Wanted Always (Xander Barns) (6 page)

I reluctantly return my gaze back to the
discerning eyes of my inquisitors to find Gwen eyeballing my entire body a bit
too long and a bit too obviously. When her eyes finally settle back on to my
face, she seems confused. I can tell by the way her eyes narrow, unconvinced
for some reason.

Like there has to be a reason as to why I
look nice, for once.

“That is a lovely dress, Marisa. And the
shoes are spectacular!” Gwen gushes, as her eyes widen in mock excitement.

They really are amazing. And if you’re
faking it right now, you’re an idiot, because there are two things here that I
have no doubts about, and that’s how amazingly beautiful the shoes and dress
are.

So don’t even go there, bitch. Don’t
pretend to like something that you try to convince yourself that you hate
because I happen to like it. Even though you don’t even mean it, because you do
truly love the dress and shoes. There’s no other way.

Like really!

Gwen turns to Mom. “Libby, you must have
bought them for her to wear; this has your taste written all over it!”

And there’s the total switch shift. It’s
so amazing, that
Marisa
couldn’t have possibly been responsible for
putting this ensemble together. It must have been someone who knows what
they’re doing.

Mom!

I cut in before Mom can answer…or lie.
“Actually, no. I bought them,” I answer first.

Gwen’s eyebrows rise again in obvious
shock. “Wow, I guess wherever you work now must pay you well; a big difference
from before, right?”

Gwen begins to giggle knowingly. More
stupidly, if you ask me. Mom’s eyebrows raise. I think it is meant for me, even
though her friend is acting like me wearing nice clothing is such a novelty;
there must be something more to the story. Well, if she wants in on the story,
and Mom isn’t going to speak up on my behalf, then I’m just going to have to
appease their confused expressions. The disbelief in their tone of voice makes
my eye twitch and fills me with the courage to give them the low down. The
dirty. The dish.

“Actually, I’m not being completely honest
with you guys about the dress and the shoes. I didn’t buy them,” I tell them
the truth, sort of, in a different perspective.

Mom’s face doesn’t alter; she still seems
confused. On the other hand, Gwen’s expression quickly morphs from confused to
pure delight. Discreetly, of course, but I can see the hints of joy twinkle in
her clear, aqua blue eyes. Gwen nods her bobble-head up and down in slow
motion, as if it all made sense now in her ‘ah-ha’ moment.

Or will it? “Yeah, my pimp actually bought
it for me yesterday.”

“Marisa!” Mom hisses after a second,
totally interrupting my confession.

I am trying to be honest. I thought that’s
what they wanted. Jeez, you can’t please anyone these days, not even with the
truth.

I continue, nevertheless.

“Yeah, he just dropped me off out front
twenty minutes ago—”

“Marisa!” Mom hisses again, a touch louder
and less controlled. Third time’s the charm; maybe she’ll blow the roof off and
this party will actually become fun.

“Maybe I can introduce you guys when he
picks me up later. I’ve got a late evening appointment I’ve got to get to after
the party, and with the new service that I offer, customers have been calling
nonstop—”

“Marisa!” Mom growls, her eyes throwing
daggers at mine, her hands have clamped into tight, boney fists.

Yep, she’s angry now. Mission
accomplished. They want a piece of me? Well, how about
now
. A few
chuckles spill out, no matter how hard I try to contain them, but this is too
funny. I take another glance at the room while Mom struggles to backtrack from
a potential meltdown. As for Gwen, she remains silent, perhaps in shock. I spot
Darcy sitting at one of the tables in the back with the rest of the young
people.

“Oh, is that where I’ll be sitting?” I
point to Darcy’s table in mock interest.

“I cannot believe—” Mom fumes quietly.

“I think I’ll go say hello, but we must
have another chat later. This one was just so much fun. Alright, see you guys
later,” I interrupt another one of Mom’s ‘I can’t believe you’ rants, and
wiggle my fingers at the both of them, as I make my way towards my thirteen
year old sister, who is busy playing with her cellphone.

“Libby, she was just joking,” Gwen tells
Mom, trying to console her quickly before she completely loses it.

Aw, shucks, I did it again. I made my
precious mother, who worked so hard to put this party together, upset. I’m just
so mean, just so inconsiderate of her feelings. When am I going to grow up and
finally treat my mother with the respect she deserves?

Might be a long time before that ever
happens.

“I cannot believe her, at her father’s
birthday party?!” Mom hisses uncontrollably, probably secretly basking happily
at all the attention Gwen is giving her. She is going to milk it. Their cat
screeches are soon drowned out by the distance I put between us, and with the
DJ playing a dance track, partygoers soon get up and make their way to the
dance floor to get down with it. I stop in front of the table, but my sister is
too involved with texting to notice that her big sister has shown up after five
months of absence.

Where is the love?

“Hey Darcy!” I sing over her. Darcy’s head
jerks up in surprise. Her brown eyes quickly finding mine as a huge smile
spreads across her face.

“Marisa! You actually came!” Darcy
exclaims excitedly. I take the empty seat next to her and hug her.

“As I said I would, little sister! Where’s
Cam?” I ask, taking a quick look around the room to see if I can spot him.

“He went with Johnny to get a soda,” Darcy
explains, putting her phone down on to the table. Johnny is Ben’s
fourteen-year-old brother. I gaze over at the girl sitting next to Darcy,
Jennifer, Ben’s twelve-year-old little sister.

Oh, those two women, they just loved
having the same amount of kids, didn’t they? Coordinating amounts by gender,
perhaps we were matched at birth, a huge three-way wedding.

As for their dreams, they’ve been talking
about it since first meeting. Mom and Gwen had a plan.

And I ruined it.

Chapter
Three

*Marisa*

Half an hour later, I’m thirsty and
hungry. Cameron finally graced our table with Ben’s little brother.

“Marisa!” Cameron splutters, shocked that
he is seeing his older sister after almost five months.

“In the flesh, little bro!” I laugh back.

“When did you get back?” Cameron asks
while coming around the table toward me.

“Yesterday,” I answer, getting up to give
him a hug. Even with my heels, he is at my shoulder. I know that in a few more
months, when puberty officially begins to hit him, he will soon tower over me.
I glance over to Darcy; she’s going to be tall too. Which is good. I want them
to be everything I couldn’t be, including venom-proof; you know, the kind Mom
is known for spitting out in her fits of rage.

I’ve still got the scars to prove it; that
shit doesn’t fade away with time. An out-of–this-world miracle or concoction is
in order to have any hope of getting rid of those marks.

Who would have thought that with words,
you can literally scar someone for life? If only I would have known; a better
preparation in emotional shields could have been dealt with.

A mother-venom-proof vest, or an invisible
shield that bounced everything she shot back towards her. Would do her some
good, a taste of her own medicine.

I’m selfless like that. Even if things
hadn’t worked out for the best for me, I’m not vindictive or selfish enough to
want my younger siblings to go through the same things I did.

And if I ever find out that Mom decided to
take turns taking out her frustrations on the twins, because I’m not there
anymore or because she thought it was fitting, then she had another thing
coming. I’m not going to let that happen, and would happily come all the way
back from Toronto just to rip her a new one.

Just enough to make her know that she
can’t talk to people the way she wants to, just because she’s angry.

But then again, it could have been just
me. Perhaps I am the one who just brought that certain evil out of people. So
the twins probably have nothing to worry about after all.

“Did you bring me anything?” Cameron asks,
stepping out of my embrace and chuckling. I narrow my eyes at him and shake my
head.

“No! It’s not your birthday for another
couple of months!” I yell back in mock frustration, raising my eyebrows to
‘show’ how offended I am, and appalled at the audacity of his expectations of
me.

But looking back at my sister and then
back at him, I kind of wish I did. I feel guilty, what kind of older sister am
I? I left them in the throes of an illogical venom-shooter that is our mom.

“We’ll see,” I chuckle and reach down to
grab my clutch off the table as Cam and Johnny sit down with the rest of the
kids. “Kids, I’m off to the bar, anyone want anything?”

They all shake their heads as I walk
around the round tables, pretending people aren’t looking at me and whispering.

The Gellys girl is back!

Marisa was gone?

Yes, Libby didn’t elaborate. Something
about a road trip to find herself!

My word!

So, is she back for good?

Her mother is so disappointed in her.

Libby was always harsh!

She looks lovely.

What a wonderful color on her!

Where did she get that dress?

She must have a good job…Gwen said…!

Good old Gwen!
I chuckle knowingly to myself as I make my way
toward the bar.

“Hey…” A familiar voice calls from behind
me as I wait behind a few patrons to order from the bartender.

It happens again, just like in the parking
lot, I freeze. My eyes widen in anticipation at what is waiting behind me,
almost half a year in the making. I turn around, and come face-to-face with a
precious part of my past. No matter how much I’d rather he wasn’t so precious,
he is a part of me, and I’m realizing right now I can’t forget him, no matter
what.

Ben.

He stands with his hands in the pockets of
his dark jeans. He’s wearing a fitted, off-white blazer, which I mentally roll
my eyes at, because who wears an off-white blazer? Even if it fits really
nicely, and the person wearing it looks amazing. Ben’s brown eyes twinkle at
the same time and his dark brown hair is gelled back to create a smooth
surface, showcasing the beauty of his face.

But yeah, I roll my eyes; or at least I
think about it. But damn, my ex-boyfriend looks fine, really fine….and if I
keep thinking things like this, this reunion will be more like my inevitable
caving or surrender.

I don’t want to surrender, or give off any
notion that surrender is an option by my facial or body movement. I want to be
strong, to show that I am still as scorned as I was almost six months ago, that
no one should mess with me, even the old love of my life.

Damn it…why couldn’t he just accept me for
me…love me for me? Because I had loved him just the way he was. Even though
sometimes he had acted like a total and complete Momma’s-boy-cocky-douchebag.
But I had accepted him, nevertheless; it was a character trait that I could
easily look past. But cheating…that was on a whole new level of things that I
didn’t and could never get past.

My
lips weren’t enough for him.

And that’s what killed the most.

“Hey,” I murmur back, slowly keeping eye
contact.

You can do this!

“How are you?” Ben asks slightly louder
than a murmur. I press my clutch against my thigh and subtly adjust my stance,
bending my knees slightly, just in case I need the stability.

“I’m fine,” I reply.

“Did you just arrive?”

“Yeah, like fifteen minutes ago.”

“So did I. I didn’t see you outside; I
mean, we arrived practically at the same time…” Ben trails off.

“I saw you,” I murmur back. Ben’s eyes
widen in slight shock.

“Really?”

“Yeah, I was in the black SUV in front of
the steps outside,” I explain.

“Oh, you changed your car?” Ben asks
hesitantly.

“No, I got a ride from a friend.” As soon
as I explain that to him, something clouds over his eyes, but he quickly
reverts back to normal.

Is that…jealousy?

“And I don’t have my car anymore…I had to
sell it,” I further explain.

My poor car…I loved that car. I bought
that car with my own money, even though it wasn’t the newest or the flashiest.
Hell, it was as far from flash and class as any car could get, well, in the
eyes of my family and Ben, but it got me from point A to point B without a
problem. And I’d treasured it. Ben’s family had gotten him a used car, a black
2010 BMW, as a graduation present.

I got raised eyebrows, while he got praise
for something he didn’t actually buy. Okay, maybe he had earned it in the eyes
of everyone around us, but I still bought mine with my own money! Do you know
how long it takes to save up four-thousand dollars earning ten dollars an hour?
A long freaking time.

“Thought you loved that car?” Ben asks,
confused at my confession. He knows I loved my car and would never sell it.
Even when he had asked me to sell it because it was old and he would drive me
anywhere I needed to be, I still refused. What was mine was mine, and no one,
not even him, was going to deter me.

I let out a slow breath.

“I didn’t have a choice,” I say
nonchalantly with a shrug of my shoulders.

“Needed the money, huh?” Ben says with a
bit of arrogance.

“You could say that.” I say, slightly
raising my voice. Ben takes his hands out of his pockets and folds his arms
across his chest, then not-so-subtly scans me from head-to-toe.

“You look like you’re doing fine, more
than fine, actually,” Ben says with a slight smile. “You said you got a ride
from a friend, someone new?”

“You could say that,” I reply without a
flinch. Ben’s eyes narrow a little; it seems as if he’s getting a bit annoyed
at my lack-luster answers. I’m not going to give anything away. This is not
information he is privileged enough to know, along with basically anything else
to do with my life now.

“Making new friends wherever it is you
moved to, right?” Ben asks.

“Tons.”

There’s a moment of silence before Ben
breaks it. “You look nice,” Ben says quietly.

“Thank you.”

“Never seen you look like this before,”
Ben whispers.

“Okay…”

“What happened? You never dressed like
this before, or fixed your hair this extravagantly when we dated.”

“Well, it’s been a while since I saw my
family, and I wanted to look nice for Dad’s birthday party.”

Ben stands silently; his eyes seem
unconvinced with my answer. “So you fixed yourself up for your dad’s party?”
Ben asks slowly.

“Yeah.”

“No one else?” he prompts.

“Nope…priorities, remember?”

“I remember.”

The bartender slides my drink towards me,
and I grab it and bring it to my lips. The cranberry juice’s flavor explodes
across my tongue. I turn back to Ben as I suck the drink down.

“Alright, well – I’m going to sit back
down with Darcy.”

Ben unfolds his arms and nods. “Okay.”

I smile timidly at him and nod a goodbye.

Walking away with my back turned to the
former (I think) love of my life, it’s as if everything is in slow motion. I do
my best not to stumble in these six-inch fabulous heels as I make my way around
the tables, on my way back to the little kids’ table.

I’m sitting at the little kids’ table
…it seems not much is going to change. Is
my mindset still like that? Like the lazy, overgrown woman-child everyone saw
me as when I lived here? I hope not. I hope I’ve grown and matured, becoming a
responsible adult.

I feel his eyes scan the entirety of my
back, and dare I say hungrily, because I’m not an idiot. I saw the look in his
eyes when he saw me for the first time after so long.

Yep. I look good and he knows it.

This makes me smile. I like knowing I’m
still wanted, even if it is purely sexual.

But that’s as far as it’s ever going to
go; he can look, but he can’t touch.

And if he cries about that later, that’s
his fault. Maybe for his next girlfriend (Gulp!) he won’t fool around with some
side-piece because he claims loneliness and drunkenness are the causes.

Responsibility.

Learn it. Love it. Remember it.

Ben, are you listening right now?

I circle the last table with my head down,
careful not to make eye contact with one of my parents’ friends who wants the 411
on what I am up to, and where I have been for the past five months. I make it
back to Darcy’s table in one piece, put my drink down on the table with my
clutch, and smooth the back of my dress as I sit down. I glance back at the bar
as the bartender slides a shot of something towards Ben, who quickly picks it
up and slams it back.

What?
I stare confused. Why is Ben drinking a shot? At
the same time as my new- found worry, the bartender slides another shot towards
Ben, who downs it in record time.

Two shots…why? We aren’t at a party with
our peers to be drinking like this. This is my dad’s fiftieth birthday party!
Who would get drunk at a party like this? Only the older people are supposed to
be getting drunk; this party is their chance to unwind and let loose, and us,
their young-uns, to be appointed as their designated drivers. Why is Ben
slamming back shots of Vodka like a frat boy?

He’s miserable, maybe? The thought melts
the armor around my heart a tad. Is he that miserable? Did I cause him that
much pain that he needs the help of alcohol to ease it enough to get through
the party?

Oh my God! The bartender slides over a
transparent plastic cup filled with cranberry and Vodka. I know this because
that was our favorite drink; well, it’s still mine, and apparently, it is still
his as well. It just isn’t
our
favorite drink anymore; we aren’t
together to have ‘ours’ anymore. This makes me sad, surprisingly. I thought I
cast all emotions involving Ben that didn’t belong in the anger-let-him-burn
category to the side, awaiting cremation.

The feelings just don’t want to die. What
am I going to do? If the feelings I thought were gone were not really gone, how
am I going to make it through another conversation with him? That is, if we’re
going to even speak again. Not unless I purposely ignore him or pretend I’m
busy.

I don’t know…I’m making things complicated
again.

Yeah, I do that too!