Sun was streaming through the trees into the small meadow all four of them we’re picnicking in. They’d stopped exploring and playing to eat and take in the rare warm bright spring day. Calla, Toni, five year old Mateo, and six year old Briar. Both preschoolers were rambling with each other and stealing each other’s fruit. “Hey, there’s enough for both of you. Share.” Calla pointed a finger and scolded them gently. She had her head resting in Toni’s lap and Toni was braiding her hair. They were about 5 seconds from a small fight breaking out.
Mateo was small for his age but strong with a fiery attitude that matched Calla’s. He was determined and Rose swore he stomped his foot the same way. Calla had when she was a child. “Bee, those are my strawberries, you don’t even like strawberries.” He complained, whipping a blueberry at Briar’s head.
Briar was all Toni - smart as a whip with a quick wit and the softest gentlest nature until her brother set her off. “Teo stop. Mama, tell him to stop.” Briar directed at Toni and shot her a pleading look. Calla tried not to laugh at it all and she could see a smile playing at her wife’s lips too. “Teo, stop throwing blueberries at your sister,” she gave him a look then raised an eyebrow slowly when he grabbed for a strawberry “that doesn’t mean throw strawberries at her either. No throwing fruit at your sister.”
Calla had not stopped obsessing over Toni when she was pregnant with Briar. If Toni so much as mentioned a craving, Calla came back with twenty different options for her. Toni had to tell her to tone it down, she was eating for two not twenty. And when Calla was pregnant with Mateo it was the same for Toni. She obsessed over her wife and they obsessed over baby Briar together.
It got a little dicey there with a baby under one and a pregnant Calla. To think Calla had originally tried to convince Toni that it’d be the most fun thing in the world to be pregnant together “because we do everything together!” but practicality had won out because Toni made a hell of a lot of sense, “Absolutely not. What if we go into labor at the same time? And the pregnant mood swings, no. Love, just no.” Thankfully Calla had listened to reason for once.
The two little ones stood up and moved to take off running in the meadow, before they could get far Calla sat up on her elbows. “Ah ah, kisses first.” She pointed to her cheeks and the two rushed over, giggling, and kissed either cheek leaving sticky residue from the fruit. Then they raced off chasing each other and yelling like children do.
As Calla sat up fully the braid fell out and her hair tumbled around her shoulders. She held her belly as she sat up, trying to get comfy again. She was pregnant with their third. “I didn’t miss feeling like I have to pee all of the time.” She joked and tried to position herself better so she could breathe. “And damn, I miss being able to breathe.”
Toni was watching their children and smiled at her protests. “You love being pregnant, you’re not fooling me Calla.” Toni dropped a kiss onto Calla’s shoulder and then let her chin rest where she’d placed the kiss. “But I’m sorry you’re dealing with the not so fun stuff too. You’re in the home stretch. One more month.” They were being extra careful this go around, the last two times after Calla had had Mateo hadn’t gone well and it had hurt both of them in ways that had been difficult to navigate. It was why there was a five year age gap between Mateo and this pregnancy.
Calla rested her head against Toni’s and rubbed her belly. She took as deep a breath as she could and looked back out at Mateo and Briar. They were taking turns crouching in the tall grass and then pouncing on each other, falling into a fit of giggles. She closed her eyes and bathed in the moment, feeling grateful for everything they had. When she opened her eyes she saw the kids running towards the tree line and she moved (not so gracefully but all the same) stand. Toni protested and said she would get them but Calla brushed her off. Both of them called out at the same time.
“Mateo!”
“Briar!”
Both the children stopped and Calla heard the tree above the kids crack and her heart leapt in her throat. “Toni, the tree.” and suddenly she was running towards her kids but they were across the meadow, too far. If only she could shift she could get there faster, if only she wasn’t so feebly human. But before she could spiral too far down that line of thought the branch that was the culprit of the cracking was being lifted off the tree and away from her children.
Calla didn’t have to look back to know it was Toni, her arms outstretched, working a bit of magic that was easy for her. Calla slowed until she was walking and finally she stopped to try and catch her breath. She was breathing erratically from the panic and from the running. She tried to call for the kids again but couldn’t muster the breath. Toni ran up next to her, calling for Briar and Mateo again. She put her hands on either side of Calla’s face. “Breathe, it’s ok. Just breathe. They’re safe. I’m here. I’ve got you.”
Calla took deep breaths with Toni and tried to keep herself from crying. “Damn hormones, I’m sorry. I just, the tree, and the kids…” to Toni’s credit she didn’t make Calla feel like she was overreacting. She rode through the emotions with her and when the kids strolled back up to them, happy as clams, Calla pulled them both into a hug with her and Toni. She kissed the tops of their heads and then kissed Toni. “You two, you’ve gotta stay closer to us. You can’t just run off into the woods without us.” And she held onto all three of them. Maybe too tight. But this was her family, her whole heart. The thought of losing them tore her apart.
Not a popular opinion on tumblr I know but I would argue character death is good for stories, actually, and often a death with long narrative consequences is much better use of a character than having them linger with no more important plot beats to hit.
Character death isn’t writers being mean to viewers or something characters don’t “deserve,” it’s an important part of narrative and plotting to give stories stakes and emotional beats. The work making you have an emotion is in fact the point, not something to avoid.
GIVING ELLE SPACE WAS PROBABLY a better idea than spending any one on one time with her. But the fucking truth was that it probably wasn’t Elle who needed the fucking space—the opposite, actually, considering the whole damn fight was about me ditching her for Tyler—it was me. Maybe I just needed to get my head on straight, because it was starting to feel like everything was turning upside down and I was helpless to do anything but watch it spin.
I don’t know what the fuck happened.
Elle and I had always had a dynamic friendship, pretty much since grade school. She’d been one of the weirder kids, and a lot of the others had made fun of her for it. But I’d thought she was fucking fascinating, even then, and not much had changed since.
It was never a sexual thing, not with Elvis. Some people were just too fucking awesome to complicate shit with sex. She was special to me, and I’d never made any qualms about admitting that. Not to her and not to anybody else, either. After years of the same, everybody seemed to understand that about us.
We’d been fine. We’d been perfect. Elle and I had been coasting on a perfectly functional relationship for years. Until recently.
I liked girls. I liked hooking up. I even liked relationships. It was fun to see how two people gelled together and what stupid shit we managed to get bent out of shape about with each other in the process. What shit eventually ended it. But the thing all of my relationships had in common? Yeah… They all fucking ended. Mostly on good terms, but me and the girl were sure as shit not best friends before or after it. And it was okay when those girls came and went. When things changed… As long as the big things stayed the fucking same. And Elvis Hirsche was one of those big things.
Which was why—without ever really talking about it—Elle and I had decided to avoid that whole fucking messy minefield. It had never needed a conversation before.
So why the fuck did I feel like it needed one now?
Maybe it was just me? Maybe I was making a bigger deal where there wasn’t one. I couldn’t be sure. It suddenly felt like I couldn’t be sure of anything where Elle was concerned.
“Gavin?” The sound of my name on her lips let me know that she’d said my name more than once while I lost myself in thought about her. Elle’s impatient face confirmed that assumption. “Am I playing this right? It sounds off?”
I tried to listen as Elle strummed on my guitar, but all I could hear was the rushing sound of blood in my veins as I watched her bite down on her bottom lip in concentration. And it was mother-fucking distracting, to say the least.
I cleared my throat and forced my eyes away from her cute little body, bent over my guitar on the sofa in my living room. Today’s lesson had been longer than anticipated, and it was all my fault, I knew it.
“Sorry baby, do that one more time for me.”
I had to clear my head if it was the last thing that I did. There was something off track in me when I couldn’t seem to stop thinking about how it felt to wake up with Elle curled up in my arms, with the scent of her hair pressed against my nose.
I liked my girlfriend—a lot. And I didn’t see that changing any time soon. So I really couldn’t understand where the frustration had snuck in from.
Elle strummed the series of chords again without complaint, effectively pulling me out of myself long enough to concentrate on the music. It was a rare fucking day where music didn’t have my full attention, but apparently I was going a bit against the grain today.
She was right, actually, about something being off. But it wasn’t because she’d done what I showed her wrong. Quickly, I realized my own mistake. I was supposed to be teaching her a new song, but my mind was so off topic that I hadn’t even played it right for her to learn from me.
“It seems like it should go more like this…” She played in a way that better rounded the music, creating a more complete tune with barely a mistake. For a moment I could only sit in stunned silence as I processed what had just happened. It wasn’t like Elle was playing by ear—not exactly—because I was teaching her something that I wrote. And so she’d taken my mistake and fixed it, then somehow managed to make it sound even better without my input.
“Gavin?” She prodded me with her foot, lifting her face from the guitar to stare at me. One of her eyebrows arched and I realized that I had been silent for too long. “Where is your mind today?”
“I only just taught you those chords last month!” I knew it sounded like a complaint, but I really couldn’t help myself. “Fuck, Elle! Maybe I should stop teaching you, before you become a better guitarist than me.”
She beamed at me, all the smugness splayed across her expression, and shrugged. “Better watch your back, Gavin Porter.” Elle tapped my guitar gently and shot me a warning look. “I might be taking your spot in the band soon!”
“Hey, hey!” I cupped my heart in mock-offense. “That’s so fucking rude.” I shook my head at her. “I thought we were starting our own band. What happened to that?”
“Oh, yeah!” Elle actually wiggled on the sofa with my guitar in her lap, she was so excited by the thought. “I could play the bongos and we could travel in one of those campers.”
“Now that’s the life.” I laughed at the genuine gleam of excitement in her eyes; it was hard not to take her seriously when she said outrageous things like that. I suspected she actually meant them all.
“We could live off love and a tip jar,” she announced with a sage nod of her head.
My smile softened as I agreed with her. “Sounds good to me, baby. Sign me up.”
She shifted, settling my guitar down next to the sofa, propped up against the end table. “What do you think we should name our band? And can I finish my fashion design degree first?”
Yeah, okay. She was probably fucking serious. I shrugged. “You should definitely finish your degree first. Garrett and Amy would never let me hear the fucking end of it if I ran off with you and didn’t let you finish school. You know, they think I’m a bad influence on you?!”
Elle scoffed. “It’s like your parents have never met my parents before…” She shook her head, but the smile on her face gave away her actual appreciation of my parents’ assessment of our friendship. She snapped her fingers at me in the way people do when someone’s being too slow about something. “Names, bucko!”
I blinked at her. “Uh-uh.” I shook my head. “You’re better at that stuff than me. You pick.”
She squirmed again, and I could practically see the wheels turning in her head. “I’ll have to think about it, then. And you’re not allowed to veto anything that I pick! Since you’re not contributing.”
“Those are some steep terms, Elle.” I regarded her seriously but she didn’t even flinch. “All right, fine. But no boy band references!” I had to at least have that much assurance. “Non-negotiable.”
She pouted at me. An honest to god, serious fucking pout that had me nervous all over again. Fuck. Everything. “Non-negotiable, baby.” I repeated, refusing to be swayed.
I shouldn’t have been surprised when she threw herself in my lap. I mean, fucking honestly. I should have seen it coming, because this was Elle, and this was just the shit that we did. But damn.
I was on the floor, a notebook opened on the coffee table in front of me, and literally at Elle’s feet from where she sat on the sofa. And one second she was there, pouting, and the next she had launched herself onto my lap like it was no big deal.
It shouldn’t have been—it wasn’t always—but it really fucking was.
It wasn’t a sexy thing that she did. I mean, it wasn’t supposed to be… She was in some regular jeans and a hoodie and nothing fucking special, and I had held her in my arms a hundred thousand times. So it should have been run of the mill.
Except it was Elle, all warm and soft, and smelling like vanilla for some fucking reason. And when she wrapped her arms around me, all I could think about was sliding my tongue up the curve of her neck, and it was really fucking me up.
My heart started going a hundred miles an hour, which was just so fucking dumb. But I was a hundred and fucking ten percent sure she tasted better than she smelled, and all I could think about was finding out for sure.
“I’m sorry we fought last night.” Her breath and her hair tickled along my neck, as I carefully wrapped my arms around her. “It was stupid. I hate fighting with you. I’m sorry I ruined your date.”
I tried to tell my heart to calm the fuck down but it just wouldn’t listen. I breathed, slowly in and slowly out, before even trying to respond to her. “I’m sorry I ditched you, baby. It was my fault.”
It wasn’t.
Elle had been less than gracious about Tyler from the start, and I had been pretending not to notice all along. But shit, I was noticing now.
“What's your problem with Tyler?” Elle shrugged and I felt, more than saw, her shoulders rising with it.
“I don’t know. I don’t have a problem with her?” She tipped her head back so that she could look at me. Which was a horrible fucking thing for her to do, because it just put her face that much closer to mine. If we shifted, I could have her on her back in a few seconds. Out of the hoodie, out of the shirt, just my hands on her skin. My mouth.
It was soft—Elle’s skin—and smooth and tan and taut. She’d probably let me do it, too. I thought she might.
Un-fucking-believable. I couldn’t focus for three seconds.
I swallowed and leaned my head just slightly back. It took a moment for me to get my thoughts back on track, to reorient myself to the topic of conversation. Girlfriend, right. One that Elle did not like. “I think you kind of do, Elle.” My tone wasn’t as light as I expected it to be, because my tone was usually always light. Soft, uncommitted. But at the moment everything was heavy and filled with tension. Even my vocal chords.
Elle sighed. “I guess I’m just… jealous.” I could see the word was hard for her to push out, and it was even harder for me to hear. It caused a tightness in my chest that I wasn’t entirely sure what to do with. And I must have looked like something—I don’t fucking know what—but my face was telling Elle something that she apparently did not want to hear. I knew this when she pulled away from me and scooted onto the open space on the floor beside me. She pulled in to herself, drawing her knees up, and rested her chin against them.
I’d been uncomfortable with her right up on me, but I was fucking hating the space that she’d created once she moved.
“I mean… You have someone and I don’t.” She sort of shrugged without looking at me, and her voice had gotten smaller. That tightness in my chest increased, but I couldn’t understand exactly why.
“I think I just need a boyfriend.” At that word—boyfriend—all of my muscles tensed. Like a coiled spring, every part of me clenched together. I was fucking speechless, and breathless too.
For some reason, the idea of Elle needing a boyfriend sucked all of the air out of the room.
“I mean…” she blinked, and her big eyes zeroed back in on my cornered expression. “I spend almost all of my free time with you. And I’m practically graduated college and yet I’m still a virgin! That’s crazy, right?!”
I couldn’t have answered her if I’d wanted to… Every fucking word in the English language had just erased from my mind.
I must have been quiet for too long, because Elle twisted her body to look at me and arched one eyebrow again. “Gavin?” She prodded my kneecap with her pointer finger. I caught her finger and tugged, encouraging her to come back to me. This time her legs straddled me on either side, and we sat there, face to face for a moment where I really wasn’t sure what I was going to do next.
I settled my hands on her hips and let out the breath that I’d been holding. “Don’t have sex with some asshole just to say you did it, Elle.” There was my voice, and it wasn’t even shaky. It was some kind of fucking miracle. “I would hate that.” The longer I looked at her—this close to my face—the surer I was that I was going to kiss her. Just fuck the consequences, I was practically desperate to feel her lips on my skin. I wasn’t proud of the realization, but I knew for sure that I wanted my tongue in her mouth.
If she moved, if she even breathed hard enough.
“You should make sure it’s the right asshole, okay?” There was no reason for me to be whispering, except the obvious… That I was still thinking about kissing her, still deciding if I was going to do it. She nodded and it was almost my fucking breaking point.
I could push her hips to my hips, I could slide my hands underneath her shirt. She would definitely let me. I couldn’t even feel my heart, it was beating so fast.
“And you’re not allowed to spend less time with me. I’d miss you too much.” It was meant to be a joke, meant to lighten the mood and create that bit of space I really needed to break this fucking hold she had on me at the moment. But it didn’t work. When I said it, it sounded too much like flirting. And, fuck me, it sort of felt too much like flirting, too.
“Relax, Gavin,” Elle patted my shoulder reassuringly. She leaned back, so I shifted and she stood. Thank fucking God. She ran her fingers through her hair and rolled her shoulders. “It’s not like I’m going to do the next jerk I go on a blind date with or something. I just mean maybe I should date.”
She shrugged like it was no big deal, and maybe she was right with that. Maybe it wasn’t.
But I still felt like something invisible had wrapped me up in a vice-grip and I couldn’t get free.
Sometimes it felt like his entire existence was built up on a foundation of regrets and vodka.
This was one of those times.
DK’s head was pounding to the rhythm of Jemma’s spoon as she tapped it against the side of her frozen yogurt cup. She was bouncing in the booth, which was normal for her, rocking her body from side to side. Her brown eyes wide and alight with pleasure as she dipped into the gummy-worm and cookie-crumble concoction that had made his stomach twist on sight. She used the forefinger of her free hand to scoop up a bit of the dessert, maintaining her beat with the spoon in her other hand.
“You can have some of mine,” she encouraged, licking the contents off of her finger without even the slightest understanding that her method was both childish and ridiculously sexy. She was like that: totally and completely oblivious. On another day DK might have appreciated the cuteness and tried not to notice the temptation. But today his head was ten thousand tons of concrete.
“No thanks, baby girl.” He rejected, trying not to cringe. Beneath the mountain of gummy worms and cookie crumbles was a layer of caramel, and somewhere underneath all of that he thought there might be some vanilla yogurt. But for all he knew it could just be a cup of toppings. He wouldn’t be surprised.
Loading Jemma up with this much sugar when he was seven different kinds of hungover was stupid and DK knew it. But he hadn’t had the strength to fight off her pouting eyes and exaggerated ‘please’ this morning.
Well, okay, maybe ‘morning’ was a bit of a stretch.
She’d shown up in his apartment right after noon and bounced him out of bed. It would have been a rude awakening except that it was Jemma.
Jemma Moss was the picture of innocence: long blonde hair, sweet brown eyes, and the smile of an angel. She could always cheer DK up when he was feeling down, she knew every right thing to say to take his mind off of his own problems, and she dolled out affection like he deserved it. Even though he didn’t. She saw the world through rose-tented glasses, always putting a positive spin on things. And he had never, ever seen her be mean to a single person since he’d known her.
But that had only been six months; somehow it felt like it wasn’t long enough and like it was forever, all at once. In the best way. He’d already tried to fall in love with her — twice — because it seemed the smart thing to do. But he simply couldn’t make his heart work on command like that.
Instead it was a renegade, always picking the wrong girl, the one destined to pluck it out. And that was why he’d given up on love a long time ago. Around four years ago, actually, when a girl named Tiffany Jones ripped him open and spit inside his broken pieces. Like the bitch that she’d turned into.
Maybe he should have seen it coming.
He had believed in it all, once. High school sweethearts and happily ever after. Best friends who never let you down and love that never ended. All that junk. He’d braided a cloth ring around a girl’s finger and promised that his heart was hers forever. But forever turned out to be just long enough for her to fuck the quarterback of the football team in the bathroom at a party.
Then everything turned to shit.
So no, he didn’t believe in true love anymore. And try as he might, he couldn’t trick his heart into believing that Jemma’s sweetness would somehow make it all better. Would turn his luck around. Maybe he’d been burned one too many times for that. But as far as things went, love was not in the cards for him and Jemma Moss.
Even so, he couldn’t stop himself from smiling at her when he glanced up to see her face. She was frowning at the empty spot on the table in front of him, as if dubious about anyone’s refusal to share her sugar coma.
“But if you have a gummy worm you won’t feel so sad,” she insisted with a soft sincerity that melted DK’s heart a little bit. He was surprised that she’d picked up on his mood, and endeared that she genuinely believed a little candy could fix it.
She could be unexpectedly perceptive at times. DK had found that out for himself on more than one occasion. He hadn’t told Jemma that he was feeling any particular way, and he was positive that if he looked anything then it wasn’t sad. Tired, definitely. A hot mess, probably. A little scruffy and a lot hungover, red eyes and a headache to be sure. But sad?
He’d been laughing with her and joking for maybe an hour. And still, somehow, she knew.
“Then my stomach would feel sad.” He told her, the smile lingering against the corners of his lips. And when she continued to look skeptical, he added, “Trust me.”
“Oh well.” She shrugged, never one to press a point, and scooped more yogurt. She used her spoon this time, but the way she licked the back clean was borderline sinful. DK laughed softly to himself.
He knew what it meant for Jemma to offer him some of her dessert; it was no small feat. She definitely didn’t share sugar with just anyone so he appreciated the gesture, but he just couldn’t get his mind to focus at the moment. It was in a hundred places, sifting through a hundred moments, and he couldn’t slow it down. He couldn’t turn it off.
He wanted to be somewhere else, or maybe some one else. To slip off his skin and begin fresh. With no exes and no disappointments and no friends who could abandon you at the drop of a dime. With a new past and a different future. He didn’t want to be the guy who nursed his problems with a bottle of hard liquor at the slightest provocation. Who showed up at the doorstep of someone that he used to know, a veritable fireworks display of feelings.
But he was that guy, as the last week proved all too well.
When he’d heard that Samantha Powell was back in town — through the grapevine, of all insulting possibilities — DK hadn’t wanted to believe it. And then, to add insult to injury, he’d learned that she’d moved into his apartment building. One floor above him. The girl was literally walking on his ceiling. Without a word, without a wave. Not even a nod in his direction.
It seemed a little unreal to him because after all this time he still hadn’t figured out what happened between them. One day they were best friends and the next they were strangers. He could remember the day that they’d spit into their palms and shook on their friendship. They had always been there for each other, he had told Sam all of his secrets. All of his truths and hopes and dreams.
And then, one day, he’d woken up and she was just gone. Now suddenly she was back and acting like nothing had ever happened?
So yeah, DK could get drunk and complain to Gavin about how much it pissed him off. And he could show up at her place throwing anger and accusations, and go on a week long bender just to prove he didn’t give a fuck about anything. But the truth was that it hurt. Jemma hit the nail right on the head: he was sad.
Samantha Powell had disappeared from Pleasant Valley like she was performing a magic trick. That was the part that DK couldn’t get out of his mind: how he had seen her only the night before. How he had danced with her at the stupid Senior Prom, had kissed her cheek. How that night he’d told her — stupid him — told her that he couldn’t imagine his life without her. His best friend. And less than twenty-four hours later she was gone.
No warning, no notice, no goodbye. Even a post-script would have been nice, but he hadn’t gotten so much as a return phone call for months afterwards. And he’d felt blind-sighted. Left behind.
He’d needed Sam to help him deal with the fallout once Tiffany Jones showed her true colors. His lying, cheating ex-girlfriend had ripped his world in two; and Sam — the one person he thought that he could always count on — had been nowhere to be found when it happened. It was like she had written him off.
DK had retraced the night before Sam left a million times in his mind, going over and over the details, trying to figure out what happened. What he’d done. Because it must have been him and it must have been big. At first DK had blamed Lennon Shephard, who had been Sam’s boyfriend at the time. But a fist-fight and a few weeks later helped DK to realize that it was only his calls that Sam wasn’t returning, not Lenny’s.
So there was just no other way to explain the dissolution of years of friendship — of trust and dependability and loyalty — without acknowledging to himself that he had to have been the catalyst.
But years of rinse and repeat cycling through that night — of examination with a fine toothed comb — hadn’t given DK any answers. What he knew was this: one night Sam was there (in his arms, dancing like nothing else in the world mattered) and the next morning she was gone, all traces of their friendship right along with her.
And right after, DK had felt his world come crashing down in unexpected ways.
So was he still mad that she’d abandoned him? Hell yeah. But mad or not, the fact that she was back again affected him. It nettled, like pricking at a scab. And no matter how much he told himself to let it go, to just forget it, he couldn’t stop thinking about it.
About her.
And that wasn’t doing his hangover any favors.
DK ran a hand through his black waves and forced a smile at Jemma’s inquiring stare. He breathed a quiet sigh, checking his watch for the time. He had to get Jem back home soon. DK had promised Carter — his older brother — that he would do something. Which meant that DK had somewhere to be, and it sure as shit was not going to keep his mind off of Samantha Powell.
Samantha Powell rolled over, a disgruntled groan falling from her lips. She came awake in measures as she recognized that the banging she could hear was not, in fact, a dream. Grumbling, she twisted up in her sheets and lifted a heavy hand to swipe at the sleep in her eyes.
“Jesus, Joseph, and Mary,” she swore, angrily shoving the covers away and pushing off from the bed. Sam stumbled, fumbling in the dark, searching for a light switch. It was a new apartment so she smacked ungracefully against the wall and scraped her hand along the length of it in query before she discovered one.
She flicked it up without thinking and the light blinded her, making her screech with irate dissatisfaction and squint into the illuminated room. For one sleep-hazed moment she couldn’t remember where she was or why she was there.
Then it all rushed back to her.
She was in Pleasant Valley, Pennsylvania in the sleepy little town where she’d grown up. And it was three in the fucking morning which could only mean one thing: The insane person trying to break down her front door had to be none other than Domino Krew.
Pushing her shoulders back, Sam fought against a yawn and marched through the tiny apartment to the entrance. Her hand hovered above the doorknob before she paused, thinking better of it. Maybe if she stood there, quiet enough and for long enough, he would simply go away. And she wouldn’t have to deal with this. At least not right now, not while she was hardly coherent enough to form a complete sentence let alone wrestle the wrath of a twenty-two year old hothead like DK.
Sam yawned, and two things occurred to her at once. The first was that if DK was mad enough to come beating on her door this early in the morning then he was probably not going to be deterred. The second was that it was three am and her hair hadn’t seen a brush in hours. That jolted her into action like nothing else. If this confrontation was happening now then it wasn’t about to be a scene where she was wearing flannel pajamas and sporting bed hair.
She couldn’t see him in person for the first time in four years looking like a troll.
With a squeak, she raced back through the apartment and into the bathroom, frantically picking up the brush. Samantha dragged it through the fiery-red strands of her tangled hair, pulling more than a little bit out in her struggle. She danced out of her button-up pajama top, leaving only the camisole, and decided that the bottoms would have to do. The knocking had turned into body slamming, she was pretty sure, and that meant time was up.
Sam pursed her lips and headed back to the door, then swung it open without pause or warning. Which was exactly why DK toppled face first into the entrance with nothing but a thump of sound to break his fall. There was laughter immediately, and a pair of hands reached down to haul Domino up from his face plant.
Not Sam’s hands.
“Mother fucking shit, dude. Really?” More laughter. Gavin Porter, of course. Did the two of them do anything separately? Obviously not much had changed. Sam rolled her eyes and stepped back, watching the scene unfold.
Gavin pulled DK up and DK, having barely even caught his balance, shoved Gavin out of the way. “Fuck you!” He was loud. “I’m good.” He was also slurring; good lasted three entire syllables longer than necessary. “Back off.”
Gavin, still laughing, shoved DK hard enough that he almost toppled over again. “Fuck you.” There was a scuffle of two wavering, idiotic boys before DK managed to extract himself and recognize that the door was open.
Sam lifted a hand to rub a soothing circle against her temple, unimpressed. “What in the hell is going on?” She asked, motioning for one or both of them to step in already. “Someone’s going to call the cops if you two get any louder.” Her voice had that harassed whisper of a warning, but it had absolutely no effect on either of the two drunk idiots before her.
DK leered at her, which at least meant that she had his attention. He walked forward and tugged at the strap to her camisole, snapping it against her shoulder. “Nice PJs.”
Sam smacked his hand away, unsurprised to feel the rise of a blush against her cheeks. She hadn’t decided if it was anger or embarrassment yet. “Are you coming in or what?” She directed the question to Gavin, who was still lingering half in the hallway.
Gavin snorted, giving her a once over that clearly stated she was left wanting and shook his stupid mop of blonde hair at her. “No fucking way.” He backed further into the hall. “He’s your motherfucking problem now.” He smirked. “So good fucking luck.” With a mock solute, he about-faced and walked away.
Sam slammed the door on Gavin’s uneven saunter and stared at the wood for a minute longer than she needed to, refusing to acknowledge that DK Stewart was just inches away from her. Standing inside of her apartment. That this was really happening; it was not a dream. Not a nightmare either.
Dear God, she wasn’t ready.
Her heart took off a thousand miles per hour as she came to terms with this turn of events. She heard her breathing in the new quiet of the apartment, commingled with his, and nothing else. The thrum of her heartbeat was so vibrant she could feel it in her fingertips.
DK had moved to stand behind her when she shut the door, and he was leaning against the wall when she turned around to face him. There was absolutely nothing between them but air. Nerves and unspoken words.
He looked the same, just older. The same rich, dark hair that curled slightly on top of his head underneath the cap. The same big, chocolate brown eyes and beautifully shaped features making his face into a Greek sculpture. The same perfect, perfect lips, even as they were folded now into a deep frown of disapproval. The same style of purple hoodie, the kind he’d always had draped over his lanky frame in school. There was more muscle now, she could see that even through the clothes, a slim but fit definition to his body. There was also stubble on his chin because he hadn’t shaved and everything about his look was a little reckless. A little careless. So effortlessly sexy that she felt weak-kneed just standing there and he wasn’t even trying.
He was more than a head taller than her and she had to tilt her neck just to look at him. He used his height to his advantage, looming, looking down at her. He was hardly sure on his feet and it was obvious that he was wasted. Not just a couple of beers deep, she knew, but totally and completely gone.
And clearly pissed off. Which was just great.
Sam pulled in her resolve, while trying to talk some sense into her galloping heartbeat and catch her breath. She could do this. She cut her eyes at him, hoping that she looked like she had her shit together.
“Do you know what time it is?” But he just stared at her, as if he were still debating whether he was giving her the silent treatment. Sam felt positive that was what he was thinking, too, which absolutely incensed her. He’d come here. He’d come to her. He could not ignore her while standing in her own apartment and glaring at her. It was against the rules.
Jutting out her chin, she demanded, “Answer me.”
“Don’t owe yooooou anything,” he spat out, bitterly. And much more coherently than she thought he had any right given the fact that he was using the wall to stand straight. But he’d always held his alcohol well; it was his favorite thing to grasp.
“No?” She challenged, feeling the heat ignite in her face again. It was pure anger this time. “Then what the hell are you doing here?” She’d tried to speak levelly but he did something to her. Just the way he looked at her, just his physical presence. She found herself screaming it at his face.
“No! YOU!” He didn’t just scream it back at her, he exploded, suddenly becoming motion. His finger jabbed towards her face accusingly. “You left! Means you don’t even go here!”
“Don’t you explain what leaving means to me, Domino Krew.” She’d almost forgotten how quickly, how easily he could get to her. Push her buttons. Sam pressed her lips together, surprised by her own tone.
“Don’t Domino me, Samanthaaaaa.” He sneered her name like it was a punishment.
She had always preferred the shortened version of Sam. It was something they had in common, as no one — no one — was allowed to call DK by the full length of his own name but his mother. Occasionally one of his siblings would slip it in. But there had been a time in their lives where Sam was an exception to the rule; once she’d been an exception to all the rules.
That time was gone now.
“Fuck is going on?” He glared, casting an angry glance around her apartment.
It wasn’t much. The living room, kitchen, and dining room all bled into one area. The bedroom, bathroom, and closet were separate fixtures, and there was a small balcony to the side. She didn’t even have a kitchen table yet, just a couch, a chair, and a television sitting on the floor without a stand. A lot of her boxes were still packed, but open, scattered around the space.
Suddenly she felt self-conscious about it all. Like she should have more to show for herself. Like she’d come home in failure. Which ignited her rage, because who was he to judge her?
“If you’ve got something to say, just fucking say it.” Sam commanded, finally managing the volume level she’d wanted all along.
Apparently lowering her voice was the wrong move. It completely set DK off. He actually turned red in the face, the beauty of his features twisting into an unpleasant expression. “You…” But he was too angry to complete the thought, so trailed off with a slow shake of the head.
“Fucking.” He tried again, still shaking his head. “Fucking fuck, Sam!” Which was very eloquent… but at least he’d dropped the full-name business. She frowned at him. “The fuck?” He was still screaming and so she just stared at him. His breathing labored, shoulders rising up and down faster than necessary. After a moment he heaved a large sigh.
He didn’t speak again until his voice pitched at a normal volume. “You staying?”
And there it was.
The room stilled, as if the moment could pulse; Sam practically felt the tension. She bit her bottom lip, looking up at him. Locking eyes with him.
She felt too much.
Blinking, hard, she shook her head and looked away. “I don’t know.”
Without a word, DK brushed by her, his shoulder bumping into hers as he stormed out of the apartment. He slammed the door behind him so loud that it made her jump.
I WAS SO NERVOUS that I could taste my own heartbeat. Gavin Porter was not asleep, and I had been aware of this for a handful of seconds that were collecting like lifetimes. I don’t know how I knew it for sure, I just… knew. Maybe it was in the tension I could feel radiating through every part of him that was connected to me.
That was a lot of parts.
I wasn’t hungover, not even a little bit, even though I knew by all rights that I should have been. I’d done much too much drinking the night before, and I’d said much too much afterwards as a result. I was still kind of surprised that Gavin and I had even gotten into a fight at all.
I hated fighting, and he hated it even more than I did. Usually when we were mad at each other, we both just kind of bit our tongues and passive aggressively referenced it until we were over whatever the problem was. Not entirely healthy, I knew, but it worked for us.
And I probably should have felt guilty for trying to make Gavin feel guilty about spending time with his girlfriend. Probably. But I couldn’t because if I hadn’t gotten roaring drunk the night before then I wouldn’t have been waking up in Gavin’s bed, wrapped up in his arms. Plus, he’d even apologized for ditching me. And I’d definitely needed that apology from him.
But, see, here was the situation: A very awake Gavin Porter had me spooned in his arms, his hands on the bare skin of my stomach, slipped underneath the t-shirt he’d given me to wear to bed. There just wasn’t enough room between us for him to deny his very obvious reaction to being pressed this close to me.
I tried not to let it get to me—I really did—because I understood the basic biology of boys and the concept of morning wood, okay. And it wasn’t like Gavin and I hadn’t ever found ourselves in this kind of position before… We’d been friends for too long and too absolutely not to have been here once or twice in the past.
I wasn’t a girl with low self-esteem, who couldn’t believe that a boy could be turned on by her. I knew I was hot, and I even knew that Gavin Porter thought that I was hot. He’d never denied it. But see, this was the thing… Gavin was awake and he hadn’t moved his hands.
At least, not yet. And I wanted to enjoy every single second of it while it lasted.
It was usually at this point in the routine that Gavin would roll away from me, put some space between us, and pretend like this little bit of awkwardness hadn’t happened.
He had to be able to feel the way my heartbeat was slamming against my chest. My back had to be practically vibrating with it. He should have moved—should have changed the subject. What he did instead was curl his fingers against the bare skin of my stomach and bury his face in my neck, so that all of my skin erupted in goosebumps and all my thoughts scattered.
I couldn’t breathe.
I couldn’t think past the idea of turning around, of sliding my leg between his legs, of pressing closer and closer until there was no closer. Oh my God, I wanted to kiss him so very badly. I wanted to turn around and melt into his arms and kiss him, just to know what he tasted like. Just to know what he felt like with his mouth against my mouth and his hands on my skin. Just to live in it, for just one moment. This perfect moment. I wanted to kiss him until the world slipped away. And I felt about ninety-nine percent sure that he would not only let me, but that he would actually kiss me back.
It was surreal in this freeing, kind of electrifying way. After weeks and weeks, and months, and years of waiting for Gavin Porter to finally open his eyes and see me…
I just couldn’t believe it was finally happening, and I didn’t trust it.
“Do you want a pain pill?” His voice was soft, sleep dragged, kind of lazy. It was the best morning sound in the entire universe, and I had always appreciated it. But this morning it seemed to sound better to me than it ever had. Probably because the words came out practically against my skin, all of his breath dancing down my neck as he spoke.
Sweet baby Jesus.
My stomach clenched, and I was almost scared to answer him. Like if he knew that I was awake too, then he would become the Gavin that I was used to again. The one completely oblivious to the fact that we had definite chemistry.
“Elle?” He moved his hands, trailing them against my skin until the one underneath me was free and the one on top of me was against my hip. The shorts I had on were a thin barrier and every single piece of me that he touched was aflame. I pushed out a slow breath, slowly peeling my eyes open.
This was not a dream.
I turned around until we were facing each other, and Gavin adjusted, his head still dropped lazily against his pillow. He lifted his hand to brush my hair from my face, his fingers trailed my jaw and my heartbeat shuddered. “Do you have a headache?”
I didn’t even mind his morning breath—I was that far gone.
I blinked, coming back down to reality, understanding slowly filtering through for me. His face was a little tenser than I was used to, but that could have been for any reason in the world. It could have been because he was still mad at me for getting drunk the night before, or because I’d yelled at him, or even because he’d yelled back at me.
It could also be because he wanted to kiss me just as badly as I wanted him to… It was hard to tell, and there was just no tactful way to ask!
The logical conclusion was that I was imagining it, of course. Because if you wanted something bad enough then it was easy to trick yourself into believing you could have it. And last night had been emotional for both of us.
The logical conclusion was that nothing had even changed at all. I knew that. And it just seemed all the more true when Gavin just kept laying there, looking at me, waiting for me to say something with an increasingly concerned expression on his face.
I sighed, careful to keep my own morning breath aimed away from him, and shook my head against his pillows. “No. I’m good.” And then I turned on my back to hide my disappointed expression from his searching eyes, because explaining myself was the absolute last thing I wanted to do right now. And Gavin always asked me what was wrong, every time that I frowned.
But—darn it!—I hadn’t imagined his hands. I hadn’t imagined the feel of his face as he nuzzled against my neck. And I knew perfectly well he’d been awake when he did it.
I sighed again. “I need to get up, anyway.” I rubbed a hand over my face, trying not to feed into the annoyance that I was starting to feel all over again. What had I even been thinking? As if this morning suddenly everything was completely different? That didn’t make any sense!
There was still a Tyler McClain, and I was still not her.
But Gavin groaned and reached, his arms encircling me once again. “Skip it.” He was whining, which was so typical of him at the mention of getting out of bed during the am hours that it really did feel like the status quo.
Maybe it was part of his idea of what a rockstar was supposed to do with their life? Sleep all day, party all night kind of thing.
I tried to shake out of his hold, but he wasn’t having it.
“You’re allowed to skip a class, Elle,” he complained, and his face found the curve of my neck again and settled there. “Shouldn’t you be hungover?” He said it like a complaint, and I didn’t manage to fight the giggle in response before it fell from my lips.
“I’m not.” I tried to wiggle away again, but he squeezed his hand on my hip and groaned.
“Please fucking stop that.”
All the tension in my body regrouped, goosebumps resurfacing, flames reigniting. I narrowed my eyes, the annoyance growing. “It’s too early in the morning for fuck, Gavin.” He sucked in a sharp breath of air, and I stilled. Because that time it hadn’t been intentional, but there it was, hanging between us. His very unconventional response to girls who said bad words.
“Ah, fuck.” This time I thought he’d let me go, and get out of bed. And then we’d pretend this had never happened. But he didn’t. He kept his hand above the t-shirt, but still on me as he mumbled, “I think you’re trying to kill me.”
And I felt like all the air was being sucked out of the room again. My stomach clenched. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” But my voice was much too breathless to be convincing.
Gavin saw through it. He sucked his tongue against his teeth and said, “You fucking liar.” But there was no heat to it, just teasing, and he still didn’t let me go.
He yawned. “Let’s just sleep in, baby.”
It was a stupid, enabling thing for him to do. But he probably didn’t know that. I did, though, so I should have gotten the heck out of there. I knew that. I probably should have told him that this crossed some sort of invisible line in the sand of our friendship, and I couldn’t do it.
But my heart was vibrating with the need to just lay there with him. And I couldn’t stop myself from giving in. He was warm and comfortable and this bed smelled like him. And he was holding me like he wanted me, which made imagining impossible to resist. Besides, I’d never been very good at denying him anything. That was the entire problem.
“I have to get out of here.” Samantha Powell’s voice was shaky with unshed tears. She could only hope that her date didn’t hear it over the tremor of the music and the rowdiness of the kids around them. Lennon Shephard squinted, leaning close to her as if he hadn’t heard what she said, waiting for her to repeat herself while the bass of some rap song thumped in the background.
Sam’s mouth filled with bile. She felt like she was going to be sick on everyone and everything. Desperate, she leaned closer and yelled louder. “I have to get out of here.”
But if Lenny heard her that time his response was interrupted by someone else grabbing her arm and spinning her around. The lights, the noise, the people, the dancing… All of it was too much. Samantha squinted at the interrupter, trying to catch her bearings.
“Sam!” DK Stewart. The absolute last person that she wanted to see—the one she was trying to avoid, and of course he’d sniffed her out. He looked entirely too pleased with himself, and whatever he was going to say to her was something that she did not want to hear.
This was a nightmare. It was a living, breathing, monster of a nightmare.
Senior Prom. She should have known that the night would be a piece of shit, every single media outlet in the world seemed to agree that proms were for disasters. How many bad teen movies had she seen warning her of exactly that? And now she was living one. A bad teen movie.
“Dance with me,” DK commanded, without so much as glancing at Lenny before pulling Sam closer. He wrapped his arms around her waist and draped his shadow over her. Domino Krew was more than a head taller than Samantha, so she had to rest her cheek against his chest. It was a comfortable fit, she couldn’t deny that, even in her current state of panic.
It wasn’t a slow song but DK moved her with an unhurried sway, as if time were at his personal command. He smelled like beer, soap, and his cologne, which left a warm feeling building in the pit of Sam’s stomach as she danced with him. She hadn’t wanted this; she couldn’t stand the thought of losing it, either. Sam lifted her hands between them, resting them uneasily on DK’s shoulders, creating a slight barrier between them as they moved.
“DK,” she warned, her voice loud enough over the music but still sounding breathless somehow. “Don’t.” Sam glanced uneasily over her shoulder to gauge Lenny’s reaction, but he’d diverted his attention back to his group of friends. A fact which actually annoyed her; he was her date, after all. Her boyfriend. Shouldn’t he be at least a little jealous?
Clearly he knew there was no reason to be. Like Sam stood a chance with someone who was totally and completely spoken for, anyway. And totally and completely oblivious, too, of everything she’d ever felt for him. Lenny knew it better than anyone.
“You owe me,” DK reminded her. It was true. Sam had promised him a dance and she hadn’t forgotten. She hadn’t thought he would snatch her away from Lenny, though.
Or that he would hold her this close.
She tried not to think about it. But then he said, “Sam,” while tilting his head down, so that his breath ghosted across her jaw as he spoke into her ear. She tensed while her heart began to seize.
Samantha swallowed, twisting her hazel eyes to meet with his gaze. His brown eyes were soft, gleaming with happiness that broke her heart.
“This is the best night of my life.” He whispered it like a secret. Then he kissed her cheek so she pushed away from him, breaking his hold of her, and stepped back. Shaking, Sam lifted a hand to run through the red strands of her hair, undoing the knots with her fingers.
DK wouldn’t stop smiling. He shook his head at her, taking in her reaction, and rolled his soft-brown eyes. “Go ahead then,” he nodded over her shoulder to where she’d left Lennon standing. The way he said it was like she was being ridiculous; like she couldn’t tear herself away from her date long enough to talk to him. Sam frowned, but didn’t fight it because she had to get away from DK.
“Tiff and I are heading out anyway.” The music had changed so it was easier for her to hear him, though Sam wished that it hadn’t been. The last person she wanted to think about right now was Tiffany Jones.
She and Tiffany were not friends any more. Not after tonight. Sam felt like maybe they hadn’t been for a long time now. She swallowed, feeling the bile rise up in her throat. Without responding, she spun away from him and made a hasty retreat.
She didn’t even bother to look for Lenny. Her head was pounding even faster than her heart, and she knew that if she didn’t get out of there right then—at that very second—she was going to explode. The mental visual of her in pieces all over the dance floor of the Senior Prom was not something that Sam relished the idea of realizing.
Intimacy is not just about sex. It's having heart-to-hearts, staying up all night talking, sharing childhood memories, thoughts, fears, dreams & hopes for the future. It's uncontrollable laughter, direct eye contact and feeling each other without touching - it's exchanging energy
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