Page 26 of Need for Speed

He sighs. “Sade, I don’t know what the future holds. I don’t how long it will take Axell to get over this. I’m not sure anyone could give you a time frame for this situation. I mean, you just told your husband since you’ve basically been with since you were seventeen that you have a son that he never knew about. That’s big, likeTitanicbig but I know Axell. I’ve seen the way he looks at you. He loves you too much Sadie to hold this against you forever. As for Drake, I’m sure he’s going to be pissed, confused, and hurt. That’s to be expected, but you are all he will have shortly so I’m sure he will try to move past it. Justremember he’s a teenage boy whose entire world is being ripped away from him. You have plenty of experience in that field sadly,” Seth tells me.

Seth is right if there’s one thing I know, it’s how to handle a teenage boy with his world exploding. I just wish I wasn’t part of the reason why his world was changing. “Thank you, Seth.”

“Anytime Sade, anytime,” Seth whispers to the top of my head. Hearing him use my nickname always makes me smile. When I first moved in with him and my dad, I asked him why he always called me Sade. He told me it was because he wanted a baby brother when our parents first told him he was going to be a big brother. When they brought home a baby sister, he just decided to shorten my name, so it sounded less girly. Over time the nickname has grown on me and I’ve even caught Axell using it from time to time. At the thought of Axell, a sharp pain shoots through my heart. Seth brings me some hot tea and Tylenol. I lie back on his couch and even though I don’t feel like I could sleep I do.

The next morning, I wake to the beaming sunlight cascading through Seth’s wall of glass. I check the time and see it’s just barely past six. I get up and make breakfast, it’s the least I can do after waking him up and crying all over him last night. He appears in the kitchen with a sleepy smile on his face. “I didn’t mean to wake you I just wanted to make you breakfast to say thank you for being there last night.”

“Sade, I’ll always be there, you know that,” he says, as he walks to the coffee pot to pour him a cup. “You still leaving today?”

I nod while biting my lip. “I have to. I put off going to South Carolina and taking care of things long enough. Mom isn’t getting any better and I need to try and mend or form some kind of relationship with Drake before she passes. This transition is going to be hard enough as is. Plus, I’m sure Axell could usethe space. I just hope it helps us heal instead of drifting farther apart.”

“It’ll be okay.”

I shake my head. “You always say that.”

“Because it’s my motto. I have to believe that. If I believed everything was going to come crashing down every day I woke up, well I’d have no reason to get out of bed. I choose to believe that everything will be okay. Things will work out however they are meant to anyways so what good does it do to worry yourself sick. I love you Sade, but you worry too much. Just breathe and have a little faith,” Seth says.

“Faith?”

He nods. “Yes, faith. Faith in Axell. Faith in your relationship. Faith in the love you two share. Faith in yourself.”

“You make it sound so easy,” I mumble.

Seth gives me that lopsided boyish smile. “Because it is. We, humans in general, tend to make things complicated. When you think about it nothing in this world is really that complicated. It’s our way of thinking that makes things seem complicated.”

Seth’s words sink in slowly and he has a point. I decide that I will have plenty of time later on to figure out if this is all that easy or if I’m making it complicated, so I decide to turn the tables on him. “Speaking of complicated, how’s Lyndsay?”

“We’re good. We actually had an early date last night. You’re plan worked, thank you by the way,” Seth says.

I smile and it’s the first real smile I’ve had on my face since yesterday morning. “Good, I’m glad,” and I am glad. I’m glad that things seem to be working out for at least one of us.

I leave Seth’s and head home. I need to shower and change so I can catch my flight. I just don’t know what to expect when I get there. What if all of my belongings are sitting outside? What if Axell kicks me out the minute I walk in? My mind goes through every worst-case scenario as I drive home. To my relief,I don’t see any of my things as I pull into the driveway. When I enter the house it’s quiet. I stop in the kitchen and start a pot of coffee. I peek into Jovi’s room and see him fast asleep in his bed. I brace myself outside our bedroom door for whatever Axell might say or do, but to my surprise when I open the door, I find the bedroom empty. The bed hasn’t been touched since I made it up yesterday. I check the closet and see all of his clothes are still there. I check the bathroom and see all of his personal items are there too. The room doesn’t smell like he’s been in it recently either.

The thought of Axell not coming home last night feels me with even more dread. Who was he with? What was he doing? I may not have a right to ask those questions after everything I just put us through, but I can’t stand the thought of him telling some other girl about all of this. He told me he’d stay at Bowie’s, but I guess a part of me had hoped he wouldn’t. A part of me had hoped that this would all be easy. I’d come home, and he’d be waiting for me. I’d apologize, and he’d tell me he still loved me, and we’d find a way to move on. I knew it couldn’t be that easy, but I wanted it to be. Now, our bedroom seems cold and silent. The moments we shared here are just a memory.

I somehow manage to pull myself together and climb into the shower and get dressed. I pull my hair back in a ponytail and forego any makeup. I have no one I need to impress. I call for a cab, write a note to Axell, and roll my luggage into the hallway. I stop in the kitchen to fix myself a to-go cup of coffee when Jovi staggers into the kitchen, rubbing sleep from his eyes. “Are you leaving mom?”

I turn and smile at him. “Yeah, my flight leaves in a bit. I don’t want to be rushed if I get stuck in traffic.”

“I’ll drive you,” he offers.

I shake off his offer. “No, I already called a cab. You go back to bed. I’m sure you had a late night.”

He nods his head. “Where did you and dad take off to anyways?” I give him a questioning look. “Oh, come on, you two were dancing then you both rushed outside. He came back in and took a bottle of whiskey from the bar that he thought no one saw and left again. You never came back. It wasn’t all that hard to put together.”

My heart sinks further but I put on a smile for Jovi. “You don’t really want details, do you?”

Jovi shivers. “Oh no!”

I laugh then step forward and hug him. “You behave while I’m gone. Listen to your dad and stay out of trouble. I love you.”

“I will behave. I love you too mom,” he tells me before he presses a kiss to my cheek. “Have a safe flight and let me know when you land.”

“I will. Get back to bed,” I tell him as I motion for him to leave the room. Once his door shuts, I blow out an unsteady breath. Where had Axell went? I don’t have time to think about all of it right now. I check my phone again and not surprising, I still have no missed calls or texts from Axell. Sighing, I roll my luggage out of the house and onto the front porch to wait for the cab, but to my surprise the cab isn’t there but Axell is.

****

Axell

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