He Loves Me...He Loves You Not (8 page)

Henry’s eyes are wide. He raises his hands.
“Calm down, Riley, please.” He touches my cheek and the warmth from
his touch spreads through my entire body. “You don’t
understand.”

I corner him and dig my finger into his chest
and push my words out, even though I’m fighting the half of me
that’s screaming touch me, infect me, love me. “I do understand!” I
shout. “Don’t tell me what to do. You’re always telling me what to
do and I’m tired of it. I’m tired of hiding! I’m tired of being
your little play thing!”

I reach out to him, but I notice my trembling
fingers and decide against touching him again. One more touch and
it might be my undoing and so far, I’m holding my own.

His hand inches toward mine. His fingers are
needy. “Riley, you know how I feel. You are not and never will be
my play thing. You have my heart.”

I pull away from him, backing up. “No I
don’t. I can’t tell if you really feel that way or you’re just
feeding me load of crap so that I’ll do whatever you want. And I’m
sorry Henry, but I can’t do or be who you want anymore.”

“What are you saying?” There’s shock and
panic in his voice.

“Riley, wait. Come back, please,” he begs.
“Let’s talk about it. I’ll end it with Callie I promise.”

The tears sting my cheeks. He’s still behind
me, following me. I swallow hard. “Leave me alone, Henry.” I do my
best to put up a cold front.

“Riley, you can’t do this to me. You’re
killing me. I’ve never felt this way about anyone else.”

He’s lying. Messing with my head. Fucking
with my emotions.

I run out the back exit doors, glancing over
my shoulder as Henry stops at the steps. “Riley, please! You know
you don’t want to do this!”

He’s right; I don’t want to do this. I feel
like I’m losing a part of myself as I run away from him. More than
that, I feel like my heart has just exploded in my chest.

I’m proud of myself for staying so strong in
front of him. I’m proud for standing my ground instead of keeping
quiet. But when I finally make into the safe haven of my car, I let
it all out.

I hunch over, hugging my stomach and let out
long agonizing sobs. And the whole time I cry I hear him in the
back of my mind, begging—pleading for me to come back.

Get out of my head!

Even my thoughts involving him are
accompanied by pain. A dull, incessant, throbbing pain. As I try to
catch my breath and control myself the pain intensifies, circling
around my gut, and I’m not sure when or if it will ever go
away.

Chapter 12

“
Love that we cannot have is the one that
lasts the longest, hurts the deepest and feels the strongest...”~
Author Unknown ~

I’m broken. Hopefully I won’t be this way
forever, but for now every part of me is broken. I’m also sick and
obsessed, clawing at my own body trying to recreate the way it
feels to have his hands on me. It’s not the same.

When I arrived home I’d consumed an entire
quart of Ben & Jerry’s Strawberry Cheesequake ice cream. I was
hoping that maybe the frosty delight would dull the pain just a
little bit. It doesn’t.

Henry calls. Once. Twice. Three times, and
every time I hit the ignore button.

Then he texts me.

Plz talk 2 me.

R u home?

Can I come ovr?

I don’t answer his texts either.

Sleep. That’s all I really want to do. Sleep
away my sorrows. Dream of blissful experiences. Dream of hope and
laughter. Infectious laughter. Maybe today was a dream. Maybe I’ll
wake up tomorrow and everything that happened will be a nightmare.
Somehow I doubt it.

****

I’ve convinced myself that I’m delusional
because half-way through my slumber I hear, feel, and smell Henry.
His clothes smell like a combination of tide detergent and his
cologne. He breathes soft and raspy into my ear and I feel the
warmth of his body next to mine. I sigh. This seems too familiar.
Too real.

Rolling over, my hand smacks into something
hard and a cough echoes throughout my room. My eyes fly open and I
scramble from my bed and crouch down in the corner of my room.
Henry rises and walks around the bed closer to me.

“Get out!” My voice is cold and brash and I’m
pissed that he thinks my bed is a welcome mat.
Thank you for
stoping by! Come back soon!
Perhaps that’s my own fault because
I made it that way, but still. Every time he came over in the past
I’d invited him. I didn’t invite him over today.

“Chill Ry,” he says. “It’s me. It’s
Henry.”

“I know it’s you. I want you to leave.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“I do. Leave. Now.” I stand. “How did you get
in here?” I follow his gaze to the open window. Wind blows in and
circulates through my curtains. I mentally huff a string of curse
words for not remembering to lock it.

Henry rocks back and forth on his feet and
nervously shoves his hands into his pockets. This is the first time
I’ve ever seen him this way. Uncertain. Lost. He’s usually so sure
of himself. He locks eyes with me. A solemn expression takes over
his face. “Can we talk?”

His gaze is magnetic. He’s trying to pull me
in, like a black widow on a web, lurking, waiting for her prey to
get caught.

I’m fighting it—the power he has over me. The
spell he’s cast. Because every part of me wants to be enveloped in
his arms. I want his fingers in my hair. I want him kissing me. As
long as I stay where I am. As long as I don’t look at him or move,
I’ll be fine. He won’t over-power me. His charm won’t manipulate my
judgment.

He doesn’t deserve my time. I’ve sacrificed
plenty of precious minutes for him. I threw away a whole summer for
him. But I’m tired. I’m in pieces, and I’m furious. The sooner I
let him speak, the sooner he’ll leave and I get back to sleeping my
life away. “You’ve got five minutes.”

Relief washes over his features and he sits
down on the edge of my bed. “Will you come sit by me?” His lips
curl into a half-smile. A seductive, come-hither smile.

I pick up a foot lurching forward and stop
myself. No. I can’t. I have to be strong. Instead, I tap my bare
foot against the wooden floor and twitch my hips. “No.”

Soft laughter escapes his throat. “So
stubborn.”

So what if I was being stubborn or difficult
or whatever, it’s my own prerogative. My eyes roll to my right and
I check the time on my alarm clock. “Your five minutes are ticking
by. Now you have four. I’d hurry if I were you.”

“I don’t understand why you’re acting like
this?”

“Were you listening to anything I said
earlier?”

“Yes. But you knew what you were getting into
with this from the very beginning and you were okay with it. Now
all of a sudden you’ve had this miraculous epiphany and you’re
willing to throw everything we have away because you’re
jealous.”

My mouth drops open and I gasp. “Are you
kidding me? Is this conversation some kind of joke?”

A serious expression crosses over his face.
He’s not joking. “Why don’t you tell me what you want from me,
Riley?”

“I want you to stop what you’re doing?”

“And what exactly am I doing?”

“I want this whole you, me, and
her
threesome to stop.” What I really want to tell him or what I really
want him to say is what he said to me in the hall. It’s over
between me and Callie. She’s yesterday’s news. I love you. I want
you. I choose you. You are my one and only.

All I get out of him is, “Uh huh.”

“Do you say the same things to both of us? Is
that it? Do you enjoy the thrill of a double life? One for keeps.
One on the sly sort of thing?”

He glares at me incredulously. “When I say it
to you, I mean it.”

“And her?”

“I don’t.”

“Then why are you with her?”

“It’s complicated.”

He’s being vague and the uncertainty tone in
his voice annoys me.

I pace across the length of my bedroom. “This
conversation is over, Henry. Get out.” My voice is hard and
brutal.

He doesn’t move.

“I said get out!”

He glances at his hand and examines his
fingers. “I think I’ll stay right here.”

I’m unsure of what to do. All I know is that
I don’t want to stay in here with him.

“My mom will be home soon,” I say. “She’ll be
pretty pissed if she sees you here.” The threat of my mom coming
home doesn’t work.

“I’ll take my chances.”

Finally, I’m so frustrated I try
rationalizing with him. “Henry, you knew that this was going to end
sooner or later.” I wish he would let me get over him. I wish he
would forget about me. I wish that he would get out of here and
find somebody else to play with. “I think its best that it’s
happening now, at the beginning of the year.”

If this happened any later, I don’t know
where I’d end up. Maybe in a psych ward.

And how would you like your meds today,
Riley? Liquid or pill form?

“But, I love you,” he tells me. His voice is
soft and there’s angst in it.

“You think you love me.”

“No. I love you.”

Hearing those words leave his lips breaks me
apart all over again. I keep telling myself to ignore them—the
words. But I can’t. I’m crippled on the borderline of love, lust,
and grief. “Just shut up. Quit screwing with my head. I’m a person,
not a game. And you keep screwing with me and screwing with me. I
swear you get some sick pleasure out of this.”

He’s wearing a devilish grin and I already
know what he’s thinking. “Don’t even think about it. You know
that’s not what I meant.”

“But it’s all I think about. You’re all I
think about. It’s like you’re the cocaine and I’m the junkie. I
want more of you. I need more of you. If I can’t have you it drives
me crazy.”

Lies. Lies. And more Lies.

“If you want more of that, then go get it
from Callie.”

He stands and inches closer. “You don’t
believe me, do you?”

I sigh. “I used to. Now I’m not sure what to
believe anymore.”

“Callie doesn’t mean anything to me. It’s
you—you’re the one I’m addicted to. Callie is just arm candy.
Easily replaceable.”

“If you’re so addicted to me and Callie is so
easily replaceable, why haven’t you replaced her yet? And why are
you always with her and not me?”

A vivid picture of an alcoholic pops into my
head. She’s passed out in her front yard clutching an empty bottle
of vodka. Addicts are with what they’re addicted to at all times.
And when they are without the fits begin. Shaking. Hysteria. Henry
looks fine to me.

“Maybe you said it best, I’m selfish.” He
takes another step. “Also, I have a lot of complications going on
in my life right now. I wish you could understand that.”

He’s so close to me I can practically taste
his cool, minty breath. If I move an inch my lips will brush
against his. “Henry, stop.” His arms are over my head and he’s
peering down into my eyes.

My hands are trembling and I clasp them
together. I want him so bad that my nerve endings are sparking. I’m
a live wire.

In a last ditch effort to save myself from
seduction I duck down and crawl under his left arm. Henry spins
around and laughs as I back into my door. “You’re quick Ry.”

I’m glad I’m so quick. Staring a second
longer into his eyes and I would have wound up on my bed—with
him.

I open the door and he grabs his shirt off
the floor and tosses it over his shoulder. I usher him through the
door and he faces me from the hall. His expression is vacant. “Is
this really over? If it is I’m not sure if I can handle it.”

“Oh it’s really over.” I start closing the
door and Henry wedges his hand in between the frame. “Henry just
go.”

“What can I do to change your mind?”

“Nothing.” The word vibrates in my throat as
the tears swell in my eyes. The image of him touching Callie’s face
resurfaces and it’s painful. Replaying that moment in my mind is
like pouring nail polish remover into an infected cut. Heat rises
to my skin. My blood simmers and I feel like my veins have been
tapped while my blood flows freely into some hungry vampire’s
mouth. “Unless you have some miraculous epiphany and decide to
dump, Callie.” I hope he senses the sarcasm as I mock his previous
comment.

“I see,” he says.

“Goodbye, Henry.”

Then I slam the door in his face.

Chapter 12

“
At some time in our lives a devil dwells
within us, causes heartbreaks, confusion and troubles, then dies.”~
Theodore Roosevelt ~

I’m an addict, a Henry Garner addict. Except
instead of a tourniquet wrapped around my forearm, the thin tight
piece of latex is wrapped around my heart. Constricting. Squeezing.
It’s squeezing the love out of me. Squeezing the life out of
me.