My Valentine

Twenty-Two

"Tammy, I'm sorry you had to find out about this the way that you did and I know that when you caught us, we looked too intimate, but I promise you, we haven't done anything aside from kissing. Please, for all our friendship is worth, don't tell anyone about this."

Tammy grabbed Nightengale's shoulders. "He could go to jail for this."

"Actually, Nightengale is an adult by law and I haven't forced her to do anything she didn't want to do. As long as the school board doesn't find out, we should be fine." They both looked at me.

"Please Tammy." Her friend looked glanced at me, then at her.

"Fine. Just don't expect me to support you guys and if your parents ask about any suspicions between you two, I'm not lying."

"Thank you, Miss Jones." Nightingale simply expressed her gratitude by hugging the darker female who only loosely wrapped her arm around her.

"I should go."

"I could drop you," I offered.

"No thanks."

"She has her own car," Nightengale later said as I drove home. I glanced up at my rare view mirror to check up on my dozing son.

"My parents are leaving tomorrow."

"Have you...have you told them about us?"

I shook my head. Sheila definitely suspected that something was going on, but I kept denying it.

"God Marshall, all this secrecy and deception is beginning to make me feel so dirty."

I placed my hand on her bare thigh, taking full advantage of how soft and tender it felt.

"We'll get through this. I just need to know that I'll have you at the end of the day. No matter what happens."

She rubbed my hand.

"Are we still on for tonight?"

"Of course. What're you going to tell your parents?"

"I really don't know. I'll figure something out."

I noticed how her shoulders slumped these days whenever we had to do something together and she had to lie to her parents. I released a sigh and accelerated.

*

"Thanks."

I nodded, wanting to at least kiss her, but her brother was on the porch.

"Yo'! Mr. Valentine! Hang for a sec!"

I waved at him.

"Is that cool with you?"

She nodded, opening the door.

Nightingale Phillips

"He's going forty meters per hour and has about...five minutes to get himself out of the car without actually burning himself too. He grabs on to the-"

"Riverton, come help me!"

My brother cringed at the sound of his name coming from the kitchen.

"Hold that thought." After he got up from where he was sitting, Marshall and I were the only ones in the room. He'd put Brook in my bedroom to nap.

We sat in silence, him on one end of the sofa and me on the other. He watched me play with my fingers.

"Are you alright?"

"Yeah."

He reached over and his ran his palms over my arm, settling on my hand.

I brought his hand up to my lips and kissed it, trying to convince him and myself that I was alright.