Authors: T L Gray
Jake looked over at me and gave me a devilish grin. “Perfect for me…yes. But perfect…no. At least I would never expect you to be.”
I sighed and turned to lay my head on the armrest of the couch. Jake pulled my legs on his lap and started massaging my feet. I closed my eyes and enjoyed how good it felt. I had drunk too much and the room was starting to sway.
“You like that?” he asked softly and I just nodded my head, keeping my eyes closed. I felt him let go and then the couch shifted
as Jake moved his body over mine. He began kissing my neck, and I felt him take the clip out of my hair and the waves tumbled down the side of the couch.
“What about this?” Kiss. “And this?” More kisses moving up my jawline.
I could feel my heart racing and my stomach filling with butterflies. I knew what we were doing was wrong, but as much as my head said to stop it, I felt paralyzed by my body and how each kiss torched my skin.
I opened my eyes and looked right into his. He was moving forward, and I knew it was a point of no return if I let him kiss me. It meant the end for me and Parker if I did, and for some reason, I felt ok with it, even tried to justify it in my head that Parker was too good for me, and it would never last anyway.
Jake caressed my face and smiled. “Baby, it’s always been you and me,” he whispered as he moved forward. I closed my eyes again waiting, and right when I felt his breath on my face, my phone started to ring.
We both froze and Jake whispered, “Ignore it,” as he continued to move closer.
I turned my head right as he touched me and moved underneath him to grab the phone. It was Issy. I jumped off the couch and answered it, watching Jake put his head on the armrest in frustration.
“Hi!” I practically yelled into the phone when I answered it. “How are you?”
“Wow, Avery, you’re like breathing heavy. What did I interrupt?” Issy asked playfully. She was absolutely her old self. I immediately blushed as guilt hit me hard in the gut.
“Nothing! Jake and I were just celebrating your waking up!” I knew my voice was louder than usual, and even I didn’t recognize the tone of it.
“Have you been drinking?” she asked with a laugh. “And with Jake of all people?”
“Just a couple of glasses of champagne, nothing big,” I answered, trying to justify it. For some reason it sounded worse when
Issy said it.
“Avery, champagne is the worst. No wonder you are slurring your words. What happened to Parker?”
Issy’s usual straightforwardness annoyed me and I retorted, “Nothing! Jake and I are just friends.” Issy sat quiet for a moment and then got real serious.
“Avery, I love Jake, you know that. But he cannot be trusted with you, ok. He’s not there out of friendship. You didn’t see him last night…I did. I mean New Year’s, whatever. Anyway, Parker is a good guy, and I’ve seen the way you are with him. You need to really think this through.”
I felt my heart start to race again. I couldn’t believe Issy was lecturing me not even six hours after waking up from a coma. I didn’t want to think about this now; my head was swimming with all the emotions of the night.
“It’s good to see you are back to your old, opinionated self,” I replied trying to find some humor in my voice.
“Would you expect anything less? Hey, since he’s there, will you let me talk to him for a minute? I can’t seem to get ahold of my mom. I guessing my dad verbally accosted her pretty well.”
“Yeah, he’s pretty efficient at that,” I agreed without thinking.
“You too? Man, he’s a piece of work. Every nurse on my floor shakes when he’s around!” I could almost see Issy shaking her head as she spoke and the depth of how much I missed her hit me, reducing me to tears before I could control it.
“Avery, what’s wrong? Are you crying?” she asked, stopping her rant.
“Maybe,” I sniffled. “I’m just so glad you are ok. I don’t know what I would have done if anything happened to you.” I knew Issy hated this kind of stuff, verbal affirmation was not something she was comfortable with at all, but I couldn’t help myself.
“Avery, this here is why you stay away from champagne. Give me Jake,” she scolded.
I handed the phone to Jake and excused myself to my room to cry it out. It was the first time I had let the tears flow since the accident, and now I wondered if I would ever get them to stop. I had buried so much of my anxiety and fear, and now it all came out with nothing to hold it back. I wanted someone to hold me and ironically, it wasn’t Jake. I missed Parker. Missed his strength and compassion. I wanted to call him, but it felt wrong. How could I ever turn to him now after what had almost happened tonight? It was shameful.
I could hear Jake yelling at
Issy from the other room. “Like hell she is!” he screamed into the phone. “He’s just the rebound guy!”
I didn’t want to hear anymore and went to the bathroom to pull myself together. I came out as Jake was getting off the phone.
“Wow, did I get an earful. I’d be totally annoyed if I wasn’t so thrilled she’s back,” he said laughing as he walked in the door. He took one look at my face and stopped smiling, walking over to pull me into a big hug. His arms felt good, but I felt empty.
After a few seconds he asked, “Are you ok?”
I simply nodded my head and continued to rest against his chest. He put his hands on my face and lifted it up to have me look at him.
“Now, where were we?” he asked softly, hunger more than apparent in his green eyes.
I stepped back and pulled his hands from my face, still holding them as I spoke. “I should probably call it a night. I have to be up early tomorrow.”
He seemed to understand, but his body was stiff as he ran his hands through his hair in frustration. He pulled me close and kissed me softly on my forehead, as he was accustomed to doing lately, and left the room.
My sleep was more than fitful that night, and I didn’t even notice I had turned my alarm off when it went off at 8:00 a.m. I finally woke when the light from outside my window was too much to ignore. My head was pounding with such force, I could barely open my eyes. I turned to my alarm, wondering how early it was and practically jumped out of bed when I saw it said 9:45. I ran around my room in a frenzy, throwing on jeans and a sweatshirt. I rushed to the bathroom to brush my teeth and recoiled when I saw my reflection in the mirror. I looked terrible and more than obviously hung over. I pulled my hair into a tight ponytail and tried to use makeup to hide the black circles under my eyes. After ten minutes, I at least looked presentable, but I knew without question I would be late to meet Dr. Davis’ grad student.
I ran to my phone and sent him a quick text that I was on my way, and grabbed my backpack, which I had thankfully prepared the day before. Jake was still asleep on the couch when I left. I checked his alarm to make sure he hadn’t missed it and when I saw that he had set it for ten, I left quietly before it went off. I didn’t want to talk to him this morning.
Russell was less than thrilled with me when I ran in the lab, ten minutes later than agreed upon.
“Avery, I need to know right now if you are going to flake out on me again this semester?” he asked exasperated. “Precision is an absolute must for this phase and even ten minutes late matters.”
I pushed down my frustration as I tried to see his point of view. “Russell, I promise, this is a one-time thing. I got some news yesterday about my friend who had been in a coma, and I stayed up a little too late celebrating. It won’t happen again.”
The sympathy card seemed to work as he simply huffed and then went on to explain the new phase of work. He was right, precision was essential, and it looked like I would be taking samples all five days during the week. The positive was that it meant only two hours at a time in the lab, but every day felt like a daunting task.
After an hour with him showing and reshowing me the steps, I started to feel nauseous, and excused myself to the restroom, hoping cold water on my neck would calm my stomach. One of the worst side effects from years of throwing up was that my body immediately reacted the second my stomach felt even a little queasy. Today was no different and within minutes I was re-tasting the champagne from the night before.
When I was finished, I tried to rinse my mouth out with water and chewed on a mint. It didn’t matter
though, even I could smell the alcohol. Great, what a way to make a good first impression on my new professors.
I bought a bottle of water from the vending machine in the hall and headed back to the lab, determined to get through the morning.
I finished up with Russell and made my way to my Thermo class. It felt different than last year, mostly because I didn’t recognize any of the students in there. My group had all advanced to Thermo II. I sighed and took out my book, ready to learn what seemed impossible last semester.
I had survived my first day, barely, and was on my way to meet Parker in the quad. My stomach had been in knots all day just thinking about seeing him after last night. I knew my behavior was unacceptable, and he deserved so much better than me. Jake had been right. I was far too flawed for a relationship of this magnitude, and if last night proved anything, it was that I would never be able to fully give my heart to
Parker the way he expected me to. I felt frustrated by my own weakness and saddened at the idea of losing someone so special.
I neared our spot and quickly spotted him laying on the grass with his head propped up on his backpack. My stomach clenched and my heart started racing. I felt the dread run through my body as I began to question if I would be able to do this.
His eyes were shut as I approached him as quietly as I could. I set my backpack down and laid next to him. His hand immediately found mine, and I felt my eyes well up with tears. He rolled over on top of me and gave me a long lingering kiss. I kissed him back with everything I had, wondering if it would be the last time I ever felt his touch again.
He sensed my urgency and kissed me with even more passion, taking in every inch of my mouth while he stroked my face. The quad was packed with students, but I didn’t care. I never wanted to let him go. He finally pulled away, but hovered just an inch above my face. “I missed you,” he said softly.
My tears could not be contained, and his face quickly became concerned. “What happened?”
I forced a smile, not wanting to have
the conversation
yet. “Issy woke up.”
He sat up quickly and pulled me up as well. “When?” he asked enthusiastically.
“Last night. I even got to talk to her and she sounded exactly the same. It was amazing.” The tears were still flowing as I spoke, only they weren’t tears of joy like Parker thought.
“Oh baby, that’s wonderful!” Parker exclaimed cradling me in his arms. “Why didn’t you call me?”
“It was late,” I lied. It was becoming all too easy to do lately.
“It’s never too late, babe, you know that,” he said softly as he ran his finger up and down my back.
I took a deep breath, trying to settle my frazzled nerves. It was now or never and if I waited any longer, I knew I wouldn’t do it. “Parker, I think maybe we should press pause for a little while.” I said it so softly, I wasn’t even sure if he had heard me until I felt his body tense and him move my face up to look at him.
His eyes showed hurt, but also determination as he spoke. “Avery, don’t do this. You’ve been pushing me away for days now and there is no reason to.”
“I just think it’s for the best,” I choked out, pulling away just enough to get him to let go of my face.
“For the best? Are you kidding me? Avery, baby, just last week we were kissing on New Year’s totally optimistic for what this year would bring. There is no way things have changed this drastically in days. It doesn’t make sense.” He was pleading with me now, and I knew I had to say something fast or my resolve would be gone. I was hurting him and it broke my heart.
“I’m just no good for you, Parker. How do you not see that?” I asked as I grabbed at the necklace he bought me. “See this, I don’t even deserve it. I threw up the night of Issy’s accident and never told you. I’m a fraud, Parker, while you’re…well, you’re perfect.” I could feel my voice getting louder as I spoke and tried to quiet myself when I saw others around us start to take notice.
Parker pulled me to him again, despite my attempts to push him away. “I’m not perfect, Avery, although I’m flattered you think so. So you made a mistake,
who cares, all you can do is move on and learn from it. I’m not going to judge you for it.”
“But you will,” I whispered. “Maybe not today, but one day you are going to see just how flawed and damaged I really am. When that happens, you aren’t going to look at me like this anymore…and you are going to regret that you ever did.”
Parker flinched as if I had stunned him and then looked at me skeptically. “Where is this coming from? It doesn’t sound like you at all.”
I didn’t answer, but continued to look at him sadly. He sighed and then started talking again, “Sweetheart, I already see you, and I love everything about you. What I can’t figure out is why you can’t accept this from me.”
“Because it doesn’t make sense…” I whispered, my voice trailing off. “There’s nothing here worth loving,” I finally admitted, exposing all my insecurity to him.