Chapter 3
1023 Words
- 5 years ago -
Oh, I've been shaking. I love it when you go crazy
You take all my inhibitions
Baby, nothing is holdin' me back
You take me places that tear up my reputation
Manipulate my decisions
Baby, nothing is holdin' me back
Nothing is holdin' me back
Nothing is holdin' me back
Shawn Mendes, “nothing is holding me back.”
I feel Xavier’s hands tap to the beat on my waist as he mouths the lyrics to the music the band is playing. We are the only ones dancing in the middle of a small restaurant we booked for the evening. We had an intimate wedding with only his closest friends and family as guests.
As for me, I only invited Dameon, and despite my protests, Xavier insisted that I ask my mother as well. Being the socialite that she was, my mother wanted to be here. She was beaming from ear to ear that her embarrassment of a daughter managed to marry into a well-known family.
I ignored her as much as I could, but I couldn’t stop frowning when I saw her mingling with the other guests. Seeing how my mother’s presence bothered me, Xavier dragged me to the dance floor.
Xavier and Dameon are my childhood best friends. I’ve known both since I was 10. I’ve had no other friends than the two of them. I met Xavier on his very first day in school. He just transferred from another school.
I fought with a bully two years older than me when we first met. He stood behind me, thinking I needed his help. He was dead wrong because I kicked that bully's ass. I remember being a neglected little girl with glasses too large for my face while he was the teacher's pet, all squeaky clean. I was known as the skinny, nerdy girl stuck like glue to the very popular hockey team captain, the school council president, and overall overachiever boy.
I really could care less what they say about me. I never heard it upfront, but I know for a fact that the cheerleaders called me Xavier and Dameon's "pity friend" behind my back.
Xavier and Dameon never cared. Both were too good-looking for high school. Dameon was the star Center on the hockey team and had girls falling for him. Unlike Xavier, Dameon loved the attention he got from the girls in school.
He had this "boy from the wrong side of the tracks" aura about him. He was always rugged, in his loose top and tight jeans, with his messy brown hair falling around his face.
Those were my boys; I was fervently loyal to both, quick to judge the latest flavor of the month and ready to beat anyone who spoke ill of them.
Between them, Xavier would always be around like a big brother who was always in my business. He would sit thru my Karate competitions and even chaperone failed dates.
When I turned 16, the other teenage boys started noticing my curves; despite all my efforts in concealing them in my oversized hoodies because I started getting asked out on dates. Xavier became the annoying big brother, always sitting too close, giving the eye to anyone who would even dare look at me that way.
So I graduated high school without ever having a boyfriend. Not that I mind, dad would have never allowed it. He already disliked my friendship with the two boys.
People often thought that dad’s overprotectiveness was fatherly love. The truth was far darker, though; dad only opposed it because he didn’t want anyone to get too close to me. Anybody too close might find out about my bruises and cuts, which I often got.
You see, dad beat me ever since I could remember. He was a failed MMA fighter and a drunk, and at home, he would pour out all his frustrations on me - as his punching bag.
Xavier was there that fateful night. I had enough of Dad’s abuse and fought back. I almost ended up killing him and myself in the process. Xavier arrived just in time to stop me. He called the police to have dad arrested. It was his testimony that put dad behind bars.
On the other hand, Mom found the whole ordeal embarrassing and signed me over to a group home. She is washing me for ruining her perfect lie of life in her way.
I was liberated from my oppressor, but my world fell apart. And through it all, Xavier was there to help me put it back together.
Being the overachiever he is, he got accepted at the state university. But he chose to stay behind and finish his studies here in town because he knew I needed a friend now more than ever.
I would have lost my mind without him. A conservative Catholic organization runs my group home, and boy, did they have some rigid rules. Xavier would visit me after school almost every day. He would sneak in some contraband, like a mobile phone that I used to exchange texts with him at night or the latest sleazy young adult novel that I obsessively read through to escape. Things that our house managers normally frown upon.
Fast forward to today, and my twisted past seemed like a distant memory. Especially today, when I just said my marriage vows to the one man who stood by me and turned it all around.
A tear falls on my cheek; Xavier notices and brushes the tear away with his thumb. “No more crying.“ he says softly as he kisses my cheeks.
Oh, I've been shaking. I love it when you go crazy
You take all my inhibitions
Baby, nothing is holdin' me back
You take me places that tear up my reputation
Manipulate my decisions
Baby, nothing is holdin' me back
Nothing is holdin' me back
Nothing is holdin' me back
Shawn Mendes, “nothing is holding me back.”
As the music ends, he lifts me and swings me around the dance floor, whispering, “I love you.”
- Writer
