My dad.
I know his feelings are hurt just as much as mine are, but for very different reasons.
“It’s open,” I sniff, closing my phone and feeling a line of hot moisture between my legs as I lay them flat against the bed, staring up at the ceiling, hugging a pillow.
I gasp again hearing the door open, the pillow scratching at my chest which is so hard it feels like it could crack.
Nothing dulls a turn on though more than the sight of my dad, and the fantasy of Carter taking me from behind in the soft mud on the bank vanishes.
“Can I come in?” Dad asks meekly, tiptoeing across to the bed and sitting at the end as if it’s a live mine about to explode.
“Sorry, dad,” I tell him, going first and knowing how hard it is for him to deal with my moods sometimes.
“I’m just over-tired I guess,” I lie. Still blaming a return from college months ago for every little thing, when in reality it’s because I have no idea what I’m doing with my life.
“I know, sweetie,” he croons, patting the space next to my leg on the bed.
“It’s just. I really want Carter to be happy. He’s been working those oil rigs for what now, twenty years? He’s finally out of it, a made man. I just hate to see someone so… eligible, deserving miss out on the happiness of…” but he trails off.
The happiness I know my dad never had.
He wants his best friend to have a wife and a happy life because his own didn’t work out like that.
“Just think it over, hun? I don’t want to see you miss out on a great holiday either. I mean, c’mon. It’s Vermont! We’ll have a great time, and it is your graduation present,” he adds, compounding guilt with how foolish I feel already.
“It’s just for a week, and I bet we will hardly even see Wendy if things aren’t fireworks with Carter.”
Wendy?
I sit up, almost feeling like I want to heave at the name given to that… face. But I swallow hard, determined not to fly off the handle anymore.
Apart from making it too obvious how I really feel about Carter, it’s not fair on my Dad.
He’s worked hard too, and we have a comfortable life. He put me through college and I know he’s gonna be working at his own job a lot harder and for a lot more years because of it.
Carter…
Closing my eyes and looking up, I take a deep breath. Knowing I’m about to regret what I have to say.
But the thought of not seeing him at all as well as losing him forever is worse than anything.
“Alright, dad. I’ll go. And sorry for being a brat. I know how much this trip means to you… how much it cost.”
“That’s my girl,” he says, leaning in to hug me, patting my arm.
“Don’t worry though, Wendy’s paying her own way. She insisted. And once she saw some more photos of Carter, she even offered to pay for the whole trip, all of us!” He laughs, making me cringe at that name again.
That plastic made-up face and fake chest.
“But, we’ve already paid. I just want us to have a great time, honey. A family holiday… As much of a family as we can be anyhow,” he adds, and I can feel his own hurt creeping back in.
“Say you’ll come, honey? I know Carter is dying to see you again,” he adds.
“He is?” I ask, sitting up as though the man himself is in the next room.
“Sure he is, said so yesterday on the phone. He’ll meet us in Vermont, flying in straight from his rig in Alaska. Said he can’t wait,” he adds again. “And he’s dying to see you.”
Dying to see me?
Carter Everett?
Well, why didn’t you say so in the first place?
Chapter Two
Carter
It’s a small case I pack, leaving my phone out so I can check in with Greg.
And Serena.
Greg tells me he has a ‘special surprise’ in Vermont. And knowing him, he’s trying to set me up with one of his co-workers or some such.
Again.
He’s always angling for me to settle down. And for the first time in twenty years, I think I might.
I’ve got a single suitcase, a couple of changes of clothes but a ton of money in the bank and investments.
I started rigging when I couldn’t afford college, even though I turned down that athletic scholarship.
Seemed weird.
Run around with a ball for free money? Yeah right, and then do exactly as we tell ya, boy. Not my style.
Too many bad memories of that sort of thing.
So here I am, on the plane to Vermont. It’s not the Swiss Alps, but I know Greg does the best he can, and he promises a couple of joining cabins with Alpine views.