Chapter 16 River
Sixteen
River
I pushed into our house after another long, pointless day of school, one day closer to the day I had to leave. I shut the door as footsteps thumped toward me. My sister tore down the stairs, hair flying, her bag clutched tight to her chest. She stopped short.
“Oh, hey,” Amelia said, not looking at me.
“School just got out,” I said, hefting my own backpack. “When did you get home?”
“Just now, but I’m…going out with some friends.”
“Until when?”
“Until none of your business,” Amelia snapped, then flinched at her own harsh tone. “Dad took Mom to her doctor’s appointment. They’ve been there all day.”
“So you stayed home from school?”
“Yes, okay? Because I can’t stand the bullshit,” she said, her voice breaking. “How am I supposed to listen to Ms. Sutter drone on about fractions when Mom and Dad are going to come home with bad news? The worst news.”
“We don’t know that.”
“I do. I’m going to the movies with Kayla, okay? I just…have to escape for a little bit. And I can’t be here when they get back. I can’t.”
“I know. I get it,” I said. “It’s fine. Go. Have fun.”
“You won’t tell them I ditched, will you?”
“No, but only if you promise you won’t get in trouble. And you don’t do it again.”
“Yes, sir,” she said, sarcasm turning her hard again, but then a small smile broke through. “Thanks, River.”
She bounded past me and out the door while I went to the kitchen for a snack, though I hardly had an appetite. I didn’t want to be here when Mom and Dad came back either. I didn’t want to be anywhere. The urge came over me again, to run out the door and not stop. No destination, just away.
“I’ll still be me wherever I go.”
I sat in the silent kitchen for a few minutes, trying not to think about how its solace and homey warmth were all going to change in a few short months, then headed upstairs.
Violet stood in the hallway. She must’ve forgotten Mom had her appointment and didn’t need a PCV today.
Lost in my thoughts, I hadn’t heard her come in.
“Hey.”
“Hi,” she whispered. Her hands twisted in front of her, and an almost panicked worry flashed over her face.
“You okay? You look a little sad.”
“It’s been a rough couple of days,” she said.
“I hear you. Want to go somewhere and get something to eat? Take your mind off things?”
A key part of my grand plan to keep my world from imploding was to ask her for a second chance and to go to prom with me, but in that moment, she looked like she needed a friend just as much as I did.
Violet’s face fell a little, as if my invitation touched her more than she expected, and then hardened into determination. Her deep blue eyes regarded me, raking me up and down.
I smiled. “It’s a yes or no question—”
The rest of my words were lost as Violet flew at me and smashed her mouth to mine in a hard, flat kiss.
I stumbled back in shock, my lips stiff and closed as her arms went around me.
She peppered my face with kisses, like a woodpecker.
A wild, desperate thought took hold—I can like guys so long as I like girls more.
This was my chance to salvage my life. To stop living every moment as if I were betraying myself.
I kissed Violet back, determined to ignite a fire between us, and she seemed just as bent on making something happen. Every awkward clack of teeth or uninspired touch of tongues only spurred her harder. She plastered her mouth to mine until I had to gasp for breath.
“Violet?”
“Your room.”
“You sure?”
“Yes. No more talking.”
We made our way to my bedroom in a fumbling dance of awkward, tepid kisses.
Violet pushed my jacket off, and we tumbled to my bed where she straddled me, her body light and delicate where Holden was solid and hard.
I shuddered at memories of that perfect night, where he’d reached around me to take my cock in his hand as if it were his.
Using his own release as lubrication, then dropping to his knees…
Heat flared through me, then grew cold again as I came back into my room with Violet.
“I never expected this from you,” I stammered, putting words between our uncoordinated mashing of lips.
“Neither did I.”
She kissed me again, and I tried to kick Holden out of the room, but it was useless. Against my will, I compared every touch of hers to his. Violet was too soft against my hard chest. Her small mouth and delicate lips couldn’t take the rawness I wanted in a kiss.
She wasn’t him.
Violet must’ve been forcing a desire she didn’t feel too. We realized the futility of that at the same time. She rolled off me, and we lay on our backs, rigid with embarrassment.
“I’m sorry,” she said in a small voice.
“Me too,” I said. “I’m usually better…at that. You just took me by surprise is all.”
“Okay.”
“That’s why I wasn’t…better.”
Pathetic.
“You said that already,” she said and covered her eyes, her body shaking with silent sobs. “I’m so sorry.”
“Hey.” I gently pulled her hands from her eyes. “It’s okay.”
“It’s not okay. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
“Nothing’s wrong with you. It’s me who’s messed up. Believe me.”
She shook her head. “No. You didn’t deserve that. Everything’s been going all wrong. I used to be so organized and on top of things. Now…” She threw her hands up. “Now it’s all falling apart. I’m falling apart. Doing things I’d never do. Being someone I’m not.”
I stared at the ceiling. “Yeah. I know exactly how that is.”
“You do?”
“Definitely.”
She rolled to face me. “How? I mean, it seems like everything’s going how it should for you.”
“That’s because I’m really good at making it look like everything’s going as it should.” I handed her a tissue.
“Thank you.” She dabbed her eyes. “Nancy told me you got into Alabama and Texas A&M.”
“I did.”
“You don’t look happy.”
Happy. It felt distant and unreal, the road paved with roadblocks too heavy to ever move.
“Can I tell you a secret?” I asked.
“Of course.”
“Swear you won’t tell anyone?”
“Cross my heart.”
I sighed. “I don’t want to play football anymore.”
“What? Really?” Violet propped herself on her elbow, her eyes wide.
“I haven’t wanted to…since forever, actually. It’s been more my dad’s dream than mine. He was a big star in his day and could’ve gone pro until a knee injury took him out.”
“Wow,” Violet breathed. “But you’re so good at it. Like Tom Brady or Peyton Manning.”
“It’s wasteful, right? To want to throw it all away?”
I waited for her to tell me yes. That I needed to get my shit together and do the right thing for my dad and my career. But Violet shook her head, her eyes clear and honest.
“Well, no. Not if it makes you unhappy. What do you really want to do?”
I lay back and stared at the ceiling. “You’ll laugh. Or think I’m a huge dork.”
She smirked. “As someone who dabbled in not being a dork for a short time until Evelyn Gonzalez returned me to the land of dorks from whence I came, you have my word.”
We shared a laugh, and I told her my dream of living here, working at the shop, and starting a family and how my father would be crushed to know I’d give up football in a heartbeat to have it.
“Please don’t tell anyone,” I said. “I don’t know why I even told you, except that I feel comfortable with you.” I grinned. “Just not when we’re kissing.”
She laughed. “Story of my life.”
We both stared at the ceiling, settling into a deeper friendship that already felt more real than anything I had with my other friends. Like Donte. His insinuations rattled in my head, and Holden felt so far away.
“So, Violet.”
“So, River.”
“Since we’re both secretly dorks in disguise, how about we go to prom together?”
A laugh burst out of her. “Oh sure. Why not?” She glanced at me, and her smile fell. “You’re serious?”
“As the plague. We’d just go as friends.”
“Don’t you have a gaggle of girls waiting for you to ask them out?”
I nearly laughed out loud at how Holden would react to that question.
“Ha, no. Honestly, I don’t even want to go—”
“Way to sell it to me, Whitmore.”
I laughed. “Sorry. I mean, I do want to go, for my parents’ sake. Dad keeps asking which girl I’m bringing, and Mom loves you. We should go. It’s our senior year.”
Violet pretended to think. “I seem to remember a certain other dance that you were supposed to take me to and then didn’t.”
“I know. I’m so sorry. But this is how I make it up to you.”
“I suppose,” she said and was quiet for a moment. “I’ll go to the prom with you. But only as friends.”
Of course only as friends. Our awkward tumble in my bed made it painfully clear I had nothing else to give, and I wasn’t about to toy with Violet’s heart. My douchebaggery had its limits.
“Just friends.” I grinned and touched a small cut on my lip. “Safer for me that way.”
Violet rolled her eyes. “I’m never going to live this down, am I?”
I nudged her arm. “It’s already forgotten.”
A short, comfortable silence settled between us, and I felt the integrity and honesty of this girl.
Violet was smart. Kind. She wanted to be a doctor.
You could tell things to a doctor, and they couldn’t repeat them.
Like a priest. When I told her my football secret, I felt it in my bones that she’d keep it safe.
If I told her about Holden…
“Violet?”
“Yeah?”
“About homecoming…”
“What about it?”
The words were there, ready to fall. I sighed them out instead. There was nothing left between Holden and me except the constant ache of missing him. Like a low-grade fever that never went away. He’d kicked me out of his life, and mine was on track with iron rails, no way to change course.
“I’m sorry I ditched you, Violet.”
She frowned. “You’ve already apologized a hundred times.”
“I know. I just… I kind of miss you.”
“You do?”
“I know we never talked much, but when we did, it was…good. Do you think we could keep talking? Now and then?”
She smiled. “I’d like that.”
“Me too.”