Page 3 of Wait For Me

My years-long crush had been cornered into the half-assed proposal he offered. Life as I’d known it for eighteen years was about to change drastically. My father wasn’t even here to tell me happy birthday, let alone to say goodbye to me, and now, this was the second worst birthday I’d ever had. The first being when I had to grow another year older without my mom, just a week after she had been killed.

“She’s not going! This is bullshit!” Kip yelled at someone, though I didn’t bother to glance up to see who that might have been. I knew it couldn’t have been Uncle Mack, because there was no way that my brother would disrespect his VP like that.

“Never said she was, Kip,” Uncle Mack’s voice was deceptively quiet. “Clear out. Give me and Star the room,” he ordered. Uncle Mack really was my uncle by blood. He was my mom’s older brother. He was the reason that my mom and dad met in the first place. Sometimes, I wondered whether he regretted making that introduction, considering he lost his sister as a result.

I really had to stop thinking. My thoughts were just growing darker and darker as I tried to avoid the situation in front of me.

“Hey kiddo,” Uncle Mack said to me as the bed dipped down under his weight. “You wanna tell me what’s really going on here?”

When I lifted my face to meet his eyes, everything was cloudy, muddled by an ocean of tears that hadn’t yet fallen. “I think it’s fairly obvious,” I explained while pointing toward my bags.

“I’m gonna let you in on a little secret, kiddo, it ain’t fuckin’ obvious. You’re gonna have to spell this shit out for me.”

I huffed, the frustration and anger I’d been feeling for weeks, and especially the last couple days, came bubbling to the surface all at once. “It is fucking obvious! Today is my goddamn birthday. I’m eighteen years old, that means I can’t fucking be here anymore. I packed my shit and I’m ready to go,” I yelled at him. “I just don’t have a way to leave with my stuff anymore,” my voice softened in defeat with the admission. Then a fucking sob broke free and gutted me because I didn’t want to do this. Not in front of him, not even in front of myself. I was stronger than this hopeless situation was making me out to be. “I don’t have a way to go, or a place to be, or…”

A feminine gasp by the doorway caught our attention and I glanced up to see a swimmy version of my Aunt Viv standing there. “Oh, my poor girl,” she moaned, voice laden with grief that I didn’t understand. “Come on, you’re coming with me.”

When I didn’t move, Aunt Viv put her arms around my shoulders and nudged until I stood next to her, then she turned her attention to her old man. “You get her bags down to my car, then you can follow me to the house so you can put my bags in the car with them.”

“What the fuck?” Uncle Mack asked.

“What you assholes have done to this girl is nothing short of psychological torture! Who in the hell was supposed to be taking care of her, reassuring her, making sure she knew that this was not an outcome she had to look forward to? I know Tripp has a lot going on with the deaths in Alabama, but someone here should have been handling his daughter while he was away.”

“I thought it had already been handled,” my uncle argued through gritted teeth.

“Yeah? You see where just thinking something gets you?” Aunt Viv sassed back. “That’s your niece!” She shouted at him while pointing at me. “This poor girl thought she had to walk away from the clubhouse with no money, no place to go, and because you were such a dick that you couldn’t even talk to her, she didn’t even think to come to us.” Viv swiped away some of her own tears as they trailed down her cheeks. Then she turned her eyes to the man who stood near the door looking as if he wished the floor would open up and swallow him whole.

“And you,” she hissed. “I know what was decided, and the fact that she was packed up and ready to leave before it was ever mentioned to her, says a lot about how you actually felt. If you had an objection, you should have said so, and much sooner.”

“I didn’t,” he argued, though it was done so quietly I almost missed it.

“You didn’t? That’s why you waited until the last possible minute to even bring it up?” She asked.

“I was going to do it a couple weeks ago,” he admitted. My uncle stiffened beside me.

“And why didn’t you?” My aunt asked.

“I screwed up,” he admitted. “Thought I would have one last hurrah, like a fucking bachelor party or something and…”

My uncle hung his head before looking back up at Jared. “She caught you?” He asked.

Jared nodded.

“She’s seen you before,” my uncle stated, and it was honestly pissing me off that they were talking like I wasn’t still in the room. At least, that was until Jared’s eyes met mine and something akin to regret swam in them.

“I was with Ashlynn.” His admission was met with another gasp of surprise from my aunt and a growl of anger so deep from my uncle that I thought maybe Jared should run.

“Not only did you not do the right thing, the thing you agreed to, but you chased off her only fucking friend outside of the club too?” My aunt asked, horror laced every word she spat at Jared.

“I said I fucked up,” he argued, as if his admission made it all better.

“Come on, Star.” My aunt grabbed my hand and started marching for the door of the room.

“Viv,” Uncle Mack called out.

“I blame you,” she told him. “I blame you, this club, your stupid fucking rules, and her father. This should have been settled a long time ago, and not in the way you attempted to do it. Obviously, that was a horrible mistake!” I didn’t miss the way she threw the words like daggers in Jared’s direction and neither did he. He flinched with each one. “I blame you too, boy! If you weren’t ready, you should have been man enough to say so.”

“Viv, that’s enough!”

---