SEVENTEEN
⛓️Xavier⛓️
39 years ago - 5-year-old Xavier
"Where's Mama?" I pestered my dad, clutching the bear to my chest as I followed him around the huge house. "Where's Mama?"
"She's gone, Xavier!" He spun around, and yelled at me, causing me to stop, my bottom lip trembling. "She isn't coming back, she doesn't love you enough to stay!" He continued to shout, smashing up the nice house as I watched with wide eyes.
"Why?"
"Because she's a bitch!" I gasped at the bad word.
"B-Bitch?" I repeated the word, and he didn't scold me. He agreed.
"Yes. Do you know what love is?" I nodded my head.
"You tell me you love me all the time, and Mama used to say it too." But I couldn't remember the last time she had said it. My eyes watered.
"Love is bad." What?
"It is?" I whispered, nibbling on my bottom lip. "But my book said it's good, and so did Mama one time."
"Books are full of shit, they're not real, they're as fuck as your bitch of a mother. You shouldn't love anyone, it will only do you unnecessary damage in the future." He sighed, resting his hands on his hips.
"I shouldn't love anymore? I can't say it?" I tilted my head.
"No."
18-year-old Xavier
I'm sitting on a park bench, watching Rocky smother his girlfriend with a load of hugs and kisses. My dad always told me that relationships are pointless, and that there was no point in getting into anything with a girl.
But looking at how happy my best friend was with his girl made my heart ache a little. He looked at her like she was the best thing in the world, like nothing could shine brighter than her.
They hugged each other goodbye and went their separate ways, Rocky making his way over to me, but he never stopped looking over his shoulder until his girlfriend had disappeared.
"You good?" He questioned, taking a seat next to me on the bench. I nodded my head. "How was prison?" He nudged my shoulder and I sighed.
I had been arrested for seven months due to petty theft. My father could have easily bailed me out, but he told me that I needed to learn my lesson, and that I shouldn't have been caught in the first place. "Shouldn't you have gotten out a month ago?"
"I got into a fight, so got extra time." I shrugged, looking around the park to spot yet another couple all loved up. I rolled my eyes and looked away. "What's so special about having your girlfriend? Does she not get put off by what you do, you work for my dad, Rocky, and he's part of the mafia?"
Rocky chuckled and leaned back against the wooden bench. He's only twenty and the fucker's body is nearly covered head to toe in tattoos.
"She loves me for me, X. I try my hardest to keep her away from what I do, she doesn't ask questions, and I don't tell." He fiddled with the bracelet she made him a year ago.
"But don't you get bored?" Rocky frowned like I had just insulted him. "What's the point in love when it will just end in heartbreak." That's what my father always told me anyway.
"I respect your father, X, I truly do. But he's fucked your mind up when it comes to love, you can't stop yourself from feeling it. It's gonna happen." Rocky stated like he could see into the future or something, and I scoffed at his confidence.
"Rocky, I'm never gonna be in love." I laughed, but Rocky looked genuinely concerned for me. "It's no big deal. I can never see myself falling for some girl and devoting my life to her. It might be for you, but it's not for me. No girl will ever make me feel that way, and I've learned to accept that. I'm not capable of loving someone." After those words escaped my mouth, it left a bitter taste.
"You never know what could happen, Xavier. You could fall in love tomorrow, next year, maybe even when you're in your forties or something, I dunno. But I stick by what I said, you can't control your emotions when it comes to love, it will just happen." He grinned.
"Rocky?"
"Hmm?"
"You're in the wrong profession."
Three years later.
"Sorry for your loss."
"I'm so, so, sorry!"
"Your father was a good man."
I threw my cigarette on the ground and stepped on it harshly, taking all my aggression out on it.
"Looks like you're the big boss now." Rocky grabbed a hold of my shoulder and squeezed tight. I stared down at the silver wedding band on his finger, that taunted me with the way it sparkled against the sun and looked away. He got married last week, and then my father decided to die a day after.
"I'm twenty-two years of fucking age, Rocky. I'm not ready for this." I inhaled a deep breath and stared at the headstone of my father's grave.
"What do you think he's been training you all these years for? You've always been ready, X. You gotta step up now and make him proud, and you've got me. I'll be here every step of the way." He reassured me.
"I just..." I struggled to get the words out and gritted my teeth.
"You what? You can tell me."
"I just feel really lonely." I avoided eye contact with him, ashamed that I was letting my emotions get the better of me. I just knew my father was turning in his grave this very moment after I uttered those words. "He taught me all I need to know in this world, Rocky, but refused to teach me how to feel anything other than a gun or money in my hands."
For the first time, I let the tears fall knowing my father couldn't call me out anymore and tell me how weak it was for me to cry.
Rocky pulled me into a brotherly hug.
"I'll stick by your side no matter what. And I'll watch you fall in love one day." He teased, and I laughed wiping my cheeks.
"Unlikely, but okay."
It's like I'm allergic to it.
And then a month later, I did the worst possible thing.
I stared my son in the eyes, who had been placed on my doorstep, and my father's words echoed in my ear.
'Love is weakness.'
'You can't have an heir if you haven't built a kingdom.'
'Love is not important in this world, son, only money.'
I told myself I couldn't love him. It wasn't possible. So, I put him in care.
And for years I carried a dull ache in my chest and resented myself.
I murdered.
I slept around too much.
Occasionally I did drugs, or I drank myself into oblivion.
I became an even more fucked up version of my father.
...
"I'm a terrible man, baby." I stare up at my girl through watery eyes, and like the sweet girl she always is, she cradles my face in her warm hands, and wipes away the tears that begin to fall. I tighten my arms around her waist, worried that she'll just disappear into thin air.
"No, your father made you believe you weren't capable of love. He made you believe it wasn't worth it. All your father was doing was projecting his heartbreak onto you, and that wasn't fair." God, she's right. I wish I had noticed this years ago. But at the same time, I don't, because I probably would have never met Honey.
"You gave up Hendrix because you believed you were doing the right thing, you were just following the rules your father drilled into your head for years." I laugh lightly.
"Why'd you always see the good in me, Honey? What do you see that everybody else can't, hmm?" I tilt my head and look down to see her place the palm of her hand on the left side of my chest.
"I see this." She whispers with a caring smile on her face. "I just see the young Xavier trying to break free from the shackles of what his father would tell him."
She's right.
"He was waiting for you, wasn't he, baby?" I smirk and she giggles, threading her fingers through my hair. "You got rid of that loneliness I was feeling all those years," I admit to her, and her big brown eyes sparkle.
"You did for me too." Pride fills my chest, and I lean my head down to bury my face in her cleavage. "Xavier!" She laughs and all I want to do is put the sound in a jar and keep it forever.
I pull back and just stare at the beautiful woman. The woman that is capable of doing all the things my father told me to avoid.
"I think about our little girl a lot." Honey's breath hitches. "I always wonder what she would have looked like, what her hobbies would be. I just liked the thought of getting a second chance to be a father. A good one. To be there for her through everything she battles in life. To have someone rely on me for the good."
I want it so fucking bad.
"When the time is right, we'll get the chance again," Honey whispers softly. "You're a good dad to Hendrix now, and you'll be a good dad when we try for another baby."
My eyes drift down to her stomach.
I wanna try now.
But unfortunately, reality slaps me in the face.
We can't.
"I love you," I tell her, and she leans down to kiss the tip of my nose.
The day she says the words back to me, I'll be a goner. I'll fall even deeper in love with her.
And I refuse to have any motherfucker rip her away from me.
There will be a hell of a load of bloodshed if someone tries, that's for sure.
A/N
If you haven't already, please check the other book I've been writing called Wicked Games. I update it every Monday and Wednesday. The next update for TDH will be on Sunday!💛