33. Nadia
33
NADIA
I climbed into the cart before Callum and sat down. Once we were both seated, Rory, the ride operator, offered us a blanket, which Callum accepted, most likely thinking I was cold because typically I was. There was a chill in the air, but I was anything but cold. The heat that was warming me from the inside out was being generated by the sparks that had been flying between me and Callum all night. Our chemistry was still off the charts.
Spending the evening with him, seeing him interact with people, and seeing the way people responded to him reminded me even more why I loved him. It reminded me who he was. It reminded me of who we were.
Everything with him was always so natural—so easy. Yes, in the past, we had our fair share of fights, but he was right. I was the one who fought; he never did. Our issues were due to my insecurity. I didn’t have to look far to figure out where they came from. I knew that the seeds of my mistrust were planted, watered, and grown from watching the men in my mom’s life. I witnessed how they lied, cheated, used, manipulated, and gaslit her before I was even able to speak. One of my earliest memories is standing in my crib, watching my mom cry while begging a man not to leave after she caught him with another woman. I only remember that there was another woman involved because it was my babysitter.
I brought all that baggage into our relationship, and he’d carried it for me with zero complaints. He never got frustrated or called me names like the men my mom dated did to her, even when I was completely in the wrong and out of line. He took after his mom in that way. In fact, he also deserved sainthood.
Callum spread the blanket out over us, and even though I wasn’t cold, I had to admit, it was cozy. The ride started with a jerk, and I gripped onto the side and stared straight ahead. As we ascended, I could feel Callum staring at me, but for some reason, I couldn’t bring myself to turn toward him.
As an adult, I was rarely ever shy. The only person who could ever make me shy was Callum, which was strange because he also empowered me the most and gave me the most confidence. It was quite the juxtaposition. I wasn’t exactly sure where my sudden bout of shyness was coming from. It’s not like we hadn’t been intimate since he’d been back. We had. But this was different. This was in public. Sort of. We were in a gondola that was moving, but I didn’t want anyone to see the vulnerability, the raw emotion, the love I still harbored for him.
When we reached the top, I finally glanced over at him, and when I did, the look in his eyes surprised me. It was intense, but not in the way I’d thought it would be. He looked…pained.
“What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know what to do.”
Okay, that was not at all what I thought he was going to say.
“About what?”
“About anything. I don’t know if I should stay here. I don’t know if I should go back to Arizona. Chloe and I are doing good. Really good. What you said about just being her brother, you were right. So right. That’s what I should have been doing all along. I am now. And, thankfully, she isn’t holding the past ten years against me.
“While she was home sick this week, I talked to her about everything, and she definitely wants me to be her guardian, so that’s one thing that’s settled. She says that she’s fine going to Arizona, but I think she’s happy here. Or maybe she’s not. I don’t know. Her life has been so hard, and I have let her down so much already; I don’t want to do the wrong thing.”
He shook his head and sighed as we once again reached the highest point of the wheel.
“All my life, I’ve been decisive. You know that. I have a plan. I have clear goals. Even when things didn’t go how I thought they would, I adjusted.”
My heart ached. I knew exactly what he was referring to. He meant my not moving to Arizona after graduation, us not getting married, and us not starting our family.
“I threw myself into my work. Then, when life threw me another curveball, I knew I had to step back, so I changed my career. But this, I don’t know what the right thing to do is. I can’t put the decision on Chloe. She’s a teenager, and she’s had to be an adult for too much of her life. If I accept the fight, and we move back there, and I’m basically MIA in both of their lives for the next eight months, how is that going to affect Chloe? But this money, I know the money could really help her future. But I also know that she can’t just be left on her own. I just don’t want to make the wrong decision. And then I’m dealing with all of this Felicity shit…it’s over. She knows that, but she’s dragging it on. She went behind my back and told Matty we were getting married and even went to see a wedding planner. He got so excited, and then I had to be the one to tell him that wasn’t happening. He doesn’t understand that she only showed up and is doing this now because of you.”
“Because of me?” I touched my hand to my chest.
He nodded.
“Why me ?”
“Because she’s jealous of you?”
“Why would she be jealous of me? ” She had something I didn’t with Callum; she shared a child with him.
“Because it’s you,” he rasped with so much emotion my heart broke. “It’s always been you .”
“But how does she know about…me?”
I could see that whatever he’d told her, he didn’t want to share it with me. I wanted to ask, to push him on it, to find out what he’d said, but I didn’t. It was obvious he was very upset. The decision of whether or not to take the fight might seem like an easy one to most people, but Callum wasn’t most people. Having Chloe’s well-being in his hands is not something he would ever take lightly; in fact, it’s the opposite. He would make himself physically ill trying to make the ‘right’ decision for fear that the ‘wrong’ decision would hurt her and it would be his fault. I knew that he was confused as to why Danielle had chosen him to be Chloe’s guardian, but I wasn’t. If I were in her shoes, I would have done the same thing.
During our relationship, I might have brought some drama and baggage, but I was also what Nora referred to as the Callum Whisperer. Whenever he was overthinking or would get too much in his own head, I was the one person who could bring him out of it. I hoped that I still had that gift.
I turned to look at him as the cart descended. “Okay, so, I don’t have any idea what you must be going through or what it would feel like to have the responsibility of not one but two people’s happiness, well-being, and futures on your shoulders. I’m responsible for twenty kids’ snacks every day, and that’s a lot for me.” I smiled, and I got a little grin back. “So clearly, I’m not an expert, but from what I can see, I don’t think that there is one right answer. I think you just have to make the best decision you can with the information you have. That’s all any of us can do. You don’t have a crystal ball. You can’t see the future. Any decision you make could be the right one, and any decision you make could be the wrong one. Or both could be right and wrong.”
His lips curled at the corners. “Is that supposed to make me feel better?”
I shrugged. “Maybe. Because the truth is, when there is no right answer, then there’s no wrong one. Everyone can have an opinion, and if you’re asking me for that, I can give you mine. But only you can know what’s right for your son and your sister and your family. And whatever decision you make, if Chloe has you , then she’ll be fine. And if she’s not fine, she still has you, and anyone who has you when they're not fine has won the not-fine lottery. I could not ask for a better person to have when I’m not fine. You thrive when people are not fine. You are like the Not Fine Superhero; it’s like a bat signal to you. When someone you love is not fine, you throw on your cape and mask and fly in to save the day.”
He chuckled as he shook his head.
“I’m serious, Callum. I know you didn’t understand why Danielle named you Chloe’s guardian, but she knew exactly what she was doing.” I lifted my hand and put it over his chest. “You have one of, no, the best heart of any person I know. Just follow that. You’ll make the best choice. I know you will.”
His large hand reached up and covered mine, enveloping me completely. “How do you always say the perfect things at the perfect time?”
My eyes narrowed, and I tilted my head to the side. “Mmmm, I think ninety-nine point nine percent of Firefly would disagree with you on that.”
“Well, then ninety-nine point nine percent of Firefly is fucking wrong.”
I chuckled. “I mean, you won’t get any argument from me?—”
My response was cut off when Callum leaned forward, cupped my face in his hand, and claimed me in a kiss. His lips pressed against mine as his tongue slid into my mouth. The kiss was both tender and forceful. Soft and firm. Gentle and passionate. It was a swirl of contradictions.
His hand wrapped around the back of my neck, and the tips of his fingers flexed, causing my head to tilt back. The new position gave him total control. His tongue explored my mouth with mastery. I moaned into his mouth and barely noticed as the ride stopped. It wasn’t until he broke our kiss and I blinked my eyes open that I realized we were hanging at the top of the ride; the cabin swayed back and forth.
Callum’s forehead was pressed against mine for a brief moment before he leaned his head over the side. When he did, a man shouted up. “Stay calm. We’ll have you folks down in no time.”
When he turned back to me, he grinned. “We’re stuck.”
“We’re stuck?”
It was the same thing that had happened the first time we rode the Ferris wheel when we’d had our first kiss. I still remember how nervous I’d been, wondering if he was going to kiss me. I’d had such a huge crush on him for so many years. Since he was a year older than me and was one of the ‘popular kids,’ he never noticed me.
Believe it or not, before I started going out with Callum, I was painfully shy. I never wanted any attention directed at me. I think that stemmed from my mother getting so much attention with her bleached blonde hair, pinup curves, and less-than-discriminating taste in men. But once I was with Callum, it gave me an identity. Everyone in town knew Callum Knight and loved him. The town was big on sports, and he played basketball, baseball, and football. Besides his sporting achievements, the community held his family in high regard. Nora, as a midwife, had delivered quite a few residents and cared for others at the hospital. Naturally, Chuck’s role as mayor elevated Callum to a prominent position.
From the moment Callum took an interest in me, I was no longer “Wendy Carson’s daughter, that poor thing,” or “the Carson girl with no daddy,” or the “the Carson girl whose mama didn’t want her,” which was something my mom let everyone know whenever she got drunk.
I was Callum Knight’s girlfriend. And yes, I know that as a proud, card-carrying feminist, tying my identity to a man is not healthy. But when that same identity was tied to a mother like Wendy Carson, I would take a dick and balls any day, especially when they’re attached to a man like Callum. And eventually, I grew into myself. By the time I left for college, I was a fully realized, fully independent, I-am-woman-hear-me-roar badass. Well, maybe not all of those things, but I no longer depended on Callum for my identity.
Callum stared at me, lifting his hand slowly and cupping my cheek. He gently drew me closer to him. Our lips touched, and just like the first time we kissed, fireworks exploded, figuratively, that is. There weren’t literal fireworks like the actual day of our first kiss, which happened to be on the Fourth of July.
I got to have the sort of first kiss that John Hughes would write about. It was straight out of an angsty teen dramedy romance, which pretty much encapsulated our relationship.
The kiss deepened as he slid his tongue against mine, and my head tilted to the side. His thumb grazed my cheek as his left hand cradled my face. I grabbed his shoulder, turning slightly, trying to get closer to him. As I did, I felt his right hand on my leg. It had taken so much self-control to keep my hands to myself tonight and not beg him to touch me. My sex throbbed in anticipation as I felt the graze of his fingertips slide up my inner thighs as he made his way to my core. My hand moved down his shoulder, and I grabbed onto his forearm; the muscles rippled beneath my palms.
When he reached the apex of my legs, his fingers began to gently rub against the cotton barrier of my underwear. The pressure he applied sent tingles spreading through my limbs. My hips began to roll into his touch as our kiss deepened. Waves of sensation washed over me as my sex pulsed with increasing pleasure. I felt myself getting closer and closer to the edge when his finger slid beneath the cotton covering my feminine folds. The moment his finger touched my swollen sex, a flash of need spiked in me.
Desperate for Callum to feel the same pleasure he was giving me, I clumsily unbuttoned his jeans and slid my hand beneath the waistband of his boxer briefs. The tip of his middle finger rubbed along my sex from the base to the top as I wrapped my hand around his shaft and gripped him tightly. I began to stroke up and down as he flicked my clit.
Callum groaned into my mouth, and I bit down on his lower lip. When my teeth sank into his flesh, his girth swelled into my palm. I tightened my fingers around him and continued to work his shaft. The angle was limited, but I was able to get short pumps. His finger began to flick faster, and without warning all of my feminine nerve endings exploded with bliss. My entire body trembled with pleasure as Callum continued kissing me, absorbing my needy whimpers of release.
After the crash of my orgasm subsided, I slumped against Callum, catching my breath, my hand still holding him tightly, his hand still nestled between my legs as his finger lazily traced my most sensitive spot, and all of the energy drained from my body.
“I’m glad the ride?—”
In the middle of me telling him that I was glad the ride didn’t restart, it jerked forward. I quickly pulled my hand out of Callum’s pants and wondered how he was going to hide just how excited he was because it was very noticeable. As I adjusted my underwear beneath the blanket, I turned to ask him what his plan was to disguise the evidence of what we’d been doing and saw him licking the fingers he’d just removed from between my legs, and I was suddenly at a loss for words.