Chapter 31
Zach
Nineteen days.
It’s been nineteen days that she has been avoiding my calls.
No more. She can’t avoid me in person.
I throw a change of clothes into my gear bag and toss it over my shoulder as Tuck enters the room. “Hey, Morris, the guys and I are heading down to The Pit. Why don’t you blow off whatever shit you were going to do and come with us.”
“Nah, man. I’m heading out to see my girl. I’ll be back on Sunday. The room is all yours.”
Tuck rubs the back of his neck. Trepidation smeared across his usually playful face, “Oh shit. Man, I just assumed after I came home a couple of weekends ago to a sock on the door that you had kinda… moved on.”
“No. I didn’t move on. I ain’t never gonna move on. I’m gonna fix this.” The words burn as they leave my mouth. I will fix this. I have to fix this. I won’t let her go. I hitch the bag higher on my shoulder and head down to the car.
The drive from Bama to AU isn’t a bad one. In other circumstances, I’m sure it’s positively lovely. But right now, these three hours are taking forever. My patience is nonexistent. My mood is in the shitter. My hands tremble with the need to fill my body with a smooth, aged, oak-scented single malt.
The parking lot is overly crowded, but I don’t care if I have to walk five miles to get to her dorm; I fucking will. Gladly .
I hot-foot it out of the car and force myself not to run but maintain a brisk walk. The fifty-nine-degree weather offers little cooling down to my sizzling skin. Co-eds fill the open spaces on campus. I shove through the bodies, ignoring the harumphs and “Hey’s!”. I have one goal: get to my girl and make her talk to me. I chant the directions to myself repeatedly.
Burlington Hall, room 319.
Burlington Hall, room 319.
Burlington Hall, room 319.
Why are there so many fucking buildings? It’s going to take me forever at this point. I reach out and tug the arm of the closest person passing by. A fit dude about the same age as me stares back at me with indignation. Not the time, bud. “Hey, what the hell, man?”
You catch more flies with honey than vinegar, Zee.
I hold my hands up in surrender, layering an apologetic look on my face. “Sorry bro, I’m lookin’ for my girl’s dorm. Burlington Hall? Can you point me in the right direction?”
He eyes me, taking in my Bama tee. His eyes narrow. Maybe he’s a baller.
“Who’s your girl?” he asks, folding his arms against his chest.
My jaw tightens as I grit my teeth together, “Charlotte.” I grind out.
He makes a thoughtful face and taps his forefinger against his cheek, thinking it out. “Hm, there’s a lot of Charlotte’s here, man. What does she look like?”
I suck in a breath of air, the coolness doing nothing to calm the raging fire brewing within my body. This kid has no clue who he’s fucking with right now. I hold my hand flat out at chest level. “About yay high. Long, blonde hair. Brown eyes. Freckles all over her face.”
I itch to punch the smirk that fills his smug face right the hell off of it. “Oh, that Charlotte. We call her ‘Charlie with a body’ around here.”
I lunge at him and grab his t-shirt with both hands, bringing us nose to nose. The smirk slides off, and fear flashes in his eyes. That’s right motherfucker, don’t fuck with a man on the verge of losing the only thing he loves. I will tear this fucking world apart, stone by stone, to find my girl. I will bust down every wall. Burn every obstacle to the ground and laugh as their ashes flow in the wind. Nothing else matters. No one else matters.
“H-hey, what the hell, man? Are you a psycho? Get your hands off me!”
“I asked you a fuckin’ question. You got exactly one chance to answer me. You don’t wanna fuck with me today, bro. I can promise you that.”
He lifts a shaky arm and points to a large maroon brick building behind my left shoulder. I follow his finger and map the quickest route in my head before shoving his body away from me. He scoffs and looks at me like he just might think about going toe-to-toe with me. Thinking better of it, he rolls his eyes and walks away. Good fucking choice.
Thank fuck no one tried to stop me at the doors. A charming smile and the little redhead turned into a damn tomato and let me waltz right in.
Room 319.
I rest my forehead and right hand against the wooden door. Inhaling like her scent will permeate the wooden fortress and soothe my wayward soul. I can almost smell the vanilla and sugar. If I concentrate really, really hard.
Vanilla and sugar.
Blonde, silky hair.
An imposter.
Tits bouncing.
Video flashing in and out. No audio.
Small hands holding my limp ones against the said bouncing tits with concentrated effort.
No.No.No. Fuck. No.
I would recognize Little Bit’s tits from fifty yards. The flashing tits in my memory do not belong to my girl. Fuck.
I did it.
I fucked Bex.
I cheated on Charlotte.
In for four, out for eight.
My eyes search the wood grain for answers. Some mystical fix detailed in the deep-rooted history carved before me. Something to tell me this is a horrific nightmare. That I’ll wake up from at any moment. With my girl in my arms, breath in my lungs, and a hard-on in my shorts .
The more I look, the more things stay the same. The door is just the door.
I’m stuck in a waking nightmare. My life is over. She’ll never forgive this. I did the one thing I’ve vowed never to do.
But I have to try.
I lift my fist and pound it twice against the guarded gateway that separates me from the girl whose world I’m about to shred right along the tattered edges of mine.
In for four, out for eight.
The door slowly opens. My arms brace against the frame, barely holding my exhausted body from crashing into the room as my head dangles limply between them.
Hot pink toes.
I snapshot those toes into my memory. I’ve never been a toes kinda guy. But these toes? Perfection. My eyes trace from her toes to the shiny silver chain secured around her left ankle with a “10” charm hanging down, resting against that perfect ankle. The chain I gave her when she first got to Alabama. She rebuffed my offer to put a ring on her left hand to let the fellas know she was off-limits. We compromised on her reppin’ my number on the delicate piece of white gold.
She laughed it off, but I wasn’t kidding. I woulda married her that day. Fuck school. Fuck football. Fuck my family’s expectations. All we needed was each other. I woulda put a couple of babies in her belly, and we woulda lived happily ever after on a beach somewhere. Watching the crotch goblins splash about the water while we sip on cool margaritas and get lost in each other like we always do.
Her shins, marred with the consistent bruises her clumsiness awards her with, glisten in the sunlight that beams in from her one and only window.
The silkiness of her legs is cut off from view by the frayed hem of the denim skirt she wears. The waist fits snugly against the love handles I love to bite into when I take her from behind.
In for four, out for eight.
A tantalizing sliver of her belly shows between the waistband of her skirt and the cozy tank top she always wears. It’s grown so threadbare you can see her bright pink bra right through it. It must have at least five holes throughout the material, but she refuses to throw it away. She knows that sometimes old, broken things need to be loved and not tossed aside for the latest and greatest thing.
The tips of her blonde hair lightly brush along the top of her tanktop and rest in a gentle wave-like movement as her breasts rise and fall with steady inhales and exhales.
The chrome heart with an “S” pendant inside the hollow space is securely in its place over her heart. Savvy wears a “C” on hers. It’s their version of a friendship bracelet but “not lame as fuck” as Savvy would say.
The soft curve of her neck is interrupted by the strain of the muscles surrounding it. The curve I’ve traced the path of countless times with my finger… tongue… cock.
The delicate slope of her chin leads to the pursed flesh of the best set of pouty lips this world has ever seen and will ever see—lips I desperately want to press against my own. Let the world fade away, and let it just be us—together. Forever.
In for four, out for eight.
With each step my eyes take up to her face, the weight of my betrayal grows heavier, the realization of what I’ve done tightening like a vice around my chest. The air around us becomes insufferably suffocating in its silence. My guilt hangs between us like a thick fog, obscuring any hope of fixing this.
When I finally meet the chocolatey eyes that have always held such love and trust for me, my breath is punched out of my chest. They are hard, guarded, and disappointed. The trust they once carried lays scattered at our feet, irreparable and unforgivable, leaving me drowning in a sea of regret.
I think this is worse than tears. Tears mean hope. Tears mean she still cares. My girl has no tears. She’s as dry as the Sahara. This girl… is done. I don’t think she’s mine any longer. But I’ll always be hers.
“Little Bit,” I choke out, latching onto the door frame with all my might to keep from reaching out to her. I don’t deserve to touch her, and she’d probably whop me a good one if I tried.
She taps her hand against her thigh, and her voice comes out flat, emotionless, “ You know, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking. Trying to make sense of things,” her hand flutters around the room, encompassing whatever things she’s trying to make sense of. “First, I made excuses. There had to be a reasonable explanation for why a sleepy-voiced female answered your phone at seven o’clock in the morning. But try as I might, I couldn’t think of one.”
“Then I cried. I cried for days. Couldn’t eat. Couldn’t sleep. Wanted to not only jump off of the wagon but crash that bitch into a mountainside and get high off the ashes. I wondered what it was about me that made me so goddamn unlovable. So easily tossed aside. Wondering why the fuck that EMT saved me. Why he didn’t just let me die like the worthless castaway I was.”
The first tear falls from my eyes. I don’t bother brushing it away. I know more will come. I want to grab her and shake her, tell her just how fucking lovable she is. That I love her with every fiber of my being. That I would do anything for her if she only just asked.
“Then, I saw the video.”
Video?
Her words cut through my thoughts. “It was then I knew, this–” she motions her hand between the two of us, “Means nothing to you. I mean nothing to you. And that, Zach… That’s a you problem, not a me problem. I will not let another man send me down the path of destruction.”
She straightens her shoulders, armor firmly in place while she decimates my entire universe.
“No more. I’m tired of people thinking they can use me in whatever way they see fit. I’m tired of not being someone’s first choice,” the slap of her hand slamming against her chest makes my body flinch, “I’m fucking worthy of being someone’s one and only choice, Zach.”
Yes, you are.
“Just tell me one thing. If you’ve ever cared for me at all. If you have a decent fucking bone in your body, be honest with me about one thing?”
I can’t answer verbally. My chest feels like it’s caving in on itself, and if I try to speak, the rest of the walls will crumble, and I’ll be lost to them forever. I nod softly. I owe her whatever the hell she needs to hear .
“Did you do it? Did you fuck sleepy-voice girl?”
I can’t lie to her. I deserve whatever happens next. The tears are steadily dropping down now, obscuring her face just enough that the sharpness of her gaze seems almost softer. I latch onto the faux softness as I nod again.
She has no bodily reaction to my answer. Her eyes watch mine with detached indifference.
Breaking the connection between us, she spins around and walks over to her desk. She picks up a small silver item and sets it on top of the box to its side. She grabs the box and brings it over, holding it out to me.
Shakily, my arms release the door frame, and I take the box from her. Noticing the quickness she pulls her fingers away so they dare not brush mine. Looking into the box, I recognize several things. Cards. Letters. Clothing. She’s giving me our life together. Ridding herself of every scrap of me. Erasing me from her life right in front of my eyes, and I’m fucking powerless to stop it.
The thumb drive on the top puzzles me. My throat itches with the words I refuse to let it utter. I deserve this. I don’t deserve her.
“Don’t ever contact me again.”
She doesn’t slam the door in my face like I was expecting. She doesn’t meet my gaze one last time with hurt and love warring in her eyes.
She softly closes the door.
On me. On us.