2.

Rumor had it that Ricky graduated but didn't attend graduation. No one knew where she was or how she was doing. I thought that I would've at least found out by now what was going on in her head, or in her life, but I didn't, and it's been going on nine months without her. Nine fucking months, and I was still hung up over her. I was so damn pathetic. I've tried to move on from her, but whenever I get close to doing so, my fucked up mind takes me back to the night she kissed me... ––– the first and last kiss I got from her and then I pull away. I promised myself that I would find her some how but I didn't know how that was going to happen. I didn't know how I was going to do it or when I was going to do it, I just know that when I decided that it was for the best I was going to put my goddamn all into it. Instead for now I was stuck at some lame frat party at a university I attended a couple hours away from home, missing the hell out of a girl that probably wasn't even thinking about me. Oh, how I wished she thought about me. I wonder if it hurt her, the way it hurt me... or if she missed me the way I miss her. I needed some air; I needed some time away from all of the fuss and chaos of this party. I placed my cup somewhere on the bar and made my way out of the congested house. Once I got outside, I moved away from the kissing couples and leaned against the side of the house, dry heaving, wishing that I was okay without her but I wasn't. How could she do this to me? How could she come into my life for such a short period of time and turn it upside down? How could she not say goodbye? All I wanted was a fucking goodbye. I heard thunder in the distance and I knew that I needed to get out of there. I'll just text Nathan that I'm heading back to the dorms and I'll see him when he gets there, if he ever decides to come back, who knew with him? I walked down the street until I found my truck and climbed in, thankful for my timing because as soon as I was safe inside, the downpour began. I licked my lips and started the ignition, peeling away from the road and towards my safe haven. You're probably thinking I'm pathetic, and I promise you, I think the same thing. I constantly think about how I was stuck loving a girl that probably never loved me. I mean, it took me two months to love her and it took her one night to leave as if I meant nothing to her, which was probably the truth. Who knows how many guys she's done this to? Ricky really did belong to no one, but a part of me hoped that she'd one day belong to me. She gave me a taste of what I could have and then ran away, and I really didn't think she was coming back no matter how bad I wished she would. Pulling into the parking lot of the dorm building, I hurried to park and hop out so I wouldn't get drenched in the process. I didn't like the rain much anymore... It didn't take me long to walk to the building, tapping my access key against the pad and getting the door open. I climbed the steps to the third floor, and opened the door before heading to my room. I stopped in my tracks. I heard my keys fall to the ground in the hallway just as she turned and her eyes met mine. She wore a small smile on her lips and she looked a bit different. She had a nose piercing now, her face was a little smaller and it looked as if she hadn't worn a smile in so long. I swallowed hard, so hard I heard myself gulp. I know I probably looked like a fucking idiot. "What do you think you're doing?" I heard myself asked.

I got that ghost of a smile, that lifted my heart up a bit and almost made me fall to my knees. "I thought that was my line?"

"No." I shook my head, leaning down to pick up my keys. "No, you don't get to do this to me. You don't." I pushed my way past her and shoved my key into the lock, opening up my door.

She followed me into the room, grabbing onto my arm to pull me back. I had to stop myself from shivering at her touch. Damn her. "Trevor, don't be like this, please."

"Don't be like this Ricky?" I snapped. "Don't be like this? You left me for nine months! No goodbye or anything!"

"I did tell you goodbye... I just told you while you were sleeping, but you did get a goodbye. I promised I'd come back."

"Oh, did you tell me that while I was sleeping as well? What else did you tell me?" As soon as I asked, I just shook my head and held my hands up. "You know what? I don't want to fucking know. You can save it. Save it."

"You know you don't mean this... I know I hurt you. Let me explain, I owe that much to you."

Damn right she did, but I was so angry and so frustrated I just paced around the room, heavy breathing and eyes squeezed closed. A part of me was hoping this was some kind of nightmare because I wasn't ready to see her face if she was just going to leave again. "I'm not ready for one of your explanations Ricky. I'm not ready for you to come back. I'm not ready for you in any sense anymore."

The female just nodded, nibbling on her lower lip. "You're right. I shouldn't have done this. You probably have some beautiful blonde bombshell girlfriend, and you're probably playing every Saturday at the football games. Hell, you're probably some kind of top-notch frat boy, already, aren't you? You have no time for me, a fucking blast from the past, right? Right?" By the end of her rant, her voice had raised a few octaves and tears welled in her eyes. My own chest was rising and falling at an alarming rate, I could feel the blood rushing to my head. But it was late, almost three in the morning, so I just walked over to my door and closed it softly, taking a deep breath to myself.

I couldn't blow up. I wouldn't blow up. I just leaned my head against the cool wood of my door and counted to ten. "I haven't been with anyone since you left me nine months ago." I turned to face her. "Yeah, I may have been on a date or two... hell, maybe even three but they have gone nowhere because even when I try to get close to moving on I think of the way your lips felt against mine. I think about your touch. I think about the way your body felt in my arms. I haven't been able to stop thinking about you since I laid eyes on you junior year. I haven't been able to get you out of my goddamn head since I've made you laugh for the first time. You just left me Ricky. You left me and you didn't even look back, and you know how that made me feel? How it makes me feel to still be hung up over you? It makes me feel so pathetic, especially knowing that this was your intention."

"This was not my intention." She states, reaching forward to grab my hand. Tears are flowing down her cheeks now, and I couldn't keep myself from wiping them away. She all but melted at my touch. "It was never my true intention to leave you. I just needed time Trevor, I needed time, it all became too much. With my dad dying, my abuela and my mom fighting constantly, my mother cheating and me feeling things I've never felt before I needed a break. I went back with my abuela to Peru and let myself grieve, mourn, all of that happened. I needed it."

"You couldn't tell me that?" I asked, desperately. "You couldn't have told me?"

"If I would've said anything to you I would've come back." She whispered. My heart swelled in my fucking chest. "I would've came back to you, there was no way I wouldn't have. I thought about you every day, I wrote you letters that I never sent just so I could get the feeling of you there." The woman in front of me moved her face so that her lips could press against my palm, moving up to the pad of my thumb and I sucked in a huge breath. Who knew a five foot three girl like her could bring a six foot two man like me down to my knees. "I think about that night a lot too. I think about how your hands felt on me, about that hunger in your eyes when you watched me undress. I think about how you look wearing nothing but those boxers of yours and it makes me so hot."

I pressed my forehead to hers, "Don't do this to me. I desperately want to be mad at you right now and you're not making it easy for me."

"Then be mad at me... do you want to take your anger out on me?" Her voice was curious and suggestive. I needed to back away; I needed some distance between us. It's been too damn long.

"Ricky, don't."

"Don't what?" She asked, kissing my index finger now, her tongue snaking out to play. "Don't do what, Trevor?"

"You know damn well what you're doing."

"Do you have someone else? Do you want someone else?"

"Were you listening to anything I just said? No, of course not. But you,"

She cut me off, "But nothing. If you want me, you can have me." She took both of my hands and wrapped them around her waist.

"I'm so afraid that you're going to leave me," I breathed out. "I don't know what I would do if you left me again, Ricky, I don't."

She just ran her fingers through my shaggy blonde hair. Her chocolate hues staring deeply into my icy blue ones. We weren't a complete match because she was so free spirited and I was so afraid to lose her that I wanted to keep her on every chain in the universe to keep her from being free. She assumes for me to always believe that she's going to come back and large portion of me believes that she always will, I just don't want to be proved wrong. Her lips touched mine softly. It was barely even a kiss, the way her lips hovered and brushed over mine but I was taking what I could get. She tasted just like vanilla and strawberries, just like I remembered. It took everything in me to hold back a sob because if this was just another one of those fucked up dreams of mine I wouldn't know what to do. I wouldn't know how to handle it. Waking up to find myself in my bed without her would destroy me. I think I would lose it and myself. I'm so weak and she's so strong. She has the power to break me and if it meant having a few more hours with her, I'd let her. "I'm not going anywhere." Her cool breath brushed against my face. "Please, Trevor. Please."

Call me stupid but I gave in. I submit myself to her, completely. She called all the shots, every ball was in her court and I was fine with that. I was so fucking fine with that. I made love to her all night. I confessed every fucking secret I had hidden away and allowed myself to blissfully fall content in the arms of the one I knew I loved, finally dozing off but not before hearing her whisper a small I love you too.

I just wish she meant it because the next morning I woke up all alone again with just the faint scent of her perfume lingering in the air as a reminder that last night was just as real it was going to get.