The Space in Between (32 page)

I’m dating my mom’s boyfriend’s son.

The boyfriend that she told me last night she was head over heels in love with and could see a future with. The man that when he finally proposed would become my father.

Eww…No.
Stepfather.

I’m not turning this into something sicker than it already is.

Despite being completely unable to move, the rest of my faculties seem to be coming back as I finally feel my breath as it releases into the now silent room and my eyes shift, searching for the sea blue that has the ability to soothe me, aching to look into them and see with just one look that this is not real. That I’m not alone in this. That he’s as shocked in this moment as I am.

Only that’s not what I find when my eyes finally settle on the face I love so much. He’s moving and coming toward me, which honestly I’m thankful for, but it’s the look on his face as he does it that ruins it.

Pain, hurt, sadness and regret. They’re all there written across his face for the world to see, slamming the reality straight into me like a knife to my heart. One that the closer he gets only seems to break apart and bleed that much more, making my knees buckle and causing the entire room to spin.

Christian…my Mikey, he knew.

The shock I expected to see radiating back at me, it’s not there. All that’s present is the look one gets when something that they’ve been holding back, a truth that for whatever reason they kept a secret, is finally unleashed. A combination of relief and regret and it’s the one combination that completely does me in.

Giving into the sensation of falling that I experienced the second my knees began to buckle, I prepare for the feel of the cold ceramic floor hitting my skin, but before I can welcome the pain that comes after completely collapsing, hands are gripping me, attempting to pull me back up.

Strong hands with the fingers raw from all of the hours spent playing guitar together. Familiar hands, and right now, the very last hands I want to be feeling.

He need to let me go. Let me fall and stand back while I collect myself enough to get the hell out of this room.

“Emery…”

No way.
He doesn’t get to put his hands on me, have my body betray me by leaning into them and then use that velvety smooth voice on me. It doesn’t matter how soothing it is. It’s a mirage. None of it is real.

His voice and the effect it has on me is as big a lie as him loving me.

This cannot be happening.

I met a boy, getting to know him over time and not allowing myself to fall in love with him right away. Taking things slow and making him work for it until it was completely impossible to deny what was taking place between us.

I followed the rules. I did everything the right way.

Christian was supposed to be my reward for being smart and doing things differently.

Not my biggest nightmare.

Lifting me up into his arms, I feel the first tear fall, forcing its way through the shock to my system and solidifying the moment as real. Willing my arms to move so I can force myself away from him, even if it only ends with me on the ground, nothing happens. So I try again, this time the hurt and pain releasing in the form of a scream, but when the sound reverberating in my brain doesn’t affect anyone else in the room, I realize that it too is only going to be for me.

I’m completely alone with the pain that’s ripping me apart inside. 

Carrying me out of the room as my mom mumbles a lame apology for the way I’m acting, the voice of the only other person in the room speaks and it hits me. He doesn’t sound as evil as I’d been expecting he would now that everything is out in the open. Nicholas Cayne sounds the opposite of evil.

He sounds sweet.

“It’s okay, Rosie. This is just a little overwhelming. Christian’s been the same since the two of you met a few weeks ago.”

A few weeks ago
.

What I thought couldn’t get any worse, does as I’m hit with another heaping dose of reality. My mom went out for the night a few weeks ago and even though I’d texted and called Christian, he’d never answered back to my messages of wanting to come over. I always thought it was weird, but since everything went back to normal again pretty much right after, I’d let it go.

Now I know why.

He met my mom that night and has been holding on to it ever since.

Finally reaching the top of the stairs, Christian moves quickly once on the carpet, in the time it takes for me to finally blink using his foot to kick open my very familiar door before making his way in and placing me down on the bed.

Lowering himself once I’ve somehow managed to get my body to cooperate enough to turn away toward the wall, I listen to the unsteady rhythm of his breathing, not daring to turn around to see the look that must match it on his face.

It’s only when I find my way past the shock to the anger and rage taking over with the realization that he kept this from me, that he rips away the quiet and speaks.

“Emery, I’m so sorry.”

Christian

This shouldn’t be happening to us. We don’t deserve it, Emery especially. I would give anything to go back in time to a few weeks ago and say or do something to prevent what she’s having to deal with now.

“I’m sorry.”

“Go—away.”

In this situation there really isn’t a whole lot to be thankful about, but hearing her speak, even if it is muffled and she’s telling me to get lost, makes me happy. It means that she’s finally getting past what happened downstairs, even if it may take her a whole lot longer to come to terms with it.

I needed her to be okay. Seeing her standing there as rigid as the stone at our spot, with no movement, visible breathing or a look in her eyes to let me know she was still in there, made me feel helpless. Picking her up and getting her away from everything down there was the only thing I could do after catching her before she fell that was able to alleviate it.

When my mom died I’d felt the same way, but this, seeing her crumble right in front of me and it being so fresh, tore me in half.

This never should have happened and the worst part is, it’s not even over.

“I can’t do that. Not until we talk.”

“I have nothing,” she answers coldly before whipping around in the bed and leveling me with an angry glare. “To say to you. Get out.”

“I can’t do that, Em.”

“Fine. Then I will.”

Moving as she attempts to sit up, I block her from being able to get around me. Grabbing ahold of her once she’s in a sitting position, knowing it’s going to come back and bite me, I pull her close and hold on for dear life.

Struggling at first, feeling the strength in her fists as she slams them against my chest, using everything she’s got to try and hurt me, I refuse to let go and hold on tighter. She can do this all she wants. She can’t do any more damage to me than I’ve already done to myself.

 After another attack to my chest that gets nowhere, she relents and lets her body sag and fall against mine. Gripping tighter and pulling her as close into me as I can, amazed when she doesn’t fight me, but instead seems to burrow closer,  I close my eyes as our bodies begin shaking under the force of the sobs she finally lets escape.

“Y-you k-knew.” She stammers through her tears and the truth physically makes my heart want to detach from my chest, but I don’t say or do anything to acknowledge it.

I can’t. There’s nothing I can say or do that can erase the fact that she’s right. I did know and worse, I kept it from her. As pretty a picture as I would like to be able to paint right now, I’ve got nothing.

I
am
nothing. Maybe even less than nothing, if that’s even a thing.

Feeling her hands ball up and knowing what’s going to come next, I allow her to hit my chest again, wanting to experience whatever sliver she’s willing to show me of the pain I caused.

Deserving every bit of her anger and pain.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I couldn’t.”

“But why, Chris? Why couldn’t you tell me? Why did you let me find out this way?”

Despite knowing that our parents are the reason for my keeping silent, I throw myself under the bus instead. If I hadn’t been so afraid to lose her to begin with, none of this would be happening. So this—all of it—is on me.

“Because I didn’t want to give you up, and I knew you would have.”

“You’re wrong.”

“No, baby, I’m not. You’ve been telling me for months how happy your mom has been since she started seeing my dad, even though I didn’t know it was him at the time. You couldn’t wait to meet him so you could thank him. If I had said it was my dad, you wouldn’t have hesitated. You would have given up on me. I couldn’t lose you. I can’t.”

The air feels thick around us, but before I can give her a chance to respond, I need to get the rest out. If her next words are that she’s heard enough and wants me to leave, I won’t be able to do it. Not until I’ve said it all. 

“I
won’t
lose you.”

“How long, Christian? How long have you known about them?”

“A few weeks.”

There’s no missing the sharp intake of breath. The same sound she made when she walked into the kitchen and saw all of us sitting the table and her mother introduced us.

A readymade family, hand delivered with a big fucking bow.

Emery, I love you. Let’s be a family.

Literally.

It sounds disgusting to my own ears, but not because there’s anything wrong with being with her or wanting those things in the future. It’s because even though there’s nothing legally wrong with what’s been going on between us, it’s still going to end.

The two people downstairs will make sure of it.

“We need to go back down. I’m pretty sure my mom is going out of her mind wondering what the hell is wrong with me.” Pulling away and out of my arms, she tosses her feet over me and stands, but before she can make a beeline for the door, I reach out and stop her.

“Not yet. We still need to talk about this.”

“We will, but not now. I’ve had more than I can take for one night and I’ve ruined things enough.  I need to go down and meet your dad. Do this over. Everything else can wait.”

“Do you mean that?”

There’s a finality in her tone and if she thinks for a second that she’s going to go down there, pretend for our parents and then disappear from my life again when I leave, she’s got another thing coming.

I meant what I said. I can’t and won’t let her go. Not when the need and want to have her is so damn strong. Something tells me that with the way we finally got together and everything that we’ve been through since, I’m always going to need her.

Grandpa wouldn’t have sent me the signs otherwise.

“When I leave tonight, is everything going to go back to the way it was before?”

I sound so weak right now, but I don’t care. I need to know that when I walk out of this room, it won’t be the last time I’m in it. That just because things got a whole lot harder, she’s still with me.

Wiping at her eyes, she smiles up at me, and while it might be able to work on my parents downstairs, the deadness staring back at me shows me exactly what kind of smile this really is. A fake one. A smile I never wanted directed at me.

“I need time, Christian. I know it’s not what you want to hear, but I can’t lie to you. I need you to hear what I’m saying right now and no matter how pissed you are, respect it. I’ve got enough left in me to go down there and put on a hell of a show for our parents. I can have dinner and smile at all the right times, but anything more than that, I just can’t. Not until I’ve had a chance to process everything that happened.”

“You mean me lying to you.”

“No. I mean finding out that our parents are dating. That out of all the men on the planet that could be making my mom happy, she had to go and find the best one.”

“How do you know he’s the best?”

“Because he made you.”

I don’t get it. Why it hurts so bad when someone you love says something so incredibly sweet to you, but there’s no doubt with the way my chest seems to swell and expand and then simultaneously explode into a million little pieces at the same time, that’s exactly what’s happening.

“Just give me time, Chris. We’ll talk, I swear, but not if you don’t give me this.”

She’s right.
I hate this and I’m pissed that it’s happening this way, but there’s something I feel a whole lot more. Love for her. So if it’s time she wants, I’ll give her as much as she needs.

Even if there’s a chance that her time away could turn into losing her for good.

Before I can walk away, take those long and winding stairs all the way down to where our worried parents are waiting, there’s still one thing I need to know.

“Em, can you ever forgive me for keeping it from you?”

Her eyes soften before they lower and turn away, but instead of walking away completely, she turns back one final time and in the way she’s been doing it since the first day, she gives it to me straight.

“I don’t know, Chris. I just don’t know.”

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Emery

There’s nothing awkward about this
at all
.

Nope. Absolutely nothing.

I’m just sitting around my kitchen table being forced to break bread with my mother’s boyfriend, who also doubles as my boyfriend’s father.

Oh yeah, just another crazy day in the Carmichael house.

The only thing keeping my butt firmly planted in my seat and not barricaded away in my room right now is the look on my mom’s face.

I can’t be the one that takes that away from her. Especially since it’s the look I’ve been waiting seventeen years for her to have.

Ultimate happiness.

A daughter that does the right thing every chance she gets—minus the times I wanted to act out in order to be alone with the guy whose eyes I’ve been trying to avoid since we came back downstairs—and the boyfriend that’s completely cool with the fact that she has a teenage daughter, and who wants to make said daughters lifelong dream come true.