California Dreamin'

by Saffron A Kent

  But with him being gone and my realization that I loved him, that I’d always loved him, I didn’t know if I could recover from that.

  I didn’t know if I could live, let alone be happy or be able to laugh, because he was gone and he didn’t love me back.

  I feel his fingers on my cheeks, bringing me back to the moment. He has moved his hands away from the door and he’s gripping my cheeks now, with passion and violence and intensity.

  “Tell me, Tiny,” he whispers roughly. “Tell me how much I’ve hurt you.”

  Tears spill down my cheeks and plop down on his fingers, the colorless water merging with his skin, wetting it.

  I shake my head. “It’s over. It’s in the past.”

  He clutches my face tightly. “I need to hear it. I need to hear how much I’ve hurt that girl. The girl I’ve loved for as long as I can remember. I need to hear how much of a coward I am. A fucking asshole to leave her like that. To make her cry for me when I promised that I wouldn’t. That I’d always keep her safe and protected.”

  “Dean, please.”

  “Tell me. Tell me how I broke my promise to you, Fallon. I need to know.”

  I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone this torn and broken up, let alone him.

  Heaviness drapes every part of his face, every part of his body.

  He’s so heavy with guilt.

  I’m not sure what rehashing the past will accomplish but I can’t refuse him. But if I have to tell him then I’ll say everything, all the things that are in my heart.

  “It hurt,” I whisper, and he winces. “It hurt so much when you left, Dean. I thought I was going to die. I wanted to die. Everything felt so lifeless and colorless. I couldn’t get out of bed for days. I didn’t wanna eat anything. I didn’t wanna… do anything. I’d just sit by the phone, waiting for your call. And then, I’d call you but you wouldn’t pick up. There were days when I just… didn’t know what was going on around me, you know? Because when you left I realized how much I loved you and just like that, I’d lost my best friend and the man I loved, the man I didn’t even know that I loved. I lost so much in one shot.

  “Anyway, I missed so much school. My friends and my teachers, all of them thought I was going through something really serious. I worried my mom and dad a lot too. But I didn’t know how to get out of it, how to make it stop hurting. But then…”

  My vision is blurry but I blink back tears so I can see him clearly. So I can tell him that the hurt I felt because of his absence made me even stronger.

  So much stronger that now, I can lend some of my strength to him.

  He’s always protected me. All throughout my life, Dean has been my champion. And now it’s my turn to be his.

  “Then I realized something.”

  His eyes are glassy. “What did you realize?”

  “I realized a thing about love,” I whisper. “I realized nothing can cure the sickness caused by love.”

  It’s true.

  Nothing can cure the illness brought on by love. Not science, not God.

  Only he could cure it.

  This man in front of me. The love of my life.

  And I had to fight for him.

  “I realized that I had to fight for you,” I say out loud and I say it with a smile. “I realized that if I loved you, then I had to pull myself out of this despair and fight. And I had to do it myself. I had to do it without the help of my pills or therapy or my parents. I knew that I had to fight alone, Dean. All my life I’ve fought with my illness and as terrible as it is, I’ve been super lucky to have so many people standing by me. My mom and dad. You. I always just followed what you guys told me to do. I always walked on this narrow, straight path. You’re right. I’ve never broken a rule or forgotten to take my pills. During really dark days, I’ve logged my thoughts into a journal because Mom always told me it helped her. I’ve made lists like her to cure my anxiety. My dad gives me books and articles to read and I read them cover to cover. I’ve always known that I’m not alone, that I have an army of people to fight with me, to fight my mind.

  “But this was the first time I was taking a risk, Dean. I was taking a chance. I was fighting alone and it was so scary. But it was also something that brought me out of my shell. Your love brought me out of my shell. I never would’ve imagined traveling out of state, let alone to California. I mean, I don’t like it that much but are you listening to what I’m saying? I live in California now. I live in a dorm, with people. I do everything by myself, on my own. It’s terrifying but isn’t that part of growing up?”

  I smile at him and kiss his firm lips. “I grew up, Dean. I grew up because of it. Because you left. It hurt but I realized that some battles I had to fight on my own. You didn’t break your promise. You looked out for me even when you weren’t there. Sometimes it’s okay to be sad, you know. It’s okay to feel hurt. Because sometimes pain can create beautiful things. Sometimes pain can make you grow up. I grew up because of you.”

  I run out of words and there are only breaths left between us, his and mine. Misty and slippery and warm. Hot even.

  There’s only the rustle of our chests moving together as we stare at each other, in a large house with a tiny light in the entryway.

  His cheek pulses underneath my palm, and then he’s taking his hands away from my face and putting them on my waist.

  Before I can put two and two together, Dean has already lifted me off the ground and my thighs have already snaked themselves around his waist.

  “Dean, what are you…” I trail off as he begins to walk inside. “What are you doing?”

  By the time I finish my question, we’re halfway down the darkened hallway that leads to the back of the house with all the bedrooms.

  Once again, we’re submerged in darkness—I don’t even know how he’s able to see where to go—but I feel as secure as ever. He has me plastered to his big, heavily breathing chest and I’ve tucked my nose on the side of his neck.

  A second later we come into the light again. It’s buttery and yellow, much like the moon is when the night is deep and dark, and it’s coming from a small lamp on a nightstand.

  We’re in his bedroom, I realize, standing by the edge of his bed.

  My heart pounds in my chest and I squeeze my thighs that have suddenly gone all trembly. Breaking our hug, I take in his room.

  Again, I’ve been here before, countless times.

  But I’ve never seen it in the dark of the night. I’ve never seen his sheets messy or his dented pillow.

  I’ve never seen the signs he leaves behind after he’s slept on his bed.

  Although I don’t think he was sleeping at all. Not judging by the mayhem and chaos on his bed. The sheets are all tangled up, the pillows strewn about.

  It’s like he was trying to get comfortable, but he couldn’t. It’s like he was tossing and turning and shifting, all alone in his bed.

  Then my eyes fall on the heap of his travel clothes. They lie discarded and forgotten, like the empty pizza box.

  My hands on his shoulders become a fist when I see what he probably had for dinner.

  “Is that what you ate? Pizza?” I whisper, bringing my eyes to him.

  He’s been watching me all this time.

  Bathed in the buttery light of his nightlamp, Dean has been staring at me while I was staring at his room.

  Belatedly I realize that he hasn’t spoken a single word. Not since I told him about what happened to me when I left. He simply lifted me off the ground and brought me into his room.

  “Dean?”

  Finally, he breaks his silence, as if my questions are distracting him from what the real issue is, from what he’s really thinking right now.

  “Yeah. Pizza,” he murmurs, staring intently at me.

  “I don’t like that.”

  “You don’t?”

  I shake my head, frowning. “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Bec
ause you shouldn’t have to. You shouldn’t have to eat take-out, all alone in your big, dark house when Mom had cooked for you. When we all had dinner together. I don’t like you being alone.”

  He smiles then, a tiny, sad smile. “But I’ve always been alone, Fallon. Ever since I was a kid. Ever since your dad found me at the cemetery on the day of my mom’s funeral. Even before that.”

  I feel the pain of his words in my chest. So much so that it’s hard to breathe. But somehow, I manage to whisper, “You’re not alone, Dean. You’ve never been alone.”

  “I didn’t know that,” he says softly, with a touch of awe in his voice. “I didn’t know that I wasn’t alone. That meeting with your dad was a stroke of fate. I had no idea that your dad finding me would lead me to find you. A girl who was born for me. A girl I watched grow up. A girl with so much strength and light and immense fucking love. Every day you stole a piece of my heart, Fallon. Every fucking day for as long as I can remember until there was nothing left in my chest. Until all my heart was gone. It was gone and it belonged to you. Every day I fought against it. I fought and battled and went to war with myself. Every day I cursed myself. I hated myself for these feelings. For years, I’d come to my big, dark house and lie awake in this bed, thinking that I’d stop seeing you, stop seeing your family. That I was betraying the only father figure I’ve known. I’m betraying the only mother I’ve known. But I could never do it. I could never distance myself and I’d hate myself even more for that. So I ran away. I ran to the other side of this country.

  “And all the while, you were there. While I was fighting against myself, torturing myself, you were fighting for me. You were quietly growing up. You were doing it all for me, weren’t you?”

  “I was.”

  “You’re a warrior, you know that?”

  I swallow. “Yes. And you’re my protector.”

  He moves then, hugging me tightly.

  I close my eyes and burrow my face in his neck as I feel him bending, lowering himself onto the bed and taking me with him.

  He deposits me on his sheets, and I hate the fact that I have my jacket on so I can’t feel them. I can’t feel the texture of the blanket he drapes over himself when he sleeps. I can’t feel the silk of his sheets on my skin.

  But before I can ask him to take my jacket off, take all of my clothes off so I can feel what he feels while sleeping alone in this bed, he fists my hair and pulls my neck back, hovering over me.

  “I was born for you, wasn’t I?” he asks, roughly.

  “Yes.”

  “And you were born for me. You were made for me,” he tells me and all I can do is clutch his t-shirt and nod. “Your soft skin. Your small, curvy body. You know why you’re soft and silky all over?”

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m hard all over. I’m rough and harsh. You’re soft because I’m sharp.”

  I feel all the words he’s saying. I feel them on my fingertips, with which I’m holding his shirt.

  I feel them in between my legs.

  It makes me ache, how hard he is.

  “I know,” I whisper.

  “And you know why you’re so tiny and warm?” he whispers, his words feeling misty and sleepy.

  “Why?”

  “Because my big, hard cock needs a warm tight home.”

  As soon as he says it, my body jerks beneath him. “Dean…”

  He comes closer at my moan of a call.

  He settles himself between my thighs, pressing our lower bodies together, giving me something to move against.

  Not only that, he grazes his lips over mine. I don’t know how they became so sweaty when it’s so cold out there, but both our mouths slip against each other, covered in a mist.

  “You are my home, Fallon,” he growls. “Your heart, your soul, your body. Your tiny cunt is my home. I’ve been a fool, you see. I’ve been a fucking fool. You never leave your home, do you? You never leave the place you belong. And I belong with you.”

  I don’t know what’s happening, but my eyes feel watery even as my pussy clenches. It ripples with his words. It flutters and gets wet.

  Not to mention swollen, and hence, smaller.

  My channel runs like a river and gets even tighter for him. Warmer.

  Because I’m his home.

  “Dean, please.” I dig my nails in his stomach. “Please fuck me.”

  “No,” he says, even though he’s jerking against me, establishing a rhythm like he would if he was inside me.

  “Dean—”

  He plunges both his hands into my loose hair and cuts off my speech. “Listen to me, Tiny. Tonight, you’re going to sleep in your own bed.”

  “What?”

  His features look harsh in the yellow light, harsher than before. As if he hates what he’s going to say next.

  “I’m going to take you home and you’re going to sleep in your own bed.”

  “But you don’t have to. No one knows and—”

  “That’s the thing. No one knows.” His jaw pulses. “No one knows that you snuck out. You broke the rules. You went behind your parents’ backs. For me. Not anymore, okay? You’re not breaking any more rules for me. I’m not letting you. So you’re going to be the good girl you are and you’re going to let me walk you home. And then I’ll do what I was going to do anyway.”

  “What were you going to do?”

  “I was going to come to your house tomorrow and I was going to talk to your dad about us.”

  I blink. “You were going to come to my house tomorrow?”

  “Yeah. I’m not leaving, Tiny. I’ve left you enough, broken my promises enough to last a lifetime.”

  Regret shines on his face and I shake my head. “But—”

  “I did,” he tells me gravely. “I let you fight for our love alone. You didn’t have to carry that burden yourself but you did. Because I wasn’t there. But I’m going to change that. I’m going to make another promise, Tiny. To you, to myself, and I’m going to make a promise to your dad.”

  “What promise?”

  “That I’ll take care of his daughter. That I’ll be there for her no matter what. No matter what happens from here on out, I’ll live for her. I’ll live to make her happy. I’ll make her laugh. I’ll fight her demons. I’ll wipe her tears and hold her hand. I’ll tell him that I was born for you and I’ll die for you too. And one day when I’ve atoned for all my sins, when I’ve erased all the hurt I’ve caused you, I’ll make you my wife.”

  My breath escapes in a rush. “Wife?”

  “Yeah. I’ll tell him that, Tiny. I’ll tell your dad that I’m going to make his daughter my wife.”

  Why does that sound so sexy and possessive? So caveman-ish.

  I’ll make your daughter my wife…

  It makes me bite my lip so hard that I almost taste metal. “You’re going to make me your wife?”

  He cups my chin and makes me let go of my abused lip with his thumb. Leaning in, he kisses that spot, licks it better. “Yeah, just as soon as I think of a proposal better than yours. The one from all those years ago.”

  I chuckle brokenly. Yeah, proposing to a seventeen-year-old boy when I was three was pretty stupid.

  But he doesn’t return it. He doesn’t chuckle or laugh or smile.

  In fact, he looks more serious than ever, his gaze so penetrating. “I never forgot that day. Even when I wanted to. It was always with me, in the back of my mind.”

  I swallow. “Maybe because you knew we were going to be here someday.”

  “Yeah, maybe.”

  There’s a moment of silence between us. It’s not uncomfortable or awkward but it’s rippling with tension. A friction caused by so many things.

  From this burning lust that I know will go unfulfilled and from the fact that in a little bit, he’ll be standing at my door, returning me to my parents safely while he plans to talk to my dad tomorrow.

  A shiver skates down my spine, a sh
iver of apprehension. “What if… What if my dad gets mad again? I’m not supposed to be here and… What if he says no?”

  For a few seconds, he remains silent and still; only his eyes are moving, all over my face.

  “Then I’ll beg,” he growls. “I’ll get down on my knees and beg him. I’ll beg him to give me you. I’ll beg and fight until he does. Because I’m fighting for the right thing now. I’m fighting for you.”

  He looks like a warrior in this moment. My warrior.

  I don’t think I’ve ever felt so cherished and loved. So feminine and prized.

  And a tear escapes out the corner of my eye because I love him so much and I don’t want him to have to beg but I know he will if he has to.

  He’ll wipe my tears off if he has to as well. Which he does. He catches my tears with his tongue and sucks them down.

  “I love you,” I whisper.

  He replies back not with words but with a kiss.

  A kiss that inflames every part of my body. It inflames my lust for him. It wakes up my body, makes it sensitive.

  So sensitive that it’s hard to bear.

  And he knows it because breaking the kiss, he moves down my body. Keeping our eyes connected, he unzips my jacket and works on the buttons of my jeans.

  “But you said…” I gasp when his fingers hook in my belly button and tug at it.

  It’s like tugging a string connected to my clit, flooding my core.

  “I know what I said,” he whispers, lowering my jeans and my panties. “I said I won’t fuck you and I’m not.”

  He manages to get my pants off and away, leaving my thighs bare. “Then what are you doing?”

  Smirking, he jams himself between my legs, which I wrap around his shoulders, my heels coming down to his back. “You were worried I didn’t have a nice dinner, weren’t you?”

  I fist his dark hair, squirming, finally getting the feel of his soft sheets. “Yeah.”

  “Well, I am now.” He reaches my clit with his tongue and takes a swipe. “I’m eating my dinner.”

  Simon is standing at the edge of his backyard, overlooking the preparations for tonight’s get-together.

  The forecast says that it’s going to be warmer—a couple of warm days before the snowstorm comes in—so Willow wanted to move things to the backyard. And when it comes to Willow, Simon can perform miracles. So getting a few people to come help set up on Christmas Eve was no big deal for him.