Chapter 40

Sutter POV

    Life was all about choices, and unfortunately for me, I was about to make one right now, and I didn't know what the aftermath would be.

    Some choices were really hard, or really easy. This one seemed easy, except when I had to think about what the girl with the bright blue eyes that completely fucking owned me would say when she found out what I was about to do.

    If I did it, which I was almost sure I was going to. But then I thought of Lilly and decided maybe I was going to.

    Choices were fucking hard.

    I've been sitting in my truck right down the road from Cross's house for a good thirty minutes, just contemplating my decision. I want to kill him, but I didn't really want to go to prison for the rest of my life either.

    When I picture him fucking Lil though it almost made me feel like it would be worth it.

     The anger had been stewing inside of me for some time now. I did my best to keep it under control around Lilly, because it wasn't aimed towards her. I had no reason to be upset with her, I'm the one who left.

      Granted she didn't exactly have to fuck my best friend and cousin, but I guess that wasn't the really the point. She didn't have to be faithful or loyal to me anymore, I severed that already by breaking all my promises first.

     But Denny and Cross? No excuse.

     I realize mine and Cross's family hadn't been on great terms in a while, but we both never let that come between us personally. Whatever issues our dads had was between them. We didn't hang out or anything like we did when we were kids, but if we saw each other we would always stop and catch up. And not to mention he's my fucking cousin.

     Why the hell would he wanna dip his dick in the same place that mine had been?

      Cross and I had been really close when we were younger, even when he was always getting in trouble. And we told each other everything. I told him I liked Lilly as more than a friend for the first time when we were ten, and he kept it a secret all those years until I finally made her my girlfriend. He knew what she meant to me, he still does. The memory of the first time I ever really got mad at him pops into my head unexpectedly.

     

       Cross and I had been playing in my treehouse for the last hour and he just pulled out a dirty magazine, showing me boobs for the first time.

      "Where'd you get it?" I asked him, not knowing how he was able to get a hold of something like this.

      "I found it in this drawer in my dads room. There was all kinds of stuff man. They had like some wand things in there that vibrates when you push a button, but I didn't really like those so I just grabbed this."

      "Aren't you scared your dads gonna notice one of them missing?"

      "No way, there was so many in there he won't notice if just one of them is gone. I figure we'll look at this one for a while and then I can trade it in for another one and put this one back. They'll never know." He has a devious smile on his face, but that's just Cross. He's not a bad kid, he just does things to make his dad mad for attention. Or at least that's what my moms says.

      "I don't know Cro-" but before I get to finish, I hear footsteps coming through the leaves in the woods, that leads to the treehouse.

     "Shit!" Cross yells, and scrambles to find somewhere to hide the magazine with all the boobies and funny places with hair.

      I run over to the window to look out and see who's coming, and feel my body relax when I see that it's just Lilly.

      She smiles big when she sees me, and waves and starts running faster.

      "Hey! I came over to ask you to play but your mom said y'all was already out here!" She reaches the bottom of the tree and I lean back in to throw over the rope ladder that you have to climb up to get in here.

     Cross yanks it out of my hand though and shakes his head. "What?" I ask him.

     He leans his head out the window and looks down at Lilly. "No girls allowed!" He yells at her, causing her smile to drop and an angry look to take over her face.

      "Since when? I been in that treehouse plenty!" She yells back. Her and Cross never get along good when we play together, each of them always wanting to get the upper hand in whatever game we're playing.

       "Since now! I made up a new rule today, and that's no girls allowed up here, so that means you ain't allowed."

     "Well that's the stupidest rule I ever heard!" Lilly stomps her foot on the ground and growls, causing Cross to laugh even harder.

     I don't like him picking on her, so I take the rope from him and throw it down the window. "This is her treehouse too, and she's always allowed in here." I tell him after he gives me a look that he can't believe I just did that.

      "You're my cousin! You're supposed to take my side!" Cross yells at me.

      "There are no sides, it's just not fair for you to treat her like that when her daddy helped build this treehouse too."

      "Yeah, what he said!" Lilly chimes in as she climbs in the window of the treehouse.

      Cross groans dramatically. "You're gonna ruin all of our fun!"

      "How? I play with Sutter all the time and we always have fun." She takes her tiny fists and plants them on the side of her hips.

      "We were doing something that only boys can do." Cross says, and I try to shoot him a look that'll tell him to stop talking. I don't want her to know I was looking at those magazines.

     I don't really know why, but my tummy just feels funny at the thought of her seeing those and maybe thinking different of me.

      "There's nothing you boys can do that I can't do." Lilly sasses back.

      "We pee standing up, I don't ever see you doing that."

      "I can to pee standing up, but I choose not to so I don't make a mess everywhere. But nice try." She sends Cross a sassy smirk, egging him on further.

      "Fine, you really wanna know what we were doing?" He asks, and goes to the corner of the treehouse where there's a shelf and he starts digging around in it to find the magazine he hid.

      "Cross, no!" I yell at him, not wanting her to see it. I glance at her anxiously and she gives me a sad look.

      "You don't want me to play with y'all either?" She asks, all sass gone and just full of sadness.

      "No Lil, you know that's not true. I just don't want you to see what he brought over here. It may upset you." I know Lilly has probably seen women naked, and she is a girl, but I just don't think she'd like this kinda stuff.

       "Don't try to stop her now, she's gonna get what she's asking for!" Cross says as he's walking back over to us, magazine in his hand. He places it in Lilly's hands and watches anxiously as she turns the cover page over.

      Her blue eyes widen and her little mouth drops some. "Wha.." She trails off, peering at more of the pages. "Why you got pictures of naked girls?"

      "Cause that's what men like." Cross answers her, folding his arms over his chest like he knows everything.

      "You ain't no man." Lilly says, and throws the magazine back into his chest. She looks ready to sass him off again, but she stops shortly and peeks over at me quickly and then looks away again. "Is that really what boys like, though?"

      "Duh!" Cross says, already flipping through the pages again and touches some of them.

      "I don't think I'm ever going to look like that." She whispers and looks down at her body like there's something wrong with her. As if she isn't absolutely perfect.

      "Hey," I say softly and step towards her. "It wouldn't matter if you didn't change another day in your life, you'd still be the prettiest girl in the world to me." I tell her, hoping to cheer her up. But also telling the truth. She has her curly hair pulled up into a pony tail, her signature blue Jean shorts and T-shirt on, with her white converse. She wears this outfit almost everyday in the summer, but every time I see her I still get this funny feeling in my belly.

     Half of her lips lift up in a tentative smile. "Really?"

      "Really." I nod.

      "You could always lift up your shirt and show us what you got now, and we could probably guess how big your boobs will be when you're older." Cross says.

      Lilly's gasps, and steps back like she's scared.

     Me? I'm mad. Madder then I think I've ever been before. I turn to Cross, rear my fist back, and slam him in the nose with all the muscle I have.

     He screams and grabs his nose, blood oozing out between his fingers. "You hit me!"

      "Nobody talks to her like that!" I yell, pointing my finger in his face. He runs to the window and goes down the rope ladder, I know on his way to tell our parents that I just hit him.

     I'll probably get a whooping and lose some TV time, but I know it was definitely worth it. Especially when I see Lilly put her hand over her mouth, and a little giggle slips out.

     Fuck it.

     I pull the key out of the ignition and get out of my truck. I leave my phone in the car, not expecting to hear anything for awhile. Lilly and my sister are having a girls night with Nadine at her house, so they won't be coming home tonight.

      I told Lilly I would probably do something with the boys, and I plan to right after I leave here.

     I walk around the house and go to the back sliding door where I know Cross has his own downstairs to himself. I raise my fist to knock but then remember what my dad said before when we went to Lilly's parents house.

     I'm in charge of this situation. So I wish myself luck, and pull on the sliding glass door, hoping the fucker left it unlocked. It glides open easily and I step inside, hearing the distant sounds of some explosions on a video game.

      I make my way in the direction of his room, and stop in the doorway when I see him. He's sitting on his leather couch in front of this massive TV, his elbows leaned on his knees and his eyes intently focused on the screen.

     He must finally see me out of the corner of his eye or feel my presence, because he glances over in my direction and jerks back when he realizes it's me.

      "What do you want?" He asks, sitting his controlling down on the coffee table in front of him and rising to his feet.

       "We need to talk." I tell him, trying not to let the fire inside me take over my voice just yet.

      "Nah, I really don't think we do. You're here uninvited and unwelcome, it'd be best for you to leave."

      "And it would have been best for you not to fuck my girlfriend, but you did that anyway, now didn't you?" I take a step further into his room.

      "She wasn't your girlfriend when I fucked her, and it wasn't like that."

      "Wasn't like what, Cross? It wasn't betrayal, or the worst fucking thing you could probably ever do to me? You know what she fucking means to me."

      He shakes his head and clenches his jaw, like he's the one who has the right to be mad about this situation. "No, I thought I knew what she meant to you. But then you up and left the poor girl when she fucking needed someone."

      "And that just had to be you?"

     "Better me than someone else. I looked out for her, I made sure she was okay."

      "You also fucked her in the process. And you may have helped her for a little while, but that didn't do shit to stop her from getting with Denny and practically killing herself with alcohol for months." He has no right to act like he helped her, for all he knows he could have made it worse on her. Added more confusion.

       "I didn't fuck Lilly, I'd appreciate it if you would stop saying that. And I did everything I could to keep her away from Denny and to stop drinking. I've beat Denny's ass more times than I can count, the dude doesn't fucking care. And as hard as I tried, Lilly wouldn't move in here with me, so it wasn't like I could watch her 24/7. I did a hell of a lot more than you did, abandoning her didn't help shit." His face is red and his hands are shaking, letting me know that he truly believes and feels everything he's saying. Which kinda throws me off, because when I came here I was expecting to be met with the same Cross I've know all my life.

     I choose to pick one thing to start with and go from there. "What do you mean you didn't fuck Lilly? She told me y'all did, so don't fucking lie to me." I know Lilly would never lie about something like that. Why would she?

      "We had sex, or I made love to her, Sutter. I did not fuck Lilly. I only fuck girls I have no feelings or connection with. That's not how it is with her." He wipes his hand down his face.

      I'm shell shocked to say the least, because my cousin just told me he made love to the same girl I've been making love to for over three years now. "Don't fucking say those words to me. Don't act like anything you and her had meant anything. It didn't."

      "It did. You just don't want it to. Wouldn't you rather it be that way though, instead of me just using her? At least you know there was at least really something there and it wasn't just for the hell of it."

      I give him a look and shake my head dramatically. "No, I don't want either of those. What I would really have liked is that you didn't touch her or look at her while I was gone, because you know she's mine. She has always been mine."

      "Yeah? She wasn't yours when her body was laying under mine with my dick inside her." He smarts off, and I waste no time walking over to him and shoving him against the wall.

       "Don't talk about her like that!" I roar, and cock my fist back before connecting with his cheek, loving the sound of his skin tearing when it hits his bone.

     He takes the hit well though and comes right back at me, catching me off guard. He punches me in my temple and causes me to stumble back, losing my sense of equilibrium for a second. He uses that to his advantage, and charges me, wrapping his arms around my waist and tackling me down. We hit his coffee table and break the wood, causing one of the legs to splinter and break off. I pick up the piece of wood and hold it in front of me horizontally in the exact time his fist was swinging towards my face, causing his hand to strike the uneven wood and slice his knuckles open. He yowls and leans back, cradling his hurt hand to his chest.

      I lean up, grab the side of his head, and smash into the top surface of the broken table. I jump up, and so does he, shaking his head a little to clear his sight. "I can do this all fucking night." I tell him, jumping up and down, feeling the adrenaline coursing through my veins, making me feel like I can do whatever the fuck I want.

      He fakes a left punch and uppercuts me right in the chin, causing my head to snap back. My teeth bite into my tongue so hard I instantly feel my mouth fill with blood and the taste and smell of copper takes over my senses. I shrug it off though, barely feeling it and spitting my mouth full of blood back on him, watching it stain the white shirt he's got on.

     He backs up though and throws his hands up, like he's surrendering. "I'm in love with her too!" He shouts, even though there's no other noise besides our labored breathing.

     That brings me up short though and I stop abruptly. "What?" I ask, knowing I had to of heard him wrong.

      "I'm in love with her. I have been for a long fucking time." He says, and bows his head down, wiping at the trail of blood that's flowing down his cheek.

      "Since when?" I ask, nervous of the answer. I never fathomed there was truly feelings involved on Cross's side, always believing he was the type to just shag a girl and then leave them the next day. He never stayed with one long, always claiming they never held his interest long enough.

      "Since always. Since we were kids." He looks everywhere except at me, but I don't need him to for me to hear the sincerity in his words.

      "No, no you haven't. Lilly has been mine since we were five. You and her couldn't fucking stand each other when we were kids." The thought of anyone else wanting her the way I did, and still do, has my heart galloping in my chest painfully fast.

      "Yeah, I know she's always been yours. That's why I never did anything or tried something on her. But I've always loved her. Fuck, I was a kid though. I didn't know how to show her that shit the way you did, and I had so many emotions going on inside me from my mom dying and then my dad remarrying..." He trails off but finally looks at me, and I see it for the first time. All the ways he used to pick on her, but was protective over her towards other boys like I was if they messed with her.

      The way he never seemed too pleased when we would make out in middle school, or found out about our pregnancy in high school..all along I just thought it was because he was a negative person. I never thought it was because he was wishing it was him instead.

      "Does she know that?" I ask him, hoping he's going to say no, because when she and I talked about this the other night, it was never brought up.

      "Does it matter?" He asks.

      "Yes."

       "Then yes, she knows. It's why we stopped what we were doing." He looks down, but not before I see the pain in his eyes. Pain that I've become to know very well, and it's the pain of living without her.

"What do you mean?"

He takes a deep breath and sits back down on the leather couch, slowly and with his hand gripping his side. "When I told her I had felt that way about her for a long time, she got upset. She told me it wasn't right for me to say those things when I know what it was like between you and her. But I wasn't going to lie to her. She thought I was only with her to get back at you in some twisted way for winning her when we were kids."

"But I didn't even know you were after her too." I say, trying to make sense of everything he's telling me.

"I know, and I told her that. But she didn't believe me, she just said she couldn't do it anymore. She didn't want anything real, she wanted something to take her mind off of you."

     "But then it stopped?"

     "When she found out it was more than just sex for me, she stopped it. Said she couldn't be with me that way, not after you."

    "But you could? You could be with Lilly after everything she and I shared? After we had a ba..well you know."

     Cross sighs and shakes his head. "I'm not saying that shit didn't plague my mind, or that I didn't think about it. But compared to having her, it wasn't enough to make me stop."

I finally give in and sit on the couch next to him, my body shaking while coming off the adrenaline high it was riding on. "I don't even know what to think about all of this." I finally say.

"Yeah, it's a fucking mess. But just know, I never tried anything with Lilly before you were gone, and I had no intentions of doing anything with her even after you left. But she's just Lilly..she's hard not to fall in love with. Even when she's broken." He says the words softly, and I bow my head at his admission.

Because what the fuck can I say to that? He's right. It's not possible to meet Lilly and not love her. Everyone always has, there's just something about her that draws you in and won't let you go.

I stand up from the couch, not having any more fight left in me and more confused than I was when I walked in here. "Sorry about the table." I mumble on my way to the door.

"S'alright, nothing I didn't deserve." Cross says back.

I walk out of the room and to my truck in a daze, feeling my whole face pounding in pain from the beating I just took, my back aching too from breaking the table.

I sit in my truck and just look out the windshield, not knowing what the hell to think or do.

Lilly's gonna be pissed as hell when she sees my face, but I can't help but worry most about whether or not she loved Cross back, too.