Total pages in book: 100
Estimated words: 98992 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 495(@200wpm)___ 396(@250wpm)___ 330(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 98992 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 495(@200wpm)___ 396(@250wpm)___ 330(@300wpm)
Doc delivers a single tap of the pen to his clipboard. “What about after Bambi?”
“I dated Bambi for the rest of my senior year,” I unhappily mumble.
“I meant, what about the women that you slept with after Bambi. Did you fuck them sober?”
My head slowly moves from side to side.
“What about when you messed around?”
“Not if I could fucking help it.”
“So, Blue Dream was the last woman you were with completely sober?”
“I just fucking told you. I fooled around sober. That shit happened.”
“But you refused to fuck sober.” He keeps my stare hostage. “You don’t find that shit significant?”
His line of interrogation makes me cringe.
My body tense.
Harder.
So. Much. Fucking. Harder.
I dig my hands into my hair, pull, and gradually begin to rock back and forth, closing my eyes in the process.
The desire to dodge the question, to change the topic, to lash out just to change the topic, claws at my sanity and causes the desultory emotions that I’m accustomed to resume their residency.
“Collins.”
My name is stated too firmly.
There’s no mercy.
No goddamn sympathy.
I squeeze my shut eyes tighter.
“Answer me, Collins.”
“Yes,” my hoarse voice reluctantly replies.
“Yes, what?”
“Yes…,” I force myself to meet his harsh gaze once more, to face the ugliness I’m tired of not facing. “I…did shit…that way…for a reason.”
“Because by not fucking them sober you gave yourself an excuse, an easy justification to the actions you knew you felt like shit for doing. A fail safe.”
“Look what happened the last time I made a decision completely fucking sober! I left the only person in the entire fucking world who gave a fuck about me because I thought for just a split second in time, I’d be wanted in my own goddamn family!”
“Family is important to you.”
“Family is all I’ve ever wanted!”
“And that’s why you walked in here today,” he calmly states on a stab of the air my direction.
Baffled by the statement, my jaw drops, and the candy falls.
“You visited with your brother. You spoke. From your shaken demeanor, it’s safe to assume he said something to you that you needed to fucking hear. However, you need to decide not only if that family is important to you but how important. You need to decide if your time being here is productive or being wasted. You need to decide what criteria you are expecting from people you want to be in your family and how much of you that you’re willing to give as well as how much of them you’re willing to take. You need to decide what family looks like to you, Collins. And what you look like in it. Accept who’ve been and decide who you wanna fucking be.”
Without another word, he picks up his clipboard, shoves the pen in his pocket, exits the room leaving nothing but opprobrious feelings lingering.
Chapter 4
Presley
Theory 2: People Lie for Love.
Xander Bloomfield, my slightly older and currently very unhappy boyfriend, gets out of his Porsche Cayenne, on a loud huff. “This is ridiculous, Presley. We wasted gas by driving two cars. Have you forgot how harmful that is to the environment?”
That’s impossible to forget since he spends more time lecturing me about the quality of the air outside than he does listening to my request to raise the temperature of that in our apartment.
The same apartment we’ve lived in for years despite the fact we can afford better.
And bigger.
And somewhere with less of a shitty commute for me.
I chomp down on the inside of my cheek to prevent from engaging in the brewing confrontation.
“Also, by you driving your own vehicle, you’ve put unplanned mileage on it, which pushes up the routine maintenance schedule by at least three days.” His slow headshake of disapproval has me shrinking further into myself. “You picked a terrible evening to add unnecessary stress to me. Do you realize that?”
“It wasn’t my intent.”
“Evidently it was since instead of just doing the easier thing you chose the difficult one.”
“Like I told when we were getting ready, I have to go to Katherine’s tonight.”
“Why?” He bites under his breath, adjusting his tie during our walk to the front door. “Why tonight? Why can’t you simply rearrange your schedule to be here for me?”
I’m just gonna skip past all the rearranging he’s never done for me and push onward.
“I did rearrange my schedule to be here for you,” I gingerly remind, grinding my teeth in between sentences to distract from the desire for dough dancing across my tongue. “You’re the one who came home late, demanded I throw on a dress – although not one that has too many colors because your boss prefers quieter women –, and told me – not asked – that we were joining him as well as a few of your colleagues for cocktails and appetizers. Katherine and I already had plans, which I pushed back by an hour to be here for you.”