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The next morning, Daddy and I packed all our belongings in to the moving truck and moved across town to Ariel and Jasmine’s apartment building. 76 Central Park West. Ariel was there to help us unpack, as well as Ariel’s sisters, Adella and Alana, twins about to graduate 8th grade. They didn’t look like Ariel at all. They had dark hair and eyes, and were gangly. But what they were good at was putting together a home.
The apartment has been professionally cleaned before we moved in, and the girls went right to work, hanging photos that hadn’t been unboxed since Mom died, adding fresh flowers in vases long forgotten, hanging drapes, putting down rugs. By the time six o’clock rolled around, we had every last box unpacked.
It’d been a long time since we’d been unpacked. Since pictures hung from the walls. I hadn’t looked at Mom’s picture since we left North Carolina. Now, her and Daddy’s wedding picture sat in a nice white frame on the side table. I picked it up and examined it. Mom was beautiful that day. Her caramel skin glowed, her dark eyes were full of happiness, her smile was bright.
I ran my fingers over the picture and sighed.
“Welcome back, Mom,” I whispered to it.
I put the picture down and picked up the one next to it. I didn’t know we owned a picture of my old horse Sweet Lips, but Adella and Alana had fished it out from the boxes of our past. I stared at the girl I used to be. Curls flying. Eyes wide and full of life. Beneath me, the Overo Paint Horse was magnificent. The brown in its coat looked unfinished, like a child had begun to color the horse in, but got distracted and walked away, leaving large areas of white behind. I closed my eyes, recalling the feel of her beneath me. The pump of her lungs, the smell of her sweat, the rhythm of her runs.
I let out a shaky breath. So many memories all at once. So many things forgotten.
I opened my eyes and examined our new apartment. A large window, complete with a window seat, let the filtered fall sunlight fill the living room. Our old brown couch was the same, but the girls had discovered a red and white Indian blanket—a gift from my grandfather—and draped it over the top of the couch, giving it new life. A giant rust colored rug sat beneath the coffee table. They’d found a red chair—or had they brought it down from their apartment?—and placed it next to the couch, forming a circle with the television, couch, and chair.
One more couch beneath the window would make the room perfect, I thought.
Crown molding gave the living room and dining room a proper separation. Our small table for four seemed too small in the open area. The girls had tried to make it work, adding tall plants to the corners, and lots of family pictures on the walls. My baby pictures, Mom standing in a sunflower field, Dad petting a horse, Grandma and Grandpa on their wedding day. The table was set with fancy dishes and plates the color of tangerine peels.
The kitchen had no windows, but the large, super bright, overhead lights made up for it. There was plenty of counter space and a big refrigerator. The girls had decided on a country theme with this room, pulling out an old watering can for the small corner breakfast nook, adding decorative dishes to the walls, a mat with a rooster on it next to the sink. They promised that they would come back and paint the walls yellow.
“You two are life savers. Are you majoring in interior design?” I asked.
“How’d you guess?” they replied in unison.
I made a mental note to send over thank you cards and flowers as soon as I could.
After a full day of moving, unpacking, and decorating, we finally sat down and dug in to our pizza. I got two bites in when there was a knock on the front door.
I picked a piece of pepperoni off my slice, popped it in to my mouth, and jogged to open it. When I pulled the door open, Cole was looking at me with those big blue eyes. His dark hair was a mess of curls that hung in his eyes. No gel today. His tall, strong frame was wrapped in a dark jacket, white t-shirt, dark jeans, and sneakers.
God. He was handsome.
“Hey,” he said.
“Hey.”
We stared at each other for a moment, taking each other in. He ran his hands through his dark hair and gave me a half smile that made my heart speed up. His shoulders were slightly hunched, his face paler than I remembered. Like he’d lost a little of his joy between yesterday and today.
“I just came by to see if you were okay.”
I stepped out in to the hallway and closed the door.
“I’m fine.”
When I woke up that morning, my mouth felt like cotton and my head verged on splitting open. After nearly a gallon of water and about ten ibuprofen, I was finally able to get out of bed.
“Last night didn’t go as I expected,” he said.
I crossed my arms, remembering his jacket so warm and delicious smelling around me. I wished that I had taken it with me. I wanted to wrap it around me whenever I thought of him, which, by the way, was much too often.
“What did you expect?” I asked.
He laughed shortly. “Not World War III.”
“Did you think that I would just fall in to your arms while my boyfriend danced in the other room?”
I wanted to hurt Cole. I wanted to hurt him because he hurt me by being with Stephanie.
“I’d hoped,” he said.
“What a thing to say to your brother’s girlfriend.”
I had to hurt Cole. It was the only way to keep him away. To keep my heart safe.
“You don’t want him.”
“Does it matter?”
“It does to me.”
“Did it matter when you were making out with Stephanie?”
I had to keep my heart away from him. If he took it, I’d never get it back.
“I never made out with Stephanie.”
“That’s not what Jake said.”
“Jake is a liar and an idiot.”
I shrugged, though knowing that Stephanie had never touched his lips made me feel a little bit better.
“Stephanie seemed to think that you two were pretty cozy.”
“I told Stephanie that we were friends. She knew that.”
“I’ll bet.”
“Why are you doing this? Why are you pushing me away?”
I put my hands on my hips, and shifted my weight on my feet.
“Cole, we are English partners and you tutor me in French. I really think that you are taking our relationship to a place where it wasn’t meant to go.”
Where it couldn’t go.
He shook his head. “That’s not true.”
“It is true.”
Please go away. I don’t want to hurt you.
“I don’t believe you,” he said.
“You have to believe me.”
Just walk away. I don’t want to hurt you.
“Cole, I am Jake’s girlfriend.”
“For reasons still unknown. Reasons I’m beginning to care less and less about.”
“You have to care about them. He’s your brother.”
“Why are you with him, huh? Did he pay you? Do you need money?”
“So now you think that I’m a whore, too?”
Please don’t make me hurt you. Please don’t make me hurt you.
“No. I think that you’re a fake. A fraud. You’re with him, but you don’t want to be. You want to be with me.”
My heart beat hard. My chest ached.
“How do you know that?”
“Because I’m not an idiot, Bella. I open my eyes. I observe things. You laugh at my dumb jokes, you argue with me, whenever I touch you, you stop breathing. Just admit that you like me already.”
“Is that why you came here? To gloat? To add me to another notch in your belt.”
He scowled darkly at me. “You know that’s not true.”
“That’s pretty much what it sounds like.”
He growled.
“You are the most stubborn girl I have ever met in my life.”
“Great. Thank you for sharing. Maybe you should go, Cole.”
“No. No. I’m not going. Not until you admit that you want to be with me.”
I shook my head.
“Leave, Cole. I don’t have time for this.”
I turned my back, intending to grab the door handle, but he grabbed my shoulder, swung me around, pressed my back to the wall, and moved in close.
Too close.
His arms encircled me, pressing our trembling bodies together.
His lips descended upon me like a hawk diving for its dinner.
Relentless. Demanding. Breaking down my every wall. Stripping away every excuse.
Cole’s kisses were like dynamite. His lips set the charges that exploded through me. Goosebumps broke out over my skin. My hands were everywhere, touching every piece of him that I could. I felt wild, frantic, desperate for more. My mouth opened, and his tongue brushed against mine, sending delicious shivers through my entire body. My heart beat out of my chest, my racing pulse our own, personal melody.
His fingers played at my back, while his learned lips gave me exactly what I needed, pressing to me when I wanted more, pulling back when it was too much, changing the angle when my heart beat slowed, smiling against my lips when it beat too fast.
Gradually, he slowed down the pace, his lips softening, his kisses turning gentle.
“I have wanted to do that since Freshman year,” he said between teasing nibbles on my bottom lip.
My hands had somehow gotten tangled in the black curls at the nape of his neck. I kept them there, playing with the dark strands, trying to catch my breath.
“I like you, Bella. A lot. You’re too stubborn to say it first so I’m going to. I really, really like you.”
His words radiated down my spine and through my toes. My eyes opened, searching his. The truth was so clear in them that it shook me to my core.
“I want to be your boyfriend. A real one.”
My world stopped spinning, my heels lightening as if the gravity had been sucked from the room. I couldn’t speak. Could barely think. Cole wanted to be with me. My heart felt so full that I was afraid it would burst.
“I have wanted you since I first saw you. You challenged me in every way imaginable. You call yourself invisible, but I see you, Bella. I’ve always seen you.”
He took my hand and placed it on his chest. Beneath the hard muscles, I felt his heart beat strong beneath my fingertips. Fast. It was so fast.
His heartbeat matched my own.
“Take what’s yours, Bella. What’s always been yours.”
His words were beautiful. I wanted so much to fall in to Cole and never return. But I couldn’t. There was too much at stake. It was too dangerous.
One fat tear rolled down my cheek. A tear for the boy that I wanted, but could never have.
“Cole, please don’t say things like that.”
“Like what? That I want to be with you? Well, I do. I can’t eat. I can’t sleep. Every waking moment, all I can do is think about you. And then I see you with him and I can’t sit still. I begged and I pleaded and I prayed for you to come to me, but you were too stubborn for your own good, so here I am. I want you, Bella. Today, tomorrow, and forever. Just ... please, say that you want me, too.”
Little beads of delight burst from my soul, and I allowed them to see the sunlight for just a second. Just one second of happiness. Just one second for me to stand here in front of a boy that I wanted more than anything and allow myself to pretend that I said the words back to him. That we’d be safe and in love and together forever.
The second passed.
It was not to be.
I smothered the happiness. Killed it. Happiness was not meant for me. Not anymore.
Cole’s eyes turned pleading. Horrified.
“Bella, don’t do this.”
I didn’t want to hurt him.
“Bella.”
I never wanted to hurt him.
“Bella, please!”
I had to hurt him.
“I don’t want to be with you, Cole.”
And with the words that sealed my fate of misery, I ran in to my apartment, closed myself in my room, and completely fell apart.