I feel it come undone, and he switches our positions so my back is to the bed and he’s lying on top of me. That’s when red flags start waving.
“Colton,” I say, breaking the kiss and touching his arm to halt his movements.
“Yes?” he says, his eyes glazed with lust. He leans in to kiss me again, but I bring up my palm, creating a barrier between us.
“Colton, I think we should stop,” I repeat. “I’m not having sex with you.”
He immediately rolls over to the side of the bed, freeing me from under him. “Shit, I’m sorry,” he says, scrubbing his face with his hand.
I sit up, missing the feel of his body on mine. “It’s not that I don’t want to,” I say, trying to explain.
“I understand, Mia. It’s too soon,” he says, his hand caressing my side.
I take a deep breath. “Colton, I—”
“You don’t need to explain. I’m sorry I pushed you.”
“You didn’t push me, trust me. I wanted to. I want to. I just want my first time to be special,” I say, laying back down and turning on my side to meet his eyes.
“Your first time with me?” he asks.
I look up at the ceiling. “No, my first time,” I answer.
“You’re a…”
“Virgin, yes. I promised myself that when it happens it would be meaningful, and with someone I saw myself spending the rest of my life with. I was kind of saving myself for marriage,” I spit out.
There’s never a proper time for this conversation, but this is as good a time as any. It’s better to have him run out the door now than before I’m in too deep.
Who am I kidding, though. I’m already there.
“It’s silly, I know,” I say feeling my cheeks heat up. I try to turn to the opposite side of the bed, but Colton stops me.
“Mia.” He takes my chin and lifts it. I avert my eyes, again ready for this to be the end of us.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you earlier.” I motion between us. “This is rather new.”
“Mia.” He tries to make eye contact again, but I avoid him.
“So, now you know you shouldn’t date me. I can’t give you what you want.” I’m waiting for him to get up and leave, but he doesn’t move. I start getting up from the bed, but he holds my hips and pulls me back down.
“I can get sex from anyone,” he says, and I roll my eyes. There’s the conceited ass I met the first time, and it hurts a little because I know he’s telling the truth. I know there’s a line of girls out there who would trample each other for the chance to be with him. Shit, I’ve seen it first hand with Abbigail.
“What I mean is—Mia look at me.”
I don’t.
“Look at me. Now!” At his comment, I obey. “Mia, if all I wanted was sex, I’d go to anyone else. There are plenty of willing girls.”
Yep, thanks for the reminder.
“Perfect. Go and find one of them. Maybe Abbigail?” I say, and it feels like I’m swallowing rusty nails. “I’m sure she’d—” I’m stopped when Colton kisses me.
“Shut up, and listen,” he says. “You don’t need to give me sex to give me what I need. You give me strength, you listen to me, and you’re there when I need you. You allow me to be me, and inspire me to be a better version of myself.”
“You can get that from me as a friend,” I counter. “You should date someone—”
Again, his lips on mine stop me from finishing my suggestion.
“I want you, Mia, and I can wait. But I won’t give you up.”
“You’ll want to have sex.”
“Fuck yeah, I will. I do right now, but not with just anyone. I want it with you, and if that means waiting, I’ll do so. Gladly. But I don’t want anyone else, and you don’t want me with anyone else. So, quit suggesting stupid shit,” he says, and I smile. I feel like I’m walking on air. I didn’t expect this to be his reaction.
“Are you sure?” I ask, giving him another chance to get out.
“If I wasn’t sure, I wouldn’t be here right now. Don’t call it quits before we’ve even started, okay, Collins?”
“Yes, Hunter,” I respond and kiss him.
We watch another movie, but really that’s just an excuse for us to make out while the movie plays in the background. We get under the sheets and kiss until I’m too tired to continue. I begin to drift off, thinking about how the last few weeks have felt like a dream, and I’m a little afraid to wake up and find it all gone. Maybe this can work out after all. That’s the last thought that crosses my mind before I give in to the sleep that beckons me.
* * *
There!
I look at myself in the mirror, checking out my ironed curls. A couple of months ago, I wouldn’t have bothered primping and preening to go to a party. Shit, Kiya would certainly agree with that. She’d have forced me to go in the first place, and then we’d fight about getting ready. Yet here I am, curling my hair and perfecting my makeup.
There is a key difference now; I have someone I care about—the same someone who was here immediately after his game ended today in his amazing uniform that hugs his form beautifully. Even after playing for a couple of hours, he still made time to see me, to kiss me and let me know they’d won.
We haven’t put a label on whatever the heck is going on between us. We’re with each other whenever we can be, though, which isn’t a lot nowadays since his games have been taking up more and more of his time.
He wanted to stay for longer, but needed to get his sweaty ass over to the house to help the guys set up for the party they have each time they win. They’ve had one every Saturday because they’re kicking ass.
I slide on a jacket and take another look in the full-length mirror to make sure I look okay. Even though he was only here a couple of hours ago, I can’t help but feel giddy about seeing him again.
I grab my purse, the kind I throw on my shoulder and cross to the side, and leave the room. Kiya got held up in a study group session so she won’t be joining me until much later. It feels a little weird to be going to a party by myself, but I promised Colton I’d be there.
I open the front door and run right into someone I didn’t ever expect to see again.
My father.
Time stops as I try and figure out if this is a dream or not—if my dad is actually standing in front of me after months and months of not seeing him, if the same person who abandoned me is the one that bothered to show up at my door.
“Hey, kiddo,” he says. That voice—I haven’t heard it since I heard mom and dad argue in the kitchen. I don’t reply. “I know you’re mad at me, and I understand.”
“Well, if you understand, that makes it all better,” I say, my words clipped.
“I know it doesn’t, but I’m here.”
“Yeah. Please tell me why you’re here.”
“I want to apologize,” he says, his sky-blue eyes looking back at me.
“For what, exactly?” I respond, going through the list of all the things he did wrong.
“For everything. I needed to come here and apologize to you.”
“Now? How did you even know I was here?”
“Yes, now, and I asked CU and they told me you’d transferred. I’m your father so they gave me the information.”
“Father? Really?” I throw back in disgust. “You’re claiming that now?”
“I deserve that too, but I just want you to know, I’m better now.”
I don’t believe a word he’s saying. “Are you?”
“I am,” he says solemnly. “Will you please let me come inside so we can talk?”
I stand there blocking the door for a couple of minutes before I acquiesce. Part of me knows he’s my father, and I was taught to respect that. I move away and let him follow me in. I find my comfy spot on the couch and wait for him to start talking, to try and explain whatever the fuck happened.
“I know I’ve made some mistakes.” Instead of following me to the couch, Michael walks around the living ro
om, stopping in front of a photo of Mom and me.
“You take after her, you know? Just like her,” he adds.
“I’d like to think so. You were saying you made some mistakes?” I tell him, trying to move this conversation along.
“Many mistakes, but I’m better. After your mom… after she…” He puts down the photo and walks towards the piano. I wince. It was him who’d taught me how to play.
“After she died,” I supply.
“Yes, after she died. I checked myself into a rehabilitation facility to help with my drinking and gambling addiction,” he says. “I’ve been getting treatment for the last few months, and I’ve been sober since she left us,” he continues, cautiously making his way to the couch.
“Well that’s nice,” I can’t help but say sarcastically. Great for him that he’s better now. But what about me?
“Part of the program asks us to go back and make things right.”
“Oh, so you’re only here because you have to check that box?”
“No, I’m here because I care about you. I love you, kiddo, and I wanted to make things right between us.” He says finally taking a seat on the couch opposite from me.
“Now you do? How do you see that working out?”
“I want us to be a family again.” I look at him with skepticism brimming in my eyes. Why does he think we’ll just go back to being a family?
“A family?”
“Yes, a family. I… There’s something else I have to tell you.” What else? I nod for him to continue. “Before your mom passed, things weren’t going well. It was all my fault, and I realize that now. I drove a wedge between us, and your mom and I… We started having problems. I was addicted to drinking and gambling and every time I lost, I basically lost my shit.”
“Okay.” I already knew that.
“And, well, one of the biggest fights your mom and I had before she passed was when I told her, I got someone…”
My eyes narrow on him. “You got someone, what?”
“I was at a bar watching a fight I had a two thousand dollar bet on, and well, I lost. I was pissed, and there was this…this woman there who had been flirting with me the whole night.”
“Oh my god, you cheated on Mom?” I scream, abandoning my seat on the couch.
“Things weren’t good at home. We’d stopped sleeping in the same bed. We only shared a bedroom when you visited from college.”
“So that makes it better?” I continue to yell, pacing from one end of the room to another.
“No, I know it doesn’t,” he says, his head hanging in embarrassment. “It only went on for a little while,” he adds while standing up.
“You had an affair? Not a one-time thing, but you actually had a fucking affair?”
There was no biting my tongue now.
“Yes, but I ended it, I did. Except, it was too late because the woman…the woman told me she was pregnant.” My movements come to a halt.
His words sound like nails scratching a chalkboard. I hear them, but I can’t believe they’re true.
“You have a sister,” he says, and at this, I walk towards the door and leave the house. He calls my name behind me, but I don’t stop. I can’t stop.
I run. I run like there is someone chasing me because there is. Well not someone, but something—my past. I left California so I never had to cross paths with him. I never wanted to see him again. Not after he left me. Tears fall and my vision blurs, but I don’t stop running. I can’t stop.
I remember being at mom’s funeral. I didn’t cry, I didn’t speak. I didn’t do anything. I couldn’t. Because not only had I lost my mom, I had also lost my dad. He wasn’t at the funeral, he’d been removed throughout the entire process. I begged and begged for him to come but he didn’t. He didn’t help make funeral arrangements. He didn’t answer any questions. Hadn’t said a fucking word to me. Not even a hug. No comfort whatsoever. Never asked how I was doing. I knew he was hurting, but I was too. And he was the parent, not me. He was the only parent I had left.
I had lost one of the most important people in my life and my dad wasn’t there to help me through it. Instead, I forced myself to not feel. Even after childhood friends, neighbors, co-workers, and anyone else that knew and loved my mother tried to comfort me. They expressed their deep sadness for my loss. Still, I could feel their confusion, could see their eyes wandering around in search of my father. I was looking for him too.
After we buried her everyone went home. There was nothing else left to do. Natasha, a friend who’d driven from school for the break with me asked if I wanted company, if I needed her. I told her I wanted to be alone.
That was a lie.
I didn’t want to be alone.
Moving mechanically, I got out of the car and walked into the house. Inside, the memories of my childhood assaulted me. I felt like I was drowning in an ocean of them. I screamed as loud as I could, hoping to let everything out—hoping to feel something other than the numbness—but it didn’t help.
I rushed to my parents’ room. I wanted to confront my father and demand answers. I was ready to fight him, too—to scream at him for not being there for me, for not being there for mom. I wrenched the bedroom door open…
No one was there.
Seeing my mother’s robe hanging on the headboard broke me. Her things were unmoved, untouched. If it wasn’t for the memory of her body in the casket, I’d have expected her home at any minute now.
I moved toward her closet, her favorite place. It’s where her collection of boots and scarfs were kept, and right then, I needed to feel closer to her. When I opened the door all I could focus on was the fact that all my father’s clothes were missing. Gone. I ran to their bathroom, and nothing of his was there either. I yelled for him, running from room to room, expecting to find him.
Finally, I ran down to the kitchen, where, there on top of the table, was a yellow envelope. I sat down and took a deep breath. I ripped the envelope open, scared of what I would find inside. I found a note and read it.
I’m sorry. I can’t do this. Seeing you every day will remind me of her. I’m sorry for hurting our family. I promise I’ll get better. I wish I had earlier.
I kept looking to see if there was anything else, and there was. But nothing that made me feel better. My father had left me a court Petition for Emancipation. At the bottom of the document was his signature: Michael Collins.
It took me forever to stop reliving that time in my head. I had worked so hard to push it down. It took me a while to regain control of my life, to feel like a person, to not look at myself in the mirror and hate what I saw, just like my dad did.
I’m still running, and while I thought I was running aimlessly, I find myself slowing down in front of Colton’s house. My hair is stuck to my face, the little eyeliner and mascara I’d applied likely smudged. My legs feel weak, my head is pounding, and my heart? Well, my heart is hanging on by a thread. Hanging on because of Colton.
I can hear the booming music and second guess going inside. People will notice. People will see there’s something wrong with me. Or maybe they won’t. All I know is that I need to see Colton. I need to be with him.
Inside, I run up the stairs like my life depends on it.
When I reach his room, I open the door, and all the air in my lungs leaves in a rush.
Laying in Colton’s bed, under his sheets, is Abbigail. She’s naked if the clothes on the floor are any indication. I look around to see if Colton is here, praying he isn’t, praying she slept with someone else in his room. I look back at Abbigail, who smirks sinisterly at me and points at the bathroom door. The door is propped open and I can hear the shower running.
I can also see Colton’s clothes laying on the floor.
I don’t know what to do. I have no idea when everything got so out of hand, but I know I can’t stay here. I can’t take another person hurting me—not tonight, though maybe it’s already too late.
Fresh tears form, falling down my cheeks
as I make my way out of the stupid Football House. I should have known better than to come here. Just because someone says they don’t need something doesn’t mean it’s true. Shit, I remember the only thing I needed was to be alone, but that was a lie. Just like Colton lied to me about not having his own needs—needs I couldn’t meet, needs Abbigail has always been more than happy to fulfill.
People stare at me as I pass, their eyes full of concern. Not knowing where to go next and not having the strength to keep going, I walk to the side of the Football House, slide down the wall onto the grass and let the tears fall. I cry so much that I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to cry again.
Why the hell did my father have to return now and destroy the walls I have worked so hard to build? I guess it’s not entirely his fault considering Colton had slowly been removing bricks. In the end, the only person to blame is me. Me, and whoever the hell ran a red light and killed my mother.
22
COLTON
I finish shaving and wash my face once more. This shower was very needed. After the football game, I went straight to Mia’s house. It’s funny how a couple of months ago, she wouldn’t let me in, and now I spend more time there than here. My time was cut short, though; I needed to help the guys set up for the party—the victory party—because once again, we have made it to the playoffs. We are well positioned to win, and that is a cause for celebration. At least that’s what the guys say, but they don’t need an excuse.
I dry my face and apply some lotion. I can see myself smiling at the mirror, thinking of how far I’ve come with Mia. Seriously, the girl has got me moisturizing my face and everything. I give myself another once over in the mirror and walk out of the bathroom. My gaze lands on a bra stacked on top of a pile of clothes on the floor. I turn my head to the right and find Abby laying on my bed.
Better With You: A Bragan University Novel Page 16
