Could Tell a Love

The other four presents were from Eric and the rest of the band. Just basic stuff: clothes, gift cards for both of us; nothing over $100, thank god.

Jared grabbed Eric’s present last. It was in a little black box.

"Oh, Beau should open that one." Eric said.

"Oh, okay. Here." He said, handing me the shiny black box. I was nervous. I lifted off the cover and my ring that Eric gave me was in there.

I tried hiding how emotional that made me, but it didn’t work.

"Eric, I don’t want this. This is yours." I said quietly, putting the cover back on.

"I gave it to you. I want you to keep it, even if we aren’t together. You can give it to Jared." He said, also sounding emotional.

"Oh, no, I can’t take this either. That was between you two. Not us." Jared said.

"Eric, I really want you to have this. Give it to the next love in your life." I threw it across the room and he caught it, not saying anything. "I’m sorry."

The room was silent for what seemed like forever. Jared rubbed my back, relaxing me.

"So you went out with Eric?" Katie asked.

"Yeah, for a while." Eric answered.

"Wouldn’t that’ve been awkward..ya know, you treated him like your kid and then you end up dating him?"

I laughed a little. "We didn’t start dating til a few months ago. The feelings towards him about being my kid were gone." I explained.

"Are those feelings gone for me too?" She asked.

I smiled and went to hug Katie. "Nope, you’ll always be a kid to me." I messed up her hair and she stuck her tongue out at me. She reminded me so much of Eric.

"Now please don’t tell me that there’s cake, too." I said, letting go of Katie.

"There is. Ice cream cake." Mike said.

"God, you guys love us too much." Jared said.

"I know. Now I took it out like fifteen minutes ago, so it’s gotta be soft enough to cut now." Eric said, going into the kitchen, everyone else following because of the fact that it’s cake.

"It’s Dairy Queen right?" Matt asked.

"Well of course, where else would I get it from?" Eric said.

Naturally, Jared and I got the first pieces. We were thinking about doing the smash the cake in the other person’s face thing like in weddings, but we figured that would be really cold.

While me and Jared were eating our cake in peace on Eric’s couch, we hear a scream come from the other room. Our heads looked towards the scream and we got up to see what was going on. It just so happened that Mike shoved his cake down Matt’s shirt while Matt wasn’t expecting it.

I started cracking up at the look at Matt’s face. He turned to look at Mike, who was cracking up as bad as I was.

"What the hell’d you do that for?!" Matt yelled, voice high pitched.

"It was so tempting. I couldn’t help myself." Mike said through his fit of laughter.

"Oh I’ll tempt you." Matt said, getting into a ninja fighting stance.

That made me laugh harder. I felt Jared rest his head on my shoulder.

"What will that do? Are you some sort of super secret ninja as your alter ego?" Mike said, also getting into a fight stance.

"You have no idea." Matt said, smirking, tackling Mike to the ground with a big boom. Matt flipped onto his back and rubbed the melting ice cream cake all over Mike. This time Mike was the one screaming. I looked around and everyone was staring at their spectacle, standing in a circle.

They both went limp with laughter, both covered in ice cream and frosting. Matt helped Mike off the ground, looking back at Eric, who, unknown to Mike, was standing behind him with another piece of cake. Mike turned and it landed right in his face. I felt the need to get in on this fight, too. It looked like a lot of fun. I dug my hand into my half eaten piece and flung it straight at Miranda.

Shock covered her face, as well as ice cream.

"You little fucker." She said, chucking her cake at me, hitting me square in the chest.

"FOOD FIGHT!" I heard Casey scream above all the commotion and before we knew it cake was flying everywhere. We were using the tables and chairs as battle stations and doors as shields.

By the time we were done with the food fight, everyone was covered head to toe in cake and we were all lying on the floor, exhausted.

"Were food fights this tiring in school?" Jared asked.

"They’re not. I just had one last week." Katie said.

"Ours was obviously more awesome." Eric said, rolling onto his stomach and pushing himself up. "The only thing is cleaning all this shit up. Should’ve taken this outside."

"We’ll stay and help, we’re not that way." Jared said, elbowing me. "Right, Beau?"

"Yeah, of course." I said, also getting up. "The only thing is that you promise me a shower so I can get cleaned up and some clothes."

"Done deal." Eric said.

"As long as you both don’t go at the same time." Matt said, snickering.

"Oh? And who says we can’t?" Jared asked, wrapping his arm around my waist and licking my cheek. "Oh, that still tastes good."

I laughed. "It is our party after all." I said, agreeing with Jared.

"Just don’t be too loud. Don’t run into too many walls." Eric said.

That made us laugh. "Don’t worry," Jared said. "we won’t."

We left the others to be and found Eric’s bathroom, smiling at each other.

"I’ll be right back, kay? I’m gonna get us some clothes." I said, kissing him, his lips still tasting of ice cream and frosting.

He smiled and nodded. I left and dug through Eric’s drawers, finding some pajama pants that looked to be long enough (damn his shortness) and two random shirts. When I walked back into the bathroom I heard the shower and the fan going. Jared’s ice cream filled clothes were in a pile next to the toilet. I got excited and stripped down, getting in the shower.

"Hey babe." Jared said, feeling up my chest. He was already soaked, which made him even hotter.

I heard a knock on the door as Jared was kissing all on my neck and jaw line. I ignored it.

We came out of the bathroom half hour later, letting the steam escape through the doorway and we walked out, not bothering brushing through our hair.

"God, you guys took long enough." Matt said, cleaning off the stove.

"Shush, you can’t rush those kinds of things." I said, grabbing a clean rag off the fridge handle, helping Eric dry off dishes. "Were we really in there that long?" I put one of the coffee cups back in the cupboard next the sink.

"Good hour or so." Eric said, not sounding like it was a problem.

"Oops. Sorry about that." I said, feeling bad about not helping clean up more.

"Don’t worry about it, really. It’s not that big of a mess."

"Where’d Katie and Casey go?" Jared asked, cleaning off the fridge.

"They went to the store really quick. Katie felt bad that she didn’t get you guys anything." Mike said.

"Oh geez, she didn’t have to do that—" Jared said.

"She wanted to." Eric said, handing me a wet plate.

"And where’d Miranda go?" I asked, realizing that she was the only person that wasn’t here.

"Outside, getting some fresh air." Matt said, whacking Eric in the ass with his wet towel.

He jumped and let out a little yelp. "Hey! That hurt!"

"Slipped." He said, looking at the ceiling, acting innocent.

"Uh huh, sure." Eric said. "Well, I think we’re done cleaning. If you guys wanna head out, you can."

"Well, wanna head out?" Jared asked, throwing his towel over my shoulder.

"Hold on, I wanna talk to Miranda for a sec, okay?" I said, going out his back door and seeing Miranda sitting there, watching the moon and stars.

I sat beside her. "Pretty, isn’t it?"

"Mmhmm. I just needed to get out of that house. I felt like I was going to explode." She said, still staring at the sky.

"What brought on that feeling?" I asked. I could tell something was wrong. She wasn’t her normal self in there.

She sighed, looking down away from the sky for the first time this whole conversation. "I know Eric’s still seeing other people. I don’t know why I got back together with him. All we do is fuck. It’s getting kind of ridiculous. I’ve spent more money in birth control and condoms than anything else." She looked at me. "I mean, I know he has other feelings for me besides being in bed, but he can’t seem to bring them to the surface."

I sighed. I swore to keep this secret from everyone else, but I couldn’t hide it from her. "Miranda, do you remember when we met? In the hospital? And I said Eric was getting stitches ‘cause he fell off that poll skateboarding?" I asked, fidgeting with the drawstring on Eric’s pants.

"Yeah..." She trailed off.

"Well.." I thought things through very carefully, trying to put it in a way that wouldn’t break her down into tears. "I was lying. Eric was actually stabbed...by his dad...because Eric wouldn’t give into his dad...because his dad sexually abused him since he was 7 years old." I finally got out, feeling emotionally drained.

She held a shaking hand up to her mouth, tears falling down her face. "Oh my god, I had no idea. How did you find out about this?"

"He told me when he came to my apartment that day and I took him to the hospital. I didn’t want to tell you because I’d just met you and that information was kind of confidential.

"So that’s why he acts the way he does in relationships. He wants to have a steady long lasting relationship, but his body keeps telling him no, and to go off with other people while in the said relationship." I explained.

"Everything’s making sense now." She said, sounding like she’s in a trance.

"Yeah, and I feel like an ass for not remembering that when I caught him sleeping with Sarah." I said, kicking a rock.

"But I think you did the right thing. You won’t be hurt by Eric’s habits anymore. Now if I could just get that smart—"

I pushed her shoulder a little bit. "Shut up. You’re not stupid. Maybe you’ll be the one that makes him change his habits. You never know." I said, hugging her to my side. "Are you gonna be alright?"

She nodded, leaning against my shoulder. "I’ll be fine, don’t worry about me. Thanks for telling me that."

"No problem. Just don’t go around and spread it to anyone else, okay? I wasn’t even supposed to tell you. I’ve kept that secret for six years, I don’t want it getting out now."

"Yeah, sure, my lips are sealed." She said, leaning up from me and getting up, stretching. "Is it okay if I tell him that you told me?"

"I guess, but he’ll probably give you the same ‘don’t tell’ talk I just did." I said, also getting up.

"Hey, Casey and Katie are back." Miranda said as they pulled into the driveway. Katie jumped out of the car before Casey even put it in park. "Beau, I had to get you guys something. I felt bad for being the only one that didn’t get you anything." She ran up to me and hugged me tightly, only coming just below my chin.

I laughed. "You didn’t have to do that. I barely could accept everything else, and I have no idea about Jared, you’d have to ask him. But since you went through all the trouble..." I peeled her off me and she swung a bag around from behind me. I opened it and inside was a shit load of candy.

"Dude! This is bitchin! How much did you spend on all this?"

"Twenty bucks." Casey said.

This time I was the one that attacked Katie with a hug. "This is the best present I got tonight. Thank you. Well, Jared and I were just about to head out, I need to go get him. It was really nice seeing you guys. Are you guys staying around for a while?" I let go of Katie and hugged Casey. "Maybe we could hang out, just the three of us."

"That would be fun, as long as you’re not busy with your band shit." He said, giving me a manly pat on the back.

I laughed and let go of him. Just as I was getting ready to go into the house, Jared came out, carrying a bag of stuff and the envelope containing our getaway. Our really expensive getaway.

"Hey, I was just coming in to tell you we were gonna head out now." I said, taking the bag and putting it in my car. I walked back into the house and said bye to everyone.

"Hey, is Miranda alright?" Eric asked quietly.

"Yeah, she’ll be fine." I said, hugging him. "See you later. Call me if you want to."

"Alright, bye."

I walked out the door and followed Jared to the car.

"Are you sure you wanna take that trip to Hawaii? I mean, it would be a blast, but the record’s coming out in a few weeks, and I wanna be here to help out." I said, backing out of Eric’s driveway.

"They’ll be fine. They’re big boys, I think they can handle it." Jared said, scrolling through my iPod again, this time choosing Bring Me the Horizon.

I smiled. "Hopefully we’re not sick of each other by the time we get back here."

He laughed. "Get sick of you? That’s funny. How could I possibly get sick of you?"

I laughed a little. "I guess that was stupid of me to say, huh?"

"Not stupid, just...silly." Jared said, smiling.

We didn’t talk the rest of the way there. We didn’t have to. Being in each other’s presence was enough, and the fact that Jared totally turned up the volume when Diamonds Aren’t Forever started playing out of my car speakers, making it practically impossible to speak to each other.