Chapter 12

EVERETT

"Oh gosh, yes, fuck me, babe." A woman's voice rings in the long hallway while I climb up the long stairs to my boyfriend's apartment. "Fuck me harder, won't you?" The voices are loud yet hushed. "I can handle it. Pummel into me faster if you can." As I walk closer to his apartment at the end of the hallway, I can see his lights are on, and they brighten the darkness saturating the atmosphere in the long passage leading to his front door. His neighbour who lives on the left side of his apartment is never home since he's always doing a night shift somewhere. The apartment on the right side of my boyfriend's place is currently up for sale. My heart freezes in my chest, and my stomach lurches. Maybe the left-side apartment guy who's prone to working long nights so much so he can proudly call himself a workaholic finally got himself a life and a girlfriend?

Tell me why that can't be true?

Please remind me of a valid reason, brain.

"Oh baby, yes, yes, yes, oh bloody fuck yes." The woman's loud voice is back. I try to concentrate and locate which side of the wall it's coming from amid my fresh bout of anxiety. "Baby, you feel so good inside me. You're doing so great. Just like that!" There's a loud moan following a satisfying laugh from the man. "Oh yeah, you're so good in bed, baby."

I can recognise that laugh anywhere.

My brain can remember that laugh even in my sleep.

That's Nathan's laugh.

My heart shatters itself into a million tiny pieces. 

I can hear him through the door. His noisy laughter permeates the air and the space beyond it as he laughs as if he's doing something he loves. All the while as he fucks another woman. A woman that's not me.

He's cheating on me.

And he's enjoying himself.

How can he do that?

Why on earth he's doing someone that's not me?

The panic swells up inside my core, and I can't stop but feel an intense bout of rage swirling up inside my stomach. My nostrils flare, and I clench my fingers into tight fists. Something comes over me.

"You know what?" Nathan's voice seeps out of the door as clear as day. "My girlfriend of three years won't even let me fuck her. I come around thrice a day thinking of her tight little pussy, but she won't let me touch her." He sounds happy but, at the same time, sad. "It was before I thought fucking you was an option, though. You are so much better than her, anyway." He moves loudly inside her. "Plus, your pussy is to die for. It's a man's dream, and to have you wrapped around me while I pump inside you feels so good. You feel so nice around my cock."

"I can feel your frustration, babe." This time, her voice is normal and almost caring. "I would be frustrated too if I didn't have a release every so often. You're not the only human who wants to fuck their own girlfriend. Her keeping you away from her sex is cruel."

In a span of seconds, the voice registers in my head. I almost drop the gift bag I have in my hand. My heart crashes against its walls.

This betrayal really isn't happening to me. . .

Nathan speaks again.

"That's what irritated me the most about Evie, you know?" He blows out a harsh breath. "I waited and waited and waited for her patiently. I was a good boyfriend to her all these years in the hopes of her recovering from the trauma of that tragic accident. But it was as if, no, nope, she didn't want to see any colour in her life. She didn't want to move on from the grief of losing her parents. I tried everything with her." He chuckles before continuing. "I spent a long time seducing her, but every time I tried to touch or get intimate with her, she made excuses." He laughs a little longer at his words. "She always said that she was busy with work. After a while, I stopped trying. I could have only handled so much rejection. If I had accepted defeat earlier, I wouldn't have wasted so much time on her." He sighs, and then his voice takes on a sombre tone. "The last time I tried to get close to her after I cooked her a nice homemade meal and cleaned around the apartment to make everything look nice and pleasing for her, do you know how she reacted?" A beat. "She repaid that gesture with flinching while I tried to cop a feel through her shirt while we were watching a romantic movie. I don't even like romance." He snorts. "She's such a poor tease."

"Hey, hey." She starts speaking again. "Why don't we get back to where we were, honey? Can't you just fuck me and process your emotions while you are inside of me?" She chuckles. "I was so close to coming, you know?"

He spanks her quite loudly. You could hear the whip of his strong hand hitting bare flesh in the long corridor.

"As you say so, babe." He breathes in her hair. I can watch them from the crack in the door. "You've been so bad tonight, babe. Haven't you, Caiti?"

She moans.

"Yes, babe." He bites her on the shoulder. "Fuck me now, babe."

"Let me stretch you out." He pushes inside of her. "I'm going to stretch you out while I'll massage your tits." He scoffs. "I wish your tits were as big as Evie's, though."

Hearing everything through the door, I slide against the wooden surface to the floor. I wonder if I should cry or break the door down, so the two people I love the most in this world won't fuck anymore, but I can't find the courage to intrude on them. So I put my head against the door and hear them both come one after another, cheating on me, betraying me.

How in the world did I ever decide to trust these two people? 

Why did I choose these two people on this earth out of a billion others?

Had I lost my mind?

I can't believe this is happening to me.

How do I stop them?

As I hear them on the brink of an orgasmic explosion, I summon up my courage and find the key to my boyfriend's apartment in my purse. It was his second-year-anniversary gift to me. He said the tiny gesture shows 'how much he trusts me.' I didn't know that this was the day the little key would come in handy. I slide the key into the door and unlock the doorknob, and the door springs wide open. With tears in my eyes, I watch the two people closest to me on this earth, bare-naked in each other's arms. 

My boyfriend is fucking my best friend.

Am I on a reality-tv episode of bamboozled?

They are so committed to the act of coitus that they don't even take notice of me for a minute or two. I fold my arms over my chest as tears fall from the ends of my eyes. When Caiti's eyes catch a little glimpse of me standing in the dark hallway, she slips her arms on Nathan's shoulder to hold him. Her mouth is agape as her jaw hits the floor, and she freezes into his big arms while he's busy pounding away into her. 

It takes another three minutes before my boyfriend notices me while he's inside my best friend. I bawl louder, and he turns to see me with my hand over my mouth, not wanting to make loud noises and bring more people to observe the scene unfolding in front of my very eyes.

Everett is never the one to make a scene.

"Evie," he literally pulls himself out of my best friend, "I can explain. I-I didn't mean to do this." My eyes get so overwhelmed with tears that I can't see clearly anymore. They break apart from their scandalous embrace, and Caiti reaches for her dress lying on the floor. "You know what? This-this is," he runs his hand through his hair and gestures between him and Caiti, "this is a mistake. I made a mistake, Evie." 

I turn around, wiping the corners of my eye with the back of my hand. The gift bag I have brought with me, I take a guesstimate before sending it flying into the air in his general direction. The bag collides with Nathan's chest and the goodies and speciality items inside the bag spill on the floor.

"Take that, you bastard." I manage to find my voice. I pivot on my feet again as I find Caiti's eyes. "Don't come home tonight. Anyway, move out tomorrow morning while I'm at work. Better yet, never show me your face. I don't want to see you ever again." Then I exhale a broken sigh, full of emotion. "If you try to lay a finger on Smokey before you leave, I swear to God that I would hammer my fist harder into your face than my boyfriend's dick was inside your cunt. It will hurt, and it won't be pretty."

After I say that, I'm running down the stairs, crying and freaking out of my mind.