The Garavaglias

Chapter 6

"Why are you just standing there creep? You scared me." He said. Maybe this whole just being friends thing would be easier than I thought.

"I just got here." I said.

"I know, you're late." He said, annoyance seeping from his words.

"Sorry." I said and walked to my desk. God what crawled up his ass this morning. He didn't respond and I rolled my eyes, looking at the stack of paperwork he left sitting on my desk. I walked over to file them. I was a little disappointed when Beau didn't follow behind me like he usually did.

I ate lunch outside alone in front of the small water fountain that said, "In loving memory of Connor Garavaglia." I'd never noticed it before, but now I was curious. I made another mental note to ask Beau who he was, on top of remembering to ask him about the snake tattoo that coiled around his muscular arm. Ugh. Those arms. I tried to shake him out of my head again but it was too hard. So I gave in and let myself ponder over his body while finishing my sandwich.

"Who is Connor Garavaglia?" I asked, after returning from my lunch. He looked up, his eyes pained.

"My father." He said, curtly, shaking out any trace of emotion and returning to his work.

"I'm sorry, I didn't know." I replied, suddenly feeling terrible for bringing it up.

"How could you have known?" He asked, looking up at me. "You've never asked." He stated.

"Well I don't think people walk around going, 'hey, are your parents alive?'" I said, starting to get annoyed at his attitude.

"It's not like you care anyways, Summer."

"I don't care? Why do you think that?" I said, a little hurt at the fact that he thought I really didn't care about him.

"Because I'm not your boyfriend, we're just having sex, and you leave as early as you can every time we spend a night together. So we're just using each other." He said with a small twinge of anger.

"That's how you like it." I retorted.

"And if I asked you to stay would you?"

"I don't know, you've never asked." I said. I guess he could tell by my facial expression that he'd hit a nerve. His voice softened.

"I'm sorry. It's just that it's the anniversary of his death in a few days and we always have a ceremony every year honoring his life, and there's just a lot going on right now." His head fell, he stared at the his shoes, lost in thought. He looked so distraught. I stood up and walked over to his desk, sitting in front of him.

"Want me to go with you? To the ceremony?" I offered, unsure if he would actually want me there or but I felt like I needed to do something.

"Okay." He replied, taking my hand in his and rubbing circles on my wrist causing heat to rise in my stomach.

"There's something else you could do to help.." He said, looking at me with dark eyes. His hand left my wrist and skimmed its way softly up and down my thigh. I stopped his hand and held it in mine.

"About that, I think we should try being just platonic friends." I said, my voice a little weary.

"I have plenty of platonic friends that I fuck every once and a while." He said his hand leaving mine again and rubbing seductive circles up the inside of my thigh. I shivered. "See? Your body is so responsive to me." He whispered, his fingers reaching incredibly close to my throbbing middle. I closed my eyes wanting so badly to give in. But I took a deep breath remembering the words of my therapist. I stood up and he looked disappointed.