I mean, she’s smaller than me and tiny in frame, so there’s no way she was able to attack him to the extent of leaving kisses on his body and opening his clothes without his being able to stop her. I was in the bathroom for like ten minutes, so I'm sure he had plenty of time to get something started before I came out. Maybe he heard me coming, and that’s why he was cooling it off again.What am I thinking?Do I really think he would cheat on me?I don’t know anymore, not after seeing that.He’s been acting weird with that girl all night and has been actively avoiding her without any explanation about who she is. She's the one person he never introduced me to. Maybe those should have been the warning signs from the first minute she arrived. Maybe his distance and avoidance were to hide something between them and not that he didn’t want to see her.“Kayla, stop.” Dane tries to grab me from behind a second time as I get up into the room and twist out of his grip. I push him away as hard
“You’re scarily quiet. What are you thinking about?” Dane and I are lying face to face in the dark, under the sheets in bed, and curled up together so we’re nose to nose. It’s been maybe twenty minutes of this, and I’m frustrated that I don’t feel any better.It’s like my confidence and security have taken a knock, and my heart is yearning for some extreme way to feel back to how I was an hour ago. Some deep emotional need to have him wipe away my hurt.“I’m fine…just…” I exhale heavily and curl into his body some more, resting my temple against his neck and inhaling his familiar scent. I can’t put into words the weird residual melancholy that tonight has left me. Maybe it was the realization that Dane alone has the power to destroy my heart should he ever actually betray me like that, and it’s made me feel small and vulnerable. Trusting someone with your soul in that way.Maybe it's being slapped with the reality that he has had sex with girls before, had some connection and relation
Dane almost catapults out of the bed. Grips my shoulder with one hand as I move in and suck the tip into my mouth and lets out a groan that almost makes me climax. Its so primal and raw and empowering.He tastes slightly salty, smooth, hard, and yet also good. Hard and thick, and I can barely get comfortable around him with my lips as this is such an alien sensation for me. Not sure if I should be doing anything else except sucking him like a lollipop. It’s not like I have ever watched it be done and only heard girls at school talking about it.How hard can it be?“Kayla….you don’t have…oh fuck…” His words die off as I find my way around what I'm doing, having no clue if it's even right. I suck him some more, explore him with my tongue and lips and take moments to experience this new feeling. Mentally wondering how far into my mouth he should be because I don’t want to end up gagging and throwing up all over him. Better to play it safe and keep only the first inch of him in there and
The house is eerily quiet, even though it’s not that early, and the sun is streaming in all the lower floor windows. Following Dane as he leads me by the hand to the kitchen, aware everyone must still be asleep. Unlike us, who ended up in bed at a reasonable hour, most of them were up until dawn. Even Tyler and Lees didn’t come tumbling into the room until it was almost light outside and are currently comatose, wrapped up in a fully clothed tangle of limbs and sheets upstairs. They are adorably cute together, like two exhausted toddlers who fell to sleep where they landed after playing.I’m tired this morning, but not overly so, and a little fragile down below, even though I didn’t think I would be. It’s not like he was rough on me or that we did it for hours, yet I can definitely feel subtle tenderness as a reminder that last night wasn't a dream. I still don’t regret it at all.I love him.Dane lets me go to rifle in the nearest cabinets on the wall closest to us and hauls out two m
“Afternoon.” I wander into the kitchen to find Dane already here where I expected to see him. Sitting cradling a half-drunk coffee with one hand while he reads one of the books I gave him for his birthday. He’s been patiently waiting for me. Looking adorably hot, perched this way and focused on the comic.It’s a nice, quiet Sunday afternoon to recover from last night, and we have only been home for about two hours. We took time to separate because our parents were home, knowing they wouldn't stay here all day. Sunday is their sort of ritualistic date day for going out to markets and art galleries. I had an essay to finish, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to focus with him beside me after last night, so it was a good use of time until they left. So he left me be and seems to have been amusing himself by reading his birthday gift.“Hey, gorgeous.” Dane drops his book, lets go of his mug, and slides out of the breakfast bar to meet me on the way in, kissing me lightly and ruffling my hair
“Mom.” Is the only word I can gasp out as I push Dane off me at speed and scramble to right my bra inside my shirt and haul my shorts back into place. Shame flushing over my entire body that we just got caught this way, and I want the ground to open and swallow me. Mortified about what they saw us doing and yet, at the same time, hitting an all-time ‘oh shit’ moment because I don’t want this to be the end. I don’t want Dane to be sent to London. I don’t want to lose him this way.I have an urge to wail and run away, taking him with me rather than face the wrath of our parents like this. My limbs are already trembling in cold fear.Dane shifts away quickly, too, to tend to his pulled-around outfit, turning away directly to probably calm the boner, causing him an obvious trouser tent, and yet it’s like time stands still. The sudden eery, heavy atmosphere and tense silence as though the world has hushed and the only noise is my mother’s subtle simpering.Our parents are standing like a f
“Bullshit…this is bullshit. You’re lying.” Dane erupts before I can really swallow down the words that have wounded me with a sucker punch to my heart. “You’ve always hated me, and I wouldn’t put it past you to stoop this low and lie….so I break up with Kayla.” He half yells, half accuses, straining forward to get in her face, and I can taste the growing despair and anger circling him like a cyclone. “I don’t believe you.”“This isn’t true…you would have told me…dad would have….” I trail off, whimpering the words as something clicks in my head and slices through me with speed and severity, making my legs tingle, and my limbs grow weak. “Is that why? Why has he been this way towards me for the past ten years?”I don’t want to believe this or swallow it down, but it’s like something just smacked me in the head and woke up the underlying doubts.It races through my brain and thunders through my entire body like a shocking cold wall of ice. Tingling my brain through my scalp, and even my
“You have to eat, open the door. We need to talk.”“Go away…. Leave me alone.” My anger and venom have not dissipated any; instead, it grows by the hour. Irritated by my mom’s lingering presence because she just won’t leave me alone.Her whiny, pleading voice only riles fresh anger in me, and I throw my pillow at my bedroom door in frustration. Annoyed by her presence, and go back to staring at my cell, waiting for a reply that hasn’t come. I feel like I am going silently insane, and time has come to a standstill. I don’t know what else to do but sit here and wait given my entire existence has been turned upside down and my hope for any future is so far away I cannot reach him.Dane has been gone for days, yet he hasn’t called, he hasn’t texted me back, and Bryan has been silent, too, like they were sucked into some soundproofed bubble where all contact has ceased. For me, anyway. I don’t know if my mother speaks to them because I can't stomach her at all, even for a second, to have o
“We can go to my study…Dane, just Kayla.” She adds as though he will follow and he probably was going to, but she’s right. Something started between her and I and should be resolved that way. Dane has been shielding me too much lately because of my inability to face more drama. I need to put my big girl panties back on. Her and Dane have nothing to say to one another anyway, and he will only put her on the defensive, which I want to avoid.“I’ll be close by….just yell if you need me…… Very close by.” Dane doesn’t lower his voice; instead gets louder with his warning tone, making it obvious to my mom that he doesn’t trust her, and I pat his arm to get him to release me.I slide out of his arms and follow my mom out of the kitchen, across the hall, and into the study without looking back, even though I can feel all their eyes follow me out. Already, my insides are like a washing machine because I do not know what exactly she intends to say to me.My mom is being weirdly quiet, too, and
“You four are making me feel chronically single.” Hannah huffs, pushing the cans of soda across the breakfast bar towards Elisa as Tyler opens up some bags of chips for us to share. We have a stack of pizza boxes waiting to dive into and a plan to darken the nook to spend the day eating junk and watching movies. Dane and I are too tired for anything else and feel like we are on some emotional comedown after a month of hell.“What happened to your Korean boyfriend? That distance could not separate you from?” Dane chimes in with obvious sarcasm oozing, while leaning into me from behind to deposit the dip we made. It’s clear to me that teasing Hannah is a full-time occupation when they are in the same room. She really is like his annoying younger sister, even if she is our age.“I am devoted to Min Yoongi, but I would like to experience a present boyfriend. Someone I can touch and laugh with.” Hannah sulks slightly, clearly regretting her life choices.“I can’t imagine anyone would want
My Dad never calls me, rarely picks mine up, and never texts either. So, seeing it now, flashing so invasively on my phone is enough to make my heart thud through my chest painfully.“Do you want me to give you space to take it?” Dane interrupts my obvious inability to move, breaking the spell it’s cast over me.“No…stay!” A sense of panic grips my stomach and throat, and the sudden cold wash of nerves sobers my good mood. Instantly afraid of what he is calling me for even though, logically, I know.My mom must have called him, or Bryan, at least.Maybe he wants to clarify…I don’t even know.“Are you going to answer it or keep staring at it?” Dane interrupts the deer in the headlight motion of me holding it at half arm’s length, and I blink at it, then him, and shake my head.“Do you need me to do it?”“I don’t know.” I sound terrified. I don’t think I have it in me to answer the call. There is so much grey area when it comes to my dad. So many times I have been hurt by him that faci
“Well, this is depressing.” Dane wheels his case into his old barren bedroom, gazing around at the emptiness even though all his furniture is still there. “It feels like someone else's room.”All the personality is gone without his things in here, and it smells like a fresh, floral hotel, thanks to Monique. His art, posters, pictures, trinkets and books are all gone, leaving empty walls, shelves, and surfaces where he used to have such an array of masculine things, more so after he moved in here permanently and brought it all from his mom’s house.“Imagine how it made me feel watching it get this way….you’re an ass.” I throw him a mock glare and get a kiss blown back at me.“I wanted you to miss me.” He winks and goes back to his case. In a happy mood ever since we started packing to come here.I gaze around, infected by his happiness, and yet sigh at the memories of being in here without him.Even the lack of his laundry tossed on the floor somehow makes this place impersonal. The be
“There’s a lot that this test result will change….I know now is probably not the best time to talk about where we go from here. You probably need to process it the same way we did, but I want you to know….I'm not going back to the UK. I’ll sort it out myself. Enroll back in school, find somewhere to stay, maybe with Tyler….” Dane sounds so far removed from the immature rebel of months ago who was forever making my life hell and living stupidly. He sounds like this experience has aged him so much.He has a sensible head on, his eyes set on the future and he’s not reacting one ounce to my mom. It’s like she no longer has any affect on him.“You’ll move back home, there is no argument in that. I’ll call the school and arrange for you to go in and re-enroll. I’ll call your mom and explain things. Don’t worry about anything. I told you, didn’t I… always your home and whenever you wanted to come back.”For being the fragile one here, Bryan seems to be the one most resigned and okay with thi
“Wait.” I tug Dane back by the hand he’s interlaced in mine, so he stops abruptly near Bryan’s room door, and I pull him to turn to me. Panick is overtaking my soul now we’re close to actually doing this. Walking in here it’s been growing inside of me like a building storm.All my bravado and anger have dissipated because I am so over trauma and tears in my life that I want to avoid any more conflict and run to hide instead. I think I have reached a point of fragility that my emotions don’t want to take anymore.My nerves are bubbling over, my heart is racing, and I'm swinging between cold and hot sweats that have my entire body flushed and trembling. I’m genuinely scared even though my mom is the one who should be.There is no more fight left in me. Not when the possibility of Dane being ripped away from me a second time is all too real, and that thought terrifies me more now I have lived it once. I can’t do that again. I won’t survive.“It’s going to be okay, I promise. We do this a
“Like what?” Hannah squeaks in outrage, crossing her arms on the table to lean in and peer at him, that he might be dissing the man of her dreams or her favorite band. Finding insult in that but nothing else he had said before this.“Your face,” Dane snaps back at her before flicking her in the forehead and pushing her back again.“Ughh.. See… Why is he like this? Is this what you put up with? How can you date him when he’s so awful?” Hannah throws her hands up in frustration, and yet all of this only makes me relax about what kind of relationship they had. If Elisa wasn't so feeble and gentle, I know this is how they would act together. At times, there are glimpses of it, but Elisa is too good-natured and cannot sass. There’s nothing in it.I can see the dynamic slowly opening up between them. She’s like an unwanted younger sibling he both doesn’t like but also does but is forced to take out with him. Annoyed by her presence, but I can tell they also have a sense of relaxed and comf
“You look nervous. Relax….What are you scared of?” Dane brushes my hair from my face for the third time, running a finger down my cheek before leaning in and pecking me lightly on the lips. Igniting the same burst of internal flutters, he always gives me, and a layer of warmth. Suddenly, in my world, everything feels right again, just having him by my side, but I still cannot escape this constant gnawing feeling in the pit of my stomach.“Every time I have seen this girl, I was a bitch to her….I’m still not ok with the fact you spent the last month with her while ignoring me.” Try as hard as I might, I cannot quench the sense of nausea and dread while sitting here waiting for her to show up. “I feel weird meeting her this way and under these circumstances.”I should never have agreed to this.It’s a clean, bright diner near the hotel they are staying at and the hospital, so we intend to stay here until we’re ready to face our parents and work out a game plan. Hannah is a formality I
“Deal…. I want my boyfriend back how he was. I don’t want to remember any of this shitty separation. Can we get back together?” I ask stupidly even though it’s obvious we are already making up. I just need him to say the words to help with the insecurity I am feleing after how cold he was. “I want my boyfriend back.”“Technically, babycakes, we never broke up. Neither of us said the words so we don’t need to get back together. He shrugs like this is the most logical thing ever, and I lean back to scowl at him.He does not get out of his asshole past four weeks that easily. The boy really is trying to pull a fast one.“Really?” I ask in obvious, oozing sarcasm. “Because I remember clearly a certain boy telling me he was going no contact and not coming back from the UK before he blocked me on absolutely everything….that was a very final break up even if you never said ‘the words.’ You can’t be in a relationship with someone who moved abroad and refuses to communicate with you.” I point