The Coincidence 06 The Resolution of Callie & Kayden (11 page)

I decide to ignore his weird sidetracking thing – for now anyway – but I will get to the bottom of it.

‘He’s been really nice since I finally told him what happened,’ I say as Kayden gives my arm a tug and lures me toward him. ‘I don’t want to be mad at him anymore. It was too exhausting and there’s no point in holding grudges.’

The corner of his lips tip to a half smile. ‘You always say stuff that I feel applies to me.’

‘Oh, that’s not what I meant,’ I begin to protest as our bodies greet each other. ‘What happened between Jackson and me isn’t the same as what your father and mother did to you. At all.’ I feel horrible for what I said. Kayden should be able to hold a grudge against his father and mother, forever in my opinion. After his father stabbed him and nearly killed him – stuff like that just doesn’t erase. The large scar on Kayden’s side proves that.

‘Callie, relax. I know you weren’t referring to me.’ He gently tugs on a loose strand of my hair. ‘I was just teasing you.’

I assess him carefully. He seems like he’s being honest and looks almost happy. ‘You seem in a good mood. What’s up?’

He rolls his tongue in his mouth to keep from smiling. ‘It’s nothing. I’m just happy I’m here with you.’

I tip my head and study him suspiciously. ‘No, something’s up. You’re like super happy and you just purposely sidetracked me from the fact that the list is missing from the door.’

‘Okay, maybe there is something on.’ He’s so cute, trying to restrain a grin. ‘But I can’t tell you right now.’

‘Is it bad?’

‘No. It’s good, I think.’ He’s totally enjoying this.

‘Okay, now I really want to know.’ I pout out my lip. ‘Please.’

Chuckling under his breath, he reaches up and touches my bottom lip with his fingertip. ‘That trick’s not going to work on me.’

‘What trick?’ I ask innocently.

He gives me a look. ‘Are you trying to tell me that you don’t purposefully pout your lip out when you’re trying to get your way?’ he asks and I get a guilty look on my face. ‘Yeah, see. I can read you just as well as you can read me.’ He winks at me then pulls me in for a kiss, dropping the football to the floor. Our tongues instantly tangle and within seconds he’s picking me up and carrying me toward the bed.

I have every intention of pulling off his clothes and re-experiencing the moment we shared in the car a few weeks ago, but then the door swings open and Harper comes walking in.

‘Oh shit.’ She halts in the doorway when she spots us on the bed, legs entwined, bodies pressed together, hands all over each other – thankfully no one’s clothes have come off.

‘Sorry,’ I apologize, sitting up while Kayden remains lying down, his fingers sketching up and down my back. ‘We were just …’ How am I supposed to finish that sentence?
We were just about to have hot, sweaty sex?
Yeah, that sentence is not coming out of my mouth.

Harper dithers in the doorway, hugging her books to her chest. ‘I can come back.’

I shake my head and hop off my bed. ‘No, it’s okay. I needed to run to the store anyway.’ I reach for my jacket as Kayden begrudgingly gets off the bed and picks up his football.

‘Hey, could you by chance pick up a roll of tape for me?’ Harper asks as she drops her books onto the bed. ‘I ran out last night.’

I nod. ‘Sure.’

‘Thanks.’ She forces a smile as she starts to unbutton her jacket. ‘Actually, Callie, before you leave … could I talk to you?’ She flicks the last button undone then sets her coat on the bedpost, her eyes flicking to Kayden before they land on me. ‘Alone maybe?’

‘Um, yeah, sure.’ I turn to Kayden who shoots me a puzzled look. ‘Can I meet you out in the car?’

He nods warily. ‘Sure.’ He softly kisses my forehead then glances at Harper before walking out the door. Once it clicks shut, I face Harper. ‘So what’s up?’

‘It’s nothing really.’ But her expression suggests otherwise as she sinks down on the bed, her shoulders slumped. ‘Honestly, I don’t know how to bring it up without you getting mad.’

‘I won’t get mad.’ I don’t know what else to say, since I don’t know where this is going.

Sighing, she fiddles with a strand of her hair, twisting it around her finger. ‘The other day I overheard you and Seth talk about stuff.’ She’s staring at her hair, completely fixated on it. ‘About something that happened to you.’

‘I’m not sure what you mean.’ I sit down on my bed so we’re facing each other. ‘Seth and I have said a lot of things,’ I tell her and then try to make a joke because she looks so sad. ‘Particularly Seth. He
loves
to talk.’

A tiny smile rises on her lips, but her eyes still seem filled with sadness as she looks up at me. ‘Well, it was the other day. I think you guys thought I had my headphones on and was listening to music, but I was actually trying to find something to listen to so I heard a little bit of your conversation … about a guy doing stuff to you.’ She winces as she says it, and even though I’m used to talking about this aloud, I still wince myself.

‘Yeah …’ Again, I’m unsure of what to say.

‘Sorry,’ she says quickly. ‘I’m sure you’re wondering why I’m saying this and the truth is … well, the truth is I heard you say something about how you were feeling a lot better and that you have been since you talked to your parents about it. I was kind of wondering’ – her gaze drops to the space on the floor between our feet – ‘how you went about that.’

‘Telling my parents that I was … raped?’ It’s still so hard to say aloud, even though I’ve been openly talking about it for a while.

Again, she winces. ‘Yeah … that.’ She looks up at me and although she doesn’t say anything about it, I think I suddenly understand why she’s bringing this up. I know that pained look she’s trying to keep trapped inside her because I did the same thing for years.

I’m not sure if I should ask her yet if she was raped. Stuff like this can be tricky – getting someone to tell the truth can be tricky. I should know since it took me almost seven years of carrying around this dark heaviness inside me, afraid to let it out because I was afraid of what people would think of me and honestly, I was afraid of Caleb, too.

‘You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.’ Harper’s words rush out of her. Right now, she seems like a completely different person, but that’s because she’s vulnerable and scared.

‘No, it’s okay.’ I lift my shoulders to build up some confidence. ‘When it came to telling my parents, I just sort of sat them down and told them. There’s really not a right or easy way to do it, other than to do it. I do think that getting to the point where you decide you’re going to tell someone is the hardest part, though.’

‘Did you struggle with it?’ she asks. ‘I mean, with getting up the courage to tell someone.’

I suck in a gradual inhale through my nose to keep the emotions inside me so I won’t freak her out. ‘Yeah, it took me almost seven years.’

Her eyes snap wide. ‘How old were you when it happened?’

‘Twelve.’

‘Jesus, Callie, that’s horrible.’

‘Yeah, it was, but I’m trying to move on.’ I pause, wondering if it’s the right time to ask her something yet, but then I realize that there might not be a right time and I just have to do it. ‘How old were you?’

She sighs, her shoulders slumping. ‘Is it that obvious why I’m asking all this?’

‘It might not be for someone else, but you have this look on your face right now that I’m kind of familiar with.’

‘And what look is that?’

‘Fear … pain.’

We exchange a look of understanding. I’ve always known that what happened to me has happened to other people, but I’ve never really discussed it with anyone who’s had to live through the hellish experience.

‘I feel those things,’ she says quietly, her eyes getting watery. ‘I hate that I do, though. Everyone thinks I’m so happy because that’s what I show them, but I’m not as happy as I seem.’

‘Everyone thought I was crazy,’ I tell her. ‘But I did chop off my hair with a pair of scissors and stop talking to people.’

She offers me a sympathetic look. ‘Callie, that’s so sad.’

‘And so is pretending to be happy all the time,’ I say. ‘Everyone should feel okay enough to be themselves.’

She nods, agreeing. ‘Yeah, but my story’s not as sad as yours. I was fourteen and older.’

‘That doesn’t make it any better.’ I stand up from the bed and cross the room to sit down beside her, my legs feeling the slightest bit wobbly. ‘Rape is a horrible thing no matter what and you should tell someone about it.’

‘I’m not sure if I can tell my mom.’ She frowns and it makes me wonder if perhaps it was somebody living under the same roof as her.

‘How about a brother or sister, then?’ I suggest.

She shakes her head. ‘I don’t have any.’

‘How about your dad?’

Her expression hardens as she grinds her teeth and balls her hands into fists. ‘I’m not telling my stepfather.’

Okay, I’m pretty sure that’s probably who did it to her, but I don’t want to push her, or make assumptions because I can tell she’s on the verge of cracking and I could be wrong. ‘What about another relative or a therapist?’

She considers what I said for quite a few minutes. ‘You’ve talked to a therapist, right? I mean, I thought I heard Seth and you talking about it at the beginning of the school year.’

‘Yeah, I used to up until a couple of months ago. I can give you her number. She’s really nice and understanding and gets things like this.’

‘Okay, yeah, can I have her number?’

Nodding, I retrieve my phone from my pocket and text Harper the contact information of my therapist. ‘You should call her today, too, while you’re in this place where you can talk about it.’

‘But I didn’t really talk about it,’ she says with a discouraged sigh. ‘Not really.’

‘That’s not true.’ I tuck my phone away. ‘What you said today was a big, huge step.’

Her lips turn upward and it looks as though she might be showing me a glimpse of her real smile. I realize right there and then I’ve never seen it before.

‘Well, I’ll call her, but we’ll see how it goes when it comes time to go there,’ she says. ‘I’ve tried this before and never got the courage to do it. I only dared bring it up to you after I heard you talking to Seth about what happened to you because it made me feel like you’d …’ – she fidgets with a bracelet she’s wearing – ‘understand, I guess.’

‘A lot of people will understand.’ I pause, wondering what else I can do to help her because I want to help her – want to help people who are struggling like I was once. Just thinking about other people out there that have gone through stuff like me and Harper makes me want to find all of them and tell them it’ll be okay. I’m not even sure how to do that, but I need to, somehow. ‘If you want me to, I can go with you to your appointment.’

‘Really?’ She perks up, seeming genuinely happy.

I nod. ‘Of course.’

She looks utterly relieved. ‘Thanks, Callie. And not just for the offer, but for not getting all weirded out. You’re really good at this, you know. Talking and understanding and everything.’

Her words warm my heart. ‘Thanks. And you’re welcome,’ I tell her and head for the door. ‘Let me know when you get scheduled and if you ever need to talk, I’m right across the room.’

She nods then I step into the hallway, shut the door behind me, and lean against it. I feel strangely at peace with myself. I’m not even sure if it’s because I was able to talk to someone about what happened to me without going into a panic or if it’s because I tried to help someone who didn’t flat out ask.

‘Is everything okay?’ Kayden’s voice tugs me out of my thoughts.

I turn my head and find him standing to the side of me, the football tucked under his arm. ‘Hey, I thought you went down to the car.’

He glances from the door back to me. ‘Nah, I thought I’d wait for you here. Seemed like you might need me after whatever was happening in there.’

I stand upright. ‘No, I’m fine. She just wanted to talk about stuff.’

‘What kind of stuff?’ he asks as we move toward the elevator, holding hands.

‘Stuff she’s going through,’ I say vaguely. ‘Stuff I’d understand.’

Thankfully, I think he gets what I’m implying without me having to say it aloud, since I’m pretty sure Harper wouldn’t want me talking to anyone about it.

I push the down button with my thumb then face him while we wait for the doors to open. ‘So are you going to tell me now why you look so happy today?’

‘Nope.’ His lips twitch with amusement.

‘You are the meanest person ever.’ I jump into the elevator as the doors swing open, yanking him in with me and he ends up stumbling over his feet. ‘But that’s okay because I love you.’

He laughs as I stand on my tiptoes to kiss him, but he quickly pulls back when his phone starts buzzing inside the back pocket of his jeans. Usually he ignores calls and texts when we’re in a lip lock, so I’m a little surprised when he moves away to take his phone out. He muses over something as he reads the message on the screen.

I recline against the wall and casually ask, ‘Who’s that?’

He stares at the screen a second longer before texting something back. ‘No one.’

I’m not sure how to respond to his brush off, so I crack a joke. ‘Well, clearly it’s someone; otherwise, your phone wouldn’t have gone off.’

He presses one last button on the screen then returns his phone to his pocket before looking back at me. ‘It was just a text from Seth.’

‘And what’d it say?’

He shrugs, bracing a hand on the wall beside my head. ‘Nothing important really.’ He leans in to kiss me, but I place a hand on his solid chest and stop him.

‘Your jaw’s twitching right now,’ I remark, somewhat amused, but a little bit upset.

He gives me a mock offended look, pushing back from the wall to press his hand to his chest. ‘Are you accusing me of lying?’

I narrow my eyes at him, but it’s a playful gesture. ‘Yeah, that’s exactly what I’m doing?’ I point a finger at him as we reach the bottom floor and the elevator doors glide open. ‘I know you’re keeping something from me and I’m going to find out.’

He’s completely entertained now as he follows me off the elevator and toward the exit doors. ‘And how do you plan on doing that?’ He shoots me a cocky grin.