For The One

by Brenna Aubrey

  I hold out my hand, palm up. I can do those odds. I rarely miss when given that chance. She places the two dice in my palm, and I promptly toss them on the worktable without taking my eyes off her. She turns her head to look, blowing out a breath. "Ninety-one. Shit."

  I look to verify. "No, it's the other way around. Nineteen. The blue die is the first digit."

  She sighed. "Thank the goddess," she murmurs and reaches up to put her hands on either side of my face. I stiffen immediately, then pull them away and indicate that she should lace them around my neck instead. I snake my hands behind her back and pull her body firmly against me. Her breasts push up against my chest, her arms tightening around my neck as our mouths meet. Unlike the other night in the car, she immediately opens for me.

  I'm tasting her and I'm drowning, but I'm also surging with power like a superhero. It's like dying and rebirth with each alternating second.

  Her tongue moves and it stabs me with pleasure throughout my entire body. My hands slide down from her back to her shapely butt..

  Our heads move together for long moments, but I know that my body wants more. I'm ready for her, and judging by the heat of her body against mine, she's ready too.

  I really, really want her.

  Basically, if people weren't in this house, I'd push her down on the ground right now and pull her clothes off. I'd ask her first, of course, but then I'd totally do it.

  Although knowing her feelings about leaving, I know that it's a good thing people are in this house right now.

  Jenna stands up on her tiptoes to press herself more forcibly against me and my hands cup her round butt, rubbing over the stiff denim of her jeans. She's making little noises that remind me of how she sounded when I brought her to climax.

  Suddenly, I hear footsteps in the doorway. Jenna and I pull apart, and then turn to face the visitor. I'm now looking straight into the astonished face of my cousin, who takes a step back and is about to leave, but apparently he can't because he bumps into someone else right behind him--Mia.

  Jenna ducks her head, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, but I can tell that she's laughing. I don't know whether to laugh or be angry. The only thing that comforts me is that my cousin looks horrified.

  Mia pokes her head around his shoulder and peeks into the doorway. She scans the room and then looks up at Adam. "What'd I miss?"

  "Uh, hey," Adam says to me while ignoring her question. "Just wanted to, um, tell you that Mia and I have to get going. Wanted to say goodbye and make sure that, uh, things are good with us." His voice sounds funny, but at least he doesn't have that shocked look on his face anymore.

  Jenna's face is now red and she's laughing really hard--so hard that her eyes are watering like she's crying. I know that she's not sad, though.

  Mia gives her a look. "You okay?"

  All Jenna does is nod. Now Adam is laughing as he's watching Jenna. "Well, I'd tell you to 'carry on,' but Liam might come after me with another sword."

  "I think it's a good idea to keep your mouth shut," I warn, pointing to my old steel sword that is hanging on the wall for decoration.

  Adam looks up at the ceiling for a moment, like he does when he doesn't know what to say to me. "Okay, Liam. See you at work tomorrow. Bye, Jenna." He turns and leaves, moving around Mia, who just stares at us with wide eyes.

  "Well, I missed whatever that was, but just wanted to say goodbye and I'm cheering for you, William. I know your big duel is next weekend, and I'm not going to be able to make our breakfast date this week since I have that exam coming up."

  I nod, troubled by the change in plans. "Okay. Text me later, then."

  Mia is looking at Jenna now, who has finally recovered. The two of them seem to be communicating without speaking. Mia sends her a look and Jenna returns it, shaking her head, but suddenly the smile slides off her beautiful face and it actually transforms into a frown. I glance at Mia, who now actually looks upset or angry--those look just about the same on Mia. And suddenly I'm annoyed at her. Whatever she did made Jenna upset, and that bothers me.

  For the hundredth time, I really wish I could read faces. "Well, bye now." Mia steps back.

  "Yeah, bye," Jenna says, looking at me and then turning away from the door to study the figurines again. With that, Mia is gone.

  I turn back to her and she's fiddling with the figurines, but I get the feeling she's not really looking at them. "What happened? Are you and Mia angry with each other?"

  She looks at me and her brows rise. "No...no. It's just..." She shakes her head and then shrugs. "It's nothing to worry about, William. In a month, it won't even matter..." Her voice trails off and she frowns.

  I clench my jaw, unhappy to be reminded--again--that she's going away. I turn and gather my old dice and throw them into the felt bag, then open the drawer to toss them back in.

  "What's all that?" she asks over my shoulder.

  I glance down to see that the drawer is full of sealed envelopes of different colors. Each one of them is addressed to me in familiar handwriting. I freeze. I really don't want to talk about this right now--or ever.

  She bends closer. "Those envelopes are all sealed. You never opened them."

  I shrug before slamming the drawer shut. "I never wanted to open them."

  "What are they? Who are they from? If you don't mind me asking..."

  My heart is racing and my stomach feels sick. "They're birthday cards, and they're from my mother."

  "And you've never opened them?"

  My fists clench and relax at my sides. "My mother and I didn't have a good relationship." I turn away from the dresser.

  "Do you want to talk about it?"

  "No."

  "Okay."

  There's a long silence. I shove my hands in my pockets, unable to think of a thing to say. Jenna moves close to me and firmly places a hand on my upper arm. "It's okay. We all have problematic parental relationships."

  "Had. My mother died five years ago, when I was twenty-one."

  "Oh. I'm sorry."

  "Why are you sorry? You weren't responsible."

  She shrugs. "It's just a thing people say. I'm sorry for your loss."

  I frown, thinking about that. I wonder why I never knew that before.

  All I can remember is her voice in my head. Her disapproving voice telling me she had no idea what to do with me, no idea how to even relate to me. What mother tells her child that?

  My chest is tight and it's difficult to breathe. I refuse to let this overtake me.

  To let talk of this--of her--ruin my moment with Jenna. Or has it already been ruined?

  Chapter 25

  Jenna

  I had no idea what to say or if he even needed comforting. His lips were pressed tightly together and the muscles in his powerful arm were tense, like coiled springs.

  "Wil. Maybe you should talk about it."

  He jerked away from me suddenly and it took my breath away. He ran a hand through his dark hair over and over again until it was sticking up on the sides. But as he'd have to squeeze around me to get out from behind the worktable, I had him trapped. He rocked from one leg to the other instead.

  "Should talk about it? Is that different than I have to talk about it or even want to talk about it?"

  I sighed. "You're wound up and upset. Maybe I can help you work through it?"

  He shrugged. "I don't get upset about my mother anymore."

  I suppressed a laugh--I guess even autistic guys were into macho posturing when the opportunity presented itself. He could pretend all he wanted that nothing was wrong, but clearly the opposite was true.

  "Everyone has an issue with their mother. I do...I told you about it, didn't I? We're okay now, but she was pretty mad at me for a while because I came back to the US to be with Brock."

  He shook his head. "Don't talk about him." His fists opened and closed again.

  "Okay," I whispered.

  "I don't know why, but I feel angry when you talk about him. Like I'm je
alous of him. I shouldn't be jealous because he's dead. But I am jealous and it's confusing, and I'd rather not think about it."

  For some reason, his honest admission choked me up. I shouldn't be jealous because he's dead. Suddenly, my chest tightened and my eyes felt a little tingly. I couldn't put my finger on why--was it the reminder that Brock was dead, or was it something more?

  Maybe it was William's heartfelt confession that he didn't even realize he'd confessed to. Sometimes he was so innocent that it pierced me to the core.

  I leaned toward him despite his agitation, and, rising on tiptoes, I ran my fingers through his thick, dark hair, right where he'd done the same thing just moments ago. His eyes fluttered closed and his hands relaxed. "Wil, can I help you? Will you let me?"

  "Just how do you think you can help me?" he asked quietly, without looking at me.

  "Maybe by talking about it? We all have parent issues. I promise you. Yours might be more difficult because your mom has passed away and you can't talk to her."

  "If she were alive, I'd have nothing to say to her. I never talked to her much."

  "How old were you when she and your dad divorced?"

  "Five." His voice held no emotion whatsoever. He really did sound like a robot, even though he'd claimed that he wasn't.

  "And you and your sister lived with your dad when they separated?"

  "Yes."

  One word answers...hmm. It was going to take a while to get it out of him at this pace. I gave a slight push against his hard, thick arm, cueing for him to face me. "Wil, tell me about it. What was it like? Were you glad you were living with your dad instead of her?"

  His face was as blank as his voice. A defense mechanism, maybe? "That was never an option. She left. She made it clear she didn't want to have a relationship with me."

  I squinted, confused. "But your sister..."

  "Oh, she saw Britt all the time. Every week. My mother even asked her to live with her when Britt turned thirteen, but Britt said no. I think my sister always felt bad for me and didn't want to leave me." He shrugged. "I told her she should go if she wanted. I love my dad and I was glad to stay with him."

  I smiled. "Your dad is a pretty awesome guy."

  His jaw clenched and then released. "Yes. He deserved better than he got." He shook his head.

  "You mean your mom didn't treat him well?"

  "I'm sure they were happy together once, maybe before I was born or before I got to be a handful."

  Ah, now we were getting somewhere. "Wait, you don't believe you're the reason they got divorced, do you?"

  He turned away from me slightly, directing his words at the wall. "It's a statistically proven fact that the parents of autistic children are more susceptible to divorce." I bit my lip, trying to think of what to say in response, but he kept talking. "Not that the divorce rate in the United States is all that great anyway, but it's higher among couples with children on the spectrum."

  "So that's why you think they divorced? Because of some statistic? Wil--some people just freak out and can't handle parenthood, or even just being married in general."

  He turned back toward me but still didn't look at me. "Her second marriage was just fine. She remarried less than a year after she left us and stayed married until she died."

  "Well, then fuck her. That's her problem, not yours. You do not ever blame yourself for that. What kind of person abandons her children?"

  "She didn't abandon us--"

  I stepped up to him and took his arm in my hand again. I wanted to shake him--to show him how wrong and harmful his thinking really was. "Wil, she abandoned you. Maybe not your sister, but she did abandon you. She never realized or cared how much it would hurt you to favor your sister over you."

  He swallowed but kept silent, looking over my shoulder. I put my hands on his cheeks. He jerked his head away.

  "Not my face..."

  "Okay." I moved my hands to his shoulders, pressing hard. "You are worthy of love. And you were worthy of her love. And the fact that she could not give it to you was her failing, not yours."

  William licked his lips, and after a long stretch of seconds, his dark eyes finally met mine. I wanted to take him in my arms, hold him, kiss him, comfort him, but I had no idea if that was what he really needed from me right now. I needed to, but his needs in this moment were far more important.

  His head fell forward slightly and his forehead touched mine. I could feel his warm breath float over my face as we stood there, silent. When I looked at his eyes again, they were closed, his long dark lashes lying calmly against his cheeks.

  "You know what we should do?" I said in a small voice. He'd have never heard me had it not been so quiet here in the back of the house.

  "What?" he asked without opening his eyes.

  "We should open up those cards. We should read them and see what they say."

  His eyelids snapped open. He looked almost sick at the idea, and slowly, he moved his forehead away from mine. "I don't want to do that."

  "Why?"

  "Because...because I'd rather imagine what I want them to say."

  "And what is it that you'd want them to say?"

  "I'd like to imagine that she was sorry. That every card was an apology that I had a chance to accept and didn't."

  "Would that make you feel any differently about her?"

  "I don't know."

  "Can we find out?"

  He was quiet again for a long time.

  I turned and walked over to the drawer, gingerly sliding it open, giving him the chance to protest. He said nothing, so I fished out the cards--there were sixteen of them. I began to arrange the various colored envelopes in order of oldest postmark date to the newest, all stamped in the month of October. The first one was dated 1994. He'd been six years old.

  "When's your birthday?"

  "October fourteenth," he intoned flatly as he watched me arrange the cards.

  "Ah, a Libra. That makes sense. Passionate, artistic, gentle and sensitive."

  "None of that astrology stuff makes any sense," he responded.

  "Okay, whatever. Here's the one for your sixth birthday," I said, holding the sunny yellow envelope out to him. "Do you want to open it?"

  "I don't want to open any of them."

  "Can I open this one, then?"

  He slowly nodded. I slid a fingernail under the tongue of the envelope and tore it open. It was a garish, generic card for a young boy with pictures of trains and trucks in bright primary colors. It looked young, even for a six-year-old. When I opened the card, a bunch of dollar bills fell out.

  There was a short note inside, which I read aloud:

  For Liam,

  Wishing you a happy sixth birthday. I promise to take you out for ice cream very soon.

  Love, Mom

  I turned to William. "So did she take you out for ice cream?"

  He shrugged. "I don't remember. Maybe."

  I placed a hand on his arm again. "You okay?"

  He pulled away slightly. "Why wouldn't I be okay? That card said absolutely nothing."

  "You want me to open the next one?"

  He shrugged again. I set aside the six one-dollar bills--one for each year of his life--on his worktable and picked up the next envelope. The next few years were much like the first one. Always a cash gift that was equal to his age and a simple, quick birthday wish with a promise to see him or take him somewhere soon.

  William grew a little more relaxed, if increasingly disappointed. Around his fifteenth birthday, he recalled that she attended some milestones, like his first amateur art show, but overall, her visits were infrequent. As he got older, she promised to take him out to dinner, and he made it a point to let me know that she never followed through.

  As he stared at the last two cards in the pile, it was difficult to gauge his mood. But with a long sigh, he snatched up the second to last card, opened it with one quick, forceful tear and unfolded it without even looking at the artwork or formal message on the outsid
e. A crisp twenty-dollar bill that had never been used slid out of the card. I added it to the orderly pile of cash on the table.

  In a flat voice, he read:

  Dear Liam,

  I know it's probably too late to explain. I don't even know if I can. You are a man, now. A grown man that I don't even know... But I hope you'll understand someday.

  With love,

  Your Mom

  He let out a long breath as if someone had punched him in the stomach. "She didn't know she was sick yet. I think she found out the following year."

  "What did she die of?"

  "Kidney failure."

  I picked up the last one and handed it to him. "She knew by the time she sent this one, though. Maybe this one has what you're looking for?"

  He glanced at me and then down to the card. "I doubt it."

  "Well, let me just say this. She was not a perfect person. She had flaws, like we all do. And you can't mend fences with her anymore, but you can forgive her."

  His forehead crumpled. "Why would I do that?"

  "Because it'll make you feel better. The Buddha once said that holding on to anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die."

  He swallowed and tore open the last envelope without even responding. Then he opened the card, extracted the money and closed it immediately.

  "You're not going to read that one?"

  He breathed in and out. "Not yet. I'm not ready."

  I nodded. "Okay. You need a hug?"

  His brow furrowed. "No."

  "Can I hold your hand, then?"

  He nodded. I slipped my palm inside his rough hand and it closed around mine, holding tight--almost painfully so. I returned the pressure.

  We both stared down at the pile of money. "That's two hundred and sixteen dollars," I said. "You should go blow it on something fun."

  "Like what?"

  I shrugged. "Oh, I don't know. How about the Fun Zone in Newport? Or we could go play video games at Dale and Boomers."

  He froze. "It's crowded there."

  "You still need to work on that."

  He pressed his lips together. Pulling his hand free, he grabbed the money and tucked the thick wad of bills into his wallet. "Dale and Boomers it is, then. Will you go with me?"

  "Of course. I'm your friend, right?"

  His eyes fixed directly on mine. "I want you to be more than my friend."

  He shoved his wallet back into his pocket and then turned his full attention on me, taking my wrist. The look in his eyes was so intense that I took a step backward.