Page 6 of Exrated
Empty moving boxes are scattered all over the living room floor. We’ve been moving all day, and I’m fucking tired.
"Dude," Jake says, flopping back on the sofa and popping a beer. "Why do you have so much shit?"
"Fuck if I know."You never realize how much shit you have until you move. And half of this stuff has been holed up in storage since I moved to California. I grab one of the last boxes and stand, looking around the large living room. “Man, whoever would have thought porn and stripping would make enough money for a house like this,” I laugh.
“And to think we were going to bother with law school.”
“Yeah,” I sigh. “Right…”
I kick the door to the bedroom open, drop the box to the floor, and sit on the edge of the mattress. Taking a pair of scissors, I cut the tape and lift the box flap. On the very top of a pile of books, lays my Junioryearbook.I open it and read over the messages left by classmates, and then I come to the note Jemma left.
Tyler,
I love you. I've loved you since we were six. I'll love you until I'm ninety-six.
Jemma
I can still hear her voice when I read that, and I smile because I loved her. I really fucking loved her. What we had, it wasn’t that high school bullshit. I can honestly say it was something real. We grew up next door to each other, she was the first girl I’d ever had a crush on, and when I was six, I vowed she would be my first kiss, and she was, even if it wasn’t until we were thirteen.
I let my mind wander back to one of those memories I can’t seem to let go of:
I finally catch her and snatch the rubber band free from her hair, laughing as one of her pigtails falls loose. “I’m telling,” she whines before taking off in a sprint across the room. I, of course, go after her. "Stop chasing me, Tyler," she shouts as I run around the couch, nearly tripping on that dumb pink Barbie car she was trying to make me play with. "Stop it!" She hops onto thesofaand bounces across the cushions.
"Nope." I shake my head and laugh as I jump on the couch after her. For some reason, I want to kiss her, even though it’s gross. I just want to kiss her.
She squeals and tumbles off the sofa before running to the corner of the room.
"Tyler!" I freeze at the sound of my dad’s voice. Jemma stops running as well, attempting to catch her breath. Footstepsfall on the stairs, and soon enough, Dad’s large frame appears at the bottom of the steps. "Come on, buddy. Time to go."
I groan and glare at him. "Thanks a lot, Dad," I say. "You just ruined what could've been the best day of my life!"
Jemma narrows her eyes at me.
"What?" Dad asks.
"I was gonna kiss her," I say as I angrily snatch my backpack from the floor. "I almost had her."
"Ewww! Gross,” Jemma says, crossing her arms over her chest.
"Son," Dad looks down at me. "You're seven."
"But she's pretty..."I look back over at Jemma, and she has a small smile on her face. “One day, Jemma, I’m gonna kiss you.”
I shake that memory from my mind. That relationship is one of those what could have been deals. First love. First heartbreak, bullshit, bullshit, bullshit. Sometimes I think had I not gotten that scholarship to NYU and moved off that I would have ended up marrying her because, let’s be honest, when you're eighteen, long distancerelationships don't work.
We grew apart, I dropped out and became a stripper. She ended up being an actress. Alegitactress, just like she said she would ever since we were kids. To be honest, it sucks because I’ll be flipping through the channels late at night after a shift, and I’ll catch her on screen. It’s a kids show, which makes me feel like a fucking perv because there’s something about Jemma dressed up like Elsa that would make any man’s dick hard. She looks all wholesome, and doesn’t that just do it? So it’s no surprise that I’ve beat off to it a time or two, right? I can’t help but laugh at myself. Here I am jacking off to her TV series and shooting porn, and she probably donates to charities for blind, three-legged dogs.I need a fucking beer.I toss the yearbook down and head into the hall.
When I walk into the living room, Jake is fooling with the new TV. “Fucking shit, man.” He backs away from the wall, turns the TV on, and waits.
“What are you doing, dipshit?”
“I can cast from my phone,” he says. “Do you know what this means?”
I go into the kitchen and grab a beer from the fridge. “Yeah, that you can cast from your phone?”
“Man, give me a second…”
I pop the tab and tip the cold beer back. And then, on my second sip, a smacking noise echoes around the living room followed by a high-pitched moan.
