Savin' Us

Chapter 23- I Saw You Fast Asleep

"I love you, Nick."

"I love you too, Lyn."

He wraps her long dark hair around his fingers and takes her lips in a deep hungry kiss. She kisses him back with just as much force and desire.

No!

She backs up towards the bed and pulls him down with her, wrapping her legs around his waist.

Stop!

"Oh, Nick..." She moans.

This isn't real. This isn't happening.

"Marcel!"

The sound of my name jolts me and my eyes snapped open.

"Yo, get up." It's Lee. He looks at me with worry in his eyes. Just great.

Another nightmare. More reasons for him to worry about me.

I get up, wordlessly, and walk towards my bathroom to get the shower running. It's almost becoming a routine; waking up sticky with sweat from a nightmare about Evelyn and that rich playboy.

I'm so sick of this.

Lee waits until I finish taking a shower and getting dressed before he begins. "This is getting out of control, man. You're hardly eating, you spend your time either buried in work or buried in this house. And now you have constant nightmares."

I go to the kitchen to make some coffee. He follows. "So? I'm still living aren't I?" I shrug.

"This is no way to live, Cel." I get the coffee started and grab a mug from the cupboard and some creamer. "Do you think she would want you to be like this?"

I freeze. Slowly, I place the mug and the creamer down. "Do you really think she cares how or what I'm doing?" I ask, gritting my teeth. "She left. She left me."

"You made her leave," he fires back.

"What is this? Some kind of daily reminder? I know, okay. It was all my fault. Now can you please go?"

I can't believe after everything I was going through, everything he just pointed out, that he just threw that back in my face.

"No. That's not what I meant."

I shake my head and pour my coffee into the mug and add the creamer. "What do you want from me, Lee?" I ask as I take a sip from my coffee. I add sugar.

"Everything isn't your fault. But you did make Lyn leave because you thought it was," he says. My eyebrows furrow as stare at him. I am completely confused. Maybe I needed to make this coffee stronger. "I know you're confused but come with me and I'll explain better."

I stare at him some more then add more sugar to​ my coffee. "Fine. But I'm taking my coffee with me. Think I'll need it."

He mutters something under his breath but I don't catch it as I'm already making my way to the door. We drive for about fifteen minutes then we stop in a familiar neighborhood. We get out of his car and climb the small steps to J's porch.

Joey swings the door open before we even get to the door. "Hey guys. Get in," he orders.

When we enter the house, he leads​ us to the living room where I see some more of my friends. There's Kyle, Drew, Hank and Kobe. Their attention turns to me. All wearing serious expressions on their faces.

"What's going on?" I ask, turning to Lee. He said he would explain better. But now I'm more confused.

Then it clicks. Joey hadn't dropped the issue about that night at the party. I haven't heard from him again after he called last week saying he would fix everything.