Unbound (3 page)

“You do that on purpose?  Is that a Goth thing or something?” he prodded with a grin.  “Your clothes don’t look Goth and I don’t see any black nail polish.”

She had to remind herself to breathe because blue was not her color.  Other kids started filtering over from the table he’d abandoned.  She reached across the table to brush the hair out of his eyes and mocked, “Did you do that on purpose?  You look like a Disney channel reject.”

The other kids that had come to the table were taking in the scene and waiting for a response from Lucas.  He cracked a smile, tilted his head, “I think I’m going to like you.  I’m Lucas, by the way.”  He reached across and stole some grapes from her lunch.

“I’m Dani.  The hair’s natural.  They’re birthmarks or a birth defect depending on your point of view.”

“I like it, and I like a girl that doesn’t take any shit.”  He strutted around to her side of the table to get a closer look.

That was it.  Lucas accepted her immediately and everyone else followed his gracious lead.  Dani was part of the in crowd and they had been together ever since that day. 
             

Tonight, four years and one summer later, they were in the bed of his pickup truck curled up in the same sleeping bag.  The stars were beautiful but she couldn’t take her eyes off Lucas.  They had done this a thousand times but this night was different.  She was leaving for school in the morning and Lucas was staying home.  A single parent also raised him but going to college out of state wasn’t an option for him.  He would attend community college and continue to work in order to help his mom with his two little brothers.  Dani wouldn’t see him again until Thanksgiving.

He drew little circular patterns all over her face as if trying to memorize every pore.  She began to place little wet kisses on his chin and down his neck.  He shuttered with anticipation. Chills ran down her spine with every tender stroke of his fingers over her skin.

They had never been this close to the edge before and just when she tried to push him beyond the point of no return, he rolled her over and pinned her arms above her head.

“I can’t do this," he panted.  “Not this way. Not outside in my truck.  You deserve better than this, Danielle.”  A tear escaped his lashes and landed on her face.  She cleared her throat and tried to pretend she hadn’t seen the pained emotion he was fighting.

“Lucas, all I want is you.  Nothing else matters.  Please let me love you,
” she
pleaded in a whisper.

“No.  Don’t you see?  The first time can’t be like this.  It feels too much like goodbye.  I want you so bad but I won’t rush you into this because you’re trying to prove your love before you leave me.”

Feeling embarrassed and rejected, she wrestled to reclaim her arms and push him off.  She struggled to unzip the sleeping bag.  Mostly naked, she scrambled for her clothes as the tears began to flow.  Why did he always do this?

What is so wrong with her that he didn’t want to make love to her?  There’s always an excuse.  She wished he would just be honest and say he didn’t want her.

“Dani, please stop and talk to me.  Don’t be angry.  I just want the best for you, baby.”  He pleaded as she continued to search for her shoes.  She was pissed.  How could he ruin this for them?

“Damn it, Lucas!  We’ve waited four years.” She said each word slowly.  “We always get so close and you stop.  Did you ever think I might need you to show me your love?”  Her heartbeat pounded in her head as she stood there topless in the lace panties she’d bought for the occasion and glared at Lucas. She realized distantly that this was a first time he’d seen her quite so bare.  Lucas stared slack jawed and something suddenly came over Dani.  She didn’t care what he thought any longer.  She was going to take what she wanted and she wanted Lucas.

She slid her underwear over her hips and let them fall to her feet.  Lucas watched the scrap of black lace as if mesmerized.  Dani climbed onto his lap looking deeply into his eyes.

“Don’t you want me Lucas?”

He didn’t answer.  Still staring at her, his eyes glazed over and she started hungrily kissing him, trying to make him feel her need for him, her love for him through the kiss.  His hands moved hotly over her body while she licked down his neck.  She began to feel strange, as if the world had somehow shifted.  Suddenly her vision was very sharp and the night seemed brighter.  Every beat of his heart was too loud and the heat pouring off him made her…hungry.  Dani’s head started to spin.  This was not the sweet, heavy petting of their past.  This was hot and the feelings he aroused in her body were overwhelming.  She pulled his shirt off, continuing to bathe him with her tongue.

Warmth spread through her body and suddenly odd pictures began to flash through her mind.  Were they memories?  They weren’t her memories but they were memories of her from the outside.  She was so excited and confused all at once.  She saw herself the first day of high school, homecoming dances, the prom, playing in the snow with Lucas’s brothers, walking across the stage at graduation.  It just kept coming.  They were Lucas’s memories, only that couldn’t really be her.  This girl looked just like her down to the white hair and light eyes only she looked angelic.  She was delicate and graceful.  She was a warm safe place. Was that how he saw her?  What was happening to her?  Then she saw the most disturbing memory from just a moment ago when she climbed into his lap.  Her pale blue eyes were black.  She jerked herself up and looked into the rearview mirror in the cab of the truck.  Her irises were jet black.  She looked down at Lucas for a reaction.  He was slumped backward still looking at her all glassy eyed as if he was looking through her and not really seeing her.  What had she done?  She smacked him to get his attention.

He shook his head to clear the cobwebs and said, “What happened?  Why did you hit me?”

“Lucas, I am so sorry!  I have to go now, right now.  Please forgive me.  I love you.”  Dani grabbed her clothes and leapt down from the truck, dressing as she crossed the field where they had always parked, leaving her shoes behind.

“Dani, I’m sorry for whatever I did.  Please don’t leave this way.  Let’s talk about this.”  He pursued her across the field but she had to get away from him.  His body heat was trying to pull her back into his arms, his pulse called her name and a hunger she didn’t comprehend burned her throat.  So she ran fast, too fast.  In bare feet, she ran through the woods and across the school parking lot.  She ran down Ebenezer Road and about ten blocks to her house to curl up on the front porch swing and pray her mom didn’t hear her.  She could not go in
to
the house.  Her mom was still up and there was no way she was going to be able to act like all was well.  She had to calm down and think. 

A while later, Lucas’s truck pulled up and he walked past the porch and around to the side of the house where her bedroom was on the second floor.  He tossed pebbles at her window and pleaded for her to come outside or answer her phone.  She pulled her cell out of the pocket of her jeans.  Good thing it hadn’t fallen out in her struggle to wrestle them on while running.  Ten new voicemails.  She had turned off the ringer so it wouldn’t ruin their magical evening under the stars.  What a joke.  After a while, he got back in the truck and left. That was for the best since Dani was too scared to deal with him tonight.

In the morning over breakfast in their little kitchen, her mom eyed her suspiciously over her coffee cup.  She was having her standard whole wheat English muffin and coffee while Dani indulged in her second bowl of cereal with an extra scoop of sugar for good measure.

Her mom still looked the same to her as she had since Dani was little.  Her dark blonde hair was shorter now, hanging to just below her shoulders but there wasn’t a gray hair or a laugh line in sight.  Dani wished she had inherited her mother’s hair.  She looked like her mom, with same eyes and figure. It was the hair and facial features that stood them apart.

She was her hero.  She worked, took care of the house and did all the things most women would call a man to take care of, and most of all she took care of Dani and never once complained or asked for help.  Tessa was a photographer so they had beautiful pictures hanging all around the house. 

“
You have to be self-sufficient, Danielle.  No one is going to provide for you when you become an adult.
” She would remind Dani over the years if her grades had the nerve to drop below a solid B. “
Your education is the greatest weapon in the battle for independence,”
she would lecture.

Dani never really understood why her mom felt the need to drive that point home.  She hadn’t gone to college and she was doing fine.  They had everything they needed and most of the things they wanted.

Then Dani remembered the night two years ago when she finally got up the nerve to demand answers, “Mom… why won’t you tell me about my father?”

Tessa was making dinner while Dani did homework at their small kitchen table.  She’d turned her head slightly in Dani’s direction so she knew she’d been heard though she didn’t get an answer right away.  She finished plating the meal and brought it to the table as Dani put her books away.  Tessa walked over to stare out the window above the sink in the small kitchen.  They didn’t need much room.  It had always been just the two of them.  They had no other family to speak of and her mom never even dated.  Dani began again.  “What am I supposed to tell people that ask about my parents?  The Immaculate Conception thing isn’t really working for me anymore.  Please don’t say I’m too young and it‘s complicated.  I’m old enough to drive, so I think I can handle it now.”

Tessa still stood there motionless and without turning to look at Dani, she finally started to speak.

“Your father and I were very much in love.  I really don’t know what to tell you because honestly I don’t know much.”  She choked on the words.  “It’s difficult for me to talk about.”  She turned around still not looking directly at Dani.  The sight of the silent tear running down her ivory cheek was shocking.  This was a bad idea.  She had never seen her mother cry.  Tessa struggled unsuccessfully to hold it together while Dani watched in silence.  She took a cleansing breath and wiped away her tears.  She looked at the wall just above Dani’s head, refusing eye contact.

“We came from different,” she paused to edit, “worlds.  His family was unwilling to accept an outsider.”

This floored her.  She didn’t know what she had expected to hear.  Maybe he was dead, or some James Bond type undercover agent who couldn’t be with them for their safety, never knowing when one of his archenemies might appear to take their vengeance by hurting his family.  She realized that these where childish imaginings but it was better than the truth of it.

“So…You’re telling me that he’s out there alive and happy.  We just aren’t good enough for him and his high class family?”  She wasn’t able to keep the shock out of her tone.

“I have no idea how or what he is doing.  I haven’t seen him since the day you were born and I’m sure it wasn’t you they objected to, baby. I was the problem. At least that’s what I was told.  I never actually met any of them myself.”

With that statement, Tessa went to her room, her untouched plate forgotten.  Dani immediately wished she could take it back.  She had caused her mother pain in order to get an answer she no longer wanted.

They just weren’t good enough.  Dani had a father and a family out there somewhere that didn’t want her.  Now she understood her mother’s need to see her strive for the best.  Tessa couldn’t stand the thought of Dani being below some perceived standard.  They never spoke of her father again.

The phone rang and brought Dani back to the present with a jolt.  Mom looked at her expectantly.  “Lucas has already called three times this morning.  Did you two have a fight?”

“No, everything is fine.”  She lied and grabbed the cordless, leaving to take the call in the living room.  She didn’t want an audience.

“Hello.”

“Danielle, finally, I’ve been calling your cell all night.  I’m so sorry.  I don’t know what happened.  It’s all fuzzy but I’m so sorry.  Please Dani don’t leave me like this.  You have to let me come over and say goodbye.  Please talk to me.”  He was pleading and she couldn’t get a word in.

“Lucas you have nothing to apologize for and I’m just sorry I tried to make you do something you weren’t ready for yet.”  He cut her off.

“I’m ready!  I’m ready!  I’ll come over right now and pick you up!  Last night cannot be the way we leave this.”  He trailed off.  “I love you Dani.”

“I love you too, Lucas.  You can come over but not for that.  I have to load my car up and get on the road.  We won’t have much time but we can talk a little.”  She tried to soothe him because he was right.  They needed to part on better terms.

“I’m on my
way.  Be there in ten.  I’m already in the truck.  See you soon.”  He hung up as if he didn’t want to give her a chance to change her mind.  He shouldn’t be so worked up.  It’s not as if he had turned into some weird black-eyed freak last night.  Obviously, he didn’t remember that little tidbit.  Strange considering she noticed it first in his memory, and what the hell was that about.  People don’t see other people’s memories!

There was a knock at the door.  There was no way he could have gotten there that fast. Tessa got to the door while Dani headed back to her now soggy cereal.