Mending Wounds

Chapter Eight

“Anything to drink?” the waiter asked as he looked between Ben and I.

“I’ll have water” Ben smiled politely before turning to me with a questioning smile “Sherry temple for the lady?”

I gave him a nod with a small smile.

“Alright, I’ll be back with your drinks in a minute” the waiter said before walking away.

I crossed my arms on the table then leaned over “How’s work?” I asked.

He smiled and shrugged “Its going good, there isn’t anything much to talk about” he asked.

When it came to Ben’s work, there wasn’t anything that he could talk to me about. His work wasn’t something he was allowed to talk about due to its nature and the rules. I myself wasn’t sure what he worked to be honest, all I knew is that he works on the base and that he will be here for two years before going back home to his family. He only had a year remaining of the two years.

Even after those three months of dating I still feel like I didn’t know Ben that well. We met four months back at one of Alex’s arranged double dates. I remember when I first saw him, I was taken by her good looks and his manners. When we were introduced, I remember how I had to look up at Ben as we shook hands because of him being a head taller than I am, and his well-built body only made me feel like I was a child beside him. His brown eyes lined with thick lashes were gentle as we spoke throughout dinner, dark pink plumb lips pulled into a smile as he made jokes to make me laugh, and hands consistently running through his brown overgrown buzz cut.

It was like Alex’s predicted it, the very next day, he asked Jeremy for my number and we’d text most of the time. It wasn’t until a month later that he asked out on a date, then a date later to be his girlfriend. I was hesitant at first, scared to get hurt, but then eventually decided that it was time for me to put myself out there especially since I found a man that is as nice as Ben.

“How’s school?” he asked.

“It’s either you called it uni or classes” I chuckled “When you refer to it as school, you make me feel like I’m still in f*****g high school”

He chuckled back “Not with that f*****g mouth and language”

“So you’re saying that you didn’t use to cuss when you were in high school?” I asked entertained.

He gave me an amused grin “Honey, I’ve been cursing ever since I came out of my mother’s womb” he said “I’m just being a gentlemen by not doing it in front of you”

He then leaned forward with a wider grin “And I prefer my ladies to only cuss in the bedroom”

Before he could say anything, I reached over to him and cover his mouth with my hands in embarrassment. Even with my hands over his hand, I can still feel his wide smirk under my hand. With a chuckle, he removed my hand from my mouth and placed a kiss on the palm of my hand, he then moved to sit next to me on the couch.

“Speaking of classes” I said awkwardly “I have a contest this week”

“That’s nice?” he said.

“We have a group project, in my case it’s just Derek and I, and we have to come up with parking solutions for our campus then present it to the judges. It’s going to be held during this weekend” I said “Which means your day off and you can make it”

A smile crossed his lips “Are you asking me to come to the event?” he asked.

I nodded “If you have the time too, I’d be happy if you can”

He leaned over and kissed the side of my head “I’d be honoured too” she said “Do I finally get to meet your friends and family, I mean other than Alex?”

I nodded “I guess so. Maybe you can even stay afterwards, we usually go out as celebration whether we lose or win”

“Sure” he smiled “So who am I meeting? Got to make sure I know a little bit about everyone before I meet them. I don’t want to lie and tell them that I heard about them when we never actually did talk about them”

I chuckled “Well, you already met Alex, she’s my best friend. Beside her, There’s Derek, he’s Alex younger brother who happens to be a best friend of mine and my partner in the project; he’s loud and clumsy most of the time. Then there’s Adam, he’s my only male friend from uni and my adviser when I need him to be. There’s also Kamila and Lina, they’re my friend from uni as well” I told him “You already know my mum and sister, and there’s Alex mum as well who is practically a mum to me as well since she was a big part of my childhood growing up”

“Wow, that’s a lot of people that I have to remember that names of” he smiled.

Well, there was one more person that I should’ve mentioned but didn’t. There was no reason for Ben to know about Cole yet, he wasn’t going to be there nor will they ever meet. Plus, Ben and I know about each other’s history when it came to ex-lovers; we never talked about them in details so there was no reason to bring him up at all.

After we had lunch, we spend the remaining of the day talking and walking around the street, most people called this street American Ally due to the one-way road being lined up with all different American franchised restaurant, and because that’s where most American’s in this country are due to how close it is to their base. I loved coming to this street during morning and afternoon on weekdays, and even morning times on weekends because having breakfast, brunch and lunch here was the best thing. I even spend countless night on the Caribu coffee on this street to study and work on my assignment. But on weekends, this street would turn from being a nice friendly place to a street filed with hormonal guys and teenagers cat calling and drunk assholes stumbling out of clubs.

“Do you want to come in?” he asked “It’s almost curfew, but you can come in if you want”

I turned to him unaware that we reached our destination. We were so caught up in talking about American Horror Story and The Walking dead that I didn’t notice that we were getting closer to the base. We stopped across the gate, me rocking back and forth on my heels as I looked at the gate then back at him.

I ran my hand through my hair, then rubbed my arm “I don’t think so, I still have so many things to do before this weekend” I told him “Plus, I have to check up on Alex. I haven’t seen her since the fight that happened yesterday”

“Alright then, was hoping I could sneak a little kiss here and there but guess not” he said then kissed me on the check “I’ll talk to you tomorrow, and I’ll see in a couple of days”

“Alright, I’ll talk to you later” I smiled, then watched him leave before I walked to my car.

***

When I reached the house, the house was empty. Alex’s, Cole’s, and Jeremy’s car were parked in the driveway, everyone was in their room though. As I walked down the hallway, I heard the screams and noises of Jeremy, Derek and Cole coming from Cole’s room as they screamed in frustration at the game and each other. So, I walked up to Alex’s room and knocked; when I didn’t get a reply after a knock, I walked into the room. Alex was on the bed, cuddled to a pillow as she watched some random show on her laptop that was propped across her. Her face was red, eyes swollen, and nose as red as a tomato.

I kicked off my shoes at the step of the door, then pulled off my jacket before I sneaked into the bed behind her. I wrapped my arms around her as I cuddled her from the back. She wrapped arm around mine, lacing her fingers into mine as she brought it closer to her chest.

“What’s wrong?” I asked her.

She shook her head.

“Want to tell me what happened?” I asked.

She shut off the laptop then turned onto her back, snuggling her head into my neck as she sobbed.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me” she said “I’m a f*****g mess and I don’t even have my f*****g life together. For f***s sake I’m turning 21 and I still feel like a child that doesn’t have their s**t together”

I stroked her hair “What the f**k are you talking about? Alex, you’re the only person I know that has their s**t together” I told her “My sister is five years older than you are and she doesn’t have her life together, not even close to what you have. Alex, you have a faithful boyfriend, a steady job, a degree that’s on its way, and a plan. You basically have your life together”

“But I don’t have my s**t together when it comes to my family” she cried “My mum keeps pressuring me about what going to have between Ben and I, my dad keeps pressuring me about classes; f**k, I don’t even know what happened to us. It’s like he’s a completely different person after he came back and we barely have a relationship. And I’m so f*****g scared of my relationship with you. I’m scared to lose you too”

I gave her a small smile “Alex you’re not losing me; if anything, I should be the one scared of losing you. I’m so scared that when the times comes, you’d leave with Jeremy and go to the states and that would be it between us. I’m scared that whatever is going on between Cole and I would put an end to my friendship with you. But that should make you feel scared, I’m a fighter, I won’t lose you without a fight.

“As for your parents, that’s what parents do, they pressure you into this and they stress you out. They only do that because they are worried about you and love. If it gets too much at some point, Al, you need to tell them the topic is putting too much on you and you don’t want to talk about it. And Cole… you guys will work things out, you always do. The only reason that you two fight is because you too alike” I told him “Don’t worry your little head about all these stuff, you’re still too young to be worried about marriage and career before even graduating”

She let out a small chuckle “I wish you’d like by your advices sometimes” she said “You give like the best advices but you need use them on yourself”

“I don’t want to use all of them on me when you clearly can’t live without them” I told her “Plus, at this point, my life isn’t that bad”

“You need to tell your parents that talking about jobs, school, future marriage and what they think to be your non-existence relationship puts pressure on you too” she said “It pains me to see you have so much life in you but don’t have the freedom to express it. Like, I want you to openly date the person you want to in public, I want you to party and go to clubs without being scared that someone will see you, I want you to wear whatever the f**k you want because you want to, and I want to see you travel the world whether it’s on your own or with me with the freedom you have”

Another chuckle left my mouth “The only reason I don’t do these kind of things is because I don’t want to and don’t feel comfortable doing it, it’s not because of my family or this country. Alex, I still wouldn’t talk to my family about the person I was dating even if it was okay for me to openly talk about it. My mum knows that I’m dating someone, and so do my sisters and cousins, but they just don’t know who because I don’t talk about my personal life with them” I explained “And I wear all the s**t that I do want to ware and I’m lucky that my parents allow me to and not forcing me into wearing things that I don’t, I just have a shitty style. I finally reached a point in my life that not everything sucks and I’m happy with that”

“You still need to lose those so-called friends that you have at uni” she pointed out “Those mother fuckers are fake and overdue for an un-friend request”

“And so is that so-called best friend of yours” I point right back at her, then pulled her closer to me “You’re good though, you’re not on my soon or ever un-friend list”

“You might be on mine if you don’t invite Ben to the contest and the after party” she chuckled “And if you don’t let me dress you up”

“I already did” I smiled at her “So what are we watching today?”