“Sure,” she said, grabbing a sweatshirt and looking over at her roommate. “I’ll be right back.”
The girl in the kitchen stared me down as I closed the door behind me. I started to think she could read my thoughts, but that was just my guilt. We walked across the street and down to the small private beach below. I had my hands stuffed in my pockets since I was trying to avoid reaching out and touching her. I knew if I touched her, I would lose my nerve, and I needed to do what I thought was right.
“The other night was really amazing,” I said, smiling. “Like beyond amazing.”
“It was,” she said, blushing.
“That being said,” I continued. “I made a promise to my mother a very long time ago that I would always look out for you. I would always treat you like family. And that night, I didn’t do that. I feel like I took advantage of you because you had a bad night with Nick, you just moved out, and you were kind of drunk.”
“No,” she said, shaking her head with hurt in her eyes. “I was fully aware of what I was doing.”
“Right,” I said, shaking my head. “But I didn’t realize until afterward what I had done. I had gone against everything I had promised my mother, and it can’t happen again.”
I looked at her face as we walked forward. She was staring down at the sand beneath our feet, and I could see how much my words had hurt her. She looked like I was stabbing her with knives in the heart. Immediately, I wanted to reach out and take her in my arms and apologize, but I knew in order to move past this, I needed to say everything.
“You are an amazing woman,” I said. “You always have been. I’ve been there as you’ve grown into the most gorgeous person, inside and out. It makes it really hard for me to follow my mother’s wishes. I want you to know, I don’t regret what happened. I just think that we should end it there. I don’t want to lose you as my family.”
“Right,” she whispered. “I understand, and I appreciate you coming to speak to me in person. Oh, and the flowers were beautiful.”
“Ronni,” I said, turning toward her and grabbing her hand.
“Thank you,” she interrupted, staring sadly at me. “For all of your amazing advice. It really was a life saver. I can’t thank you enough for that. Anyway, I should go back. I have dinner plans, and it’s getting late.”
She grabbed my arm and leaned up, kissing me on the cheek and lingering for just a moment. She turned and jogged back toward the street. I swear I could see the glimmer of a tear on her cheek as she turned. I felt absolutely horrible. Ronni was such an amazing woman, and I would be lucky to have her in my life. If it weren’t for the promise I made to my mother, I would be on cloud nine right now, trying to woo her and wine and dine her. She was exactly the woman I was looking for, and I didn’t know until that night that I had been looking. I turned and watched the sun dip below the horizon. A cold wind whipped along the beach and down the collar of my shirt.
I walked back to the car and looked up at Ronni’s window. She was standing inside with her hands covering her face. Her roommate was hugging her, and she looked up at me angrily, before leaning forward and pulling down the blinds. I hadn’t realized I would have such an effect on her
. I jumped in my car and headed to the gym. I needed to get these emotions out and the only thing I could think to do was workout.
I grabbed the gym bag from my trunk and headed into the gym, thankful they were open twenty-four hours. There was barely anyone inside, not that it mattered, and after I had changed, I jumped on the treadmill. With every step, my gut dropped, thinking about Ronni’s face when I told her. I picked up the pace, now running full speed. I breathed heavily and wished the knot in my chest would disappear. After about forty minutes, I got off the treadmill and headed over to the weights, doing as many reps as I could handle. I worked out harder than I had in a really long time, but still, I didn’t feel any better about what I had done. I had broken Ronni’s heart, which was the complete opposite of what I set out to do in the first place.
I finished my reps with the weights and walked over the punching bag, slipping my headphones in my ears in an attempt to drown out my own mind. Nick was supposed to be the villain in this scenario, not me. And yet, I continued to punch the bag as hard as I possibly could, feeling the sting in my knuckles. This girl had really done something to me. She had touched me in a place that I couldn’t describe, and I didn’t just mean my dick. Being with her was not a normal hookup. It was years of bonding and love, all compressed into one really hot night. She was smart, probably smarter than I was, and determined like I had never seen. She wanted to make something out of herself, and she wanted to do it all while spending time with me and giving herself to me fully. Had I known she was giving her virginity to me, I would have held her longer, caressed her more gently, and made her feel like she was the only woman in the world.
I took in a deep breath, reared back, and punched the bag as hard as I could over and over again. My knuckles swelled and cracked as they met the plastic material. I grabbed the bag, stopping it from swinging, and leaned my head against it. No matter how many times I punched this bag, I was still a giant piece of shit.
Chapter Eight
Ronni
I took a deep breath and wiped away the fog from my steamed-up mirror. There was a knot in my chest from the conversation I had with Nathan the night before, and I really didn’t like it. I had given him my virginity, given him a part of me that I could never get back, and he had broken it off before it even had a chance to begin.
All this time, I’d thought Nick was the bad guy, the one that would break my heart. But I never saw it coming from Nathan. He was so kind and gentle. Even when he was telling me this couldn’t happen, his eyes told me he was genuinely upset about it. That should have made it better, but it almost felt worse, knowing he wanted to be with me but the ghosts from our past were dictating our future.
No matter how good his mother’s intentions had been, they never came to fruition. I wasn’t treated poorly, but I was never treated like a sister. Now, it was messing with Nathan’s mind so much that he couldn’t separate it from what happened. It made me angry that he couldn’t come to terms with the fact that his mother’s wishes had been broken a long time ago, and there was no going back.
I was drawn from my thoughts by my phone buzzing on the counter. I looked down and saw Nick’s face flashing across the screen. I picked it up, thinking twice about answering but pressing the call button anyway.
“Hey, Nick,” I said, trying to sound normal and not mopey.
“Hey, beautiful,” he said in his normal energetic voice. “I wanted to see what you were up to tonight.”
“I don’t have any plans,” I said, sighing. “Why? What’s up?”
“Well, I thought maybe I could make up for the other night and take you dancing at this awesome club in San Diego,” he said, igniting visions of that night in my head.
“You know what? That sounds great.” I decided that I needed to get Nathan out of my head, and there was no one more likely to help with that than Nick.
“Awesome,” he said. “Pick you up in an hour?”