AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“But even more worrisome than these are the sins of the flesh,” Pastor Lawrence said, and I winced, unable to stop myself from thinking about my recent, uh, sinning with my flesh that I’d been doing.
I could still feel Pike against me, inside of me, if I closed my eyes. Fuck. It had been almost two weeks since I’d last seen him, not that I was counting or anything (I was), and I still couldn’t get him out of my mind. Dammit.
I did my best to tune out the service again, and to not think about Pike, but I couldn’t hold in a sigh of relief when we finally got around to saying our final prayer and the services ended. Everyone immediately got up to chitchat, including Mom and Dad. Yeah, I still went to church with my parents. It wasn’t really a big deal, but it still managed to make me feel like a kid again sometimes, still hanging around afterwards waiting for Mom to be finished gossiping with everyone, feeling like I was five years old again.
To try and distract myself, I went over to the donut table, idly peering at it to see if there was anything good left. Not really—the kids had all descended on it first thing like the little vultures they were, just like I did when I was a kid, and they’d picked clean all the good ones. Maybe I could try the coffee… but historically speaking the coffee at my church was not that great. Probably a bit oily and not worth the risk.
“…yes, that’s exactly who I mean, Pike Transcom.”
My ears perked up. Some older women and a couple men were gossiping—about Pike.
I knew it was stupid but I couldn’t help myself. I wanted to listen in. After all, according to my brother a lot of the gossip had been about me with Pike. It was only fair that I listen in and see what people were saying about me, right? So that I could be prepared?
Trying not to look obvious, I continued scanning the donuts while I eavesdropped on the conversation.
“I heard that Amber was with someone else?”
“Apparently her parents didn’t approve, so now she’s with Pike. Trying to make them even angrier if you ask me.”
“I’m not surprised that they’re back together. They were on and off for years.”
My stomach twisted up. There was no way that I could eat a donut now, even if I’d wanted one before. I felt like I couldn’t breathe a little, my disappointment was so strong, like someone had knifed me in the back. I hadn’t expected any news about Pike to hurt me this much. I guess I’d been pining more than I’d thought, despite all of my best efforts.
What the fuck, though? He was back with Amber? After telling me that we had a connection that he wanted to pursue? Who just did that?
Maybe he was driven into her arms because you rejected him, said a voice in my head that sounded a lot like Michelle. Damn it. Maybe that was true. Maybe I had rejected him, and he’d been hurt, and Amber had seen her opportunity to swoop right in with the compassion and sympathy.
But if he was so easily persuaded to fall into her arms and date her, could his connection with me really have been all that strong? I didn’t think so. God, it was a good thing that I’d said no to him. My suspicions—or fears, rather—about him getting bored and moving on were apparently justified.
I wished that it made me feel triumphant, and vindicated. Instead, I still just felt sick and let down. Perhaps, in a part of myself that didn’t want to admit it, I had wanted Pike to prove me wrong. Not that I’d expected him to go all Say Anything on me and show up in front of my house with a boom box, but I’d hoped, more than I’d let myself think about, that he would do something.
Mom asked why I was so down on the way home from church. I just shrugged and said I was thinking about post-college life, that was all. She nodded and didn’t ask anything more, but I was pretty sure she didn’t believe me and was just respecting my space by not pestering me about it.
For three days, I stewed. Okay, fine, I still wanted Pike to date me. I still wanted to be with him. And I knew that in a way it was my own fault that he was like this, that he was moving on to someone else. I hadn’t given him a chance. But I also stood firm that I had reasons not to give him a chance, reasons to doubt him and his ability to stick by me.
Ugh. It felt like I was stuck between a rock and a hard place with no right answer no matter what I chose to do.
