
I was pissed.
Pissed at myself for reacting, pissed that I’d let my team down. There was no way they were going to win with ten men against a team who were more physical than we were. This was the last match I would play for the school and I’d fucked it up by reacting like I had.
The only silver lining was that I could shower, change and get gone before the others came back. I’d get the public bus home and save myself the pain of seeing Dean and Malia.
Even saying those three words made me want to kick all the lockers and then start on people.
As I came down the hallway, the teams were coming in from the field. The look on the opposition’s faces told me what I already knew: we’d lost, and judging by the smiles, we’d lost heavily.
“Thanks for handing us that win.” One of them laughed and I lost it again. I dropped my kit bag to the floor and shoved him backwards. He came at me and I was ready for him. The beefcake got one good punch to my ribs and I got another to his kidneys. With a bit of luck, he’d be pissing blood for a few days as a reminder of my bad mood.
The fat fuck hunched forward, clutching his side, and as I reared back a fist, ready to launch it at his head, another body hit mine and pushed me away from my target.
Dean.
“Bro, stop!”
Him touching me with hands that had touched her didn’t calm me. “Fuck off!”
“What the fuck’s got into you?”
“Get the fuck off me.” I pushed him away and stormed off.
I had to get out of here.
Away from him.
“Reef!” I ignored her. “Reef!” I ignored her again.
I exhaled when she stopped shouting and then felt the rage return when knuckles rapped at my bedroom door.
“What, Mom?”
“Can I come in?”
“If you must.” I burrowed down under my duvet and heard the door creak. I’d come home from the soccer game, dumped my dirty clothes in the laundry and climbed into bed.
“Aren’t you surfing before dinner?”
Surfing. The last place I wanted to be was the fucking ocean. That meant being out there with them. Right now, the sea was tainted. They’d taken that away from me, too.
“No.”
“Did you win tonight?”
“No.”
I felt the bed depress behind me. “What’s wrong? Are you ill?”
“Yes.” If ill made her go away, I’d let her believe I had fucking Ebola to get some peace and quiet.
I felt her hand fumble for my forehead. “Mom!”
“What? My little soldier is ill, and I want to look after him.”
“I just need some rest,” I groaned.
“Would you like me to bring up some dinner on a tray?”
“Yeah.”
Now I was the one lying. Everything swirling around me at the moment was one big fucking lie.
The woman was a marvel; she brought my dinner up on a tray and came back an hour later to remove the dirty pots. “Dean’s been over. He didn’t look happy.”
“No?” I feigned ignorance and carried on watching mindless Netflix shit in an attempt to occupy my brain and stop it thinking about… those two.
“I told him you weren’t feeling well. He wanted to come and see what was wrong, but I told him whatever you’ve got, he doesn’t want it. Anyway, he and Malia send their love.”
“I bet they fucking do,” I mumbled as she got to the door.
“What, love?”
“Thanks for dinner.”
I managed to convince Mom that I was ill enough to spend the next two days in bed. She was more concerned that I was missing out on my last few precious school days, but while she’d been at work, I’d been making arrangements to go and get s
ettled in Florida early.
Dean, Malia and I had planned to head out to Hawaii early. We were going to surf and get settled before college happened. My timeline was still the same; I just wouldn’t be going with them.
The only thing that kept me going was the plan I’d hatched to confront them, sever our friendship and fuck off on my own.
Start again.
Learn from this lesson.
Get my life on track and be selfish for a while.
The next person who had my loyalty would have to earn it.
“Look what the cat dragged in,” Dean said when I appeared at the school bus. It was our last official day of school and if I hadn’t have gone of my own accord, Mom would have dragged me there.
Malia’s face lit up when she saw me, and it hurt. Her smile was something I’d imagined a lot lately. “Are you better? I’m glad you could make it today. It wouldn’t have been the same without you.”
I nodded, not trusting myself to agree. I knew if I opened my lips, I’d find myself saying something ridiculous, like telling her just how fucking pretty she was.
When I saw her smile, my plan changed.
I wanted to feel her lips on mine and I didn’t give a flying fuck about my so-called best friend. After I’d kissed her, I’d tell her what I knew and watch as she felt as shit as she’d made me feel.
We made it to homeroom, and I looked around feeling all nostalgic. Not going to Hawaii felt like I was leaving more than just my friends. I was leaving all this. I was going to put all the memories from my time at school with Dean to rest. Everything I’d known, everything familiar felt so distant and unreal here. I was suffocating and I needed the new start.
I needed to be away from the ocean in Cali. They’d ruined that for me. Surfing was in my blood, but it was so closely linked to three of us that I needed to cut it out for a while and discover a way to look at the waves without hurting.
“I need volunteers for an exciting opportunity.” No one moved. Nothing about today would be exciting. Classes were set to be a waste of time. Most of the idiots would be playing pranks and doing nothing more. As our teacher continued his big sales pitch, the door opened and five other kids from different homerooms stood there, including Charmayne. “Two lucky people will go in the school bus to home depot and help gather all the things for tonight’s final dance.”
Malia: A Black Sentinels MC Novel Page 7
