The Boy Who Knew Me When (From Boys to men Trilogy) (17 page)

Chapter
Eighteen

Jemma

I needed him and I could not have cared less about the decision to wait sixty days. I had gone long enough denying myself the one thing that could truly make me happy simply because I was unsure as to whether or not it was real. I knew with all of my heart that this was real. I wanted to give him everything and I wanted to take all that he was willing to give be damned the consequences. And so we both gave and we took until we were so completely spent that our bodies could no longer move.

Yes I ached, yes I needed to be healed but this was nothing like the ache that had shadowed my decisions so many times before. This was not an ache that yearned for a temporary fix, this ache could only be healed with a cure and that cure was my prince, my Julian.

The entire room smelled of sex and sweat both of which seemed to drive the intense need for more. We fucked, we made love, he tasted, I tasted and then we fucked some more. It was weeks of pent up desire motivating every erection and fueling every release. If there was ever a doubt that two human beings could be completed and totally one hundred percent molded, crafted and designed one for the other that doubt could finally be put to rest.

Julian was my other half. We were made to fit together like pieces of a puzzle. Without each other neither of us made any sense. All we did was skate through life never finding a real connection because we had not made our way back to one another. And so here we were, wrapped up in each other’s arms making sense for the first time in a very long time and it was the very definition of Heaven.

Julian decided to forgo his Monday classes so that we could spend the day together. We didn’t have a chance to see much of the beach not to mention we had slept in through check out time. Only realizing we had done so after the maid walked in on us, Julian’s head buried between my legs his tongue desperately feeding both of our needs. She retreated out of the room just as fast as she had walked in not the slightest bit embarrassed. I could imagine she had seen much worse. Julian finished up his healing session, taking me from behind and filling my body for the fifth time with his salty sweetness. He was still hard when he called downstairs to add another day to our charge. 

“I think a shower is in order sweetheart.” he said hanging up the phone.

I looked down at his hard shaft and bit my lip. “Only if I can have another taste,” I teased.

“You are insatiable!” He replied.

“Is that a yes?”

Julian nodded his head then I crawled on my knees over to where he was standing and took his erection into my mouth. For the first time, no matter what trick I used he wasn’t able to comply.

“Give it a minute, Angel. I am positive he is just napping.”

I pouted and he threw me over his shoulder dragging me off to the bathroom giving my bare ass a gentle slap. Half way through the shower he was hard again, not that he had ever actually gone down, this time there was plenty of him to go around.

After our shower we walked downstairs for lunch at the small beach cafe next door. We were so hungry that we ordered everything but the kitchen sink and ate every last bite. After which we walked down to the beach, Julian smoothed out a small blanket and we applied sunscreen to each other’s backs. Julian taking extra care to slide his hands down into the crease of my ass.

“I want to take this someday.” he whispered into my ear.

“I did say I wanted to give you everything. I meant
EVERYTHING
.”

Julian smiled a devilish smile and all I could think was ‘What did I just get myself into?’

We spent most of the day between the water and the sand. No matter where we were our hands never strayed far from each other. Most of the time he was on his back people watching while I lay on my stomach reading a book.

“Julian?”

He squinted and turned to face me.

“Hm?”

“Can you help me help my dad? I cannot live with him spending what could possibly be his entire life in prison for something that he didn’t do.”

“I am not sure how we can but I am sure the truth to the right people would be a good start.”

“Yeah, the truth, that is what I am afraid of.”

“You have nothing to worry about sweetheart. It was an accident, an accident that was so traumatic to you that you could not remember it for almost ten years. Nobody is going to fault you, you were only a little girl.”

“I know, at least, I think I know. I also know that I cannot marry you until he can be there with us. Besides Tilly and your grandmother he is the only real family we have left.

Julian shook his head at the sad tragic truthfulness of it all.

“He’ll be there sweetheart. I promise, I keep my promises to you. Your dad WILL be at our wedding if I have to break him out with my own two hands.”

All I could do was smile at his confident assurance.

“Speaking of which...” He stood up and reached for my hand. “Give me back my ring, woman!” he demanded.

I frowned playfully as he pulled the delicate pink diamond from my finger.

“I never did get to do this right. I had the words planned and everything,” he joked in his best pouty baby voice.

I put my hand to my mouth to stifle the giddy, childish giggle at the awareness of what he was about to do on a crowded beach as he got down on one knee. In one hand he held my left hand, in the other he held out the ring. And even though I had already said yes, the little girl who had always dreamed of this moment became overly emotional and teary eyed.

“Jemma Lee Hale, my Skipper, my fairy princess, love of my life since before you were ever even born. I want to spend the rest of my life dancing in the sunlight, proudly showing my fairy wings to anyone who would care to see them with you for the rest of my life. Only I don’t want to be your prince anymore, we are no longer children and it is time to grow up. No, I want to be your king side by side with you, my queen, and together we can lead all the land towards love everlasting. I will never leave you and I promise to be everything you need me to be. I love you Jemma, will you marry me?”

After I gave Julian the obvious answer of “YES, YES, YES!” he bowed before me and took my hand, placing the ring back on my finger. He then pulled me to him and we danced. We danced until the sun set on the horizon.

“Julian, put these on.”

Jemma asked handing Julian a pair of blue sparkly fairy wings. She was never without her purple wings and she knew Julian would love a pair of his own. Maybe he would even want to live in fairyland with her. She knew it would take the towns people a while to warm up to him but as princess of fairyland she also knew that the rest of the fairies had to like him simply because she said so.

“OK Skipper.”

Though he knew Nick would give him hell if he found out he was prancing around as a fairy, Julian could never say no to Jemma, no matter what she asked of him. He didn’t know why, he just knew that he wanted to make her happy.

Nicolai had been asked to ride with his dad over to the lumber yard to help haul back wood for the fort they were building in the back yard. Mrs. Hale just told him to hang out until they got back so he decided to do what he always did when Nick was not around. He went to find Jemma who he found dancing around in the back yard in full leotard complete with those shiny purple wings.

“Wanna be my fairy prince? I am the fairy princess and all princesses need a prince. You would make a fine prince Julian.”

Did he want to be a fairy prince? What exactly did fairy princes do?

“Sure Skipper, I will be your fairy prince. What do I have to do?”

Jemma put her finger to her cheek, pressed her lips together sideways and began to think.

“Well, whatever the fairy princess asks him to do of course!”

That would not be much of a stretch; he already did whatever she asked him to do.

“Well then, what have you of me my lady?” Julian said taking a bow all the way down to his toes. He knew he must have looked ridiculous but the mile wide smile on her face was worth it.

“First things first, we have to make all the other fairies fall in love, the kind that lasts forever like my mommy and daddy’s kind. Then everyone in fairyland will have someone to give them kisses when they are sad. Everyone will be so happy that they will laugh and dance in the sunlight all the time. Fairy’s love dancing in the sunlight you know?”

“Okaaay…How do we do that?”

“Well, we have to dance silly. You are my prince now so we have magic powers, but only when we dance.”

And so they danced. Julian danced not just because she told him to, though he would have done so had that been the only reason, but because every time he had ever laid eyes on her dancing in the sun he had wanted nothing more than to dance right along with her.

Chapter Nineteen

The drive back to Austin was a long one, Julian and I had not slept much during our trip so we were exhausted and I still had to face Brea. Jonathan sent a text to Julian letting us both know that they made it home in one peace but we never heard another word. Brea was angry with me when she left as I was with her. I knew that I had no right to be, not after the way I had treated Brandon and in all honesty it should not have surprised me that they found comfort in one another, after all she was the person he turned to after I unceremoniously kicked him to the curb.

“I don’t know if I can face her right now Julian.”

We had been sitting in the parking lot for the last 10 minutes. I know that I was being a coward but so much had happened over the weekend and I had simply had enough drama to last a lifetime.

“You have no choice sweetheart. As much as I would love to sit in this car for the rest of my life with my mouth taking in every last inch of you, I think it’s about time to suck it up and go make up with your best friend. ”

I stared up at the empty balcony of our apartment and opened the door. Julian was right, it was time to put on my big girl panties and face my best friend, even if it seemed the word
best
, or even friend, no longer applied to either of us.

We made our way upstairs to find the apartment basically untouched. Besides the fact that Brea’s bedroom door was locked I would have thought she had never even come back home.

“I guess they made up, her door is locked.” I said. I shrugged my shoulders and followed Julian into my room where he dropped off my luggage.

“Well, I hate to be a downer....” He put his arms around my waist grabbing me by my jean loops and pulling me close. “But I have a paper due in the morning that I haven’t even begun to write yet so I am going to have to check out.”

The fact that he put his life on hold to spend a weekend with me warmed my heart. Besides the drama, the weekend with Julian was a dream come true and though I did not want to let him out of my sight I knew we had to get back to life as it is when we aren’t buried inside of each other. Though the idea of spending the rest of our lives doing exactly that appealed to me like nothing else in the world.

“Julian, why didn’t you tell me? We didn’t have to go away this weekend.”

“Oh yes we did, we absolutely we did. Don’t make me remind you why!”

“Please remind me. I seem to have forgotten.” I teased grabbing both of his butt cheeks and giving them a tight squeeze.

Julian crookedly smiled and put his mouth to mine, stealing my kisses with every ounce of fire he had left until sleep took over and he pulled away to yawn. He had almost fallen asleep twice on the way home, I knew he was exhausted.

“Sorry. sweetheart.” He mumbled mid yawn.

“It’s OK, why don’t you go go back to the frat house and get some rest. Call me later?”

I walked Julian to the door
where he paused for a moment to kiss me goodbye before disappearing down the hall. Like a schoolgirl I ran to the balcony just in time to watch him get in the truck and drive away.

“Jem?”

I turned to see a red faced Brea rubbing her eyes behind me and the smile that was on my face quickly faded. She looked as if she had been up for weeks, her face was whiter than usual, her nose was chafed, her eyes were blood blotched and the circles under them looked as if they had been done by make-up artists on a horror movie. I quickly ran to her side and put my arms around her neck without saying a word.

Never, in all of the years I had known her had she looked so absolutely destroyed before. She had her moments of sadness, when Martin Aldan, a boy whom she had been pining over all of freshman year, told the school that she had a butterfly shaped birth mark between her legs she had cried for a full 24 hours straight.

She had never gone all the way with a boy before but she thought he was amazing, he said and did all of the right things, they dated for months, he was patient, kind and good looking. Who would have thought he would turn out to be such a jerk? But once school started the very next day her tears dried up and her pain escalated into pure hatred. When we showed up she dragged me around campus twice before we finally found Martin holed up in the upstairs boys’ bathroom. Brea left me waiting outside and dragged him out into the crowded hall by a handful of his shirt.

Brea reached down and cupped his balls giving them a tight squeeze hard enough to make Martin cry out and then she kissed him. She kissed him hard and long making sure everyone saw her. When she pulled away from him Martin was standing up against the locker speechless. While the two were lip locked Brea had undone his pants allowing his hard on to spring free for the entire school to see, not that there was much there to see.

Brea made a show of looking down at his tiny penis before shrugging her shoulders and looking him dead in the eye.

“Meh, never mind. Wouldn’t be worth it anyway, there just is not much for a girl to work with.”

Then she grabbed my hand and we walked away leaving Martin completely exposed while half the school laughed at him. I did not say a word; I just watched it all play out, in shock, just like everybody else. From then on out nobody cared about Brea’s birthmark. Except Brandon who promised to rearrange Martins face the next time he saw him, which he did, thoroughly.

“Sweetie, what’s wrong?”

Brea cried into my ear.

“It’s over Jem, he was so angry, he just got out of bed and left. I haven’t heard from him since.” She said hysterically.

“I’m so sorry, sweetie.” I ran my hands through her knotted hair and walked her over to my bed. “Tell me what happened? Was he that angry over what happened at the beach?”

“No!” she sniffled. “No, we made up before we ever left. We only left because I didn’t think you would want me there anymore and Jonathan and I needed to talk anyway.”

“Then tell me, if you two made up I don’t understand why he left.”

“We had been a sexual emotional wreck since the plane. We had sex in the bathroom but it wasn’t enough, both of us wanted more. Well we came back here, the moment we walked through the door he shoved me up against the wall and we had the most amazing sex of my life. I am telling you it was
THE BEST
.”

She sniffled some more and I grabbed the tissue box by the side of the bed. She took a few and blew her nose.

“OK, keep going.”

“I woke up, I dunno maybe one-ish and just stared at him. I realized then that I was crazy about him. I mean, I already knew that I liked him but Jem, I realized then that I was in love him. He was lying there, looking so fucking perfect, he was mine. He didn’t care about all of the guys I have slept with, he never judged me for anything. I love him Jem.”

Her tone became urgent and I was having even more troubling understanding why she was behaving the way she was.

“Honey, I love you, but I am seriously have a hard time following here. You love him, he loves you too,
even Julian says so. Jonathan told him that he was in love with you.”

And then she screamed and what was just sadness turned into total anguish. The tears she poured were thick, heavy tears and I didn’t know what to do to help her. Her heart was breaking more and more with each tear and I couldn’t wrap my head around it.

“Please Brea, please talk to me.” I pleaded, doing everything I could to hold back my own tears. Her pain was my pain. I could not bear to watch her fall apart.

Though they were still falling like heavy rain she wiped he tears away with the palms of her hands.

“Jem...” she cried barely able to say my name. I looked at her reassuringly, begging her once again to please speak to me.

“I love him so I had to tell him Jemma, I had to and when he found out he left me, he didn’t say a single word, his face said everything I couldn’t bear to hear him say.”

“What did you have to tell him Brea?”

“I...” she gulped. “I’m pregnant!” She screamed the words at me just before losing control all over again.

“What? That son of a bitch!” I shrieked. Needless to say, I was pissed. “What kind of a man leaves a woman after she tells him she is going to have his baby?”

And then Brea stopped sobbing, her tears became silent but they continued to fall. In slow motion I watched the change in her face and as her head began to move side to side I knew what had made Jonathan walk away because for a split second that was all that I wanted to do.

“How long have you known Brea?”

“A few weeks.”

“The baby is not Jonathans?”

“No Jem...” The pitiful look in her eyes said everything I needed to know. “It isn't Jonathans.”

I was not OK with the information my friend was relaying to me but at least for once in my life I did not feel like crying. I maintained all composure, somehow hoping that everything I was hearing was a lie even though I knew that there was no way it could be.

“Brandon knows?”

“Yes.”

“Is that why he was upset about Jonathan?” Brea bopped her head. “It was just sex, I get that you are pregnant with his child but why would he be mad about Jonathan Brea?”

“Because it wasn’t just sex, Jemma. Brandon doesn’t do
just
sex and I would never
just
have sex with Brandon.” She paused for a moment to choose her next words. “He asked me to marry him when I told him about the baby Jem. I said no, of course.”

“Oh but of course you did!” I replied sarcastically.

“Jemma, please!” She begged. “Jem, do you think I want to be pregnant with my best friend’s ex-boyfriends baby? I feel like I am living in a fucking Jerry Springer episode! And what makes it worse is that I am nothing but your fucking shadow. My
baby daddy
has been dreaming of what your two little bouncing bundles of perfection would look like since he was fourteen. How the fuck could I ever compete with you when it comes to Brandon?”

Brea jumped up off the bed and began to pace the room.

“Are you saying you wanted to say yes?”

Her pacing halted and turned to me.

“The truth?” I nodded. “The truth is that I have been dreaming of my wedding since I was fourteen years old. I know that we have never talked about it, we haven’t because my dream was a dream and that is all that it was. But the dream always included Brandon.”

“When he began spewing at me a bunch of crap about ‘doing the right thing’ by me I wanted to jump through hoops to let him. But there was just no way that I am a ‘do the right thing’ kind of girl. Before Jonathan I thought I was going to have to live the rest of my life pining for someone I could never have because I didn’t think it was possible to love someone so much twice.”

“And now Brea, what do you want now?”

“I want Jonathan to walk through that door, throw me over his arms like a caveman and tell me that it doesn’t matter.”

I stood from the bed trying to process the information being thrown at me. To say that I was overwhelmed by the nonstop turn of events the last few days would be an understatement. Between my father’s bomb dropping, finding out about Brea and Brandon, then finding out about Brea, Brandon and their unborn child I felt like my head was going to explode. How much more could I take?

On top of everything, I needed Julian and Julian was probably sleeping like a baby completely unaware of anything but the fact that I just might be joining Brea in baby bliss. It was then that I too became aware!

“I don’t know what to say Brea.”

“Say you forgive me. Say you will be here for me. Don’t hate me because I need my best friend.”

I took a deep breath and looked hard at Brea not really sure that I could answer those questions but I did anyway.

“I forgive you and even though this is REALLY, really weirding me out right now I am not going anywhere. I am here as long as you need me.”

As the words came out of my mouth I knew that I meant them. Brea threw her arms around my neck, she apologized, thanked me, cried a bit, told me she loved me and thanked me some more before pulling away.

“Oh my God Jemma, all this time and I completely forgot about your dad. How did the visit go?”

I cringed at the thought of reliving the news that came with visiting my father for the first time in seven years but I knew I wouldn’t be able to leave my friend in the dark. I spent the next half an hour recounting the events of my visit. She would stop me every once in a while to gasp or ask for some kind of clarification when she wasn’t quite sure she heard me right.

“So what happens now?” She asked.

“I guess I have to figure out some way to get him out of this mess. I figured perhaps speak to his lawyer or go straight to the DA, I honestly have no idea.”

“What about Brandon?”

Confused and almost defensive I ask, “What about him?”

“Besides the fact that he chose to attend a college with one of the top law schools in the country and has probably met tons of people that could help there is that little fact that his dad is one of the top prosecutors in central Texas. Don’t get all defensive, sheesh!”