All for Maddie (19 page)

  “You’re in the kitchen,” my
dad interrupted, carrying sleepy eyed Maddie.

 Alex stepped away and took
Maddie when she reached for him.

  “I firsty,” she told him. I
handed him my glass of orange juice and got the hell out of the kitchen.

  We ordered pizza and
watched a Thanksgiving special with Maddie. I was a nervous wreck anticipating
going to bed with Alex. What if he did want to have sex? I couldn’t stop him. I
knew that to be a fact.

  I found myself in a very
awkward situation when my dad took Maddie to bed to read to her, and Dana left
us to shower. Why the hell was I so nervous around Alex all of a sudden? I
hated it. I felt like he was seeing right through me as I watched whatever the
hell was on the television.

 My dad never came back. I
knew he fell asleep with Maddie. Dana announced that she was turning in with a
book and I was left alone for the night with Alex. Oh God, this was bad.

 Alex all of a sudden shifted
his weight, forcing me to lay back. He had one knee between my legs, towering
above me. I could only stare wide eyed up at him. He lightly brushed my lips
with his and whispered.

  “I’m going to shower. Go
upstairs and take
all
your clothes off.”

 And just like that. He was
gone.

I couldn’t move. I couldn’t
do it. I didn’t want to. I texted him, knowing that he was in the shower as I
sat there fighting with my mind to go upstairs and do as I was told. I didn’t
do it. I went to Maddie, she was safer. He never texted back after my lie that
Maddie was awake, and I was going to lay with her for a while. He knew I
wouldn’t be up. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to go. I did. It was more of an
I
couldn’t
. I don’t know why. I just couldn’t do it.

<><><> 

I hadn’t planned on Maddie
throwing a fit to go home with Papaw come Saturday morning either. I didn’t
want her to go. I needed her here.

“You can go. Daddy will come
and get you tomorrow,” Alex offered. Her tantrum was instantly over.

I wanted to go to. I wanted
to suggest it, but didn’t. I didn’t want my dad to think something was going on
between Alex and me. The air was already thick enough to cut with a knife. We
hadn’t spoken one word to each other the whole morning.

Alex locked himself in his room
the entire day. He wouldn’t even come out for lunch, when I tapped on the door
to tell him that I had made cream turkey from the leftover Thanksgiving dinner.
This was bullshit. He was going to sulk and pout all day, because I wouldn’t
bow down and do what I was told. Whatever. He was such a freaking child.

“What are you doing tonight,”
I asked as soon as Regan answered her phone. I would show him. Maddie wasn’t
home. I didn’t need to sit there and wait for him to stop moping.

“Trenton has a basketball
game at six. Do you want to come?”

“Yeah, can you go out
afterward?”

“Honey, I do what I want. Let
me ask my husband,” she teased. “We’ll pick you up around five.”

“Sounds like a plan, thanks.”

“You need to get away from my
brother?”

“Yup, you could say that.”

Regan laughed. “Okay, see you
in a little while.”

I showered, and dressed in
dark jeans with a white hoodie. I didn’t feel like looking sexy. I didn’t want
out of that house to be eye candy for some other idiot. I had one of those at
home. I couldn’t figure him out, but I had one.

“Where are you going?” Alex
asked as I slipped into my new sneakers that I hadn’t worn yet, courtesy of
Alex himself.

“I’m going to watch Trenton
play basketball, then Regan and I might go have a drink.”

“Maybe I wanted to go watch
Trenton’s game.”

“Do you want to go, Alex? I’m
sure it would be fine.”

“No, I can’t. I’m on a
deadline. I haven’t worked for three days.”

“Okay.” What the hell was he
whining about if he couldn’t even go? Men, I swear.

Trenton was quite the little
ball player and her mother was quite the loudmouth, yelling and screaming the
whole game.

We went for pizza after the
game with Vince, Trenton, and three nine-year-old girls. I was sure that Vince
wasn’t going to let Regan out of the house, not with four giggling girls,
spending the night.

We spent another twenty
minutes letting the girls pick out movies from the Red-Box and decide on
Doritos or Nachos. They ended up with way more than they were going to eat. I
still didn’t know if I was being dropped off at my house or if Regan and I were
going to get to go out. I didn’t want to ask, not wanting to start an argument
between the two of them.

“No, don’t turn,” Regan
yelled at Vince as he started to turn down my street. “We’re dropping you guys
off and going to have a drink.”

YES!

“Oh no, you’re not leaving me
with all these girls,” Vince demanded.

“They’re not going to bother
you. They’ll be in the basement all night and you know it. We won’t be out
late.”

“You’re a liar. You never
come home until you close down the bar.”

Regan laughed, not denying
the fact that she couldn’t argue. I was hoping we closed the bar, and I got
drunk enough to pass out and sleep the entire next day away.

We forgot about one minor
detail while we beat the pants off bikers in pool and got totally wasted.
Neither of us could drive. It was almost midnight and last call had been
called.

“Call Alex,” Regan tried.

“No way in hell am I calling
Alex. Call Vince,” I countered.

“I can’t call Vince, there are
four girls at my house. I can’t expect him to drag them out. Besides, what
would their parents think of them coming here to get Trenton’s drunk mother?
You have to call Alex.”

“A cab!” I yelled as it
popped into my head.

“A cab is going to cost us forty
bucks from here.”

“So, Alex will pay for it.
I’m not calling Alex.”

“What is up with you two?”

“What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean. I
can’t quite figure you two out. You act like a couple, but yet you don’t. And I
saw all of your things in the downstairs bedroom. Why are your things not in
the same room that you sleep in? You do sleep in the same room, don’t you?”

I wanted to talk to Regan. I
wanted someone to know what was going on, why I was even there. I didn’t. I
knew better. He would be furious with me. “We sleep together,” I said, turning
my eyes toward my drink. We did sleep together. Twice.

“Are you in love with him?”

Well, shit, maybe I didn’t
want to talk about this with her.

“Let’s get a cab.”

“No, not yet. Answer my
question.”

“I don’t know, Regan. It’s
complicated.”

“Are you with him because of
Maddie?”

“She plays a big role in it,
yes.”

“That’s not what I asked you.
Would you be with Alex, if Maddie wasn’t in the picture?”

I didn’t speak for a few
seconds. “No, I wouldn’t be with Alex if it weren’t for Maddie,” I honestly
answered.

“Whitley, you don’t have to
be with someone you don’t want to be with, because you have a child together.
People share custody every day.”

“Yeah, well, like I said,
it’s complicated. Let’s go,” I coaxed, downing the last drink of whatever it
was Regan had been ordering for me. I stood up. Whoa, I should have stuck with
the beer.

Regan rode in the cab to my
house first and then to her own. I turned and waved once I managed to get the
teeny tiny key in the smaller hole. Yup, I was going to be swearing off alcohol
again in the morning. For sure.

My heart dropped instantly
when I saw the unfamiliar white fur coat hanging over the back of the sofa
along with the designer purse. I couldn’t believe it. The stupid fuck had the
nerve to bring someone there. Oh, hell no. Not when he walked in my bedroom in
my own home and threw Jaron out.

I was furious. I could feel
the blood pumping in my veins as I stumbled my way up to his room with no clue
what I was going to say. What was I about to walk into? I had a good hunch that
it would be the blonde Kendall.

I took a deep breath and
burst in. It wasn’t the blonde Kendall at all. I had no idea who the redhead
was. She was pretty from what I saw of her. I couldn’t see much, other than the
red hair. Her body was covered with his. He was fucking her.
Un-fucking-believable. He turned to look at me and pumped in her two more
times. He fucking didn’t stop. I knew it was just a spiteful gesture directed
right at me. It made me even madder. 

He rolled off of her cupping
himself as much as possible, trying to cover himself.

“GET. THE. FUCK. OUT!” I
demanded.

She jumped up, covering
herself with the sheet.

“GET OUT!” I screamed again.

Alex jumped up, covering
himself with his jeans.

“Get out and let her get
dressed for Christ Sake,” Alex demanded, pulling me toward the door.

“Don’t fucking touch me!” I
demanded, jerking away. He had to grab me to keep me from falling over. I
didn’t feel drunk anymore. I thought I had sobered up immediately. Evidently my
body didn’t think so.

Alex held on to me as the
girl grabbed her clothes, quickly getting dressed. I reached around him, going
for her hair as she darted out of his room. He grabbed me around the waist to
keep me from reaching her.

“You stupid mother fucker!” I
yelled, turning my fists and my anger to his chest. He had to drop his jeans to
hold my arms.

“Stop, Whitley,” he demanded.
“Why are you even mad?”

“Really? You fucking threw
Jaron out of my own house, and you fucking bring someone here to the home that
I am forced to live in with a fucking pig?”

“Oh, so it’s okay as long as
I don’t bring her here?”

“NO! I mean yes. No, no, it’s
not okay, Alex. It’s not fucking okay for you to fuck other girls. Where are
you going?” I asked as he just walked away from me and into the bathroom.

“I’m going to get rid of this
condom,” he replied. “Calm down, I’ll be right back.”

“I’m not your pawn. You can’t
treat me like this,” I yelled drunk words, trying to make sense.

Alex walked back out wearing his
jeans.

“I have never treated you
like my pawn.”

“You think I’m young and
stupid and I just have to do everything
—
”

My words were cut off by his
lips on mine. He tossed me toward to the bed and jerked my shoes off, flinging
them roughly across the room. I stared in shock as he unsnapped my jeans and
pulled them crudely over my hips.

“Alex, stop. What are you
doing?”

He didn’t listen. He ran his
fingers between my legs, aggressively shoving two fingers inside of me,
dragging them up my wet slit, to my clit, and back inside of me.

“You want me to stop,
Whitley?”

“No,” I whimpered as he
assaulted my throbbing clitoris.

I dropped from my elbows as
he moved down and took me with his mouth, violating my clit with intense
pleasure. I felt like I was going to faint. It was so powerful and
concentrated. I didn’t think he was ever going to let me come. I would get so
close. As soon as I would start to writhe my hips into his mouth, he would slow
down.

“Ah, right there. Don’t
stop,” I begged with a whimper.

As soon as I screamed out in
unbelievable pleasure he was kissing me. This was so messed up. I just walked
in on him fucking someone else, and now I was tasting my pussy on his mouth.

“Fuck me, Alex,” I pleaded,
panting heavily in his mouth.

He pulled back and stared
down at me.

“I’m not going to fuck you,
Whitley. I’m going to make love to you, but not tonight. Not now. Do you know
when I am going to make love to you?”

I couldn’t answer. I just
stared wide eyed and shook my head.

“I’m going to make love to
you when you tell me to make love to you. When you are not drunk. Have you ever
had sex sober, Whitley?”

I didn’t know how to reply.
He was towering above me with a stern glare. He wasn’t going to touch me. I
couldn’t answer his question. He was right. I had never had sober sex in my
life.

<><><> 

That night was our last
contact for a full two weeks. We went right back to the same routine. Neither
of us about to cave. The next time we were intimate was a couple weeks before
Christmas. Regan and I had shopped the entire day and ended our night with a
cab ride home, too drunk to drive.

I, once again, in my
intoxicated state tried like hell to seduce him. He took care of me as I knew
he would, but wouldn’t fuck me. The next time was the following weekend. We
drove to the resort for our annual Christmas party and again I was drunk.
Maddie stayed with my dad and Dana and I was stripping clothes as soon as we
were in the door. He was pretty tanked too. I was sure I would get all of him
that night. I didn’t. He spread me, sitting on the couch, using my vibrator and
then his mouth, but still wouldn’t fuck me.

Why was it so easy for me to
want him when I was drunk, but come the next morning; I was back to hating him
for all that he had done. That was the first weekend that I think I actually
started to have feelings for him, maybe I had from the beginning, I don’t know.
That weekend I let myself
feel
for the first time in my life. Maybe the
rape played a role in that. Actually, I was sure it did. I didn’t want to feel.
It was easier not to feel.

When Alex kissed me around my
family, I kissed him back. When he held my hand, I held his back. When he
wrapped his arms around me, I let him without stepping away. When he stared at
me, I stared back. I was feeling something, I just wasn’t sure what it was.

We had to sleep together once
again at his parent’s house on Christmas Eve. It was a family tradition. They
always spent the night there: got up, opened their gifts to each other, ate
breakfast, and then went home to open their own gifts.