What He Really Feels (He Feels Trilogy) (3 page)

I had already packed my iPod docking station and all of my CDs (yes, I still had CDs), so I was forced to listen to the only CD that I could find, the one that was already in the CD player of my under-the-counter stereo
in my kitchen that I hadn’t disassembled yet. Emerson Hart belted out, “I Wish the Best for You.”

I liked Emerson’s sentiment, but I wasn’t sure I shared it.

Maroon 5’s “Makes Me Wonder” came on next, and the lyric, “And it really makes me wonder if I ever gave a fuck about you” hit a little too close to home for my comfort. I thought about that from her perspective. Did she ever give a fuck about me? Or had she used me to get the comfort she needed?

With a friendship that went back as far as ours did, I had to believe that she cared about me and that she was just confused. I knew I had hit her with my confession of feelings at a low point for her, but I had hoped that she would be so overcome with the realization that she loved me, too, that she would just forget about what’s-his-name.

Turns out that didn’t happen.

I pulled my plates off of a shelf and separated them with packing paper, wondering why I was torturing myself even more with this CD.

The next song was Justin Timberlake’s “What Goes Around Comes Around.” I chuckled to myself, the first sign of laughter I had felt in days. It would serve both of them right. I wasn’t malicious, but I was hurting.

And the CD was like a goddamn soundtrack of my life. They kept coming:
Avril Lavigne’s “Keep Holding On” (no thanks… done with that shit), Hinder’s “Lips of an Angel” (Jules did have some amazing lips), Kelly Clarkson’s “Never Again” (damn right, Kelly), and finally, Nickelback’s “Rockstar.”

Okay, the last one didn’t have any significance to my situation with Jules, but I wanted to be a
rockstar, too. Who didn’t?

The irony wasn’t lost on me, and I finally decided to turn the damn CD off. It’d be easier packing in fucking silence than listening to all of the songs that reminded me of her. The whole point of this exercise in packing and moving was to get her off of my mind, anyway. It was time for a fresh start and something
new, and getting the hell out of Arizona seemed like my only option. After the long history I shared with Jules, there were just too many reminders around me of what broke my heart and of what I could never have.

My phone rang, and I picked it up when I saw who it was.
“Hey, Mom.”

“Dad filled me in. How are you doing, T?”

I wondered briefly what exactly my dad had told her. I had confided in him certain details about my sex life, in particular that Jules and I had slept together. My mom, not so much. She was too… motherly to share those details with. I assumed he just shared the details about Jules and me breaking it off and the whole moving to San Diego thing. “I’m okay,” I answered, scrubbing my hand down my face. I hated lying to my mom, but I didn’t want her to worry.

“It’s not like her.”

“No, it’s not. But she was hurting. She did what she thought was right.” I realized that I was defending her. I was defending her decision to fuck me and then dump me to go back to Nick. What kind of idiot was I?

“I guess. I’m just so sorry.”

“Thanks, mom.”

“So you’re really moving?” she asked.

“Yeah. I just need to get away.” That damn lump was back in my throat.

“How long will you be gone?”

“I don’t know. We’ll see how San Diego works out for me. Maybe a few weeks or a month, or maybe a year. Years. I don’t know.”

“I’ll miss you.”

“I know, Mom. I’ll miss you, too.”

“Call me every day.”

I chuckled. “We’ll see.”

“Then text me every day.”

“You’re such a mom.”

“Yes, I am.
Your mom. And I love you and just want to make sure you’re okay.”

“I will be. Thanks for calling. I love you.”

“Love you, Travie.”

I fucking hated the name “
Travie,” but she was my mom. She was the only person in the world allowed to use that nickname.

I hung up with my mom and finished packing my kitchen, leaving out a few random items for last-minute supplies. I headed to bed, still completely crushed by Julianne’s betrayal, but feeling the tiniest spark of hope knowing that I was moving to San Diego, a place that would provide me with a fresh start.

CHAPTER 2

I packed all weekend. I had lived in the same apartment since I had graduated from college nearly four years earlier, and for a dude, I was amazed at the amount of shit I had accumulated.

Saturday night found me at my favorite bar with two of my best friends from work, Bill and Mike. I can’t exactly judge how good looking guys are, but we must not have been ugly based on the female attention we were receiving.

Mike drove, knowing I needed a night out without worrying about driving, and the guys picked me up from my apartment a little after nine. I wanted to go somewhere where we could play pool, so we headed to the place closest to my apartment.

The problem was that Saturday was Karaoke night.

Kill. Me. Now.

My buddies and I always bet money on our pool games, and I was one shot away from taking a hundred bucks from Bill when some chick got on the microphone and screeched Leona Lewis’s “Bleeding Love,” totally fucking up my shot and setting Bill up perfectly. Ultimately he won, so I sat there with not only a broken heart, but a hundred fewer dollars in my pocket.
Plus the bleeding ears and the cringe on my face as I listened to the song.

I was on my fourth whiskey and coke when a cute redhead came over to make conversation. I was a beer drinker.
Almost exclusively. But on occasion, I partook in whiskey, usually just the nights I wanted to get real fucked up. I was succeeding, and then the redhead showed up while I was sitting on a barstool as Mike and Bill played pool.

“Hi. I’m Shannon.”

“Hi Shannon. I’m Travis.”

“You’re cute.”

“You look smoking hot in those little pants.”

She did. She was wearing some tight black stretchy things, and I could make out the exact shape of her tight little ass. She wasn’t hard to look at, but I realized that something was suddenly getting hard as my erection strained against my pants. It felt good that Travis Junior, or “TJ,” as I liked to call him, was awake again after being on lockdown for a few days.

Julianne Becker was suddenly the furthest thing from my mind.

Okay, that’s not entirely true. The fact that my mind actually told me that Julianne was far from my mind was proof that she wasn’t.

Bill was trying to catch my eye to make sure I was okay, but I was too focused on Shannon to realize it.

Shannon leaned forward and kissed me. It was very forward of her, and it was also very weird. She wasn’t Jules, but she was drunk and I was, too. I grasped her hips and pulled her closer to me, so she was standing between my legs as I sat on the barstool.

My aggressiveness took her by surprise, and I used her gasp as my entrance into her mouth. I kissed her long and hard, my tongue exploring every curve of her mouth. I felt her softening into me, and her hands curled around my neck as she did things with her tongue that were probably illegal in at least seven states. She sucked on my lip, and I imagined her sucking on other parts of my body. Suddenly we were making out like two teenagers who snuck out of the house for some alone time. Only we weren’t teenagers, and we most certainly weren’t alone in the middle of the bar.

It hadn’t been long since my last random bar kiss, but suddenly an image of Jules entered my mind. Whenever I pictured someone in my mind, I always saw the same picture of that person. The image of Jules that was burned in my mind was from nearly eight years earlier. It was the day after our senior prom, and she was in a black bikini as we went tubing down the Salt River. The wind was in her hair, and she was grinning with a lighthearted, happy smile. I loved that image of her in my mind, and that’s what popped into my mind as I kissed someone else.

She was never, ever far from my thoughts.

I moaned, thinking of Julianne, but Shannon mistook it for passion, and her hands started working wildly all over me.

I knew it would be a total dick move to let her do what she wanted to me, but I was four drinks in and brokenhearted, so I didn’t have the proper mindset not to be a douche bag.

She took my hand and pulled me up from my stool. I grinned as she led me back toward the bathroom.

“Not in here,” I murmured.

“No?” she asked.

“Bathrooms aren’t very classy,” I said. I’m not saying it never happened in a bathroom, but there had to be somewhere cleaner and classier to have a quick grope.

I let her lead me outside and around a corner. There was a doorway there, quiet and private and hidden from view. She kissed me and then shimmied down my body slowly. She got down on her knees and pulled TJ out, and then her lips wrapped around me she proceeded to give me the best head I’d had in a long time. Despite the abandoned pleasure of getting head in an alley, I couldn’t help but think she’d done this before.

It was quick and clean, and she swallowed it down with gusto. I briefly thought that I’d like that to happen again, but my heart wasn’t anywhere near it, and besides, I was moving to San Diego.

I zipped up and we returned to the pool tables. I bought her a drink along with my fifth. It was the least I could do after what she had done for me. We kissed a little more, and then we parted ways.

I doubted I would remember her name in the morning.

And I didn’t. I remembered very little of that night, actually. Mike informed me that I had consumed a total of seven whiskey and cokes, and he said I talked the whole way home about what I had dubbed my “Blow Job in the Alley.”

I passed out when I got home and woke up a few hours later. I made it to the toilet in time to puke my guts out, and then I passed out again, this time on the bathroom floor. When I woke up again on Sunday morning, I realized how disgusting my bathroom floor was. And then I vowed that I was never drinking again. Ever.

I was what my ex-girlfriend Brooke would call a “hot mess.” Sunday morning through afternoon was awful. I was more hung over than I’d been in years, and I felt guilty and a little embarrassed about my BJ in the A and not even exchanging numbers with the girl who did it. My actions were shameful, and I knew it.

The few minutes of pleasure the night before hadn’t been worth the self-disgust I felt that morning.

It was time to start turning things around, and I knew that San Diego would allow me to do just that.

I’d wallow in self-pity and douche-baggery for the next week, and then I’d pick my ass up off the floor and start fresh in California. I had to believe that it would work, because what I had done the night before wasn’t working for me. I was not that guy who went into alleys for random blow jobs. The best I could do would be to learn from the mistake I had made and not make that same mistake again. 

I made a vow to myself: I was going to turn over a new leaf. No more random hook-ups, because they weren’t helping me get over Jules. It was immature and foolish, and I knew I just needed some time.

No matter how good it felt in the moment, the aftermath just wasn’t worth it.

Maybe this was a sign that I was growing up.

Sunday night, my sister called me. She was married with two kids, both boys, and my nephews were the greatest kids known to man. I didn’t want my own anytime soon, but I loved hanging out with them and being Uncle Travis.

“Hey, Lizzy.”

“Hey
Travie.” Oh yeah, my sister called me that, too. But only when I called her “Lizzy” first. She hated “Lizzy” as much as I hated “Travie.”

“How are my awesome nephews?”

“Parker has an ear infection, which is a delight. Jackson has endless energy. They weren’t playing well today.”

“You sound tired.”

“You sound like you want a punch in the gut next time I see you.”

We hadn’t always gotten along so well. In fact, when we were kids, we constantly fought. I’d pull her stupid pigtails and she’d push me. I’d call her mean names, and she always managed to retaliate with something even meaner. She was older than me, and hence bigger than me, so when we were little, before I grew muscles and started working out, she could take me on. We’d leave each other bruised and battered, and my parents would get pissed at us and tell us to stop, but we wouldn’t.

We still ribbed each other, and she could still be the ultimate bitch, but she always looked out for her baby brother, and for that, I was grateful. Now that she was a mother, she was different. She had become a mama bear, and she looked out for me like she did for her own kids sometimes. It was overbearing and annoying, but I got where she was coming from and I appreciated my sister. Even if she irritated the fuck out of me.