Going Down In Flames

A guilty conscience hung heavily over my head. Trying to make sense of what the heart wants couldn’t just be a simple decision, it had to be complicated and all over the place. I had snuck out mischievously in the early hours of the morning without being noticed. Hanging my head in dismay i held my eyes at Travis’s motionless body in slumber. My head my spinning and my heart beating at an unreadable pace; everything was so jumbled now.

A cool morning breeze brushed across my skin resulting in a slight shiver. The grass was dipped in morning dew damping my legs as they rest on top of the dark green leaves that laced the ground. I could tell dawn was approaching as a vibrant orange appeared slowly from below the horizon gradually bringing a glow to the sky.

I slowly leant back, resting my head on the soft grass below, a cool shiver running up my spine. I was dreading what today was going to bring but i knew i had to sort some things out and make sense of this mind spinning situation. I knew a few things: i liked Travis i always have had a soft spot for him and now its building a lot more than i expected, i also had something for Aaron unquestionably it wasn’t as strong as what i have for Travis regardless, there was still something there. I also needed to discover what this now means between Travis and i and when i discover that I’m dreading when i have to talk to Aaron, i don’t want to lose the friendship that we have over this, the memories, the laughs, the fun i don’t want it to come to an abrupt end...

Mentally slapping my forehead in frustration i walked back inside and headed straight for the kitchen; my stomach grumbling in starvation. I couldn’t be bothered to make anything fancy, grabbing a bowel, cereal and milk. Leaning over the counter i heavily dug into my breakfast, not bothering to waste the few moments it took to sit down.

Two warm hands slid up the side of my shirt, i jumped in surprise of their touch. Turning around almost instantly my eyes fell upon a groggy, still half asleep Travis. His eyes wondered over your body, you looked down at your bare legs, only Travis’s t-shirt covering your upper half. With a flick of his head, he quickly searched around the room for watching eyes before crashing his lips to yours.

Without removing their touch he lifted you with ease up onto the kitchen bench, pressing his body firmly against yours. I clenched my fingers in his dark locks as his finger tips traced the contours of my upper thighs before running then up my abdomen. A creek of the floorboards from upstairs gathered my attention. Unwillingly i dragged my lips away from Travis’s a smile lingering on both your faces as our eyes met.

I pressed my index finger to my lips indicating for him to be quiet. I gently dropped my body back to the ground and grabbed my bowel of cereal empting the contents down the sink along with my sudden loss of appetite. I grabbed the hem of Travis’s boxers with my index finger and dragged him willingly upstairs back towards his room.

As soon as the door shut, i pushed Travis down forcefully onto the bed. Straddling his waist i connected our lips with desire once again. With our hands fumbling over each other’s bodies exploring the features, i gently rocked my hips along with the current of movement. Travis pushed himself up slightly, propping himself up on one elbow. With a quick movement of his hands he removed his shirt from your body and pushed your shoulders down changing position so his body now hovered over yours.

Travis trailed kisses down my jaw, towards my collar bone where he paused for a second, nibbling gently on the skin. I leaned my head back and let out a small moan. With my head tilted to the side, my eyes fixed on the clock illuminating its vibrants blue numbers. I mentally cursed various amount of times before letting out a heavy sigh catching Travis’s attention.

“What’s wrong?” he looked up.

“Look at the time” i sighed once again.

“So...” he paused thinking “Oh...”

“Yeah, oh...”

The clock read 8:56am, both Travis and i knew that Jim’s alarm would go off at 9 which would mean he would probably wake up a few other members of the crew just to be a pain in the ass. Travis rolled his body off you and we laid in silence for a mere few seconds.

“I have to go, Jim will be beyond suss if he comes in here, and see’s me wearing well... basically nothing and you next to me. He won’t even bother asking questions before the yelling starts”

“Your right, this sucks” he pouted.

“Don’t worry about it, we probably would have woken them up anyway knowing us” i winked and laughed.

Gathering your clothes that laid scattered around the room i slipped them on my body; covering my figure almost completely. Hovering slightly over Travis i pressed my lips to his for a moment before beginning to walk out of the room.

“I don’t know how the hell I’m going to be able to control myself around you today” he said quietly as i walked through the door way.

“Me either...” i whispered to myself.

~~~~~~~~

Escaping from the crew for a while i headed to the back of Travis’s property where most of the freestyle motocross jumps were based at. I dug my feet into the earth as i climbed up one of the steep jumps; dangling my feet over the dropping edge. Taking out my phone i began to type a new message.

To: Aaron
From: Ally
Hey Aaron, are you busy today?
I need to talk to you about something.

To: Ally
From: Aaron
Hey, uhm I’m at work sorry and i won’t be finished till later tonight.
I’m on my break now though if you wanted me to call you and we can chat now?

To: Aaron
From: Ally
Oh no fun.
Yeah okay, that sounds good.
Talk to you in a second x

I replied and waited a few moments before my phone blasted ‘Fever – Bullet for my valentine’.

“Hey” i said into the phone after answering.

“Hey Ally, how are you?” Aaron spoke cleanly through the phone.

“I’m really good thanks, and yourself?”

“Yeah pretty good, can’t complain. So what did you need to talk to me about?” he asked.

“Well, I’m not really sure if this is going to be a pointless conversation or not but i just don’t want to lead anyone on. I don’t really know if you classify me and you as something, romantic wise. I know there have been some moments when we’ve kissed and stuff and don’t get me wrong i did like you, i really did but some stuff happened last night and things changed a lot more than i expected it to. I just thought i would do the right thing and just clear anything up rather than giving out false expectations” i spoke quickly with nervousness.

“oh, uh, yeah i understand thats cool” he spoke softly, i knew I’d hurt his feelings and i felt terrible.

“Aaron, please don’t get me wrong i still want to see you, i still want to be friends with you and everything, just nothing romantic wise. I don’t want to lose our friendship...” i pleaded.

“Yea thats cool, well i gotta’ go – See ya’ around sometime i guess” he said quietly before abruptly hanging up without letting another word escape from your lips. You felt utterly horrible for doing what you just did, you didn’t even know for sure if there was actually something going on between Travis and yourself but you didn’t want to be that bitch Aaron would talk about to his friends that led him on for ages before informing him one day that she was kind of with another guy.

After wallowing in my guilt for a few minutes i effortlessly jumped off the edge of the jump, landing firmly on the dirt ground below me. I headed back to the foam pit arriving just in time to see Travis fly off his bike into the foam pit in an attempt to do a triple back flip. His mattered curls popped out of the corner of the pit, a cheeky smirk lingering on his face as he glanced in my direction. I laughed slightly and let my head fall to my shoes.

“What are you laughing at?” Jim questioned from beside me.

“Oh, nothing” i said softly, looking away in the other direction hiding the smile smeared across my face.

“Hey Ally, got the balls to try something or are you too clumsy for 2 wheels rather than 4?” Travis taunted as he jumped out of the foam pit.

“Just to refresh your memory after the countless amounts of concussions you have had from you failing on two wheels, if you don’t remember i used to keep up with you quiet well on two wheels back in the days!” i said emphasising the word ‘failed’.

“Oh... that hurt. Well come on, show me these great skills”
“Hey, i did say when i was younger!”

“Age is just a number”

“Give me your bike!” i sneered.

Travis wheeled his bike towards me, grabbing his helmet that sat on the ground below. I playfully snatched the helmet out of Travis’s hands, slipping it over my head.

“Do me up!” i commanded lifting my chin up.

“Please be careful” he said softly while doing up the straps.

“Only for you” i whispered.

“Do you remember how to work the bike?” he asked.

“Yep, well kinder... Oh well, I’ll work it out as i go along” i shrugged.

Flinging my leg over the bike i leant slightly to the side, it took me only 3 attempts to kick start the bike. I road slowly past Jim his death stare eyeing me off the whole way, it was obvious he didn’t want me to do this. I couldn’t help it though, i was an adrenalin junkie and lived for the thrill. Plus, i couldn’t dare not take up a challenge, it didn’t bother me if i failed but as long as i gave it a shot i would be pleased.

Firstly, i just did a standard jump into the foam pit, working my way to the right speed and distance. I needed to know my limits. Again, i did the same testing the extra throttle and the distance i travelled. Once back out of the foam pit i stopped just beside Travis.

“What am i doing?” i questioned.

“I don’t know what you’re comfortable with trying”

“Neither am i...”

“Just do whatever, it doesn’t matter if you can’t do it”

“Stuff it, I’m trying to back flip” i shrugged and sped away.

Turning the bike back around i flicked my eyes over to Travis whom had moved and was now standing beside Jim. The look on both their faces was priceless; fear. It was something those two guys don’t see much off with the adrenalin running frequently through their veins, fear to them was just a figure of imagination.

I played out the jump in my head, comparing the jump with doing back flips into the pool. It seemed similar except for the fact i had to bring the bike along for the ride with me. Quickly i did a small back and arm stretch just to increase my mobility. Getting over the anticipation i cracked my neck and fastened my eye, locking them on the jump ahead.

I clamped my hand down on the throttle and jumped with speed towards the jump. As soon as the bike left the end of the jump i pulled backwards in rotation and bent my knees in the correct form. Before i knew what was happening i fell out of rotation sideways, letting the bike fall into the air before crashing down on my body. I clenched my eyes and pushed the pain away as the bike’s handlebar landed heavily onto my left thigh.

“Are you okay?” Jim yelled from out of sight.

“I’m good, just get the bike off me”

Within a few seconds after your command the pressure on your leg from the bike was released. I pulled off my helmet handing it to Tommy who slung over the top of the foam pit watching. I gave my hand to Andy as he gave me the momentum to pull myself out of the foam pit. Forgetting of my leg i jumped to the ground. In a sudden jolt of pain, my knees buckled underneath me and i crashed into the ground.

Various people yelled and pulled me off the ground ringing my arms around their shoulders. I was soon placed on the lush green grass, the crew crowded around me.

“What happened?” Jim asked.

“When the bike came down, the handle bar went straight into my left thigh thats all” i said pulling down the top of my pants revealing my dark red mark with a purple tinge forming to it in which was going to be a nice plump bruise in a few hours.

“No more for you today” Travis stated.

“Agreed” i nodded.

“You did really well, just when you were rotating you were leaning towards the right off the bike which made you fall out of rotation” he explained.

“So did i meet your standards?” i asked.

“You will never know” he flirted.

Snapping out of your flirtatious ways with Travis i looked up at the wondering eyes of the crew. Jim’s expression made you laugh a little, it was that face of an older brother when his little sister comes home crying because a boy has hurt her feelings or broken her heart. If we had a shotgun, that would be the time that Jim would ask for it with a apathetic expression.

I smiled at his protective brotherly ways, it was sweet but he had to acknowledge that i wasn’t a little girl anymore. I’ll always be his little sister but I’m old enough to be able to make my own decisions and deal with their consequences wether they turn out to be good or bad.

After a while, we everyone began to flood back inside as did you with the assistance of Travis and Andy. Limping towards the freezer i grabbed a bag of frozen peas and headed upstairs to my temporary bedroom crashing down onto the bed as soon as possible. I grabbed a pair of shorts and changed into them revealing the dramatic change in colour of partially half of my left thigh. I placed the frozen peas on my leg and rolled onto my side closing my eyes.

I pretended to be asleep as i heard the door gently creek open. I heard footsteps, step by step getting louder and louder as they edged towards my bed. A finger caressed my cheek and tucked away the strand of hair the dangled lightly over my eye. Lips softly touched my forehead, their warmth being held there for seemingly not long enough.

“Your beautiful Ally DeChamp” Travis’s voice whispered.

I heard Travis quietly close the blinds of the room to stop the sun rays penetrating my eyes he then quietly left the room. My heart was racing, i was surprised Travis didn’t hear its loud thump in my chest with his touch. I could feel it, i didn’t know if it was a good feeling or bad, if i should be cautious or adventurous. My walls were collapsing quicker than i ever thought was possible.