Somebody Else (Somebody, Nobody Duet Book 1)

by Jaxson Kidman

  “No,” I whispered.

  I tossed my phone to the passenger seat and put the truck into reverse. I wasn’t going to sit there and stare at the field, waiting for Kinsley’s ghost to appear.

  I didn’t exactly like going home to sit there alone either.

  Which left me with only one option.

  To go get a beer. At the bar I worked at.

  Let temptation eat me alive as I drowned myself in everything that should have been. All the while waiting for Kinsley to make a move. Because I knew she wasn’t happy. Now, could I make her happy? That obviously hadn’t worked out the first time.

  The only difference… this time… I’d give my life to see her smile.

  9

  More Tricks Than Treats

  Kinsley

  I wore a witch’s hat all day. Deb tried to wear vampire teeth but had to keep taking them out to talk to people. Half the dogs I saw were dressed in costumes. Angels, devils, dressed as horses, dresses, and even a nice looking suit for one dog, complete with black sunglasses that the dog didn’t mind wearing.

  On my way home, the streets were starting to crawl with kids walking door to door for free goodies. The young kids were dressed in elaborate costumes with their parents right behind them. The older kids - probably too old to be trick or treating - were dressed in basic costumes with pillow cases.

  It made me smile. To be young like that again…

  When I got home, I hurried to get the bowls of candy ready. I turned on the porch light and I stood at the door, waiting and hoping that someone would take a chance and walk up the cul-de-sac. This was one of the very few pitfalls of living here. Most people walked the main streets. And considering I was the only one of the neighbors who cared about Halloween, it was hard to get traffic. Linda always took Paige out. Last year, I joined them for a few blocks, knowing that leaving Ben alone with candy and responsibility wasn’t a good idea. I arrived back home thirty minutes later to the house quiet and dark. Ben said nobody came up the street and he wasn’t going to waste his night. So we sat on the couch together and ate way too much chocolate and watched a few horror movies until I dozed off.

  I stepped outside and put the bowls of chocolates on a plant stand. I bit my lip and opened my phone, going to Brice’s emails. The picture of me and him from Halloween all those years ago was priceless. It was so good, I wanted to show Ben, but I didn’t want the questions. It was funny because I filled out the information to rent the costumes. The guy at the shop thought I did that on purpose to be silly, which turned out perfect. Brice dressed as a woman, me dressed as a man. It was the best Halloween ever.

  The night Brice emailed me that picture, I was out at dinner with Ben. We hadn’t seen each other for two days straight and he insisted I meet him for a fancy dinner. So I scrambled to find a dress I liked and met him almost forty minutes away. The restaurant was sleek and super expensive. Ben looked devilish in a suit and no tie. We sipped wine, ate, talked, and laughed. I couldn’t remember the last time we had a meal like that. No phones. No phone calls. No talk about work either. He asked me again about taking a vacation. So we sort of fantasized for a little bit. Talking about everywhere we wanted to go. From Paris to Japan. A worldwide trip even.

  We came home that night and I waited for him to take me to bed. He went to take a shower and I got ready to join him. Which, of course, meant stripping naked and opening the shower door. I scared him, he slapped the wall, and told me he was going to be done in a minute.

  Thirty minutes later, he was answering emails and I waited him out to fall asleep before I checked my phone to find Brice’s emails waiting.

  The second one got to me the most though.

  Hey Kins,

  Just wondering if you’re around right now. I have a little bit of free time to chat. Email. Phone. Meet up for a quick drink or something.

  That meant something was wrong. He needed me.

  But the thing was… it wasn’t my job to be there anymore for him. Not without creating a bigger problem than I already was. My urge and desire for Ben to throw me to the bed and take me or pin me against the shower tiles while the hot water smacked our bodies… I knew a part of that was because of these emails. And that was wrong. But it just showed me that I still had that same fire and passion.

  And even dinner with Ben. That showed we could spend time together without the need for phones and work.

  That was just how relationships went though. When you got too comfortable, you fell into a little rut. And that was okay. Because you just pull yourself out and keep going.

  Only I spent the next hour that night reading Brice’s emails, looking at the pictures he sent, and writing back to him.

  I closed the picture on my phone as Ben pulled into the driveway. He was home early, which was great. We could sit outside on the porch in hoodies with a couple of drinks, enjoying the cool fall air and the Halloween night.

  I rushed to the kitchen to get two wine glasses and grabbed a random bottle from the wine rack. Truth time, I hated wine. I had grown accustomed to the taste after being with Ben for so long. There were just far too many times when we were at places where ordering a cold beer was considered inappropriate. And drinking actual liquor was never a good idea for me. One drink and I was usually over the edge. Believe me, Ben made it very clear that there was nothing more embarrassing than a drunk woman hanging on the arm of a successful man. Which I respected. Oftentimes, when we went out in a public group setting, he was meeting with business partners or investors who had the potential to sign over massive sums of money.

  So wine became a sort of evil acceptance to me.

  I leaned against the table and tilted my witch’s hat to the side a little. I quickly unbuttoned my entire top, leaving a tight and thin spaghetti tank top partially seen through the open shirt. I bent my right leg and had this vision of me being a slutty looking witch.

  Just for Ben though.

  The door that separated the kitchen and the garage opened.

  “Well, trick or treat you big-”

  “Yeah, well he can kiss my ass,” Ben’s voice growled. “I’m not playing that game like last time. He’s not going to string us along. I’m not sitting on his books to look pretty for a few months and then…”

  Ben paused when he saw me.

  This was his moment to tell whoever the hell it was on the phone that something came up. Then he could hang up the call. Forget about the wine for a second. I would gladly wear nothing but the witch’s hat and cast spells on his body that would make him feel as though a demon were being exorcised from him.

  What is with you, Kinsley? These thoughts… these urges…

  My cheeks blushed because I knew exactly where this was coming from.

  I winked at Ben.

  I carefully peeled open the unbuttoned shirt, thrusting my chest out. I let my fingertips slide over the curve of my breast, over my shirt, all the way down to my jeans.

  “Yeah, I’m here,” Ben said. He held up one finger to me and turned. “Look, this is not going to happen. I’ll take the risk. I’ll take the blame.”

  I shut my eyes for a second and mentally sighed.

  I turned and looked at the wine and the glasses.

  My eyes moved up a little and I spotted a few kids walking on the sidewalk toward the house.

  In a wicked scramble, I buttoned up my shirt and made a move for the door.

  “Hey, wait a second…”

  Ben’s hand grabbed my arm and pulled at me.

  He spun me around so hard, my hat fell to the floor.

  “There are trick or treaters coming,” I said. “We usually don’t get many.”

  “Yeah,” Ben said. “Sorry about that call. I… didn’t… realize…”

  I quickly smiled. “Hope everything is okay.”

  “It’s perfect,” he said.

  You can throw me against the wall now, Ben. Say ‘fuck it’ to anyone outside.

  “You’d better do your thing then,” he
said to me.

  He crouched and lifted my hat off the floor and put it on my head.

  “You look perfect,” he said.

  “So I look like a witch?” I asked. “I’m only wearing a hat.”

  “Right. But the rest of you… it’s devilish. The way you looked. Standing at the table like that…”

  I opened my mouth and Ben’s phone started to ring just as the doorbell rang.

  He looked at the screen. “Oh, fuck this. Let me finish this really quick, my dear. Then I’m all yours tonight.”

  He walked away and I opened the door to greet a small group of young kids. A princess. A tiger. A train conductor. A fairy.

  If there was one good thing about Halloween, it was a night where it was okay to pretend you were happy being someone you weren’t.

  We ended up with more traffic than previous years, but even still, it wasn’t as much as I had hoped for. I sat on the porch trying to think of a way to make it busier. Some Halloween lights on the house, maybe. Some of those inflatables. Maybe music or a strobe light.

  A little after eight, Linda and Paige came walking back.

  Linda looked at me and stuck her tongue out as though she were dying.

  I smiled and waved, mentally telling her that smoking will do that to you. Then again, who was I to talk? I started smoking at a young age and only gave it up because I was pregnant.

  I looked down at my stomach and felt a sting of pain.

  It was Halloween. It was the best time of the year to be a kid. The leaves changing. Raking big piles and jumping into them. Trick or treating. The next morning it would be Christmas time. No offense to Thanksgiving or anything, you know? The radio stations would start with Christmas songs nonstop. Commercials, toy ads, all of that would be in full swing. The pressure of figuring out if you were good enough for Santa to make a quick trip to your house.

  I sat there alone, thinking about… her.

  I promised myself a long time ago that I wouldn’t do that. I wouldn’t sit around and pretend she was with me. Or what she would look like. Or what it would be like if she were around.

  That promise was hard to keep, but it had gotten much easier to keep it after meeting Ben. He was the fresh start. The clean slate. The unwritten page. That’s why I fell in love with him the way I did. He knew nothing about my old life and I knew nothing of his. It was only about the future. I loved the way he planned it all out. From day to day, to the week, month, and year. There was comfort in that. It was like a security blanket.

  But sitting there alone, I couldn’t stop thinking about her. So much so that I decided to open that bottle of wine. One glass quickly became two and the third was a last-ditch effort to make it all stop.

  I had to stop picturing her as a young girl in a princess costume. I had to stop wondering if she would have been a tough girl who dressed as a boy superhero because why the hell not? I had to stop aching for the moment we dumped all the candy on the living room floor to go through the good stuff, the crappy stuff, the stuff that didn’t look all that safe. And that I would casually sneak my favorite piece of chocolate without her seeing and she would do the same, only I knew she was doing it and let her. That on Halloween night, she’d go to bed with chocolate stains on the corners of her mouth and a belly full of sugar, which meant a crappy night of sleep and a stomachache in the morning.

  But it would be totally worth it.

  I sipped the fourth glass of wine as a stray tear finally trailed down my cheek.

  Ben had apologized an hour ago that his calls were running late. But don’t worry, it was okay. Why? Because Halloween was my thing. He didn’t like it. So he preferred to stay inside while I sat outside. Alone. Flirting with my phone because I knew Brice was a click away.

  Yet in some sense, I was pissed at Brice for even emailing me. Because of him emailing me, I sat there with the thoughts I had in my mind. Because of him in general…

  “You look like you need some company.”

  I blinked fast and scratched at the corner of my eye to wipe away the tear.

  “How was trick or treating?” I asked as Linda stepped up on the porch.

  “Exhausting.”

  “Lots of walking, huh?”

  “Yeah,” she said. She sat down. “But Paige is happy. This year was supposed to be Dave’s year. Go figure.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “I’m not. He demanded we split holidays and all that. I went along with it knowing this would happen. I can’t imagine not spending a holiday with her, you know? It does give me anxiety that one Christmas he’ll show up to take her.”

  “Don’t let it worry you,” I said. “Even if he did, you’d still outdo him.”

  “Of course I would,” Linda said. “I’m a manipulative bitch who holds a grudge for years.”

  I laughed. “Remind me not to get on your bad side then.”

  Linda winked. She leaned over the bucket of candy I had as leftovers. “Oh, some good ones are still left.”

  “Help yourself,” I said.

  “I think I will. I could use a cigarette, but… you know…” Linda cocked her head at the front door. “Mr. Happy in there will get nervous.”

  I tried not to laugh. “He means well, Linda.”

  “Of course he does.”

  Linda had a little bit of a biased opinion on men, and for good reason. So I always tried to roll it off my shoulders when she got on Ben’s case. But there was a situation where she had some merit…

  “Speaking of which, where is Ben? Doesn’t he like Halloween?”

  “Nah,” I said. “He’s finishing up work. End of the month stuff, you know?”

  “Ah. Right. And you’re drinking wine alone?”

  “Is that a problem?”

  “That’s usually what sad women do. Not to mention the chocolate…”

  “Wait a second,” I said with a slight grin. “The chocolate was for Halloween. For trick or treaters. And the wine was the lesser of two evils.”

  Linda lifted the bottle. “This was full?”

  “It was…”

  She nodded. “Rough day?”

  “Not at all,” I said in a dry voice.

  Linda had this knack of knowing when to ask questions and when to let things go and just be there in silence.

  She didn’t ask anything else about my day.

  After a few minutes, she let out a sigh. “I can’t believe it’s November already. These years go by faster now. And I swore I would never be the cliché person to say that.”

  “I know the feeling,” I said. I finished the fourth glass of wine and knew I had to stop myself there. If I had another, I’d end up a blubbering mess and I’d end up saying something to either Linda or Ben and messing up my perfect life.

  “So, what are the big plans for Thanksgiving?”

  “Plans?” I asked.

  Linda looked at me and raised an eyebrow. “Don’t act like Ben doesn’t have everything figured out. The date, place, time, what you’re wearing. The temperature of the room. The sturdiness of the chair.”

  I burst into laughter. “You’re too much sometimes.”

  “What? I’m just saying, he loves to plan.”

  “That he does,” I said. “But it’s good. And I think we’re going to my family this year. It’s just my dad and my brother. But it’s family.”

  “That’s good,” she said. “Doesn’t matter how big or small your family is. As long as everyone is true and has a good time.”

  And as long as my father and brother know to keep quiet about everything in the past… that they understand it’s my personal business to talk to Ben about when I’m ready…

  “What do you usually do?” I asked.

  “Family,” Linda said. “My brother’s place. He’s got some big fancy house in one of those developments. We get the tour of all the new stuff they’ve bought and hear about how rich they are, blah, blah. Paige loves her cousins though. I love my brother too. His wife. Eh, she’s okay, I gu
ess. Snobby. But he’s got a great job and makes big bucks, so maybe it’s me being a little jealous.”

  “Sibling jealousy is a part of life,” I said.

  “Are you jealous of your brother?”

  I laughed. “Kyle? No. I don’t think he knows how to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.”

  She snorted. “My brother was always smart. Super genius smart. I could never keep up. That fucker.”

  “Linda,” I said as I laughed.

  “Ah, I love him though,” she said and waved a hand. “Oh, shit.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Paige’s bedroom light just turned on.” Linda hurried to stand. “Mind if I steal a few chocolates to go?”

  “Take the bucket,” I said.

  “Now that would be dangerous.” She took a handful of candy. “Happy Halloween, Kinsley.”

  “Same to you. And Merry Christmas starts tomorrow.”

  “Oh, to hell with that. I’m keeping up my fall decorations and celebrating Thanksgiving first.”

  “Good luck with that,” I said.

  Linda hurried back home, and I was left alone again.

  That next glass of wine was very tempting, but I resisted. I finally called it a night and decided to go inside. I already knew I would have a little bit of a wine hangover in the morning.

  But that was certainly more tolerable than a hangover from Brice.

  It was late, and I was drunk.

  I was barely able to wash out the wine glass without making a ton of noise. I left the wine bottle on the kitchen table along with the bucket of candy. Anything I ate I just threw the wrapper back in the bucket because why not. I felt guilty for eating chocolate. I felt guilty for drinking so much wine. I felt guilty for thinking what I did that made me drink the wine. I felt guilty for emailing Brice.

  Yet Ben was in bed.

  At least that’s where he had to have been. His car was in the garage. Everything was dark, including his office. So he finished his calls and went to bed.