Abbi Glines - Hold On Tight

I opened my eyes just as Dewayne walked across the street toward my house. Quickly I moved back behind the curtains and watched as he stepped up onto my porch. The doorbell rang, and I hurried over to my bedroom door to crack it open so I could hear him. Why was he here? I hadn’t seen him leave his parents’ house much over the past few weeks.

“Hello, Dewayne,” my mother said in a gentler tone than I’d expected. At least she respected the fact that he’d lost his brother. She didn’t have to be angry at him because I was pregnant. I was just glad my dad was at work.

“Is Sienna here?” he asked.

He was here to see me. Someone to talk to. Someone else who was hurting and lost without Dustin. Someone I trusted above anyone else.

“No. She isn’t here any longer. She’s been sent to a . . . facility up North. She had issues dealing with everything, and she wasn’t right emotionally.”

What?

“Oh. Uh, I didn’t realize she’d left. I . . . When is she coming back?”

“I don’t know. Not anytime soon,” my mother replied.

What? Was she serious? I was right here in my bedroom like I had been for a week now. Did she honestly plan to keep me locked up like this? Wasn’t that illegal? I had to see a doctor at some point.

“Is there a number where I can reach her?”

“No. She can’t communicate with anyone here. It upsets her. Talking to you will upset her. She needs time and medication.”

Holy crap! My mother was making me out to be a crazy person.

“Well, when she’s ready to talk to someone again, can you please have her call me? I can leave my number. I’d like to check on her. See if she’s doing well. I don’t want her to think we don’t care. We know she lost him too.”

I got a funny tightening in my chest that only Dewayne Falco managed to inspire. How could someone like Dewayne, with his party-boy ways, be so incredibly sweet? He’d been like that my freshman year. He always seemed to be there when I needed him.

“Sure. I’ll give her your number,” Mother said in a clipped voice. I’d never see Dewayne’s number. She’d burn it first.

“Thanks. Tell her that I came by and that I’m thinking about her.”

“Okay. Thank you, Dewayne. Tell your parents they are in our prayers. You all are.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said.

I closed my door quietly, then ran back over to my window and watched as Dewayne walked away. I would find a way to see him and talk to him. He’d made the first move, and now it was my turn to make a move. He would love this baby. It was part of Dustin. If my parents wanted to lock me up, he could help me escape. He was older. He would know what to do. I just had to find a way to get to him.

The next morning before the sun came up, my mother woke me and hurried me out to my father’s station wagon, then handed me a suitcase before she climbed into the passenger seat. My father was already in the driver’s seat. I looked over at him, but he didn’t say a word. He didn’t even turn to look at me.

“Where are we going?” I asked, almost afraid she was about to make good on that story she’d told Dewayne. I wasn’t crazy. Surely they couldn’t get doctors to keep me if I was perfectly sane.

“Your aunt Cathy’s. She’s agreed to take you in until you’ve had the baby.”

That was the last thing my mother said to me. We rode in silence the eleven hours it took to drive to Fort Worth, Texas. My father never once acknowledged my existence. When we arrived, they unloaded me and handed me my suitcase. Spoke in whispered voices with my aunt Cathy, who I had never met before, then drove away without a good-bye.

Present day . . .

DEWAYNE

Micah lay sprawled out over me, fast asleep while Darth Vader kicked ass and took names on the television. The original plan had been to watch Pirates of the Caribbean . But then Micah said his mother liked Captain Jack and that we had to wait on her to start the movie.

Hell no was Sienna going to sit here and look at Johnny Fucking Depp. I had ejected that DVD really damn fast and stuck in one of the Star Wars discs. I didn’t even care which one it was. Just so Sienna wasn’t thinking about some other man.

Sienna walked into the room with that silky little wrap around her and her hair in damp curls, her face scrubbed free of makeup. “Is he asleep?” she asked, moving toward us.

“Yeah,” I said, wondering if she had anything on under that wrap.

“Let’s get him into bed,” she said, bending down to scoop him up.

“I got him,” I told her.

“Okay.” She stepped back and let me stand up with him, and then she led the way back to his room and pulled his covers back so I could tuck him in. Tonight we’d made sure he was bathed and in his pajamas before movie time.

She bent down and kissed his little cheek.

“Love you, Momma,” he muttered with his eyes closed.

“Love you more,” she replied.

When she turned to leave the room, I bent down and ruffled his hair. He was such a little thing. So much like his daddy at that age.

“Love you, Uncle Dewayne,” he said in that same little groggy voice.

My throat closed up, and I had to swallow hard to loosen it up before I could speak. “Love you, kiddo,” I told him.

He pulled the covers under his chin and snuggled deeper into his bed.

This moment was all because of Sienna. She’d made this possible.

I fucking loved her. Not just because she’d given me this kid to help heal what I’d lost, but because she’d stolen a piece of my soul with those big eyes and that sweet smile when she was fourteen. I’d wanted to be close to her and keep her safe. I hadn’t exactly known why then, I’d just known I wanted her happy. It was important to me.

But I knew why now. She was special. The kind of special that is hard to find in this life. The kind of special most people don’t get to touch. It’s the rare kind that, when you find it, you know it’s worth fighting for.

Her hand softly touched my arm. “Today went well.” Her voice was a whisper.

I wrapped my fingers around her small hand and walked out of the room with her by my side.

When she closed the door behind her, I was able to peek down the front of her wrap to see that she was in fact naked under there. Hell yeah.

“I hope he’s a deep sleeper, because I got some plans that involve you naked with those long legs of yours over my shoulders.”

Sienna glanced back up at me with wide eyes. “Tonight?”

“Fuck yeah, tonight. I hope you don’t think I’m going home without you. I told you I wasn’t going anywhere and, baby, I was speaking real literal. If you’re here, then I’m here.”

“Oh,” she said as she swayed toward me slightly.

“Yeah, oh . Get your ass in that room and let me unwrap my present,” I said, turning her toward her bedroom door and walking her inside, then locking it behind me.

The double bed that sat in the middle of the room was so damn small. Sleeping on that was going to be tough, but I’d have my king-size one moved in tomorrow. Tonight we could deal with a double.

“Dewayne?”

I tore my eyes off the small bed and my plans and focused on the almost-naked beauty in front of me. “Yeah?”

She fidgeted with the satin belt, keeping me from seeing all her creamy pale skin underneath. “You staying here is moving fast. I don’t want Micah to get his hopes up if in a couple of weeks you realize this isn’t what you want.”

She didn’t get it. Of course she didn’t. Sienna Roy didn’t understand that she was special. I had a lifetime to show her just how special she was.

“This ain’t something I’m trying out, Sienna. I don’t fucking try shit out. I either want it or I don’t. And I’ve wanted you since I was seventeen years old. Admitting that shit ain’t easy. It felt wrong for so long because I love Dustin. I’ll always love him, and I’ll miss him to the day I die. But he had what I desired, and more than anything I wanted you to be happy. I thought Dustin was who would make you smile. He was who you loved. So I made sure you got what you wanted. But he didn’t see what he had. He wasn’t careful with it. He didn’t cherish it, and in the end he lost it all too young. So I won’t be changing my mind in a few weeks. I don’t do this shit. I never did this shit. Because they were never you.”