Floating (8 page)

Tears start to leak from my eyes, and it’s all I can do to stop myself from sobbing as I grab fistfuls of the back of his t-shirt. Smoothing a hand up and down my back, Nate tries to soothe me as only he can. “Hey now, pretty girl. No tears. I’m back and I’m going to spend the rest of the summer with you, yeah?” Slowly my fists begin to unfurl. “You still going off to college for art, Babe?”

Trust him to remember that I was planning to go to Texas U to study art. Nate always remembered everything. That was one of the many things I loved most about him. It proved to me he really was listening, and heard every word I said. Nodding, I remove my hands from his shirt and use them to dry my face. “Yeah. I leave a week before summer is up, so I have time to settle into the dorms and get any last minute things before classes start.” Not taking a breath I ask, “What are you doing back? How come you can stay all summer, don’t you have a job and everything to get back to?”

I shouldn’t have asked. I don’t really care why he’s here, just that he is. “I’ve got a job, Sunshine. When you don’t take time off for four years, and put a fuck ton of overtime in, they tend to want to let you have time off instead of having to pay it out. As for why I’m back, I’m back to see you. You’re going off to college soon, Sunshine, I’m not going to be able to know exactly where you are every minute of the day, or know that you’re safe and sound when you’re there. Here, I knew you would be safe and protected, at least. I needed to come back and see you now, before you left.” That’s sweet. Not giving me time to formulate a reply, he added, “How about you come check out my new ride and we go down to the diner on Main, just like old times? I’ll even spot for a cheeseburger, extra cheese and onion rings instead of fries. How’s that sound?”

Giggling, I crush him to me again and nod, “Yeah that sounds perfect.” And it was. Everything about that summer was perfect. Well, up until the end and you already know most of that anyway.

Nate and I spent every day together that summer. I was lucky enough not to have to work, unlike most of the other newly graduated seniors, I had planned this for the previous three years. I worked at a bookshop in town called, ‘Read ‘em and Weep’ for going on three years, saving every penny I had for the summer before I started college, and for expenses when I got there. I wanted to make this the most memorable summer of my life, and I didn’t want to worry about being tied down with a job for it.

What Nate didn’t know, and I didn’t tell him until later, was I had every intention of using that money for bus fare to track him down and see him before I started the new chapter of my life. Luckily, he’d saved me the hassle because I had no idea how I would have made that happen, I only knew that I would have. 

For two weeks; we swam, had picnics in the national park, went to movies, and generally just hung out together, like old times. I played him my eclectic music selection, all while he laughed at the fact that it included country music and electronica. According to him, they should be melting my iPod having to reside in the same playlist as each other.  Nate made me feel special every day. In some little way he tried to make up for all the days, weeks, months, and years he was absent. Sometimes he gave me bunches of wildflowers, and sometimes it was my favourite candy, Sour Patch Kids. Most of the time he just held my hand and told me how beautiful I was, how much I’d grown up, and how proud he was of me for going off to college and chasing my dreams. Everything changed shortly after that…

I can’t even really tell you how it started. I know it was five days before my eighteenth birthday though, that day would be burned in my memory forever. Nate and I were sitting under the tree in my backyard when he leaned in and kissed me for the first time. At first I froze, it was my first kiss, after all. Yes, I had been asked out and all, but I had said no every time. I desperately wanted it to be Nate, that I gave my first kiss to, that I gave my first everything. Even though he wasn’t here, and hadn’t ever come back, I knew deep down he would one day, and that day, I wanted to be able to give him everything. I held on to that hope for four years, and I was damn glad I had.

Nate started out by kissing my lips softly. His lips were warm and sure, coaxing me to open for him. The second I did, he stroked his tongue against mine and I melted into him. MELTED, I tell you. It was the best first kiss in the history of man, I was sure of it. I relaxed under his guidance, hands travelling over my shoulders, down my arms and linking around my back as he rolled us to the grass. With me underneath him, and his hips firmly wedged in between my thighs. I was aching, my panties were getting damper by the minute, but he didn’t let up the sensuous torture of his mouth. It was then I felt how hard he was, how turned on he was by me.

I couldn’t believe it. I, Veronica May Stevens, made Nate; gorgeous, handsome, sex on a stick that could have any woman he wanted Nate, hard. His chest was heaving like he’d run a marathon as he wrenched his mouth from mine, and I whimpered at the loss. “Damn, Baby. You kiss like a fucking dream. You know what this means don’t you, Ronnie?” I’ll admit; I was a little confused by that. What this means? I had no idea. I must have looked all kinds of stupid as I looked up at him. Chuckling, he rolled us to our side and tucked my head into his neck. “You’re fucking adorable, Baby. You haven’t worked it out; I’ll clue you in. This, what happened just now, makes you mine, Ronnie. All MINE. We’ll work it all out, but you and me, this is us together, Babe.”

My heart soared and then decided to do barrel rolls in my chest. He said I was HIS. I had always known it somewhere in the deep recesses of my heart that were reserved just for him. I just never, ever thought he would feel the same way. I hadn’t dared to give conscious thought to that desire. From the time I was nine, right up to and including that day, I loved Nate Burke. No matter the distance, the non-existent communication, all the crippling heartache and anger I felt hadn’t changed that. Not one bit. I loved him with everything in me. With everything I was.

That was the first, but not the last, of the magnificent days I would have with Nate, before everything fell down in a big, heaping pile of shit. That summer turned out exactly like I planned, like I’d dreamed it would; the most memorable, important summer of my life. I hadn’t expected it to end with heartbreak and devastation. But sadly it did…

What I definitely didn’t know, what there was no way for either of us to know, was that summer, the summer that broke us was about to show up, rear its ugly head and do something I didn’t think was possible. Destroy me all over again…

This time it would happen in an even bigger, more horrifying way. In a way that I had no idea if I could come back from, it would be that bad. But as they say, “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger”. I would need to hold onto that thought in the near future.

CHAPTER FOUR

Nate

Nine Years Ago…

             
Having Ronnie in my arms, holding her close in her bed has only ever been a dream for me up, until now. Now, before you go thinking that I’m some creepy fucking sicko, crushing on Ronnie when she was a kid, it isn’t like that, not at all. First off, I have always known Ronnie would turn into the most magnificently sexy woman I would ever lay eyes on.

It was a given. She was perfection the likes I’ll never see again with her gorgeous, long, naturally red hair, her porcelain skin with those cute little freckles dotting the bridge of her nose, and those stunning cat like hazel eyes would forever be my undoing. There’d been a fuck ton, I’m not bragging; it is just a fact, of women that threw themselves at me on a daily basis back in Dallas. I’m not a monk, not by a long shot, but it wasn’t often that I took them up on their blatant offers of sexual favours in back alleys, public bathrooms, hallways or at the shop I worked in. I say not often, because I have, in fact, done all of the above, more than a handful of times. I’m not proud of it, in all honesty, it makes me feel more than a little sick thinking of some of the things I’ve done with women and where I did them.

Not that I’m into kink or anything. Sure, I like restraining a woman’s hands when I fuck her, above her head with my own, nothing more. I love fucking them from behind. Pounding into the usually nameless body in front of me. I even spanked a few women that have begged me for it. I don’t need that shit to get off, but it changes things up, in a normally average, boring round of nameless sex.  It doesn’t matter how many times I tell women that I’m not looking for a relationship. That I’m not interested in dating, friends with benefits, multiple hook ups with the same woman, they all expect more in the end. That’s why I took to fucking them from behind in the first place. I don’t have to look at them, they can’t look into my eyes and make up some kind of a connection between us. There’s nothing but all out, carnal fucking. Just how I liked it. There’s only one woman that will get more from me than that, and she’s far too young and far too good for me.

I wasn’t like that in the beginning of my move to Dallas, fuck no. This is a realisation that came with time; came from experience. It came after a particularly crazy bitch named Cynthia, decided that after dating me for a few months it was time to move shit along and get engaged and move in together.

What in the holy fuck? Not only was the idea abhorrent to me when she mentioned it countless times, it scared the fucking shit out of me, too. I’m not scared at the thought of moving in with someone eventually, or getting married someday, no. What scared the shit out of me was the woman asking, no demanding, this of me.

Cynthia was fucking hot. She was a sexy seductress that played her part well. I just wished I hadn’t been blinded by her beauty or her pussy, long enough to open my eyes and realise she was bat-shit crazy. At five foot seven with long platinum blonde hair, it wasn’t natural, but who gives a fuck, nice big, but again fake tits, small waist and a pretty face, she was the first woman I asked out since arriving in Dallas, five months earlier.

I met her when she came into the mechanic’s I was working at, ‘Custom Restore and Rebuilds,’ looking to have repairs done on her classic sixties era car. We got to talking when she picked it up, and one thing led to another. I asked her to dinner and ended the night with her legs over my shoulders fucking her like an animal. I hadn’t dated or bothered going out looking for pussy to satisfy me up until then. I missed Ronnie like crazy and I was doing everything I could to distract me from calling home, or racing back to see her. This meant I worked fucking insane hours at the shop, exhausting myself until I went home to my sad, lonely, cold fucking apartment, where I crashed until morning and then repeated the process.

Ronnie had been, shit, she still fucking is, even though she probably hates me by now for leaving her with no word, my best friend. The person I told all my secrets to. The girl that patched me up after the run-ins with my dad, if I needed it. The kid I taught to skateboard, the one that no matter how many times she fell off, grazed her knees, elbows, chin, got back up and tried again. Ronnie was the only person that could make me full out belly laugh, smile when I really didn’t want to, and light up my day like a ray of sunshine through the clouds. I loved that girl like crazy. Not in that way, not yet, that would happen much later. No, I loved Ronnie in a way that I would never stop. A way that no matter what happened in my life, where I went, how long I was gone, it would be forever. I loved her for saving me, for being my everything. For being my world.

As time went on, I made the choice to start living a bit more. I couldn’t stay locked up in my apartment or working myself to death forever. That was when the, what is now called, ‘Unfortunate Fucking Meeting,’ of Cynthia transpired.

One date turned into two, turned into three months of dating, when I finally decided I needed to cut her loose. Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t just kick her to the curb because of all the talk of moving in together and marriage. Fuck no, although that was the final straw. I broke up with her ass because over the course of our relationship I caught her taking money from my wallet, flirting with every man in hearing distance of her, taking my brand new, Boss 428, without asking and running it into a letterbox. And finally, because she was a pain in my fucking ass, and not worth the shit she was doing just to get my dick wet regularly.

She constantly bitched that I wasn’t taking her out enough, we never did anything fun, and I was always tired. Fuck. I worked sixty to seventy hours a week, of course I was fucking tired. I didn’t buy her nice things all the time, I didn’t pamper her like her friends boyfriends did? I’d like to meet those fuckers and have a word because I’d bet my left nut that was all bullshit she was feeding me. I knew I didn’t love her the second she started spewing all that shit. If I was honest with myself, I knew I’d never loved her. She was a filler, someone I was passing time with. I wasn’t looking for love. If it found me, then so be it, but I wasn’t opposed to it either. When the time was right it would happen.

Thank fuck, I wasn’t jaded by the example my parents set with regard to love. That was one thing I was truly grateful for. After years of beatings and my mom promising that my dad loved me, most kids would have turned off to the prospect of love. Never believing that it existed in the first place, and certainly not taking the pragmatic approach I was that it would come about when the time was right.

So, after getting rid of Cynthia; a long drawn out process that took months longer than we even dated, and consisted of numerous violent tantrums with property destruction, and damage to my car. I decided no strings fucking was the only way to go for the time being. Meeting women in bars, clubs, even at the gym I frequented; I took them back to their place, never mine, I’d never make that fucking mistake again, hotels, back alleys and bathrooms. I fucked them, once, twice, however many condoms worth I had and left. Simple, easy, no drama. Exactly what I wanted. That was until I went home the summer four years after I first left.

That summer changed everything for me. I never expected what happened back in Patterson, but I can tell you I wouldn’t have changed a thing, not until the events at the very end.

I made the decision to go home after talking to Braydon, the only guy I considered a true friend, the only person whose opinion mattered, other than Ronnie. Agonising over the decision, I asked for his take on it. He told me that this might be my last chance to see Ronnie for a while, seeing she was leaving for college, and I should take the opportunity while I still could.

Braydon also knew exactly how much Ronnie meant to me. He’d listened to many drunken rants about how much I missed her, missed talking to her, missed hanging out with her. He agreed it was for the best that I not keep in touch, if all it would do would make it worse, making me want to turn around and run home to her. The choice to cut all ties with Ronnie was one of the hardest things I’d ever had to do. It was the right choice, but I couldn’t help feeling like I’d abandoned her. Fuck. Honestly I had abandoned her, and it had eaten me up every day since.

Biting the bullet, I put in for the time off. There was no problem there, I’d worked with no holidays, sick days, and they owed me more overtime than I could keep track of. I packed my shit and drove back to Patterson. Pulling up outside the house I used to live in, I couldn’t have been more shocked than if I had been licking a telephone wire at the sight that greeted me.

On her front lawn, in the tiniest pair of fucking shorts known to man, tight ass green workout top and sneakers is Ronnie. My Ronnie. The little girl that had turned into the awkward teenager; has now grown into the most gorgeous woman I’ve ever laid eyes on. I fight my dick getting hard, really I do, but I never had a hope in hell of controlling it when I watch her stretch in those tiny shorts showing off her magnificent ass. I adjusted my cock and climb out of my car, shutting the door as quietly as possible. I don’t want her noticing me, just yet. I want to watch her. Watch her lithe body move as she stretches those long toned legs, arching her delicate spine.

She is fucking breathtaking. I know because I’m struggling to force the air into my lungs. All that long, silky red hair tied into a pony tail on the very top of her head, and her graceful movements as she contorts her spectacular body into what looks like effortless positions for her. When she spears me with her phenomenal green eyes something shifts inside me. The eyes that years ago captivated me, held me hostage as her friend, mesmerise me again.

This time she captures me with the eyes of a woman though, and trapped in her gaze, I don’t want to get free. I need her to look at me, so I can read her expressive eyes, they are the one thing about her that tells the truth no matter what. Everything else about her; her posture, the words coming out of her mouth, even the way she takes steps to move further away from me, tells me she doesn’t want me here. Her eyes, they tell me the truth. Ronnie missed me as much, if not more than I’ve missed her.

After getting our first meeting out of the way, fuck me, it was touch and go for a while there, because at the time I didn’t know whether she would ever talk to me again, let alone spend any time with me, we fall back into our old routines, with one exception. Every time I’m near her, I want to make love to her. I want her touching me, her legs wrapped around my waist, my mouth on hers. It’s fucking painful being so close to her and not making a move on her. I’ve never wanted a woman the way I want Ronnie. The desire to have her, hold her in my arms, kiss the breath out of her is consuming me. Every waking and sleeping thought is of Ronnie. I’m fucking obsessed. I swear I can even smell her on my sheets when I lay down at night.

Over the weeks that follow I spend every day with her, from the time we wake until it’s time to say goodnight. I think these are the hardest times of all. When I have to hug her, kiss her temple or the top of her head, sending her off to bed without me.

I can’t tell you how many cold showers I’ve had. How many times I’ve jacked myself off to the images of Ronnie on her knees. Images of her releasing my cock from my jeans, taking it deep, in her hot, wet mouth, all the way to the back of her throat, while I play with her tits, grab her hair in my fist, and fuck her mouth. Let’s just say I don’t think a day went by when that exact scenario doesn’t play out in my mind.

Kissing Ronnie for the first time is like coming home. It’s a day I lost all willpower and finally give into the desire coursing through my body. It’s nothing short of magnificent. I could kiss her for eternity and never get enough. To find out later that I’m her first kiss, that she’s never been touched by a man before is like winning the fucking lottery.

At first I thought she was lying. How can a woman that looks like Ronnie, curves in all the right places, beautiful, more than a handful of tits, long, sculpted legs, not have been chased by every fucking jackass in school?

Ronnie tells me then she has been pursued by guys, but she turned them all down. It kills me to think of all those horny teenagers sniffing around my girl, but I’m somewhat mollified by the fact that she hasn’t taken any of them up on their offers. Knowing my woman’s also a bit of a bookworm that cloisters herself in her room, only further convinces me she’s telling the truth. Ronnie hates being the centre of attention. I’ve always been puzzled as to why, now I’m more than happy she actively sought her own company or Carmella’s, over the dicks that want in her pants.

The way she blushes when I questioned her about whether she’s a virgin or not, whether any other man has put his hands on her is fucking adorable. I swear she can blush from the swell of her tits to the tips of her ears. She is no less than mortified to answer me, but she knows somehow it’s important to me so she battles through the embarrassment and does it anyway.