I Found You (23 page)

“Leave me alone.” I lifted a hand, as he got nearer, palm out, warning him to stay back.

“Rachel?” His voice had dropped, it wasn’t threatening, but he was still moving, and I didn’t want him near me.

“Stay away!”

“No, for fuck sake, Rachel. This is ridiculous. I just wanted sex. You like sex…”

Not with you. Not like this. Not anymore. I’m gonna go… The words whispered through my head as though I’d only just made the decision to leave, but surely I’d made that when I pushed him off me. But where was I gonna go? Oh, I wish my brain wasn’t so clouded by thick black fog.

“Rachel?” He was right in front of me, his hand reaching for me. I felt sick. Shaking my head, I backed away. I couldn’t.

“Just calm down…”

“No.”

“Look, if you don’t want to…”

It was only a reprieve, in a few hours he’d try and cajole me, and force me into it again. I kept moving.

He kept following.

The anger inside me mixed up with fear, swirling one in between the other. My hands were trembling. “Leave me alone.”

The bathroom was behind me, a few feet away. If I… I turned and ran for it as he reached out for me, and I made it but he was right behind me, grabbing my arm and trying to pull me back as he blocked the door from shutting.

I shoved it at him, hitting him with it, but he was too tough. We’d fought enough times. I knew I’d never win. He was much too strong for me.

“Let me go!”

“No. Don’t be fucking stupid, Rachel. Just calm down.”

“Leave me alone!” As I screamed at him, I reached for the mirror which stood beside the sink, without thought, it was just suddenly in my hand, and then in the next moment I’d smashed it on the edge of the sink. The shattering sound rang from the marble lined walls, echoing about the space and shards clattered to the floor.

It was like someone pressed pause on time, like Declan and I were held in limbo waiting. His hand still gripped my arm, his fingers a pressure on my skin, but he wasn’t trying to pull me back anymore, I think he knew what I was going to do. I didn’t. Not even when I grasped one long shard of splintered glass from the sink, not even when my hand lifted and swung it in an arc––not even when I thrust it into him, felt the pressure, and pressed harder.

My hand let go. The shard of glass was buried deep in his flesh, just above his hip.

Oh my God.

My hands shook harder.

“Fucking hell, Rachel. What the…”

He looked in shock as he touched it, then gripped it and pulled it out. God, there was so much blood.

I turned to the toilet and vomited in the bowl, then grabbed the towel and wiped my mouth as I heard him back in the bedroom, moving around.

At the sink I washed my hands and my face.

Scarlet ribbons of blood swirled about the white porcelain sink, disappearing with the water.

When I looked at myself in the mirror to put up my hair in a band, the image I faced was naked. Still naked. I needed to get dressed.

“Get up here!” Shit, Declan was calling someone on his phone. “Yeah. Now! I said get up here! I need some help.”

I needed to get out.

I didn’t look at him when I went back into the bedroom. I didn’t speak to him. He was sitting on his side of the bed. But I sensed from his position in the periphery of my vision, he had one hand pressed over the wound, while his other gripped his phone.

I grabbed a pair of jeans out my wardrobe, only an old pair, a pair I’d had when I met him. I snatched a t-shirt out too, and slipped it over my head. Then I put on my jeans. My hands were shaking so much it took ages to get the buttons done up. I took a deep breath when the last one finally slipped into place.

I pulled out some sneakers, not looking at the eight pairs I had to choose from. I just wanted anything that would help me walk out of his life.

He didn’t turn as I left the room, and I didn’t look back. I wasn’t ever gonna look back. I wasn’t gonna regret leaving, and I wasn’t gonna think about what I’d done.

He never said a word. Nor did I. Our goodbye was the sound of the door slamming shut behind me…

Tears ran down my cheeks. I had to tell Jason I was ill. But I didn’t think of myself as ill, my illness was just me.

I got off the toilet, flushed it and went back to bed, feeling lonely, and awful.

I wanted to hug Jason, to ground myself by being with him again. I wanted to have sex with him. I’d feel normal then––alive. I felt trapped now, and isolated, not just by the staircase separating us, but by the chasm my stupid brain was busy opening up between me, him and this odd world he came from. If it kept getting wider, I wouldn’t be able to reach Jason across it. When I shut my eyes, I could see my hand stretching out to his in my mind, and not being able to reach him.

But he was downstairs, alone too, probably thinking of me, and wishing I was there as much as I wished he was here. I desperately wanted to go to him, but I didn’t. Instead I touched myself when I was back in bed, and thought of him, and wished his parents to hell, my bad side screaming back to life.

I didn’t really wish them to hell; it was just a moment’s feeling. But I knew I was going to struggle to get through this Christmas if I couldn’t be near Jason.

~

When I came downstairs in the morning, Jason was waiting in the hall. He handed me my coat and said in a low voice, “I’m taking you out. I’m giving you the tour of the town.” He smiled when I met his gaze, but then his smile dropped and he looked serious as he took a breath. “I told Mom and Dad you’re pregnant this morning.”

“Oh.” I didn’t know what else to say. He looked angry, and when he closed his mouth the muscle in his jaw ticked with a little jerk, like his teeth were gritted, and he was holding back frustration.

“I didn’t want to tell them yesterday when everyone was here, but they had to know.” His voice sounded hard edged with restraint too.

I nodded. Of course they had to know, they’d know eventually anyway; a child was pretty hard to hide. He could have waited, but if a miracle happened and they got to like me and then they found out…

“I didn’t tell them I’m not the father…”

My eyes said
oh
again, I was sure, although no sound left my mouth. I couldn’t imagine the conversation. They must truly hate me now. The implication was I’d trapped him. He should’ve said the baby wasn’t his, but then if he had done, their reaction would probably have been worse.

“We’ll come back before the party, but we’ll get lunch out and spend the day together.”

“Your mom doesn’t mind you going out?” I asked quietly, concerned he’d offended his parents and they were now angry at him too. Was he taking me out to get me away from his mom, run away himself, or had they asked him to take me away? Whatever the reason, there must have been some heated words flying between him and his parents this morning.

“Hi, Helen…” His mother’s voice seeped through the closed door which led to the living room.

“I don’t think she cares at the moment, Rach … ” Jason said, but I was only half listening to him, my hearing was tuned to his mother’s voice beyond the door.

“It’s worse,” I heard his mother say in a low voice. “Jason told us this morning that that girl has gone and let herself get pregnant…”

“…Perhaps she’ll work her temper out of her system by the time we get back,” Jason continued. I doubted that. He wasn’t listening to his mom. “But at the minute I think she would rather we weren’t here.” Jason’s eyebrows lifted then, and he whispered, “Sorry, Rach, you shouldn’t have to listen to her condemning you to Aunt Helen.” So he had heard.

I smiled weakly, feeling guilty. “No,
I’m sorry
. I’ve caused a rift between you and them.”

“Don’t be stupid. This is my fault, not yours. I made my own choices. You didn’t twist my arm behind my back to make me fall for you, did you?”

I shook my head, intensely glad we were going out. I just wanted him to myself for a while. Then maybe when we got back I could deal with this better.

He turned and picked up his dad’s keys. “We’re taking the truck. Dad said we can have it. Then I can run you out to the lake, too, once you’ve seen the town.”

Pride rippled through me, when he held the door for me to pass. He looked so… Oh I don’t know… Sensible, grown up, and gorgeous, with the keys dangling from his hand and a look of determination on his face. This was the guy I’d fallen for––the guy who’d taken me in and was helping me change my life––the guy who
loved
me.

A smile lifted his features, when I glanced at him, and his eyes shone.

My smile came from somewhere deep inside me, and I brushed my hand across the front of his jeans as I passed, forgetting his parents and this town which disliked me. My bad girl was growling again. I just wanted to tell them all to fuck off.

He laughed.

My heart swelled when he clicked the button to open the truck, and I climbed in one side while he took the driver’s seat. It felt good to be alone with him again. Just as good as it would have done if a guy had ever driven me in a car to a prom. This was my special guy, and this Christmas was going to be special, just because I had him. I didn’t give a damn about the rest of them judging me anymore. Let them judge.

The surrealism of his world suddenly swept over me though. This whitewashed winter wonderland was like a dream to me. It was a way of life I’d only ever seen in films. But it was
his
life; he’d lived it for twenty-two years.

Through the window of the truck, beyond Jason, there were the icicles, real and fake, dangling from the snow coated roof. And the carpet of snow still covering the ground, was mottled by animal tracks, cats and birds. The jolly Santa, sitting in his sleigh, held his hand high as if he hailed us as we pulled out of the drive.

It really was like living in a film set.

I looked back at Jason, pulling my belt across me. “Where are we going to first then?”

He glanced sideward at me. “I thought I’d start by showing you the school I went to.”

“Ah, the height of excitement in a small town.”

He laughed. “Yeah, okay, so you’re a big city girl who doesn’t get small town. But I thought you might want to see where I’ve spent my life. I thought it might help us to get to know each other a little more…”

“You mean, you just wanna relive the successes of your football team, and spend the morning reminiscing over old glories.”

He threw me a mischievous look. “That too…”

I laughed and gripped his thigh.

It did feel good to be sat beside him in a truck, it pulled me back to reality, making me feel like a real person, leading a real life, not just acting it.

I left my hand on his leg as we drove into town and he chatted constantly, telling me stories about his friends, things he’d done, and places we passed. They meant nothing to me, but I liked listening to him, and listening about his life. It was so different to mine.

When we got to his High School it was deserted for the Christmas holidays.

“Come on, let’s explore.” He switched off the engine and then picked up my hand which was still on his leg and kissed my palm before letting it go. “Go on, get out then, honey.”

He gave me a guided tour of the outside, pointing at classrooms and telling me stories of his antics here, which made me laugh. He sounded like he’d really enjoyed High School. I barely even remembered mine.

His hand gripped mine the whole time, stopping me from slipping as I cautiously stepped across the snow and compact ice in my stiletto heels.

Then when he was showing me the running tracks then the football and baseball pitches at the back of the school, we saw a break in the fence.

“Let’s go in.” He pulled on my hand with a wicked grin. I was laughing as I ducked down and crept through a break in the wire fence. He made sure it didn’t snag on my clothes.

I just loved his small considerations.

On the baseball pitch he messed around as I insisted he showed me the style of his best pitch, and he held a pose, then described every nuance of the throw to me.

God I loved him.

“I bet you were one of those guys who was sickeningly good at every sport.”

His head tipped sideways and he shrugged his shoulders, “Hey, what can I say, it’s just the way I am, and I was, sickeningly good at Math too. Don’t you hate me…”

It was a joke, but I went over to him and put my arms up on his shoulders.

His hands gripped my hips.

“I don’t hate you. I love you, Jason Macinlay.”

He smiled. “Likewise, Rachel Shears.”

He kissed me, a short sharp press of his lips against mine, and his eyes shone with emotion, deep and bright when he pulled away.

Then I remembered how fast he could run as I saw the running track over his shoulder… “I bet you were on the athletics team, too, weren’t you? As well as the football team and the baseball team…” I looked into his rich brown eyes and saw my love reflected.

“Sorry, sweetheart.”

“Oh, do not apologize.” My hands slipped to his muscular waist. “I’m reaping the benefits of all this athleticism.”

He laughed, but then the jet circles at the heart of his eyes widened and his grip on my hips firmed, and a second later his mouth was on mine again, but this time it wasn’t superficial.

My eyes shut and my fingers slipped to grip his ass.

I wanted to do far more than kiss. The hours I’d spent alone last night surged into my mind, along with all the images I’d played through my head as I’d touched myself. Images of him. Of us. Doing crazy things, in crazy places.

There was a ridge in his jeans that said he’d missed me last night, too.

I was breathless and hot and ready when he broke the kiss and looked at me like he was going to propose going behind some shed somewhere. If he didn’t propose it, I was gonna.