Fated (6 page)

“Aggravated assault, along with a couple other things.”
He laughs at me now.

“Oh course you are. Is that why Joe left you?”

“John, don’t.” I hear Austin say again before the anger begins to coil up inside of me and I interrupt him.

“You want to know what happened.” I look at him raising my voice, emotionless, “After I lost my business, my apartment, when I had to move in with him, that fucking useless piece of shit.” I hear my mother gasp at my use of profanity. “He came home that night after I locked the store for the last time, didn’t realize that I was already there. Well he came home with his girlfriend, who he was with before he even met me. I heard them talking, talking about how he was planning
on marrying me just so he could divorce me and take everything that I had worked hard for. It was their plan from the beginning. So you want him to be around good go fucking find him, maybe then you can find someone to be proud of because I have never been able to do it for you.” I say tossing my fork onto my plate, getting up from the table, and stalking off down the beachfront. I’m standing far enough away from the house when I feel hands on my arms and I look over seeing Austin standing there.

“Is he always like that way towards you?” I see the sad look in his eyes.

“Since I can remember, Mar was always their favorite” I look down at my feet.

“I’m sorry,” he says pausing, “I wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to catch up to you.”

“Well,” I say trying to stay mad at the scene that had taken place, “I quickly realize that you can’t walk down the beach pissed.”

“Is it too beautiful to stay mad?”
He says sarcastically and I force myself to not crack a smile.

“No, it’s more like, you can’t stomp in the sand.” He laughs, standing beside me looking to the ocean, and then looks over to me.

“Come on, I want to take you somewhere.” He says pulling me by my arm as we go up to his house and get into the car, pulling off down the road.

When we pull up I see the giant stadium i
n front of me, “Why are we here? Is there anyone even here?”

“Nope,” he smiles to me and I look at him confused, “So
, a little secret no one knows about me, but my mother’s side of the family owns the stadium.”

“No way,” He nods.

“Come on, let’s go.” He pulls my hand, we walk inside of the building and as we pass a janitor that is mopping he looks up to Austin,

“Good afternoon, Mr. Calloway.” He nods to him.

“George.” He pulls my out into the stands and down onto the field.

“Austin, what are we doing?”
I ask him and he smiles back at me.

“I come here sometimes when no one is here, and hit some balls around.” He smiles to me walking to a dugout and grabbing a couple of balls and a bat. He hands me the
bat and then walks to the mound.

“Are you going to hit me with the ball?” I joke.

“It’s possible.” He shrugs and then laughs, “Just focus all of your anger onto the ball.” I watch as he pitches it and it comes to me. I swing with as much force as I can produce and watch as the ball flies into the back field.

“Wooooo,” I scream and toss the bat down and begin to round the bases, Austin is laughing as he turns to watch me run. “Home run, bitches” he laughs harder with my addition.

“Sure if I don’t attempt to go and get it.” I stick my tongue out at him and He laughs again. “Doesn’t that help?” he asks and I nod my head. “Come on let’s go somewhere else.” He says grabbing my hand and leading me into a bar that sits inside of the building.

“What are we doing in here?”

“Shh,” he says walking up to where a mic sits and turning on some switches. “Come on help me pick a song,” he says to me. We scroll through many songs before he picks one out and walks over to the microphone and begins to sing along with the music. I laugh hopping onto one of the stools and watching him sing into the mic. I clap as loud as my hands will let me. He finishes and walks over to the bar pulling up one of the bottles of liquor and pouring us both a shot.

“What are you doing?” I ask him and he smiles.

“You’re next,” he laughs as I shake my head, “Come on, Soph, I’m the only one here.”

“Fine,” I say and toss the liquid back into my throat. I pick out
Flyleaf and start to sing, I see him smiling at me until the song ends.

“Wow, I knew that you could sing, but I didn’t know you could sing like that.” I laugh it off as we take another shot. We continue to sing along to songs, taking turns, sometimes singing together, until I start to sing Coldplay
and I realize that I am singing it to him. That I want to fix him; that I want him to know that he is worthy of love, when I say the last words before the instrumental part of the song I see his eyes deepen as he gets up off the stool, abruptly, and walks over to me, pressing his mouth forcefully to mine. I kiss him back passionately and he tangles his hand into my hair. He pulls back with the last line, singing it to me, telling me that he wants to heal me, and I smash my lips back to his. He pulls me back up to the bar as he lifts me up so that my face is level with his and pulls back looking at me, “I just want to kiss you tonight.” He tells me and pushes his face back towards mine; I’m not sure how this makes me feel because he is willing to jump into bed with anyone… except for me.

We finally leave later on in the night, late enough that I hope everyone in the house is asleep. We stop in the driveway and Austin comes over opening the door for me and walking me up to the house.

“Good night, sweet Sophie,” he says and leans over slightly to kiss me again. I intensify our kiss as he pulls back, “I meant it when I said only kissing for tonight, and if you keep that up I won’t be able to help myself. Goodnight,” he pulls back and kisses me on the forehead.

“Goodnight,” I say as I walk in through the odor. I shut it quietly and as I pass the dining room I see my mother sitting, waiting for me; almost like I missed curfew.

“Sophie,” she says stopping me in my place.

“Mom,” I turn and look at her.

“Sit, please,” I obey for the first time in my life and I think that it shocks her just as much as it shocks me. “Have you been gone with Austin all afternoon?” I nod my head, telling her that I have. She smiles, “He’s a very handsome man.” She says and I again nod my head. “Do you like him?” I look at her confused because she has never once asked me about any interest that I have had in guys.

“Mom, this thing with Joe and I just happened, I think it’s a little soon to like anyone, don’t you?”

“No,” she smiles at me, “I never thought you loved Joe, I think you were more in love with the idea of being in love.” It shocks me that after all this time that I thought she didn’t know me she knew me better than anyone, maybe even myself.

“That’s probably true.” I tell her and
I think that she laughs because she knows it’s my way of telling her that she is right.

“Austin though, he seems to care for you a lot, not like any other girl.”
She adds.

“How do you know that?” I ask her.

“Oh, sweetheart, before your father I had an Austin only his name was Ryan and he was a drummer to one of the bands that I went to see in college, we had a whirlwind romance one summer until he left for a tour.”

“Did he cheat on you?” I struggle trying to say.

“No, we got into a fight when he was in California, and I broke up with him, a couple of days later I met your father, and by the time that Ryan came back for me, we were already engaged. He confessed to me he should have fought harder for me, but he couldn’t break up a wedding and I let him leave town for good. I have no idea what ever happened to him either.” She looks away almost slightly sad for a moment.

“Do you regret it?
Letting him leave that is.” I ask her not caring if it’s inappropriate.

“I never regret you girls.” She tells me and then looks up the stairs, “But sometimes I wonder what my life would have been like if I would have fought for him. If I wouldn’t have given up on us, but I was young and vulnerable and I knew that I could never compete with the thousands of girls that would throw themselves at him.” She didn’t need to look at me to know that it was the way that I felt about trying to be with Austin, “You don’t want that feeling of waking up one day and wonder the what-ifs. You only get one life you deserve to be happy.” She looks back at me, and I am taken a back when I realize that those are the same words that I told Austin about his job, she was the one that taught me
that. “I’m sorry for what Joe put you through and just let me know if there is anything that I can do to help you through it.”

“Thanks, mom,” I tell her and I get up from the table and walk up to my bedroom walking out onto the balcony and thinking to myself that Austin told me just this morning that he could see my from his house, and then almost like he knows that I am thinking about him I feel my phone vibrate in my pocket and I look to it.

Austin: You look beautiful standing in the moonlight.

I turn to look towards his house and I see him standing on his balcony looking at me.

Chapter Eight

I’m lying on the beach a few days after Christmas, tomorrow is New Year’s Eve and I am not looking forward to spending more time with my father. We had gotten into another argument
yesterday that led me to spend the rest of the day at Austin’s house. My mother and I have been getting along much better in the few days that they have been here, and I couldn’t wait until after New Year’s when they would be leaving to go back home.

I never thought I would ever be able to
lie on the beach in December and not freeze to death. I feel heavy footsteps on the sand as I turn around to see Austin running towards me. Our relationship had taken a turn for interesting, neither one of us had discussed what we were, but we spent every day together, and he made me laugh harder than anyone could. But we have yet to sleep together his rule not mine. When I asked him about it he told me that he wanted it to be special that he didn’t want it to be like with everyone else he had been with.

“Get up,” he yells and I look to him confused.

“What is it?”

“They moved your date up, it’s on the second now, we have to get going, and leave now.”

“What can they do that?” I ask him and he nods his head.

“They are trying to screw you Soph, we have to go.” He had been telling me for the last week or so that they were trying to screw me by changing the date so that I wouldn’t be able to make it. I jump up and shake out my towel running inside as Mar shoves a bag at me.

“He already called me and told me, here go… hurry.” She shouts at me and I run out of the door as Austin already had his car out front. I look to him to see a smile on his face and then he wipes it away quickly.

“How are we going to get a flight back, they have to be all booked up.”

“I’m sure they are, but my mother’s family owns their own plane so we will just go on that.” He says speeding down the road.

“Is there anything that your mother doesn’t own?” I ask more smugly than I mean to and he presses his lips into a firm line and shrugs his shoulders.

We board the small place and he smiles to me as we sit down. “Calm down,” he says from the seat across from me, “It’s going to be alright.”

“How can you say that?”

“Just trust me,” he says as he moves across to the seat next to me and presses his hand to the side of my face and then lowers his lips to meet mine slowly and we find a rhythm.

When the plane lands it hasn’t ev
en been two hours yet as I look around and I see Austin grinning from ear to ear at me.

“We’re not in Boston, are we?” and he shakes his head at me as we exit the plane. It’s hot here, hotter than Miami. “Where are we?”

“Saint Croix.” He grins.

“Why?”

“Because, I knew that your dad was making you crazy and I thought you needed a few days away. Mar and your mom agreed so I decided to bring you here.”

“Mar knows?” he nods his head. I don’t know what he says as he takes my hand and leads me through the small airport and out to get a taxi, we pu
ll up to the hotel a few moments later, Austin checks into it and pulls me along to our room. I look out of the sliding glass doors and it takes my breath away. It’s incredible. I feel him come up behind me as he stares at the ocean with me, wrapping his arms around my body and leaning his head on my shoulder. I turn to him and kiss him passionately. He makes the kiss intensify when he slightly nibbles on my bottom lip and I let a moan escape into his mouth. His eyes shoot open as he looks down to me.

“Austin,” I ask him the question with my eyes.

“Are you sure?” He asks me and I nod my head. He smiles forcing his kiss even deeper as he pulls my body into him and pulls my shirt up over my body and pulls me back over to the bed. He leans my body down and hovers over top of me as he kisses my lips and down my neck, finding his way to my bra as he tugs at it with his teeth, and I giggle; I mean I fucking giggle, I have never giggled in my life. He unclasps it and then moves over my body. I reach to him and grab handfuls of his shirt pulling it up over his head. I stare at his body. The sculpted abs that sit staring to me, I run my fingers overtop of them and I can feel him tensing at my touch. I feel his hand touch the button on my pants and pull at them until I am uncovered sitting in front of him. I slide his pants off only seconds later reveling all of him. We sit kneeling on the bed in front of one another just taking every ounce of one another in and wanting to cherish this moment in time. We both move at the same time, quickly, and actually end up smacking our heads together.

“Ow,” We say in unison and start to laugh. He smirks at me and then slowly leans over and places his hand behind my neck and pulls me closer into him. He leans me back down on my back and then covers my body with his own. He takes his time kissing me before I feel him press into me.

We lay on the bed with the moonlight streaming in through the window, staring at one another, neither of us wanting to move. He covers my body with his arm and pulls me into him as I begin to feel kisses on my neck.

We spend the next day wandering around the island together around the island. We do everything on the island from scuba diving to parasailing. He takes me around the entire island and for the first time since the summer I feel like I am happy, completely happy.

“Hurry up,” he yells to me while I’m in the bathroom.

“I’m almost done,” I say walking out in a short black sparkly dress, high blue heels, and dark make-up.

“You’re going out like that?” he asks pointing to me and scanning my entire body with his eyes.

“Yeah, why so you have a problem with it?”

“Well, no, not exactly,” he says reaching up with his hand to rub his neck, “But I’m either going to have to fight some guys off of you or we won’t make it the whole night out there, or both,” he says shrugging and then smiling to me.

“It’s New Year’s Eve though.”

“I know, come on let’s go.” He says putting his arm around me and pulling me into his side.

We are sitting at the bar at eleven listening to people singing in the background, only he can find every bar that has Karaoke. I’m not sure why he loves it so much. I watch as he slides a shot
in front of me.

“I can’t,” I’m pretty sure I slur a bit, “Alright, fine,” I say without and persuasion from him causing him to laugh a bit. I feel the liquid run down the back of m
y throat when I feel him lean into me,

“Have I told you how incredibly sexy that you look tonight?” I nod my head, blinking my eyelashes uncontrollably, and biting down on my lip. “Please don’t do that,” he says in a husky voice. I look up through my eyelashes and lean over to whisper into his ear.

“Have I told you how much I want to fuck you lately?” I hear him growl at me and then his hand begins to scale its way up to the hem of my dress and his lips press to my one bare shoulder and I think I hear someone call out names.

“Oops, I forgot that I put us up for karaoke.” He says smiling and pulling me up.

“What? What song did you pick? What if I don’t know the words?”

“You’ll find out, and trust me you will know the words.” He says putting his hand on the small of my back and guiding me up. When we get to the stage I hear the music for You’ve Got a Friend in Me start to play and I laugh as he leans over and says into my ear, “I’m Randy,” and I can’t help but laugh.

Throughout the song he tries to mimic Randy Newman’s voice, actually coming surprisingly close to it, but with the voice comes a ridiculous acting session trying to go along with the lyrics. When I have to sing the words, “I love you,” in the song my stomach tenses up and I feel the words more than just say them.

When the instrumental start I am trying desperately to leave the stage and to not laugh all at the same time when Austin takes my hand and begins to dance with me, spinning me around and then kissing my nose; when the song fades off
he dips me down and leaning over he kisses me passionately; I actually hear an applause to our performance, and I realize that I was not even nervous up there with him, he managed to take all of the jitters out of me just by standing next to me and acting like he does when it’s just the two of us.

We walk off of stage and he tells me that he is going to the bar to get us another shot when a girl I haven’t even noticed walks up to me.

“So, is that your boyfriend?” she says pointing to where Austin is standing.

“Something
like that,” I say smiling after him. She sighs, smiling to me.

“You’re lucky; I wish that I had someone to be in love with.”

“What? Oh, we’re not in love.” I quickly correct her.

“You’re not?” she asks and I quickly shake my head. “You two had me fooled,” she tells me.

“No, we just met a few weeks ago.” I’m not sure why I am trying to defend myself.

“This took me long to learn,” she smiles a sad smile and puts her hand on my arm, “and I lost someone incredible because of it, but sometimes it doesn’t matter how long that you have known someone, sometimes you just know. Love, it sneaks up on you and catches you when you are least expecting it.” For some reason I think of the story that my mother told me.

I look up at the bar from across the room and I watch the muscles move in his back as he pays for the drinks. He turns looking to me and I smile. I can’t stop smiling.

“Oh, that is the face of someone who just realized that she is in love.” The girl at my side says and then walks away.

Our eye contact doesn’t break as he walks toward the table, closing the distance between us and handing me my drink.

“Who was that?” he asks me pointing in the direction of the girl who just walked away from me. I just shrug and we toss back the shots.

“So,” he leans over and whispers into my ear and I feel his hand back on my thigh, “Where were we?” I feel his lips turn up into a smile as he nibbles slightly on my ear. “Do you want to get out of here?” and I look up to him nodding my head and I feel my teeth graze my bottom lip once again. I see it in his eyes how this action unglues him.

The door shuts behind us and I feel his arms come around my body as he pushes me up against the back of the door. I can feel his need pushing into my thigh. He groans as he lifts the hem of my dress up and over my head. I reach for his pants unbuttoning them and he steps out of them. I pull his shirt over his head as he lifts me up and I wrap my legs around his hard body. He pulls me over to the bed, settles me down,
and then hovers over top of me. He kisses my mouth, face, neck, breasts and I feel a sensation and he pulls back.

“Soph,” he looks down into my eyes, “Make love to me.” He tells me barely over a whisper, and then his mouth comes back to me. This time his need isn’t forceful, but yet he takes his time, exploring my body. When he finally puts my need to rest my eyes roll back into the back of my head as he starts a rhythm, and I could die right here and be happy forever.

I feel my body coming closer to the peak, closing to my release; I can hear shouts outside as they count down into the New Year. I feel the whole world around us slow down.

5, I never want this moment to
end.

4, I feel this amazing spark between us as he opens his eyes and looks into mine.

3, oh, his eyes are incredible.

2, I see the sides of his mouth turn up as he smiles to me and whispers, “Soph, let go with me.” he pauses.

1, “I love you,” I hear him say as the waves crash over us and I barely hear the fireworks being shot off outside of our room.

He rolls off of me and then turns nervously to me as I turn my eyes to him as I regain my composure.

“T-T-To-Too soon?” he asks stumbling over his words.

I shake my head and look to him not able to speak for a minute. When I can finally utter the words they come out quick and all together, “Say it again,” he smiles leaning his face over my body and touching his lips to mine.

“I love you.”

“I love you, too.” I whisper to him and then let him kiss me again.