FOREVER MINE (11 page)

Once inside we call the police.  They are sending someone out to get our statements.  I grab Brody’s digital camera and go back outside to shoot some picture of the rose petals on the ground.  It’s dark now, so it’s a little harder to see what is in the photos but it is not impossible.

Heading back toward the house I can’t help but remember what it felt like to finally kiss Brody.  I have wanted to do that for so long now. I had to know if he’d stop me or apologize.  I have always been worried that if we took it to that place and it went bad we couldn’t be friends.   I am
still
a little worried.

I stand looking at the place where held each other while the sun set and had our very first kiss.  I know fear.  We have been bed fellows for a long time now.  I sleep with the lights on more often than not.  I carry a gun.  I take self defense classes, not to better myself, but because I’m afraid.  I live in an apartment alone.  I don’t take risks with my heart anymore.  I was so wrong before, with Michael, I never felt love like I thought I had with him.  It was fast and furious; passion and eventually pain.  I thought if you love with your whole self the other person will love you just as much.  I was so very wrong.

I know insecurity.  I know what it feels like to have absolute faith in someone.  And have that blind faith slap you in the face and make you feel dirty.  It makes you lose what little faith you had in yourself.  You feel like a fool.  You feel raw.  It becomes part of you.  Something you wear on the outside; like a second skin.  Everytime someone touches you, the sensation never penetrates the invisible shield that has hardened to protect you. Everything you do, every choice you make is questioned by the little voice in your head. 

What I don’t know, is this feeling I am experiencing with Brody.  It feels familiar.  I think if I scrutinize it too much I will destroy it.  I can’t have faith in myself; I haven’t learned how to do that. 
Yet.
  I know I’m ready to move past this.  I do trust Brody.  It’s not blind faith or blind trust.  He has earned it.  Over and over he has been there.   No questions.  He has also come to me.  He trusted my fucked up opinion and listened to whatever I had to say.  I trust him to know what we do now.  I sure as hell don’t know.

Sighing I walk into the kitchen.  My little mental tirade leaves me feeling a little exposed.  I rub my hands up and down my arms trying to get rid of the feelings I’m wearing as an insecurity/fear shirt.   As if he can read my mind Brody hands me a cup of chamomile tea.

“I saw you having a talk with yourself and thought you may need to relax when, and if, you ever came back inside.”

The tears fall from my eyes before I can stop them.  This is why I trust Brody.  He doesn’t even know what he has just done for me.  He knows I need something and does his best for it to be the right thing.  “Thank you.”  I wipe my face angrily as I cry again.  I take a deep breath and fix the facade I have to hide behind.

I let him hold me for a minute.  I don’t trust myself to show him beneath my mask right now.  The police are coming.  If I lose my control now I may not get it back, but I promise myself I will show him. 
Soon.
  I pull out of his arms gently, and sip my tea. He isn’t finished talking yet so I wait.

“You don’t have to worry about what happened before.”  He says as he sits at the kitchen table.  He scrubs his face with his hands.  “I don’t want you to think I’m going to change on you because we kissed.  It was amazing, and I am having trouble thinking of anything besides kissing you again; and soon, but I will not move beyond a kiss until I feel you’re safe; physically and mentally.  I am still your best friend.”  He smiles a bit devilishly at me.

I put my tea on the counter by the sink and walk over to where he is sitting.  I squeeze in between him and the table, straddling his lap, and brush his lips with mine, never breaking eye contact, just the slightest touch.  His hands rub up my thighs and over my hips to rest high on my ribs; his thumbs just below the curve of my breast.  Slowly, I lick his bottom lip; just trace it with the tip of my tongue.  He moans and tries to capture my tongue.  I pull back a little and shake my head telling him no, and go back to learning the contours of his mouth.  When I can’t take it anymore, I hold his face in my hands and pour everything untainted into him.  It’s passionate and carnal.  I open my mouth to his kiss; I open my soul to
him.

Michael waits in the car until Brody is in the house.  He watches as he climbs the stairs to the porch, unlocks the door, and shuts out the outside world.  It drives him crazy that he doesn’t know what is going on.

He starts the car in drives around the block to the alley.  He parks the car so the driver side of the car is on the side of the yard.  He is parked under a tree so the shade is providing enough shade not to draw attention.  He is still taking a chance being so close.

Michael puts the binoculars to his eyes and sees Charlie taking bags out of Brody’s hands, grinding herself obscenely against him.  She rubs her face against him like a cat in heat, and whispers something in his ear.

It’s madness he feels, as he watches that whore throw herself at someone like Brody.  It is all consuming.  He feels it in his head.  His brain is pulsating, his ears ringing, eyes watering, his mouth goes dry.  Why does she offer herself to everyone, except him?

He punches the dashboard so hard it cracks.  He opens up the glove box, taking out a 3 inch pocket knife and opening it, he begins to stab the seat next to him.  The sweat pouring from every pore, his breathing is heavy; his arms ache from the torrent of blows delivered to the passenger seat. 

As he calms, the plan takes center stage in his brain.  He has to stick to the plan.  To deviate would be disastrous.  He takes a few cleansing breaths, clears his mind. 
Control.
  He has to stay in control.  He stretches his arms above his head, rolls his shoulders, and cracks his neck.  Ready.

Quietly, he opens the car door. Walking to the back of the car he takes out a big Ziploc bag.  Inside the bag he has 3 dozen black rose petals.  Torn from roses he grows himself, in a greenhouse in his building.  He set up lighting and irrigation so the flowers grow to be perfect specimens. 

Opening the bag he throws the rose petals on the ground, walks over to the gate, and urinates on the bottom of the fence.  He marks his territory like an animal.  Then, he gets in the car takes one more look in the window, and sees they have moved to the other rooms in the house.  He drives to the front rings the door bell, gets in his car, and drives farther into the neighborhood like he belongs.   No hurry, no fear of getting caught, just leisurely driving.

He stops the car at a McDonalds back in the city, 20 minutes away.  While he eats he thinks about the roses he started growing just for Charlie.  It stirs memories of another time he gave a rose to Charlie.

It is 2000; senior prom night is just beginning.  The Limo is idling while we take pictures.  Our group of misfits consists of Charlie and me, Samantha and Will (my friend from football), Brody and Rachel (a girl who graduated 2 years ago.  I honestly don’t know what girls see in him.  He is disgusting.), and Melissa and Paul.  I think Melissa is somehow related to Charlie, but I never cared enough to ask how.

Charlie looks beautiful tonight.  She is wearing a long sliver satin dress.   The sleeveless dress covers her from throat to foot.  The rhinestone choker attached to the dress at her throat twinkles in the light.  There is a slight opening in the dress between her perfect breasts, showing the tiniest bit of cleavage.  The two slits on either side of the skirt go almost to her hip, and are visible only when she is walking.  Her back is completely bare; only a sparkle at her neck, and a shimmer of fabric draped low on her hip caressing her fabulous backside.

The black tux I’m wearing has a matching sliver bow tie and vest.  I brought her one long stemmed white rose.  It represents purity.  I have a matching rose pinned to my lapel.  We look stunning together.  It is this moment that I decide that we will be married.  After college and our careers take off.  We have to follow the correct path.

Once we are in the limo, the girls are still taking picture, and the guys are trying to look like they’re not having fun.  I notice Brody and Charlie
are
giggling.  He has whispered in her ear and she is nodding her head.  She reaches over and takes his hand kisses his cheek.  I pull her away from him and sit her firmly next to me.

Pretending not to be mad, I put my arm around her, kiss her cheek and
I
whisper in her ear.  “I can’t wait till later.  You look beautiful tonight.”

“Thank you, you look amazing yourself there,
Mikey
.”  She giggles and rubs her nose against mine, running her hands in the back of my hair.  I love when she holds and rubs my head like that.  I’m putty in her hands.

“Mmmm, I love that.”  I tell her almost growling in her ear.

“I know.”  She whispers against my mouth right before she kisses me and nibbles my lip.  “I know something else you’ll love.” She is still holding my lip captive in her teeth.

I forget there is anyone else around when I’m with her.  I would never act this way with an audience but I can’t help it.  She has a way of closing out the rest of the world no matter where we are.  My hands are wandering the smooth planes of her back; each vertebra, each rib, her shoulder blades; finally finding a home at the spot between her hips and lower back resting on skin and satin. 

She leans in close, I can almost see into her dress through the keyhole opening, she whispers in my ear, very low, very deliberate,
“
I’m not wearing panties.”

My heart has stopped.  My pants are five sizes too small.  And the limo stops.  Of course it does.  I watch as she shimmies across the seat and gets out of the car.  We’ve talked about this for some time.  We have been dating since fall.  We have had Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s, and my birthday together.  I am going away for college in a couple weeks and Charlie so far, is still going to community college.  I hope to change that but for now I will take what I can get. 

She wants to have sex tonight.  She wants me to be her first and she wants to do it before I leave.  What is more memorable than prom night, right?  She said it is cliché but doesn’t care.  When Charlie makes up her mind she really makes up her mind. So, we told her mom she was staying at Sam’s.  Tomorrow we are all going to the beach, and she would just leave from her house, since they want to get on the road early. 

In reality, we have a hotel room waiting.  We really are going to the beach, but she is not leaving with Sam, I will be driving her.  We plan on going to some after parties and then being alone.  I wasn’t sure how Charlie was still feeling about the whole situation, until now.

Taking a deep breath, I get out of the limo, adjust myself, and come face-to-face with a scowling Brody.  The girls have walked inside already.  I look back to him and raise my eyebrow as if asking ‘what’.

“I know what you are going to do with her tonight. You had better make this right for her; she has some notion that you’re this great guy.  You break her heart and I’ll break your face.” He pokes me in the chest.

“Brody, no matter the threats you throw at me, the looks you cast my way, the things you say to or about me, none of it matters.  I will be the one with Charlie tonight. I will be the one
inside
Charlie tonight.”

“You’re a fucking pig.”

“I might be.  That doesn’t change the current situation.”

Brody grabs the lapels of my jacket and gets in my face just as the door opens, and Charlie is there, “Hey guys come on, Brody what are you doing?”

“Nothing.”
He let’s go.

“Well, let’s go, we want to dance.” She is vibrating with excitement.

“We’re coming.” I say.  “We start walking, I grab Brody to slow him up a little, and whisper as I pass him, “Just a thought while you’re riding your high horse.  Charlie chose me.  She has no idea you even exist.  Unless it’s to pick up the pieces after someone else has hurt her feelings.  Oh, and in preparation for our evening, she isn’t wearing underwear.  To show how much she wants to be with me, me Brody, not you.”  I smile at him knowing how jealous he is feeling.

I walk past him and grab Charlie around the waist and kiss her deeply, grabbing a handful of ass to show off for Brody.  She returns my kiss with matched vigor and moans a little when I grab her.  Brody storms past us and I don’t see him for the remainder of the evening.