Forever & More: The Friend Zone series (2 page)

His headstone is a statue of an angel, and the irony isn’t lost on me. Who was it that said, “
The devil was at one time an angel, too”
? I shake the thought from my mind. Guilt from where my mind has traveled crashes into me with the force of a train, threatening to knock my feet out from under me. The constant battle of my emotions is maddening. Grief from the loss of a friend consumes me, but the anger and heartbreak from his deceit are still fresh and raw. My chin and hands tremble, tears well up in my eyes, but I refuse to allow them to spill.

It’s been five months since Tom’s death, and I’m no closer to having closure or any semblance of peace than I was the day I found out about his passing and betrayal. The sun blazes down on me from its two o’clock position in the sky. The cloudless blue sky is a complete contrast to how I’m feeling inside. Any other day, I would look at this as the perfect day, but the sunshine and singing birds are marred by the statue sitting in front of me.

I silently read the words that are etched perfectly into the ivory stone.

Death leaves a heartache no one can heal, love leaves a memory no one can steal.

Thomas Eugene Anderson

Born

September 26, 1984

Died

August 23, 2014

A warm, soft hand embraces my own. I look down at the fragile fingers that have intertwined with mine, scared to look into her eyes.

“Chloe, how are you holding up?” Sara asks this question every time we come here. I stare at the single dandelion growing at the base of the stone for a beat until I can finally muster up the courage to look into her eyes.

Her big, brown eyes are so full of concern it makes me feel sick to my stomach. Here I stand with an infuriating mixture of grief and hatred swirling throughout my entire being for the person who harmed her. Tears burn my eyes and my chin starts to quake. My stomach churns as the bile rises in my throat. Sara’s eyes mist over at the sound of my barely audible sobs.

The first time we were alone after we were both released from the hospital, Sara and I had a long, sincere heart-to-heart. I attempted to chastise her for getting involved and confronting Tom. But, in true Sara-like fashion, she stared me straight in the eye and refused to acknowledge that what she did was reckless.

Instead, she told me,
“Your pain is my pain, Chloe. Don’t you fucking get that? If you’re hurting, I feel it, too. If you’re mad, I get pissed, too. We’re best friends, no scratch that, we crossed the friend’s line a long time ago, we’re sisters. I have every fucking right to do what I feel like I should do to protect you, whether you liked it or not. I love you and would do anything for you. That’s my right as your friend. You don’t get to feel guilty because something bad happened to me. I’m a big girl. I can handle the consequences of my actions. And, as fucked up as it is, this is a consequence for what I did. But, you want to know something? I would do it a-fucking-gain, a million times over if I had to. So shut the hell up with all the woe is me bullshit, and go make me a sandwich. I’m hungry and really fucking over this conversation. So unless we’re going to talk about how good Harley’s ass looked in his jeans this morning, this conversation is over.”

I sat there for what seemed like forever staring at her in shock. Eventually, she laughed and starting waving her hands in the air like she was flagging a car as she said, “Hello? Handicapped girl needs some vittles. Ya mind?”

“Chloe?” Her voice startles me from the memory.

A broken “I’m good” slips past my lips. We both know the words are a lie, but she doesn’t challenge it. Instead, she squeezes my hand in a silent show of support. “Let’s go,” I manage to croak.

I’ve got to leave this place. I never wanted to come here to begin with. Sara forces me to bring her at least once a week; she thinks it will help me “heal.” Force me to face my fears, my ever-changing emotions and bring me some semblance of closure. She couldn’t be more wrong.

The only thing coming here does is remind me of the pain he’s caused. It also pushes me to remember the good times, and wonder what could have been. Coming here and staring at this damn monument confuses the shit out of me.

How can I hate him for all he’s done one minute, but in the next, love him for all he was? This grey area in between right and wrong, love and hate, has me trapped, making me feel as if I’m in purgatory.

I don’t want to feel the remorse that pulls me under until I’m drowning in the turbulent sea of my emotions. I don’t want to continuously suffer through the ache of losing a lifelong friend, one of the only people who has ever mattered to me. I don’t want to believe that Tom, my
best
friend, my
brother
, was capable of doing the things he’s done. What he did is unforgivable, so why do I so desperately want to?

He’ll have to pay for his sins. I wish I could just figure out where my head is, what I have to do to get to the point where I can move on and live my life without this dark cloud hanging over me. The tiny droplets that I’ve been fighting to hold back spill over, one by one, following along their familiar trails down my cheeks.

To top everything off with a nice, pink bow, I feel as if I am committing treason to my friendship with Sara for harboring even an ounce of grief for losing Tom. My feet move slowly as I step in place behind her wheelchair. I grip the handles tightly while I wait patiently for her to unlock the wheels. She looks back at me, a soft, barely big enough to be seen, smile graces her lips. It’s a smile meant to portray sympathy, but I don’t see it as that, I see it as pity. I don’t want her pity; I don’t want anything from anyone but me. And the one thing I want from myself, I’m never going to get, inner peace.

The farther we walk away from Tom’s resting place, the easier it gets to breathe. I’m not sure if I’m able to breathe better because I’m walking away from Tom, or moving closer to Skye. He has that effect on me more so now than before. Most of the time when he’s gone, I’m suffocating, but the moment he walks into the room, the air returns to my lungs. There have been times when he’s been the one stripping me of my oxygen, but that’s only because he’s trying to protect me from myself. I understand that, doesn’t mean that I have to like it, though.

“Chloe? Can I ask you something?” Sara states carefully.

“You know you can.”

When I lift my eyes from the sidewalk, they immediately land on the Skye. My heart skips a beat, my steps falter. His dark hair glistens in the sunlight, making it look as slick and as black as oil. His full lips pull up on the corners into a wide smile, and I offer a smaller one in return.

Sara’s voice breaks through my thoughts. “If Tom was still here, do you think you could forgive him?”

I stop dead in my tracks. I’ve asked myself this same question a million times already
. Could I? Would I? Would he ask for my forgiveness or just walk away?
I would like to think that I could forgive him in time, but I just don’t know. Too much has happened and the wounds are still so fresh they’re barely scabbed over.

I realize Sara’s waiting for my response. “I don’t know. I would like to think I would,” I answer honestly. I want so desperately for my statement to be true, but in this moment it's not. She nods her head and my feet begin to move again.

Before we reach the car, Harley is at Sara’s side, scooping her into his arms. She releases a yelp, followed by a carefree laugh. She wraps her arms around him and buries her face into his neck. Jealousy eats away at what’s left of me.

Since Sara’s wreck, Harley has become a constant figure in her life. Every time she looks at him, her face lights up, her smile widens, and she wears the goofy love struck expression like a badge of honor.

I miss that all-consuming feeling of loving someone so much it hurts, being able to express my feelings without fear of repercussion. Most importantly, I wish I could allow myself to commit to someone completely without apprehension. I would love to be able to trust those closest to me again.

Once I learned about Tom and his treachery, the walls around my heart were instantly resurrected. My love for Skye is still there, still overwhelming almost every thought in my mind. Dominating every emotion in my body, but my love for him is now tainted by someone else’s misguided actions.

Skye has proven to be everything I’ve ever wanted and more. But, I can’t shake that little voice in my head that keeps screaming at me to be careful and to hold him at arm’s length. To never turn my back to him so he doesn’t have the opportunity to stab me in it.

Skye’s been at my side ever since my accident, but things have been strained since we left the hospital. I think he senses my inner turmoil because he’s been acting so different toward me. Treating me as if I’m a wounded animal that may attack at any moment, and I don’t blame him since that’s exactly how I feel.

I’ve been walking on the razor’s edge just waiting for the moment I may fall, or cut myself. I know it’s only a matter of time before the frayed rope I have been so desperately clinging to slips from my grasp and I free fall into the dark nothing of raw emotions that is waiting to swallow me.

Skye cautiously approaches me seconds after Harley and Sara walk off. He wraps his thick, muscular arm around my waist, pulling me close to his side. His body presses tightly against mine and I flinch. It wasn’t intentional, but it’s the first reaction I have when someone touches me now. I would give anything to melt into his embrace as I once had.

His body tenses for a moment before he leans his head toward mine. Minty breath fans my neck and ear as he speaks. “Everything okay, baby?” Chills break out over my skin, causing me to shudder.

My lips graze his when I turn my head to face him. I glance up into his deep pools of emerald green and nod. He raises an eyebrow, wordlessly acknowledging my lie, challenging, no, begging me to open up to him and share how I’m actually feeling inside. That’s a challenge I’m not willing to accept right now. I watch with intrigue as heartbreak flashes in his eyes for a moment before he pulls himself back together, masking his emotions.

The engine on Skye’s Jeep roars to life; it startles me. I glance up and spot Sara in the passenger seat and Harley behind the wheel.

“Y’all coming?” Harley yells across Sara.

“Hold the hell on. We’re coming,” Skye tosses back.

“Well, shit, hurry the fuck up. You’re moving at the speed of smell.”

A chuckle escapes my lips, leaving a bitter taste on my tongue. Skye’s grip tightens around me, squeezing me one last time before letting me go.

We cross the short distance between the Jeep and ourselves in an unhurried pace. I climb in the back seat and scoot all the way over to the other side of the cab as Skye climbs in behind me. Sara looks back at me, annoyance plastered all over her face. I raise my eyebrows in question, but she ignores me and turns back around.

I look over at Skye, offering a tight-lipped smile. I’m more than a little hurt when I get the same tight-lipped smile in return.

To distract me from the heavy tension in the car, I pull out my phone and open my Kindle app. I lose myself in my newest read. It’s about a woman who is so traumatized by life and things around her that she loses control of herself. She sets out on a path of self-destructive behavior that almost gets her killed. While on this journey, a man notices her and her bad behavior and he begins to become obsessed with the wild beauty. Once he reels her in, he senses her dark thoughts and it becomes his mission to bring her back in the light. He introduces her into his world, where pain equals control and empowering pleasure. She finds that his brand of kink is just what she needs to center herself, to become whole again.

I’m so drawn to this raven-haired girl and her tormented soul. There are books you read that you like and there are those that you love, and then there are others that crawl into your soul. They suck you into their world of make believe and turn the reality of your world to fiction. That’s what this book is for me. My reality is so ugly that I’ve lost myself between the pages and made them my reality, this is now my world.

I glance over at Skye and see his gaze trained on me. His coal colored hair gently rustles from the wind blowing around us. A generic ringtone chimes through the wind in the cab. Skye reaches into his pocket, pulls his phone out, glances quickly at the screen, and then silences the screaming device. The hairs on my neck start prickling with unease.