8. Phone Buddy

CHAPTER 8

PHONE BUDDY

KALLIE

Jeremy's threats haunt me. I toss and turn all night long in the guest bedroom, dreading the alarm going off at seven in the morning.

Dixie would probably say I was stupid, a glutton for punishment, for still being here in Austin. I should have left the night I arrived. But I can't let him or Dad get away with this, and I need something out of this, too.

My mind drifts back, thinking how I'd been distracted with so many things to do with a week left until our wedding. Jeremy had become more and more miserable, just plain awful to live with, a fact which I'd attributed to his pain, and to his heartbreak at having to retire from playing hockey, the sport he loved. I had way too many excuses for his behavior.

One morning, we'd argued over something stupid, I can't even recall now what, and he shook me by the arms on my way out the door to do a final meeting with the caterer. But I pushed off and told him my future husband needed to stop being an asshole to me or else we'd have a pretty unhappy marriage. He apologized and promised once the wedding was over, he'd be back to his old self. But it was more than that, and I took the moment to call him out on his drinking and the drugs, too.

It ended up being the worst fight of our relationship. Me in tears, screaming at him to get his shit together. Him, beet red, at one point his hand raising, looking like he'd hit me.

He'd often been a little rough with me, grabbing me by the arms, giving me a little shake during our arguments, but nothing I'd have called abuse at the time, just two people passionately arguing. That morning, though, when he looked poised to strike, I knew better. I had to leave. I finally saw it for what it was.

Something wasn't right. That wasn't the Jeremy I'd fallen in love with. The injury, the drugs, all of it changed him. But I was still the same, wasn't I? I always thought things would improve after the stress of the wedding was over, after we'd relaxed on the beaches of Saint-Tropez on our honeymoon. But would they really?

After the caterers' meeting, I'd driven back to the house so we could talk things out, hoping that we'd both calmed down enough. We could get counseling, he could get help, whatever he needed to get better. Whatever we needed to get over this together.

I never expected what I found when I got home. I entered the kitchen from the garage, dropping my purse on the counter, still holding my overly stuffed wedding planner in the crook of my other arm when moans hit my ears.

I peeked around the corner into the living room. My eyes grew wide at the sight of him fucking Marissa from behind, gripping her hips hard. Both fully undressed, he had her bent over the new white leather couch I'd recently purchased that was perfect for our living room. Perfect for us. Not them.

An open bottle of champagne stood on our new marble coffee table. I recognized the label as a bottle from the special shipment his family had ordered, particularly for the rehearsal dinner.

But next to the bottle was the fuse to my powder keg. White lines and a bottle of pills sprawled across the marble.

Their party of two stole my life, love, hopes, and dreams.

"Leave her for me," Marissa had said, to the sound of their skin slapping together.

"Fuck, baby, you know I can't do that," he'd groaned, leaning over her back, reaching for her neck and circling it with his big hands. She arched her back as he squeezed the air out of her while he pumped harder from behind. It shocked me, the intimacy of it, and how she let him dominate her so. He'd never done that to me in the throes of passion.

"I can't go on being the other woman," she croaked.

"Yes, you fucking can. You love sneaking around, getting high. What my cock does to your cunt. You can't quit me. I refuse to let you, my little whore." His knuckles turned white around her neck.

"Yes. Yes, I'm your little whore," she squeaked. "Harder. Make me pass out."

Watching them got me so heated, so pissed off, and fiercely jealous. I'd let out an anguished yelp and dropped my wedding planner. Pages and pages of notes and photos and swatches and all the stupid things that are supposed to make a wedding day so special for two people in love spewed across the floor to their feet, like a broken trail between me and them.

"Kallie!" He jerked upon seeing me, dislodging his dick from her and stumbling toward me like he was out of his mind so high. This was a nightmare. It had to be. I rubbed my eyes, but his red, stiff, glistening monster glared at me, the proof that what I saw was very real.

I left, and ran to my other friends, because isn't that who you go to when you're upset and hurt and find out your man had been cheating on you with your bestie? But apparently, my bridesmaids all knew of the affair. I was the last to find out, and I refused to speak to any of them since.

Humiliated isn't a big enough word for how I felt after that day.

At three in the morning, tired of reliving every horrible second of that day, I finally get up, kicking off the covers. Sleeping is pointless. I clean when I'm upset, and after I was away all summer, Jeremy hadn't exactly kept this place up.

Although why do I care? This house won't ever be the home of my dreams for us. Practicality wins out, though, because to sell it, it needs to be clean. I'll be damned if I lose money on my share of this selling price because he's a slob.

I vacuum the bedrooms and hallways upstairs. Two bags get filled with Gatorade bottles, takeaway boxes, and junk from the fridge.

I glare at the unkempt king size bed in the master bedroom. He and Marissa probably slept on it together. My stomach churns. Would I get in trouble with the fire department if I took all the bedding out and burned it?

All of a sudden, I attack it with a fierceness I've never known I possess, stripping the mattress down. After kicking out the screen, I toss the linens out the window to the lawn below.

Then I search under the master bathroom sink for cleaning supplies. I need strong stuff, bleach, anything to remove the stench of deceit and lies. I'm on a roll now. This house will be gutted.

"What a mess." There's so much junk in this cabinet, and I have no idea how it got there. I madly start pulling out everything. Weird things, too, like discarded candy wrappers, pill bottles, a hammer, a bible. Maybe in Jeremy's drug induced state, he doesn't realize what the hell he's doing and stuffs things in here.

I come across the bin of bath fizzy's, but when I move it I see something pink.

"What the fu—" I grab it. My old phone, the one in a beautiful shade of frosted rose gold metal. I fall back to the floor, staring at it.

Jeremy had come home last year with a gift of a new white phone out of the blue. He said he was tired of me continuing to use my old pink phone that wouldn't even update to the latest operating system anymore, and he wanted me to have the latest gizmo. But I loved that phone, the color and the size, regardless of its age.

He'd pre-loaded the new one with all my favorite apps, along with sweet photo montages he'd made of us that would constantly play on the home screen. He'd taken my pink phone that night, laughing, and hid it away so I'd be forced to use the new technology.

Holding it to my heart like a long-lost friend, I begin to see all the little ways he'd attempted to control me over the years. All the things I thought he did for me out of love, I sit here and question if he had ulterior motives for every move he made.

My phone is out of power, but I find the old cord and charge it up. Within minutes, it turns on. I spend an hour on the floor listening to messages from old friends, from my bridesmaids with wedding questions, including some from Marissa who had planned our entire co-ed Las Vegas bachelor/bachelorette party.

What a party that was, and a fiasco. A wave of nausea overcomes me again as I recall her and Jeremy going off to score some drugs together on the strip at one point that night. They were gone forever, it seemed, something I wasn't pleased about, but our group was wild that night, drinking to excess, partying it up Vegas style.

Now, with the benefit of hindsight, I can just picture them going up to our casino suite and messing around together, fucking and snorting something. God, I've been so blind.

I delete every message with a vengeance. Then I see I've had a dozen recent calls come in from a number in California. My mind is a mess and I can't think of who on earth would call me from there? They didn't leave a message, although my mailbox had been full.

I gasp when it hits me. "Oh! No way." Big D had said he lived in Los Angeles. Could that have been him? In my half-asleep state the morning he left me in Montana, did I rattle off my old phone number instead of my new?

My thumb hovers over the number. I take a deep breath and call it to see.

Six rings and I almost hang up until a message comes on.

"Cody here. Or, as some women like to call me, Big D."

I smile at the sound of his healthy ego and roll my eyes at it—although he has every right to claim that name. He is, in fact, heavily endowed.

"Leave your name and number. I'll call you when I can."

His voice has a deep, slight rasp to it with a chuckle, like he's someone who can laugh at himself. Good natured. Very likable quality.

Beep.

I swallow hard. What do I say?

Oh, hi. I'm the woman you gave six orgasms to in Montana—remember me?

But I don't say a thing, quiet on the line. He could be the type of guy who gifts a new woman every night with his talents.

No. He didn't seem like that. Talented, yes. But the way he gazed upon me and talked with me and made me laugh seemed like something more.

After Jeremy, though, what the hell do I know about men? How can I trust myself to choose a decent guy?

I hang up without leaving a message. A shroud of loneliness overwhelms me.

I could call Mom. But she and I haven't talked seriously about anything in far too long.

I call Dixie in Montana, but it goes to message, and she's probably sleeping. At least it feels good using my trusty pink phone again, like my hands miss the feel of the rose metal.

There's no one else to call, like I'm cast away on a deserted island. I'll befriend a soccer ball that washes up on the shore, and spend the rest of my days talking to it until I die of starvation and a broken heart.

My chest suddenly heaves, and shoulders shake uncontrollably. Tears fall faster than I can manage them. I'm so far down into the depths of despair, there's no way out.

I'm having a breakdown on the floor of the bathroom where Jeremy threatened me, in the house we were supposed to make a home, in the life that doesn't make sense for me anymore.

When my phone suddenly dings, I yelp. A message comes in. Through watery eyes I can just make out that it's from Cody's number.

Cody: Hey.

With one word, one text, he's thrown me a lifeline, a preserver I can latch onto because I'm drowning.

I don't answer right away, but stare at it for a long time.

Cody: Kallie?

It's six in the morning for me, earlier for him, given the time difference between here to California. The number six makes me think of all the mind-blowing orgasms he gave me, and the way he left me in Montana so completely satisfied, saying how I deserved it.

What I don't deserve is to live in all this misery, thanks to Jeremy.

Fuck it. I wipe my tears and nose and text back.

Kallie: Hi.

Cody: I've been reaching out, but not able to get a hold of you.

Kallie: Things have been crazy here since I got back.

Cody: I thought you gave me a wrong number.

Kallie: No. Just an old one. How are you?

Cody: Fine. I'll be in Texas soon. Want to get together?

My pulse races. For whatever reason, the picture of Jeremy's hands around Marissa's neck comes to mind. I want that. Not with my ex, and maybe not exactly like that. But I want such wild passion, the feral, utter abandon of getting so lost with a man who loves on me so good.

I want Montana with Cody all over again.

But my life is so screwed up right now. It wouldn't be fair to Cody to invite him to take a ride on my hot mess express. Even if just for sex.

Kallie: If it's okay with you, I could use a friend. Can we just talk?

Cody: Sure. Tell me what's going on?

Exhaustion hits me, my brain suddenly too tired to spend the next hour telling him everything.

Kallie: Soon. Right now, I'm just glad to know you're here.

Cody: Reach out to me anytime. I'll be here waiting for you.

I'll be here waiting for you. My mouth hangs open to the floor. When was the last time a man said that to me? Never.