This Modern Love

Walking home took me a lot longer than I thought it would. I had to take breaks because my body was sore. Usually, people at least get an eight hour resting period after sex before they move. Nope, not me. I had to go help Louie get his hand out of a toilet and tell my boyfriend I had sex with another guy. That was another reason that I took forever to get to Mason’s. I was going through the possible reactions Scotty could come up with. I was afraid of him leaving me alone, while Shaun was off on vacation and riding out the rest of this ‘experiment’ trial.

I kept trying to figure out why I was feeling so bad for Scotty. I don’t think that I would have been so worried about his reaction if he didn’t tell me he loved me, or if I was completely comfortable around him. Why was I so comfortable around him? I thought I was one hundred percent comfortable with Shaun, but I was wrong. This new Shaun scared me a bit. But Scotty, I felt that I loved Scotty, and I don’t want to. I had told Shaun that you can’t love two people, and you can’t.

I walked into Mason’s room, my blood cold and my stomach in ropes.

Keir walked past me and into the kitchen. I followed behind him.

“Is Louie unstuck?” I asked quietly.

Keir turned around, startled by my sudden vocal appearance.

“Yeah. We almost had to call the fire department, though,” he answered, grabbing a box of Frosted Flakes from on top of the fridge.

“How did he get it stuck in there?”

“He dropped a necklace or something in the toilet. Louie being Louie stuck his hand in there and, you know, I can’t miss an opportunity,” he chuckled. “I kept flushing the toilet, making him dive for it, and he got his hand stuck.”

“That’s horrible,” I mumbled with a small smile. “Do you know where Scotty is?”

“Living room,” he answered, pouring chocolate milk into his cereal.

I made my way towards the living room. The boys were watching Celebrity rehab with Dr. Drew. I never understood why crack heads yelling at each other entertained people.

“Scotty, I need to talk to you for a minute,” I whispered in his ear.

He jumped, not expecting me to be right behind him. He got to his feet and I quickly walked up the stairs, and into Tyler’s room. My stomach started to coil from being so tight, and I thought that I was going to throw up in Tyler’s Longhorns hamper.

Scotty shut the door behind him, and took off his hat.

“What’s going on?” he asked, with a smile.

I stared at the floor, biting my nails. I didn’t know how to start off. How do you tell somebody that you cheated on them? I looked up at Scotty, whose face fell and stared me down.

I wrapped my arms around his neck and tried to hide my face in his shoulder. He wrapped his arms around my back and kept quiet. He knew that I would talk when I was ready. We stood there for a few good minutes, until my legs got tired of standing on my tip-toes to be able to reach him. I pulled away, and sat on Tyler’s bed. I felt a tear start to grow in the bottom of my eyelid, but I tried to repress it as much as possible.

“What happened?” Scotty asked, resting his hand on his palm.

I blinked a couple of times, trying to find a perfect way to say it.

“Shaun and I had sex,” I mumbled. I had said it so quiet, that I could barely hear myself.

Scotty shook his head.

“Sorry, I didn’t catch that,” said, leaning in to hear me better.

“Shaun and I had sex,” I repeated in his ear, just as quiet as before.

Scotty leaned up, sitting straight. He nodded, chewing on the inside of his cheek.

“Today?” he asked in a harsh tone.

“Yeah,” I answered quietly.

Scotty cleaned his throat and ran his hand through his hair.

“Scotty, I’m sorry! I tried to call you, hoping you would say no, but I didn’t get an answer,” I announced quickly.

He just sat still, staring at the floor.

“He said that he wanted to so you and I could be together, because he knows we’ll be bored all break,” I informed him, waiting for him to say something.

He still didn’t move.

“I only did it because I wanted to be closer to you,” I breathed, staring at the side of his head.

He moved his hand off of his head and cleared his throat.

“Alright,” he said, and looked at me. Irritation was etched into his face.

“You’re mad,” I whispered, scanning his face.

“Never said that,” he disagreed, looking away from me.

“You aren’t mad?” I stated in disbelief.

“Never said that either.”

I bit my lip and swallowed the hard block in my throat.

“You can yell, you know?” I told him. The silence was killing me, and I wanted to know what was going on through his head.

“No, that doesn’t solve anything,” he sighed.

“Please, talk to me,” I begged, scooting closer to him.

“I thought you weren’t waiting for him?” he asked, raising an eyebrow.

“I’m not. I don’t know. I had sex with him, so I could have sex with you.”

Scotty quickly slapped his hand on his forehead.

“It is not about the sex, Candace! I’m not with you so I can get laid all the time!” he growled.

“Being in a relationship is all about physicality! Without that, then we are just friends!” I countered quickly. Shaun had finally said something useful.

“He tell you that lie?” Scotty asked with raised eyebrows.

“He had a point,” I snapped.

“I told you that I would take care of it tonight,” he said after taking a deep breath. “Couldn’t you at least broke up with me a couple days and then get back together afterward?”

“It’s not like I planned for it to happen. He just popped the idea up when I was over there,” I defended, getting a little irritated with his attitude. Although, I deserved every bit of it.

“Didn’t I cross your mind at all?” he asked, his voice failing a little bit.

“Of course you did! That’s why I agreed to it! And I’ll tell you something else, if he didn’t play that card, it would not have happened.”

He rubbed his eyes and put his hat back on.

“Look, I’m not going to make this a huge deal that causes something bad to happen. So I’m just going to leave it at that. I don’t want to hear about it, talk about it, or even remember any of it happened. Got it?” he demanded more than asked.

I lowered my head and nodded.

“Just don’t do it again,” he said, wrapping his arm around my shoulder.

I nodded again, leaning my head on his shoulder.

“I think I’m going to take a nap. I feel like shit,” I whispered.

“Mind if I join you?” he asked, trying and failing to hide the irritation out of his voice.

“Not at all.”