Mixed 'N' Matched Love

Nick's POV:

For a while, Pat didn’t say or do anything, but just stood there and sighed deeply. Finally, he wrapped his arms tight around me and I lied my head down on his chest.

♪Do you feel cold and lost in desperation?
You build up hope, but failure’s all you’ve known
Remember all the sadness and frustration
And let it go. Let it go.♫

I looked up then, Pat was singing the favorite part to one of my favorite songs: 'Iridescent' by Linkin Park.

His eyes moved down just as I looked up and they immediately locked with mine. I knew that my whole face was burning up more than ever, but I just ignored it, because I knew that there was nothing I could do to make it stop. I just simply shut my eyes and soon enough I could feel Pat’s soft lips brushing against mine. I felt my breathe catch in my throat then and my heartbeat ricocheting up.

I had just reached my hand up and placed it behind Pat’s head, when I suddenly heard a loud noise coming from over Drew’s house. I snapped my eyes open, realizing it was the sound of his balcony doors smacking shut. That only made it more clear that Drew was watching us and that Pat really was making an good act to only show it to him more. Pat had probably knew this was all going to happen, which was why he had planned it from the beginning and stopped me from going inside the house and ruining the moment.

That was all it took to basically tear me out of my trance then and bring me back to reality. I pulled away from Pat and looked everywhere else but at him.

“What?!” he asked me. Before I would’ve figured by his voice that he was actually hurt by what I had just done, but now I know better and that he was only feigning it.

“I-I just can’t do this,” I stammered out. “It-it’s just too wrong.”

”What’s wrong?” Pat persisted.

“This!” I practically shouted out.

“But, I thought that this was what you wanted! You wanted to make Drew jealous by doing all of this with me, right? And he’s watching all of this right now, or he was, so what’s wrong with one little kiss that’s not even true?”

I felt my heart beginning to hurt and more tears appearing in my eyes. People were right, the truth did hurt. And Pat saying all of this to me hurt like hell.

“I-I know, but…but…” I felt my voice faltering and trailing off and just shook my head, indicating that I couldn’t go on.

“But what?” Pat still wanted to know.

“What if I seriously start to fall for you then?” I whispered to him, my eyes shut tight, causing the hot tears to start falling down my cheeks.

“That’s what you’re afraid of?” I could sense a little humor in his voice now, almost as if he thought I was kidding.

“Well yeah, it happened before with this other guy.” I told him.

“Sweetheart, I’m still the same old Pat you knew before. It’s not like I’ve changed. Just because I’m doing this with you, doesn’t change anything between us,” he informed me. “And all guys are sweet talkers. They're always saying stuff they don’t mean and the only reason they do is to trick the chicks and have them eating out of their palms. It's only to lead them on, but I thought you were smarter than that, Nick," he chuckled a little then and shook his head at me. "Oh wow, man."

I felt my heart warm up as I could feel myself starting to get a little pissed off. I couldn’t believe what Pat was saying to me.

“So basically what you’re saying is that they’re all liars?” I retorted back to him. “And you’re just like them?! You didn’t mean any of the things that you just…?” I found my voice trailing off on its own then as depression settled into me once again.

This was great, I had just lost another guy and this one happened to be one of my friends!

“What? No! I mean…I mean, I only did all of this was ‘cause what you said was obviously not true. I mean, I was only playing along with you! The fact that Drew got you raped and just left you all alone, that-that’s obviously not true! I know Drew; he would never do something like that!”

I couldn’t help staring at him in bewilderment for a few seconds before actually reacting to his words. Finally, I just decided to spill everything out.

“So, what, do you actually think that I lied about all of this?” I asked him straight out. “Drew seriously never talked to you about any of this? Wow. I thought he was like your best friend! I can’t believe he hid this from you!” I pretended like I was shocked.

When he didn’t reply, I just scoffed and turned to leave. I had only placed my hand on the doorknob and was about to twist it and go on inside, when Pat grabbed a hold of my bare arm and pulled me back, which I had expected actually.

“What are you talking about?!” he screamed at me. “All of that cannot be true!”

“Why not?!” I shouted back at him. “If Drew can get drunk for the first time in his life and if he can force me to get all dressed up like some kind of hooker and then make me parade around in some unknown neighborhood at one in the morning, then I’m sure anything’s possible!”

Maybe this was all too much to handle all at once and that too for a guy like Pat and I knew it really was a little too much for one night, but once I got started, it was a lot harder for me to just stop. I always go over the line and past the breaking point. I was just stupid like that to not realize when enough was enough; it was always a bad habit of mine.

While I was saying all of this to him, he had loosened his grip on my arm and slipped his fingers away from it, but now all of a sudden, when he grabbed my wrist, I couldn’t help flinching and then wincing in pain. He wasn’t holding it that tight, but it still hurt there from past malfunctions.

That was probably a mistake, because immediately looked down and started stroking the spot where my veins were and where I had rubbed concealer over. That was another habit of mine, after I had given up hurting myself, I wouldn’t dare step out of the house wearing a short sleeved shirt and even if I did, I would make sure to put something over the wrists in case someone were to spot the deep, red and highly noticeable scars and ask me about them.

To people, once a cutter was always a cutter. And that type of thing was sure to get me into lots of deep trouble, which was something that I really didn't need right now, not with all that's going on with me right now.

“Whoa, wait, you cut yourself?!” Pat asked aloud then, as he ended up rubbing off the rest of the make-up and noticing the cuts. Some of them still looked fresh, even though they were made years ago.

“Yeah, I used to,” I answered him in a soft voice, as I looked down at them as well. “When I was like younger and stuff.”

“Oh my god, I am so sorry! Was it because of me and Drew? Was it ‘cause I was always making fun of about stupid stuff and just constantly bothering you?”

“Yes, but no,” I shook my head at him. “I-I had other issues besides you two.”

All of a sudden, without any warning, Pat pulled me back onto his chest.

“Oh man, there is just so much that I don’t know about you,” he whispered to me, placing his pointy yet soft chin on my head.

“It’s just that my life isn’t really all that great or really anything worth talking about, which is why I never really bother mentioning to you guys about it.” I whispered to him, as I played around with the little strings attached to the hood of Pat’s sweatshirt.

“I’m sorry.” He kissed my hair softly.

I knew it then that Pat wasn’t really saying sorry to me for what’s happened to me in the past or just apologizing to me for something that’s clearly not even his fault. Instead, he was saying it because he was seriously sorry for how he had acted towards me a few years ago.

The longer that Pat held me close to him, the warmer I felt myself getting. Finally, I allowed my head to look up and my eyes to look into his. And then without thinking about it then, they fell down onto his lips. Pat really didn’t do anything about it, probably because of what I had just said to him now, but I couldn’t help myself from leaning closer and closer to him until my lips were finally on his.

The kiss felt both sweet and passionate to me at first, because Pat was only kissing me back softly. I was afraid he wasn’t really into it and would soon pull away, but as I wrapped my arms around his neck and moved my body closer to his, I felt his arms immediately wrapping themselves tight around my waist.

As our kiss progressed on, my insides were suddenly starting to feel hungrier for him. I started to kiss him back a little harder and faster and I could tell Pat was feeling the same way, because he ended up pushing me up against my front door and caressing my face with one hand while squeezing my waist with his other.

My cell phone rang out all of a sudden then, causing me to gasp and slightly pull my lips away from Pat's. I pulled my phone out of my back pocket and saw that it was my dad on the caller ID. I answered since I pretty much had no other choice but to do it.

"Hello?" I said into it.

“Nicolette, where are you right now?” he asked me, without returning my greeting.

“Oh, I…” I briefly turned my eyes towards Pat; he was now softly nudging his face against the side of mine and gently grazing his lips over my ear and cheek, softly kissing the spots. “I-I was out, with my friends.”

“Well, hurry on back home. We need to talk.”

“Um, is anything wrong, dad?” It was something about the way that dad had said, ‘We need to talk.’ that sounded a bit off and made me feel a tad bit uneasy.

I looked nervously over to Pat, he had his hands wrapped around my waist and he pulled my back in close to his chest. I moaned softly as his lips pressed against the nape of my neck.

“It’s about Drew and you.” Dad finally filled me in.

I coughed. I felt like I was suddenly chocking on my own heart. Clearing my throat, I moved away from Pat before finally finding the courage to open my mouth and manage to push some words out before it was too late and dad decided to hang up on me.

I could tell that Pat was disappointed, but he didn’t try to pull me back, because he probably figured that this was something important, which it so was, by the way! Instead, he stood patiently next to me with a small smile on his face and soft eyes that watched me as I spoke.

My mind felt like it was all clogged up with all the smoky thoughts that were rushing around, making the beat of my heart accelerate.

“I’m sorry,” I sighed. “I have to go now. Dad says there’s something he needs to talk about with me.”

“I understand,” Pat smiled softly at me. “It’s getting pretty late anyway. So, I’ll see you tomorrow?”

“Yeah,” I felt the corners of my mouth lifting up. “Sure.”

I turned then to enter my house, but then frowned and turned back around.

”What’s wrong?” Pat asked me, his brow furrowed.

“It’s just that…I don’t think dad would find it rather pleasingly if I stepped into the house dressed like this. I mean, dad’s known I’ve changed my style and been like this for years now, if I decide to change it all of a sudden or even try to go back to what I used to be like before, well…”

“What were you like before?” Pat cut in.

I gave him a look that said I wasn’t going to start talking about this now. “My point is that he’d get all suspicious and try to find out why I was doing this now.”

“Alright, alright, I got it. So, what are you gonna do?”

I sighed deeply. “I don’t know.”

“Ooh, why not just go up to your room, you know the way you usually get out of your room through the balcony and just quickly change your clothes – your room is still soundproof right?” I nodded. “So, yeah, then just climb back down and go in through the front door.”

I agreed; that was a pretty smart idea.

I used the branches on the tree in front of my house to climb up to the top and then carefully and making sure not to look down, I tentatively placed a single foot on the edge of my stone balcony.

Then I pulled myself closer to it and grabbed a hold of a ledge, bringing my other foot onto it at the same time. I sighed deeply. The next part was pretty easy; all I had to do was swing my feet over the ledge and get to the other side and through my balcony doors.

I knew they were still locked, but this was my house and these doors connected to my room, plus I’ve been doing this for years now so I knew how to get in and get out like it was adding two plus two. All I needed was a hair clip and I could pick the lock in under two minutes.

I’ve been doing this since I was sixteen years old, so I was no longer scared of heights like I used to be. I wasn’t even worried about the fact that if I made one mistake or that one little slip, and the next thing I know I’d be falling to my death in two seconds flat.

Without even turning on the light – in case Nyla or dad saw it – I slipped on a pair of sweats over my skirt and put on a loose t-shirt after taking off the other one. Then, just as quick, I walked out onto the balcony and climbed down the tree and back down onto the ground as I usually did and was now standing in front of Pat.

“Nice.” He complimented me.

”Thank you very much.” I smiled back at him.

He grinned at me and just stared straight into my eyes for a few seconds.

“So…” he finally said, dragging the word out.

“Yeah?” I looked up at him then.

“Um, you’re gonna go in now?”

“Yeah, I guess,” I answered him. “Unless… you know you wanna say something to me first.”

“Well…” Pat spread both his arms out then and I got the idea.

I smiled and moved in close to him until I was safely inside those long and muscled arms of his. I sighed softly and inhaled Pat’s scent as he stroked my hair and rubbed my back.

“Good night, love.” He told me.

”Good night.” I whispered back.

“Sleep tight, Princess,” Pat released me then and looked at me. “And don’t let Drew get to ya.”

I leaned into give Pat one last kiss before finally heading inside. Because of that time that I spent talking with Pat and sharing all those feelings and thoughts with him, I was suddenly feeling a whole lot lighter and better about of all this. I was now ready to face whatever that was about to come when I went inside.