LWLU – Overdue Explanations

Well, of course Michael would feel that way right now. But he didn’t mean it. He couldn’t. What he was saying…Sara’s brain simply didn’t comprehend it.

For a long time, she did nothing other than stare at him. What was she supposed to say to that? Did he even expect a response from her?

“Michael…”

“Save it, Sara. I don’t want to hear whatever you’re going to say. From where I’m standing, it looks a lot like you just got home from a date with Paul Kellerman, a guy you went out of your way to tell me you didn’t like.” He drew in a shaky breath. “Don’t stand there and pretend you haven’t been lying to me.” Bitterness crept into his tone. “I guess I at least understand now why it was so important to you that we keep our relationship secret.”

She’d really made a mess of things this time. “Please just let me explain. I know how it looks, but…please.”

He pushed up the glass pane of the window and swung one of his legs outside. “No way. I can’t even look at you right now.”

She had to make this right. Michael was out the window and climbing down the tree before Sara could think of anything to say that might make him stay. If their relationship was going to end, this wasn’t the way. Determined, she moved to the window to go after him. She was out on the branch before she thought through the situation.

This was a problem.

In theory, Sara knew how to sneak out of her window. She just never had. Michael was always climbing up the tree to get into her room, so she assumed getting in and out was an easy task.

Once she found herself clinging for dear life to the branch to keep from plummeting to her certain death a story below, she realized the error of that assumption…

“Michael?” she whispered out into the darkness below her. “Help…”

Silence.

He was already gone, she realized. She was on her own if she was going to make it to the ground or the window. Taking a peek at the lawn below, she felt a wave of dizziness. Climbing down was out of the question. If she was getting off this branch, she was going back through her bedroom window.

Unfortunately, that posed a problem as well. She couldn’t go in feet first, so she’d have to turn around if she was going to reach for the window ledge. But how could she turn without moving the arms and legs she’d wrapped around the branch for safety? Maybe she could climb around on the other branches until she came full circle back to the branch she was on, just facing the right way.

That was stupid. She’d have to release her grip on the current branch to do that, too. No matter how she came at the situation, it involved falling.

After a lifetime, Sara decided to move. She had to. The temperature was dropping fast and she could already feel her hands going numb from the cold. If she waited much longer, she wouldn’t be able to move at all.

“Feet first,” she whispered to herself, mustering every shred of courage she possessed. She squeezed her eyes shut, not wanting to catch sight of the ground again. It was just as well. She couldn’t rely on her vision through the stream of tears anyway.

With the rough bark biting into her palms, she loosened her grip enough to slide like an inchworm towards her window. After only a few inches of movement, a fierce blast of wind shook the tree, threatening to toss her away. She clutched the branch as best as she could, but icy fingers made it difficult to hold on. Her reflexes were too dulled by the invading cold.

She was falling.

It was a surreal experience. She’d never so much as sprained her ankle, so she wondered what it would feel like to break all the bones in her body when she landed. What a funny thought, she mused. Wasn’t her life supposed to be flashing in front of her eyes? All she saw was Michael.

No, wait…Michael was there. He made a grab for her arm from a nearby branch and steadied her before she could slip all the way from the branch.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing out here?”

“C-coming af-fter you…” Between the cold and the terror, she could barely answer him.

“Well…that was stupid. Let’s get you back inside.”

“N-no. N-not until I t-talk t-to you.” She wanted to wipe the tears out of her eyes so she could see him, but she was too scared to move. “H-have t-to explain.”

He groaned. “Fine. I’ll talk to you once I get you back into your room.”

With her eyes still tightly shut, Michael helped her get back to her window. She didn’t have a clue how he’d done it and she didn’t want to know. Sneaking out just wasn’t for her.

Only after her feet were firmly on her plush carpet did she risk wiping the tears from her eyes. Michael closed the window to shut out the cold, but remained next to it, arms folded over his chest. He might be willing to hear what she had to say, but he clearly didn’t like it.

“I swear to you, Michael, I’m not dating Paul. I know how it looked tonight, but…no. You’re the one I want.”

“Going out with another guy is a funny way to show it.”

She knew that. What she didn’t know was how to make him understand. “It’s such a long story. I don’t even know how to explain.”

“Maybe you should start with why you were out with him tonight when you were supposed to be studying.”

Sara bit her lip. “We were sort of spying on Nika and her date.” When Michael gave her a questioning look, she added, “This guy is really bad. The last time we were out, he was trying to take stuff too far with her and Paul had to practically pull him off her to get him to stop.”

“What do you mean the last time you were out? Exactly how long has this been going on, Sara?”

Crap. She’d forgotten he didn’t know about the bowling alley. “A couple of weeks, but please let me explain. It’s not the way you think.”

“Go on.” His voice was cold, colder than her still frozen fingertips.

“The day after my birthday…a few hours after you left, Nika came over. Basically, she’d set us up on a double date to go bowling. I really didn’t want to go, but she kept pressing the issue, so I had to either go with her or tell her about us. So I went.”

“An excellent choice.”

“Dammit, Michael. You don’t know Nika. She already thought I was acting strange and…we sort of made this vow-pact thing not to have sex at least while we were still in high school. I don’t know why, but it’s really important to her. She’s never going to forgive me for breaking it.”

“You couldn’t tell her we were dating without mentioning the sex?”

Sara shook her head. “I don’t know why, but she thinks you’re gay for some reason.” She shook her head again. “Anyway…Her date picked us up here and told her that the other guy couldn’t make it, but that someone he worked with was meeting us there. It ended up being Paul. I told him as soon as I saw him that it wasn’t a date and he told me the only reason he was there was to make sure Sucre – that’s the guy Nika was with – didn’t hurt Nika. Nika and Sucre vanished after we’d bowled one set and we found them outside. He brought us both back here right after that and I didn’t talk to him again until the other day at school when he told me Nika was going out with Sucre again tonight.”

“And he told you this…why?”

“Because they were going to a drive-in movie and he thought it would look strange for him to be sitting in a car by himself staring at them. They left like an hour into the movie, so we followed them to a café.” She let herself take a breath after her torrent of words. “Oh, we sort of ran into your brother and Roni there. Roni started yelling at me in the bathroom about the birth control pills in my purse and Nika heard her screaming at me for sleeping with Paul. Nika confronted us after we left the café, so we lied and told her we were on a date to keep her from realizing we’d basically been stalking her all night.”

“So…let me get this straight. Nika thinks you’re dating Paul and Vee thinks you’re sleeping with him?”

“Yes and no. Nika thinks that, but…Roni knows I’m sleeping with you.” Sara dropped her gaze to her feet. “Well, I guess she knows that we were since we’re over now.”

Michael opened his mouth to respond, but they heard the floorboard at the top of the stairs squeak before he could respond. Someone was coming. Sara’s eyes darted to the closet. “Get in. Quick.”

There was a soft tap on her bedroom door and her mother poked her head in. “I thought I heard you up here. Did you have a good time on your date, sweetheart?”

Sara mustered a smile. “Yeah. The movie wasn’t very good, but we had fun.”

“That’s good.” Her mother crossed the room to sit on the edge of Sara’s bed. “He’s not the boy you were telling me about, is he?”

She sunk into the desk chair. “No. How did you know?”

“Because you don’t look at Paul the way you would if you were in love with him. What happened to the other boy?”

Well, she’d made a stupid mistake and lost him. “He doesn’t want to be with me.” She sighed. “I really screwed up and a misunderstanding blew up. I lost him.”

“Do you think you’ll be able to fix things?”

“I hope so, but…I don’t think he wants to.”

“If he’s worth giving your heart to, he’ll come around.” Her mother yawned. “Does this mean you’ll be seeing more of Paul?”

“I don’t think so. He’s a nice guy, but he’s not…” She caught herself before she could say Michael’s name. “We’re just friends.”

“Well, your father will be disappointed. He was already talking about inviting Paul’s family over for dinner and taking him golfing to get to know him better after the weather warms.”

“Mom…what’s wrong with him tonight? Telling me to stay out until 1:30 and all this other stuff. Paul’s a nice guy, but come on.”

She shrugged and rose to her feet. “He may not be the one you want to be with, but that boy does make a good impression.” She stifled another yawn and cringed at the noise coming from downstairs. “My sleeping pills are kicking back in, so I’m going back to bed. You might want to turn on your stereo to drown out your father’s snoring.” She paused at the door. “It’s all going to work out. And…I can tell you’ve been crying over what happened with this other boy. Anyone worth those kind of tears will come around. Just give him time.”

Once her mother was out of the room, Sara turned on her stereo and opened the closet door. “Sorry about that.” She fidgeted with the hem of her shirt. “I’ve told you everything, so I guess you can go now. You’ve held up your end of the bargain.”

Michael held her gaze for a moment. “When did you tell your mother you were in love?”

“As soon as they came back after my birthday.” She shifted her weight. “She wanted to know why I looked so happy.”

He nodded. “I actually told Linc the same thing when I got home that day.”

They stood in awkward silence. She wanted to say something else to make him understand how sorry she was, but there was nothing to say. Offering a simple apology would never be enough. Maybe if she’d been honest with him about everything in the beginning…

Michael closed the gap between them in two quick steps, drawing her into his arms, lips moving over hers in frenzy. She tasted the tears flowing down her face. “I’m so sorry,” she murmured against his lips. “So sorry.”

He pulled away and brushed away the tears with tender fingers. “Please don’t cry. I can’t bear it. I don’t ever want to be the reason you cry like this again.”

Their lips met, softer this time. Sara felt her calves hit her mattress, surprised because she didn’t realize they’d moved. Both of their shirts hit the floor before either of them could think. The rest of their clothes joined the pile and then they were under the covers.

He gazed down into her eyes and smoothed the hair from her face. “I love you so much.”

“I love you, too. Make love to me, Michael.”

“Wait. Shit. What are we doing, Sara? Your parents are downstairs.”

She shook her head. “Dad’s a sound sleeper and Mom’s sleeping pill kicked in. Neither of them will be up again for hours.” She searched his face. “But we should maybe try to be quiet.”

A grin, the first she’d seen on his face that night, spread over his features. “I’m not the screamer.”

“I’m going to pretend I’m not mortified you just said that.”

“Hey, I never said I didn’t like it.”

She wanted to respond, but Michael’s hungry kiss swallowed her words. Then words became impossible. Everything other than the way his body moved with hers fell away from her mind.

It was a perfect night.

Continue reading…

…Go back

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Hey, y’all.

Just a quick note. If you didn’t read the comments on the last chapter, you might want to. I might have let some pretty big spoilers slip during that conversation.

Jen

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