Always and Forever (28 page)

“I'm eating lunch,” he ground out and tossed back a forkful of his salad for emphasis.

“I know that.” I rolled my eyes. “I mean, why aren't you eating with Kara?” My whole body rebelled against that question. Really, I didn't want to know. Why couldn't I just be happy knowing that he was eschewing her company for mine? But there was some small, hopeful part of me that prayed he wanted to be with me, not because he felt guilty that his friend was dying.

He sucked in a sharp breath, his nostrils flaring wide, his eyes shuttering. After a beat of tense silence, he stabbed a slice of radish and stared at it. A slow, forced smile spread across his face, and he turned hard chocolate eyes on me. “She's not as entertaining as dick and douche over there,” he replied, tightly, waving his fork at Brad and Dave.

“Dude, he called you a dick,” Brad hooted and shot a fist out to catch his boyfriend in the shoulder.

Dave grimaced, rubbed at his shoulder, and glared at Brad. “Well, I'd rather be a dick than a douche anytime,” came his rejoinder, which made Brad do some glowering of his own.

I shook my head at their antics. A small smile tipped up my lips before falling abruptly away as I turned back to Kal. “You'd have more interesting conversation with her,” I told him, shooting a quick glance over his shoulder to where Kara openly stared at Kal's rigid back. She was just so nice, basically the female version of him. She didn't deserve to be so completely ignored just because of me and my illness. If there was anything I could do to make things right with my best friend, this had to be it. “You should go over there.”

“I'm fine right here.”

“Well, I'm not,” I snapped out a little more viciously than was probably necessary. “I don't want you here. Please just go.” Inside, I was screaming for him to,
please just stay
, but that wouldn't help anyone, least of all Kal.

His fork dropped to his plate, the hurt look on his face ripping my heart right out of my chest. “Fine,” he ground out, shot to his feet, snatched up his tray, and stalked away.

I watched, heart lodged in my throat, as he settled down next to Kara, his back a tense line of agony. She said something to him, but he just shook his head and bowed over his plate, mechanically shoveling food into his mouth. When her hand slid over his back and rubbed small soothing circles between his shoulder blades, pain lanced through me. I had to turn away.

“I'm fine,” I tossed out in answer to Brad and Dave's worried frowns. “Just a little headache. I'm fine.”

“You look fine,” Brad responded, more than a little sarcastically. At my loud yawn, his frown deepened, lines etched into his smooth face, making him look far older than the teenager he was. “Maybe we should take you home.”

“No, no. I'm okay,” I hurried to assure him. “Really.”

But by the time lunch ended, my eyelids drooped heavily, and my limbs were filled with lead. Brad half-carried me out of the school, his arm anchored around my waist as I stumbled along beside him, leaning heavily against him. Dave trailed behind us and juggled all of our backpacks while fishing my cell phone out of mine to call Mom or Dad or probably both. Brad boosted me up into the front seat of the Hummer and strapped me, the harness far too complicated for my fog-filled brain. Then Dave appeared in the driver's seat, asking Brad if he was belted in.

The trip home flew by in a blink, at least for me. Dad turned his car into the drive just as Dave pulled to a stop at the curb. My door opened as soon as Dave put the vehicle in park, and Dad was right there, gently extricating me from the harness and pulling me into the cradle of his arms.

“I'm okay, Daddy,” I assured him in a faint slur. “Just a little tired is all.”

“I know, princess,” he murmured. His long strides brought us to the front door in no time. Brad was already there, my key in hand. He opened the door for us and wordlessly, stepped aside. “Thanks, boys. I appreciate you bringing Mia home.”

A clear dismissal.

Brad and Dave nodded, mumbled something to Dad about stopping by after school to check on me. Then, they were gone.

The door opened again, and Mom rushed in, her face a mask of worry and fear. Dad shook his head and turned to carry me upstairs. Once they had me securely tucked into bed and the baby monitor turned on, they each pressed a kiss to my forehead and slowly withdrew, closing the door firmly behind them.

It didn't matter; I could still hear Mom's loud, choked sobs, only slightly muffled by the closed door and the walls between us. Dad did his best to comfort her, reassuring her that I was okay, just a little worn out from trying to do too much, too soon, but his words fell on deaf ears. She just wailed louder.

My eyelids drooped even more, and I floated off to dreamland with her tears as my lullaby.

*   *   *

I woke with a low, tortured groan, the pounding in my head amplified by the bright afternoon sun beating down on my face. Squinting against the searing light, I raised a hand to shield myself from it. Feet hit the floor, the mattress bouncing slightly, and then a
shuffling sounded, followed by the room being enveloped in shadow as the shades were drawn.

“That better?”

“Yeah, much better,” I sighed, dropping back against the pillows to let Kal's voice slide over my skin like smooth liquid silk. “Thanks.”

“Not a problem,” he mumbled, settling himself back in the chair beside the bed.

We sat in silence for several long minutes, neither one of us willing to be the first to shatter the fragile air between us.

“I was never dating Kara,” he said without preamble, his melted chocolate gaze so hot, it seemed to burn straight through me. “I mean, I did ask her to go to Brandt's party with me, but after she tried to suck my damned face off in the front yard, I told her we couldn't be anything more than friends.”

“I don't think she believes that.”

“I don't give a flying fuck what she thinks,” he snarled. His eyes rounded, jaw dropping as the words left his mouth. He shook his head, sat up straight, and cleared his throat loudly. “I mean…I just…” A look of self-disgust at his outburst plastered itself across his face. “Damn it, Mia. We've always been able to talk, tell each other anything. When did that all change?”

“When I lied to you about the cancer,” I whispered, tears gathering in my eyes. Everything that had happened between us had all grown directly out of that one lie. There was no hiding from it any longer. All of it was my doing. My fault.

“No,” he said, shaking his head in fierce denial. “No, that's not true. It started before that. It began that day at the Pit when we shared my board. When I realized that maybe, just maybe, you felt the same way about me that I had for years. That was when it all started. The cancer—” His voice broke on an agonized sob, and he scrubbed a hand over his wet eyes. “That just broke us down that much faster. You didn't ruin our friendship, Mia. I did.”

“Kal—”

“No, please. Just let me get this out,” he pleaded softly. His pain shredded my chest wide open, bled me dry with just one look. “You're the best friend I've ever had.” He reached out to take my hand in his. “That's the most important thing.”

He slid out of the chair, climbed up onto the bed, and perched next to my bent knees, his eyes not once leaving mine. “I do love you, Mia. Always have. Always will. That won't ever change, no matter what you say or how you say it.” A sad little smile twisted his lips, made it more into a grimace than a grin.

“Kal, I—”

“But I understand that any part of you that may have shared those feelings…well, that's gone now, and I only have myself to blame for that. I shouldn't have pushed you, forced my feelings on you. I know that now, and I promise you that after this, I'll never say another word about it. I just want us to be friends again. I need us to be friends again, Mia. I can't just sit by and watch as you die. Please don't ask that of me.”

“Kal, stop—”

“I promise I'll be the Kal you want me to be,” he rushed ahead, steamrolling right over me. He scooted forward. Both of his hands clasped mine, squeezing hard as he begged. Tears rolled copiously down his cheeks and smashed through the dam that I'd erected against him. It all poured forth in one giant gushing waterfall of emotion. “I'll do anything, be anything, say anything. I won't even say anything if you decide you want to spend the rest of your life kissing Adam or sharing secrets and swapping stories with Brad: things we used to do. I-I won't stand in your way. Just please, Mia. Please don't push me away again. Let me in. Let me be here for you.”

He crumbled then, falling forward into me. The tide of his pain crashed into me, forced me to either ride it out or be dragged under by it. Looping one arm around his neck and the other around his lower back, I dragged him up against me, leaning back as I did, so that we were both lying down. His body jerked and spasmed against mine as anguished, desperate tears flowed out of him and soaked through my t-shirt.

“Shh, Kallie. It's going to be okay. I promise,” I whispered in his ear, rubbed my cheek against his, and hugged him close. “You're my best friend. Always and forever.”

Sniffling, he leaned back just far enough so that he looked directly into my eyes, our noses just barely brushing against each other. “Promise?”

Slowly, I nodded.

His answering smile was bright and blinding, one of pure joy and relief. He tugged me back into him. His arms hooked around me in a grip that was at once soothing and bone-crushing.

“Kal,” I gasped out a laugh. “You're going to break my ribs.”

Chuckling softly, he pulled back a fraction of an inch and buried his face in my neck. “Sorry about that. I'm just so happy,” he breathed, his hot breath fanning over my skin, making it ripple and dance in anticipation. “Thank you, Mia. I'll make it all up to you. All the time we've wasted being apart because of my jackassery. Whatever you want. I'll make it happen.”

“No more fighting with Brad.”

“Done,” he agreed quickly and lifted his head up so that I didn't miss his eye roll. “Although it did feel surprisingly good to knock him around.”

I shot him a dark look.

“Right.” He cleared his throat. “No more fighting with Brad.”

“Or Dave.”

“Or Dave,” he added. Up went one dark brow as he stared down at me, happiness sparkling in his bottomless brown eyes. “Anything else?”

I nodded slowly. “Just one more thing.”

“Anything, Mia. Whatever you want.”

I slid a hand up around his neck. My fingers threaded through his locks and pulled him back down to me. “The only one I want to spend the rest of my life kissing is you,” I whispered in what I hoped was a sultry voice just as my lips found his.

He jerked back, hope and confusion warring on his beautiful face. “What about Adam?”

“What about him?” I countered. “We kissed once, Kal, and it was a mistake. He's not you.”

“But—”

“But nothing,” I jumped in. “You promised me whatever I wanted, Kal. I want you. End of story.”

He stared at me for an endless moment. Then, a slow, super-heated smile spread across his face. “Well, if that's what you want, how I can I argue with that?”

“Exactly,” I murmured as his mouth crashed into mine, and he surrounded me in a kiss that stole every last one of my senses.

T
HIRTY
-T
HREE

IT'S TRUE WHAT THEY SAY
about happiness and hope being a cure for what ails you. Over the next two weeks, I slowly but surely gained more strength. The dizzy spells lessened. The headaches, while always right there in the backdrop of anything and everything, weren't nearly as debilitating as they had been after my fall. My schedule—and by association, my parents'—was back on track. No more leaving by lunch to come home and crash. No more sleeping on the sofa twenty hours out of the day.

I was doing so much better, and I was pretty sure Kal had a lot to do with that, if not everything to do with it.

He was always with me, never leaving my side unless absolutely necessary, which wasn't all that often. In fact, we'd fallen so effortlessly into our normal routine that it was sometimes easy to forget that I was dying. Well, maybe not, but with him there, I wasn't so scared, so angry, so alone.

It was yet another Friday afternoon, and spring was just beginning to emerge, although not quite. Ice still covered every available surface, sun glittering off the slick patches in dazzling displays, but a native Michigander could see the hints peeking through the tufts of grass here and there cutting through the still frosty ground. The birds singing merrily in the mornings, a sure sign that at least nature was aware of the upcoming shift in temperature. I just hoped I'd be around to see everything in full bloom. Spring had always been my favorite season.

“Penny for your thoughts,” Kal murmured as he sat down on the sofa next to me and slid his arm around my shoulders.

I curled in close to him, reveled in the warmth of his arms, and rested my head on his shoulder. Across the room, Brad and Dave argued over what game to play. They had it narrowed down to Madden and one of Ben's war games. I shook my head, a small smile tipping up the corners of my lips.

“Nothing,” I said quietly. “Just, you know, spring is coming.”

“Yeah, it's always nice to see everything so green and new, instead of the frozen tundra we get during winter,” he agreed as his arms tightened around me. “My mom's tulips should be coming in soon. I'll pick you some.”

A bright laugh burst out of me, causing Brad and Dave to stop their bickering and look up. “She'll skin you alive if she catches you stealing her flowers.”

“That may be true, but she'll have to catch me first, and I'm pretty sneaky,” came his laughing rejoinder.

“What are you two gossiping about?” Brad asked while he slid a game into the console and tossed a controller at his boyfriend.

“We're planning a heist,” Kal told him, shooting me a smirk.

“Well, whatever it is, count us in,” Brad replied. “Dave can be our wheelman.”

“Right,” Dave snorted. “Because a Hummer blends in so well.”

At which point, we all erupted in laughter. Then, the boys started their game, and there was no room left for idle chatter. That suited me just fine. I snuggled deeper into Kal's arms and pretended to watch their football game.