Our Forever Read online

  Every night, when my emotions hit rock bottom, I become a person I barely even recognize. The bubbly, outgoing, fun Jo becomes buried by the dark, despondent Jo, who lives vicariously in her past, desperate to keep Christopher alive.

  It’s unhealthy, I know, to clutch on to someone through memories. I’ve been to various therapists and counselors, but I can never seem to get myself out of this emotional rut. It’s exhausting. Just once, I would like to close my eyes and not have his beautiful face taunt me, like it does every night, but I know that’s not possible, as my thoughts will always be consumed by him, grasping at every last remembrance.

  Since I was five years old, he was my life. How do you stop loving someone who was your whole world? How are you supposed to continue on when half of your heart stopped beating the moment his did?

  He was my person, and without him, I’ve felt hopelessly lost ever since.

  When he first died, people told me that it would get better after time, that I’d mourn and move on, that I’d never forget but it’d get easier.

  Their words were utter bullshit.

  I’m still waiting for the day when the agonizing pain no longer weighs me down, when my lungs ease with sufficient oxygen, making each breath more manageable.

  It hasn’t gotten easier. If anything, it gets harder with every passing day, especially when Junior turns a year older and the absence of his father is a cold reminder of how cruel the world really is.

  I’m walking through the meadow, toward our tree. Christopher didn’t tell me to meet him, but I feel him. His energy is humming through me, vibrating almost, and I know he’s close by. It’s always been that way since the moment I met him. I’m able to sense him before I can see him. It’s what makes our bond unique.

  Excitement courses through my veins at the anticipation of seeing him. It feels like it’s been forever since I last saw him. I’ve missed the stare of his hypnotic green eyes, the caress of his touch, the whispered murmurs of “I love you.” I’ve almost forgotten the way it feels when he pins me down and tickles me until it turns into something much hotter and pleasurable. I’ve yearned for the sensuality of his kisses, the roughness of his stubble, and our late-night talks after we’ve made love.

  But, most of all, I’ve just missed him, and I can’t wait until I get to feel the heat of his warmth again. It’s been so long.

  My feet continue forward until they falter slightly when I see the six-foot figure leaning casually against the tree, his arms crossed over his chest and his smirk in place.

  My feet speed up until I’m jumping into his strong arms, and I inhale the sweet and husky smell of him.

  “Christopher,” I whisper into his neck, clutching him tighter.

  He slightly pulls away, his gaze intense, drinking me in. “Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes?”

  The thumping of my heart begins to race in my chest, and my eyes roam over his beautiful, handsome face. I bring my fingers up to the dark beard I knew would welcome me. I love his stubble.

  “I could say the same about you,” I say with a laugh.

  “I’m going to ask about my boy in a minute, but first, I need to kiss you.”

  He gently presses his lips to mine, and the instant our lips connect, the distinct flavor of peppermint and a hint of coffee explodes on my tongue. I devour the taste and scent with fierce starvation, my starvation for Christopher.

  The last time I kissed him was when he was being deployed to Afghanistan. I forgot how incredible it feels to be kissed by him, how worshipped and desired I feel when his lips are on mine.

  My body temperature rises as he makes love to my mouth with slow and precise movements. My fingers run through his short hair while my tongue keeps up pace with his. This here is my heaven, and once I’m in the midst of a spellbinding kiss—his spellbinding kiss—I never want to let go. I’d stay in this perfect bubble forever if it were possible.

  I feel him begin to pull away, and it takes everything within me to let him. I groan when my lips finally become unglued from his, and his chuckle echoes around the meadow.

  “So, you missed me, huh?” Christopher asks with a bright smile.

  “There was never a day when I didn’t miss you.”

  “I missed you, too, so much.”

  I slide down his body until I’m on my feet, and I pull him onto the grass, so we can sit in the place that feels like home to me. Our maple tree even has a heart carved between our engraved names. We’ve been coming here since we were kids.

  I kneel between his open legs and place my hands against his firm chest, surprised at the bulky muscles I feel against my fingertips.

  “You feel bigger. Afghanistan has really worked you.” I continue to caress my hands up and down his chest, loving how incredible it is to touch him.

  It’s been so long since we made love that I’m already turned on.

  “Do you like it?” he asks with a flirtatious glint in his eye, a look that has me biting my bottom lip with sexual need.

  I nod eagerly, my fingers kneading deeper into his muscles.

  “Yeah…I like it so much that I can’t wait to get you naked,” I respond honestly, eliciting a husky moan from his lips.

  “JoJo…” he growls.

  I love the way my nickname rolls sexily off his tongue. He’s the only person who’s allowed to call me JoJo. It usually annoys me when somebody else calls me that, but Christopher has always been able to get away with it.

  “It’s been a long time since I’ve been buried in you. You can’t tease me like that.”

  “Who says I’m teasing?” I question seductively.

  His gaze burns into me, and before I can take my next breath, I’m on my back with him hovering over me, suggestively pressing his hips against mine. After a moment, his heated stare turns adoringly appreciative.

  “I love you, JoJo.”

  I smile softly while my eyes flutter closed. He presses the barest of kisses against my lips before pulling away.

  “I love you, too.”

  He trails his fingers up my arm and then along my neck until he’s pushing a piece of my hair behind my ear, triggering a shiver to tremble against my skin.

  “This moment is exactly how I imagined it. Coming home to my best friend and my son is all I’ve been thinking about. How is my boy, by the way? I can’t wait to see him.”

  “He’s perfect. He can’t wait to see his daddy. He’s missed you.”

  “I’ve missed him, too.” He leans in to press another luscious kiss on my lips when the sound of music pounds from underneath us, causing the grass around us to vibrate with every beat.

  “What’s that?” I ask, pulling my head up, my eyes narrowing.

  “What’s what?” he questions, almost like he’s completely oblivious to the god-awful music echoing through the meadow.

  “That music. Where’s it coming from?”

  “I can’t hear anything, babe.” He chuckles, as if I’m losing my mind.

  His laughter fades when he gradually begins to dissolve right in front of me.

  “Christopher?” I ask with panic. My fingers try to clutch ahold of him, but my hold isn’t strong enough as he slips right through my fingertips.

  “Christopher?” I repeat as tears fill my eyes when his form vanishes into thin air, simply gone from the world. “Christopher!”

  My eyes fly open as I startle myself by whimpering out Christopher’s name in a strained sob. My bearings are a little distorted as I blink through the mist of fog that clouds my vision while I try to piece together where the hell I am.

  Once my eyes adjust to the darkness, I remember I’m in my new home in Austin, and my heart cracks when I realize that I’m no longer back in Dallas, sitting under our maple tree in the arms of my best friend. It was in fact a dream.

  I press the palm of my hand to my chest, feeling my heart thudding against my fingers, as I struggle to transition from my dream to reality.

  Christopher…

  I sit up
and press my shaky hands to my face, feeling the wetness of my tears against my skin, as the pain of losing him resurfaces. It’s doomsday all over again. Well, to everybody else, the day he died was just like every other day, but for me, that was when my world obliterated right in front of me.

  My dreams come in two forms—memories and wishes. This dream would go in the wish pile, as it was what I always pictured when I thought of him coming home. It’s what I wish had happened. Instead, what happened was quite the opposite.

  My breathing slows until everything around me makes sense, and that’s when I’m hit with a sense of déjà vu. Thumping heavy-metal music can be heard in the distance.

  Where the hell is it coming from?

  I remember, in my dream, a bizarre heavy bass was moving through the meadow, like a rock concert was nearby. That’s what must have woken me up.

  I frown when I grab my phone from the nightstand and see that it’s two a.m. What the hell? Who would play music that loud so early in the morning?

  My heartbreak from my dream turns to rage, and I storm into the living room. The music that seemed extreme in the bedroom only becomes harsher the closer I get to my front door.

  Seriously, who the hell is playing music this loud at stupid o’ clock in the morning?

  “Mama,” Junior begins with a whine.

  I turn around when I hear Junior’s soft voice.

  “Where’s that loud music coming from?”

  “Sorry, baby. It’s coming from across the hall. Go back to bed, and I’ll sort it out,” I say as calmly as possible.

  On the inside though, I’m anything but calm. My skin is itching with fury. I don’t know what I’m more pissed off about—that the music woke us up, especially my son, or that it took me away from the incredible dream I was having about Christopher.

  “Okay, Mama,” he mumbles under his breath as he wipes the sleep from his eyes, shuffling back in the direction of his room.

  Once I hear his door close shut, I furiously stomp to the side table, grab my keys, and storm out of my apartment, forgetting that I’m dressed in only a long T-shirt and panties.

  My eyes zone in on my neighbor’s door where the loud music is coming from.

  Ugh!

  I have no idea whom I’ll be dealing with, whether a drug dealer or an ax murderer, but that doesn’t prevent me from banging my fist against the wood of this asshole’s door.

  I feel the wrath of a dragon burning through my veins, especially as I continue to knock on the door—or more accurately, aggressively imprint my fist into the wood—waiting for someone to hear me over the racket.

  This is what happens when you wake mama bear up; she turns vicious.

  Finally, after my hand becomes numb from the consistent banging, the music suddenly stops, and the door swings open. I’m on the guy before he can finish opening the door, but I don’t miss the way his eyes lazily fall down the length of my body in my barely there T-shirt.

  “Do you know what time it is?” I shout. I don’t give him a chance to reply as I continue with my irrational rant, “It’s two in the morning. Two! That mind-numbing noise you call music has not only woken me up, but also my six-year-old son! Who in their right mind plays music at this time of night? It’s inconsiderate to your neighbors, especially ones who have just moved in. Thank God staying here is only temporary, and I don’t have to live across the hall to an asshole like you for long. Seriously, it’s too early for this shit!” I finish a little breathless. I was more abrupt than I needed to be.

  As the silence lingers between us, I shift uncomfortably at the intense gaze that burns into me from a set of blue eyes greedily taking in my lack of clothing. I have the urge to pull my T-shirt further down my naked legs, but instead, I stand tall and stare him out, feigning confidence when I’m trembling inside and my heart is racing.

  Shit, what if this guy is a drug dealer or a murderer?

  As my rage simmers and dissolves into fear, I finally take in the guy with the shit taste in music, and that’s when I realize he’s dressed just as indecently as I am. He’s in only a pair of shorts, and his messy dark brown hair looks as if someone put their hands through it a couple of hundred times, telling me that I’ve, no doubt, interrupted a sex session.

  At that thought, through no fault of my own, my eyes instinctively drop down to his chest. That’s when I see how incredibly ripped he is, and his skin is decorated in various tattoos. I can’t help but follow the continuous patterns of art that cover both arms, noticing that one is Captain America’s shield tearing from out of his skin. The unique tattoos carry on over his right shoulder, along the center of his chest, and down his stomach. I continue lower, and it’s not until my gaze begins to drift to the V of his hips and the tattoos that fade into his shorts when I quickly avert my eyes.

  My hackles rise again when I see a subtle smirk curling his mouth.

  “Well?” I question, wondering why the hell he’s just watching me with an amused smile. When the silence continues and he doesn’t utter a single word, I huff in annoyance, my anger simmering again. “Fine! Don’t apologize, but do not come to my door when you need a cup of sugar! Good night,” I bite out before turning on my heels and heading back in the direction of my apartment.

  Strange sensations of shivers erupt up my spine at the feel of his stare searing into my back. The heightened awareness throws me off-balance and quite frankly terrifies me, but I push the inexplicable feeling away and focus on getting the last word in. “Oh, and keep the goddamn music down!”

  Moments later, I slam my front door shut, and I let out a shaky breath. I lean back against the door and close my eyes as I take in the past couple of minutes.

  Confusion rattles through me, and I hate how the anxiety seems to have latched on to my chest, making it hard for me to breathe. I’m usually okay with confrontation—the reason I had no qualms with storming out of here with all guns blazing—but that, with him, just put me on edge, and I’m feeling uneasy.

  The way he looked fixedly at me, as if he could see through my very soul, was almost like the way Christopher used to look at me.

  No.

  I can’t even go there.

  I won’t go there.

  I’m just exhausted. I’m imagining things because the dream I was rudely woken up from still feels so real.

  Like all of my dreams.

  Except they’re never real, and I’m always left with a gaping hole in the center of my chest when the realization comes crashing down on me. My dreams are made up of wishes that can never come true.

  “Wow, it sounds like your first night in Austin was eventful,” my best friend, Kaelyn, says via FaceTime after I relayed what had happened last night—or, technically, this morning.

  “I know. Tell me about it,” I agree as I take in her pretty face, feeling incredibly envious of her right now.

  It’s eight a.m., and while I look and feel like shit with what can only be described as a bird’s nest on the top of my head, she looks her normal beautiful self with her perfectly styled brunette locks, vibrant chocolate eyes, and flawless glowing skin.

  I take a sip of my morning coffee—something else I’m thankful I brought with me from Dallas. I need it since I was inconsiderately woken up last night, and I couldn’t get back to sleep after I ripped that douche bag a new one. I keep telling myself that the insomnia was from the embarrassment that I was half-naked in front of him and the adrenaline from the confrontation, but deep down, I know it was more than that.

  As soon as I tried to allow sleep to envelop me, all I could see was my neighbor and the intensity of those soul-baring eyes. For a split second, I forgot about Christopher, and when that realization hit me, the guilt came at me full force. The tears that followed took me back to the very day I’d lost him, my heart dying a slow, excruciating death. As the pain shook violently through me with every tear that fell from my silent cries, all I could imagine was the ghostly presence of Christopher’s beautiful green hues looking dow
n on me with disappointment, and from that moment, they were all I could think of. They were hauntingly vivid, and memories began to materialize into my conscious, each one just as gut-wrenching as the next.

  There’s one particular moment, probably one of my favorites, that played itself on a loop more than once. It’s when our friendship slowly began to form into something more.

  Setting my pen down, I closed my eyes and stretched my neck from side to side to ease the knotted muscles I’d gotten from lying in the same position on my stomach while I studied. Christopher and I were sprawled out on the living room floor with various textbooks scattered around us.

  I looked up and noticed Christopher’s intense gaze on me. Immediately, a flush covered my skin, and I nervously looked down, pretending to be engrossed with my essay even though I could hardly register what one word said to the next.

  I could still feel his stare on me, and unable to resist, I looked back, and my heart halted within my chest when my eyes latched on to his hypnotic greens.

  “What?” I practically whimpered on a whisper, my pulse thumping violently against my burning skin.

  He anxiously gulped, and for the first time since I’d known him, he seemed genuinely nervous.

  Things had been a little strange between us, especially since my birthday at the water park where I’d realized I was hopelessly in love with him. In fact, I thought I’d always known I was in love with him, but it had taken seeing him practically naked for me to finally realize it.

  Since then, I’d been awkward when around him, but lately, his gazes had been getting longer until I found him outright staring at me, like now.

  His stare intensified, and he broke out his usual charming smile. “You look really pretty today.”

  His words were simple, but the impact of them caused havoc on my already racing heart.

  I was left silent, unable to form a single syllable.

  All I was able to manage was a trembling smile, but that was quickly wiped off and replaced with a look of shock when he added, “Actually, that’s a lie. You don’t look pretty today. You look beautiful.”