Unbound (26 page)

The school came into view and Dani thought about all the days she’d spent roaming those halls. From the very first days, Lucas had been by her side. Hand in hand, they trudged through four years of growing and learning together. Would anyone ever know her the way he did? Would anyone ever want to again? Would Lucas be able to get past this thing she had become and still love her? Of course, in the back of her tormented mind Dani wondered what he would taste like. Way to ruin it, idiot, damn black-eyed freak.

Trying to shake off that line of thought, she reached the back of the school. Behind the school sports fields there was a line of trees. On the other side of those trees was their field. It’s far enough away from all the street and house lights and that made it a great place for stargazing. They’d spent innumerable nights out here, lying in the bed of his truck, looking up at the night sky, talking and making out. So many happy nights were spent under the stars in this place. How many times had she gone home to twirl around in her room and fall on her bed thinking about Lucas, his lips, his hands, and all the promises he whispered to her.

She broke through the line of trees and sure enough, Lucas’s truck was parked on the far side of the field in the spot
where
they had always parked. She couldn’t wait to crawl up in the bed of the truck with him and relive their happiness. She missed him so much. They could get through this together. Dani ran across the field unable to hold herself back any longer. She needed to be loved and forget all the craziness.

As she got closer to the truck, a strange scent hit her like a ton of bricks. It was like cheap perfume and beer mixed with…with sex. She couldn’t go any farther. She stopped and listened to the sounds of a girl moaning and asking for more.

“Lucas,” s
he breathed, “that’s it, baby, r
ight there.” A female voice was moaning her pleasure to him. Now she could see what she’d missed in her rush to reach him. The truck was rocking.

“Yo
u like that, huh? I know you do,
” Lucas said in a deep raspy voice. H
e was panting with his exertion.
“I told you I had what you needed, girl.”

Oh God. She needed to leave. She couldn’t hear this, couldn’t know this. Why? Why would he tell her no and reject her for all these years just to do it with a stranger? She couldn’t get her legs to move as the truck began to rock faster. They were both panting and making sounds of sickening pleasure. Finally her legs did move but in the wrong direction. She walked toward the back of the truck while her brain screamed at her to run, leave now. She didn’t want to see this, couldn’t see this.

Tears streamed down her cheeks and she knew her eyes were black because her sharp vision picked up every hair on his bobbing head when she rounded the truck bed. Night vision was now a curse. Her Lucas was on their field having sex with another girl. It’s an insult, like doing it in their bed, if they had ever shared a bed.

“I love you, Lucas,
” the girl said in
a
heated whisper.

“Yeah, I bet you do,” Lucas replied with
dirty innuendo.

Oh God. Hearing him use that tone with another girl made her sick. Why was she there? This was destroying her and every scrap of her love for him. It burned her like a hot iron to the heart. Her soul was twisting with the pain of it. He was touching her and giving her what Dani had begged him for so many times. He must love her in a way he couldn’t love Dani. She hadn’t been good enough for this kind of passion. He never wanted her the way he so obviously wanted this girl. Here in this place, their place, he was giving away her love, her kisses. They should have been hers. They were supposed to be for her and he gave them away. Dani actually heard the fissure in her heart when it cracked. The piece of her that belonged to Lucas shattered and divorced itself from the rest of her. It turned to dust and blew away in the wind with the smell of their lust and the sound of their climax. There was nothing left in this life for her now. Nothing in this human life she’d lived for nineteen years to keep her here.

The stunned silence she found herself in was almost unbreakable. She didn’t know how long she had stood there before he saw her, but he had seen her. She must have looked like some sick, perverted stalker, standing there staring at the bed of his truck. Lucas leapt from tailgate frantic and confused.  His girlfriend was screeching something at them that Dani couldn’t understand over the deafening silence in her head when Lucas grabbed her shoulders and started to shake her. Maybe she was in shock. After what had felt like the vacuum of space, all the sound and pain flooded back into her at once. She looked up at Lucas. He was disheveled and beautiful, and he reeked of lust and beer.

“Baby, Dani are you okay? Please, talk to me. I’m so sorry.” He wrapped his arms around her. “How long have you been here? I’m so sorry. I didn’t think you would ever speak to me again.” He was holding her tight with her feet dangling and his face buried in the crook of her neck. “I love you so much, Dani, please talk to me.”

She regained some control of her body and pushed at him until he released her. The pissed off girl in the back of his truck was getting dressed now and yelling about how that’s the last time he would ever get her out in this field. Between her comment and his obvious ease with her, Dani could tell this wasn’t the first time. She started to walk away and he grabbed her arm, spinning her around. Now he could see her eyes in the bright moonlight.

“Dani, what happened to your eyes?” He didn’t run like she thought he would. He grabbed her again hugging her tighter, but she pushed him away again.

More calmly than she thought was possible she said, “You should go take care of your girlfriend. I’m going home. Goodbye, Lucas.” And they both knew that was goodbye forever. Dani backed away from him taking one last look at his sandy hair and blue-gray eyes. He had been her savior, once upon a time, but he couldn’t save her anymore. No one could.

“Please, I know you’re upset, but we can talk about this. You broke up with me. I thought you didn’t love me anymore. I was lonely and hurting,” he said around the beginnings of a sob. The girl was screaming at him from across the field to take her home. The cold that had settled into Dani’s chest was either the calm before the storm or the death of their love. She wasn’t sure which.

“Don’t cry for me, Lucas. I don’t blame you. I understand now that I wasn’t what you wanted, what you needed. I guess I didn’t deserve your love. I begged you to love me like you loved her and you didn’t want to. What an ass I made of myself, begging for your affection. I begged you, Lucas.” She shook her head in self-disgust.

“Are you crazy? I did love you. I do love you. She is nothing, nobody. Please let me make this better. It wasn’t that I didn’t want you,” he sputtered. “You scared me. I know that sounds ridiculous, but something about you would always scare the shit out of me at the last minute.” He was really crying now and trying to grab her hand while she continued to back away. He could see the resignation in her blank stare. He could hear the end in her cold tone.

“So, what you’re telling me is you gave away my love for nothing, to nobody? Just like when you came to see me at school. You hurt me to impress a bunch of guys you didn’t even know, and broke my trust with a stranger. I’m very sorry to know that all the love I gave you was worth so little.” The calm cracked as tears overflowed and she turned away from him. Dani moved so fast she was sure he didn’t even see her go but she couldn’t stand there anymore with him trying to touch her with the hands he’d had all over that girl. He had pressed his lips against Dani’s neck after kissing her. She was disgusted.

She ran until she reached her street, her mom’s street. She didn’t live here anymore. She didn’t belong. She stormed into the house hoping her mom wouldn’t see her, but no such luck. She was standing by the stairs and got a full view of the black-eyed freak when she walked in. Tessa staggered back a step.

“Danielle, what happened? Are you alright?” She rushed forward to embrace her, but Dani didn’t want to be touched.

On her way up to her room she said, “Don’t you mean Soleil?” and slammed the bedroom door. Ok. That was uncalled for, but she was so damn mad at the world for lying and making her think she was something she wasn’t, and it all started with her mother. She gathered everything that was of any importance to her from her room. Tessa knocked on the door and walked in.

“Please don’t touch me. It hurts too much.” She flinched when Tessa reached out to her.

“What hurts? Did someone hurt you?” Alarms rang in her mom’s voice and she reached for her cell phone.

“No
,
Mom, nobody touched me.” She paused to take a deep breath before she lost it. “I found out today that my whole life has been a lie. I have no idea who or what I am anymore. Even my name is a lie. I have to give up my freedom to be protected by people that are only going to reject me when they find out I’m not what they think I am. I have to hide from someone who wants to kill me, and I just caught Lucas having sex with a girl in the back of his truck. All I want now is to be left alone please.” She couldn’t even look at her mom. Sanity was holding on by a string. Tessa nodded and turned to leave.

“I’m sorry I y
elled at you. I love you, Mommy,
” Dani apologized.

Tessa looked back and their eyes met, “I’m sorrier than you could ever be.” She shut the door behind her. Shortly after that, Dani heard a knock at the front door. She had expected him to follow so she was prepared for his arrival. She should have told her mom not to let him in, but either way it didn’t matter. Dani cracked the door so she could hear Tessa telling him that she was busy and didn’t want company.

“Please, Ms. Tessa, I have to see her. She doesn’t understand,” he begged.

There was a pregnant pause before she began. “Did she see you having sex with another girl, Lucas?” Mom asked very directly. He didn’t respond but she figured his face said it all. “Then I think she understands perfectly. You have made your feelings known in a vivid fashion, and now I would like you to leave.” She shut the door in his face.

He came around the side of the house and started yelling up to her window just as she had expected, “Dani, please let me in. Let’s talk about this. I love you. Please, listen to me.” She ignored him for a minute but didn’t want the neighbors to call the cops. She opened the window. “Dani, finally, please let me in. We need to talk. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I really thought we were done.”

Dani leaned out of the window with an arm full of clothes he’d given her and dropped them to the ground. His jacket she’d always worn to school, t-shirts she used to sleep in, and she even tossed the damn black lacey panties and bra she wore when they were supposed to make love that last night before she left for school.

“We are done, Lucas.”

Then she grabbed all the pictures from her mirror and dresser and tossed th
em down. “Hold on, I’m not done,” s
he said and fetched the scrapbook of all the memories she had lovingly gathered and put together and tossed them out the window, followed by a box containing snap shots spanning four years. When she looked down, he was crying and gathering all the scattered memorabilia.

When he looked up, she told him honestly, “You did us a favor tonight, Lucas. I know this doesn’t make sense to you now but you’re better off without me. Go on with your normal life and forget about me. One day when you’re married and have beautiful blue-eyed children, you’ll thank me for this. I did love you, Lucas, and I thought I always would. But I can’t anymore. I don’t want you to beat yourself up over sleeping with that girl. You were right; I did break up with you. And I slept with someone else, too.” With that, she shut the window, lowered the blinds and turned out the light.

Dani collapsed onto the bed and let the sorrow take her under. Sorrow for the loss of her first love and the loss of the life she would have had if she were the human she’d believed herself to be. She would let the pain have its way with her. She could still feel Lucas out there. He was still standing beneath her window. Hoping she would change her mind, praying she would let him in. Maybe he was thinking about her confession that she’d been with another man. She could hear his heart beating so hard in his chest. It was such a familiar sound. She’d listened to it with her head on his chest so many times. It called her to him. Begging her to hold him and not let go, but she couldn’t do that anymore. Too much had happened. She had seen too much. They’d both made too many mistakes to think they could ever be the same. He was afraid of her all that time. She loved him so much and still he had felt the monster hiding inside her. He knew it was there long before she did. Nature had told him to run from the hunter.

Dani cried until she could no longer breathe. Every time she thought she was out of tears, the dam would break and let loose another torrent of agony. She wrapped herself around the hurt and let it drain her. She wanted to bleed this pain and love from her soul and leave it there on the bed. She would never cry for him or her old life again. She heard her mom come to the door a few times. She sat outside on the floor for a couple of hours before she went to her room.

When the sun finally started to rise and throw shades of pink and gold across her bedroom wall she got up and left her human life behind in puddles of tears and sorrow. Looking in the mirror was a mistake. She looked worse than she felt, but it was over now. She took a quick shower and pulled her hair up. At least her eyes were back to their normal shade of blue. She found Tessa peering out the living room window.