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Instead of You

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by Anie Michaels




  Instead of You

  Anie Michaels

  Instead of You

  © Copyright Anie Michaels 2016

  This publication is protected under the US Copyright Act of 1976 and all other applicable international, federal, state and local laws, and all rights are reserved, including resale rights: you are not allowed to give, copy, scan, distribute or sell this book to anyone else.

  In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the author at anie.michaels@gmail.com.

  This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return it, and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Any trademarks, service marks, product names or named features are assumed to be the property of their respective owners, and are used only for reference. There is no implied endorsement if we used one of those terms.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Edited by Hot Tree Editing.

  ~To Myself ~

  Is it rude to dedicate a book to yourself?

  I don’t care.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Epilogue

  Chapter One

  Cory’s Sixteenth Birthday

  McKenzie

  Like any other day of tenth grade, I spent my lunch break sitting on the brick wall that lined the school property. It was only four feet tall and easy enough to hop onto, and that’s where we sat, every day, and ate our lunch. Except today. I was alone. Today was January 10, and Cory was noticeably absent because his brother had taken him to get his driver’s license. Well, assuming he passed. If he didn’t pass it would be ridiculous as I’d taken the test two days earlier, on my sixteenth birthday, and told him all of the questions and answers. I’d also spent the last month studying with him. He had to pass.

  Halfway through lunch, Hayes’s familiar Mustang pulled into the parking lot. As it drove closer I could make out both Hayes and Cory in the front of the car, Cory in the driver seat. I tried not to get too excited—just because he was driving didn’t mean he’d passed. The tinted windows wouldn’t give me any more clues, so I waited impatiently for the car to pull all the way up the circular drive, my heart thumping wildly as it came to a stop right in front of me.

  When Cory’s door flew open and his smiling face popped up over, I knew he’d passed.

  “I did it,” he said, one fist pumping into the air above his head.

  “I knew you could,” I said, trying to match his smile.

  Cory came around the hood of the Mustang, practically bouncing. It never really got too cold here in the winters, which was why we could eat our lunch outside even in January, but Cory was wearing his signature brown leather jacket that only intensified the blond of his hair. Surely the Florida sun had something to do with his hair color, because he was a stark contrast to his brother.

  Hayes stepped out of the Mustang, and I was looking at Cory’s antithesis. Where Cory was on the shorter side, Hayes was close to six foot two. Where Cory had light blond, short, manageable hair, Hayes’s hair was dark, longer than it needed to be, and quite unruly. Cory was lean and light, running track and swimming the backstroke for the high school swim team, and Hayes was, well, built. Hayes was not wearing a jacket and even though I tried desperately to avoid it, my eyes always seemed to find his biceps.

  “Hey, Kenzie,” Hayes called as he walked around the front of his car.

  “Hi,” I replied, smiling. I’d known him my whole life, but I didn’t know him nearly as well as I knew Cory. “Did you come home for Cory’s birthday?”

  “Yeah. Mom would have killed me if I missed my little brother’s sweet sixteen.” His smile was playful and knowing.

  “Only girls have sweet sixteens, Hayes.” Cory rolled his eyes, obviously irritated by his older brother.

  “Was yours a sweet sixteen, Kenzie?” He’d stopped outside his door, arms folded on the roof of his Mustang, biceps bulging.

  “Yeah” was the only thing I could say in response. I was afraid if I said anything else it would be, “Yeah, biceps.” Hayes gave me a knowing grin and I felt my cheeks heat, so I looked down at my sandwich.

  “Bye, Hayes,” Cory said with irritation.

  “Later, kids.” I watched as the Mustang roared out of the parking lot, and I couldn’t help but give a relieved sigh. Recently, Hayes always managed to put me on edge. It was unnerving. Luckily, I only saw him when colleges were on break. He was twenty now and attended Central Florida University two hours away. About the same time he started making me nervous was when he left for college. I remember, sadly, being glad when he finally left for good. Being around him and Cory was confusing for me.

  Cory hopped up onto the wall next to me and held out the brand-new shiny plastic license that looked exactly like the one I’d earned two days previously.

  “I can’t believe we both passed.” His words were quiet but full of wistfulness. “We’re both sixteen, we both have our license, it’s like the one day we’ve been waiting for since, well, since we were twelve.”

  Sixteen was a big deal to most teenagers. But sixteen for Cory and me held an unprecedented weight. To say our mothers had built a fantasy around Cory and me dating would have been a massive understatement. It was expected. A forgone conclusion. However, when Cory and I hit a certain age, my father stepped in, forbidding me to date until I was sixteen.

  I was so thankful for his rule. Grateful that the decision to date Cory would be put off for a few more years, that I wouldn’t have to worry about how I felt until then. But now, it was then. I was sixteen and so was Cory.

  “I was wondering,” he said, bouncing the heels of his Converse against the brick of the wall, “do you think you’d like to go with me to my party tomorrow?”

  I tried to hide my reaction, to keep my breaths even, not let my body show how tense I’d become at his question. He was my absolute, hands down, best friend. But I wasn’t sure he was who I wanted to be my boyfriend.

  “Cory, of course I’ll go with you. I’ve never missed one of your birthday parties.” I made my words light and airy, the exact opposite of how I was feeling that
moment.

  “No, Kenzie, that’s not what I meant. I want you to go as my date.”

  It was suddenly one hundred degrees hotter than it had been just seconds before and my lungs decided to work overtime. Cory apparently didn’t notice my freak-out, as he kept talking.

  “I know we’ve been waiting, but we’re both sixteen now. I don’t want to wait anymore. I want to be with you.” He reached over and took my hand. This wasn’t a rare occurrence; we held hands every now and then. He was my very best friend and I loved him. But a lot of the time I wasn’t sure if the only reason I loved him was because I’d been trained to do so. But on that afternoon, as we sat on that wall, when his fingers slid between mine and gripped me tightly, I knew he wasn’t thinking about our friendship. He wasn’t holding Kenzie’s hand, the girl who he’d pushed over in the sand box when we were five. No, he was holding Kenzie’s hand who he wanted to be romantic with.

  God.

  Be romantic with.

  I couldn’t even fathom it, let alone try to put it into words.

  How could I tell my best friend in the whole world, on his birthday, that I had no idea what I wanted? That even though we’d basically been primed for this our whole lives, I wasn’t sure it was something I wanted? If he was something I wanted?

  Easy: I couldn’t.

  I just smiled at him, gave his hand a squeeze, and let him come to whatever conclusion he would, fully knowing I was taking the coward’s way out. When his smile widened and eyes sparkled, I knew I’d started something I wasn’t sure I had the power to stop.

  Mr. and Mrs. Wallace hadn’t spared any expense when it came to Cory’s birthday party. They’d rented the ballroom at the local golf club, complete with DJ and dance floor, photo booth, and a wait staff walking around with silver platters of finger food that most of the kids attending couldn’t have identified if they’d tried. It was, in a word, fancy.

  My birthday party the weekend before had been much more my speed. My parents had let me take five friends to Busch Gardens. We’d ridden roller coasters until we couldn’t walk straight. It was awesome. Cory had come, along with my friends Becca, Holly, and Todd. Becca and Holly were my best girlfriends, and Holly practically begged me to invite Todd. I figured it couldn’t be bad to have another guy there so Cory didn’t feel too out of place. It was a lot of fun, and nothing like the formal affair I was currently observing from my strategically scouted spot where I was doing a fantastic job of holding up the wall.

  I watched as my classmates and friends danced in the middle of the room, colorful lights flashing around them. It looked as though they were having fun, but I knew I wouldn’t feel comfortable out there like them. My body had always been a mystery to me and I’d never figured out how to properly control it. Sure, I could walk around just fine, but trying to coordinate so many limbs to move at the same time and make it look smooth? I would never be good at that.

  Cory was in the middle of the crowd, dancing as if he’d been practicing his whole life for this performance. He’d always been so good at things like that. He was entertaining, confident, and fun to be around. Everyone wanted to be his friend and nearly everyone was. Every person invited to his party coveted their invitations and knew he’d treat them all as if he were genuinely pleased they’d managed to make it. He was a people person, through and through.

  I saw my parents in the far corner, only lit by the flashes of light coming from the DJ table, talking with Cory’s parents. Our moms were talking to each other while our dads did the same. It was a vision I’d seen my entire life. It was comforting to a point—something I could always count on. But it was also redundant. I wondered if the people I was friends with now—Cory, Holly, and Becca—if that was it for me. I loved them all, but would I ever have more connections with different people? I hated feeling trapped at sixteen, but it was something I was experiencing more and more each day.

  I pushed off the wall and started walking toward the doors leading outside, needing a little air. Cory caught my eye and gave me a questioning look, and then signaled that he would come with me. I waved my hand to stop him, then held up all my fingers, mouthing, “five minutes” at him. He nodded, but looked confused. Regardless, he didn’t follow me and I couldn’t help but feel guilty that I was glad to leave him behind. I just needed a moment.

  I walked outside and shut the doors behind me, hearing the music quiet, but not the thumping of the bass. I could still feel the beat vibrating through my feet, still hear it as the windows rattled from it. I continued for about ten steps until I was at the edge of the patio, then took in a deep breath, letting it out slowly.

  A few minutes later I was almost to the brink of panic, thinking too obsessively about all that had happened in a matter of days, when a harsh wave of music broke through the quiet. I turned to talk to Cory, who I assumed had come to find me, but practically stumbled when I saw it was Hayes instead.

  “Kenzie,” he said, obviously surprised to see me. “What are you doing out here all by yourself?” He slowly made his way toward me. He was shrouded in darkness and I couldn’t see his face until he was a step or two away.

  “I needed a breather.” I silently hoped he wouldn’t pry.

  “I get it” was all he said in response, which made me happy. He came to stand right next to me, but didn’t look at me, facing out toward the green just as I had been before he joined me. So I turned and looked in the same direction. There we stood, in relative silence, with only the faint buzzing of the music behind us. I felt the tension start to drift away, the endless loop of stressful thoughts slow in my mind, and the silent hum of the evening cast some sort of soothing magic over me. It was the most relaxed I’d been in days.

  Then, as if he’d been waiting for me to be tricked by his silence, he asked, “So when’s the wedding?”

  Instantly, I was on edge again. I knew exactly what he was referring to, but didn’t want him to know that.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Your and Cory’s wedding. When’s the date? I need some advance notice so I can tell my professors I’ll be out of town.”

  “Ha ha.” That was the best response I could produce considering my heart had started beating a million miles an hour.

  “No, seriously, Kenzie. You’ve both reached that magical age everyone’s been waiting for. It’s full steam ahead now, right?” The venom in his voice, the disgust that dripped from every word, surprised me. In the sixteen years I’d known Hayes I could remember him being visibly upset so few times, I could count them on one hand. He was aloof, removed, and uninterested in anything having to do with me. His anger toward my would-be relationship with Cory was so shocking, I nearly stumbled.

  “I don’t know what’s going to happen,” I whispered, unable to come up with any other answer besides a truthful one.

  Hayes turned toward me, coming close enough that I could hear his breath panting out and dragging back in. “Isn’t he what you want? What you’ve always wanted?”

  “He’s my best friend.” Again, the truth fell from my lips.

  “Is that all?”

  I wasn’t sure. I had no idea what I wanted us to become, I only knew what we already were. Best friends. Anything beyond that seemed scary and bigger than I could handle.

  Suddenly Hayes was closer, only a breath away instead of a step. I should have taken a step back, should have moved away, but his hand came up to cradle my cheek and all I could do was move my eyes up his chest, over his neck, and meet his gaze.

  “Has he kissed you yet?” Hayes’s voice was even lower now, somehow rougher, almost as if it hurt him to speak the words.

  “No,” I croaked out, trying to shake my head, but his big strong hand keeping my face still. Then the other one came to join, starting at my cheek, but slowly moving back into the hair at my nape.

  “Good.”

  Everything went black as his lips pressed against mine. My eyes closed, I could no longer hear the music from the ballroom, and all my sense
s dulled… except for touch. I felt his lips slowly slide across mine, felt his thumb brush gently over my cheek, even felt the hardness of his chest as my hands mindlessly slid up his front.

  Looking back on the kiss I would not remember what prompted me to move closer to him, to angle my head to the right, wanting to give him access to all of my mouth, or even remember how it felt so right to be kissing him, but all of that happened. It was my very first kiss and it should have been awkward and stilted and uncomfortable, but it wasn’t.

  It was, however, instantly passionate, like every cheesy romance movie where the two lovers kiss and fireworks ignite. There should have been fireworks. When his lips touched mine, nothing short of an explosion took place. We were magnetized to each other, moving closer and closer until there was not one iota of space between us.

  I should have felt scandalized when his tongue swept across my lips, but I didn’t. I didn’t feel anything except ready for whatever came next. Having Hayes’s tongue gliding through my mouth, his hand gripping my hair, his body seemingly trying to meld with mine, it was both the best and worst thing to happen to me.

  When he finally pulled away, because Lord knows it wasn’t going to be me, I stumbled a bit, trying to acclimate myself to being so solitary again. With only minutes of being connected to Hayes, going back to standing on my own was more difficult than it should have been.

  He stood just a couple feet away from me, our breaths both panting out, creating the slightest bit of fog.

  “I’m a shitty person for taking that first from you and Cory, but I’ll be damned if I say I haven’t wanted to kiss you for the longest time.”

  What?

  “Hayes,” I said, cringing at the wobble in my voice, too aware of the thumping in my heart and other parts of my body that were really unaccustomed to such throbbing. “What was that?” My fingers came to my lips, and even though I knew it made me look like an idiot, I couldn’t help but touch the part of my body that had been so intimately connected to his.

 

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