Sixteen
Ben
I never called Sadie back last night, and this morning I woke up hungover with a throbbing headache. And by morning, I mean nearly two in the afternoon.
“Boys, sound check in forty minutes, get up!” Nick passes our bunks, banging on the wood above each one. I drag my hands up and down my face and turn over to see my phone next to me. After blinding myself with the harsh light and nearly throwing my phone, I turn it down and squint through my blurry, hungover eyes.
Seeing all the missed calls and rereading the one message from Sadie, I take a deep breath.
I fucked up last night.
The boys start moving around outside my closed bed curtain as I call Sadie and wait for her to answer. Before I start anything today, I need to make it right with Sadie, if I didn’t already lose her for good with my fucking jealousy.
She doesn’t answer. Fuck.
“Ben, you got thirty minutes. The boys and I are headed to sound check. Hurry up!” Nick hollers, but I don’t respond. I call again, and she doesn’t answer. Shit. I clench my phone and climb out of the bunk. I may need Nick to get Sadie to talk to me. My feet hit the bus floor, and I call again, but before I can bring the phone to my ear, I hear her.
“Hey.” Sadie’s angelic voice comes from the front of the bus. I turn, and like a dream, she stands there. Close enough to fucking touch. Her hair is in some side braid draping down her shoulder, and she is wearing a pair of jeans and a white V-neck T-shirt. She looks so fucking good. Is she real?
“Sadie?” She nods. Fuck, she’s real. I am on her in seconds. “Baby, I am so sorry.” I wrap my arms around her and pick her up, squeezing her tight, as if she might evaporate.
“I caught the first flight I could—nearly missed it, actually. We can’t fight on the phone. I don’t want to do that with you, Ben.”
“I’m sorry. I fucked up last night. I shouldn’t have reacted that way.” Coming out of the gate with an apology seems only right.
“It’s okay,” she mumbles into my chest. Her voice is soft, as if she is cowering, and that is all my fault. Sadie feeling like she has to take more shit from someone without speaking up makes me nauseated.
“No, it’s not.”
“Ben, why don’t you trust me? You know what trust means to me,” she asks as she untangles herself from my suffocating grip.
“I do, it’s—”
“No, you don’t,” she says, cutting me off. Good. I deserve her calling me on my shit. “If you did, you wouldn’t have acted that way. You hurt me last night,” she admits. She looks down at her hands, which are picking at each other.
“You’re right. I didn’t trust you, and I have no reason not to.” I lift her chin. “But you’re here—fuck, you’re here.” What made her come to me when I don’t deserve to breathe the same air as her?
“Because I said that I would be open to this, that I would talk things out. But I need to know that you will too.”
“Baby, I broke our trust. Joke’s on me. Clearly, I’m the one who can’t be trusted.” I smile.
“I do trust you, though. You have been from New York all the way to Florida and now here in Atlanta, and I haven’t once worried that you have done anything to break my trust. I deserve the same thing. I deserve honesty. You can have moments where you doubt me, but talk to me about it, Ben. You have to tell me.”
I don’t deserve her forgiveness. I haven’t had to plead my case or beg her to forgive me; instead, she just showed up here. How do I make this right? I should be kissing her feet.
“I’m working on that one minute at a time,” I whisper.
“One minute at a time. Next time, I won’t fly out when I am in the middle of school to make it right.” She smiles. My girl.
“I can’t believe you did this. How long do I have with you?” I run my hands up and down the smooth skin of her arms.
“Until tomorrow. I have to get back to studying, and my shifts start back up at the hospital.”
“Good. That will give us some time to talk about this. After sound check?”
She nods.
“Thank you for this, Sadie. Thank you for not running.”
“Don’t give me a reason to.”
Softly, I slide my thumb up and down the slender column of her neck. I want to mark her. Leave love bites everywhere I can.
“It doesn’t make it all better, but can I taste your lips? It’s been too fucking long since the last time,” I ask. She nods. Her breathing becomes labored. Aroused. Craving me and our closeness. There is an intimacy that goes beyond physical touch. The way we shelter our relationship from the outside world to make it our own draws us so much closer. That is the most intoxicating thing about us.
“We have an instant connection. You make me feel alive. When you touch me, I’m actually breathing for the first time,” she whispers.
“Me, too, baby.”
“You came in and flipped my world upside down in a matter of days.”
“Look who’s talking, angel.” With that, I seal our lips and brand myself with her taste. I want her scent all over me.
I could have easily lost her over something so damn small, but instead she’s telling me she doesn’t want to leave me. I revel in the fact that she wants me as much as I want her.
* * *
“Good night, Atlanta!” I holler into the mic, grabbing my water bottle and putting the mic back in the stand. Sadie is at the side of the stage, and after that amazing show, all I want to do is get to her.
“That was electric, Ben!” she tells me as I run up to her, wrap one arm around her waist, and spin her. I kiss her neck, and she giggles. Fuck, I missed that sound.
“Ahh! You are so sweaty!” she hollers, and this time I run my mouth up her jaw, over her cheek, and back to her ear.
“Am I? You want to be this sweaty, baby?” I groan into her ear, my cock getting hard.
“Ben, there are lots of people around.” She lets out an aroused moan.
“There are . . . so how about we go back to the bus?” I lean back enough to look at her.
She bites her lip and nods.
“Nick, clear the bus for the next hour. The boys can stay here and party,” I holler to Nick. Sadie keeps her head low. So shy. I will work on that.
“One hour. That’s it, then we have to hit the road; we need to be in Nashville tomorrow. We can’t be waiting on you two.” I brush him off and get us back to the bus in record time. The second the door shuts, the silence around us makes our breathing more pronounced.
“What now?” Sadie asks, placing her hand on her stomach. We stand in the small living area, and yet it feels like the feet between us are miles.
“Now you’re going to let me say sorry. You are going to let me kiss you up and down, all over your body.” I drop my blazer on the couch and slowly move closer to her. I admire the way her throat moves as she anxiously swallows, the way her nipples pucker under that white tee. She backs up, and with each step I take, she repeats that action.
“You want me to say sorry like that, Sadie?” She nods eagerly when I ask.
“Yes, please, Ben,” she moans, and now I am on her.
“Such a good fucking girl,” I groan into her neck, one hand gripping her waist and the other taking her hand and pinning it above her head in the hallway.
“Oh,” she cries.
“Let it out, no one is here.” I kiss the nape of her neck, then bite it.
“God!” she cries, and that’s my cue. I pick her up by her ass, and she wraps her arms around my shoulders. We have a room at the back of the bus, and I make a beeline for it.
I lay her down and hover above her the second we get to the queen bed. The room is modern, with a white headboard, black silk sheets, and a white comforter, but the icing on the cake is the mirror above the bed. I laughed when I first saw it. Such a cliché, but now it will be used in anything but cliché ways. It will be another way I can show Sadie what pleasure and sexual freedom look like. I start with her jeans, our eyes never leaving one another. The button first, then the long trail of zipper that I swear feels never ending.
“So beautiful. You know that? Look up at the mirror, pretty baby.” I want Sadie to see what I’m doing. Finally, she looks up, and as she does, I pull her pants down. She lifts her hips slightly to help me move the tight fabric over her curves. I slide them all the way off. She is left in nothing but a pair of nude panties.
“Look at you. See it?” She shakes her head. “Look again, baby.” This time, my hands trail down her thighs, over the peaks of her knees and down to her ankles. I grab them and lift them effortlessly; she is under my control now, and she is letting me lead. My favorite fucking thing.
I place her feet shoulder-width apart, flat against the bed. “You are the embodiment of sex appeal, Sadie. And now it’s all mine,” I tell her. She gulps, and I move her panties to the side, exposing her center to me. “Fuck, there you are. My girl is so wet for me,” I praise her.
“Touch me, please.”
“Gladly.” Without another word, I drag my knuckle up and down her center from her entrance to her clit, and she shudders. I insert my middle finger, and she cries out my name.
I place my wide-open palm on her lower stomach to keep her from moving away from my touch. The pleasure will drive her to the brink, and I want her to be enthralled in it. I tilt my finger up slightly, hitting that spot deep inside her warm cunt, and I massage it with pressure.
“I’m sorry I fucked up. How could I do that to my girl? So fucking special.” I praise her through my apology.
Her moan hollows to a cry. Her eyes start to close. “I know you are, baby.” She accepts my apology, and the way she calls me baby is music to my ears.
“Don’t you dare close your eyes. Keep watching, Sadie. Watch how beautiful you look when you come.”
“Ben, I am so close.” She tries to scoot away, but my hand on her stomach is keeping her locked in place.
“Holy fuck. What would you do if your parents knew you snuck away to let me finger-fuck your gorgeous body? To claim you. You know that this is mine now? All of it?” I add my thumb on her clit, and her back bows slightly.
“Yes,” she cries.
“Prove it. Come on my finger and prove that I own this body.” On command, she orgasms, fast and hard, screaming my name and grabbing the sheets in pure euphoria. Her core pulses around my finger, her juices now sliding down my hand. I am going to drink her in.
I lap lazily at her center as she comes down from her orgasm, taking all she will give me. So responsive and so giving.
“Angel. Angel,” I repeat over and over.
“Ben, I might come again,” she rushes out, her stomach tightening and her chest rising and falling with deep breaths.
“Ride that out, you can come again. I’m still craving you. Feed me more, pretty baby.” Her second cry is softer, a lazy, almost overwhelmed sound.
“Oh, Ben.” Her juices coat my mouth, and I swallow it all down, thirsty for all of her.
* * *
“I’m glad I came here,” Sadie whispers in the dark room. We stay locked in the back room, going at one another as the bus leaves the venue. There is more pleasure in pleasing her than in getting off. I want to wait for that, travel her body first before we even get to mine. Respecting her wish to only go as far as she is comfortable with isn’t an inconvenience to me.
Every once in a while, we pass a car, and the lights shine against the wall next to us and dance by quickly.
“Me too. Thank you for listening to me. I haven’t really learned how to talk and be heard before,” I admit.
“What do you mean?”
“Sometimes when I am hurting and I talk about things, it’s like people want to jump in or fix it. But I don’t want that. I want to be heard. I want them to listen. When they try to fix it, I feel like a burden.” The darkness may be why I am so willing to share more with her. There is still a barrier keeping me safe, but I let Sadie in a little bit more.
“You aren’t a burden to me, I hope you know that. And sometimes people want to fix problems because they don’t want to see the hurt drown you anymore. Fixing it sometimes means an act of love,” Sadie says, running her hand slowly up and down my abs and chest.
“I guess that is something I don’t know how to differentiate,” I admit. Sadie stays silent for a minute before she says one simple word.
“Trust.”
I nod, looking up at the ceiling; even in the dark, I can slightly make out the shape of us. “Trust,” I repeat.
Sadie isn’t wrong. Trust is everything, and if we have it, then we always know where we stand. I have to remember that.
“Sadie?” It’s been several minutes since we said anything.
“Mm-hmm.”
I can tell she is almost asleep. She won’t remember what I am about to say, and that is okay because I need this for me. I avoided it all my life until I found her.
“I love you.”
“Mm-hmm,” she repeats, confirming that she is in fact slipping into sleep.
“Good night, angel.” Kissing her forehead, I let slumber take us both.
* * *
We finished our last show in Michigan yesterday, and today we start the long drive home. The two days with Sadie were needed. I knew when I dropped her off at the airport in Tennessee that I would be seeing her in a matter of days, but the goodbye was shitty nonetheless. I wish I could keep her with me every day.
Nick, Jason, and I spend the day on the bus drinking and playing cards. Eric spends the day fighting with Kate because she found out about his random hookup a few nights ago, while JJ sleeps most of the day. Nick, Jason, and I finally call it quits as we get ready to pull into some town for dinner. I head to my bunk to grab my phone and my jacket as the guys head out.
“I’ll meet you inside!” I yell as they climb off the bus. Grabbing my phone, I see a missed call and a voice mail waiting. I don’t notice the number, and I instantly regret listening to the message.
The call came from a California state prison: “Son, it’s me. I get that you don’t want to talk to me, but please come see me. Forgive me, son. I love you. I don’t know what else to say. All I have is begging. Please.”
This is the third attempt the old bastard has made at reaching me in the past few years, and like every other time, I despise him. Tunnel vision fills my eyes, and I blink away the blur taking over.
Forgive me, son. I love you.
I can still hear his voice.
The hell you fucking do, bastard! You hurt me over and over again. You beat Mom to death and fucking took the one person I loved in life. You’re a guilty old son of a bitch looking for forgiveness in all the wrong places!
In the confines of the small bunk, I slip into a manic rage. Blackness takes over, and I become the Ben in the shadows that no one is ever prepared for—not even me. I punch the wall then grab at my hair, pulling at the strands in agony. Reaching for my backpack at the foot of my bunk, I dig deep and find my special vial—the vial filled with my medication, the nonprescription kind. Cocaine. I should take my other medication and lie down, but tonight my prescription won’t be enough.
Dumping some on the back of my hand, I sniff the bump faster than it has time to settle on my skin. It stings my nose, and my eyes instantly water—but it’s the good kind of burn. The burn that promises a release, a darker side of vengeance.
I put the vial back on my bunk and grab my jacket. I head in the opposite direction of the restaurant and search out the nearest bar.
Tonight, I will take on my mother’s pain and beg her to forgive me.
It is Thursday night and tomorrow I will be with Sadie, but right now all I can think about is that call, and I’m only seeing red. Sadie’s face is slipping from my mind as my mania sets in. We’ve stopped for dinner on the outskirts of Idaho, and there is one seedy local bar crawling with lowlifes—exactly what I’m looking for. I sit at the bar, my eyes watering and my nose itching as I down another shot. My skin is coated in a light sheen of sweat, and I swear I can feel the hair on my head growing, or even the littlest of pieces falling out of place.
All my senses are heightened while I look around for someone—the unlucky bastard I want to fight—to numb me from the outside in.
“Come on, baby. Wearing a dress like that means you’re looking for a quick fuck.” A deep voice down the bar from me is talking to the waitress. She’s young, and I bet she’s only in this dump to make enough money to leave this shithole town.
The man has a beer gut busting out of his greasy, stained shirt, and his trucker hat hangs sloppily on his gray hair.
“Sir, please pay your tab and leave,” the young woman tells him, and I watch as he basically fucks her with his greedy eyes.
Bingo.
“Don’t be such a cunt. Come on, give big papa a ride. I’ll make it feel real good.” He grabs her ass, and she turns, slapping him hard enough to leave her handprint on his cheek. Her body moves again, stepping into his space to knee him in the balls, but there is no need. I will gladly do the honors.
“Hey!” I stand, running my hand over the back of my head, cracking my neck from side to side.
“What?” He stands up like he’s about to intimidate me with his size and age. I don’t care if he’s forty years old and over two hundred pounds of hamburger meat. He’s not only a piece of shit, he has the perfect-sized fist for bruising my face.
“Why don’t you back off the girl and go home and play with your small dick, fucker?” I challenge, getting closer.
“Excuse me, son? You might want to rethink who you’re talking to.”
“The town asshole? I’m good.” I smirk, flicking my left nostril and sniffing. “You’re a piece of shit I will gladly fucking set straight.”
“Is that right?” he yells, taking a few steps closer, his alcohol breath pungent and his shirt stained with God knows what. Getting in my face, he points to the exit. “Why don’t you set me straight, then?”
He pokes my chest, and I look around the bar, making sure all the attention is on me. That’s how I like it. Even the waitress has her eyes glued on us, and the other people in the bar have their jaws on the floor. I nod.
“Gladly.” With that, I see it all happen before it even starts, and I do nothing at all to stop it. I welcome it—fucking count on it.
Pulling his fist back, he flings his arm forward with all his might, catching me right in the eye. That was a good one, and I’m sure it’ll leave one hell of a black eye. But I always say, if you want to throw a punch, you better make it a damn good one.
I tackle the man to the floor and give him the special treatment. The father treatment. With each punch and each failed attempt at retaliation, the real man disappears and my father’s face comes into focus, taking each hit like he deserves.
“Fuck you, you piece of shit!” I hit him for the third time, seeing him begin to weaken. People scream, then a loud commotion comes from the door at the front of the bar.
“Ben!” Turning at the sound of Nick and Eric’s voices calling to me, I catch a fist to my jaw and topple over onto the floor.
Fuck.
The stocky man stands to kick me, but before he can, Eric stops him, and Nick grabs my arm, pulling me up off the floor.
“You son of a bitch! You better hope I don’t fucking run into you again!” the man spits as Nick rushes us out the door. I never lose the shit-eating grin on my face.
That one was for you, old man.
* * *
“What the fuck were you thinking!” Nick yells at me a short time later. The second we got back to the bus, Nick woke up our driver and demanded he get back on the road. He’s been working on damage control, ensuring no charges are pressed. To be fair, I did make sure the asshole hit me first. Sprawled out on the bus couch with an ice pack on my eye, I don’t answer. I’m still messed up from the high of pummeling the jackass who didn’t know how to treat a woman. My eye is throbbing, and my head feels like it is being repeatedly hit by a sledgehammer, but I don’t regret what I did even if the room does start to spin if I keep my eyes open for too long.
“Don’t fucking ignore me, Ben!” Nick shouts.
Releasing a deep breath, I count in my head, doing everything I can to keep from snapping on him. It’s one thing when it’s a stranger, but it’s another thing when it’s someone I care about.
“Ben!” he yells for the third time.
“What! What the fuck do you want me to say!” I throw the ice pack against the wall adjacent to me, and it dents instantly.
“You can’t do this. You know that it’s going to lead to you self-destructing. You are doing really good, Ben. Stay with me.”
“But the dick deserved it!”
“Ben, I can’t keep pulling you out. One day, I won’t be able to pay someone off. You will get arrested. You can’t be getting hopped up on drugs and going out to fight someone. You could kill someone—or yourself—one day, Ben! This shit isn’t a game! How many people who love you, how many therapists, need to tell you that for it to stick!”
“You don’t think I get it?” This time I stand and punch the wall, nearly breaking my hand as the pain gallops up my arm. “Fuck!”
“Goddamn it, Ben! Sit down! Now!” My blood singes my veins, spreading to each limb like a wildfire. Shit. I breathe in and out while the pain in my hand duels with my internal pain. The room begins to turn to a smoky gray haze. Words form deep in my chest and begin to rise to a boil, ready to spill over the top.
“Don’t fucking tell me what to do!” I go to hit him, but he dodges my fist and moves behind me fast enough to catch me off guard. Hearing the boys coming from the bunks as Nick wraps his arms around me, I try to fight, almost breaking free from his bear hug until he grips me tighter.
“Ben! Relax!” he yells in my ear, dragging me to the couch and pulling my body on top of his. I yell out, still attempting to break free.
“Let me go, Nick!” My bandmates are watching me as I lose myself to the rage.
“Get the shot, Eric. It’s in my shaving kit.”
“Don’t fucking knock me out, Nick!” I fight against him even harder.
Whenever I’m too far gone, Nick takes the sedative my doctor gave me and injects me with it. The worst part is, it knocks me out for hours and leaves me lethargic for nearly a day afterward.
The room spins, and I blink rapidly, thinking of anything in the world that could calm me down. First, I see my mother, but that only reminds me that she’s gone. Music—I try to think of my music, but it still does nothing.
“Get me Sadie. Fuck, please get me Sadie!” I growl out, tears coming from my eyes not from sadness but anger. I’m too wound up, with no way of controlling what’s already lost. I have to find my center again.
“No, I won’t let her see you like this. I won’t let the one good thing in your life leave,” he says, and Eric appears with my medicine.
“She won’t. I can calm down if I hear her. Call her, let me hear her.” I’m desperate. Maybe she can help me; she has centered me before. Never when I was this far gone, but I am willing to do anything.
“Maybe we could try it, man, maybe it will help,” JJ chimes in. I nod my head, thankful I have someone on my side.
“Please.” I stop moving because I have nowhere to go and only one way to get what I want. Already, the thought of talking to her has me able to think straight.
“Call her.” Nick holds me still, and Eric takes my phone off the table. With each ring, my heart rate drops closer to its normal rate.
“Hey, baby! Sorry, I’m barely leaving the hospital! I didn’t want to miss your call.”
“Sadie.” Her name is a plea.
“Ben, is everything all right? What happened?” She sounds worried.
“Nothing. I just had a rough night. I don’t want to talk about it. Please, say anything, just—just tell me about your day. Anything.” There is a long pause. Sadie will push for more. She will. And I might regret this call after all. Except she doesn’t. As if it’s just another fucking call, she changes her tone and does exactly what I begged her to do.
Nick’s face relaxes, and he loosens his grip on me slightly so I can grab my phone. Eric hands it to me, and I cling to it.
“I had a busy day with studying, and then I had to help Mama and Papa clean out the garage. Then I had clinicals. That’s about it. What about you?” I nudge myself out from Nick’s grip and move away from them, heading toward the sleeping quarters.
I climb into my bunk and close the curtain. In the background, Nick’s calling Dr. Davinah, stealing quick glimpses at me to make sure I am still lying here and not doing anything I shouldn’t be, like taking another bump. I will talk to my therapist next, but I need Sadie this very second. I’m shaking uncontrollably, and I can still feel myself lost in the blurry mist that happens when coming down after an episode.
“Today was shit, but I’m here. That’s all I care about. Where are you going now? Home?”
“Yes, I put a pot roast on before work. It’s my turn for dinner, so a Crock-Pot meal it is. Did you eat dinner? What town are y’all in, anyway?” Her Southern drawl hums soothingly in my ear. I’m coming back. Keep bringing me home, angel .
“We just left some town in Idaho, and no, I haven’t eaten yet.”
“It’s almost eight here, so I’m starved!” She giggles.
“I bet you are. Hey, Sadie . . .” I trail off as she hums into the phone. The sweet noise is enough to set me free, to let me take my first full breath in hours, and it feels like the rarest type of air. “Thank you.”
“Whatever you’re thanking me for, Ben Cooper, anytime. I’m here when you’re ready.”
“Did you think about me all day?” I inwardly beg her to say yes.
“Always. In fact, you are becoming quite the distraction.” She laughs.
“How?” I push for more. Nick waits a few feet away, watching me. He says something to Dr. Davinah, but I block him out.
“I think at one point today, I was jotting your name down in my notes at the hospital when really I should have been writing this sweet lady’s chief complaints for my mentor.” She giggles again. That sound is the drug that I need.
“No one died on your watch because of me, did they?” I swallow thickly.
“No, but it was a close call,” she teases.
“Good, baby, that’s good.” As I hoped, Sadie has helped put me in the clear. With her, I am out of the woods.
“How was the last show? I get to see you tomorrow!” She is so fucking thrilled about being with me. I feel that familiar swell of comfort in my chest.
Tomorrow, I’m going to have to tell her about my eye, about my current mental state, and—fuck me—about my father. Knowing that Sadie has the power to pull me through a rage means that out of anyone in the world, I feel safest sharing that part of me with her. No one has ever been able to pull me through that without my medication or a swift kick to the fucking head.
The night doesn’t fade away effortlessly, but she eases me enough to talk to Dr. Davinah. But when I talk to him, I lose myself again. My peace is gone, and my demons are left breathing down my neck.