Teach Me To Live (Teach Me - Book One) (41 page)

“It’s nice to know that you’ve covered your body with images that are meaningful to you,” Dad announced over a sip of his coffee. He was eyeing Austin over the rim of the big white coffee mug. “Most people just pick an image out of a book.”

Mom’s eyes bugged a little in her face and I huffed a laugh at the words my father had just allowed to release from his mouth, but Austin just nodded, agreeing. “I design most of my own tattoos, sir.”

Dad shook his head. “You can call me David, Austin.” He looked a little pale now. “You’re a part of this family.”

At first, Dad couldn’t stand the thought of me and Austin. But over the last month or so, he’d begun to accept that he was there in my life. However short-term Austin was in my world, my father treated him like there was always another day. I think Dad did this for me more than anything. He knew better than anyone that I’d had no taste of loss. This would be hard on me, and because of this, he had placed his feelings of fatherly dislike for the man I’d chosen for myself, and moved into something like tense acceptance. He was my Daddy, the man who would always save me from all the pain he could, because that’s what Dad’s did. This was just a pain he was trying to make less for me. I knew this, and I appreciated it.

Austin shifted in the chair at the dining room table where we sat over breakfast after spending the night together in the pool house. I knew this was also something my father found hard to accept, but he did so with grace. Again, it was appreciated.

“David,” Austin spoke my father’s name on an unsure tongue.

Mom jumped into the conversation, “Are the two of you doing anything fun today?”

Mom was living a little vicariously through us. She wanted to hear of our every adventure and was a little aghast at the thought of jumping off a bridge into the North Saskatchewan River. And the face she made when she learned we’d gone skinny-dipping had been absolutely priceless.

“Uh,” Austin yawned. “I think I’d really like to have a day in today.” He looked at me and I felt my heart flip. Austin had yet to want to stay in during the day. “I’m okay, just a bit more tired than usual.”

The entire table turned quiet and I felt my world pulse at the beat of my heart. “Okay,” I said, finding my voice. “We can do a movie day or something.”

Austin smiled. “That would be nice, sweetheart.”

When I looked away from Austin, I found my father watching me with sad eyes. Regardless of all the ways I wanted to crumble, I promised myself I would never crumble in front of Austin. I beamed. “I’ve been dying to make you pay for that awful horror movie you made me watch.”

Austin groaned. “That was forever ago.”

“I haven’t forgotten. My soul has been scared,” I said dramatically. “Yes, I shall retaliate with a good romance, I think.”

Austin smiled, lifting his water to his lips. “That’s a brutal retaliation.”

I laughed and so did my parents. But both Austin and I sensed that their hearts were breaking in their chests.

“Oomph,” Air blew from between my lips as Austin lowered himself down heavily over my body. Beneath me, the late September leaves crunched as our bodies rolled over the land of his yard.

Austin was laughing, but that didn’t stop him from kissing me hard. “Thought you could run from me, did you?”

I smiled, replying against his lips. “I would never run from you.”

“And I would always chase you. If you ever actually did try and run,” He promised. His hand moved to my thigh where he gripped me, lifting my leg up around his waist. I circled my leg around his waist, holding his body to mine at his urging. And then I kissed him harder.

I lost a little more of myself to him in that moment. There’s something so very intimate about the connection that comes with a kiss. Connecting this way to Austin is even more beautiful than what I suspect of the norm. He breathes me in—literally. Every time he kisses me, he inhales my sighs, consuming the sound of my pleasure. Tasting my very soul . . .

Every time he kisses me, I feel my heart beat a little stronger for him.

A lot has changed in the last three months, but more has changed in the last month. July and August were blissful. They were filled with life and love and
living.

September is when the real changes began to take place. They weren’t fast changes like a flip of a light switch, but they weren’t slow, either. They were steady and heartbreaking. Austin started sleeping more and he was taking a medication now that he wouldn’t tell me about. Thankfully, I have Kaiden, and he has informed me that the medication was an opioid. It’s used to manage pain. I hated that Austin didn’t feel as though he could share his pain with me, but I didn’t press him. This was how he needed to deal with what he was going through, and I would let him do just that, however he needed.

Thankfully, Kaiden has been sticking around the house lately. His parade of women has ended. Raina returned home to Calgary as school started early in September and she had classes. It had been obvious that she was afraid to leave. And it hurt everyone who watched her go because she held Austin close, as though she feared this was the last time she would ever hold him. And when she drove away, I knew the dam that was holding back her grief broke. Still, I appreciated that she hadn’t allowed Austin to see her break of pain.

He’d felt it, but he smiled and teased in the way Austin did. He was so much stronger than any of us. He was so beautiful.

Sliding out from beneath the covers, I slipped into a pair of pale yellow pajama pants that had little white butterflies patterned all over the material. Oddly enough, Austin bought the pajamas for me. He said it was getting colder and I should have something warm to wander around his house in. I loved them. They were adorable.

I moved to the dresser where I kept a good amount of my clothing and pulled on a white long sleeved shirt over my tank top. Then, because the floors in his trailer were cold, I slipped my feet into little yellow slippers, also courtesy of Austin.

As I moved to the door of the bedroom, I glanced back at Austin who slept soundly. I’d stayed in bed for as long as I could before I got up. Austin had never been much for sleeping in late, but the last couple of weeks, he’d been sleeping more and more. I let him, because he needed it. At first, he’d fought it, but doing so had begun to take its toll on him. I encouraged him to take advantage of the fact that he was no longer working in the shop with his Dad, and sleep in.

He didn’t fight me. He slept.

Slipping into the hallway, I closed the door quietly behind me before I tiptoed as soundlessly as my slippers would allow into the kitchen. I startled as I caught sight of Kaiden standing against the counter. He wore a big hoodie and a pair of gray sweats. He looked awful.

“Morning,” I greeted.

“He’s still asleep?” He asked, ignoring my greeting. I nodded. “He’s been doing that a lot lately.”

“Yes,” I didn’t know what else to say.

“He’s getting worse.”

My throat felt tight. “Kaiden,” my voice was a warning in itself, but I shook my head in warning anyway. “Don’t.”

“You know he’s in pain.”

I placed my palms soundlessly against the countertop, feeling my heart crack in my chest as I sucked in a deep breath. “I know that.”

“I don’t know what to do.”

“There’s nothing,” I felt my voice break and a sob sounded. “We can do.”

As though just realizing the way he’d hurt me, Kaiden moved forward. He tugged me against his chest and hugged me tightly. “I’m sorry, Maddy.”

I smiled at the name he adopted from Raina. I was just happy he wasn’t calling me baby cakes.

“It’s,” I sighed, hugging him back. “It’s not you. But this isn’t o-okay.”

“I know,” I felt him nod. “It’s not fair.”

I shook my head. “Not at all.”

The sound of something banging stole our attention away from all that wasn’t right in the universe, and we both moved quickly to Austin’s room where the sound had come from. When I opened the door, the sight of Austin stole all my breath right from my lungs. He was on his knees beside his bed. He was white as a sheet and he was gasping, wheezing. His hand clutched his chest and his eyes were wide.

The last time this had happened, I hadn’t been here. I’d gone home for a few more pieces of clothes and he’d been taken into the hospital. That was when he’d been given his opioids—for the pain.

I couldn’t move.

“Call an ambulance!” Kaiden shouted and my body jolted into action. I claimed the floor between myself, and the phone on Austin’s nightstand, faster than a hurricane wind.

I called for help and if I was told to do it, I couldn’t recall a word of the conversation I had. I couldn’t recall anything.

Now, as I sat here in the waiting room of the hospital in Edmonton, Alberta, where the ambulance had taken Austin, I kept seeing gray. My eyes watched as they took Austin away in the truck. Kaiden had rushed me from the house behind them, his hand pushing into the small of my back and all I can actually recall is gray. The sky is so very gray. The clouds were heavy and dark with the need to rain—or possibly snow. Who knows in Alberta. It is October.