Loved In Pieces (48 page)

Manuel remembered, “I’ve always been in love with you. She knew that. I tried to deny it when she confronted me. She saw us in the stands at the homecoming game together. She said
she saw me close my eyes and smell your hair. That’s why I got the tattoo. She wanted me to prove to her that I was in love with her, not you.”

He was sad and his shoulders slouched. He looked down. “I loved her, so it was easy to repress my feelings for you until she brought it up. The problem was that after she forced me to explain my feelings for you, I knew it was absolutely true that I was in love with you. I couldn’t ignore how I burned for you when I thought of you. I felt weak, dishonest.”

“You don’t need to explain yourself, Manuel. I know
you’re
a good man. This is none of my business.”

“No,
Lia
. You should know
,
so you don’t think I’m the prick that I’m sure she told you I am.”

“I know you’re not…” I started.

He put his hand up and continued. “When she changed her mind about not having sex, I was hoping that releasing the tension I felt would make me love her more and reduce my feelings for you. It didn’t work. I couldn’t get that memory of you getting out of your red bikini out of my mind.
I wanted to have sex with you,
not her
.
Then it hit me
that I loved you
each time I saw your picture, and I started seeing your picture everywhere. It started to be painful to know I was in love with you.”

He paused and kissed my forehead. “I know this sounds strange, but
I’m
so grateful that Kate made me realize how much I loved you.
It’s so much easier with you. She always had to be seen at parties in her millions of new clothes and shoes, crap like that. She hated my apartment and me reading books and stuff. She had so many rules and never told the truth like you do.
Life just wouldn’t have been complete if I didn’t get the chance to be your boyfriend.”

“Thanks,” I said. “
I feel the same way
. I even told her that after she told me the rest.”

He worried
,
“There’s more?”

“Yes. Kate said she deliberately put magazines and tabloids in front of you that had pictures of me in them so that she could gauge your reactions. She said that she was absolutely sure you were in love with me by your response.”

“So that’s why she had all that stuff in her room.” He explained, “But I have a lot of self-control. I could hav
e handled my feelings for you. T
hat night, she yelled at me, gave me an ultimatum. She told me that it was her or you. I loved her. You were about to go on some worldwide
‘
Muse
’
premiere
tour with either Matthew or Grant
.
You were an actress, you would always be kissing some hot guy in some movie. I chose Kate.”

He took both of my hands in his and lifted them to his lips, kissed them and put them on both of his cheeks. “
Later
she told me I couldn’t speak to you anymore. I told her I couldn’t do that. That would have been much too painful.
I broke up with her
. I felt terrible that I didn’t love her enough and felt worse that I dreamt of you.”

He stopped. He
took
my
hands from his face. The pain of the break-up was surfacing. I didn’t want him to remember. I wanted to get to the point, to save him from the guilt he felt. I also felt Alan watching us from across the pool. I felt uncomfortable with
the setting and
the confession that was none of my business. I needed to get this conversation moving.

“Then she got pregnan
t and everything got confusing. Sure we were engaged but it felt so messed up.
She dumped me the night we all went out to see
Jefferson’s
Muse
because she knew. I couldn’t watch you on screen. It absolutely burned me to the core to see you kiss Matthew. It was so wrong that I coveted you. I didn’t deserve either of you.”

“Manuel, don’t beat yourself up about feelings you didn’t even act upon. You were trying to do the right thing for yourself, Kate, and the baby in a
bad
situation.”

“I do feel guilty,
Lia
. I was going to marry her, have a baby, and
there
I was thinking about you.” He looked ashamed. “I put her through hell. She knew
,
and that’s why she got an abortion. I’m not as good as you think I am. I guess that’s what she wanted to tell you, that I’m a complete prick.”

I interrupted and put my hand on his shoulder. “Shh…
You’re
a good guy with faults. We all have faults and I love you. But that is not exactly what she told me.” He still looked down.

“Manuel, listen.” I waited until his eyes met mine to tell him. “She wasn’t pregnant. She made it up to trap you. She lied and didn’t know how to get out of the lie since you committed to her and wanted the baby that didn’t exist.
She was going to pretend a miscarriage but
said
the abortion thing to hurt you. She broke it off because she was in the lie too deeply and couldn’t live with it anymore.”

“What?” He stared at me.

“Kate knew you were in love with me and made
the pregnancy
up
to make you love her more
than you loved me, to
commit to her
.”

“Why?”
He stared at me.

“To keep you
,
but then she felt bad, had to get out of the lie
since you knew something was off. Remember, your immediate respo
nse was that she cheated on you
. Y
ou were convinced for days.
You knew you weren’t drunk and didn’t believe that you guys had unprotected sex. Then you did the math to figure out when she ovulated. You and I talked about how nothing added up to you
. Y
ou knew it wasn’t yours because you were right. There was no baby.
”

Manuel jumped off the chaise and yelled, “That bitch!”

By the time I had realized that he was gone, he was getting his phone out of his backpack on the other side of the pool. I walked back towards the table where Alan was sitting, watching
Manuel. Everyone was watching Manuel.

He was yelling into the phone, “You bitch. We need to talk right now… No, I’ll meet you… No, if you don’t I’ll tell everyone here at Alan’s… Fine… No, now!... Yes,
fifteen
minutes.
Where?
”

He hung up the phone. “
Lia
Marie, I’m too drunk to drive. You have to take me. Let’s go.”

“But I don’t want to go! Can I drop you off? Shit, Manuel. I shouldn’t be there.”

“Please. Drive me, wait with me. I’ll talk to the bitch alone but be there. I need you.”

I gulped. “Ok
ay
, let’s go.”

I saw that everyone was still staring at us, wanting to know what was going on.
Manuel said something to Beth in German. We
left.

It was Thursday afternoon, and I was
done
with high school! I couldn’t wait to see Manuel and relax. He was waiting for me at my place. I felt a lot better since I talked with
Dad
and read CSY6’s emails.  I was also glad Manuel knew the truth about Kate. After he had a very emotional discussion with
her
, he asked me to drop him off at his apartment. He wanted to talk to his
parents
. He felt played
—
betrayed. He did not forgive her.

“Hey, Manuel!” I said as I came in from the garage.

“Hi, high school graduate!” Manuel hugged me.

“Yeah. It’s cool. My finals today were really easy.”

The housecleaners were finishing up the floors, so Manuel took my hand and led me to my bedroom. He spun me around. He was happy. He put his arm around me, sliding his hand from the middle of my back to my shoulder. I shuddered from a tingle that zipped down my spine and warmed my pelvis. The feeling was getting uncomfortably intense.

I ignored my feelings. So this is what it used to be
like for him before my birthday?
Wanting me so badly but trying so hard to be good. This is how he felt about me while he was dating Kate. Poor guy. I had no idea how intense the feeling could be and how much control I had to exert over myself. 

I
asked, “So what do you want to do for the rest of the day?”

“I thought we might drive to Malibu. I kn
ow you love that s
ushi
restaurant
, and thought I’d experience it with my new perspective.” Manuel laughed. “Before we go, though, I want to give you your graduation present.”

I could tell he was very excited to give it to me. But I was so preoccupied these last few weeks that I didn’t have a present for him. I didn’t even think about it. I hesitated.

He asked
,
“What’s wrong?”

“Manuel, I don’t
have anything for you. I didn’t even think about it. I’m so sorry.”

“
Lia
, I don’t care. As a matter of fact, I kind of like it better this way because now I won’t get two things and you just one. I kind of share in your gift.” He beamed. He was even more delighted.

We heard the housecleaners close the front door. We had the house to ourselves. The thought made my heart leap. I tried to settle myself when he took my hand to lead me to his backpack leaning against my bed, but his touch re-ignited the fire and I was burning for him. We both sat on the bed.

“I saw this and thought it perfectly
captured our relationship. It’
s really corny. But the guardian angel thing is just between us, so…” He handed me a large jewelry box tied with a ribbon. I smiled at him. He smiled warmly back at me, eager for me to open it, hoping I would like it.

The box contained two pendants on their own chains, one chain more delicate than the other. Each pendant was a half of a heart. Together they made a whole. Both halves were engraved. The pendant on my dainty necklace read, “Guardian” and the one on the thick necklace said, “Angel.”

“I love it! I love you. Thank you!”

Manuel was
overjoyed
that I liked his gift. “Let me put it on you!”

He already had my necklace out of the box and was unclasping it. He sat in front of me, sincerely looked into my eyes, and put the chain around my neck. Once more
a shock of
electricity overwhelmed my body. My groin was throbbing and my lungs felt tight as if my heart was ready to explode. He admire
d
the pendant.

“I love you,” he breathed.

And that was it. Finally my mind and my body were in complete agreement. I wanted him. I chose him. I
had
to have him. I just could not take another second of being aroused or it was going to become painful. I tackled him, kissing his lips with passion I had no idea that I had. I pulled at his tee shirt, desperate to get it off of his body. With the other hand, I pulled off my sun dress, exposing my breast
s
and pressing them into his chest as I worked on getting his shorts off. He started helping me. Within a few seconds, we had our clothes off and were completely
linked
in a passionate embrace. I was on top of him on the bed and tossed off the comforter. I slowed down my kissing and opened my eyes. Shortly afterwards, he opened his eyes too. I looked at him devilishly, feeling overwhelmed with love and appreciation for him and absolute desire. Then I started to make love to my boyfriend, my lover, my best friend.

I continued to kiss him while he got ready. When we started again I felt his entire body
relax
. He kissed me and touched me, intensifying the pleasure I was feeling, multiplying it until I felt like I was going to burst. Then a feeling beyond intensity overpowered me. Electricity pulsated from where we were together to
every part of
my body, my toes, my head and neck, my fingertips. I gasped in the delight of the pleasure and open my eyes. I was too dizzy to see. I couldn’t focus. It felt like I had
lost my eyesight and
my head spun.
I felt completely relaxed
as the love pulsated through my body.

Manuel
looked absolutely triumphant. I
giggled and remained on top of him, resting my head on his chest. I stayed still while I let the electricity flow through my body.

After he could feel that I calmed down, he whispered, “
Thank you for my tattoos. I’m so
happy I could give you all of me.
”