Chapter 3

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When I came home that night, Monika was nowhere to be found. Sean said she had decided to spend the night elsewhere, to make a statement to Ryder. Danny had gone to bed early due to having to get up at the butt-crack of dawn for work, and Jonah was still out with his woman. Crazy Matt, who I had not seen since yesterday’s welcome home/ beer fest, had barricaded himself in his room until further notice. Sean himself was busy at the computer desk in the living room corner when I walked in, and Ryder was flipping violently through the channels on the TV with his war face on. When I saw him sitting there, I got this weird feeling in my stomach, like the sweeping rush of dread feeling I used to get when I took a glance at my cell phone clock on the way in the door, realizing in an unprepared instant that I had returned home to my parents way past curfew. It was exactly like that.

“Hi, guys,” I whispered as I walked in the door. My meek and quiet attitude could be excused away as a means not to wake up Drama Dan, but in all actuality I was just wholly timid in Ryder’s presence. Trent never came in the door behind me, and I figured he had gone off in search of some girl that was actually interested in giving him a good B.J. as he had obviously been craving. Sean turned around and looked at me with wide, frightened eyes, as if warning me of the impending doom inevitably coming from Hurricane Ryder.

That’s when the brooding blonde got up and kicked the off switch on the TV, making it jerk away and almost fall over in offense. Sean immediately began to pack up his laptop for a quick retreat. Ryder threw me a harsh glare before going into the kitchen. I was starting to not condone his throwing a tantrum like some three-year-old, and crossed my arms.

“What?!” I demanded.

“You know what!” he hissed at me, throwing the door to the fridge open and drinking some old orange juice from the carton.

“Obviously, I don’t know, Ryder, why don’t you explain it to me.”

“Uh, gee, you and Mr. Sexual Deviant, maybe?!” he huffed, trying to keep his voice as low as possible. “It’s disgusting. Look, I-- I love the guy to death, but when it comes to women, you and I both know what he’s after.”

I rolled my eyes.

“That’s kind of my business now, Ryder, don’t you think? I appreciate the effort, but I’m a big girl-- I can do what I want.”

“You don’t know him like I do,” Ryder insisted. “I’ve seen it over and over again. He’s so sly. You won’t even realize you’ve fallen for his tricks until it’s too late. It’s inevitable that he’s going to hurt you--”

“Where have I heard that before, Ryder?” I asked, cocking my head at him snottily. “Maybe out of Jonah’s mouth, about you?”

“No way, SO not the same thing. Me: drugs and thug issues. Him: hypno-rapist. You are forgetting what you learned with your own two eyes, in this very house--”

I put up my hand to make him cease-fire.

“Ryder, stop, just stop,” I begged, not being able to take that intensely concerned look in his eye, like the way he once looked at me when his drug cartel guys were around to threaten us. “You… you already have a woman to worry about.”

He visibly gulped and made no further attempt to interfere. He simply turned and escaped into his room, leaving me with my guilt. I grumbled to myself and had a drink of water to occupy my time. I began to hear Ryder’s melodies of weeping misery coming from his Fender and I rolled my eyes at his melodrama. He was becoming worse than Drama Dan. When I couldn’t take the wailing tears of his guitar any more, I sighed and put my empty glass down in the sink, and stormed down the hall to hammer at his door. His crybaby guitar immediately stopped.

“You want to talk about this like grown-up, adult-like people?” I said through his door. “You blonde baby.” I added for effect, and to disavow the maturity level of what I just said.

“I just want to remind you,” he said, sounding very near to the closed door, apparently using it as his deflector shield. “That you were the one that broke up with me. I have every right to still care about you.”

“You still care?” I asked in a much less hostile tone. “Wait, don’t answer that until you open the door.”

“You can open it yourself. You and I both know it has a bum lock like every other door in this house.”

“I’m standing on principle.”

Ryder opened the door, and leaned on the frame like a model being a naturally sexy poser.

“Of course, I care,” Ryder said in a low, humble voice. “I’m Ryder, you’re Jonnie. That much hasn’t changed. It’s just everything else around us that has.”

“You know,” I shuffled my feet, trying to dig my toes into the really cheap brown carpet. “When we used to joke about getting married in the summer… I kind of took it seriously after a while.”

I could swear I heard his heart stop beating, and I knew I had revealed too much about myself, once again. I suddenly felt the self-protective need to dissolve that vulnerability with a ruthless turn of phrase.

“I didn’t realize you would propose to me on the phone and then hang up and go screw Monika.”

Ryder immediately stood up straight and went on defensive mode again.

“Hey, you left me. Alone. To deal with all my shit by myself.”

“Boo hoo, I’m a suicidal drug addict who knocked up my ex-girlfriend, feel sorry for me, la la la… Excuse me while I don’t pity the stupid.”

Ryder drew back, his mouth becoming a flytrap in his shock. I felt horrendously cruel, and bit my lip in shame. Ryder’s face folded into even more anger than before, as he looked at me with a sort of appalled disgust.

“When did you become such a bitch?”

Ouch. That stabbed me deep. Totally deserved it, though.

“Probably about the time I found out that you were lying to me about being off drugs,” I snapped on.

“I wasn’t lying,” Ryder was giving me his most honest eyes. “I was off them. Until you broke up with me that first time and made me depressed and want to get back on them. That was about the time I hacked off my hair, as you recall.”

“You blame your drug addiction on me?”

“You’re among the people I blame, yes. My evil twin is also included.”

“That is a level of retarded that I can’t comprehend.”

“Can I close my door now?”

“Are you just jealous of me spending time with Trent? Is that what this is really about?”

Ryder closed his door. I opened it again.

“What happen to standing on principles?” he demanded in offense, his back to me now.

“Answer the question, Ry.”

“No!”

“No, you won’t answer the question, or no, you’re not jealous?”

“Jonnie!” Ryder bellowed, getting into my face.

“Oh, would you both just SHUT UP?!” Danny bellowed from down the hall. “SOME people WORK for a living!”

Ryder and I ignored him and simply glared at one another, panting hard and angrily. He put two firm hands on my shoulders and herded me backward until I was outside of his room. Then he slammed the door again.

“This isn’t over!” I huffed, trying to sound as intimidating as possible to his thin, fake wooden door. The door was considerably taller than me, and stood menacingly in my way of Ryder, so my façade backfired.

I was so upset by Ryder I didn’t know what to do with myself. I stood like a moron in front of his door, staring it down like we were in some sort of contest. Which, of course, the door would inevitably always win. I didn’t know what to think. I felt like I was dangling on a string, clutching it with both hands and not knowing if it was going to break. That was my string of feelings towards Ryder. He didn’t want me, but he didn’t want me with Trent. He wanted to help Monika, but he wanted to make me keep hoping we might get back together.

No sir-ree. Not happening. I was NOT going to be the cake that Ryder was going to have and eat Monika too. And if you understood that metaphor than you are a master, metaphorically speaking.

Trent, dare I say it, had gotten his hooks into me, and it was just the antidote I needed to get off this Ryder disease. Trent was charming, sexy, and we communicated well, and he genuinely seemed interested in me. No matter what anyone else thought, it came down to what Jonnie thought. So, screw Ryder. I thought Trent deserved a chance.

By God, I hoped Ryder never got the pleasure of being right about him.

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Signed,
--RedRogue55