Vegas Boys

Banner by Jon Walker. <3

It was still Christmas break, so there wasn't even school to distract me. Brendon had called me countless times since our fight on Friday morning, but I had diligently ignored him. He had already hurt me once--I wasn't about to forgive him and give him the chance to hurt me again.

It seemed like we had always been a couple; I had completely forgotten all the weeks and months of struggling we had gone through first, when he was determined to have me and I was determined not to give in. But I should have known that he wasn't going to give up on me this time, either.

-----

On Saturday, I felt so bad about everything that I just had to get out of the house--sitting in there in the quiet with no one to talk to and nothing to keep myself busy would have driven me mad. So I got in the car and drove around town for a couple of hours, just seeing the sights. I had never realized before how much of the city I had never seen.

It still hurt too much to think about Brendon. There were things I had to deal with there, things I had to work out on my own, but I couldn't do it yet--I needed to give the open wounds time to heal first, and maybe then I could come back and evaluate the situation and figure out how I felt about it. But right then, it felt good to just get out of the house and occupy myself with other thoughts.

I got back home at around three or four o'clock in the afternoon, and the door was unlocked. Surprised, I checked the driveway, but my car was the only one there: Dad was still at work. Shrugging, I figured that I must have accidentally forgotten to lock the door, and went inside.

I was feeling much better, and had even come to peace with my fight with Brendon, sort of, as I made my way up the stairs to my room. I wasn't expecting anything out of the ordinary, so I received the shock of my life as I stepped into my bedroom and found Brendon waiting for me.

He was perched on the edge of my bed, wringing his hands out (not because he was nervous, but because he was Brendon, and always had a lot of excess energy), looking at me with this expectant expression, as if we had agreed to meet here beforehand.

As I edged away from the doorway, still keeping my distance from him, I folded my arms over my chest and tried to seem more annoyed than surprised. "How did you get in here?"

"You keep a spare key under the big fern by the front door," he replied, without skipping a beat. When I raised my eyebrows at him, he smirked, but it was a mere shadow of his usual gleeful expression. "I watched you all summer, remember?"

I ignored his obvious attempts to make me smile, hugging my own body even tighter as I felt my lips press together into a thin line. "Well, I think you should go now," I said coldly.

Brendon got to his feet, his mildly amused expression rapidly fading to be replaced by that horrible devastated look, the one that always made me hurt inside for him. "Kelsey," he began, softly, "please, just let me try to explain--"

"There's nothing left to explain, Brendon," I snapped. "You already explained everything. I get it. I understand."

He sighed, looking crestfallen. "I know. But...I just want to make it better."

I bit my lip and looked out the window, but it was no use: all I could see out my window was the window that used to be his...the window I used to watch him through from time to time....

"Kelsey," he pleaded.

I looked down at the floor, away from him, and ran my hand through my hair. "I don't even know what to say to you right now, Brendon," I admitted.

"Say that's it's okay," he begged desperately. He was less than a foot away now, I could feel the heat radiating from his body--he had come closer, and I hadn't even noticed. "Tell me everything's gonna be okay."

I looked up at him, and his big brown eyes were full of pain and suffering and pleading, darting back and forth as he studied my face. In that moment, I wanted nothing more than to hold him in my arms and hug him and kiss him and tell him it was alright. But I had found out the hard way that lying (even--no, especially--to yourself) never did anyone any good in the end.

"I can't, Bren," I whispered.

I saw something shift in his dark eyes, but that was all that changed; his face held its distraught expression, and it broke my heart so much to see him that way that I struggled to explain.

"I'm not...I'm not sure...." Tears stung my eyes, and I paused long enough to blink them away and collect myself. Then, all at once, the horrible truth tore free from my soul: "You won't remember me. You'll leave, and you'll forget. You don't need me, Bren."

I looked down again, in the hopes that he wouldn't see me crying.

"Kelsey--wha--that's--what are you..." Brendon seemed to be at a loss for words. "Of course I need you!" he burst out suddenly, and his loud, outraged tone was so different from his previous one that I looked up in surprise. "Of course I won't forget you! Are you crazy?!"

But then his face softened as he reached up to tenderly push some of my hair out of my eyes and wipe my tears away, and he let out a little humorless laugh of disbelief. "As if I could ever forget you. Do you have any idea how much I think about you?" He smiled, and he was so sweet that I started crying again.

"It'll be different," I choked out, forcing myself not to let him sway me, "when you leave. You'll get famous, and you'll have all the girls you could ever want to choose from--"

"You're the only girl I want," he insisted stubbornly.

"I'm the only girl you want right now!" I corrected him. "You don't understand, Brendon. People change. You'll change. You want me right now, but you'll change your mind--"

"No, I won't!" he half-shouted, not because he was angry, but because he was upset. He always got upset when I underestimated my own worth, when I downplayed how much I meant to him. His dark eyes were glimmering again, with some deep emotion I didn't recognize, and he swallowed hard. "I love you, Kelsey! That's not going to change!"

The gravity of his words took us both off guard, and we just stood there staring at each other in shock for a few moments. I was overwhelmed with two completely different emotions: extreme happiness, and despair. As much as the sound of it made my mangled heart swell, I wasn't foolish enough to believe that one little word could magically fix everything that was wrong here.

I finally managed to say, in a trembling, strangled voice, "Brendon...you don't--"

"Yes, I do," he said, quietly, but firmly. "I do love you. I know I do. I love you, Kelsey."

Nothing wavered in his expression, but there was that deep emotion in his eyes again, and I couldn't take it. I shook my head and looked away, and said, "I really think you should go--"

"No, listen to me," said Brendon persistantly, undoubtedly seeing that I was reluctant to believe him. "Kelsey--look at me!"

He grabbed me by the shoulders and brought his face down to my level, and I looked him in the eyes, as he had told me to.

"I love you," he said sincerely, with overwhelming conviction. "I know I love you, because I want this--this band thing--I want it so much, Kels. It's all I've ever wanted, all my life, and I want it so fucking bad..." He paused and swallowed hard. "But I've been thinking about it a lot for the past couple of weeks...and, sometimes...sometimes I think I want you more."

It was too much. It was far too much. I started crying again, and I looked away, struggling to distract myself with any thought of anything...anything, just to keep Brendon's voice, the soft serious one he reserved for me, from declaring his love to me again and again in my head.

"You need to go," I whispered faintly. It was all I could manage.

"Kelsey, please--"

"Just go!" He flinched at my raised voice, but made no move to leave. "Please, Brendon, just go!" I sobbed, my voice breaking on each and every word. "I really can't do this right now...."

He released his grip on my shoulders and went to kiss me on the cheek, but I turned away. Biting his lip, he said goodbye with a glum expression and walked away. He was almost to the door when I remembered something, and, even in my current state, my curiosity got the better of me.

"Brendon!"

"Yeah?" He turned around and started back towards me eagerly, hoping for a change of mind.

I quickly dashed those hopes. "Your car wasn't in the driveway," I said lamely. My voice cracked again.

He shrugged casually to hide the underlying hurt. "It got towed this morning. I walked here."

"You walked here? From where?"

"The Smoothie Hut."

I gaped.

"It's not that far," said Brendon, but he didn't seem so convinced himself. "And, anyway, you're worth it."

And I was so taken aback by that last part--and the small reassuring smile he flashed me afterwards--that I completely forgot to ask if he needed a ride home.