“Stop, Cal. I am not a child.”
“I know it, but what Sam has been through is more than anyone person should bare. Like he was dealt the worst cards, then by some cosmic fuck up, they were delivered in the worst manner. His story isn’t ever going to have a happy ending.” I know he is serious as he says this. He doesn’t want me to get hurt, but even more peculiar, he wants to protect Sully too.
“I must have hit my head in the shower this morning because I am actually contemplating confiding in you.”
“Look. If it was five years ago, I doubt I would be as easy going, but I would always be here for you, Mya. I just handle shit better now.” He was right too. Jen was the person he hurt the most and the one person who made him the best of the best. He changed his heart for her and was by far a better man for it.
“So, we went back to his room that night. Everything was hot and heavy, and he went down on me-”
“Christ, Mya. Come on!” He says disgusted and covers Rylie’s ears like she would have a clue what I just said. I did get joy from watching him cringe. Twenty-one years to freak him out and I nailed it.
“Cal, you can’t ask me to come to you then get pissed.” I don’t give him the option of changing his mind and continue. “He learned quickly that I am still a virgin and flipped out on me.”
“There was no deflowering then?” He asks, a queasy look on his face and I love the power from creeping him out.
“No, but I had hopes damn it!”
I watch him grab his phone and start texting rapidly, and I fear he is yelling at Sully, so I grab his phone. “Don’t text him you jerk!”
He yanks his phone back and rolls his eyes. “I wasn’t you lunatic. I was telling Jen she needed to get home. I have no desire to talk to Sam about almost fucking you.”
I laugh at his demeanor and sip more from my drink. “He was rude though. Very cold about it.”
“How so?” He asks, his posture firmer, his eyes lit with anger in my defense. Big brothers are so awesome for that.
“He told me to leave, to get out. He said, and I am paraphrasing here, ‘I am thirty-three with a sadness in me to rival what Noah went through. I don’t want to do this because to me it is just sex and will only ever be sex. I will not fall in love with you, marry you or be with you. You are twenty-one and deserve to be some lucky guys favorite color.’”
Cal lets a whistle out and shakes his head, a sad look on his face where anger had been moments before. “That favorite color shit has a purpose. I don’t know, Mya. Honestly, I agree with him. You need to be someone’s first everything. There is a mess around Sam you can’t understand.”
“Well, stop being all loyal and shit, and dish!”
“Not happening. If it was something unlike what it is, I would, but what he carries, what he lives with, that’s his business, and not even for Jen would I share it.” He looks to Rylie with a sad smile. “If I were in his shoes, I would kill to keep my shit private.”
Sully
Mya walks in the shop with Rylie in her arms and holding Axes hand. Axe charges Noah first, signing rapidly his hello. “What’s shakin’, dude?” Noah signs and Axe is a flurry of hand gestures telling him his day’s events.
Axe was born with degenerative hearing loss and at six, he had only twenty percent of active hearing, so we all have done our best to learn ASL so we can communicate.
“Hey, Mya,” I say, trying not to look like a pubescent teenage boy with a boner at seeing her. I recall how she tastes with absolute clarity and wish I could turn off my desire for her.
“Hey, Sully. Jen in?” She asks and looks at Raleigh with a smile as he pokes Rylie’s belly.
“No. She’s off today.”
“And you know that,” Raleigh adds, outing her for coming by most likely to see me.
She looks like she might choke Raleigh and I wish her luck in succeeding though I know she won’t. “No, actually I didn’t. I assumed she had to work today when she asked me to watch the misfits. Cal just called me and asked me to meet her here to grab the kids.”
“He had his specialist appointment today for his hand and she drove him,” Noah offers. Now, we all look to him for answers on the report on Cal’s hand. Cal was in a fight defending Jen a little over a year ago and his hand was shattered in the process. The band was relying on his full recovery before they moved on with the new album release.
“He’s good, cleared,” he says, reading the text from Cal that we all just received.
Noah takes Rylie from Mya and signs for Axe to follow him. I know he is taking them to the roof where Axe likes to look out over the harbor every time they are here. Raleigh watches both Mya and I with intensity until finally the phone rings distracting him.
I look at Mya and for whatever reason, I can’t stop myself from flirting with her. “So, for once you aren’t here to stalk me?” I say with a wink. I won’t deny I look forward to her dropping in all the time to see Jen. She eyes my ass, my arms, and my tats. She watches me like I’m her next meal. We usually end up flirting in private though. Based on Raleigh’s nosey stare down earlier, I fear we haven’t been as discreet as I had hoped.
“Don’t feel bad, lover. I always have a motive,” she says, and blows me a kiss mockingly.
