Un-Sable

Drowning

"I'm drowning in lies."

- Evie

Secondary Colors

Once Upon a Time There Was a Little Girl...

Stay

Holding my gaze, he brushes his lips against mine and whispers, “You’re so beautiful, Evie, I forget to function.”

I moan into his open mouth and pull him into me, my fingertips touching the uneven skin of the scar on his back. When I move them across it, he jumps off me.

“What’s wrong?” I pant, leveraging my upper body up on my elbows.

“It’s nothing.” He paces at the foot of the bed, rubbing his hands over his face. “Maybe we’re moving this along faster than I’m comfortable with.”

I’d never say I knew this man. I don’t. Not really. I know he’s lying, though. Perhaps there is honesty in his statement. Perhaps he’s right.

“Is it because of your scar?” I sit up. “It doesn’t bother me if you’re worried it does.”

He peers down at me.

“It bothers me.”

I crawl to the brass footboard and kneel, taking his hand in mine.

“Would you like to tell me how you got it?”

His face drops with—shame?

“No.”

Well, that’s that.

“I should leave,” I state, dropping his hand and gathering my nightgown from the floor. I clutch it to my naked torso, trying to hide my body and my humiliation. I haul ass for the stairs. My toes touch the first step when his work-worn hand clasps my shoulder. I stop mid-step and glimpse at it, saddened. It makes me feel safe, wanted, needed.

His silence weighs down on the air.

I’m thankful for my long, thick hair. I lose myself in it. I’d give anything to hide from this moment. His hand disappears under the mess of brown toppling down my back and breasts, pushing it off my neck and over my other shoulder.

A whimper seeps between my lips when his mouth closes over the curve of my neck.

“Stay with me tonight.” His warm breath tickles my skin.

“We already tried that.”

“No sex,” he whispers, his fingers running along my arms. “I enjoy when you sleep beside me.”

“Alright.”

He takes my hand and leads me back to his welcoming bed, the sheets crumpled and warm from our almost lovemaking. I start to put my nightgown back on, but he stops me.

“Let me feel your body against mine.”

I drop it on the floor, climbing in under the sheets he holds back for me. He covers us and draws me into him, his arms winding around me like morning glory.

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Love is Weakness

I’m terrible for keeping things from Aidan. He’s really sweet and respectful. I owe him more than this. I owe them both more than this. Aidan and I share a history and much more. But Holt turns my knees to rubber and my brain to oatmeal. There’s no thinking with him. I react. It’s instinctual.

“I’m not exactly pleased with myself. But the only reason you want me to dump him is because then you win. It has nothing to do with me or his heart being broken.”

“Of course you’d believe I wouldn’t have the capacity to empathize with another person.”

“I know I don’t belong to either of you. He hasn’t talked to me about anything past going out as friends at this point. And when it comes to you, well, you’re everything he isn’t.”

“Best of both worlds,” he says emotionlessly.

“You know, I wouldn’t be so eager about my making a decision about you two. Hate to break your heart, but you may not be the one I pick.”

That was harsh. But as usual, he pushed me.

I stride out of the kitchen, done with this conversation, and down the hall toward my waiting guest. I’m rounding the stairs, Aidan’s back in view, when I’m stopped roughly, nearly spilling the drink in my hand. Shoving me against the wall, Holt kisses me deeply, hungrily. It makes me woozy with arousal.

Snapping out of his influence, I jostle him away, not wanting Aidan to accidently discover us sucking face in the entryway.

“That’s what you want from me, isn’t it, Evie? You want me to give you everything he won’t, everything he can’t.”

He gives me exactly what I need, but I don’t want Aidan to discover me pinned to the wall by Holt’s hard body.

“Keep it in your pants, Turner,” I scold him.

He sets his hands on the wall behind me, sandwiching me between them, and leans his mouth right up against mine. My lips part on an exhale. He smirks into my open mouth. He has me all screwed up on him, and he knows it.

“You didn’t say that the other night,” he whispers and then nips at my bottom lip. Pushing himself back, he stares me down.

“Do you think this is easy for me?” I hiss, trying to keep my voice low enough so Aid doesn’t hear.

“You have only yourself to blame for that one, peaches.”

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Un-Sable (Un-Edited)

“My aunt told me to stay away from you,” Sable said casually one nippy afternoon, while she sat on the counter in my kitchen. 

It had been three weeks since Sable broke into my life like a thief. She had spent the better part of those twenty-one days at my house or around it. I had to admit. When I’d see her walking toward my house along the beach or heard her unique knock on my door, I actually felt something warm in my gut. I enjoyed my time with her. Even if she did talk a lot and asked questions that made me squirm. And since I wasn’t a talker, she filled in the conversation most of the time. I preferred it more when she would talk about the things she liked, rather than probe me about my life.

I’d found out she was a ballet dancer. She’d been dancing since she was four. And even though she didn’t make it her profession, she hoped to teach it someday to other young girls.

Her favorite flower was the dahlia.

Her favorite animal was the peacock because she admired their unashamed beauty. She’d never thought herself very beautiful. My chest actually ached when she said it. Though she wasn’t my type, she was still a looker. She held herself in a way most girls didn’t. Her head was always held high, her back straight and long. She had a confidence in herself, even if she didn’t see it. I did.

“Why? Because boys are bad and only want one thing?” I teased her. But if it had been the case, she wouldn’t have been wrong. Men are disgusting creatures with one thing on their mind. Though, some of us manage to find restraint.

“She doesn’t want me to get too close to you.”

I stopped laughing.

“Why is that her concern?” I snapped.

I didn’t know why her straightforward statement had pissed me off. Maybe it was being told who I could and couldn’t be friends with. Maybe I took it as a personal attack. Did her aunt think I wasn’t good enough for Sable? I’d come to learn, it was all and none of those things.

“Whoa,” she said in a placating tone. “I wasn’t trying to upset you. She didn’t say we can’t be friends. We just can’t get too close is all.”

“Why does she care what her grown niece does with her time or who she does it with?”

“It isn’t you, Everett. It’s me. She’s scared.”

“Scared of what?”

“I’ll hurt you.”

Fall 2017

secondary colors prologue

I’m pregnant. 

The two most terrifying words in the English language. More so, when you’re a freshman in college. I hadn’t planned on being a cliché statistic, obviously. But that’s the harsh truth of my reality. I’m pregnant at eighteen. 

It only took one time. That dead horse. Literally, my first and only. It was the end of summer and everyone was so emotional about leaving our little pond to enter the great big ocean. We got swept up in everything and, well, one plus one equals two—or three in our case. Most would probably believe we weren’t safe, but we were. Three lousy percent. 

Now, to tell the other one in this equation. I’ve overthought this time and time again. I’ve gone over every possible scenario and opening. From, ‘Happy Holidays, Aidan! I hope you don’t mind if my present is a few months late, I’m making it now’. To, ‘I know we haven’t seen each other since our night together last summer, but I thought you should know I’m knocked-up! High-five! Nice shot!’ 

No matter how I manage to spill, he’s always devastated by the news. How could he not be? How do you tell someone their life might be over before they really have a chance to live it?

This is why I’m sitting in my car outside his family’s enormous house in the middle of a New Hampshire winter, my hand hesitating over the handle of my door.

I place my other hand over my swelling belly, the flutter of life stirring inside me. She isn’t even here yet and I already fear for her safety and happiness. I’m not far enough along to know whether or not the baby’s a girl, but I sense it in my rounding gut.

“There’s no turning back the clock now. We only have forward, little girl.”

I breathe the first full breath I’ve taken since I pulled up to the opulent lakeside house, and then exit the car. The initial steps are the hardest, but they get easier with momentum. I step up to the over-sized front door with my fist balled and ready to make contact. It takes me a second to actually knock. It’s weak. I doubt anyone heard it. I’m about to do it again when I’m greeted by the shrinking glare of his mother.

“Yes?” she says, her voice unemotional. She’s never been very warm toward me. I don’t know why. But the chilliness of her demeanor rivals the bone-cold of the weather.

“Merry Christmas, Mrs. Channing.”

Her stone eyes fall to my stomach. Even under my sweater and jacket, it’s easy to see my protruding womb. When they target back on mine again, her piercing gaze is no longer icy. They’re on fire.

“I-Is Aidan home?”

She peers over my head, as if she were expecting someone else.

“Come inside.” It’s an order, not a welcoming gesture. She steps aside to allow me access to her expensive and perfectly furnished home. She guides me to the living room toward the back and then motions for me to sit on one of the two couches opposite one another with an impressive wood and glass coffee table in the middle.

“Would you like a cup of tea?” she asks. She only does it because that’s what you do when a guest comes to your home, you offer them refreshments. I take the offer with a grain of salt and nod my head. She walks into the modern, open-air kitchen while I contemplatively stare out the two-story glass window at the lake and forest surrounding it. It’s snowing heavily now, but I swear I make out my house across the frozen water through the endless drift of powder. I take my strength from it, hoping to get through this in one piece.

When she returns with the tea tray and sets it on the table, I put my focus back on her. She sits on the couch across from me and begins to pour the tea into a cup. Not asking how I take it, she simply adds sugar and cream and slides it across the table. It’s a hostile gesture.

“Would it be possible for me to speak with Aidan now?”

I pick the cup from the table and taste the herbal warmth.

“No, Evie, it isn’t.” 

“Is Aidan home?” 

“Whether he is or isn’t, has nothing to do with why you won’t be speaking to my son.” She sips on her afternoon drink and wipes the corners of her mouth, even though there isn’t anything to wipe. She’s stiff, every move calculated. “I know what you wish to speak to him about, and I have no intentions of allowing you to ruin his life. You’re more than free to ruin your own. However, I won’t sit idle while a Hathaway screws up my son’s life as well.”

As well?

“I think that’s Aidan’s decision to make,” I politely disagree, setting my teacup on the table between us.

“He’ll never find out about this,” she says with unwavering certainty. “I want you to get rid of it, preferably before the birth. I’d hate to have genetic evidence of this problem out in the world. It could come up to bite him later.”

I’m horrified into silence.

She picks a checkbook off the tray. I hadn’t noticed it before. I was focused on the situation. She opens it and retrieves the gilded pen tucked between the sheets, probably worth more than my entire wardrobe.

“How much do you want?” she asks, her eyes trained on the blank check, the pen ready to jot down any amount it’ll take to keep me quiet.

“You’ve clearly misread my intentions, Mrs. Channing.” 

“Everyone has a price,” she states confidently. “It’s simply a matter of negotiation.”

“I don’t want your dirty bribe money.” I rise from the couch, realizing we won’t see eye to eye on this. “I won’t be bought off.”

I see myself out. I’m halfway down the foyer when she says, “He’ll never forgive you if you ruin his life, too.” Her words stop me in my tracks. “Do you think he’ll ever see this child as anything more than a burden, a noose around his neck? Who do you think he’ll blame for that? You’ll be the girl who destroyed everything.” I face her, vibrating, tears of anger, hurt, and betrayal threatening my stinging eyes. “You may not want my money, but if you’re smart, you’ll get rid of that thing and move on with your life.”

Thing?

“One day, you’ll regret this, Mrs. Channing. It may not be tomorrow. It may be years from now. When that day comes, it’ll be too late.”

I turn on my heels and walk back to my car with steadfast footsteps, my boots crunching in the white powder. I want to run like the wind, sensing she’s watching me leave. But I won’t allow her the satisfaction of my defeat. I open the squeaking door of my Nova and slam it shut with a screaming groan.

In the safety of my ice-covered car, I place my hands over my womb once more. There’s no flicker of her inside me this time. Her tiny heart is broken.

“I’m sorry, baby,” I whisper, rubbing my palms over her, trying to sooth my unborn child, my fatherless child.

As the snow flitters to the ground, my tears do, too. Small trickles growing into big, fat tears, soaking the front of my sweater.

“I’ll figure this out,” I weep, now cradling my arms around myself. “I won’t let you down, baby. I promise.”

secondary colors prologue

#loveisweakness