Unspoken Memories (Unspoken Series) (12 page)

Matt pauses, looks back at me with a smile then says, “Deal.”

A COUPLE OF days later, I’m laying
on the couch watching a reality show on the entertainment channel, when Matt
comes into the living room. He lifts my legs from the couch, sitting himself
under them, and then rests them back on his knees.

I look around the room and wonder why he picked that spot
when there’s a whole other couch, not to mention the recliner, empty for him to
sit on?

He looks at me with a casual smile, and starts massaging my
calves and ankles. They’re a bit sore from our long run yesterday, a run that
ended up being a total of ten miles without me realizing it.

Matt had said we were going for a run, so I laced up and
followed. Lesson learned, as I was cursing him halfway in, next time I’d ask
him how many miles before we even head out of the door and double it in my
mind.

Halfway through the run my body began to notice that we were
running more that our
usual
five miles. When I questioned Matt how much
longer we were going to run, he wouldn’t answer, but stated that I could handle
it. Repeating,
one foot in front of the other,
I just kept running
.

After the second time of him saying it, I wanted to strangle
him. The only reason I didn’t was that he kept pulling ahead of me, keeping me
at an arm’s length. I would have given up had we not been running in the
direction of the car.

He’s still moving his large hands up and down my legs,
gently rubbing and massaging them. It’s really hard to lie there, trying to
ignore the flurry that is running up them, directly to the center of my thighs.
I’m using a great deal of effort to focus on watching TV, hoping he doesn’t
notice how turned on I’m getting right now from the rubbing of his hands. I’m
saved a couple of minutes later, when he stops, leaving me already longing for his
next touch. I clap my knees together, uselessly trying to calm my turned on
body.

I finally look back at him, trying to look bored, and he has
a shameless smile on his face. He’s not buying my boredom for a minute. He
knows exactly what he was trying to achieve when he was giving me my rub down.

“Did you need to tell me something?” I ask, narrowing my
eyes at him. “Wait,” I say, holding up a finger to stop him. “If it involves a
girl, or body parts connecting in places, then I don’t want to know after all,”
I say, scrunching my nose at him.

The last thing I want to hear from those lips are sex
stories about other girls, but Matt finds it amusing and throws his head back
laughing. When he’s done, he looks at me. “Why don’t you want to know? You
aren’t jealous, are you?” he says, wagging his eyebrows.

Focusing on him, I roll my eyes and look back at the
television saying, “Never mind, I don’t want to know after all.”

“Actually you do, since it involves you,” he states.

I yank my head back at him, apprehensive about what he’s
going to tell me. My face goes into a grimace as I try to think of what he
could possibly tell me and he chuckles.

“You know how I’m running that half in two weeks?”

Matt had mentioned during one of our runs last week that he
was going to run the Portland Marathon again this year, in memory of his
sister. That’s why he needed to run long distances every week. He was preparing
his body for the race by building endurance and distance. He was running half
the distance of a marathon, which would be thirteen miles soon.

I’m still confused how this involves me. “Yeah. What does
that have to do with me?” I ask.

“Wellll, I signed us up to run a 10k.” He’s says it as if I
should be ecstatic about what he’s just said.

“A what K?”

“A 10K, it’s a charity race.”

Ok, I’m all for charity, but it still doesn’t answer why he
recruited me to do it with him? “Okay. When is it?”

“Tomorrow,” he says, tossing my legs off as he stands up,
walking away. I’m left wondering why I have to actually run the thing. “Couldn’t
you just have made a donation in my name?” I protest from the couch I’m still
laying on.

“Actually, you already did when I registered you, but this
kind of donation involves running it as well.”

“Why would anyone pay to run, shouldn’t it be the other way
around?” I say in disgust.

Matt sighs, taking a deep breath. “Look. I’ve signed you up
already. It’s not a big deal, it’d be like one of our usual runs,” he says
before heading into the hallway bathroom forcing me to take in what he’s said.

Dammit. Maybe I should follow him into the bathroom, but I
already know that even if I did it wouldn’t get me anywhere. When it comes to
arguing with Matt, he is just as stubborn as I am.

THE NEXT MORNING Matt walks into my
room yelling “Wakey, wakey, eggs and bakey.”

“Since I don’t actually smell bacon, I’ve decided it’s not
worth getting up,” I say into my pillow, turning onto my stomach, yanking the
blanket with me to my chin.

Last night I had decided that I wasn’t actually going to run
this “K” thingy. I wasn’t the one training for a big race, so why did I have to
keep putting my body through hell? Nope. I was putting my foot down today and
sleeping in.

I feel the covers being yanked from the bed, and when my
mind has comprehended what has happened, I feel Matt’s large hand on my ass.
The God-awful sting that comes with it causes me jolt up, a reflex reaction
that anyone would have.

Groaning, I immediately grab my pillow and throw it at Matt,
hitting him in the chest with it. He throws the pillow right back at me,
hitting me on the ass. At least that didn’t hurt.

He laughs and says, “Sorry beautiful, I couldn’t resist,”
tilting his head to the side staring at my butt, “it’s such a sexy ass.”

“Just remember Matthew, payback’s a bitch!” I say to him as
I get up from the bed and head to the bathroom, rubbing my ass at the same
time.

As he exits the room, I hear him shout, “As long as you
promise it’s something nice.” His retort makes me roll my groggy eyes.

An hour later, I have realized that putting my foot down
does not work when it comes to Matt. We ate a banana and half a bagel instead
of eggs and bacon. Which makes me swear if I don’t get eggs, bacon,
and
pancakes after this I just might have to murder this man, no matter how good
looking he is.

I didn’t realize that Matt had woken me up at 5:30 this
morning until I looked at my phone as we got into the car. I could have
murdered him for that alone. He claimed we had to pick up our packet before
6:30 because the race started at 7:00. Being that I’ve never run with Matt
before 8:00 in the morning, my body was still trying to wake up. I couldn’t
keep from yawning.

“I didn’t know you could open your mouth that wide. It’s
giving me ideas,” he says as he’s driving.

Right now I’m so tired that I don’t even have a rebuttal for
his perverted mind. Besides glaring at him, which causes him to laugh at me. I
give up and sit there trying to stifle my yawns with no success. I already have
a feeling this is going to be a
really
long day.

We finally arrive at the race location and make our way into
the line for registration pick-up. After a couple of minutes of standing in
line, Matt and I finally reach the front of the booth, and I hand the volunteer
my ID to receive my packet. She sees the name on my ID, snaps her head up at
me, and her eyes go wide.

“OMG, it’s Abigail Adams!” she says with excitement,
practically jumping out of her seat.

I wince since I’m still half-asleep, but this helps wake me
up a little as I begin to yawn again behind my hand.

“I can’t believe you’re running our race. This is good, I’ll
make sure they know you’re running,” she says as she starts looking around like
she’s looking for someone.

I panic, my body going rigid and Matt notices. “Actually,
she was hoping not to bring attention to herself. She’s doing this for charity
and would really appreciate if you don’t mention her name please,” he says,
trying to save me.

The girl gives Matt a puzzled look. “And you would be?” she
says in a snotty voice.

“Her assistant. Now can we have our packets so we can line up?”
he demands sternly.

Her shoulders sag in disappointment and she begins to look
for our packets. Once she has handed them to us, she moves on to helping the
person behind us.

As we’re walking away, I’m staring at the bib with my number
on it. “See, this is why I should have stayed at home,” I say dryly while I
cover another dreadful yawn with my hand.

From the corner of my eye I see Matt grin and I really don’t
want to know why he’s smiling like that. I doubt it’s because of what I’ve
said. We keep walking in the direction of the start banner and find a spot off
to the side.

With Matt’s assistance, I get my number on, and we’re
standing in line with the crowd of people waiting. As I stand with him I start
to get my playlist ready for the run, trying to select my favorite ones. Done,
I start fumbling with my earphones, and I’m beginning to grow curious about how
far this race is. He never did mention it.

“So how many miles exactly is this 10K we’re supposed to
run?” I inquire, staring at the start banner ahead of us.

“Six miles,” I hear him say besides me.

Horrified, I turn to him. I wasn’t awake before, but I am
now.

“You want me to run six miles?” I exclaim at him. “Are you
crazy?” I practically squeal.

I hear someone standing behind me chuckle and right now I’m
thinking I should walk off. Ignoring the agitation growing inside of me, I go
back to messing with my phone, ignoring Matt as well.

He breaks our silence by saying. “Why don’t we make this run
a little fun?” with a mocking tone.

I stop fumbling with my phone and turn to look at him with
my eyebrows raised. “What did you have in mind?”

He tilts his head up as if thinking, his eyes going directly
up to the sky, and then says, “Loser has to cook the winner dinner.”

My mouth falls open. “That’s not fair! You know I can’t
cook.”

He smiles in victory. “Then you better not lose,” he says as
he inserts his ear buds into his ears, walking forward as they herd us to the
start line to begin the race.

I narrow my eyes at him. Inserting my ear buds into my ears,
I realize that I might be screwed. I can’t lose this race. Not only for
bragging rights, but also because I
really
don’t want to have to cook.

The gun finally goes off and the runners slowly start to jog
over the start line to the course ahead. Matt begins moving to the outside of
the crowd and I try to follow. It proves a bit difficult being that there are
quite a few of people huddled together as they run forward, but he manages to
find an opening in the small crowd and moves through it. Speeding through them,
he leaves me stuck behind a couple running side by side.

I’m shocked that he left me behind like that. He didn’t even
bother looking back to make sure I was following.

How rude!

Already seeing him advancing in the crowd it pisses me off
that I’m stuck here. I move to the left of the couple, find an opening to run
through, and take it. I’m able to catch up to Matt by a couple of feet, but
once again I get stuck behind another bundle of a crowd.

Don’t these people know to move out of the way if they’re slow?

I’m practically dancing back and forth as I’m running,
trying to find a way to move forward and ahead of them. I finally find another
open pocket and squeeze my way forward.

I see Matt again and he must be focused because I see him
weaving around people to get through openings and ahead. I keep watching him
and I realize what he’s doing to make it easier to get ahead. So I follow his
lead and finally start to advance. It’s not easy, because unless you want to be
impolite, you have to keep bobbing back and forth around people to get forward.

Somehow after fifteen minutes of doing this, a majority of
the people split off to the left. The remainder of us go running to the right,
in the direction of the sign with an arrow that says “10K runners this way.”