My heart races and bursts into a million pieces, traveling to every corner of my body with the furious rush of my blood. I become my heart, a pounding mess, and my heart becomes me, sleepy and peaceful in the midst of my climax.
I think I black out for a few seconds because the next thing I know, Thomas is standing up, dragging my previously fallen coat over my arms. My orgasm-addled brain is confused as he buttons up my coat. My mind goes to the last time I was here and he kept opening them. His actions are so not what I was expecting when I came here, not after what he said to me about imagining my pussy.
I put my hand on his as he is about to close the last button beneath my chin. “What…What are you doing?”
He looks up. His eyes are still burning, his cheeks slashed with red. He wipes his mouth against his arm, making me catch my breath. That move was so masculine, so fucking primal that I can’t help but be affected by it.
“Taking you home.” His voice is scratchy, as if he hasn’t spoken in a while.
“What? Why?”
“Because you need to leave.” He knocks my hand off his and finishes buttoning my coat. The gesture is aggressive, angry, and I can’t breathe for a second.
“But…I—”
He straightens the collar of my coat as if I’m a child and stares into my eyes. “If you want someone to fuck you, you need to look somewhere else. Don’t come back here. We’re not friends. We’re not anything, you understand?”
I remain quiet. My ability to form words is gone. Thomas isn’t happy, and neither is the tic flickering on his hard jaw. “Do. You. Understand, Layla?” he asks again, with gritted teeth and flaring nostrils.
“Y-Yes.”
He moves away from me, cool and unapproachable, and breathes deep. “Let’s go.”
How the fuck did it go so wrong?
I thought…
What did I think? Yes, what was I thinking? That he’d sleep with me? That his pain is so big, so agonizing that he’d commit the sin of adultery?
Not everyone is like me. Not everyone is selfish and impulsive and a goddamn moron.
I sob and groan and cover my face with my palms, even though I’m alone in my stone-cold bathtub.
Thomas dropped me off an hour ago, without saying a word. The entire ride took less than five minutes, and from the inside of his car, campus looked even more forbidding and dark and desolate. I didn’t even wait for the car to come to a full stop before I jumped out and dashed into my tower, and now I am here, drowning in embarrassment and guilt and anger.
We’re not anything.
If he didn’t want me then why did he make me come? Why did he put his mouth on me and let me shatter in his arms only to kick me out the door?
My tattoo is buzzing with heat. How crazy does someone have to be to do something like this for a man who isn’t even her boyfriend? Thomas has to be the most confusing man I’ve ever met—not that I’ve met many men in my life. My love for Caleb took care of that.
I slide down and lie on my side, bringing my legs to my chest and curling into a fetal position. I spend the night in my bathtub, oscillating between sobbing and being angry. In the morning, I hear a crash and I’m jerked upright. There are angry noises and I run out of my room to see what’s going on.
“I’m not taking their side. What’s wrong with you?” Dylan booms, shaking his head.
“I don’t want to talk about this. Can you just leave?” Emma is holding the front door open, her face tight and inflexible.
Dylan runs his hand over his face and sighs. “Fine. Whatever. You’re being unreasonable.” With that, he strides out of the apartment.
I decide it’s safe to speak. “Hey, what’s…what’s going on?”
Emma is staring down the hallway. She turns to me slowly and closes the door behind her.
“Sorry, did we wake you?” She drags her feet to the couch and plops down on it, dejected.
I sit beside her. “No, it’s fine. Tell me what happened.”
“It’s nothing. It’s stupid.”
“It’s not stupid if you kicked Dylan out of the apartment first thing in the morning because of it.”
She turns to me and seethes. “He was being a moron, that’s why.”
“Okay. About what?” I realize this is what normal life feels like—fighting with your boyfriend, kicking him out, and then bitching about it with your friend. These are normal problems to have. I wish I had normal problems. Normal problems are so much better than what I have.
“About spring break,” Emma replies. “My mom wants me to come home. I don’t want to, but Dylan is insisting that we go. He wants me to bond with my mom or something.”
“And that’s a bad thing, why?”
She sighs and peers up at me. I’ve never seen her this serious and this calm. It’s kind of scary. “My mom… She is not a nice person. I don’t like her, and that’s never going to change.”
My heart is beating anxiously. Is that why she never talks about her parents? I remember the heated phone call she had when she first moved in. Dylan was the one to calm her down. Since then I’ve never seen her talk to her family.
“Did…Did she do something to you?” I ask, apprehensive.
“No, not to me. To my dad.” She sighs, looking away from me and staring at the wall. “She cheated on my dad, and he had no clue. None.” Air rushes out of me and I feel like I’m collapsing on myself as she continues, “It hit him out of nowhere. He was devastated. I mean, how could you do that to a person you promised to spend your entire life with?”
My throat is dry and scratchy. It’s rejecting words, but somehow I manage to mumble, “I-I’m sorry.”
She shakes her head and goes on, as if she didn’t hear me. “She destroyed our family. My dad lost his job because he couldn’t keep up with it. They spent months fighting over custody of me. I was a minor so I didn’t have a say, and my mom won because my dad wasn’t ‘stable’ enough to take care of me. On top of that, she married the man she cheated on my dad with. As soon as I turned eighteen, I decided I’d never step foot in that house again.” She turns to look at me, her eyes glassy. “I’m never going back. Never. I hate her and what she did to us.”
“How’s your dad?”
Emma shrugs. “He’s fine. He’s dating someone. As much as I’m happy for him, it’s too weird for me, but I don’t begrudge him that. He deserves all the happiness, you know?”
“Yes.” I nod, too ashamed to do anything else, too guilty. How would she react if she knew what I did last night? Is there any way to justify cheating? Is there any way I can ever tell her, my new friend, my only friend who seems to like me, what wrong I almost committed last night?
Last night will be another one of my many, many secrets. I can never tell her. I can never tell anyone. I can’t…I can’t go back to being lonely again. It’s too scary now.
“Hey, you okay?” Emma puts her hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to unload on you like this. It’s way too early for that.”
“I’m fine. I’m just…I’m sorry.”