Chapter 5 #2
“Reid told you?”
I nodded.
“You’d be the first girl he ever did,” she said, and set down the bags she was holding.
He hadn’t really told me because he’d wanted to, but I didn’t tell her that.
Mac grabbed Bram’s chair that had been moved out of the way for Bobby and she dragged it back to the side of the bed next to me. She took a seat. “I don’t like to talk about it or think about it. I’ve always just wanted to move on and be happy. Shove all the bad into a box and forget about it.”
I could see why she would want to do that.
She stared down at the floor. “Seeing you hurt and knowing how it happened makes it difficult to ignore everything in that box.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t you dare apologize. It’s my shit to deal with.” She sighed and picked up a bag. “I promise to be a better friend moving forward and I started that by buying you stuff. Well, I didn’t buy it. I used Bram’s card with his permission.”
“You didn’t have to buy me anything.”
“Yeah, I did. You don’t have anything. Not even any clothes, and I’m sure you don’t want to keep borrowing mine.” She gestured to what I was wearing.
I pulled on the baggy shirt. “I figured these were yours. Did you change my clothes?”
She nodded. “I’d already seen your tits. I figured you wouldn’t mind.”
I felt the urge to smile.
“My mom helped, though. She washed the blood off your skin and brushed the tangles out of your hair.”
I really wasn’t in a mindset to care who saw me naked. So I defaulted to what I thought I was supposed to do or say in that moment. I thanked her and asked her to pass along my thanks to her mother as well.
“Well, anyways, you needed stuff,” she said as she looked into the bag she’d picked up.
“I let Bram know earlier and he gave me his card. He told me to get everything I thought you would need. I enjoyed the retail therapy even though I had two tagalongs. And those two had an opinion about everything. Mostly Roe. Reid only chimed in a few times.”
Just as she finished speaking, Wyatt came in with a lot of bags hanging from his arms. He set them down under the TV and walked right back out.
“Roe and Reid were with you?” I asked.
“Unfortunately,” she grumbled. “They overheard me talking to Bram before Noble showed up. Roe said there were some things he wanted to go out and get for you, too. He and Reid followed me from store to store. They vetoed so many cute outfits I picked out. I couldn’t even buy you a damn toothbrush without someone saying something.
The input on toiletries was helpful, I supposed.
They knew about some of the products you used. ”
I wondered if they had seen what I used in my bathroom when the three of them stayed over. Looking back, I had left some stuff on the vanity after I showered.
Mac sighed dramatically. “I was finally able to get free of them toward the end. I picked out intimate things then, like bras and underwear.” A mischievous smile pulled at the corners of her mouth.
“And I may have gone back and grabbed some of the outfits they turned down. Every girl has the right to dress sexy. I know that’s far from your mind now, but you might feel differently later and there will be a couple of outfits waiting for you. ”
Only worries seemed to occupy my mind. I wondered if her shopping trip had been a waste. What if I didn’t get to wear everything she had bought? What if I wasn’t here that much longer? Despite my heavy thoughts, I still thanked her.
Mac stood and started picking up bags. “I’m going to put all your toiletries away in the bathroom.”
As she left the room, Wyatt came in with more bags. “Roe and Reid are back. They’re coming in with the rest.”
The rest?
Just as Wyatt finished adding to the pile of bags on the floor under the TV, Roe came in, arms full of bags as well. He set down them all with the rest, except for one bag that had a well known label on it.
Roe brought that one bag over to me and sat in Bram’s chair. “I’m sorry that took a while.”
Mac came back into the room and looked over all the bags on the floor. “I’m surprised I beat you back. Where did you two go?”
Roe pulled out a small box with a picture of a phone on it out of the bag.
“I wanted to get Lottie a phone. I realized this morning when I went to text her that she didn’t have her old one.
” He spoke as he took a brand new phone out of the box and powered it on.
It was matte black, unlike my previous, which was pink.
“You didn’t have to do that.” I may have grown up with money, but I understood phones weren’t cheap.
He held out the phone to me. “How else will I talk to you when I’m not with you?”
“Sounds like he did it for selfish reasons,” Wyatt said as he watched us. “So don’t feel guilty and just accept it.”
I took the phone and ran my thumb over the back, liking its color.
“I was going to get the same color as your other one, but Wyatt told me to get the black instead,” Roe said.
I guessed that was what they’d been texting about earlier. My eyes found Wyatt. “Why black?”
Wyatt shrugged as he started peeking into the bags on the floor. “Your favorite color is black. I thought you’d like it more than pink.”
I stared back at the phone, remembering the game of questions we had played and how he had asked me what my favorite color was. “I do. Thank you. Both of you.”
“You three are cute,” Mac said as she carried more stuff into the bathroom.
“Where’s what Reid got her?” Wyatt asked as he continued to look in the bags. “I want to make sure he got the right stuff.”
“Reid got me something?”
Roe sighed. “I’m sure he’ll give it to you later.”
Wyatt rolled his eyes. “We should help Mac put all this away.”
“No!” Mac yelled from the bathroom before she came running in. “I don’t need your help.” She glared at Wyatt. “Back away from the bags, Wy.”
Wyatt put his hands up as he walked away. He returned to his spot on the bed next to me.
“You bought something we told you not to, didn’t you?” Roe said as he frowned at her.
Mac put her hands on her hips and gave him a look full of attitude. “You do not get to dictate what your girlfriend wears, Monroe Walker.”
Roe ran his hands down his face. “Please tell me you didn’t buy that see-through latex dress.”
I couldn’t stop my eyes from widening as I stared at Mac for her response.
“I only picked that out as a joke to rile you and Reid.” She chuckled as if remembering it. “And even if I did buy it, Lottie would look smokin’ in that dress and you would thank me for getting it for her later.”
“She’d be practically naked, Mac,” Roe argued.
“Is there a reason you don’t want to see Lottie naked?” Mac asked.
Roe carefully thought before responding, “That’s not what I said.”
The more Mac argued with him, the more delighted she appeared. “So you’re okay with her wearing it.”
Roe shook his head. “No.”
Mac smiled triumphantly. “What are you going to do, strip it off of her if she doesn’t listen?”
Roe didn’t respond.
“I guess now you understand why I would ever consider buying a dress like that for Lottie in the first place and why you would thank me.” She winked at him before returning to the bathroom.
“I wouldn’t wear a see-through latex dress,” I said.
Wyatt chuckled a little. “That’s too bad. Mac worked so hard to make Roe question everything he thought he knew.”
Roe rested his head back with his eyes closed. “Shut up, Wy.”
That only made Wyatt fully laugh.
I let out a little yawn before saying, “If I was going to wear something see-through, I would choose chiffon or lace.”
Wyatt’s laughter stopped abruptly and Roe’s eyes shot open before he lifted his head. I could feel them both staring at me, but my focus was on my new phone. Roe had already programmed in everyone’s numbers, including Bram’s.
“I have so many responses to that,” Wyatt said.
“Keep them to yourself. Now isn’t the time,” Roe said.
Wyatt hummed as if debating. “Speaking of sex—”
Roe cut him off. “She wasn’t talking about sex.”
“But we’re all thinking about it,” Wyatt said.
Roe let out a curse as he shook his head.
“As I was saying…Bobby informed me that Lottie is to not—”
“Please don’t make me relive that,” I begged.
Roe looked from me to Wyatt. “What?”
Wyatt grinned. “I’ll tell you later.”
For the next hour, Roe and Wyatt hung out with me while Mac emptied and put away everything in the bags. Mostly I listened to the three of them talk as I rested. Mac had just left when Bram showed up. He told Wyatt and Roe to go home. It was only seven, but Bram looked tired.
Roe and Wyatt reluctantly got up to leave. Roe leaned down to kiss me goodbye, but before his lips reached mine, Bram said in a very cold voice, “Before you put your mouth on my daughter, Monroe, remember I own guns. Lots of them.”
Roe froze.
“Don’t threaten my son, Bram.” Noble’s voice carried in from the hall behind Bram, who was blocking the doorway.
Noble’s words didn’t seem to reach Bram. He frowned at Roe with his arms folded over his chest.
Roe sighed, probably feeling the weight of Bram’s stare, and settled with kissing me on my forehead. “See you tomorrow.”
Bram moved out of the way for Wyatt and Roe to leave by coming farther into the room. “I saw that you didn’t eat much earlier.”
I glanced at the bedside table and finally noticed that the tray with the soup was gone. He must have come in while I had been asleep. “I wasn’t hungry.”
“Are you hungry now?”
I shook my head.
“You need to eat something. I don’t even care if all you can stomach is a damned milkshake.” The thought of me not eating really seemed to stress him out.
“I’ve never had a milkshake before,” I admitted.
He stared down at the floor for a moment and exhaled heavily through his nose. “If I get you one, do you think you could drink it?”
I thought about it. I wasn’t hungry, but I’d always wanted to try a milkshake. “What if I don’t like it?”
“It’s ice cream. It’s hard to dislike ice cream.”
I nodded. “Okay.”
“I’ll be right back,” he said before leaving.
I was alone. The realization hit me when the silence did. Closing my eyes, I tried to ignore my thoughts. I had done enough thinking and feeling today. In my fight to just lie there, I thought I heard a small noise. Then the smell of leather and bergamot filled my nose.
I opened my eyes and found Reid reaching over me to set something on the other side of the bed.
He went still when he noticed I had caught him.
I glanced at what he was trying to leave on the bed next to me.
It was a cloth bag I knew very well. The craft store where I bought my art supplies sold them as an alternative to plastic bags.
The money earned on the bags went to a local women’s shelter.
I looked back at Reid. For a moment, we just stared at each other.
He opened his mouth slightly, like he was going to say something. Then closed it. He straightened so that he wasn’t leaning over me anymore. “Roe forgot to give you that.”
Confused, I watched him leave. Had I heard Wyatt and Roe wrong earlier?
I didn’t have enough fucks to give to stress over it.
I grabbed the bag and pulled out a large sketchbook, a pack of charcoal pencils, a pack of graphite pencils, and a pack of compressed charcoal.
All were brands I preferred to use. There were also a kneaded eraser and a sharpener in the bottom of the bag.
I held the sketchbook to my chest and tried not to cry.