Got the Life (A Nicki Sosebee Novel) (3 page)

After graduation, they attended
Winchester
Community College
together.  Sean
was taking classes for Automotive Science, while Nicki—unsure of what she wanted to do with her life—worked on an Associate of Arts.  Her advisor told her she could then transfer to a four-year university and maybe by that time Nicki would figure out what she wanted to do.  No such luck.  She finished school, all right, but was still clueless about where she wanted to go after that.  So she figured she’d take a few years off from school and come back when she had a clue.

Eight years later, she was still clueless.

Sean never finished getting his degree.  After a year of classes, especially
ones like
Basic Algebra, Composition, and Biology, he decided he was done.  He
figured
he knew enough about motorcycles (one of his passions) to open up a repair shop already, and what he didn’t know, he could teach himself.  The first two years, his mom let him work out of her garage until he’d earned enough money to rent a place of his own. 
Since then, his business (and reputation) had grown enough that he’d had to move his business one more time for a bigger place.

But it was during that time that something transpired between Nicki and Sean,
T
he Night That Must Never Be Mentioned Again.  Easy to
avoid
talking about
, maybe, but Nicki would never forget it.

Her two-year college plan turned out to
last
three
years
, and sometime during the first year she’d fallen for a guy she met in one of her classes.  Brent was a few years older than she and good looking.  They dated for a year and a half, and Nicki had begun to think of him the way she suspected Kayla was now thinking about Sean.  Nicki had thought maybe Brent could be the one.  She’d been thinking about it for a few months.  Her parents liked him, and he had a bright future.  He was planning to attend a university in either
Denver
,
Colorado
Springs
,
or
Pueblo
once he graduated a
semester
later, and Nicki had begun thinking about following him to whatever school he decided on.  That was until the night she’d been on the WCC campus studying
for the Abnormal Psych
midterm
in the library with a group of friends.  It was late, probably
close to
ten, and the work study student manning the desk had warned them that the campus was closing up soon.  Nicki excused herself from the group to use the restroom
before picking up her books.  But the three stalls in the little restroom across the hall from the library were already
being used
,
and she didn’t want to wait.  S
o she walked down the hall to the other end of the building.  Even though most of the lights were already turned off down there in preparation of closing, she figured security wouldn’t care if she used the restroom
anyway
.
  The bathrooms on campus had motion-sensor lights, so she knew the lights in there would switch on as soon as she entered.  That particular restroom
was the biggest one in the building, with seven stalls, including one large handicapped-access one.
  She wouldn’t have to wait in there.

Except
the lights were already on, and
someone was using th
e
large
handicapped
stall, and that someone wasn’t taking a piss.  That someone was getting fucked.
  So she was in a dilemma—
now that I’ve prolonged it and I
really
need to go, do I just go for it or do I go back down the hall and use that one?
  She really had to go and, she figured,
having people hear your business
was a risk the fucking couple should have known they were taking when they decided to copulate in a public place.

She chose the stall next to the door leading outside, so she was several yards away from the large stall at the end of the room.  If the couple heard her, she could pretend like she didn’t know what was going on.  With all the grunting and groaning, maybe someone was just constipated, right? 
Okay, stupid. 
So she couldn’t play dumb, but her hope was to just pee as quickly as possible and leave before she had to face the horny couple down the way.

There was no way to disguise the steady stream of urine splashing into the bowl.  But
the couple didn’t seem to mind;
Nicki could tell because the rhythm
ic
pounding into the metal wall of the stall down the way
didn’t ease up
.  Nicki felt embarrassed but smiled just thinking of the story she could tell her study group when they packed up their books for the night.  The girl was squealing with delight, and
Nicki still didn’t register that there was a
problem, even when the girl yelled, “Oh, yes, Brent!”  Nicki finished up and walked to the sink to wash her hands and that was when she heard the man
grunt
through gritted teeth, “I’m close, baby.”  She paused, the water streaming through her fingers, as she realized the man in the stall was
her
Brent.  She knew because, for some stupid reason, he’d always
felt the
need to announce
during sex
that he was
getting ready to ejaculate
:  “I’m close
.
”
  She finally managed to swallow the buildup of saliva in her mouth and shut off the water, but she felt as though a robot had taken over her body.  In slow motion, she grabbed a paper towel to wipe off her hands and started walking toward the door
to the hall
.  But then she felt an unexpected fury well up inside her and she stomped back to the other side of the bathroom.  She pounded on the door to the stall three times and then said, “
I hope she squeezes your dick off!”  She spun around, heading back to the hallway door, her eyes already clouding with salty tears.  As she opened the door and began walking out the hall, she thought s
he might have heard her name.

And she
would never
remember exactly what she said to her study mates when she returned to their table in the library; she just knew that she gathered up her belongings and darted out the door before
she turned into a blubbery mess, promising to see
her peers
on test day.

She didn’t want to go home; s
he didn’t want to have to talk to her parents about it.  And she didn’t want to talk to her girlfriends either, who would have told her he was a loser and then would have proceeded to tell Nicki that they’d warned her about what a creep Brent was.

She decided that she wanted to get drunk.

She was legal now, so she had no qualms about it.  But she didn’t want to drink alone, so she called Sean, her willing partner in crime.  He wasn’t in bed yet, so he invited her over to his apartment.  She promised to bring a twelve-pack.

Brent called her cell phone several times.  She never answered and she finally shut it off.  When she got to Sean’s house,
she tried to plaster on a smile, but
he asked her what was wrong. 
H
er face must have been streaked with tears.  So she told him
why she’d been crying
.  And instead of drinking, he held her close while she sobbed in his arms. 
A
fter she was able to let the tears go, she continued to rest her head against Sean’s chest.  “Thank you,” she said.

He stroked her hair.  “For what?”

“For being here.”

“God, of course.”  They were quiet again for a while until Sean finally said, “Brent’s a dumb motherfucker, you know that, don’t you?”

“What do you mean?”

“He can’t keep his dick in his pants when he’s got you.  That makes him a dumb motherfucker.”

Nicki half laughed
, the after-crying-jag endorphins
kicking in
.  “That’s so sweet.”  Smiling, she looked up at Sean, only Sean wasn’t smiling
back
.  His mouth was on hers before she could register what was happening
.  And even though Nicki had relived that night in her mind at least a thousand times since, she couldn’t quite rem
ember every detail like she’d
wanted to.  She remembered his lips on her nipple, causing her to arch her back and
sigh
. 
She remembered the easy
delectable
orgasm she’d had at the touch of his expert
fingers
.  She remembered the swell of his penis as
he
slid in and out
of her
and how she had moaned his name as she came again.

Only she hadn’t moaned Sean’s name.  It was that fucker’s name, Brent, that had escaped her betraying lips.

She hadn’t been thinking about Brent, had in fact been shocked at how awesome Sean was in bed
and wondering why the
two of them had
never done this before
.  It was like he had The
Nicki Handbook and knew exactly how to drive her crazy,
knew
all the right places to touch her,
how to make her melt at his touch
, how to just breathe on her to make her come
.  And she’d never been the same since.  She really had meant to say
Sean’s
name but for some stupid-ass reason her mouth had decided to say
Brent
.  Un-fucking-believable.

So she’d apologized right after.  She couldn’t even blame drinking
for her gaffe
because she’d been stone-cold sober.  He said it was fine, that he understood, but she knew better.  And when she had to leave a little later (didn’t want mom and dad asking where she’d been all night long—that’s what happened when you decided to save money by living with the parental units), she knew she’d fucked up their friendship royally.

She left the beer on his table.  He might
want
it later.

So things were stiff and uncomfortable for a while, and there was a silent agreement between the two of them.  But they stopped spending time together, stopped calling each other, stopped hanging around.  Nicki grew tired of it and she went to Sean’s
garage at his mom’s house
in between classes
one day
.  She told him, “Look, Sean, I can’t take back what I said, and I’m sorry if I hurt your feelings.  But I miss having you as my friend.  I can’t stand this.”

Sean had been adding up some receipts at a desk in
a corner
.
  He looked up from the papers.
  “Can’t stand what?”

“We don’t hang around together anymore.  Can’t we just go back to the way we were before?”

And they agreed.  And with that handshake, followed by pizza and a beer and nothing else, they had decided without saying a word that they would never again talk about The Night That Must Never Be Mentioned Again.
  And after several uncomfortable months, they’d finally eased back into the friendship they’d once had.  Except that it was never the same for Nicki.

It was far easier getting over Brent.

Chapter Four

NICKI PARKED HER
car in the
Tribune
’s
employee parking lot behind the building and walked toward the
hulking
brick
structure.  The heat outside was climb
ing, probably
in the mid-nineties
by now.  She was glad she’d chosen the miniskirt topped with a light white cotton short-sleeve blouse and white sandals that showed off her pink toenails.  Her long, light brown hair, though, was starting to feel a little smothering, and she was deciding if she wanted to pull it up in a ponytai
l or just suffer
.

She walked in the backdoor through the press area.  Normally loud and unbearable, the press was off for now.  It wouldn’t get revved up until much later in the day.  For now, though,
the room
was an empty shell, quiet and oppressively hot.

She walked toward the doors that led to the main offices of the paper.  Once she opened the doors, she felt the air-conditioned breeze blowing down on her arms.
  The little hairs on them stood at attention while goose bumps formed. 
Oh, yeah…our imitation of the North Pole.
 
Someday she would remember
to
bring a sweater.  She knew she’d be ready to go back outside again
after three or four minutes in the cold air
.  But she needed to talk to her editor first.

Neal Black was a
decent guy, probably in his late
thirties, if Nicki’s judgment was right.  She knew this was his first full-fledged editor job, so she suspected that was why he was sometimes a hard ass.  He had full, thick, brown hair and brown eyes, with a medium build.  And Nicki suspected he wore contact lenses
,
because when he looked tired, he blinked a lot.
  She walked through the back hallway, avoiding the pool of reporters and copy editors to the left, instead heading straight for Neal’s office.