Trying Not To Love You

When I woke up the next morning, Hunter was still sound asleep on his stomach, turned in my direction, with his right hand tucked under his face. He looked so at ease. Despite having a hangover, I had one of the best nights of sleep in a long time. I laid there for a little while watching his back rise and fall with every breath he took, but nature called. I got up as quietly as I could and went into the bathroom. While I was in there, I looked in his cabinets for some pain reliever to help with my slight hangover from the night before. After I took some, I made my way down to the kitchen to get something to drink.

I walked down the stairs, and I could not believe my eyes when I reached the bottom. The house was a mess, and there were people passed out everywhere. I looked across the living room to the couch, and just about died at what I saw. Two girls were duct taped to it. I shook my head and mumbled to myself, "Looks like they aren't getting up anytime soon." I made my way toward what I was hoping was the kitchen. As I approached, I saw a guy duct taped to the bathroom door. I mumbled to myself again, "What is it with people being duct taped to shit?" Walking back down the hallway, I passed a guy asleep on the floor. Someone had taken black marker and had drawn all over his face, arms and legs. In the kitchen, there were still a few people playing poker. I grabbed a water bottle out of the fridge, and headed back upstairs. I walked past a huge window at the top of the stairs, and looked outside. I noticed the picnic table had been set on fire at some point during the night, and there was a guy and a girl sleeping on an air mattress in the pool.

Shaking my head at the mess left behind, I opened the door quietly to Hunter's room, hoping that I wouldn't wake him up. I was surprised to find Hunter sitting up and running his hand through his hair.

"Damn it CC, I thought you left." He was pissed.

As calmly as I could, I said, "Relax Hunter, I just went to find something to drink."

"F*ck! I'm sorry. I thought you had left me." He pointed towards the fridge that was in the corner of his room. Somehow, I had missed that earlier. "There's water and orange juice in there."

I sat on his bed and pulled the covers over my legs. "Sorry, didn't see that over there. I wish I had though," I started giggling. "You don't want to go out there. Your house is trashed."

He looked up to the ceiling. "I'm not surprised. Every time Bentley throws a party at the beginning of the year, this shit happens. He hires a cleaning company to come clean all that."

"Thank God, because it's going to take forever to get that shit cleaned up. You should see the people duct taped downstairs."

Groaning, he looks over at me. "Are you serious?"

I shook my head at him. "There is some guy that was colored with a Sharpie all over. That shit is going to take forever to clean off."

"At least the police weren't called this time." Hunter got up and adjusted his boxers. "I'm going to jump in the shower, and then I'll take you home."

"Ok, sounds good. I'm going to go back to sleep; wake me up when you're ready." I laid down, pulled the covers up to my neck and watched Hunter walk across the room to the bathroom. God, he was a sight to look at. He has one of the nicest asses I have ever seen. One of my favorite tattoos was on his upper right arm, praying hands holding Rosary beads and above that, it said Only God Can Judge Me in old English lettering.

He must have sensed me staring, because he turned around and winked. I pulled the blankets up to my nose, trying to cover that fact that I was blushing because he caught me, but I could not tear my eyes away. When he closed the bathroom, I kicked my feet and squealed like a little girl. I could not believe I actually spent the night with him, alone, and in his clothes.

A while later, the sound of my phone buzzing woke me up. Rolling over on my side, I picked it up off the bed. There was a text message from Hailey asking me where I was. I checked the time. Christ, I was asleep for two hours.

I could not help but wonder where the hell Hunter was, and why he didn't wake me up. I sat up and jumped in surprise. He was sitting at the foot of the bed watching me. "Damn you scared me. Why didn't you wake me up?"

He shrugged. "I like you sleeping in my bed. You looked so relaxed."

"Have you been watching me sleep the whole time?" God I hope I did not talk in my sleep.

"No, after my shower I tried to wake you up, but you weren't having it. I went for a run, and just came back and took another shower."

"Well, thanks for letting me sleep in."

He went over to his dresser. "Do you want a pair of sweat pants to put on for the ride home? I don't think it's a good idea for you put that dress back on."

I did not answer him. There was no way I could go back to campus wearing his clothes. Dominic would flip his shit. I took off the t-shirt I was wearing, threw it in the corner with the rest of his dirty clothes and stood in only my bra, and his boxers. I heard him gasp. Since I now had his attention, I decided to throw a little flirting back at him. I picked my dress up off the floor and slid it on. Then, I reached under my dress and slowly started pulling the boxers down; I glanced back and saw him watching me intently.

Smirking at him, I winked and asked, "See something you like?"

He shook his head at me. "You have no idea." He mumbled just loud enough for me to make out what he said. "We have to get the hell out of here." He grabbed his keys, hat and wallet and opened the door, saying over his shoulder, "I'll meet you downstairs, so hurry up."

After running into the bathroom and throwing my hair up in a ponytail, I met Hunter downstairs. I was still laughing at the chaos that was all around when I asked him, "So, how did you become roommates with Bentley?"

Hunter ushered me out the front door, "I uh, helped his sister out last year."

I did not like that answer and was content to drop the conversation, but he continued as he opened the truck door for me. "It's not what you think CC. Bentley had a party here last year. Things got a little out of hand with a football player. He wasn't taking no for an answer from her, so I taught him a lesson."

"Where is his sister now?" I certainly hoped she did not live there with him.

"She dropped out of school and moved back home."

Thank God!

"She was ok though, right?" I asked, wondering what he meant by the football player not taking no for an answer.

"No, not at first, but she is getting better."

Hunter shut the door, got in the driver's side and we drove back to campus. He dropped me off and said he would call me later on to check up on me. I walked into my room and Hailey was lying on her bed watching TV.

"Where have you been? You never texted me back last night."

"I ran into Hunter as I was leaving. He wouldn't let me go by myself so I stayed with him last night." I sat down on my bed and kicked my shoes off. "When did you get back?"

"Last night. I felt bad about you coming home alone after what happened at the party. Now I wish I hadn't."

"Sorry, I should have texted you." I really did not want to know but asked anyway. "What happened after I left last night?"

"I don't think you want to know Kenzie." She looked over at me then continued, "You really need to open your eyes, and see what is going on. He's not the same guy he was when you first started dating."

"Just tell me what happened? I feel him changing too, but I need him. I know you don't understand."

"That girl he was dancing with…" When I nodded at her, she continued. "He stormed off with her after you left. A little while later, they came back."

I gazed over at the picture of Dominic and me on my desk, remembering all the fun times I had with him. "Do you think he cheated on me?"

"Kenzie look at me." I turned towards her, tears on the verge of spilling. God, I hope he did not. "No, not that I saw anyway, and don't you dare cry. He isn't worth the tears. I mean it."

After talking with Hailey, I took a long hot bath. As I was relaxing in the bath, I checked my phone since I had not checked it since this morning. I had two text messages. One from my mom, making sure I was coming home for Thanksgiving. She wanted to plan Chloe's baby shower for that weekend, since that was when we would all be home together before she had the baby. The other one was from Dominic this morning, asking if we could talk.

A few hours later, I was getting hungry. I decided to text Dominic to see if he wanted to grab some pizza, and come over to talk. He responded back saying yes, and that he would see me soon.

About an hour later, he knocked before he came in. "Baby?"

I sat up in bed and pulled my ponytail tighter. "I'm here."

He put the pizza down on my desk, and came to sit next to me, "I don't know exactly what happened last night, but we need to figure it out. I can't lose you because of a misunderstanding."

I scowled at him. "You sure didn't seem too concerned about it last night; you and that bitch were f*cking dry humping each other. How could you do that Dominic, ten minutes after I gave you a blow job?"

"She's my roommate's girlfriend babe." He reached over and put his hand on the back of my neck. I pushed his hand off. "Remember the girl that came over the other night?" I nodded, remembering exactly whom he was talking about. "That was Brittany; she's no one, no reason to get upset."

"She sure didn't seem like she is a no one. Not to mention, you made me look like a complete fool in front of your friends. You didn't even come after me when I tried to leave. I ran into Hunter, and he made me crash in his room because I was a little too drunk to go home by myself."

"No one thinks you're a fool. He made you crash in his room? Where the f*ck did he sleep?" He stood up and started pacing in front of me.

I knew I was being spiteful. I could not help but gloat at my payback for his acting like an a*shole, so I told him the truth. "Where else would he sleep, but in his room, with me."

"You have got to be f*cking kidding me." He yelled.

"Maybe you should have been the one to make sure I was ok to get home, instead of worrying about that skank."

"I'm sorry Kenzie. I acted like a f*cking idiot. I drank too much. I love you, and only you." He came over and cupped my face.

Sighing, I said, "I'm scared Dominic. I feel like you are changing, and I'm going to end up getting hurt."

"I'm not going to hurt you, I promise. Come on; let's eat before it gets any colder." He kissed my head, then put a slice of pizza on a plate and handed it me.

While we were eating, Dominic mentioned that he was not going to have a lot of time to spend with me, now that football was picking up. I told him I was going to look for a part time job to keep me busy. He agreed that would be a good idea, and offered to let me borrow his car to go job hunting. Times like this, I wished I had brought my own car. Dad had suggested I leave it home, since I really would not be using it. He figured that Dominic and Hunter would be here to help me out if I was stuck. Dominic stayed and watched a movie with me, and then he went back to his room to sleep since he had to be up so early in the morning.

Later that night, when Hailey came back, I asked if she wanted to go out with me tomorrow and look for a job. She agreed, saying she could use some money with the holidays coming up. She could not rely on her mom to help her out, since she was already helping her so much with school.

The next afternoon, Hailey and I got all dressed up and went out looking for jobs. Dominic had slid his key under the door as he said he would. We applied at a few local coffee shops that were within walking distance, and they all said they would get back to us. We stopped at a few places at the mall too, which were not too far from the dorm.

By the time we were done, Hailey and I were both hungry, so we decided to stop at the little café near campus. We ran into Gracie while we were there.

"Why don't you try the library? They are always looking for people. All the good shifts are probably taken, but it's worth a try." Gracie said.

Hailey looked over at me and knew that I would not last at a job like that. I always needed some kind of noise. This was something outside of what I would normally do and I needed to give it a shot. "Thanks. I think I'll stop over there tomorrow on my way home from class."

"Kenzie, you will never last at that job." Hailey said, shaking her head.

"I will be fine, plus if they hire the both of us, I won't have to worry about the quiet with your mouth always running." I said, smiling at her, because she knew I was right.

"With it being a Sunday, it's pretty quiet over there; you could try and see if anyone could talk to you now." Gracie smirked at Hailey. "I think Logan is working, actually." As I said, Hailey's mouth was always running, so I was not surprised Gracie knew about Logan.

Hailey practically jumped from her seat. "Running into Logan sounds good to me, so let's go."

When we walked up to the building, she turned to me. "Let me do the talking and we'll both have jobs." She winked, and then walked in.

There was a nerdy looking girl with pigtails and glasses sitting behind the desk. We walked up to her, and Hailey asked if she knew where we could find Logan. The nerdy girl looked from Hailey to me, then back again to Hailey. Then she pointed to a row of shelves to the right of where we were standing.

Hailey grabbed my arm and practically dragged me in the direction the girl pointed. We looked down the first couple of rows and did not see him. Finally, we found him in the last row; he was standing there with his back to us. We walked down the aisle towards him, but Hailey stopped dead in her tracks.

I nearly ran into her, but she turned to look at a book. She shushed me, and shifted her eyes to Logan and then back at me.

"Leave her the f*ck alone Britt. She doesn't know anything about you." Logan said this just loud enough for us to hear. Hailey looked at me with wide eyes.

"He needs to tell her. I should have done it the night I showed up and she was in his room." Brittany said.

I raised my eyes brows at Hailey and she did the same to me.

Logan turned around, right as Hailey turned to look at him. "Oh, hey Hailey, what are you doing here?" He leaned back a little so that I was in his view. He cursed under his breath, and looked back at Brittany before acknowledging me. "Hey Kenzie."

"Hey Logan." I glared over his shoulder towards Brittany. She looked like she was caught doing something she was not supposed to be doing.

"We were looking for a book on…" Hailey grabbed a book off the shelf. "Ah, here it is, The Big Book of Lesbian Horse Stories."

Way to go Hailey. She was making this even more awkward. I snorted, and turned to walk away. I heard Hailey say something to Logan in a hushed voice, and then heard her groaning as she came up behind me.

"Let's never come into the library again, unless it's absolutely necessary." Hailey said.

I stopped and looked at her. "We came here to get a job, Hails. I'm at least trying. What did Logan say?"

She squeezed her eyes shut. "Nothing. Just go fill out the application with nerdy girl so we can get the hell out of here. I need a drink."

I asked the girl for an application, which she provided, and I filled it out while Hailey walked off to hide from Logan. I finished and handed in the application, found Hailey and went to the dorms. We stopped at Dominic's first, so I could drop off his keys. When we walked in, I went over to his desk to write him a thank you note.

"Um, Kenzie, what the hell is that?" Hailey said, pointing to a pair of panties on the floor by Dominic's bed.

I was dumbfounded. What the hell were those panties doing by his bed? They sure as shit were not mine. Dominic would not be stupid enough to bring someone here, would he? Was he cheating on me? I know everyone thought he was up to something, but I always brushed it off because he was so different when we were together.

After staring at them for what felt like forever, I looked at Hailey and said, "Come on. I think we both need that drink."

"Already taken care of. I texted Hunter; he's on his way." Hailey grabbed my hand to lead me away from the panties.

"Have I ever told you I love it when you take care of me?"

She nodded at me, but stopped suddenly. "Now what?" I asked.

She dropped my hand and walked back to the desk; she grabbed the pen, bent down to pick up the panties with it and then dropped them on the keys. She grabbed my hand again, and then said, "Now we can go."