Chapter Twenty-Two
The next few weeks are filled with Asher, sex with Asher, fixing up the barn, more sex with Asher, visiting my dad, more sex with Asher, and more sex with Asher. It was kind of scary how much I was becoming dependent on him, how bad I wanted to be around him every second.
“I wish you could see him,” I said out loud a few weeks later at the hospital, looking down at my dad who was still sleeping soundly. “You probably wouldn’t even recognize him. Oh, what am I saying? You probably knew he had changed all this time but could never tell me because I made you promise to never mention him to me.”
I lifted his hand up to my lips and brushed his fingers gently across them. “I’m sorry, that really wasn’t fair to you, dad.” I sighed sadly. “I guess none of this was really fair to you.” I shook my head. “I’ll tell you all about it when you wake up. Did I tell you that I’ve been looking for nursing jobs here in town? Well, I have. I thought maybe I would try sticking around for a while…”
I didn’t even realize how true the statement was until I said it out loud. When I had first gotten off that plane those weeks ago my goal was to get the hell out of here as fast as possible but somewhere along the way sticking around didn’t seem like such a bad idea.
As much as I wanted to convince myself it had nothing to do with Asher, I knew it did. It felt like we were a real couple now. He would kiss me in front of his friends, we would have dinner at his parent's house, he held my hand protectively out in public, and look like he wanted to kill any guy who glanced my way.
A feeling that was mutual.
I’d seen Ashley a few times over the last few weeks but each time she had just given me a dirty look and moved along. Something, no doubt, that had to do with Asher but every time I brought it up he would just act like I was a crazy person but I knew he had talked to her. Why else would she of backed down?
I pushed Ashley out of my mind and looked back down at my father, I had more important things on my mind. “I miss you, dad, I miss you so much.” I glanced up at the monitors that were still holding his life together and sighed. “The doctor tried to talk to me about unplugging you, did I tell you that?”
I stood up and laughed, straightening the flowers that were on the windowsill across from him, people had been sending them in the bunches since the accident happened. “Can you believe that? He thought you weren’t going to wake up but we’ll prove him wrong, won’t we?”
I kept busy rearranging the flowers, pulling them together and weeding out the dead ones, pulling the prettier ones toward the front. When my dad opened his eyes I wanted him to see only the prettiest things.
“I’d say we sure will.”
My father’s voice was so low and faint that I had to strain to hear it. Yet it was enough to make me jump about ten feet off the ground. I had been talking to him for so long without any response that the shock of actually getting one was overwhelming.
I turned around and the tears were already flowing down my face even before I saw his open eyes. My dad was looking back at me. For the first time in years, I could see his gaze.
I choked up and rushed toward him. “Daddy?”
He shook his head, trying to lift up his hand.
“Dad?” I was frantic. “Can you hear me?”
He lifted his head to the side. “Water,” he whispered.
I ran away from him and into the bathroom, grabbing a paper cup off the counter and filling it with water before running back and placing it into his hands. “Daddy? Are you okay? Do you remember me?”
I rushed over to the wall and started banging on the call button.
“Of course I remember my own daughter.” My father rolled his eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous. How long have I been out? Did you just fly in?” He shook his head and tried to sit up before falling right back down. “You really didn’t have to come all this way, I’m fine, just fine.”
I felt like I was in a dream. How was my dad just sitting here talking to me like everything was normal? He had his speech back right away, I knew that wasn’t normal. I mean every case was different but…
Suddenly the room was filled with nurses and doctors, rushing in to make a huge fuss over my dad when they realized he was awake. I backed away from him slowly, the tears and relief still overcoming me. “It’s going to be okay now, dad, there going to make sure you get better,” I called out over the sea of people.
My dad looked confused for a second and then he caught my eye across the room and shook his head slowly with a faraway glazed look in his eyes. “Asher,” he called out to me.
I turned around but no one was there. And then it occurred to me that my dad must have heard the end of my conversation with him today and was wondering where he was. “Asher isn’t here, dad, I’ll go and call him now. He will be here soon, he will want to make sure…”
“No,” my dad shook his head back and forth. “It was Asher.”
“What was Asher?” I asked, confused.
“The night I was hit! Asher… Asher was there.”
And just like that my entire world came crashing down.
***
The double doors to the hospital swung open minutes later and Asher came bursting through them and dodging through the pond of people toward me. “Bella!” He placed his hands on my shoulders as soon as he got within reach and pulled me into a hug. “I came as soon as I heard! Why didn’t you call me?”
Suddenly, his touch seemed wrong. While it had felt pure and right less than twenty-four hours ago now it was dirty and wrong and I wanted nothing to do with it. I couldn’t believe someone who had once made me feel so safe was making me feel so small right now.
“Are you okay?” He pulled back and locked eyes with me.
I refused to hang on to him, letting my arms fall flat to the side of me like they were made of sand. My eyes felt heavy like if I blinked once I’d never be able to open them again. The tears started to fall from my face quickly but I refused to look away from him, wanting him to really see the pain he had put there.
“Bella?” His eyebrows knitted together in worry. “Is he okay?”
Was he okay? Was he okay? Was he seriously asking me that right now? “Do you think he’s fucking okay, Asher?” I snapped, laughing bitterly. “He was plowed into by some asshole that couldn’t even bother to stop afterward to make sure he was okay.”
“Bella.” Asher moved closer to me again.
I snapped my body back. “Tell me he’s lying.”
“What?” Asher frowned. “Bella, you’re emotional and confused…”
“Tell me my father is lying,” I cut him off, practically yelling now. “Or mistaken! Or something! Tell me… tell me he was fucking seeing things, Asher!” I slapped at the tears peeling down my skin now, trying to make his face out through the water that clouded my vision.
Once I did I almost wished I hadn’t. Because what rested there was the one thing I had wished hadn’t. Guilt. Intense guilt. And I knew. I knew without him having to say one word that it was true. My dad hadn’t been mistaken, he had seen Asher there that night.
I pushed him against the chest hard but it did little, he barely budged so I tried again, throwing my entire body into it. “You’re an asshole, you know that? Is that was this was all about to you?” I pushed him again, harder. “You just wanted to hang out with me so that you could make sure I wasn’t on to the truth?”
Asher shook his head. “Bella, no, it’s not like that. If we could just…”
“It was just a bonus that you got to fuck me, right?”
Hurt and pain came across his face slowly. “It’s not what you think, Bella, I swear to you… you have to believe me right now.” He moved closer to me, trying to calm me down.
“Don’t you fucking touch me!” I screamed, yanking my body away from him.
Asher sprung back, stung.
I was very aware of people looking at us now, curious about the scene we were causing but it was the last thing I gave a fuck about in that moment. I felt like I had been broken into a million and one pieces and left to die slowly all alone in the middle of the floor.
“Never touch me again,” I said slowly, lowering my voice.
“Bella, please,” Asher’s voice caught in his throat.
I forced myself to look up into his eyes. His eyes that were filled with regret and pain and a deep need to explain. But what was the point? There was nothing he could say. Nothing he said was ever going to be able to make this right. He had almost killed my father and then he had taken my virginity and heart without so much as a word about it.
Not to mention some innocent kid was in jail for what he had done.
But I didn’t want to think about that right now, the only thing I wanted to think about was making sure my father was okay and then I would deal with everything else. My father was the only thing I could think about right then besides the fact that I wanted Asher away from me.
“I never want to see you again,” I told him firmly. And when he made a move to come toward me again I shook my head, holding my hand up. “Get the fuck out of here, Asher, or I swear to God I’ll call the cops right now.”
And then I took off toward the room my father was in, trying to leave every part of him behind. I had never known such intense pain in my life and I was very aware of the fact, even during a crisis, that it would be extremely challenging to get over.
But I would spend the rest of my life trying.