So, as any other woman scorned would do, I grabbed my stick, sauntering over to Sully who was just about to take his beer from Gretchen’s hand and placed both of my palms on his chest -his hard, toned chest- whispering seductively in his ear: “I need you to show me how to break.”
He nodded, leading us to the pool table.
Let the games begin. Gretchen bit her lip, knowing exactly what kind of game I was playing.
“Okay princess, brace your right hand on the table nice and firm like this.” I bent over the table mirroring him. He came up behind me, leaning his muscular body into my back, bringing his arms around mine to position my hands where they needed to be. “Now slide the stick in between your fingers like this.” He breathed in my ear giving me instant goosebumps.
Guiding the pool stick along my hand, he pulled the stick back once, twice, then a third time and gave it a good thrust, sending the cue ball cracking into the cluster of colored balls making more than one go in. “Looks like we’re stripes, princess,” he said proudly.
Jealousy seethed behind Davin’s black irises while he discreetly watched me from under his baseball cap across the tattered felt table. A couple more shots and it was Bernadette’s turn.
Unsurprisingly, she missed almost every time the entire first game, swearing each time she failed to make a ball go in. Lucky for her, Davin picked up most of the slack, hitting the balls harder and harder with each shot as I continued to spitefully flirt, tease and laugh with Sully while finishing one drink after another with Gretchen.
By the end of the fifth game I was beyond tipsy, and that was when Bernadette made her ultimate low-down dirty move. Davin had just shot the eight ball in, winning the game, when she jumped up and down, running to him and forcefully pulling him into her by his shirt, kissing him with so much aggression and lust I could smell the sexual desire from her in the air. And that’s when I lost it. I retched, quickly holding my hand over my mouth and headed for the bathroom.
Gretchen was standing against the cracked green tiled wall when I walked out of the stall. The bathroom was fit for nothing more than the junkies that commonly used it to get their fix throughout the long drunken nights.
“I’m sorry I made you come. I really thought getting you out to have some fun would make you feel better. Challenging you to a pool game and her make-out fest just to torture you was evil, even for Bernadette. She’s been jealous of you since the day you showed up at school.”
I turned the knob on the grimy faucet, splashing some water on my face, looking at my pale complexion in the warped mirror that had half of it broken clean off at one time, leaving dangerously rough edges jutting up.
“I think I just had too much to drink.” She raised her eyebrow at me, knowing that wasn’t the cause of my sudden nausea. “I know I shouldn’t have ever let her get to me, but I lost the one person that ever made me feel the way he did to that evil bitch. Even if he is acting like I don’t exist, I still can’t help but love him.”
“Oh honey...” She rubbed my back sympathetically. “Trust me, I know how happy you two were together. This whole situation is just as confusing to the rest of us as it is to you…well, I mean at least the illusion they are all seeing on the outside. But I know the truth behind the scenes, and it still baffles the hell out of me. Do you want me to tell Sully to take you home?”
I shook my head. Dabbing my face with a stiff paper towel. “No, I’m going to step outside for a few minutes and get some fresh air. Just tell him I needed some time alone.”
“I gotcha covered, babe.”
I left the bathroom and was able to sneakily slip out the front doors without drawing any attention to myself. It was snowing again but the cold, wet snowflakes felt good on my skin that was burning up more from adrenaline than the alcohol.
Each white fluffy flake that landed on any part of exposed skin quickly melted, leaving drops of precipitation behind. I wasn’t sure how long I had been walking, but sometime later I found myself in front of the arched gates to Hanover cemetery.
I stood staring in through the looming black wrought iron bars that appeared to be keeping the fog that rolled in nightly from the surrounding forest, mainly encased inside; further making the gnarled naked trees, rows of weathered marble slabs, and towering statues seem much more eerie than they already were on a normal night.
Why had I walked here of all places? I certainly should be terrified of this place -and underneath my anger from earlier I was- but maybe that’s what brought me here in the first place. The need to do something rash and unpredicted; something that took me out of my comfort zone, and made me feel something other than the hate, jealousy, or resentment that was filling me to the point of breaking.
Maybe I needed to feel fear! Fear could substitute any other sad pathetic emotion I was wallowing in and completely devour every inch of my body with nightmarish pins and needles. Tonight was obviously the night to take numerous trips down memory lane. Pushing the gate that was already half cracked open, I stepped inside. Visions of Xander’s final hours began to dance around in my head as I walked farther and farther into
