“There will be.”
Her round eyes stare back at me, unconvinced. Though who she imagines forgetting the other is beyond me. “We’ll see.”
Fight for her, that same voice emerges. She is everything I want, everything that makes me feel whole. But if I want to fight for her, this is the only way to do it. Battling myself and my own selfish desires before taking on the rest of the world.
Three months, I tell myself.
I can do this.
Three more months and Aly McKenzie will be mine.
Chapter Fifteen
Aly
So after he gave me the greatest sexual pleasure of my life, he told me we could no longer see each other.
It’s not the best greeting to open with when I see my mother, but it’s all I have on my mind at the moment. Even two weeks later, his touch lingers on my skin. Fourteen whole days placed between us, neither of us talking, focused on our work. And all I can think about is how wonderful he felt.
How wonderful he made me feel.
I suppose I’ll reserve the usual, “Hello, how are you?” greeting for her and then wallow in my own misery in silence.
To make matters worse, Lyndsey didn’t come home until late the next morning. And while I normally love having that time to myself, I could have really used a shoulder to cry on. It didn’t help that she was likely somewhere doing the very thing I wanted to be doing with a man who took the tired “let’s just be friends” conversation to a whole new level.
Instead, I drowned my sorrows in an individual-sized tub of rocky road ice cream and watched a few episodes ofSnapped. No reason.
His suggestion wasn’t too far-fetched, was it? He could lose his job over something like this and never be able to work in a university again. And he loved his job. Isn’t that why he pushed students so hard, to see them flourish when they reached their full potential? Being with me would cost him everything. I couldn’t be the reason all of that went away.
Marianne had issued that same warning to me. On the same night no less. A warning I foolishly disregarded in favor of animalistic desire.
Was I being selfish? I hadn’t been the one to initiate the kiss. I tried to walk away with no more than a handshake for goodness’ sake! He had been the one to pull me back, to kiss me. And even though I begged for it with every last breath in me, he had also been the one to touch me. In the most intimate of places. Long before I even knew what was happening or what to expect.
And then in an instant, it was gone. For months.
I can wait for three months for him. There is no doubt in my mind about that. Sometimes I feel as though I’ve waited a lifetime, just for him.
Icould wait. But could he?
I straighten, mentally preparing myself as I stand outside my mother’s home. Right there on the front doorstep, like an idiot, I’m coaching myself to put on a brave face.
It’s fine. I can live with this. If he does move on or finds someone more accessible than me, I will handle it the same way I have handled all the gut-wrenching disappointment in my life.
Burying it deep down beneath the surface until it festers like a gaping wound?
That’s getting old, isn’t it? It’s not like I wouldn’t be upset if he showed up in the next month with a busty blonde goddess on his arm. Or maybe a chic but sassy brunette is more his speed. I guess I’ll just have to wait and trust that he feels the same way for me as I do for him.
I focus my thoughts on the task at hand: walking through my mother’s front door. I have every right to be upset. But not here.
Not when my mother needs me to be strong.
One last breath and I have that game face I need: a fake smile and a confident stride. I open the door and find my mother at the kitchen table. She looks up at me, her palm pressed against her temple almost as if she had been sleeping right there in the middle of the kitchen.
“Baby, you’re home,” she says, groggy.
“Are you ok?” I ask out of habit.
“Of course.” She nods and holds up the coffee cup in her hands. “Just a little sleepy. Needed something to keep me going.”