My Future Stepbrother

Chapter 157

The drive back to the marina was just me asking myself that question over and over again... okay and a bit of me picturing what it would be like to rip that fucking dress off her body.


I haven't got laid in three years and my balls are bluer than my fucking eyes but it had never bothered me until now, there was no-one that ever just made me want to fuck them senseless like Lee did, never mind make passionate love to them. She'd ruined other women for me.


There was no parking as per usual during the summer down here but just as I was ready to give up hope and find a side street I saw someone pulling out right in front of the walkway. I sat staring down at the view of the boat. This is exactly where I ended up that night.


Right after Elizabeth had finished ripping my heart out and showing it to me she gave me the final gut punch, the keys to Chad's hummer.


I told her I didn't want it, I could never bring myself to drive it. She told me she couldn't look at it, she wanted me to sell it and use the money for something I could remember him with. I drove around for hours after I left there and ended up in this very spot just as the sun was starting to rise.


The crying came first, all of it too much. Lee was always happiest by the water and it was the only thing that made me feel close to her anymore. I walked all the way to the end of the pier and watched the sun rise high into the sky, I was just getting ready to leave when I saw this boat. It was even more dilapidated up close than what it looked like that day she spotted it across the dock but there was something about it, it had charm like him and beauty like her.


I spotted the for sale sign in the window and the rest is history. I wasn't even sure what I was going to do with it at first, I just wanted to make something in my life whole again and this seemed like a good place to start.


When I brought Cole to see it he told me I was mad, when he first tried to sit on the bench and went straight through the wood to the floor I don't think that helped matters.


The time we spent working on it changed things between us, we'd talk while we worked. Of course we avoided the subject of Lee for a really long time but I learnt so much about him outside of that. We'd talk about his life as a kid, losing his parents, mum and then Heather.


I liked hearing stories about her, she sounded funny, feisty and pure. Just like her daughter. I'd been living in the pool-house surrounded by her art for so long I'd started to feel like I knew her already. You can tell so much about someone from their work.


One night we were working late, we'd been at this every time I came home for almost two years and were sitting having a well earned break when he finally he asked me the question he'd always wanted too. "Did you truly love Aleah?"


I wasn't expecting it, he never spoke about her in front of me but that night something had changed. We'd talked about everything else until that point and I think he'd learnt I wasn't capable of being the person he'd built me up to be in his head and he finally wanted to know the truth of what happened between us.


"Cole, I have never loved anything as much as I love Lee, and I never will again. I fell in love with her before I even knew what love was and if I'd died in that school that night I would have died happy knowing that I'd been given the honour and the privilege to have her love me back."


I told him everything that night, okay not everything - I'd made sure to skim over the details she'd rather her father didn't know about that we did together.


He'd listened to every word. He didn't get angry or lash out once, even when I told him about what happened with Brittany.


"Son.. the way you talk about her. It's not the way someone talking about someone in their past speaks. All this, it's still there with you isn't it?"


The first moment I acknowledged it out loud was right then. "I'll never stop loving her Cole. I've tried. I know that's hard for you to hear, I know it would be better for you and Mum if I could but I just can't. This, staying away, it's the best I can promise to do."


When Cole went home that night everything had changed between us, we were close now. I was always going to hold a bit of resentment against him but I was working on it, I knew one day I'd get there. In the months since he has been more of a father to me than mine was in my entire life.


Stepping into the cabin I could see Lisa still passed out on the bed, drool hanging out of her lips all over the pillow. Thank god she's going to get her misses tonight because one more day of looking at that face and I might drop her off in the Atlantic.


I walk back up on deck and do what I always do when I feel like this, draw.


Sketching for a bit as I feel the cold ocean breeze hit the back of my neck, I just let my pencil flow across the page with little notice of what I was actually drawing. I was completely lost, my pencil moving faster than my mind until eventually I stopped.

Staring down at her eyes I knew I had to walk away. What was wrong with me? I hadn't drawn her in months. One fleeting moment of verbal contact and I'm right back where I fucking started.


I closed the overflowing book, my fingers lightly grazing over the inscription before leaving it in my art supplies bag on the newly waxed bench. I turned and added a few more layers of deep red to the canvas instead. I'd been quiet inspired by Heather's work, even my final college piece had been based on something she did.


I need to go clean these brushes, Lisa will be up soon and once she starts chatting I'll never escape. She wined for two hours last night about the fact I only ever have non-alcoholic beer in the fridge.


As soon as the tap turned on I could hear footsteps up on deck, too light to be Cole returning my tools, Mum?


Stepping out the doors and turning, I fell against the frame. There she was, her white dress blowing in the breeze as she touched delicately towards the canvas. The afternoon rays bouncing of her golden hair like she was a vision created solely in my mind. I can't believe she's standing there, on my deck. This, all this, it was inspired by her dreams.


"Fuck." I see the red paint I'd just applied now coats her slim fingers as she starts to panic.


"Lee?" Shit. She jumps at the sound of my voice, clutching her hand to her chest and spreading the paint all over where her heart sits. I can't believe I'm fucking talking to her, her name so easy to speak out loud now I'm looking at her.


I need to stay calm, I don't even know why she's here. Did she want to speak to me? Did mum send her for something?


She motions towards the canvas where her tiny prints sit and I can tell she thinks she ruined it, if only she realised having a small part of her on there only makes it that much better. I try to wipe the smile that's desperate to make its way to my face away before it has a chance to show, the emotion feeling completely alien after so long without it. "Why are you here Aleah?"


I couldn't say Lee again, this shouldn't get so familiar. I need to hold my shit together, don't let anything read on my face. She could just be here to see if I've got laundry or something, I'm blowing this out of proportion.


"...Did you fix this up yourself?" I want to ask her so many questions, tell her everything about what I did here but now just isn't the time. I just nod, fearing my voice will give me away completely.


I can't stop looking at her, I can't say a damn word as I just rake in the sight of her. I've pictured this moment so many times, everything I'd do and everything I'd say but it's all left me now. My heart feels like its going to explode if I just keep ogling at her, every emotion I've felt and repressed over these few years is scraping at my insides to be let back out.


She wants to go. I have to say something to keep her here. "Your hair is longer."


Seriously you fucking idiot. You're probably the most moronic dick on this fucking planet right now. Her hair? Jesus..


She runs her fingers along her delicate curls and I feel weak. "Yeah, I actually cut it shorter a few years ago but it grows like a weed."

I had that, all of her. I ran my fingers through that hair as she slept, I washed that fucking hair while she rested peacefully against my chest, I wrapped my fist in it as I pulled her and arched her back...


"I remember, it looked good on you. This is better though."


Oh fuck.


She looks at me like she has no fucking idea what I'm talking about, she saw me I know she did. Did she not realise I saw her too? Maybe she thought she escaped without me noticing? As if my body wouldn't react to her mere presence in my vicinity. "I saw it the day I came for a game at your school, well from the back mostly, as you were quiet busy sprinting away from me at the time."


Her face is gaining a stronger rose tint by the second, she still can't hide it even after all this time. I forced myself not to race after her that day, it was all still so raw back then.


She starts stumbling over her words, I should feel bad that she's like this but it's just too fucking cute. It's nice to have the tables turned considering what a dick I made of myself earlier. "...I just wasn't expecting to see you."


A smirk that has eluded me for so long places itself firmly at my lips. "Well.. I guess you know how I felt earlier then..."


She's nervous, she's trying to hide it but she can't stop fiddling with her dress and doesn't even realise she's practically lifting it to the point I can see her underwear... is she trying to kill me?


I have to look somewhere else, anywhere else. I hone in on the red paint dusted along her chest, focusing on it's attempts to dry under the heat.


Wait... What is that?

I step forward without meaning too, just trying to get a closer look. There's a mark, almost invisible but I can see the way it glistens under the rays. A perfectly circular burn.


She follows my eye-line and starts to try rub the paint away with her fingers frantically. She must be panicked because we can both see she's just making it worse.


Grabbing one of the cloths from my bag I subtly push my sketch pad down towards the bottom, she doesn't need to know I still have it. She'd probably think I'm some weird stalker dude for still taking it with me everywhere.


Then it happened. Just as I hand her the rag, her touch meets mine and the electrical charge is enough to power this whole town.

Fuck... This fucking girl. Barely a moment her skin against mine, hardly long enough to register and yet its like an eruption goes off within my soul.


She can't meet my eyes but I need her too, I can't fucking stand this. I walk straight too her as she gets further distracted by the paint and I just want to take her and fucking kiss her right now.


I know I can't. I know a girl like her probably has someone waiting for her, every guy in her classes probably went to bed at night dreaming of the beautiful girl sitting in the front row.


The sun catches that mark again and I focus my view their instead. My fingers reach out and I don't have the control to stop them. Her skin is just as soft and smooth as I remember, the small bumps of the circle only a blip against her porcelain complexion.


I know what this is, that fucking gun. He shoved it into her chest while it was still hot from killing Harley, if that cunt wasn't already dead I'd have killed him my fucking self.


I couldn't cope with looking at my scars from that night, the bullet wound, the operations. They all left eternal marks but now they're covered all I see is my art displayed along my skin instead. She wouldn't ever have to do that of course, she was always so much stronger than me.


"Jayce..."


Please don't say my name like that. I won't be able to hold back if she keeps looking at me like that either.


"Does it still hurt?" I try to make my voice match my touch, I can see the pain evident in her eyes. We've never talked about that night, not once. We both just ran away from it and each other in the process.


At the time I really thought that was for the best, she held my hand that day and I could see her resolve was solid. I had one moment of weakness, a split second when she tried to take her hand back and I just held on but I had to let go. I couldn't keep her anymore, she was already set on being gone.


I want to talk to her, I want to be a part of her life but I know I could never just be her friend. She's Lee. She's the love of my life and being her friend, watching her move on... even the thought fucking destroys me.


I bite the inside of my mouth, the pain pulling me back to reality so I can focus on anything but the way she's staring back into my eyes right now. "Do you recognise the boat?"


I've done so much here, I doubt she would. I've tried to keep as much as I could but I couldn't be sure she'd even remember showing it too me. I've never let anything leave me from our time together but that doesn't mean she has held onto any of it.


She scans the deck, taking in the subtle details until I see the realisation hit her. I can feel the way her heart starts to beat erratically against my fingertips.


"...the one I saw in our first date..." There it is. The thing I'd lost and needed her with me to find - finally a smile spreading across my face... She remembers.


Her eyes glow as she smiles back up at me. I never meant it to be this but deep down I always knew one thing - I did this for her. Even if she never stepped foot on this thing I'd still know I only have this dream because she gave it to me. It all started with her, it was always her.


We keep smiling at each other and the unfamiliar feeling of happiness fills me up like hot coffee on a cold winter evening. I'm home.


"Hey jock! You got anything else to drink here but... oh sorry. Hello?" She always did have shitty timing.


Jesus, Lisa is going to freak when she realises who this is. I wouldn't even show her a photo of Lee but she's always been desperate to meet her I was afraid she’d slide into her DM’S or something. I hope she doesn't embarrass me too much here, the girl’s my best mate but she's kind of a nightmare.


I step away before she decides to start making kissy noises or something. "Um... Lisa this is... Aleah."


Her eyes grow bigger then the empire state building and I want to beg her not to say anything but she's not even attempting to look in my direction right now.


"No way! Wow, it's lovely to meet you." She walks past me and extends her hand Lee and I can already see the way she's scanning her entire body.


She turns back to me with a smirk. "You were right Jayce, she's gorgeous."


For. Fucks. Sake. Why don't you just tell her I'm still in love with her too Lis? God! Her eyes move back to Lee's and I practically want to hit the thoughts I know she's having out of her head, if she didn't have a girlfriend right now I know she'd be all over Lee like a damn rash. Hot straight girls are her fucking cat-nip.


Lee stares directly at me but the look in her eyes is hurt, what happened? "I'm sorry, I didn't realise you had... company.... I'd um... better get back."


Lisa isn't fucking company, she's just my weirdo best mate that practically lives here when she's in town and annoys the shit out of me.


Lee's not okay, I look at Lisa and she senses it too. She runs off down the steps and Lisa shouts how it was nice to meet her but Lee doesn't even look back.


I watch her walk away, her hair blowing in the breeze as she scurry’s down the walkway.

"Do you think she thought we were... you know?... Because eww... dick germs. Sorry mate but if the survival of the human race rested on me fucking you then I'd welcome extinction with a smile." I look to Lisa pulling on her now dry pants and I realise now how this must have looked.


Shit.

I throw my shoes on and run down after Lee but there's too many people, I look into every red car along the strip but she's nowhere to be seen. She probably thinks me and Lis are.. fucking hell.


I get back up on deck and Lisa has finally decided to get her clothes back on. "She thought we were fucking didn't she?"


I throw myself down on the seat next to her. "I think so. I couldn't see her, can't exactly just fucking call her after all this time and tell her can I? Plus she might not even be bothered, probably has her own guy by now."


"Dude you don't know that. Besides did you see how she reacted?... I thought that was the point of you going on this stupid fucking trip and leaving me all alone for a few months was to finally get over that chick anyway."


I nod. "Yeah, that was before I saw her. Shit Lis, I thought I was good but I sweat the second I laid eyes on her again it was like I'd never been apart from her."

Slamming my head back against the wall I try to rub out the knots forming in my neck. "It's still there. All of it. I'm still fucking in love with her and there isn't shit I can do about it is there?"


She offers her version of comfort my punching me harshly in the arm. "Woman up, you need to tell this girl all this stuff before you run off douchebag. Don't give me that shit about your mum because you know I won't buy it. You've been in love with this girl practically your whole life mate, you need to talk to her and if it's not going to happen then at least you'll be able to move on knowing that you tried.” I don’t think she gets it, things aren’t that simple for us. “I gotta say though... it's good to see you smile again. Didn't think you were capable of being anything but all broody dick anymore."


I shove her and her ass hits the floor with a thump. "You deserved that for telling her I told you she was beautiful."


She chuckles getting up and dusting herself off. "Well mate I didn't need you to tell me that, have you seen the ass on that girl? No wonder you can't let her go."

For fucks sake....

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