Seven Days (17 page)

**

“Ryan’s down getting breakfast and trying to find a landmark for us to check out today. I feel like the worst tour guide ever,” I bemoaned. “I mean, he invited me to show him Arizona and I was out of suggestions in less than two days.”

“Whatever,” I could almost see my sister rolling her eyes in front of me. “He didn’t invite you because you were some expert, Carrie. We both know he invited you because you were pretty and he wanted to bone you,” she challenged. “I mean, you spent two whole days in Nevada, so it couldn’t have been about seeing the state so much as spending time with you.”

“I’m not sure he wants to be here anymore,” I said, voicing my fear.

“That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard,” she laughed loudly through the phone. “You are an amazing person, Carrie and anyone that gets to spend as much time with you as he has is going to know it and fall for you because of it.”

“So you’re really okay from everything that happened the other night?” I asked, wanting to change the subject to a more familiar topic. Hearing praise that was contradictory to who I felt I was could be just a little too much.

“I promise, I’m okay now,” Britton answered and I could hear the irritation in her voice at my subject shift. I was glad she went with it though. “I just underestimated how crazy he would be. I mean, I had no idea he cared that much about me,” she explained. “Now I see why we had to wait to leave town.”

“You’re telling me. I didn’t want to have to hide out for four years and I didn’t have the money we would’ve needed to change our identity,” I snorted, tucking my feet under my butt on the desk chair. “But if you need me, if you are still upset, I’ll come right home, you know that, yeah?”

“I do, but I’ve learned so much from watching you make sacrifices all these years, Carrie,” my sister sighed, deciding it was time to get ‘real’ with me. “I’ve learned that you look out for the people you love and, genuinely want to help them find happiness. You’ve done
everything
to make sure we had a roof over our heads and to make sure I got that damn diploma- that we both did. I couldn’t have asked for a better role model,” she paused, her voice getting a little choked up. After a deep breath, she carried on, “I’m finally eighteen in just over 72 hours, and I hope that you trust in everything you taught me,” she soothed. “You
have
to trust me enough to know that I’m old enough to look out for myself. That’s not to say that I don’t still need you, but you’ve gotta loosen the reins a little,” she chuckled, lightly, through the phone, letting me know that she was right. I
had
equipped her with all the tools she needed to make better decisions than I had. I needed to trust her judgment.

“Wow, listen to you, all grown up,” I smiled, blinking back the overwhelming swell of emotions I felt in my heart at her words.

“Speaking of that,” she said, clearing her throat. “There’s something I need to talk to you about. It’s about Monday and our trip,” she continued with a more serious note in her voice.

“What about it?” I asked, sitting up straight in the chair, my posture now more tense.

“Well,—”

“Honey! I’m home!” Ryan shouted as he burst through the door with a tray full of food from the continental breakfast downstairs.

“What was that, Brit? Ryan just burst in like a crazy person,” I prompted, letting her know I hadn’t heard her issue.

“You know what? Never mind,” she said, quickly. “It’s not important, so we’ll just talk about it on Sunday, okay? Okay,” she rushed out and ended the call without giving me a chance to respond. I pulled the phone back and stared at it. What was that about?

“You aren’t dressed yet,” Ryan said, calling my attention to him and the tray he was setting on the empty desk in front of me.

“Sorry,” I mumbled, distractedly, setting his phone on desk beside the pile of food. “I wanted to check on Britton and the call went longer than I expected.”

“It’s okay, but you’re still in my shirt and I know you are so very naked under it, because I put you in it myself,” he relayed, sidling up to me and pushing a piece of my hair behind my ear tenderly, pausing to trace the outer shell of my ear before pulling back. His words and actions sent a montage of arousing images of the shower we’d had the night before through my brain, letting the tension of Britton’s call melt away. Our shower had not involved any emotional breakdowns on my part, so there had been plenty of opportunity for us to explore each other with soap and other previously un-stimulating objects. Joint showers were definitely something I could get used to. “Fuck, don’t look at me like that or we’ll never leave this room again,” he threatened, stepping back from me and grabbing an orange from the tray. He started to peel the fruit as if he needed something to keep his hands busy.

“Sorry, I’ll get dressed right after we eat,” I frowned at the way he was able to control himself and found a cherry Danish in the pile of food on the desk to eat. “So where are we off to today?” I looked up at him, expectantly.

“Well, the clerk was almost no help,” he started, and I could tell he was winding up for a rant.

“Oh yeah?” I asked, amused by the disgusted look on his face.

“Yeah, he suggested the Caverns nearby at first,” he punctuated his feelings by throwing a long strand of orange peel into the trash beside me.

“I can’t believe the nerve,” I said in mock indignation.

“I mean, I know he lives here and everything, but come on, man! Think outside the box!” he threw his hands up and almost sent the freshly peeled orange sailing across the room.

“I seem to be a terrible influence on you,” I snorted unattractively only half joking as I took a drink of the cranberry juice Ryan had brought up for me.

“No, sweetheart, you have been the best influence,” he denied. “I realized this again, when his
next
suggestion was a day trip to Tombstone! I can see that any time,” he scoffed. “Then I told him, I wanted to see something that I needed to experience, not a place with a thousand and one images on Google.”

“HA! You’ve finally figured it out!” I bounced in my seat, excited that he understood why I hadn’t wanted to go to the Grand Canyon or the weird vortex thing in Sedona, even though we took a pit stop in Oak Creek Canyon.

“I always understood your motives,” he said, giving me a censorious look. “I just wanted to tease you about it a little. You have no idea how much I love fucking teasing you. You are so responsive,” he continued, verbalizing something he’d made more than obvious in the last few days.

“You’re a real charmer,” I told him, flatly, shoving the rest of the Danish into my mouth and standing to retrieve my clothes.

“Worked on you,” he shrugged, looking down at me with a sly smile. “I seem to remember that I even got you to let me put my cock inside you a couple of times,” he smirked, his amber eyes glowing from our easy banter.

“Well, that’s not—”

“Nope!” he barked, stopping whatever self-deprecating statement was about to fly from my lips unchecked. “Get dressed, Carrie. We’re going somewhere I think you’ll love.”

“Jeans or shorts?” I asked, trying to figure out where he could be taking us.

“Definitely shorts, and one of those hot as fuck tank tops you are always wearing,” he dictated, having a seat on the foot of the bed to watch me dress. I couldn’t believe how voyeuristic he was about the whole thing. Since the first time we had sex, he never wasted an opportunity to watch me get naked. Turning my back to him, I started to lift his shirt over my head, when strong arms stopped me and took over the task. “Too slow, honey, now we won’t get to where we’re going until after we utilize the last condom in our stash,” he graveled out as he threw the shirt behind him.

“Oh?” I asked, trying to gather my wits, but with way he was handling my breasts I was lucky to get my vocal chords to work at all. “We’ve gone through that whole pack already?” I was truly surprised.

“You even have to ask that question?” he returned, as if our stamina didn’t astonish him in the slightest. “I’ve been dying to bend you over this desk since we got here. We could play boss bangs his secretary, what do you say?” he professed, moving his hips flush with my body so that I could feel his arousal against the small of my back before his words sunk in.

“No,” I said in a voice I didn’t recognize, stepping away from his embrace and grabbing my bag from the floor. Not giving him a chance to recover from my rejection, I locked myself in the bathroom and got dressed. With a deep breath and a long hard look at myself in the mirror, I forced down the fear bubbling inside me. I knew that Ryan had no clue of what I’d been subject to, how I’d allowed myself to be used over the last seven years. He never would’ve made such a declaration if he did.

“Are you okay?” came along with a soft tap on the door. “What’d I do, Carrie?”

“It’s not your fault,” I called out, quickly, gathering my strength and pushing away from the sink. Plastering a fake smile on my face, I opened the bathroom door and walked back into the room. “I’m okay. Let’s just save that condom for where ever we’re going.”

“O—kay,” he said, slowly, his face a mask of utter confusion, but I didn’t know how to explain why his words had sent me running again without revealing everything to him.

“I promise, when I’m ready,” I whispered, looking down at my feet. Even though I was being honest, I wasn’t sure if I would ever be ready to see the look in his eye when he found out who I’d been before he and our trip changed my entire world.

“Alright,” he accepted. “Let’s get going, we’ve got about an hour or so in the truck to look forward to,” he announced, trying to sound just as excited as he’d been when he arrived with breakfast. He failed and I knew I’d ruined our easy, carefree morning with my own hang ups. Again.

“So, are you going to tell me what it is with you and water?” I asked as we parked next to our campsite in Patagonia Lake State Park. It was, for lack of a term I hadn’t used a hundred more times on this trip, beautiful. Our front desk clerk had definitely steered us in the right direction. On our way in, we passed through an adorable postage stamp sized town with quirky shops and restaurants. We’d picked a little pizza place for lunch and ended up uncomfortably stuffed. After a walk and time spent window shopping, we continued on to the large lake, deciding to try camping again. The town had a nice bed and breakfast, but camping on our last night felt right.

“What do you mean?” Ryan looked at me, puzzled.

“I mean, the first day or so was a fluke, but it seems to be a common theme here,” I pointed out, swinging myself down from the truck.

“I don’t know,” he said, thoughtfully, staring out at the incredible lake in front of us that shimmered in the afternoon sun. “Maybe I’m a little bit obsessed with the idea of rebirth, and water is a symbol of a baptism? You know, finding a path to absolution and all that.”

“Are you trying to make this trip more profound than it is?” I tried to play off, even though I really loved his explanation. His desire for forgiveness spoke to me, whether it was for choosing a path different from his parents’ wishes or not being able to save his friend.

“Whatever, maybe I just like the concept of water in the desert then,” he shrugged. “Or, I’m just thinking of you soaking wet, again,” he joked, breaking the heaviness of the conversation.

“Whatever, perv,” I rolled my eyes. “The creek, the canyon, the river, I can see, but I’m pretty sure this is man-made, too,” I return his shrug as if I’m unimpressed with something that was so beautiful I couldn’t even find the words. That, too, was something I’d thought several times on this trip. Patagonia Lake was so much different than Saguaro or Canyon Lake. It was so lush with vegetation that I felt like I was back at the Monastery. The lakes I was used to visiting were surrounded by desert and cacti. Being here, I felt like I was seeing something beyond the ugliness I saw daily back home.

“That’s okay,” he responded. His eyes were still taking in the lake in front of us as he moved to sit on the picnic table in our camp spot. “It’s still perfect. I mean, this is the very definition of what I think of when I hear the word ‘oasis.’”

The awe on his face as he watched the water lap at the shore drew me toward him like I wasn’t even in control of my movements. Because of the wake restriction on this side of the lake, the quiet was an almost dominating presence. A couple of row boats drifted further out and a group of ducks sat on the surface of the glassy water, waiting for the kids at the site beside us to toss them some bread. The whole scene felt surreal in the reflection of the lake’s golden glow, leaving me to wonder if my own expression was a mirror of his as I sat down next to him on the picnic table.

“You know, if we had another week, I’d take you to all those places I’ve been avoiding: the Grand Canyon, Havasupai Falls, Montezuma’s Castle, even that big ass crater,” I admitted. “There’s a reason people flock from all over to see them, and it’s because they are incredible.”

“Yeah, but if we’d gone to those places, we would’ve never found the solitude we’ve been able to enjoy this week,” he observed. “Just because something is popular, it doesn’t mean that the hidden gems aren’t just as spectacular. It just means they are the least likely to be ruined,” he looked over at me like he was trying to tell me more with his words than I could fully understand. “Although, I did expect this place to be busier,” he mused, more to himself than to me.