Birthday Girl

I want a life I never want to take a vacation from. That’s my goal.

“Now I’m simply terrified for every woman I see you with,” I continue, “but also secretly smiling, because I know after they fake how much they love your cock in bed, they’re in the bathroom, fingering themselves to a mental image of any guy in town who’s not you.”

I can’t help the smile that peeks out. Cam isn’t stupid, is she? It’s the perfect color on me, my base tan already in full swing. The panties sit perfectly on my hips and even without much support in the top, my breasts sit perky and flattering. I run my hand over my smooth, flat stomach and up the curves of my waist, wishing someone was here to appreciate the view and make me smile.

“Look in your backpack when you get into your room. Test it out. See how it feels.”
I stop, turning halfway around and thinning my eyes on her. “Not another vibrator…” I whine.
She throws her head back and laughs at the present she gave me for my eighteenth birthday last year. It wouldn’t have been so bad if she hadn’t let me open it in front of a party full of people.
“Not that,” she says. “But it’s definitely something you and Cole can enjoy together.” And then she jerks her chin toward the dark house behind me. “Or, um…perhaps the man of the house might like it, too. The other man of the house, I mean.”
She wiggles her eyebrows at me, and I shoot her a dirty look. “I don’t even want to open the package now.”
“’Night!” she taunts and pulls away from the curb.

Guilt rips through me. She’s Cole’s. He kisses her. He holds her. He makes her smile. It’s not my place to have any opinions about her, especially territorial ones like where she bartends or how she dresses. I just still keep feeling like I did in the theater. She’s a young woman I met and had fun talking to, and no one else had anything to do with it. Part of me keeps feeling like I knew her first, even though I know I didn’t.

“Pike, right?” she says, putting a hand on her chest. “Cam, remember? I’m Jordan’s sister.”
Dutch is staring at her, his mouth hanging open just slightly.
“I’m just here to give her a ride to work,” Cam tells me and then her eyes fall down my torso and arms. “And nice ink, man.”
Her eyes light up as she nods her approval. I notice she has some, too, down her upper arm, and a phoenix on the side of her torso. Which I can only see, because she’s wearing almost no clothes, dressed in a black mini skirt and a black tank top cut off just under her breasts.
Where the fuck is your father? Seriously…

I drop my eyes to her shirt, seeing the soaked navy-blue T sticking to her body, tight and molded to every inch of her chest and stomach. A sliver of her hips and tummy peek out just below where the shirt is pasted to her. Her skin is flawless, her curves beautiful. I swallow the lump in my throat and turn quickly away.
She definitely has a body I don’t remember nineteen year olds having when I was that age, but she is still only nineteen.
And she’s Cole’s. Not mine. Don’t check her out again.

I just shake my head. Not now. It’s not weird my son’s girlfriend wants to pay her way and be helpful, but it is weird that he’s not here, too. Does he know she took his place, helping out this morning? What kind of man is okay with that? I taught him to fulfill his obligations, goddammit.
Or maybe he just didn’t want to come with me.
I need to do something about him, but I don’t know what. This whole “waiting and seeing” tactic isn’t working. He needs a kick in the ass.

“No, that’s okay,” I tell her. “Stay here. It’s… safer. Thanks, though.”
Her eyes shoot up, focus on me, and then narrow. “Safer?” she questions like I just said I’m going out for a pedicure. “Or are you just worried you’ll spend more time holding my hand than getting any work done?”
I try to keep a straight face. She’s pretty smart.
Okay, yeah, sorry, honey, but yes.

But the girl of my dreams is off-limits. She’s Cole’s, and she’s nineteen. There’s no way.