The Bond That Built Us (8 page)

Josh looks better, his lip is a little swollen and there are a few bruises that range from yellowish green to purple. But he still wants to go with us. We trek
down the walkway a block from our villa and through the beach, our sandals kicking up sand as we walk. I have the cooler in one hand that is full of beer and my beach towel in the other. We pick a spot on the beach (and when I say ‘we’ I mean Cara and MJ) and settle in.

I watch as Cara and MJ immediately strip off their sundresses and lay on their towels to tan. Aubrey looks at the girls with envy, then down at herself. I see a little frown press her lips and I know she is judging her body. Little does she know I think her body is the best out of the three. Sure, Cara’s tits are huge but there is something about Aubrey’s
slight curves that make me want to bury myself inside her.

Dammit, not even five minutes into the day and I’m already hard thinking about her. This rule of mine can go suck it.

About a half hour later, a group of guys come up to us and ask if we want to play some volleyball. Aubrey immediately jumps up and agrees, while MJ and Cara grumble something about manicures and tan lines. I roll my eyes and join in, so does Josh.

As we are walking to the net, one guy skips next to Aubrey and begins talking to her. I can’t hear what they are saying, but suddenly she throws her head back and laughs loudly. I’m instantly jealous that it wasn’t me that made her laugh. But I relish in the sound of it anyway.

Turns out the guy’s name is James, which is Aubrey’s last name. I think it’s fucking weird, but for some reason they bond over it. To each their own, I guess. He grabs her hand and pulls her onto his team, while I’m stuck with Josh and some fucking ditz who can’t even go twenty seconds without hiccupping. It’s only one in the afternoon and she is already completely wasted.

As we play, I become more and more irritated. Ditz, aka Ra
chelle, calls every ball that soars over the net but always veers the wrong way. If it is heading towards her left, she dives right. And Josh’s hand is still a little messed up from the fight last night that I’m pretty much on my own. He helps but he can’t do much but spike and dig with his left.

I feel like every time I glance over at Aubrey and James, he is touching
her somewhere. I want to bury him in the sand head first and wait for the damn tide to come in. Finally, after his hand parks extremely close to her ass for too long, I detonate.

“Hey, I think it’s time we g
et Aubrey back.” I try to say it blasé but it’s kind of difficult with clenched teeth.

“No way, man. I recruited her, she’s mine.” The way his eyes narrows when he says ‘mine’ definitely makes his double meaning unmistakable.

“Come on, it’s clearly one sided. I have a guy who has a beat up hand, and she makes Charlie Sheen look like a saint,” I say, pointing to Rachelle. She belches and smiles then takes a bow but stumbles and falls to her knees. I give James a ‘there you go’ gesture but he seems unaffected. “You made her that drunk, you take her. Give me my girl back,” I exclaim, giving obvious emphasis to ‘my girl.’

Aubrey’s eyes widen slightly and she looks nervously between the two of us. I know she is hoping there isn’t another fight, with this one potentially being the third one in less than twenty four hours.

“Kellan-“ She warns, and bites her bottom lip anxiously. Dirty things surge into my brain when I see her nibble on her lip and my rage is forgotten until I glance over at James and see him giving her the same look.

“Aubrey, baby, let’
s go back to our spot.” I’m tired of arguing, and I know calling her an endearment is a low blow, but I’m desperate. “We need to get back, babe.” I throw another one in there for good measure.

She scowls at me, but turns to James and says goodbye
and walks to me. He looks a little stunned and it takes everything I have not to stick my tongue out at him like a ten year old and give him a smug smile. I hold my hand out for her as she comes to me but she brushes right past me, knocking her shoulder into my arm.

Josh and I follow her closely. Her hands are fisted at her sides and she is stomping through the sand so hard she leaves craters in the sand. When we reach our spot she snatches up her dress and shoves it on, then sits down on her towel and crosses her arms. Fine, if she wants to po
ut she can pout all fucking day as long as James isn’t groping her.

The next few hours are spent in and out of the water, and
our cooler of beer dwindles. We mingle with other groups but thankfully James and his posse stay away. I meet Marissa at around my fourth beer and by the eighth, she is sitting on my lap. She is pretty, with dark brown hair and naturally tan skin. Her brown eyes look at me seductively, but for some reason I keep looking over at the dark blue ones that make me feel like I’ve been punched in the stomach.

The next time I look over at Aubrey, she is gone. I search frantically for her, and when I spot Josh I mouth, “Where is AJ?” and he points to the large hut at the top of the hill where food is served. I continue my somewhat dull conversation with
Marissa but am constantly worrying about Aubrey. She went by herself, again. I guess I wasn’t really available for her to go with, but I know if she had asked I would have thrown Marissa on her ass and left with her.

We all eventually migrate up there to the hut and get dinner. Aubrey is sitting with James and another guy, but they are on opposite sides of a table. Another girl sits down next to her and they begin talking. I keep an eye on her the whole time while
Marissa runs her hands all over my body.

We run out of beer at about seven o’clock and a few of us run to get more. Now that all the coolers are replenished, the party starts once again. Quite a few of us are burnt, while others are hitting the end of the party. A couple people are slumped over the tables at the hut and others are passed out completely on beach towels.

I lose count of how many beers I have before nine. Marissa leaves with a couple of her girlfriends for a while, promising to come back. When she is gone, I see Aubrey sitting with the random girl, James is gone. I drudge over to her and plop down to the left of her on the bench.

“Hey,” I say, smiling.

“Hi, Kellan.” She sounds a little pissed off at me still, but I know how to turn that around.

“I forgot to tell you how beautiful you look in your bikini.”

A flush creeps on her face and she says, “Thanks,” quickly.

“You’re welcome.” Liquid courage, and lack of common sense apparently, propels my hand forward and I run it down her thigh to her knee and hold it there. I begin making little circles on her knee with my fingers, causing a chill to tear through her body. She clears her throat and says something to the girl, then pivots her upper body to me. She rests her right elbow on the table and cups the right side of her face with her hand, effectively blocking the girl next to her out.

“What are you doing?” She whispers.

I shrug. “Do you want me to stop?”

She looks down at my hand then back up to my eyes, which are probably a little droopy, like hers. When she doesn’t say anything, I take it as a ‘no’ and continue doing it. Her eyes close and she sighs. Then her attention turns and she is talking to the girl beside her again. I see three beer cans in front of her, and I remember her having a few more on the beach so she must be pretty drunk.

I lean in closer to her and press my lips to her bare shoulder, breathing in the smell of her sunscreen and what little I can smell of her shampoo. Her left hand travels from her lap down to my hand, and I twist mine until our fingers are laced together.

I hold her hand for a few minutes, and we don’t speak to each other. She continues her conversation with the girl and I just sit there and listen, completely content. After a while I have to take a piss so I squeeze her hand and excuse myself from the table, breaking the connection to her. When I come out of the bathroom, I see Marissa and her friends come up to the hut. She is suddenly latched onto me and I can’t break free. But that is okay because she is pretty hot.

A whole
day of drinking can’t be good for my rationale because for some reason I am convincing Josh to let me take Marissa back to the villa. For the last hour she has been on my lap, moving her hips in little circles, effectively arousing me. When she leans in and starts licking and nibbling on my ear is when I charge over to Josh and plead my case. It’s all a little fuzzy. My vision is so blurry I haven’t been able to pick Aubrey out of the crowd since Marissa came back.

“Why can’t you just do her here?”
Josh asks, defeated.

“No
condom,” I say blatantly.

Josh hesitates for a while longer then finally gives in. I rush over to
Marissa and grab her hand then drag her to our villa. All I really remember after that is her being a screamer. She is so loud that I have to clamp my hand over her mouth and tell her to shut up. But for some reason that turns her on more and she moans louder. Afterward I tell her to leave and she slips on her dress and walks across the hall to the bathroom, but I pass out before I hear her walk down the stairs.

The next morning, or afternoon, I open my eyes and immediately shut them. The light is so bright my head feels like it is going to explode. Normally hangovers only affect my head. I never throw up, I never feel sick. But when I think back at what happened the night before, I want to hurl. And it has nothing to do about the alcohol, but the beautiful girl that probably slept on the couch.

I had sex with a random girl, right here in this bed, with Aubrey down the stairs. The girl was loud, probably on purpose. I told Aubrey she could stay with me, but I brought a
nother girl back. Shit.

Technically I shouldn’t care because of my rule but for some
messed up reason, I feel guilty. I groan out my frustrations and pound the bed with my fists.

“Ugh, will you not do that?” a voice
says beside me. A girl’s voice. I crane my neck and see the girl from last night. Maria? Missy? Shit I don’t remember it. And she is naked next to me. I move away from her, closer to the wall, and I can feel sand in the sheets.

She sits up and
purrs… fucking purrs. Like I’m attracted to cats or something. “Hey, what’s for breakfast?”

“Um, whatever you have back at your place. I told you to leave last night.” I normally don’t act like a total dick to the girls I hook up with but maybe if she leaves pissed off it will help my cause, whatever that is.
Plus I’m in a foreign country and never plan on seeing this chick again, so who cares how I treat her now? I was so wasted last night I could have screwed a burrito and wouldn’t have known the difference.

She only laughs and gets off the bed to put on her dress. “Fine. I see. So, what’s my name?”

“Oh, my God, I don’t have time to play this shit with you. I don’t remember your name, I don’t want your number, I’ll pay your cab if you want, I don’t care. Just… go.” I am exasperated; I have been with girls like this before. The ones that know everything and laugh and make a game of it when you don’t. They don’t even care that they are used for sex.

“Okay, okay. I get it,” she says and winks. “I’ll see myself out, I guess.”

After she disappears down the hall, I freak out, afraid everyone is downstairs in the living room. I bolt out of bed, and sputter to a stop at the top of the stairs. Boxers, I need boxers. I have them half on by the time I’m at the landing, just as I see her turn at the bottom step. Her mouth is in a sneer, ready to speak.

“He’s all yours ladies. Sorry for the audio last night. When my buttons get pushed there’s no stopping it,” she smirks at the three girls in the living room and vanishes from my sight.

I don’t want to go down there now, I’m too embarrassed. Maybe I can sneak back up the stairs and climb out the window and hop on a flight out of here and move out of the apartment and transfer schools before they even realize I’m gone.

“Kel, get your skanky ass down here and stop hiding,” Cara yells at me from the couch. I take a step at a time, the feel of the carpet scratching against the bottom of my feet. “Do you
want to explain yourself? Is there some double standard here in this villa? I do recall myself having someone over not too long ago, and him getting the shit kicked out of him because of it. So believe my utter confusion when I find out that a random girl is here when there were strict rules forbidding such a thing?”

I open my mouth to reply, but MJ cuts me off. “And when we got back here last night, the door was unlocked, her nasty K-mart sandals were kicked in the entryway, and we got to hear her lovely voice screaming your name. Poor A
J was in tears.”

My gaze, for the first time since I came down the stairs, shoots to her, hoping she isn’t crying now. She isn’t, but the glower on her face isn’t much better. She looks at me like she hates me. I try to tell myself I didn’t do anything wrong, but I know it is just a technicality. And my tiny, pathetic, and useless brain decides to torture me and pull up a memory from last night with me and Aubrey at the table. She let me touch her and we held hands. And I was supposed to sleep with
her
.

“I’m sorry,” I say, but i
t comes out in barely a whisper, my voice still groggy from last night’s activities.