Forever Layla: A Time Travel Romance (14 page)

“She’s not thirty-six. She’s twenty-four. Not even close to twice my age
, Mom.”

“You’re a kid and she’s a grown woman, same thing.”

I shook my head holding in the emotion. “I’m not a kid anymore.”

“I blame Michael for this. This smells of his influence. I should have put my foot down years ago when you started hanging out with him.”

I moved away from her. “No, Michael has nothing to do with this. He goes straight for the honeymoon and is done with a girl, skips the wedding. They’re all a notch in his belt. I want Layla for the rest of my life.” I headed for the stairs and took them as quickly as I could to get away from her, but she followed.

“You’re too young to know that. Why do you have to marry her? Why not just live together for a bit and see?”

I grabbed my shoes and kept stuffing them in the bag. “That’s not how you raised me at all. Weren’t you one of the moms at church who led the purity weekend when I was thirteen? What a hypocrite.”

She came to the closet and stood in the door way. “Maybe I am
, but I’d rather you make a smaller mistake than a huge one.”

“Layla is not a mistake.” I grabbed my bag and threw it over my shoulder. I brushed by my mom and grabbed the other
bags and headed for the stairs.

“You hardly know th
e girl. And Layla? What kind of name is that? Sounds like a stripper name. Is that where you found her?”

I spun to face her, my finger in her face, a disrespectful stance I’d never taken with my mother before
, but she’d crossed a line. “She’s not a stripper, not even close. She has a real job selling insurance for Drake Duke. But I’m sure you have found that out too. This town can’t keep anything quiet. She’s turned his whole office around. That’s what she does. She shows up and gives clarity and direction.”

“Yeah, they say she must be selling something else out the back to bring any business to Drunk Duke. He probably can’t stay sober long enough to keep up with whatever kind of business she is running out of his office.”

I didn’t even turn back to face her as I walked out the door and threw my bags into the back of the truck. “Mom, if you would have bothered to get to know her, you wouldn’t be assuming any of this or listening to stupid gossip. We might even be able to have a conversation.”

I marched to my truck, got in
, and slammed the door. I pushed the button for the garage door to open, suddenly realizing I didn’t need the remote anymore. I put the truck back into park and got out and walked to my mother. She was leaning in the doorway, hugging herself as she watched me. I looked into her red-rimmed eyes as tears streaked the makeup down her cheek. For just a moment, I felt sorry for her. I knew she loved me, and all she was doing or ever did was try to take care of me. If she could only see me as a man capable of making my own decisions, it wouldn’t have come to this. If she had bothered to get to know Layla and to trust that she had taught me well—but no, she just couldn’t let go. She only left me with one solution. I took her hand and placed the remote in it. “Goodbye, Mom.”

Her shoulders shuddered
as she let out a mournful sob. “David, please. I’ve worked so hard at being a good mom. Have you ever needed me and I not been there for you? I’ve done and I’ve done and I’ve done for you and now you want to throw your whole future away for a girl.”

“I’m not throwing anything away. And I know you’ve always been there for me, but now it’s time to let me go and make my own choices.”

“But you aren’t ready. This foolishness with this girl proves it.”

“I’m going to prove you wrong.”

She only turned away and cried harder. We were at an impasse. There was no middle ground. I walked away and got back in my truck before I let her see my own tears.

*

I SAT IN THE KITCHEN of my new home thinking about the day I’d had. I’d taken my things from my parents’ house and moved them into the house that would be my home with Layla in just a few days. Why did the making of a new family mean the breaking of another? And why did the breaking have to be so painful?

To get my mind off of things
, I pulled out my notebooks and looked at the formulas. My mind started skipping ahead of me as new formulas started appearing in my head. I grabbed up my other notebook and started jotting things down. Bits and pieces of how time travel would work were coming together, but not fully there. There was always a wall, blocking the rest of the information. I needed more knowledge to bust through it.

The college I had applied to was all wrong. I wasn’t going into pre-dentistry like my dad. I was going to study physics
, and based on the latest formulas rattling about in my head, perhaps biochemistry. My parents had taken charge of the whole college application thing. Dad made a phone call to his old friend at Wofford College and had scheduled the tour he and mom took me on at the campus. It was a beautiful campus, and I’d had no problem picturing myself happy there as Mom and Dad pointed out what had changed since their time. But that wasn’t my path now and I knew it. It was time for me to claim my destiny and make my own trail rather than just following theirs. I ran out and got in the truck and headed to the high school. Maybe the guidance counselors could help me with late applications and how to get my scholarships sent to the right school. I was pretty confident that with my GPA, SAT and ACT scores, I’d get in somewhere with a scholarship.

*

THAT FRIDAY, I STOOD ON the platform preparing to deliver my valedictorian speech. I’d put off writing it until the last minute, and then it came to me:

“Preparation and choices. More than the subjects we have studied and the facts we have memorized, all our lives have been preparation for the choices before us. If we choose to follow one path, we also make the choice not to follow another. When we choose to add some people into our lives, it often means we choose to leave others behind. How do we know if we are making the right choices? In some ways we don’t, until we come to the end of that path or discover what it is like to have those people in our lives or until we have worked in that career for some time. The best way to know what choices to make is to be prepared for those choices and what they bring. Will this choice hurt others? If it is a purely selfish choice, you will figure it out by the collateral damage left in its wake. If it is a quality choice, there may still be damage, but in the end, more good than bad will come from it. I am convinced of tha
t. So as we step out of our roles as children and step into our roles as adults, we need to think of others. But most of all, we need to seek to be the people we were created to be and make the tough and unpopular choices that come with that. Only then will we reach our full potential.”

I went and sat in my spot on the football field
, waiting for my turn on the stage. I knew where Layla sat in the stands of the football field, but I had made sure not to scan the crowd too closely for fear of who else I might see, or not see.

Today I would graduate from high school. Tomorrow I would be getting married
, and come late August, I’d be going away from my bride Monday through Friday to go to school at Clemson. I had made my choices, and I was prepared to fight for them, because as far as I was concerned, my notebooks and a girl from the future dropping into my life had pointed me there.

Chapter 13

                            Layla

I
STOOD BY THE LAKE holding David’s hands as Drake spoke the vows for us to repeat. I heard the flash of a camera. Drake had surprised us by hiring a photographer to take pictures so we could always remember the day. David was in a pair of dress pants and a white button-up shirt, and I was in a white mini wedding dress I’d found at a thrift store for twenty dollars. I’d fallen in love with the 60s style retro, ultra-mini dress the moment I saw it. It was an A-line dress with a high choker neck with mesh and floral work down the sleeves and bodice that stopped mid-thigh. I’d used a ton of products and a teasing comb to get the bouffant to match the dress, and of course, my false lashes with a bit of liquid liner to create dramatic cat eyes. Drake said I looked like a blonde Priscilla Presley. I had to pretend I knew who he was talking about. I figured it was someone associated with Elvis.

I trembled like I was freezing, but the warm setting summer sun was making sweat form on my neck.
With the chills and sweats, my nerves had me feeling more like I had the flu than like a bride. I looked at David under my dark lashes and my heart did somersaults in my chest. I took several deep breaths as it became my turn to repeat the vows. I swallowed hard and looked into David’s beautiful blue eyes under dark bangs, always shaggy and needing a trim. I remember the first time I saw them—I couldn’t speak. I’d stood there staring, and he never even knew I existed, not that version of him. His eyes then were surrounded by more lines and a dark sadness was always there, even when he smiled or laughed. Here those eyes were still cheerful, as he not only looked at me, but into my soul. It wasn’t the way other guys had looked at me. The hunger in his eyes was overshadowed by something more than attraction. It was something bigger than the both of us, and I think we both sensed it.

“I
, Layla, take you David to be my lawfully wedded husband, to have and to hold from this day forward, for richer and poorer, in sickness and in health, in good times and bad, for as long as we both shall live.”

David smiled a goofy
, lopsided grin just before saying the same words–only at the end, he took a breath and thought for a moment. “And maybe longer.”

My breath caught
, knowing what he might mean.

Drake declared us man and wife, and David lifted my veil and leaned in, his lips pressed into mine. The camera flashed several times as Michael started playing some song I didn’t recognize. I pulled back and looked up at David
, and then we turned and faced the photographer and smiled as directed. I leaned over and whispered, “Did Michael just sing about panties at our wedding?”

David smiled.
“Would he do something like that?”

I glanced over at him
, and he did the eye squinting thing he did to all the girls.

“That doesn’t work on me.”

Michael put down the guitar and came over and slapped David on the arm. “I told you the first night we met her that something wasn’t right about her. Sorry, dude, looks like you got a broken one. Nice wedding, but now I’m off. The guys said sorry they missed it, but they aren’t a bunch of girls so they don’t care about weddings.”

David rolled his eyes at him. “Don’t you at least want to stay and eat?”

“Can’t. Gotta go meet with Lacy Stewart. She’s auditioning as a girl singer to join Head Trauma.” He swaggered off before spinning around for one last remark. “And call me later if you need help figuring out where everything goes.”

David nodded.
“Yeah, that coming from the only person I know to flunk sex ed.”

“That’s only because it was all written work. Had they offered a lab
, I would have been the star pupil.”

Drake paid the photographer before the man left,
and then he headed over to a large grill area and started pulling meat from what looked like an outdoor fridge under a stone countertop, complete with sink.

“You really didn’t have to pay for a photographer. The wedding here was more than enough of a gift.”

He only shrugged in reply. I walked up to him and looked around. “Can I help with anything?”

“No, I’ve got it. Have a seat. It’s your wedding. Soda?” He hel
d out a Coke.

“I don’t usually do the hard stuff, but since it’s a special occasion.” I took it from him and turned to David, “Want one?”

“Sure.” He took it from my hand and plopped down into a cushioned patio chair before he pulled me into his lap. “So Drake, how come you aren’t married?”

“I used to be, but it didn’t work out.”

David coughed. “Sorry to hear that.”

The awkward silence lasted for about a minute it seemed before Drake ended it.
“It was a long time ago.”

“What happened?”

I couldn’t believe he’d asked that. I slapped his shoulder and gave him a look, but it was too late.

Drake sighed as he threw the steaks on the grill and the meat started to sizzle. “Let’s see. I was young and stupid. To be honest, we both were
, but everyone is stupid when they’re young. I was also a spoiled brat who had never had any responsibility. She couldn’t be pleased no matter how hard I tried. I couldn’t do anything right, and she told me so… very often. So I started stopping by the bar on my way home, sometimes not making it home until time to get up and go to work, which I stopped doing altogether until my dad died, and I was forced to be there. Somewhere in the middle of all that she left, and I chose to drown my sorrows.”

David put the Coke down on the table. “Wow
. That… sucks.”

“Yeah, it does. How do you guys like your steak?”

“Medium,” David and I said in unison before looking at each other and laughing.

“Look at that
. You two already agree on something. Now all you have to do is grow older and less stupid together.”