Never Been Kissed: A Never Been Novel (27 page)

I frown, turning into him, so his arm is resting along my waist. “You
have
those things, you
are
not
just those things.”

“Exactly.”

“I’m not following.”

Hunter tucks some hair behind my ear, hands infinitely gentle on my face, tracing his fingers over my cheekbone, down along the
bridge of my nose, to my lips.

“I’m a way to get off, baby. I’m also a paycheck,
a guarantee of a cozy future.”

“Where do
es Matty factor into all this?”

“He doesn’t. She’d ship him off as soon as the marriage license
was signed. Not gonna happen.”

“Yeah, over my fraking dead body. Who the hell does she think she is? Lilith?” I rest my hand against the side of his neck, the words
I love you
choking me with the force they need to come out with.

“Are you talking
about one of your shows again?”

“You bet.”

Hunter chuckles in the darkness, the sound so intimate and sexy, I can’t help but snuggle closer, warmth hitting my chest because I can make him do that.

“Which one is this?” I love that he wants to know more about me, about the shows I love to watch. I didn’t know it, but I want to share with
him the good parts of my life.

I tell him through two yawns what
Supernatural
is about. Two brothers have been raised to fight evil, kill demons and all sorts of supernatural creatures that destroy human lives. It’s about sacrifice, and family, and what you do for those you love, no matter the cost to yourself. It’s about angels and demons, and scary creatures that make me sleep with the light on the night of the episode. It’s about forgiveness and weakness and honesty and loss. It’s about hope and the chance for a better life.

“Aren’t you terrified of going to go to sleep every night? What if we lived in a world where all that s
hit existed?”

“I already have packets of salt in my purse for such an occasion. Salt stops, like, eighty percent of things that go bump in the night. And, and, and the whole show is about killing these things. It’s basically like a manual. I know how to kill everything already.”

“Fuck.”

“What?”

“I just pictured you in leather pants and a black tank. Jesus
Christ
your ass would look amazing in leather pants. Then I wouldn’t be able to let you out of the house, since every guy with a half a dick would want a piece of you.”

I admit the truth. “I t
hink only you see me that way.”

“Baby, it’s not
my fault you haven’t noticed.”

“Right.” I half-fake another yawn until I almost pop my jaw with the force of it. “I’m tired, I want to go to sleep now. Would you shut up?” I yawn again, snuggle closer. “Wait a sec, Hunt. Who’s Jules?”

As close as I am, I feel it, his body tightening up, the chill between our bodies as he imperceptibly moves away from me.

“It doesn’t matter. She’s Matty’s mom and she died a long time ago. Sweet dreams, baby.” I get a kiss on my mouth (how does he
see?)
and even though Hunt pulls me closer to him, if feels like we’re miles apart.

I wake up thinking that I must be on the surface of the sun. I’m hot and sweaty. Cracking an eyelid open, I can see why. Hunter MacLaine has wrapped himself around me like the kraken pulverizes a pirate ship. On my back as I am, a heavy arm is wrapped around my rib cage, and his hot breath is on my neck as he’s nuzzled there sometime during the night. A leg is trapping both of mine underneath his. I’m trapped.

Did I
mention I’m hot? Like, boiling?

Hunt makes a sleepy snort in my neck, which makes me grin, even as I try and wiggle out from under him. The bastard just winds up closer to me, and really, I’m having a
hot flash
at twenty-five years old.

“Hunter?” I whisper, rocking my body into his, trying to nudge him awake. “Can you get up now?” I wiggle some more, and an affirmative sound comes out of him, but the kind of affirmative sound that a little kid would do when his Mom tells him to wake up for school. A sound for
me to shut up so he can sleep.

“Hunter, I’m dying here. Please, for the love of the Winchesters, can you
please
get up?” I’m still whispering, but I inject more bite to the words and another body wiggle.

“I think my sugar’s high.” Oh, God. His morning voice. Why can’t nothing he do be gross? It’s not fair to us normal folk, really. His voice is deep and raspy from not being used all night, and as close as we are, he’s pressed up against me, and I can feel the words vibrate in his chest.
Wow
.

It takes a few seconds for the words to get through my waking-up-with-Hunt haze, since last time we actually slept together, I bolted nice and early to avoid this awkward situation. So not awkward now, except I’m burning alive!

“If you let go of me, I can go get your insulin. But you have to let go, first.”

His arms tighten around me in answer, all
yeah, right
. “I just want to sleep it off. You don’t have to do anything yet.”

“Fine. But Hunter, I swear to Castiel, I’m going to melt unless you let go of me. Please, have a heart.” A bead of sweat slides down between my boobs. I can feel the hair near my ears and the top of my forehead getting damp. Am I sleeping next to the
Human Torch
or what?

That affirmative sound again.

“C’mon, let me check on Matty, and I can make us breakfast.”

“I hate
eating breakfast,” his voice is still sleepy, but he’s loosened his hold on me a little. Just a little mind you, not enough for freedom. Gah!

“You’re breathing on my neck, and it feels like you’re breathing fire on
me!”
My voice is rising with every single word, still in a whisper. I have no idea what time it is, as his curtains are drawn, but telling by the light and the lack of total opaqueness of his curtains, it has to be somewhere around eight or nine. Maybe. Whatever.

Did he just
bite
me? My spine is made of adamantium, and my whole body is doing a great impression of a field-post.
What just happened?

“Stay with me.”

I wiggle again, feeling like I’m doing an awful dance to LMFAO’s Party Rock Anthem trying to get free. “Could you let go? I’m dying over here.”

“Fucking shit. Why don’t you want to stay in bed with me?”

Thank you baby Jesus - he finally rolls over.

“I’m not used to sleeping with someone,” oh, shit! “
the whole night, okay? I mean, you’re throwing enough body heat to melt the ice shelves in the Arctic.” I get up to a sitting position. After all this talk, it finally hits me what I did last night, or what should be nagging me this morning. Too many unanswered questions between us, and whatever we have, frail and weak trying to keep it all at bay.

I don’t like it, but what am I going to do? Strap him to a chair, pour artificial light in his face and do torture
Ace Ventura
style with a fork, a knife, and a plate? I shudder, just thinking about that sound.

My back is to him. I don’t usually care what I look like in the morning. I usually get pillow battle scars on my face from pressing into it too hard during the night, and my hair does whatever the hell it wants
. Hunter’s shirt is twisted around my torso, showing Hunter a strip of my lower back. Shit. My sweats are tangled along my legs, one up to the knee, the other twisted around completely.

All in all, I make a striking attractive figure, and I really don’t know how Tom Hiddleston hasn’t found me and married me yet.
Right
.

I stumble into Hunter’s bathroom and do the whole routine, eyeing his toothbrush if I should be stealing it. I use my finger to brush my teeth instead, half-smiling in the mirror when I see Matty’s Iron Man one, and
Spider-man toothpaste.

And now my cheeks are burning. I look away from the spot where Hunter and I, well, we, uh, for the love, I rode him like I was a professional bloody jockey without meaning to. Mortification makes my eyes slide closed, even as I rinse my mouth. Right, whatever. It was a totally normal reaction.

And now I’m thinking of what I did to Hunter last night on his couch. Of how I touched him and how he felt, and the sexy sounds he made, and now I need a cold shower.

I might have to tell him I’m a virgin. I’m prob
ably going to have to tell him. Walking to Matty’s room, I ponder this eventual situation.

Hi, Hunt, well, before we go any further, I just wanted to tell you I still have my v-card. Yes, you heard right, my v-card. I’m a virgin. A vir-gin. As in untouched, pure as the driven snow. As in I’ve never had a man before, you get it? Stop looking so shocked. Did you swallow your tongue?

Yeah, that would go over
super
well.

I knock on Matty’s open door, watching as he quickly ducks his head under the sheets and plays dead. Shaking my head, I go over to the bed and commence one of many tickle-fests I hope I’m going to have the cha
nce to give in the near future.

“What’s up, little man? What’s with the glum fac
e?”

Matty’s eyebrows are low on his face, and he’s sucking on his lower lip, thinking. I blow a raspberry on his cheek and he explod
es into laughter. Score for me.

“Where did you come from?”

Shit. Shit, shit, shit. “Well, uh, from next door, of course!”

God, he knows,
he knows!
Just look at that face, his baby blues are lasers of truth cutting through all my white-lies and exposing me for the liar I am. Gah! Matty nods slowly, and he knows, he
has
to know that I slept over last night.

I would cut off my big toe with a light-saber if he heard us last night. How did we think whatever we were up to, Hunter and I, that it wouldn’t affect him? I’m pretty sure I have a one-wa
y ticket to the bowels of Hell.

“I don’t like Sundays,” he says. I’m surprised he knows the days of the week. I sure as
hell didn’t at four. Well, maybe I did, but I’m sure I never got the day
right
when asked. Matty MacLaine is a little genius! My boy is a genius!

Uh,
whut?!

Rewind, stop, and play again. Did I just say that? When did that
happen?
Why am I thinking of him as mine! He’s not mine!

I clear my throat, wishing I could Etch-n-Sketch whatever thou
ghts are tumbling in my brain.

“Nobody likes Sund
ays, kid. It’s a fact of life.”

“Tomorrow is Mondaaaaaay,” he wails, covering his face with the sheet again. “I have to go to school tomorrow, and I don’t wanna!” And then he dissolves into tears, like actual real
violent sobs.

“Matty!? What the bloody hell is going on?!” My attention is divvied up into three parts: yep, still wondering why I called Matty my boy, like he’s my
kid
; why is he crying; and oh-my-God, Hunter is going to think I made Matty cry!

“Kids at school make fun of meeeeeeee,” he whines, still under the covers. I move closer to him, lie myself down, prop myself up on an elbow and gently coax him to bring down the covers (no matter how cool they are), so I can see his face.

My heart twists, knocking against my ribs, and my throat gets tight thinking about little asshole children making fun of (yeah, I’m gonna say it in my head) my kid, my Matty.I’m enraged, I want to go and beat up on little kids because they fraking
dared
make fun of the sweetest, cutest little kid in the world who gets my jokes, and called me beautiful.

He won’t look at me, instead he faces the wall, and his whole body is shuddering as he pours his heart out. “They say I can’t play with them because I can’t keep up. They won’t even let me
try
, Sera! Daddy says everyone gets a chance, sometimes even two! And they won’t give me one, ever! It’s not
fair!
”

I curl my body around his little one, and push his hair back off his forehead, leaning down to kiss the shell of his ear. I start to remember old hurts as well, what is was like for me, being made fun of everyday, only to come home to it as well. How many times had I been stepped on, how many times had others’ words cut me down to the bone? How many times did those same words take root deep inside me and made me believe what everyone else said? I’m twenty-five, and I’ve believed those two false truths my entire lif
e.

I don’t want that to happen to Matty. So everything that comes out of my mouth, I make sure he
gets
it, that he understands that no matter what happens, there’s always someone in his corner handing him the water bottle and wiping the invisible blood at the end of the day.
Me.

“You know, kids used to make fun of me, too.” My voice is soft and weak, like I’m back there, in the playground, in the high school cafeteria, at home in my room, nursing my pain, licking my wounds.

Matty’s body stiffens, and in a nanosecond, he’s turned over, bouncing the bed with the slight body weight he has, flopping down on his pillow and staring up at me with eyes so much like his father’s.

“Is that true?” He breathes out the last word
like he can’t really believe it, like I just told him that unicorns exist and we’re going to go see one today.

“Yeah. Everyone in my grade used to make fun of me. But I had some friends who made me forget about all that stuff for the day. They helped make me feel better. Do you have any friends at school who can help you like that?”
Say yes, Matty, please, for my sanity. Say yes.

“You’re not sick.” He says the last word like he’s kicking a turd away from him or something. Seeing his disgust in regards to himself makes me want to pun
ch something.

I shrug, and lean down so that we share the same pillow now. “It didn’t matter. People, anybody, they make fun of you because you’re different. It’s the way it is, little man, and I’m sorry about that.”
What can I say? What can I do?

“How are you different?
”

My throat tightens up again, and my nose starts stinging. I don’t want to cry, I don’t want to show him that it still hurts, that you never really forget when others cut you down.

“I’m not... I’m not like everybody else.” There. Good enough explanation.
Drop it, kid.
But his blue eyes are wide and his face is just staring at me like whatever I’m saying is exactly what he needs to hear. “I’m not...” God, just
say
it. “I’m not beautiful like other girls,” I say, the words tiny and small, just big enough to fit in his ears and nobody else’s. “A lot of people made fun of me because of that.”

Matty throws back the covers with such energy, with such force, I half expect him to call down the power of Grayskull without the aid of a sword and fight whatever evil I can’t see.

“Who said that to you? I’m gonna – I’m gonna kick ‘em in the shin!”

Yeah, he’s my kid. I want him to be mine, I can’t lie to myself anymore.

“Matty, I’m telling you this because I want you to know you’re not alone.” Maybe I’ve gone and ruined everything. What’s the standard answer here? Do I tell him to ignore it? To pretend they don’t exist? And what happens if he starts crying, or gets into a fight? Or worse, starts believing what they tell him?