Scandalous

It was where Trent had shoved me against the wall for the first time, threatening me, taunting me, calling me out on my bullshit.

On shaking legs, I crossed the road. My whole body was humming a song I didn’t know. I felt so alive I thought I was going to scream. The hope it filled me with was dangerous. It threatened to crush me to pieces if it was wrong. I walked into the bluish dawn readily, knowing it could give me all the light I needed.

“Trent?” His name sounded like a wish. What was I doing, hoping to see him there?

But I heard nothing. I took another step, pressing my back against the same wall, at the same spot we’d met for the first time, closing my eyes and taking a deep breath.

“Please,” I said.

“Please, what?” His voice came out of nowhere. I didn’t open my eyes. Maybe it was just my imagination. Maybe I’d gone crazy. And perhaps I didn’t care anymore. I couldn’t risk opening my eyes and not seeing him there, so I kept them closed.

“Please forgive me.”

“For what?”

“For trying to ruin you. For trying to ruin myself, us. For not trusting myself enough to do the right thing about my father and Theo so long. For being a coward. But most of all, I am sorry for not telling you how I felt. Because maybe then you’d have taken a step back and none of that would have happened.”

“What are you feeling, Edie?” He cupped my cheek in his big, warm palm, and that’s how I knew it was real. That he was real. My eyes snapped open, and he was there, in front of me, in the flesh. The man who filled my heart with music with his silence.

“I…” My mouth parted, but I couldn’t finish the sentence. His lips slammed into mine in a desperate kiss that made my head spin and sucked the air from my lungs. His lips sucked mine, comforting me with their sweet warmth, and I gripped his flexed forearms, pulling him closer.

“You never gave Jordan the flash drive,” Trent said.

I wanted to cry. Every night, I’d lain in bed praying he’d somehow figure it out without me telling him. I didn’t want him to have to choose between Val and me.

“How could I?” I moaned into his lips. “How could I when you’re my ocean.”

We drowned in another kiss. A different kiss. A kiss of affirmation. That this was real. And no matter how twisted and wrong and bad it looked—and sometimes felt—it was also ours.

“I don’t want to come between you and the mother of your child,” I whimpered into his mouth so pathetically, I had to claw my fingers deeper into the skin of his arm to keep him close. Shockingly, he gave me what I wanted, gluing his body into mine, giving me everything he could.

“The mother of my child came between her relationship with Luna, not you. You were the one who taught Luna to smile. You were the one who spent time with her. Who fucking took her by the hand when she was bullied. You’re more of a mother to my daughter than Val would ever be. I don’t know what you saw the day when Val came to my apartment, but whatever it was, you got the wrong idea. She never gave a shit about her kid. She came here to claim money and power. And she is going to crawl back to where she came from.”

“I’m so sorry.” I touched his face, pulling away, staring at him.

“I’m not,” he said. “I’m also not sorry for sending your father to jail. Edie, he did some terrible things that you need to know about.”

I nodded. “I believe you.” And I did. I’d already heard some of them. No matter what Trent would tell me about my father, I knew he was telling the truth. Because Jordan Van Der Zee had absolutely no limits.

Trent kissed my nose softly, his forehead dropping to mine. “I love you,” he said, cupping my neck from both sides and shaking his head in exasperation, like this was a mistake. Like he shouldn’t be loving me, but had no other choice. My heart swelled. “I’m so fucking in love with you, Edie Van Der Zee, I don’t know where I end and where you begin anymore. I love you despite knowing that it is crazy. That our situations are disastrous. I love you knowing that you should have at least a few more experiences before you find the love. I love you even though we’re not at the same place in life, have nothing in common, and started off so fucking bad. And still, I love you.”

“I love you.” I sniffed, holding back my tears, pressing my forehead deeper to his. “I love how fierce you are when it comes to the people you care about. I love that you’re so aware of your flaws. I love that you fight them. I even love it when you succumb to them. I love every single part of you. The good and the bad. And I will never love anyone else the way I do you, because it’s not about my age. It’s about my heart. It belongs to you. Trent Rexroth, you’re my ocean. You make me wet.”

He grinned, pulling me into a tight hug. “I would have come for you, Van Der Zee, even if you had given him the flash drive. Even if you threw me in the lion’s den. And I promise to never stop making you wet, my Little Tide. Promise to always keep you drenched.”

THE DOOR SLAMS, AND I know exactly who it is.

The only person in the house to treat doors like they have somehow wronged him and the universe. Crass movements, gentle heart.

“N-n-no! Never again!” Theo bellows, kicking his muddy shoes in the hallway. “I’m d-d-done playing football. I’m no g-g-good at it.”

“What the hell are you talking about? You can tackle a fucking elephant to the floor if need be.”

“Trent,” I sing-song from the kitchen, smiling to keep myself from scowling. No matter how much time passes, no matter that we live with thirteen-year-old Theo and five-year-old Luna, my boyfriend still can’t seem to let go of the word (and act) fuck. In fact, he drops enough F-bombs to wipe away our whole continent. “Language.”

“Yes, M-m-mom,” Theo mocks me from the hallway, wearing his new confidence like a cape. I stand in the kitchen, looking over my shoulder at my mother, who is cutting vegetables on a board with an unsolicited grin. I’m glad she doesn’t mind that Theo calls me that sometimes. Glad she knows it’s just a joke.

“Your child is out of control,” I note, dumping the diced steak into the hot frying pan.

“In my defense, you were the one to raise him for the majority of his life,” she says with melancholic acceptance. She comes to our house every weekend to spend time with him and Luna. And every Thursday, Trent and I go out, and Camila watches over the kids.

Every Thursday, we act our ages. Well, my age, anyway.

Every Thursday, we make out in cars, let abandoned city halls swallow us in darkness, go to the movies, and restaurants, and clubs where I don’t have to worry about a fake ID, because my boyfriend is influential enough to own this city.

We live in a house with tides and lows. Where the ocean is always stormy, but that’s okay, because we’re great swimmers. We live in a house of seahorses, of survivors, of people who have tasted the other side of life. People who stood on the sidelines, begging to go unnoticed.

But we notice. We notice each other in this chaos called life.

We go down to Tobago Beach every weekend to surf, and eat, and laugh, and not give a damn. Not about the world and not about the money.

Luna and Theo love each other. They bathe each other in mutual respect and attention, and it is heartbreaking and wonderful to watch. He finally gets to be the responsible adult, and she gets to have a fierce big brother. She has a room that is blue, with an aquarium with seahorses, and he’s got a room that’s green, with posters of Tom Brady Trent manages not to rip off the walls—but just barely.

And then there’s us. Me. Trent. Our love.

Our love draws attention like a wildfire. We’re a biracial couple with a huge age gap. We carry baggage in the form of two kids. It looks bad. Tragic, even. Not half as photogenic as Vicious’ perfect little family, or Jaime’s gorgeous fair-haired nest, or Dean’s sweet, no age-gap, no-nonsense household.

We’re different, and we wouldn’t change it for the world.

Trent, Theo, and Luna saunter into the kitchen with huge grins on their faces. Luna is the first to jump on me with a hug. She still doesn’t talk, but she does communicate using sign language. And it’s a huge step forward.

“The boys kept you busy?” I ask, feeling her long, thin limbs enveloping me as I return a hug. She nods into my shoulder. When we disconnect, she signs me the words, Theo almost killed a swan throwing the ball.

“That’s…” I wrinkle my forehead, “very bad.”

“He was just eager.” Trent ambles toward me, planting a kiss on my forehead, a bottle of water already in his hand. My mother gets the same treatment—only a kiss on the cheek—and Theo is trying to help Mom now.

“Not before you wash your hands, bud,” I warn. He scoffs, but walks over to the sink. The steak is sizzling in the pan, and the kitchen is warm with food and company and love. With family. With everything I didn’t have at my parents’ house.

Trent comes behind me and whispers into my neck, “A word.”

“I’m cooking,” I protest, but not really. Living with two kids with special needs, we’ve mastered the art of sneaking out for quickies. Though this is too much, even by our standards. I mean, they’re all right here. I can’t be that quiet. Not with him.

“I don’t care,” he growls like the HotHole he is. Ruthless. Cold. But always full of heart.

I cut my gaze from the food I am cooking to my mother and kids. Yes. My kids.

Trent does the same, frowning. “Get your mind out of the gutter, Edie. If it was a quick fuck I was after, these people behind us would have been eating McJunk down the road, safely locked outside this house.”

I laugh, because I can’t help it. I’ve already come to terms with the fact my boyfriend is a Grade-A jerk. Most of the time, I’m not even mad about it. It is actually pretty charming, in a screwed-up way.

“I can’t leave Mom with both kids,” I say under my breath, a trickle of panic seeping into my heart. Not that I don’t trust my mother, but she’s come a long way in a very short period of time, and I don’t want her to feel overwhelmed by taking care of two kids.