Page 40 of Knight
I looked up at Tara right as the car pulled to a stop. She gave me a tight smile and a sudden chill filled the car causing goosebumps to take over my skin.
“Hey, hold on a second,” I said answering the call before it clicked over to voicemail.
I wasn’t trying to be rude, but I knew how Stacy was and if I didn’t answer it, she would be busy doing something else by the time I called her back. It didn’t matter that it would only be a few minutes from when she called me, that was just how her brain was.
“Thanks for the ride. See you tomorrow?”
“Yeah,” Tara said as I popped my door open. I gave her a friendly wave, but she took off too quickly to notice.
“Hey!” I said so cheerfully loud I was sure everyone in the apartment building could hear. “Oh my God, how are you?”
“Fat and immobile,” she replied and though her comment was negative, her voice betrayed her excitement. I let out a happy giggle.
“You’re not fat. You’re pregnant. How much longer?”
“A little over a month. But I would argue if he came a little early.”
“I still can’t believe you are going to have a baby. How is Mikey?” I asked and I couldn’t seem to wipe the smile off of my face as I made my way into my apartment.
I flopped onto my bed and kicked my shoes off, not caring for the moment that they were in the middle of the walkway.
Mikey and Stacy were, for lack of a better term, destined to be together. They met in high school and it took months of Mikey asking her out over and over again for her to finally give in. From that first date on they were pretty much inseparable. So, it didn’t surprise me at all when only a few months after they got married, she called me up to tell me that she had a bun in the oven.
“Good,” she replied. “Nothing new here. Tell me what’s going on with you. How are things with Knight? God, it’s still weird to me that you two are living together, but not really.”
“It’s…” I struggled for the words that would explain everything. “Sometimes it kills me and sometimes it’s like that whole chunk of time doesn’t exist. Like we are back at the clubhouse, eating ice cream sandwiches and watching whatever we could find on the TV.”
“It’s still hard for you, though, huh?”
“Yeah,” I sighed and tried to keep the tears at bay.
“You still miss the Knight that you knew. Not the one that broke your heart but the one that would give his life to make sure you were happy and safe.”
“Sometimes I get this feeling like he’s holding back. He’s overprotective but from a distance. Ugh. We had it out the other night. It was so bad, Stace.” The last thing I wanted to do was relive that whole thing but now that I’d opened my big, stupid mouth I knew there was no way she was just going to let me brush it off.
“Did you finally snap?” she asked like she knew me so well. Mainly because she did.
“Yeah. I was going out with a friend I have here, Tara. Well, really, she’s my only friend outside of the club. But anyway. We were dressed up and headed out. I didn’t even know that Knight had returned home at some point while we were getting ready. And, oh God, Mouse was here too. He witnessed the blow-up.”
So for the next ten minutes I relived the whole thing in my head as my mouth pushed out the words. She listened intently like the amazing best friend that she was.
“You were totally right,” she said on a heavy exhale after I was finished. “It is toxic. You guys seem to be trapped in this weird space where you both are just floating there. You can’t move forward because you won’t deal with the past. You guys will never trust one another until youbothsit down and tell each other how you truly feel. Once it’s all out there, that’s when you guys can begin to heal and move on, or whatever you decide.”
As much as I hated it, she was right.
“Find your balls, bitch, and take charge. Where is the take-no-shit Gwen that I know?” she said delivering the final blow.
“He hurt me,” I said so low I wondered if the words had actually made it past my throat.
“I know.”
“I hate him.”
“Know that too, girl.”
“I missed him—miss.I miss him.”
“Well, duh,” she said with a short laugh. “Tell me something I don’t know.”
