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My knee was hurting like hell from the long drive from Texas. I could have taken a plane or train, or hell a bus, but I didn’t want to give up my truck, so I threw everything in the back of my truck and left. Now, I wondered if this was a good idea or not. I should have had a plan, but Ashton was my plan. He was my best friend and no matter what was going on, I knew that he would help me if I needed it. He always had in the past.
There was a woman on the stairs as I was walking up, talking to someone in another language. French? I stopped in my tracks when I realized that the sophisticated woman that was sitting there was once a girl I knew very well. Ashton had told me that she was going to be here, but I wasn’t prepared. Now when she looked up, I still had my mouth open like an idiot.
“Hey,” I said as casually as I could. I felt bubbly inside. What did that mean?
She didn’t recognize me for a moment, I could see the aggravation in her eyes for even talking to her. Then though, she started to see that it was me and she stood up, letting me tower over her. “I can’t believe you got bigger.”
That was what she said to me after ten years? I didn’t know how to feel about that and now I wasn’t sure what was next. I was bigger because the military made me drill until my muscles were torn apart and rebuilt to look that way. It had done a lot for me and now it was all gone. I got sad for a moment, totally unrelated to the woman standing in front of me. I tried to hide the moment of bother, but it was hard, and Lara asked me if I was okay.
“Yeah, just haven’t been back here in a long time. I don’t know what I was thinking, but I guess it wasn’t this. Bogalusa looks the same.”
Lara agreed that it did. “I got back last week, and I still can’t believe that it is just like it used to be. I didn’t think I would ever find myself here again… What about you? I think the last thing you said to me was that you would rather die than stay here.”
I was embarrassed, because I had said that and, of course, she remembered. I didn’t want her to remember that side of me. I had been harsh the last couple of times we talked. There wasn’t a lot that I regretted, but how we ended things was definitely one of them. What could I say now? Could I tell her?
“You know how teens can be.”
Lara nodded and said that she had been just as bad. She knew that going to Paris was going to be either good or bad. She had left me, just as much as I had left her. The only difference, what I never wanted her to know, was that I had gone back for her, tried to stay there with her, but Lara was gone. She had made such a big deal about leaving, but she had done the same thing. I still couldn’t get my head all the way around how she had walked away from what we had growing. It wasn’t whole, it was something I was sure was going to end me at some point when I was younger, but I had toughened up. The military helped with that, but Lara taking off to Paris to live out her dreams had done far more in that circumstance. I’d always wondered what would have happened if I hadn’t have left first. Would she have stayed, would we have ended up together?
There was a moment when I went in for a hug and Lara wasn’t ready for it. When she was, we were in this weird lock and then Ashton came out to see me in the compromising position. He knew how I felt about his little sister and while he had not been happy about it when we were younger, he had said many times through the years that he wished we had been together, so Lara wouldn’t have taken off on the family the way that she did.
“Hey, man, what’s up?”
I shook Ashton’s hand and after a moment we walked off together. I could still feel the touch of Lara’s soft hands and I wanted to stay there with her. I had other things to do though. I wanted to get squared away with Ashton. It had been too long, and we had a lot to talk about. I did look back once; I couldn’t help it. Lara was even more beautiful than she had been before.
Her blonde hair was up and so fancy. She looked like a completely different person and likely a lot of that happened because of where she had been. Her clothes were different, and she didn’t smile like she used to. That part was a shame, because when Lara smiled, the whole room that she was in would get that much brighter. It was amazing how she always made me feel. It wasn’t like she was sad, but Lara was reserved now. I didn’t like the idea of that. Lara was always the wild spirit. What did it mean if she was now calm? Was that even possible? Damn, how badly I wanted to find out if Lara was the same girl that I knew so long ago.
She looked the same, only even more beautiful than what I remembered. Her dirty-blonde hair was longer than before, but it was wavy now, and I wanted to put my hands in the curls. Lara’s smile was still just as delightful, and her innocent look was somehow intact. As soon as I saw her again, my heart skipped a beat, and I wanted her even more than before. I wasn’t ready to see her again apparently.
3
Lara
Iscowled at Ashton as he walked off with Nicholas. I wanted to talk to Nicholas. It was nice to see him, and he was so different that I wanted to stare. I wanted to memorize every single line and wrinkle that was new, as well as every swell of muscle that wasn’t there before. I could see it all now, and he was amazing to look at. Nicholas had always been handsome, but the military did something to him.
My brother ruined it all though, and I swear he was doing it just to drive me nuts. He wanted to see how crazy he could make me and surprise, surprise, it was crazy. I was doing my best to try and make it work since I’d been back, but I didn’t know if being around Ashton was going to be something that I chose to do for long. I was already looking for a place of my own, even if my siblings didn’t understand it. I had lived on my own since I moved out. That was a long time ago, and I wanted them to see that I was still just as independent as before.
With Nicholas back in town, I didn’t know how that was going to play out. I liked to believe that nothing was going to happen. What was between us was a long time ago, it was just a fling. I didn’t know why I was the one that was holding onto it so tightly. I knew that there was always going to be a part of me that felt something for Nicholas. I had compared every guy since him to him, but that didn’t mean that I hadn’t learned my lesson. Nicholas and I weren’t meant to be together, even if hugging him for a minute had made me believe otherwise.
I went inside and Ashley wanted to know what my problem was. I didn’t say anything, and she knew. “Oh, you’ve seen Nicholas, huh?” Ashley’s blue eyes twinkled at me like she was in on some secret that I was not.
I nodded my head but said that I wasn’t any one kind of way about it. I wished that I was able to say something else to disprove what she said, but there was really nothing that I could do. Ashley and Ashton knew me too well. It was one thing to have to live with the brain twins that knew everything that the other was thinking. I didn’t want them looking at me and reading my mind, screw that.
Going to my room, I hid away for a while. I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to act around Nicholas. He was a great guy and I missed him, but there was a lot of pain attached to him as well. We had some sort of love affair, but then things had gone sour. He’d left, I left, I couldn’t remember who left first, but it felt like it was Nicholas. Before he left, I knew that he was going, but I didn’t think that it would be so soon. I didn’t even get to say goodbye really.
There was a knock on my door a bit later and I jerked awake. I didn’t know how I had managed to sleep, but there was nothing more that I could do but get up. I didn’t want to, thought I had a lot better things to do, but I wasn’t going to worry about it, I couldn’t. I asked who it was and then the door opened. I hadn’t locked it, but I was going to have to if I was going to be staying here much longer. The twins had no privacy, they liked it that way, but since I wasn’t on the mind meld that they were on, I liked a bit more space. I didn’t understand why they didn’t get that.
I started to say something to one of the twins, still not sure which one it was, but then I saw that it was Nicholas, and I really didn’t know what to say. Nicholas wanted to go get some dinner.
“Dinner, it’s still early, huh?” I was out of it and had no idea what time it was. I hadn’t gotten here late, so it still had to be too early for that.
He disagreed. “You’ve been sleeping all day. The Ashes have already gone out to get something to eat and made me stay here. I am starving and I don’t know if I can wait much longer, so come on.” His hand came out to help me out of bed and I took it without knowing how good of an idea it was.
I looked at the window and sighed. I didn’t know how that even came to be the case. I was trying to stay away from Nicholas, but I was stuck to him now more than ever. If I wanted dinner, apparently, I was going to have to ride with him. I let him help me out of the bed, even though I didn’t need it. I didn’t need the reaction that looking at me got either. His eyes were wide, and I swear that it was hard for me to focus.
“What?”
Nicholas’s dark eyes nodded down, and I saw that I had a shirt and no shorts. I shrugged. “What? I have panties on.” I almost popped my shirt up to show him, but it felt like that would be too far. I used to mess with him in that way, but I remembered that we weren’t together like that now. Even if I wanted it to be true, it wasn’t.
