“I love her…”
“Oh, you want to love her. I don’t know why, but you’ve spent all your entire relationship trying to please her. It’s not supposed to be like that.” She takes a shaky breath. “It wasn’t like that with Walker. He never made me feel like I came second and he always made sure I felt safe. You deserve that too.”
I turn my head and look over her shoulder. At this point I’m not sure what I deserve. It’s true Sloan has done a lot of shitty things to me, but what can I expect when I haven’t exactly been living straight?
I pat her leg. “Okay, Bishop. I hear you.”
She slaps me with a rag. “I hope so. You’re the most stubborn man I’ve met.”
I smile, but a nagging feeling keeps pulling at me. “You still mad at me?”
She gives me a hard look and crosses her arms. “I’m furious with you, but as mad as that is, I miss you more. Having you here makes everything seem less broken.”
When it looks like she’s about to cry, I pull her over to me and wrap my arms around her. She has no idea what a relief it is to hear her say that. I can lose a lot of things, but I can’t lose Tess.
Taking a jog through the neighborhood the next morning seemed like a good idea. My level of physical activity has been lacking since I got out, and I can already feel myself losing mass. I need to find a gym. Maybe it can help with some of my other frustrations as well.
As soon as the thought leaves my mind, a blonde ponytail comes jogging around the corner. Sloan smiles warmly at first and then she recognizes me. She pulls her earbuds out and gets a concerned look on her face.
“Perry,” she breathes.
I stop in my tracks, resting my hands on my hips. “Why him?”
She looks taken aback. “What?”
I throw my arms up and let them fall heavily at my sides. “Johnny. Why marry him?”
Sloan shuffles on her feet, looking up and down the sidewalk before turning back to me.
“I don’t know what you want me to say. I did what I thought felt right.”
“And now?”
“Now what?” she asks, a slight edge to her voice.
I grit my teeth. She is so frustrating sometimes. Well, it’s actually most of the time, but right now she’s really pissing me the fuck off.
“Does it still feel right? You want to marry that douchebag?”
She crosses her arms. “He did ask.”
I laugh once. “Oh, you wanted a proposal Sloan?” I take a step closer, invading her space. “When was I supposed to do that, huh? After I buried my best friend or before I went to prison? Cause you see, babe, things haven’t exactly been falling into place for me.”
She cranes her neck back to look up at me. “And whose fault is that? Every choice you made was yours alone. I tried to get you to go to college with me, be something other than some wannabe thug growing up in suburbia. It’s exciting when we’re young, but what’s it got to take to get you to realize that’s no way to live your life?”
I place my hand on the side of her face and lean my forehead to hers and whisper, “I’m trying to make up for that.”
Her hand grips my wrist and I can see the struggle in her eyes. “He’ll never mean to me what you do. I know that may be hard to believe considering my track record with you, but you’re always the one that I want.” She sighs, dropping her hand. “I just don’t know how to be with you now.”
We stare at each other for a moment, letting everything sink in. Sloan is right. No matter how much time passes we are still this entity that can’t be denied. Fucked up, yes. Completely irrational, hell yes. But wrong? I’m not so sure.
10
Smoke Clouds
Perry- Then
The first day of school is always the same. Walker, Jeremy and I meet up to for a little pregame before we head back to the halls for another year. Our last year.
We pass around a joint outside of Jeremy’s garage while we wait for Tess to finish getting ready. Apparently now that she’s a sophomore, she needs an extra hour to primp herself before we go basically anywhere. It’s either that or her new relationship with Walker has made her more aware of the fact she’s actually a girl.
I take a large hit and pass it back to Walker. “So, we need to come up with some sort of game plan now school’s back in session. Everyone left the lake last weekend and I don’t think it’s a good idea to mess with someone else’s territory.”
Walker shrugs. “Maybe we can work together?”
Jeremy laughs. “That’s not how it works, dude. If we start selling at school and Robby finds out, he’ll be pissed. And by pissed, I mean he’ll kill us.”
Robby Marker is the resident dealer for all things illegal at our school. If you need pot, call Robby. If you need an unmarked gun, guess what? Call Robby. This may seem extreme considering we live in a small, very safe town, but just outside the lines of New Haven is a different world. One that none of us should be involved in.
“Okay,” I say, taking back the joint. “I guess we had our fun and now we should just call it a day. Retire from the game at the ripe, old age of seventeen. No harm, no foul.”
Two pairs of eyes are now staring at me in question.
“What? You want to be career criminals now? I thought this was just for the summer.”
Walker runs his hand through his hair, his features nervous. “We were talking, Jeremy and I, and we were thinking that maybe we could do it a little longer?”
The fact that they were discussing this behind my back is really fucking pissing me off. We started this together, we should make decisions together. Plain and simple.
I turn to Jeremy, gritting my teeth. “So you two took it upon yourself to decide how far we’re going to take this. If fucking Sloan finds out, she’ll leave me for sure.”
“Tess, too,” Walker chimes in. “Don’t you think I have something to lose as well?”
I throw my arms up. “So why do it? Why take the risk?”
Jeremy slings his arm over my shoulder and I glare at him. “Because, my dear friend. It’s easy money. We only have to keep doing it for five, six months tops and then we can walk away be set for whatever we need.”
I let out a disgruntled sigh. “Let me think about it, okay?”
Jeremy releases me and pats me on the back. “That’s my dude. See, everything will be golden.”
I roll my eyes. Golden is far from what this shit show is about to be.
I meet Sloan at her locker every morning. I can’t take her to school because I have wrestling practice before homeroom and she hates to be early. She usually catches a ride with one of her friends, but today it appears someone else decided to make sure she made it to school on time. I immediately see red when I spot her walking side by side with Johnny Tate. She smiles when she sees me and turns to Johnny and says something in his ear. I clench my fist.
“Hey, baby,” she says, stopping in front of me and planting a kiss on my lips. I don’t kiss her back.
She shoots me a look. “What’s your problem?”