Bitter Kisses (It's Just High School #3) - Thandiwe Mpofu Page 0,150
the contract I’d signed years earlier but still I took my shot because Nancy… people don’t get that kind of love all the time. Only a few people are ever truly in love but she, she was the essence of my life.”
I don’t know that I’m crying until I feel the wet trails in my face.
“Do you know what happened to Nathan?” I finally ask.
“Yes.” He doesn’t even blink as he says it.
“Did you have something to do with his death?”
“Absolutely.”
“Do you know about the contract I was forced to sign? The one that someone already bought, ergo, bought me?” My voice is small even to my own ears as I say that, but I need to know. To John’s credit, he holds my gaze and doesn’t look bothered, as if we’re talking about the food we had for dinner.
“Yes,” he finally says. “I’ve known about it for a while.”
“Your son told you?”
“He did, yes.”
“Well, since you two gossip like third graders, please tell him that the contract was already bought and that I’ve been waiting for years for the perve that bought me to come for me. I even have a lovely gift for whoever it is.”
And I do. I bought a holster the week after Julian broke into my apartment. I mean, I’m still learning how to shoot but I do know one thing now. Knives. And I always keep on my body at ALL times.
“I’m sure he already knows,” John says clearing his throat. “But as I was saying about Paris. I thought we made a nice, even cute little family. You, Julian, Liam, Nancy and me. I thought we could work as our own unit, that if there was the kind of will we both had, we could make it work. But she never wanted to have kids because she knew she would get sick one day soon and also there was one other little thing that happened on the trip.”
He looks at me then, the suspense building.
“Did… did I do something wrong on the trip?” I whisper. I have no idea why I’m whispering.
“It wasn’t just you, Mia,” John says kindly. “You were dancing in the ballet studio I used to rent out for Nancy when she was in Paris and Julian was watching you from the shadows. I mean, he was about seven or eight, I don’t remember but he was watching you with this look in his eyes that even years later, I only see when he’s talking about you.”
Julian.
“I know you didn’t want to talk about Julian but your journey in life was sealed that afternoon in that ballet studio,” John says.
“Why, what happened?”
“You two kissed.”
Holy shit!
“Wait, what?”
John lets out a small chuckle. “Don’t get me wrong, it was innocent enough, but I know my son. When we finally went back home, he told me that he was going to marry you.”
It’s at this point that tears dry up and I’m no longer comfortable.
“What exactly does that mean, John when I saw the contracts Courtney had for Roxy Bishop to marry Julian? If they are the same as the ones you and that she-beast signed, then…”
“Then yes, they’re irreversible, but Mia, Julian is not married,” John says. “His name is not on those contracts.”
“But… but I saw them,” I mutter. “Roxy even confirmed it.”
“I’m sure they were told Julian but it’s actually Liam.”
Okay, at this point, I’m running out of Holy Shits to react with in this conversation.
“Liam?” I repeat like a parrot. “And what does that even mean?”
“It means whatever you gather from it,” John says getting up now. “In these past four years, I’ve watched my son move Heaven and Earth, do the impossible just so he can be with you.”
“But he’s not!” I cry, my heart cracking all over again. I guess the numb glue didn’t work. If only they had Gorilla Glue for broken hearts. “He’s not with me and as far as I’m concerned, he never will.”
John opens his mouth as if to say something, but he closes it. Instead, I watch as he pulls out something from his pocket.
“I won’t tell you how to live your life or how to deal with everything’s that hurled at you, but you should know, when Nancy and I saw the kiss between you and Julian, she looked at me with this look on her eyes… then she looked at you.”
“What did she say?”
“That the future had a better chance than we did,” he says softly. “And that we had