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“Yeah, man, she’ll be here,” I said. I smiled, not wanting to show him I had serious doubts swirling through my mind about the woman that was quickly becoming his favorite person. Cody loved Tasha. I knew that, and it would break his heart if something happened between us, but I also had him to think about. This wasn’t a cut and dry scenario. I needed some quiet time to think. “Go get washed up. Dinner will be ready in just a bit.”
Cody ran off, seemingly happy. I wanted to keep it that way. Once he was gone, I turned back to the TV and turned it back on. I was again greeted by the horrible view of the couple having sex, wondering if I could at least count on this being an ex-boyfriend of hers. But then as they finished the climax and she collapsed on top of him, the scene changed. This time, there were only pictures. Half-naked pictures were displayed on the screen. Tasha smiled proudly as she posed for these pictures.
My heart fell. Not only did she have a sex video made, but she was now posing for near nude shots. Did she do it for the money? If she needed money, I could halfway understand that, but still why stoop so low as to pimp herself out?
I couldn’t even watch the whole thing as more and more of her body was exposed. No decent woman should have these views of her being sent through the mail. I turned the TV off and went over, nearly yanking the DVD from the player. I put it away, leaving the letter on the outside. I didn’t know who the letter was from, but it was obviously from someone that hated Tasha so much, and the thought hit me. Only Melinda had that much vengeance towards her, as to direct it at me, at least so I figured.
I fell down on the couch and just sat there, dumbfounded by the revelation. I don’t know how long I sat there for, but when I heard her voice, I didn’t even realize she had gotten to the house.
“Hey there!” She giggled.
I was still staring at the blank TV screen.
“I knocked, but you didn’t come, so I let myself in. I hope that’s alright.”
I slowly turned to her. I had been practicing the words I would say to her in my head since I watched the DVD. I knew that what I needed to do was let her know how I felt, and then tell her that we needed to slow things down drastically, until I got to know her better. But as I looked at her, I couldn’t even get those words out of my mouth.
She frowned. “Matt, is everything alright, babe?”
“Um…well, not exactly,” I started. I stood from the couch and walked over to her. I looked past her and peered up the steps, making certain that Cody couldn’t hear us, then grabbed her hand and pulled her further into the living room. “I need to talk to you.”
“You’re scaring me,” she softly said, then a nervous chuckle accompanied her words. “What’s going on?”
I swallowed the lump in my throat. “That’s what I’m wondering,” I said. I held up the DVD. “This came in my mail today. Care to explain what I saw?” I kept my voice low, so it wouldn’t trigger Cody to come downstairs.
Her eyes narrowed in on the DVD. “Well, first of all, what’s the DVD of?” She looked at me, confusion etched on her face.
The scene came back to my mind, and I shook my head, wanting to erase it forever. “It’s of you and um…some guy,” I hissed. “Then half naked photos of you.” I thrust the disc towards her. My anger boiling over, unable to think straight. Her eyes widened as she grabbed the disc from me.
“I don’t understand. What are you talking about?”
I took a deep breath and wanted nothing more but to stay calm and cool about it, because this was the woman I loved, and I wanted to trust her and believe anything she had to tell me. However, my eyes were clouded over with deceit, and I really couldn’t picture her telling me anything that would make this okay.
“I got this note.” I opened it up and held it open to her. She read through it and her eyes went dim. The brightness I saw when I looked at her before, was gone. “Matt…I can explain,” she said.
I shoved the paper into her hand and shook my head. “I doubt you can, but give it your best shot.” I moved past her. I was prepared to open the door, kick her out, and never look back, even if my heart was breaking with even that thought.
“Matt, listen,” she slowly stated. “It’s not as bad as it looks.”
I slowly turned around and moved back in to close the distance between us. “Are you sure about that? It looks pretty damn bad, and let’s talk about humiliating. If it got out that my girlfriend made a sex tape and posed nude…”
“I wasn’t nude,” she quietly stated.
“Oh…I stand corrected. HALF nude! You know, I can’t be a hard nose attorney, when I can’t even handle a relationship. If that DVD got out, then I would be the laughing stock of the city. No one would want to have me represent them. My career could be finished. I guess you’d finally be the topic of all the popular blogs then,” I said the latter before wishing I could suck the words back into my lips and swallow them down to the deepest and darkest places of me that I never wanted the world to see.
“They won’t find out,” she said, and her chest began to heave up and down. I could see the pain in her pleading eyes. She searched me out for the compassionate, understanding guy that she’d grown to love, but I could only see red.
“Oh yeah…how do you plan on stopping them, when it ended up in my mailbox?” I continued.
“Matt, that video was shot a long time ago, so even if someone does leak it to the blogs, it’s from when I was younger,” she said. “I was just getting into the business and—”
I shook my head and put up my hand to stop her. “I don’t want to hear about it. I mean it, Tasha. There’s nothing you could say that would make this better.” Tears had started to form in the corner of her eyes and I wasn’t a monster; I hated seeing her like that, but the situation really gave me no choice. I looked away from her. “I think you should go,” I said.
Out the corner of my eye, I saw her nodding. “Yeah, I really should. I never thought you would be such a judgmental asshole!”
“Oh yeah, well, I guess that makes two of us who’ve been duped.” I turned away from her and led her out of the living room, feeling like I was walking in quicksand that was only pulling me down. I was getting emotional, as well, but I couldn’t let her see the pain I felt at that very moment. I internally damned Melinda Lory for being the evil witch of the south who I was certain was behind dropping this bomb in the middle of the damn near perfectness that had become Tasha and I.
We had just reached the door, when I heard Cody’s footsteps on the stairs. I turned around and looked up to find him bouncing down the stairs, a huge smile spread across his face.
