Billy
Iwoke up around dusk from what seemed like the best dream ever. But, it wasn’t a dream. Kat was still lying next to me, asleep, soft and warm, cuddled against me. Her mane of red hair tickled my chin. She still smelled of lavender, but now, it was supplemented by the salty sweat that lingered in the air. Sex with Kat was unparalleled, even compared to ten years ago. We had changed, we were more confident. I don’t know if I would ever see anything as sexy as her laying there waiting for me, naked and wet. And then, with my cock thrust inside her, she said she was mine.
Was she really mine? Or was she just caught up in the heat of the moment? I didn’t know what any of this meant. Where did we go from here? We still had the same problems we’d always had. Kat’s life was centered around her career and New York, and I was tied to this ranch. But I was different now. Knowing what it was like to live without her, I would compromise in some way. I had to. We had to live apart, but we could see each other. That sounded terrible, but something was better than nothing. I couldn’t imagine going back into the darkness of a life without her light.
Behind me, in the pile of Kat’s clothes, her phone started to ding. It was a loud bell sound, and I didn’t want her to be bothered, so I jumped up to silence it. I rifled through her things and found the phone in her jeans pocket. Before I pressed the buttons to quiet the sound, I noticed the text message that had popped up on the front screen.
June: Good News. Wheels up tomorrow. Noon.
My heart started to race and my stomach curdled. Kat was leaving tomorrow. That first day we ran into her she told Wyatt that she had to get back to New York. If it weren’t for the snowstorm, she wouldn’t be here at all, and now she was leaving again. She promised Sarah that she’d go to her concert at Sadie’s tomorrow night. Guess not.
What was I doing? Kat was an international rock star. There was no life for us together, and no matter how much that killed me, I absolutely could not tolerate her letting down the other people in my family. I couldn’t let any of them feel the way I felt for the last ten years. Getting burned by Kat Bennett was not something you get over. She scars you for life.
I looked at her, naked, laying on the blanket in my hay loft, and I just so felt angry. So angry that she left me, so angry she came back, so angry that I couldn’t have her, but also so mad that she was about to use the excuse of her music to let Sarah down.
I crossed to my clothes, grabbed my jeans, pulled them on, buttoned them up, and buckled my belt. I felt like her naked body was a weapon she could yield against me, like I couldn’t resist her. But maybe with my jeans, I’d be less exposed, like having my dick encased in denim might keep my big head in control when Kat woke up. Stewing, I sat down on a hay bale across from Kat’s feet and waited. With each passing minute, my anger grew.
I faltered for a moment when, with her eyes still closed, she pawed behind her looking for me in her half-awake state, but then I considered the disappointment Sarah was going to feel when she found out that Kat was leaving before her show and my rage solidified. Kat’s eyes popped open and she sat up, looking for me. My ire must have been written all over my face because any semblance of the lazy peace she had when waking disappeared.
“Tell me, how was this supposed to work, Kat?” My voice was tight and bitter.
She curled her knees into her chest in an attempt to cover her nakedness, and then shifted so she could wrap the blanket around her. She hadn’t had time to get angry like me, so the cool and the ugly in my tone hit her like a slap.
“I … I ...” She stuttered. “I ... don’t know exactly. But we can figure it out. Can’t we?”
“I’m pretty certain that I remember this part,” I spat. “I want you to stay and you have to leave. Isn’t that how this works?”
Kat was a firecracker, it didn’t take much to ignite her spirit for better or worse. So, she quickly found her footing and snapped back, “I do have to leave, Billy. I have commitments elsewhere, but just like ten years ago, that doesn’t mean we can’t make this work. Or if you want, I can go, and you cannot call me again. As I remember it, that’s how this works, isn’t it?”
“Fuck you, Kat.”
“Too late, you already did.”
I turned to leave, but then I stopped. I couldn’t help myself. I spun and spat ten years of vitriol at her. “I was nineteen. Nineteen. My mother was dead, and I was responsible for all of my siblings. I couldn’t just go racing all over the world with you.”
“You never even said that,” she yelled. “You just fucking disappeared.”
“I needed you and you left.”
She was shaking. “I had a contract ... a record deal. I couldn’t just walk away from that. But ...”
I interrupted her, “Stop.” This was the same old garbage. We would never get out from under this mountain. Her responsibilities to her music would always be more important than me.
I pointed from her to me and me to her, “This is done. It was always done. I’m sorry we entertained the idea of resurrecting it.”
“Of course you are,” she scoffed.
“What’s that supposed to… you know what, forget it. I’m good.” I turned again. “Have a nice flight, Kat.”
I headed quickly to the ladder.
Behind me, she screamed, “May the wind be at your back, asshole.”
It was something she said in a letter that I ignored a long time ago. Barefoot and shirtless, I climbed down from the loft as pissed off as I had ever been. I needed to drive. I grabbed my boots and headed straight for my truck. I couldn’t believe I let her do this to me again. I practically flew into the cab of my truck, slammed the door, and peeled out. I didn’t know where I was going but as long as it was away from her, it was perfect.
I drove for an hour determined to get as far away as possible. Never looked back. Never stopped, just drove. Honestly, it is amazing how once you're an experienced driver, you’re capable of subconsciously following traffic rules without being truly conscious of what's happening around you. I wasn’t thinking of anything specific, just broiling with rage. Eventually, I stopped at a quick mart. I plowed into the store in nothing but my jeans, belt, and boots, and grumbled at the clerk, “You sell clothes?”
He nodded towards a rack of long-sleeved tourist t-shirts, featuring images of Glacier National Park. Fine. Clothes are clothes. I grabbed a bright orange long-sleeved tee with the word Montana scrawled across the front in neon green and pulled it over my head. Then, I booked it to the coolers at the back of the store and grabbed a twelve-pack of beer. I wasn’t really a big drinker, but today seemed like as good a day as any to get wasted.
Items paid for, I got back in my truck, turned around, and headed for a rest stop on the freeway about forty minutes outside of Conway. I certainly wasn’t going back to chit chat with Kat in her ... correction, in my kitchen. No, thank you. I wanted her good and gone before I went back there again. And when I got back, I was going to dismantle that fucking bedroom of hers and the rest of it, too. But before I did that, I was going to drink all the beers on my passenger seat and pass out in my truck bed. Now, if I could just erase the look of love on her face when she broke apart all over my cock.