I chewed on my lip as we sat in the cab in silence. I didn't know what the hell to say, and he was clearly at a loss as well. The only thing I was sure of at the moment was that the rest of the alcohol had caught up to him twice as fast during the drive to his condo. When we filed out, I stood on the sidewalk, mindlessly glancing at the other people walking by without truly looking at them.
Caleb fumbled with the keys on his keyring, cussing when he dropped them down to the concrete.
"Here, let me." I bent down to pick them up, and the moment I did, Caleb's hand smoothed over my jean-clad ass.
"You really do have the sexiest ass I've ever seen."
"You just want to fuck it," I reminded him, looping my arm through his and tossing his suit jacket over my other.
"Not just it. The rest of you too. I only want to fuck you, Rach."
"And they say romance is dead. Thank you, Caleb, for reminding me that I'm only good for sex to you."
He frowned, moving his lips and tasting the words he'd just said. He started to shake his head. "No, no that isn't...That came out wrong."
"I'm sure it did. Except alcohol is the best truth serum humans have." I waved him towards the elevator, but he just continued to stand in the lobby. "Come on. Please? I wanna get home." And hope my friend isn't fucking the club dude in my bed.
Caleb finally stepped into the enclosed space, and the door shut, taking us up. Next thing I knew, I was pushed against the metal railing at the base of my spine and Caleb's lips were on mine in a harsh kiss of need. I lost myself for a moment, the heated desire in my core taking over my voice of reason, but then I reminded myself of the words he'd just said and I pushed him off.
"Rach, baby, don't. That isn't what I meant. I didn't mean I only want to fuck you. I meant it like I only want to fuck you. Just you. Fuck everyone else...Not literally though. I'm sorry," he slurred the word, his speech getting more incoherent as the minutes passed. "You know something? I...I think I might be a little drunk."
The innocent chagrin on his face pulled a bit of quiet laughter from my lips, and I bit them to stop myself. I wasn't good at being mad around the man. Never had been. It was why I'd always needed to walk away mid fight—if he didn't walk away before it even started.
When the elevator opened and I stepped off, I turned back only to watch him sway. Once, twice, and when he did a third time, his arm launched out towards the railing on the wall to keep himself from going down.
"Oh, come here."
I stepped forward and wrapped an arm around his waist. Almost immediately, he leaned into me, and I huffed against the weight I didn't expect him to use me to support.
"Jesus, Caleb," I groaned, but laughed when he turned a lopsided grin at me.
God, he really is drunk.
Stumbling together, we walked down the hallway to his door. As I worked to find the proper key to let us in, his long fingers stroked through my hair, running from my scalp to the ends. They skimmed down my back as he made his trails.
"Stop that," I warned half-heartedly. "You're gonna put me to sleep before I even get you into bed."
"Hmm," he hummed.
Caleb leaned into me, his nose feathering down my neck. Soft kisses followed the same path, and while my mind was telling me to stop him, to just get him inside so I could leave, my body was already answering his advances.
My head fell to the side to give him greater access. And he took it.
"God, your skin's so fucking soft. You feel so good."
When he spoke, his breath tickled my neck and I squealed, squirming from his grasp. But when I felt his lips curl into a wide smile, I couldn't help but turn my head to see it.
My heart stammered in my chest at his look of pure, unadulterated joy in the moment. With a mind of their own, my fingers lifted to trace over his lips, and the moment they touched him, I was a goner.
Caleb's eyes heated and he bent to me, kissing me like he was afraid I wasn't real. Like I might disappear. His mouth moved with fervor and his hands roamed endlessly along my body, grabbing at my hips to jerk me closer, around my back to hold me there, and at my breasts for no good reason other than he wanted to. And I was glad he wanted to.
I arched into the curve of his body, moaning against his greedy lips. I was vaguely aware of the fact that we were still in the building's open hallway, so I fumbled blindly with the key I'd finally gotten to fit in the doorknob, turning it to let us in.
We fell inside without parting, and I dropped his suit jacket to the floor somewhere along the way. Caleb moved with drunken caution, backing me slowly around the place that I was still mostly unfamiliar with. When my heel caught the corner of the couch, I tore my mouth from Caleb's and yelped, flailing without success to catch something.
It was all Caleb could do to not fall with me to crush me. He rocked back, almost too much so because it sent him stumbling back before he inadvertently caught his balance when he'd tumbled backwards so far that his hip hit the kitchen counter. I, on the other hand, wasn't as lucky. My ass hit the floor and my head jerked back with momentum, smacking against the leg of the side table at my back.
I gasped, rubbing at the already-forming lump on my head. "Ouch," I whimpered.
Caleb cursed, fighting his feet to work properly and falling around the kitchen to put ice in a bag. He grabbed the towel hanging on the oven's door handle and took cautious steps towards me. Bending down, he rocked in off-balance sways while holding out the towel-wrapped bag.
I held it to my head with a wince, though the wince was more in embarrassment than pain. This was so not how I saw this going.
"Sorry," I whispered, grabbing blindly for the armrest of the couch for leverage to stand.
Caleb's arm looped under mine and around my back. "Don't apologize, gorgeous. You've always been a klutz. I'm just usually better at catching you, but someone decided to get me drinking."
I tittered a laugh. "You're nicer to me when you're drunk."
"I'm always nice to you," he scoffed with feigned offense. When I gave him the side eye, he chuckled and bent forward, kissing my forehead in a slow pause of a movement.
I closed my eyes, but when I leaned into it, his lips disappeared and he reached up to take the ice from my grasp.
"Come on. I think we both need to lay down."
"Mmm," I thought about it, ultimately deciding it was a bad move to stay. "No. I should go."
"I wasn't asking, Rachel."
I backed away from Caleb's hold, swatting his hand away when he reached for me. "I'm not staying."
"And I said you're not leaving. You could have a concussion, so I'm not letting you walk out that door and into the hands of what could be a murderous cabbie when you can't think straight."
I rolled my eyes but turned, waltzing into his bedroom. "You watch too much Dateline," I called over my shoulder.
"And you don't watch enough," he retorted, following me with calculated steps.
I wanted to fight him, but he had a point. My head was pounding; my sight was blurring. I shook my head in hopes it might clear, but it only made the ache more prominent. I groaned, sitting on the bed with a hand rubbing at the knot on my scalp.
"Here."
Caleb slid between my legs, placing the icepack on my wound with a gentleness that didn't fit our almost-tiff we'd just had.
"You're a mess," he said with a harbored chuckle behind it.
But his voice cracked off when he rocked backwards, nearly falling again.
"You're no better," I pointed out, slapping the spot on the bed next to me. "Come on."
Like a kid in a candy store, he grinned widely down at me, dropping the ice pack without care of where it landed. He rushed around the foot of the bed and leapt, landing in his sleeping space and bouncing twice before he hunkered down into comfort. He sat up a moment, only long enough to jerk his button down off and toss it away.
I laughed and shook my head, immediately blinking back against the throbbing that reminded me I was in no shape to do so.
"Come here, baaabe." Caleb dragged the word out and threw his arms open in invitation.
The smile on my face was almost to the point of pain, and I should've felt like an idiot. I just couldn't find the energy to care. Not tonight.
I grabbed the ice pack and threw it onto the nightstand, figuring that if I did have a concussion, ice wouldn't help. And if I didn't...ice still wouldn't really help. I needed Advil, but I didn't care enough to get up and get it. And Caleb surely wasn't in any shape to be my errand boy.
I laid my cheek on his bare chest and sighed, closing my eyes. When a warm hand touched the nape of my neck and stroked down my shoulders and back, then back up again, I shuddered. It was a comfort I'd not felt much of in years, and I was afraid to let myself realize how much I liked feeling it again.
Mostly because of who had been doing it.
I reached back and grabbed Caleb's hand, placing it on my hip and holding it there.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing. Just don't want to fall asleep yet. In case I have a concussion, you know?"
"Talk to me then," he offered, a kind of question and statement all at once.
I thought about what to say. Lord only knew I had a million and one questions, and maybe it was even the perfect time to ask them. He was drunk enough to answer them honestly, but I didn't think he'd wake up without recollection. And to be honest, I wished he would've been that far gone. It might've made my inquisitions easier if I knew he'd be a blank slate in the morning should things go wrong.
I felt the sliver of confidence I had flowing out of my body. I deflated, feeling like a glutton for punishment for not having the balls to find my own answers. And I think Caleb felt it, too, because he—shockingly—spoke up when I didn't.
"Why didn't you ever tell me you were applying for grad school in New York?"
I froze. "What?"
"You only told me when you'd gotten in. Had I known, maybe I could've prepared for things better. We could've—"
My head popped off his shoulder and I sat up. "We could've what? Gone off and played house in a new city? Your grandma needed you here, Caleb. You were the only family you both really had to count on."
"I had you," he whispered, unmoving from his position in what I assumed to be hope that I might lay back down.
"It wasn't enough though, was it? Me? I wasn't enough for my parents. I wasn't enough for my friends. And then I wasn't enough for you." His brows furrowed and he started to reach for my hand, but I jerked it away and set it in my lap, skidding back to sit on the opposite side of the bed. "Don't. I'm just...It's a cycle, you know? To answer your question, I didn't think I'd get in. Because of all of that, I didn't think I'd be enough for NYU. And I didn't want to jinx anything by hoping out loud."
"I was your fiancé."
"Yeah," I nodded, hugging my legs to my chest, "which is why it hurt so bad when I thought I'd found my person and it turned out that I wasn't enough for him either."
"That was never the truth. You have to know that. I didn't want to hold you back, Rach."
A sarcastic laugh burst from my lips. "Hold me back? Fucking—"
I pinched the bridge of my nose. I was stuck there for the night, and in my pained state and his drunken one, it wasn't the time or place for that hurdle to come to light yet.
"So, what, you're saying you put me first by cheating and breaking it off? By basically leaving me at the altar? How selfless of you, Caleb."
"I put you first, Rachel, because I knew you wouldn't. I knew you'd have stayed if I'd asked you to. If I'd told you I had to stay behind. I didn't leave because I didn't want you. I didn't even leave because I fucked up that night. I left before you changed your future just for me and hated me for it years later. Because I couldn't leave, Rachel, and you deserved more than to stay."