Bishop

He called me Bish. I’ve heard it come out of his mouth a million times, but it’s never sounded as good as it did just then.

“You okay?” Kyle asks as I watch Jake turn and walk away.

“I, ah….”

“Dude,” Jax says, “what’s the go?”

“Sorry,” I say, snapping out of my Jake haze. “Let’s go.”

“I didn’t mean that,” he says. “I mean why are you still standing here? That’s your bloke, right?”

I nod.

“Are you going to go after him?”

“I, ah, I d-don’t think so,” I say.

“Why the fuck not?” he asks.

Rubbing the back of my neck, I sigh. “It’s been a long time since we’ve seen each other and the way we left things, they um, they weren’t good.”

Kyle rubs my back. “But you’re in a much better place now than you were then.”

“I’m scared,” I say, looking my friend in the eyes.

“You don’t need to be. Look how far you’ve come, Bishop. You’re here. You’ve made peace with your dad, you’re riding better than ever –”

“But still not as good as some of us,” Jax interjects.

“—you’ve done everything you need to in order to be with him.”

I shake my head. “I just need some more time.”

“You’ve had time,” Kyle insists.

“I think we need to let Bishop handle his own problems,” Mav says.

I shoot him a grateful smile while Kyle humphs.

“Come on,” Bentley says, “I’m starving, let’s go get something to eat.”

For days Jake’s number has burned a hole in my phone. As soon as I started to head towards the restaurant with everyone, I knew I was doing the wrong thing. All I wanted to do was to run in the opposite direction, find Jake and kiss the shit out of him. But something was holding me back.

Sitting on the lounge in Bentley’s living room, the sound of the ocean a few metres away soothes me.

“It nice, isn’t it?” she asks as she sits down next to me.

“Yeah, it’s beautiful.”

“You going to call your guy or what?” she asks.

“Huh?”

“You’ve been playing with that thing,” she motions to the cell phone I’m spinning in my hand, “since we ran into him. My question is, are you going to call?”

I shrug. “I want to.”

“Then why haven’t you?”

“I’m scared. I’ve wanted Jake for so long, so long, forever basically. The thought that he’s so close is absolutely terrifying to me. What happens if I stuff up? It’s what I do, I stuff up everything good that’s ever happened to me.”

“You haven’t stuffed up here.”

“Yet. Give me time, I’m sure it’ll come.”

“You know, I never thought I’d ever be in a relationship. The thought of marriage was one I never, ever entertained, and now look at me.” She twirls her massive engagement ring around her finger. “I get what it’s like to be scared, Bishop. Before Jax came along, I was terrified.”

“You had good reason to be,” I say. Knowing Bentley’s past with her abusive ex, she’s more than justified in her actions. Plus, this is Jax Ryan we’re talking about, the guy is more than a little bit nuts.

“Maybe,” she says, “but what I did learn, what Jax helped me to learn, was that I can’t be scared forever. Could you imagine what kind of life you would have if you were?”

Pausing for a moment, I consider her words. “Okay, so you might have a point.”

“I more than have a point,” she argues.

I chuckle.

“Plus, you’re just as crazy as that fiancé of mine. You ride glorified kids bikes off gigantic ramps, jumping over stupidly big gaps and turning yourselves inside out, back to front, and upside down. How the fuck are you afraid of a guy you’ve known and loved pretty much your whole life?”

I turn to her, her green eyes blazing. “How the fuck are you with Jax?” I ask. “You know you could go out there and pick a million guys off the street and they’d all fall at your feet, and rightly so too.”

She gives me a kind smile. “Jax has this way of making everything seem better when he’s around. He makes me laugh, and smile. He also drives me up the wall but I know it’s because he loves me and he only wants the best for me. That’s what true love is, it’s wanting the best for your other half.”

Well knock me down and call me Charlie.

“What do you want, Bishop?”