Chapter Ten – Aston
“Remember where you’ve been to see how far you’ve come,” I mumble to myself, pushing the psych paper aside. “Yeah, all right, Gramps. F*ckin’ helps if you’ve actually got somewhere, though, doesn’t it?”
I push the heels of my hands into my eyes, rubbing harshly. Hear something enough and it’ll be burned into your body, scarring your skin and tattooing itself in your mind. It doesn’t matter how long ago the words were said. It just matters that they were.
Thirteen years and I don’t feel like I’ve got anywhere. So what if I’m not the scared little boy in the corner anymore? He’s still inside. He’s still afraid. He’s still shivering. He’s still bruised. He’s still broken. He’s still beaten.
Just because I appear not to give a f*ck doesn’t mean I actually don’t. Not everyone is what they seem, and I’m one of those people.
I don’t even know who I am. I spend so long fighting against who I don’t want to be that I have no time to be who I want to be. I have no time to be who I could be.
The same old voices are creeping back into my head, the same ones I battle every day, the same ones that tell me who I should be, who I am.
Just like her… No good for anything… Worthless…
I shove away from the desk, my chair getting caught on the carpet. It tips backwards as I stand, and I ignore it, slipping my feet into my sneakers. I grab my wallet from the desk and slip my jacket on.
I need to prove them wrong. I need to prove myself wrong.
I ignore everyone on my way out of the house. If I speak to anyone, if I stop, if I think for even a second right now, I’ll be back in my room still swirling in the same pool of self-doubt.
My engine whirs to life, and I pull away from the frat house. There’s a bar just outside the city, set away from the roads leading to the interstate. One glance at the bar and you know it’s a run down, no ID, shabby place.
The kind of place my mom would have worked at. The kind of place she would have been picked up at. The kind of place her body was found at.
I push on through the city traffic, perfect people driving back to their perfect families in their perfect little houses.
You’re not worth anything.
I flick the radio to “on” and Trapt blares out, the beat of Headstrong fueling the feelings running rife through my body. A mixture of anger, determination, frustration, and a sliver of helplessness. Because they still control my life.
I take the turn off to the small road that will lead me to the bar. The road is deserted, no cars, nothing, until the bar comes into view. The parking lot outside it is half full with rusted, run down cars that need more than a fresh coat of paint. My car looks out of place here.
I look out of place here.
I’m out of place here. Mom wouldn’t have been.
I pull a cap onto my head and get out of the car, staring at the exterior of the bar. The sign is slightly broken, one of the lights flickering pathetically against the darkening of the sky behind it. Eighties music hums from inside, and a woman’s voice screeches. A scratchily written sign proclaims a karaoke night.
I push open the door and get hit by the smell of stale smoke and beer. A woman in a barely there outfit passes in front of me, a tray raised above her head as she weaves her way through the patrons gathered about the bar. It’s far from busy, but everyone is focused on the thirty-something woman trying to sing in the corner of the bar.
I walk up to the bar, adjusting my cap, and order a beer. I was right. This place doesn’t care about ID. A beer is put in front of me and I hand over the cash. No-one gives me a second look, apart from the waitress cleaning glasses at the opposite end of the bar.
Her eyes flick up and down me and she runs her tongue across her lips. Her clothes barely cover any skin, leaving her body on show.
It’s all you’ll be good for.
Her bleach blonde hair is flicked over her shoulder as she bends over to put glasses away, causing every man at the bar to look at her ass.
You’re just like she is.
She straightens, sending me a suggestive smile. She’s not much older than me – maybe one or two years – and I drink some from the half-flat beer as she meanders across to me.
“What’s a guy like you doing in this bar?” She leans forward, resting her elbows against the sticky wood. Her tits squeeze together, almost popping from her top.
You’re nothing, just like her. It’s all you’re good for. You’re worthless. Useless. A pile of shit. You’re just the son of a whore, born to be a whore.
There’s no stirring in my dick, no attraction towards this waitress flaunting herself right in front me. There’s no desire at all, except the one to get the hell out of here.
“You know what?” I push the glass towards her and stand. “I have no f*ckin’ idea.”
I don’t wait for her reaction, instead turning and leaving the bar within minutes of my arrival. No-one notices me leave except her. I was invisible.
My car is comforting. I rest my head against the steering wheel, fighting against the constant voices swirling in my head.
“I’m not,” I say quietly, out loud. “I’m not like her. I’m not like her!”
And I’m not.
If I was, I’d be waiting for that girl to finish her shift so I could f*ck the shit out of her. It’d be what my mom would have done, except she would have sold her body for money or drugs. She wouldn’t have thought about what she was doing, or how it was affecting those around her.
But I am thinking. And I’m not waiting for the waitress.
I’m driving away from the seedy, run-down bar and heading back to campus.
I’m heading back to Megan.
~
Seeing her face, even if it is across a crowded hallway, makes the day brighter. Seeing the guy next to her, making her laugh, makes the day turn darker than the dead of night.
It drives me f*cking crazy. I should be the one walking beside her, making her laugh and wrapping my arm around her shoulders. Not that f*cking a*shole that is.
I lean against the wall, waiting and watching as they come closer. She shrugs his arm off, adjusting her books in her arms, resting them at her side against her hip. The hip that’s between them. Her hand not holding them tucks some hair behind her ear, making the side of her face even more visible to me.
She glances up, her blue eyes colliding with mine for a second. Her facial expression doesn’t change, and neither does mine. Any twitch of lip, any blink of an eye, any movement of our bodies is all it would take to out us. We both know that.
The stakes of this game are high.
She drops her eyes from mine as she walks past me, and I drop my eyes to her ass. Her jeans hug it tightly, and I remember what it’s like to hold it as she moves against me.
The more time I spend around her or thinking of her, the more I need her - the more I need the peace she can bring me. The more I need the complete and utter silence she brings me when she’s tucked tight in my arms.
The more I need to prove that I’m not my mom. That I’m more than a whore’s son, born to be a whore myself.
The more I need to prove to myself that I’m more than that – just like I did last night.
I’m not good enough for Megan. I know that. I’ll never be enough for her, and it’s best for her if she packs her bags and runs in the opposite direction screaming for her life.
I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to let her in the way she wants. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to tell her all of me, let her know all of my past. I don’t know if the shaking little boy inside, stuck in a hall of horrifying memories will ever be able to break free from that and let me be with her completely.
But I still won’t use her the way I’ve used girls for so long.
I would rather lose her entirely than use her for my own selfish needs.
She disappears from my view and I push off the wall, heading outside. Ryan joins me outside.
“Took your f*ckin’ time,” he mutters.
“Don’t start your girly shit with me today, man,” I warn him. “I never said what time I’d be done.”
“What? Didn’t bag a girl in class to scratch your itch?”
“Why would I? You know I only pull that shit at weekends. You aren’t the only one with grades to keep.”
“You mean you actually have grades?”
“You’re a dick, Ryan.” I shake my head. “And yeah, if you must know, I graduated high school with a GPA of 3.8, so f*ck you.”
“Shit! That’s higher than mine!” he exclaims. “I barely scraped a 3.4 to get in here from out of state! How the hell did you manage that?”
“My gramps was probably a better teacher than the poor shits that got stuck with your ass,” I reply. “That’s how I managed it.”
“Did you not go to school at all?”
“I went the last two years, and that’s it. It was easy as hell. I’d already learned most of it, so I spent it f*cking about and surprising the hell out of my teachers with near perfect scores on most tests.”
“I never knew that.” He pushes the door open and we step into the house.
“Why would you? You all assume my brain is in my dick.”
“That’ll be why I don’t even know your major, then,” he muses, dumping his bag on the floor and dropping himself onto the sofa.
I grin, setting my back next to me as I sit down. “Psychology.”
“Are you for real?” He sits up.
Braden walks in, eating an apple. “Is who for real?”
“This dick is majoring in psych. Did you know that?” Ryan cocks a thumb towards me and looks at Braden.
“No f*cking way.” Braden looks at me. “Are you really?”
“Pretty damn sure that’s why I do the classes the course requires.”
“Well, f*ck me.” He leans against the door frame. “What you studying that for? To understand why you need so much sex?” Him and Ryan chuckle.
So I can understand why my mom was the way she was and stop other people going that route. So I can help stop other kids dealing with the shit I had to.
“I know why I need sex, a*shole,” I retort. “I’m doing it to work out why people like me hang around with f*cktards like you two.”
“Oh, that’s easy,” Ryan shrugs. “We make clever dicks like you look good.”
“True that,” Braden agrees.
Ryan looks at him. “You know something? I don’t even know what your major is.”
Braden shrugs a shoulder carelessly, chewing. “You know something?” He grins. “I don’t know either.”
I laugh at the smile on his face. “Ryan, man, you might just have a point about you two making me look good.”
“I’m majoring in engineering, if either of you dicks care.” He shrugs.
“Hey, that’s supposed to be pretty tough. All that math and stuff,” Braden says vaguely.
“Math was all I could do well in school. It made sense.”
“Yeah, well.” Braden straightens, dropping the apple core in the trashcan. “The only math I know is that me plus Maddie, minus clothes, equals a product not even algebra can create.”
I smirk as he leaves with a satisfied smile on his face, and Ryan snorts.
“That’s some pretty sweet math… One I think this whole house can appreciate.” He grins.
I nod in agreement, thinking of Megan.
F*cking right I can appreciate that math.