6th Chapter.
After 10 minutes of laughing about nothing, we stopped. When she looked at me, I could see that sparkle in her eyes. I kissed her. It was the best kiss in the world. No other girl could amount to this women here. Did I really just think that? I asked myself. "I gotta go." she mumbled bringing me out of my thought. "Why?" I asked her, confused on why she wanted to leave. "If I'm late, I'm grounded." I looked at my watch and it said 6:16. "It's not even 6:30, Em." she stood up and said, "I know." she just walked out. I got up and ran after her. "Look, I understand if you don't like me. But don't lie to me about going home." I said, very very confused. "I do like you. It's just I got a lot of stuff on my mind at the moment." I should have thought about what I was gonna say. But I didn't. "Are you seeing your ex?" I had asked. That's when her whole face changed. Over the years, I could tell when someone was lying their ass off. And she was. If it wasn't her ex, it was somebody else "Emily, your face changed. If your gonna lie, at least do it to where I won't find out." I told her "I'm not seeing my ex. I'm seeing somebody else." she mumbled to me. I knew it. I nodded. "I thought so." She shut her car door and walked over to me. "Why does that matter?" She asked, crossing her arms looking up at me. She looked beautiful in the sunlight. The way the sun hit me from behind made her squint. "If your gonna be kissing me like you were doing, I wanted to know if they're was another dude I had to worry about." I said, as sincere as I could make it. "Oh, so your implying that I'm a whore." I didn't try to imply anything. "No, I was just.." she interrupted me. "Then why did you ask me that question?" I was kinda mad. "Well, your kissing and all over me, and your seeing somebody." I said trying to make my point. "And we're not dating, the guy I'm seeing and I. We just hang out, enjoy each others company. Is that a bad thing?" She asked, not getting my point. "Dude, you don't get anything." I said walking away. She grabbed my arm and pulled me toward her, which I knew she would. "What do you mean by that?" She asked. "Just like me, alright. You'd kiss me and touch me. But your always going to go back to that one guy that you have special feelings over. Yes your "seeing someone" but it doesn't mean you won't go back to Tommy." I told her. "You think I still love Tommy?" She asked in confusion. "Yes, a little part of me, I think you do." She looked at me and walked over to her car. I caught up to her, and grabbed her arm. I guess I grabbed her arm, a little harder than I expected. 'Cause she turned around and shoved me. "Sorry, but don't leave when we're having a conversation." I said in a mean and harsh voice. I didn't mean for it to sound the way it did. But when somebody, especially a girl, walks away from me. I get extremely angry. She looked at me shocked. She shoved me once more, but a little farther than before. "Don't grab me or even talk to me like that. Call me when you calm the hell down." She gets in the car and drives away.
In the result of the conversation with Emily, I decided to visit Liz. "So, how are you?" I asked her sitting next to her. "Better. I'm not living in fear." she smiles a little bit. "Good." I told her. She kissed my cheek. "What was that for?" I asked her. "Being so nice to me. I'm really glad that you helped me when you did." she puts her hand on me. "I just know how you feel, that's all." She smiled at me, I smiled at her. Her eyebrow raised. Somehow she knew. She knew everything about me, by this one little look at me. "Who is this girl your falling in love with?" She asked. I started laughing. For one, I couldn't believe that she'd think that I was falling for somebody. And for two, I can't believe she'd know if I was without saying anything. "Nobody." I said, trying to hide my feelings. Hell I didn't even know that I was falling for somebody. "There's gotta be somebody. I can see that little sparkle in your eye. I know it's not me. Who is she?" She asked. She kept asking me, when I didn't say anything. "Okay, I'm not falling for her, but its my step sisters friend." She laughs. I didn't know why. "What are you laughing about?" Soon, her laughter dies. "It's just, I can read you like a book, dude." I smile. "Oh, is that true?" I asked, not convinced. "Yeah, and even though we'd slept together I think I know you pretty well." She said with a smile. "I can read you too." I said looking at her. She looked at me not convinced. "Oh really, so tell me something about me that you haven't already known." I looked at her for a minute. I looked around her house. I tried to find something that I haven't already known. "I noticed that every time you go to meet up with me, or I tell you I'm coming for a visit. You would get all ready, but show enough skin to get me to notice. I also notice, that you always smell like vanilla. That must be your scent." I said confident. "Alright, now tell me something about my personality." I smiled because this is all too easy. "I know that in your past that you have had a lot of trouble with guys. I know this because you like to show me affection when I'm around. But you don't need a guy like me. You need a guy that treats you with respect." I told her. I could tell that she was amazed. She didn't say anything. She just sat there smiling. She had something in her head. "So, I guess you can read people." I threw my hands in the air after she said this. "I told you." she looked at me and asked, "Tell me something about your past that no one knows." she asked. I just looked at her. I think she knew that I didn't want to tell her. "Just tell me, Dejuan. I let you see me in a state where I don't want anybody else to see me in." as she told me this, I felt bad. It was true. I don't think she wanted me to see her crying, helpless, and fear for her life. "My mom is a crack head. My dad went to jail and I was left on my own." I expressed to her. Liz knew there was something else I wanted to say. I just didn't know how. So she pushed me by asking, "Why'd your dad go to jail?" I let a tear fall from my cheek. I knew that tears made me vulnerable, to everybody and everything. I learned that the hard way. If I cried that meant that everybody else would think I'm defenseless, helpless, powerless. "When I was 9, I walked in my house. My dad was higher than the sky. He asked me to sit down. So I did. He asked if I ever became a man. I told him no. So he told me to take my pants off. I didn't know any better, so, I did. When my dad put his hand.. there, I began sobbing. He hit me. He hit me so hard I fell against the table. He told me that a man never cries. A man takes it like he has no fear. So I did. He touched me and he made me touch him. I didn't know that this was wrong, at the time. Then on my 12th birthday, I finally told my mom. I told her that he's touched me and you know what?" By then I had tears pouring down my face. I've never told anyone, not even the Johnsons'. "What?" she mumbled. She was in tears as well. She grabbed my arm and held it tightly. "After he went to jail, she blamed me. She said if I would have never told anyone. He'd still be there with her. He was the only one that would give her, her addiction. I cried for hours when I heard my mom tell me that. I had no clue how to react. She didn't do a line anymore. I watched my mom do 3, 4 hell even 5 lines of coke,before I even went to school." I stated. "A week later, she went and bailed him out. I was scared when he went to my room. He took off his belt. And beat me til I turned blue. Then he used his belt to tie me to my bed, as he touched, licked and rubbed all over my body. I wanted to cry so bad. But that's when I knew. Men don't cry on the site of pain. Or even, the fear of it." She hugged me. It was the tightest anyone has ever hugged me. I just cried into her shoulder. She rocked me back and forth, telling me that she was sorry. I told her it wasn't her fault. She just kept saying it over and over. About a half an hour later. I woke up to my phone ringing. I had fallin asleep in her arms. I woke up and answered my phone. "Hello?" I answered. "Dejuan, it's midnight. Where the hell are you?" Tom asked yelling through the phone. "I'm so so sorry, I'll be right home." I hung up kissed and hugged Liz bye and went home.
Since it was a Friday, I was grounded to my room. I had the 360, Wii, and my phone taken away. They told me in jail, we have T.V. So they let me keep my T.V. At dinner, it was pretty quite. All you heard was the forks hitting the plates of the ones who was free to do anything that night. Neither, Tom or Julie has talked to me since they opened the door for me last night, and grounded me. When dinner was finished me and Julie was doing the dishes. "Why were you over and Liz's midnight?" Julie asked. I looked up at her. I was afraid to answer that question. "I just have a lot of problems right now. I didn't mean to stay out that late." I had told her. I still didn't want to tell them about my dad. I told Liz, and it was hard. I had put a lot of trust in Liz. Julie looked at me. I continued to wash the plates. I could feel her staring at me. "I don't want you to lie to me Dejuan." She said to me. I finally looked at her. "I'm not, why would you think I'm lying to you?" I asked her. She shrugged and said, "I'm not saying that your lying. It's just if your wanting to talk to me. I'm a great listener." I could just die hearing them words. I knew I could trust her. It's just, I'm not going to take the chance of them looking at me any different than what they already look at me. After the dishes, I had to take out the trash.
The next day was great. They had a meeting with the foster agency. So I got to watch T.V and call Liz. "Hey, I didn't mean to get you into trouble last night." she said, sweetly. "Don't worry about it. It wasn't your fault." I replied. "Do you want to hang out?" she asked me. "Can't, grounded. It's a surprise that they're out of the house and that's why I'm calling you." I told her. "Oh, how much trouble did you get into?" she asked me. "Not very much, just yelled at and grounded." I answered her question. I talked to her for a few minutes and then by then Julie and Tom came home. I went outside for some fresh air. Only to find Emily and some girl I never seen before walking up. "Where's Erica? Emily asked looking like she didn't want to talk to me. "Not here. Went with her boyfriend to the mall." I said, by then they started to walk toward Emily's car. I ran after her. "Hey." I stopped her before she got in. "Sorry about last night." I told her. "Does it matter." she said getting into her car. "Yes." I said leaning into her car window. "It does matter. It always does. You matter. I don't see why you won't talk to me." I added. "Because you piss me off." she said coldly. "Alright, why?" I asked. "You hurt me and expect me to forgive you." she admitted. "I'm sorry for not being good at this shit. It's hard for me too." I told her. "How is it hard for you?" she asked me. "I've never been this sober for this long to have a girl not leave me, yet. I expected you to leave me a long time ago." I told her. She just sat there. Her friend was staring at me. That was really awkward. "I wouldn't have left you." Emily breaks the silence. She looks up at me. I look down at her. We stare at each other for a couple minutes. I just had to break the cold stare she was giving me. "I didn't know that then. I'm sorry." She looked away again. Then back up at me. "Why did you go over to Liz's last night?" That was the question I didn't want her to ask. "Just for some stuff, I needed to get off my chest." I told her. "Like what?" She replied. "Did you sleep with her?" She added. "No, for one she's on crutches. And two she's just a friend." I notified her. "Like me. I'm just a friend?" she asked me in a strange way. I didn't know what to say. I was caught off guard. "No, not like you." I said that and walked off. I thought it was smart til she got out of her car and yelled to me, "How in the hell can you say that to me?" I turned around. She was looking at me with her arms in the air. "I guess, I can." I told her. She walked over to me. "You can't. You haven't been true to your feelings. So you can't say that to me." How in the hell was I not true to my feelings. "Oh, whatever." I said to her loud enough my parents could have heard. "What do you mean by whatever. You haven't." She informed me. "Oh, really. I haven't? When I hurt you, I told you that I was sorry from my heart. Your the one that hasn't been true to your feelings." I kinda yelled at her. "Why, 'cause i yelled at you for grabbing me like your crazy?" she yelled back. "No, It's because everything I do you have an opinion to. I can't have friend that happen to be a girl, without you sitting over there telling me I don't have feelings for you." I said to her a little quieter to her than I did earlier. "I never said you can't have friends that are girls. It's just you say mean stuff to me. How am I going to believe that you are true about them if you don't express them." I couldn't believe what she just said to me. "If I think your going to be gone in a week or two, then I'm going to try to push you away. That's what my past done to me." I told her. I walked in the house. I didn't care how she felt. I didn't want to hear her stupid voice. When I got in the house, Julie and Tom wanted to talk to me. As I sat down I could tell it was about something serious. "We had a meeting with the foster agency this afternoon." Tom reminded me. "Yeah, how did it go?" I asked not really caring. I was still upset about Emily. "Well, they let us read some of the reports they have from the past 15 years." Julie told me. That's when I got scared. I didn't want them to know. I didn't think they were aloud to know that stuff. So I asked them. "Where you aloud to know that stuff?" I asked. "We didn't care if we knew or not. But the agency said that it would be a good idea to be told what's in store." Tom said. "In store? What does that mean?" I asked. "We're going to go through with the full adoption." I smiled. I got extremely happy. "Really?" I asked out of joy. "Yeah." they both said. All I could do was hug them. I hugged them for a long time. That night, I was waiting for Erica to come home to tell her the news. I was pacing back and forth trying to figure out how I was going to tell her. When she walked in with her boyfriend, I hugged her. She screamed as soon as I lifted her off her feet and spun her around. "Whoa, whats up with you?" She asked when I put her down. "Your parents... our parents, are going through with the adoption." I said with happy in my eyes. "I thought they were going to do that any ways?" she asked confused. When all three of us sat down, I finally told her. "Well, since I was a 'troubled teen', they wanted me to live with you guys for a while. Then when your parents liked me or seen the bad in me, they got to either give me up. Or adopt me. And that's what they did. They're adopting me." I smiled at her. She hugged me again. "That's great. I'm happy that you get to stay." Erica told me. Even her boyfriend said that it was awesome that I was staying with them.