Chapter 7
Alanna
Three Months Ago
How the fuck did this happen? It was one fucking night?
My eyes darted around the familiar room. There were moose, pine trees, and pine cones on the shower curtain in browns, marron, and greens. The marron and green rug had embroidered moose on it as well as the tan towels that hung from the towel rack.
The walls were a stark white, which helped to keep the darker colors from darkening the room too much.
“Did you die in there?” Bianca called through the solid wood door which separated us.
Also, separating her from my little white stick party.
“I’m fine,” I lied.
“You don’t sound fine,” her voice was filled with concern.
I took a couple of deep breaths and soon felt like I might be hyperventilating. My chest would swell and collapse with each deep inhale and exhale.
“I’m coming in,” Bianca informed me with her take no prisoner’s voice.
“No, don’t!” I shouted.
Fear at being caught had my eyes looking around for a place to hide or even escape what was going to come.
The doorknob turned, and why didn’t I lock the door? I watched in horror as it started to swing open. Reaching down I started scooping the little sticks like I was trying to scoop water out of a sinking life raft. All the while watching the sharks circle, just waiting for that moment when your safety is nonexistent.
I then felt like that dying person who was watching their death approach.
“What the fuck?” Bianca said in shock.
I froze in place, and the little sticks started to clink back to the tile floor. The sounds of them falling bounced off the walls, which made the noise sound louder, even to my own ears.
Bianca squat down in front of me with her long brown hair pulled back into a messy bun. She examined them like one would a foreign species.
“You’re pregnant?” she whispered in shock.
I could only nod, my head moved like a little bobblehead as if I was on a bumpy ride. It didn’t stop even when I told it to.
“Who’s the father?” Bianca asked, her blue-green eyes focused on me.
What do I say? Oh well, guess what? You’re going to be an auntie? Yeah, that wouldn’t go over well. I bit my tongue and felt it swell as the words bubbled just below the surface. Like a black witches’ caldron begging to boil over.
“Reyes’.” I said his name and the caldron had officially bubbled over, allowing his name to come out.
It was like a bomb had gone off in the room. The silence that followed was deafening.
“My brother?” she asked, her voice was quiet and devoid of any emotion.
I swallowed and stared at the sticks like they held the answers to world peace.
My heart was breaking, and I was a wimp. I couldn’t bring myself to look at my friend and tell her how sorry I was for letting this happen. That I was in love with him and had been for years. I knew I needed to say something, but I couldn’t.
“Yes,” I whispered finally.
Her eyes were still on the little sticks.
“I’m going to be an auntie?” She asked, her voice was devoid of anything.
“Yes,” I whispered again.
“How did this happen?” She asks me.
For some reason, I felt like being a sarcastic asshole.
“Well, the man sticks his dick in a woman’s pussy, and they move back and forth...” I start, but she cuts me off.
“No, don’t say any more. I don’t want images of my brother,” she says with a shudder.
I slump back down, and the air literally was taken out of my sails. This was it, I was finally going to be alone. Dad passed away two years ago, and mom chose her boyfriend over me. So, I’ve been alone for the last two years. My only family was Bianca, and now I wouldn’t even have that.
“Do you love him?” She asked me in a soft voice.
“I have for years,” I tell her, honestly.
And no matter how things went from here, it felt fucking amazing to finally tell her the truth. Like the weight of the world had been lifted or more like the lies. Reyes heavy ass had finally been removed.
“He’s the reason you’re hiding?” she asked me.
Her eyes meet mine, and I could see she already knew the answer to that question, but I replied anyway, “Yes.”
“He hasn’t been faithful,” she said again in her soft voice, devoid of any emotion.
And for some reason, even I already knew he wasn’t. It still hurt, and it hurt like a fire heated knife to the chest cauterizing the wound as it sunk deep into me. It burned like fire ants stinging the skin over and over.
Breathing through it was difficult and add to it the thought of losing her, everything shook like a broken merry-go-round. It just kept spinning, and I wanted off.
“That’s why you left, isn’t it?” she asked me.
“Yes,” I tell her.
“That fucking bastard!” she shouts.
For some reason, I didn’t want her to hate her brother. Color me stupid, but this felt imperative, like the next breath of air.
“It’s just who he is, B,” I tell her, honestly.
Reyes would never change. I wasn’t the right woman to make him want more, and that hurt the most. I wasn’t the one to help him become a better man, a faithful man.
“Alanna,” she whispered.
“No B, I know this, and I have to accept it,” I tell her quietly.
One day, I will accept it and move on. There would be a day where Reyes didn’t rip me apart. A day where his name didn’t punch holes in my chest when his voice wouldn’t gut me and his eyes couldn’t destroy me.
I knew somewhere out there was his one and she would be perfect, and everything that he needed to tame the great Reyes. I just wished she was me. No matter how many wishes I uttered, how many nights I cried myself to sleep, hoping he would tell me that he wanted me and only me. It was all just a fairy tale, a dark, twisted fairy tale.
“It’s time I figured this shit out B. He will never want me more then he wants them,” as the words leave my lips it felt like the final nail in my coffin.
Cold finger sunk into me, the icy calm of truth settled over me. Reyes will never be mine.