I did as she asked and looked at the phone not understanding what the hell I was looking at until the night before came back to me. “What? This is some chick who asked me for an autograph, how did you get this?”
“Someone sent it to Annabelle, read the caption.” I looked at the words that made no sense. They implied that I was about to go up to my room with this chick, whoever she was.
I walked down the hallway to our room and she’d locked the door. “Anna open the door.” I jiggled the lock and called out to her again. “Annabelle.” Still no answer.
The situation was finally registering. Someone had set me up. I remember the girl asking me for an autograph, remember her slipping and falling, her arms landing around my neck to keep herself up.
I must admit it looked suspicious as hell, but she should know better by now. “Get away from the door Anna.” I kept my voice nice and even because I could imagine what she was thinking. With her past it may be asking too much for her to overlook something like this.
And even though I was starting to get pissed off that she believed this shit of me, I had to keep a cool head. I kicked in the door and she made a run for the bathroom.
“Stop right there, what the hell are you thinking?” I grabbed her around the middle and took her back over to the bed and dropped her. She bounded back up, still not talking to me, but looking mad as hell.
“Let me out of here, I have nothing to say to you. Is this why you had to go to Miami?”
“Anna, I didn’t sleep with her, I don’t even know her. She came to the club and asked for an autograph…”
“You’re lying, I don’t believe you. I’ll never believe anything you say again. I should never have trusted you, I should’ve followed my mind and stayed as far away from you as possible.” She was screaming by the time she finished.
She headed for the door and I grabbed her again, telling myself not to put hands on her. “You’re not going any fucking where.” How the fuck can I get her to understand if she won’t even listen to what I have to say?
She was understandably pissed, but as the one at the wrong end of this shit I wasn’t far behind. I tried explaining again but she actually covered her ears and screamed.
This is the shit I was trying to avoid. I’d made the choice to change my whole life around so that she never had to go through this shit, but here we are. I guess the last few weeks meant nothing to her, and that shit just pisses me off.
After the lengths I’d gone to this is the thanks I get. She wouldn’t even give me a fucking chance. I brought myself all the way down the way I’d learned to-to control my anger. Now I was pissed, the kind of cold pissed that don’t give a fuck.
“You want to know what I was doing this weekend? This is what I was doing.” I’d wracked my brain trying to figure out how to give her this ring, coming up with different ideas. But this scenario wasn’t one of them.
I took the box from my pocket and threw it at her, that’s how mad I was. “I got my boys together for one last night of partying, and no, fucking some random chick wasn’t part of the plan.”
“I thought since you have trust issues that once I put my ring on your finger I won’t ever give you reason to doubt me, but I guess I was wrong. I’m not your father, and I’m no longer interested in spending the rest of my life paying for his shit.”
I left the room, headed I don’t know where. “Where are you going son?” Mom tried to stop me at the door. “Get out of the way momma I gotta get out of here.” I opened the door and walked out with all of them calling me back.
“Travis, I didn’t do this shit.” I felt like I owed him at least that much.
“I know, just give her some time.”
“I’m all out. Do me a favor, get Tony over here, make sure she doesn’t leave, she has nowhere to go.”
I left before I went back in there and did something stupid, like beg her. That shit’s not about to happen. If it was that easy for her to throw us away, then fuck this shit. Life was easier when I didn’t give a damn.
I ran down to the garage, got into my ride and peeled out headed nowhere in particular. I was trying to outrun my thoughts but that shit wasn’t working, and I was too mad to stop and think.