The Space in Between (27 page)

When are you gonna stop making her pay for something she doesn’t even know about?

Damnit. I’ve been trying. As hard as it’s been going back to normal while keeping everything I know from Emery, I’ve tried my hardest to do it. I know I’m failing and that it’s noticeable, especially with the way everything just went down in English class, but I can’t help it.

Every time I look at her lately, all I see is her mom kissing my dad. It’s gotten so bad that I spent the majority of last night locked in my room with a contraband bottle of my dad’s bourbon, drinking shot after shot until I was numb enough not to think.

All that gave me in the end was a night spent bending over the porcelain god.

She was with me the entire time in my head, hammering away like she always does. Smiling at me, telling me she can’t wait until we’re alone later, and how she loves the feel of my lips on hers. Hell, she even told me she loved me and that hasn’t even happened in real time yet.

Emery is haunting me every second and my response to it is treating her like shit.

She’s not the only one paying. Jonah asked me where the keeper to my chain was earlier and I lost it, practically slamming him straight through his locker. I’m pretty damn sure with the force I used, it’s dented and I’m officially down one best friend.

I can’t bring myself to care. I’m so torn up over what I walked in on that I can’t seem to focus on anything else. Baylor’s not the first teacher I’ve snapped at today either. I’m taking this out on everyone but the two people that deserve it most. It sucks, but I’ve got no other way to handle the influx.

So overreact, push away, and act like a complete douchebag it is.

I’ve never hated someone I loved so much in my life.

Why am I in this position? Why did I have to be the one to come home early and catch them in the act? Why couldn’t we have done it as a team? Or why couldn’t she be the one going through it? Emery is so damn put together that if it had happened to her, I know for a fact that nothing would change.

She might walk away from me the way I think, but at least she’d stay completely together when she did it. Not get hauled into the office for a nice little chat with the principal.

“You done acting like a jackass or do I need to prepare for round two?”

“Baylor finds out you’re here and I’m not the only one that’s gonna be on the principals shit list. Go back to class, Emery.”

“Screw you, Christian. I managed to go seventeen years without a dad, I’m not looking for someone to fill the position now. Least of all a pissed off little boy who won’t talk about his issues.”

Rolling my tongue over my teeth, resisting the urge to respond, unsure which side of me would win out—the one pissed off at the world for dealing me this shitty hand or the one head over heels in love with the girl standing in front of him. The girl that despite my rudeness today keeps trying.

“Figured you wouldn’t have a response for that, so let’s try something that even your clueless brain can understand.”

“Gee, Ems, tell me how you really feel.” I snap, earning one of her
‘only for Jordan’
eye rolls.

Damn. I must have really pissed her off if I’m earning those.

“What happened with you and Jonah this morning? Why did you shove him into the locker?”

“Cool Whip got pissed.”

“He passed pissed a long time ago with the size of the bruise on Jonah’s back. Try again.”

“Emery, I know this gonna be hard for you to do, but do it anyway. Stay out of it.”

Leaning over me, the shadow of her small frame growing in size until it’s completely shading me in, she reaches out and lifts my head so that my eyes are level to hers and despite my behavior, presses her lips to mine. A move so familiar and so calming that for a split second as it’s happening, I’m completely caught up in the feel of her and able to forget what a jerk I’ve been.

Pulling away, but staying close enough for her breath to tickle my face, after a few rapid beats of my heart, where I’m seriously debating whether or not to stand up right now and find a secluded spot so I can have my fill of her, I catch her hand starting to lift and before I can react, she slaps me, the heat hitting my face first, followed by the sting of her pain mixing with mine as it hits my cheek.

“Wake up, Mikey! Stop acting like a jerk!”

“Do you normally kiss and slap someone when they need a wakeup call?”

“No, but then again, no one’s reached your level of jerk in a long time so I haven’t had to.”

Sighing softly when she catches me lifting my hand to rub the place where she made contact, she moves away and throws her body down into the chair beside me.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“I just had an altercation with a student. I’m gonna wait for Principal Moss. I need to be disciplined.” She answers easily, side smirking before following it up with what I know is the truth. “You can hate the world all you want, Christian, but whatever you’re going through, you’re not going through it alone.”

She needs to stop. I already know how I feel about her. The last thing I need is a reminder why.

“I’ll deny you did it.”

“If you do, then I’ll tell Moss that Baylor made a mistake in class and you weren’t being rude. I’ve been in this chair before for starting stuff, so who do you think he’s gonna believe? Me or the student that’s been pretty much perfect since he got here?”

This is the problem with dating someone who’s always thinking. They’ve got things mapped out before you can even wrap your mind around the first idea. With me moving here and being a model student up until now, it’s a guarantee that he won’t believe a word I say and just release me back to class.

“Please talk to me. Even if you just wanna keep snapping back and forth because you’ve got a lot on your mind and can’t talk about it. I’ll take it. But stop acting like a jackass to everyone.”

“I can’t.” I finally break down, give in and admit. She has no idea how much I want to tell her everything because then the weight wouldn’t be all mine, but all I see when I do that is her going into shock, turning away and never seeing her again.

Dramatic sure, but with the idea of her leaving me mixing with the promise I made our parents to keep my mouth shut the night I found them together, dramatic is all I’ve got.

Emery isn’t exactly known for letting the big stuff slide. She’s an all or nothing kind of girl and since this has to do with her family too, or what’s left of it before my dad goes ahead and proposes in a couple of weeks, I know that when I tell her, she’ll go all in here too, just not in the way I want her to.

She’ll go all in for her mom’s happiness.

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Both.”

“Chris,” she sighs again before leaning over and resting her head on my shoulder. An innocent move that is anything but. “Just tell me who I’ve gotta kill.”

Your mom. My dad. Life. The World.

The list can go on and on, but I can’t say any of them. I know that if I want to keep her with me, I’ve gotta change the way I’ve been acting or my worst fear is going to become reality, but when faced with telling her truth as the only other option, this seems safer. Maybe I can keep doing what I’ve been doing all day and she won’t want to kick my ass.

Who am I kidding? If I keep acting bi-polar with her, an ass kicking is the least of my worries.

This girl would bury me.

“I’m sorry…”

“I know, and I’m sorry too. I learned a while ago that you’re not exactly the most forthcoming when you’re stressed or upset, but I keep trying anyway. I just can’t stand seeing you turn mean when I know that’s not how you are.”

“You’re right. I’m being an ass. I’m just not dealing right.”

“Does this have something to do with your dad?”

“Yeah.”

“Figured as much.” She answers softly, understanding even though I’m only giving her half of what’s really going on.

Lies by omission are still lies and no one knows that more than me.

I’m going to hell for this.

“What’s going on with him?”

“He’s gonna propose to his girlfriend soon. He told me about it the other day. I’m having a hard time dealing with it. I don’t want it to happen.”

Lifting her head off my shoulder and my heart tightening with the loss of her, she places a hand on my cheek and turns me toward her. “Why not?”

“It’s just not the right move. It’s too soon. I don’t think she’s right for him.”

Bullshit. Bullshit. Bullshit.

I’m officially the King of BS. Screw Cool Whip. I’ve got a new title.

“Do you feel that way because you think she’s going to replace your mom?”

“She could
never
replace my mom, Emery.”
There it is
. The anger. I was wondering when this conversation was going to hit the skids and it would make a comeback. I didn’t have to wait as long as I thought. “But since we’re on the topic, your mom is dating too. If she came home tonight and told you that the guy she was seeing proposed, what would you say? Would you be alright with it?”

“Yes, but our situations aren’t exactly the same. I’ve spent the last seventeen years watching my mom give up a life in order for me to have mine. She’s been unhappy all that time, so if the man she was seeing proposed, as weird as it would be this soon, I would be okay with it.”

“How can you be like that? Be so accepting?”

“She’s my mom. Whenever I’ve done things she doesn’t like, she’s forgiven me. She’s accepted me as I am and has never asked me to be anything I’m not. She’s never asked me for anything at all. I figure it’s the least I can do.”

“I wish it was that way with my dad.”

“It can be. I know that you’re not exactly stoked that he’s moving this fast, and that you’re technically gonna have another mom, even if she is a step mom, but maybe this is what’s best for him. He lost your mom too. If you can move on and be happy,” she nudges me and smiles softly. “Then I think he should too.”

“I…”

Shit.
No. I can’t say it now. I’ve spent the last couple of days treating her like garbage and I’m sitting in the principal’s office because of it. The last thing I need to be doing now is saying those three not so little words. She deserves better. We both do, even if I’ve gotta spend some more time convincing myself that I deserve much of anything with the way everything is happening.

“You what?”

“I’m sorry, Ems.”

“I think you said that already, but just in case you haven’t already figured it out by the way I’m still here, you’re forgiven. You don’t have to tell me everything that’s going on with you, but when you know you’re going to lose it, I’d appreciate a heads up so I can get my riot gear ready.”

Laughing despite myself, l lean over until our heads are resting together, her warmth and understanding radiating so strongly that it’s fusing itself straight into my heart.

I have never loved someone as much as I do this girl.

“I promise I’ll let you know next time. You should probably go back to class, though. Baylor’s gotta know by now that you’re not just on a pee break.”

“What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him, Mikey. I’m not going anywhere. We’re in this together.”

Music.

That’s what her words are, and even though I know she means them, I also know that sooner rather than later, it’s all going to crumble around us, and the way we are right now won’t exist anymore.

We’ll both be completely alone.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Valentine’s Day 2015

Christian

A few years ago, when I was this fresh off the line niner, I didn’t see a point to anything.

It was right after I lost my mom, so my disconnection from everything along with the belief that nothing had a point or mattered, made sense. I was just going through the motions. Taking pointless class after pointless class, none of them leading me anywhere, or making what should be an easy decision—what you want to do when you grow up—easy. Now, just like then, I didn’t have a clear view of what I wanted to do with the rest of my life, but what I did have is a penchant for stockpiling useless information from those classes that would pop up at the most random times.

This is one of those times.

Today is Valentine’s Day.

It’s the time when card companies, manufacturers of chocolate, and people that spend their lives cutting and arranging flowers, are making a killing. Couples the world over eating it up and declaring their devotion to each other while gorging themselves on chocolaty goodness.
It’s also the day that up until now, I’ve never had a girl for, so was just another day that I wished would hurry up and be over. All of that changes this year though and because of it, all I can think about is the random factoid I learned freshman year about the origin of the day. 

How during the Middle Ages, people in England and France believed that February 14 was the start of bird mating season and because of it, some poor love sick idiot out there thought it should mean something similar to the humans as well, affectively marking the day down as a day dedicated to love. Now, maybe it’s because my brain is comprised solely of song lyrics and musical chords that I don’t get it, but what two birds wanting to get it on has to do with what this day is supposed to be about, I have no clue. I didn’t then, and I still don’t, but it makes what I just said valid. It’s a useless fact that I apparently need to remember because of its connection to what today is.

Well that, and this year, I’m officially one of those love sick idiots. 

But a willing one if it means having Emery’s brown eyes glowing when I give her the present I took weeks searching for and perfecting to reflect us.

I’m such a love sick idiot that I’m even wearing red and for once it’s got nothing to do with a team uniform.

Yes, as a matter of fact, I do have it that damn bad. Thanks for asking.

What I’ve also got is a fierce determination to put everything that’s happened with our parents out of my head so that I can give her the night of her dreams.