Something Else Entirely

31 - The if-I-ever-meet-this-asshole, unfathomable kind of bad.

Taking to Logan makes me feel weak at the knees.

Weak in that she's come in and taken out my feet with a sweeping ground kick to the ankles, dislocating both knees on the way down; then lures me seductively back to stand just to be closer to her even though I'm unsteady as hell, and her infectious giggle that results from this move somehow heals the parts of me I didn't even know were broken.

She's almost debilitating, in an all-consuming, aggressive, sassy, sweet and damn sexy kind of way.

I think I might love her already.

I definitely feel different with Logan compared to everyone else I've ever dated. Not that we are dating. She's made her thoughts on that matter perfectly clear, and I am perfectly content with allowing her to pretend like we don't like each other and that our talking all day every day means nothing other than the 'fulfilling of our daily, routine, time-wasting teenage obligations to message each other a hundred times a day.' Her words, not mine.

I can't hold it against her—her resistance. I'm sure if I had ever been in a situation like she was, I doubt I'd be wanting to jump into another relationship again any time soon, or even a year later. I don't feel like I have any right to ask her about it, even though a part of me feels like I need to know what happened.

She'll tell me if she wants to. I'm not going to force myself on her like that fuck Davis. It's been so hard not to think about him, even though I've never met him and have no idea what he looks like. I've wondered about it though. How a person can know and have the affections of a girl like Logan, then fuck up so bad and hurt her in one of the worst ways imaginable. All I can say is that I hope I never have to come face to face with this jackass at any point, because I'm not sure just what I would say to him for what he did to her.

"So, Jet, what are you planning for your first official date with Logan?" Sadie asked, sliding onto the couch beside me with a book and a cup of coffee perched on her growing stomach.

It was first thing Saturday morning, two weeks after I sat outside on the curb with Logan when we got pizza, and I was hanging out on the couch waiting to hear when she was awake and what she was doing today, hoping that she was free and wanted to spend her day with me. A less-embarrassed version of myself might admit that I was sitting on the couch drinking a coffee and reading over our texts from last night. But the somewhat proud, less-ridiculous version of me wasn't going to ever admit that out loud.

"We're not dating, Sade. You know this already," I said, dismissing her question as it wasn't even on the cards yet.

"Remind me why, when you already know you're both into each other?"

It's hard to explain to Sadie why I'm not actually dating Logan without disclosing to her what happened. Then again, from details I do know about Sadie's teenage life, there might be some of this that she understands and could help me with considering her ex-boyfriend Camden was a jackass, too.

"You can't say anything, Sade," I said, not bothering to get Sadie's promise not to say anything because I knew I had her complete confidence regardless. "But she had a bad experience in a previous relationship, and she's not sure she's ready to enter into another one."

"What sort of bad experience?" she asked quietly, lifting both her book and her coffee from her stomach, placing it on the coffee table in front of us and facing me completely, giving me her undivided attention.

"The if-I-ever-meet-this-asshole, unfathomable kind of bad. I don't know details, but she said something about him taking it too far and her having to fend him off."

"I see," she said, pulling her necklace into her hands. It's the one she wears every day, no matter the outfit or what the occasion is. Dad made it for her when they were seventeen. He carved the two whale flukes himself out of wood, sanding and polishing them by hand, and bought her a long, silver chain to wear them on. I've never seen her without it, and have noticed that she fidgets with it a lot when she's anxious. She was holding it when I was with her in the doctor's office, and a few days later in the ultrasound appointment, too. It soothed her somehow, like a lucky charm. So, either this news of Logan has really rattled her, or it's reminded her of something else that has in the past, which I feel instantly bad for.