Chapter 13
Chapter Thirteen
J USTIN
I wake to a hammer to my head. Not literally, but it feels as if someone has been knocking on my skull with one for hours.
This always happens when I come back to the land of the living after a crash.
My body should be rested and feeling great, but no, that would be too easy.
Now I have to suffer through a killer headache and foul mood.
I sit up and get confused by my location. I look around and slowly realize I’m on the floor of Kayla’s trailer, tucked in with a blanket and a few pillows. She must have left them here for me.
I lean on the couch, cover my face with my hands, and groan.
Son of a bitch. That’s embarrassing. I dropped on the floor like a sack of shit right after the kiss.
The kiss. Fuck, that was a kiss. I’m surprised I didn’t break my dick during the fall because it was hard as iron.
Happens every time I’m near her, especially if I get a whiff of her smell.
What happened during the kiss… I was not prepared for that.
Just remembering her in my hands, feeling her skin under my fingers, her lush mouth swollen from my kiss makes my dick go full mast again.
I look down. Will ya chill already? You aren’t getting shit!
And we aren’t buddies anymore because she’s our enemy, remember? You traitorous… dick!
I vaguely remember mentioning that she’s constantly on my mind. Did I really say that out loud? Fuck. It’s one thing to secretly jerk off to her ass in leather pants and another to admit it to anyone. To her, no less. I dug myself into a hole.
The first time I came to her yesterday, I was drunk and acted on something my sober brain had been itching to do for so long.
I wanted to say whatever was on my mind so she’d kick me out, yelling some shit back that would make me hate her even more.
But she surprised me by being a decent person and drove me back. A good thing, considering I was wasted.
The second time I came to her was of my own sober will. I was so tired of her being on my mind constantly. All the damn time. I was tired of my dick not reacting to anybody but her. Fuckin’ tired of my calloused hands on it instead of a woman’s body.
So, I came here for a fuck. A good hate fuck that would let me move on, and I could keep hating her afterward.
But once my lips touched hers, I knew I was fooling myself.
One time wouldn’t be enough. I was ready to devour her, to fulfill all the fantasies I had (or at least the ones I could fit in one night), but my body once again acted against me, embarrassing the ever-loving crap out of me.
She’d think of me as weak now, a freak. I can’t have that.
The headache intensifies, and I get up in hopes of finding some Advil.
I’m not going to snoop, but I need pills, or I’ll go crazy.
I go to the bathroom, almost tripping over her super fluffy, pink rug.
It’s so… girly. It surprises me. Kayla seems like a punk girl, but everything here is pink and fluffy.
Okay, not expected. I check the mirror cabinet and find some basic medicine in there.
Thank God. I pop three Advils into my mouth and go to the kitchen to wait for them to work.
The coffee pot is half full and still warm, so I pour myself a cup and search for sugar.
I like my coffee sweet. Once I find everything I need, I fix my cup, get a bowl of cereal, and go to the couch.
Thirty minutes later, I feel somewhat like a human again and decide to take a shower. I’m not leaving here without what I came for, so I might as well get comfortable and pleasant.
Two hours later, I’m browsing the net for some new repair tools that just hit the market when I hear a car engine nearby. A familiar one.
I drop my phone next to me and take a leisurely pose on the couch, hoping the fact that I made myself at home pisses her off. I need her aggravated so I can remember who we both are.
She walks in and groans. “You’re still here?”
“Yep,” I say through a mouthful of honey-crusted cereal.
“What do you need, Justin?” she asks, rolling her eyes so far into her head—I fear they might get stuck there permanently.
“We need to finish what we started.” I put my feet on the coffee table, and her eyes zero in on my legs.
With a tight jaw, she says, “We finished. Now you need to go home.”
“I don’t think so.” I cross my legs, which drives her insane. I can tell by the ticking vein on her temple .
She sucks a loud breath in and asks, “Would you be so kind as to get your feet off my table?”
“Why? It’s a trashy table. I’m pretty sure my feet are cleaner than it is.” I smile at her, even though I’m cringing inside. The stuff I’m spewing? I hate myself a little more for it, but if it helps keep the same vibe we usually have, then so be it.
“Get your feet off my table, Justin.” When I don’t move, she jumps toward me and knocks my crisscrossed feet from the table with her hands. “And get your ass out of my house!”
“I don’t think so.” I get up swiftly and move toward her as she takes a measured step back, but I keep going, closing in on her in this confined space. She doesn’t have many choices of escape from here.
“What? Do you think that after that ,” she circles her hand over my body, “we’ll just go back to where we stopped yesterday? That’s what you said you’re here for, right? You must be out of your mind then. Get out!”
“I think we will. You and me, we both know this,” I point at the space between us, “will not go away on its own.”
“What exactly?” She blinks, bemused. “You mean your hateful ass won’t leave my house? Oh, I think it will.” Her eyes narrow into tiny slits, her pose defensive.
“Oh no, Kayla, you owe me that much.” I feel my voice drop with a malevolence that’s been missing recently. “You owe me the peace .”
“Oh, for God’s sake! Stop already with this ‘you owe me’ crap.
I don’t owe you anything, and I don’t know what I ever did to you.
What I know is that if I ever see your face again, it will be too soon.
So, get out.” She points at the door, her cheeks turning pink with red splotches of that beautiful anger I crave so much.
“I mean it, Justin. Get out and never come back.”
Oh, here she is again with her innocent game. But I’m done playing. I will all the desire I ever had for her to dissolve into resentment.
“I will leave when I want to,” I hiss just as she brings her hand up and smacks my face. I see it coming, and I let her. Now, she’ll get what’s coming to her. I grab both her wrists into my hand and jerk her to me.
KAYLA
I smack into his body with my hands tucked into his firm grip between us. His chest squashes mine.
“You know what, Kayla. Stop playing.” His voice is furious.
“You know what you did that night. People got hurt in the end.” He practically spits in my face.
My eyes widen. I true to God have no idea what he’s talking about, but I begin to understand that Mark’s assumptions might not be that far off the mark about that night being the catalyst to all of this.
“I hope that haunts you for the rest of your life.” His nose is so close to mine; his eyes are furious.
His breathing comes fast and shallow. A bull before an attack.
Whatever he believes I did… he truly believes it.
He looks hurt, so instead of pushing, my tone turns placid, even if I want to claw his eyes out.
“I honestly don’t know what you’re talking about.
You need to explain it to me, Justin. It’s been so many years since you’ve started treating me like this, and I deserve to know why.
I tried so many times to ask you what the hell happened, and every time you act like I’m this big fucking monster who eats ch ildren for breakfast, but you don’t explain why you think so. ”
There, for a second, I see a tingle of doubt. For a second only. “The night I got arrested,” he says slowly, carefully choosing words. His right eye is twitching.
“Yes. I remember that night. What happened?” I continue in that unfaltering, soothing voice I’m so proud of right now.
“You called the cops on me,” he spats out scathingly.
“What?” I rear back. He thinks I called the cops? The thought is absurd.
His eyes contract into tiny slits. “You’re the only one who saw me that night. And you called the cops on me.”
“That’s why you act this way? Because you think I called the cops on you?” I manage to say in dismay.
“Yes,” he hisses. “Couldn’t you have fucking waited one day to rat me out?”
I shove him back, but he doesn’t move. “How about you not do shit to get arrested in the first place?”
“That’s none of your business why I did what I did.” Pure repugnance laces his voice.
I begin laughing. A good, full-belly laugh. He drops my hands and steps back. “Do you think it’s fucking funny?” he yells. “My sister got raped because I couldn’t get to her on time because I was pulled over by the cops! And this is funny to you?”
I immediately stop laughing. “What? Alicia’s been raped?”
“Yeah, how do you feel about yourself now, huh? Knowing if you didn’t call the cops on me, I could have gotten to her on time.
I could have prevented what had happened to her.
She called me right after I left that night.
She called me and asked me to come to pick her up because she felt like she got a roofie in her drink.
” He grabs my shoulders and shakes me lightly.
“And I was driving to her. I was driving to get my baby sister so she’d be safe.
But instead, cops pulled me over and arrested me, so she got fucking raped because I couldn’t get to her on time!
” He’s full-on yelling and raging. I hear a ringing in my ears; it’s not from how loud he is but from the things he’s saying.
His face is red, his eyes blotchy as if he’s reliving that night… or whatever followed.
I shudder violently. I can’t believe it.
Now it all makes sense. Why Alicia seems so sheltered, why she changed out of nowhere from this beautiful social butterfly to a hidden hermit, and why Justin and Jake act way too overprotective over her all the time.
My heart’s breaking for her, this poor, poor girl.
Suddenly, as if he’s been burned, Justin drops his hands and steps back.
“I can’t even look at you.” He stalks toward the door.
“I fuckin’ hate myself for putting my lips on you.
I hate myself for wanting you. I fuckin’ hate you for what you’ve done, yet you somehow still keep making me fuckin’ feel something for you!
” His voice booms through the space, nearly shaking the furniture.
“Justin,” I say quietly, but he isn’t listening, so I gently touch his shoulder.
He shrugs me off with visible disgust, so I quickly step back but keep talking.
“I never called the cops on you. I’ve never called the cops on anybody in my life,” I say before he storms out, and everything left is lost for good.
I don’t want him to go without hearing my truth because this hate for me and for himself is misplaced. I understand what’s happening. I do.
He stops and smacks his open palm on the doorframe but doesn’t turn back. “You were the only one who saw me that night.”
“Was I?” I ask quietly, and he stills. Because he remembers that night too. Of course, he does. He will never be able to forget it. Neither will I. “That’s right. I saw you punching the shit out of that poor guy.”
“Yeah, and you were so conveniently present, rescuing your fellow trailer trash friend. He didn’t deserve your or anyone’s help.” His lips press into a firm line, his shoulders square.
“You don’t get to decide what he deserved. In fact, he deserved so much more.” I shake my head. “I was there. But I wasn’t the only one,” I add after a pregnant pause. A heavy weight settles on his shoulders as they slump.
He finally turns to me and shakes his head.
“Ashley was my girlfriend back then. She wouldn’t do that, and you know it.
You’re just being pitiful and jealous.” His voice is so gravely confident in Ashley that it makes me want to vomit.
The corners of his lips turn down while he’s looking me up and down as if assessing the level of disgust he feels for me.
“But I didn’t do it. And he didn’t do it.
You know he’d be on the wrong side of the bars no matter what.
Whether he was guilty or innocent, there wouldn’t have been a trial.
Trailer trash and all that.” I shrug. “So, who does it leave?” He doesn’t say anything, so I walk to him.
I take his chin between my two fingers and force him to look me in the eyes.
“ Who does it leave, Justin ?” I accent every word to ensure they get through to him. “Who?”
His Adam’s apple bobs in a violent swallow, his mouth likely dry after such a revelation. Mine gets that way too. I drop my hand and step back, pointing at the door without a word. He walks out.
I don’t hear his car start for a long time, but when it does, I breathe a sigh of relief.
Part of me was hoping he would walk back in, everything forgiven so life could go on, morphing into a happily ever after.
I’m clearly a glutton for punishment, clearly loving to torture myself.
But part of me is relaxed. I know what happened.
That I’m not at fault. I had seriously started to doubt myself.
It’s like gaslighting—they tell you that you’ve done something you never did, and eventually, you start believing it, unable to interpret true from false.
And another huge part of me just wants to weep for the poor girl whose innocent life was changed forever that night.
That night changed the lives of so many others.
I make a mental note that the next time I see Alicia, I’ll make it up to her.
Well, I can’t really make up for everything she’s been through—and to be honest, I can’t even begin to imagine what she went through that night and the demons she’s been fighting ever since—but I can help make her day a little better.