The song for this chapter is Found Out About You by Gin Blossoms. The first verse really stood out to me when I was writing this chapter. I'm not really very proud of this chapter because it was really bard to write, but I hope you enjoy it anyway. I may go back and fix it if I decide it's not good enough.
The next morning, Honey woke up feeling lighter than air. 'Things are going great. Kip is getting closer to getting patched in, we're getting closer, everything is going so well.' Even the muffled moans of her parents having sex downstairs in their room couldn't put a damper on her happiness today.
She gets out of bed, humming happily as she puts on a white bra and a cropped white tshirt over it, then a knee length, flowing, white skirt with a rosy pink floral pattern. She examines her outfit in the mirror, deciding that since she's already dressed up more than usual she may as well go all the way. She sits on the foot of her bed to tie the tie of her grey espadrille wedges around her ankles.
Heaing a door slam downstairs, she frowns and grabs her makeup bag, tossing it into her burgundy velvet shoulder bag on her way downstairs. As she grabs herself a poptart, she notices Clay sitting at the dining table. "Is mom okay? I heard a door slam."
"She's not feeling too hot today. Might be late into the office." He grumbles, not looking up from his morning paper.
She nods slowly, nibbling on her poptart as she murmurs softly. "Alright...I'll handle the office 'til she feels better."
"Thanks, baby girl." He finally looks up at her and smiles softly. "You look nice today."
"Thanks." She smiles and smooths her skirt, blushing softly as she finishes her poptart. "Well I better go..."
He nods and folds his paper up, taking a sip of his coffee. "Alright."
She walks out of the house, sighing softly as she gets into her car and drives to the clubhouse. 'Something's going on with those two.'
o-o-o-o-o-o
At the clubhouse, Half Sack was just cleaning out his dorm and gathering his laundry, to please Honey mostly, when he hears Bobby call out. He walks to the bathroom, covering his nose as the pungent smell of hot shit assaults his nostrils.
He watches as Bobby uses his knife to pull a red lace thong out of the toilet. "Now who in the hell would be flushing lace panties down the shitter?"
"That's weird." Half Sack agrees, chuckling softly as Bobby looks at him, laughing.
"Yeah, you think? Go find the number for the septic guy, tell him the tank is full again." He nods and turns to walk out, remembering that Gemma kept the number in her desk since it was used so frequently.
He steps outside, noticing Honey's car as he walks across the lot to the office in the heat, smiling as he hopes it's her working today instead of Gemma.
Luck is on his side today, it seems. He steps into the office and smiles as he sees Honey curled up on the couch with a tattered copy of The Great Gatsby. Rapping his knuckles gently against the door, he grins at her when she looks up. "Hey, baby. Do you know where Gemm keeps the number for the septic guy?"
Honey nods, smiling as she sets her book aside and gets up, walking over to the desk and leaning over to grab the scrap of paper with the number scrawled on it. He bites his lip softly as he admires her ass before she stands back up amd hands him the number.
"Did Piney fill the tank again?" She leans against the doorway with him, smiling as he laughs softly.
"I don't know if it's that or the lacy panties someone's been flushing down the toilet."
Honey laughs, raising an eyebrow as she glances out at the lot to see Juice pulling into the lot with a girl in the cab of the truck. "I don't even...wow." She notices his eyes widen as he watches the tiny brunette wearing blue shorts, black tank top, and black boots climbing out of the cargo truck. "Kip?"
He doesn't seem to notice as he watches Clay exchanging harsh, hushed whispers with both Juice and Cherry. Honey frowns, nudging him gently to get his attention. He swallows hard as he tears his eyes away from the scene unfolding outside and looks down at her before hurrying over to the phone to call the septic company.
Honey follows him, laying her hand over the phone to prevent him from picking it up. "Kip, who is that girl?"
He looks into her trusting blue eyes and murmurs, "She's a uhm...a Tribe hangaround from Nevada."
Honey frowns as she glances out the window, noticing the girl staring longingly at the office. "Why did you look like you were about to have a heart attack when you saw her?"
"Just...Gemma's going to be pissed." He fidgets with the paper in his hand as he feels a nervous sweat dampening his hairline. "Y'know, 'cause Clay slept with Cherry so it's like a...an issue."
Honey frowns, ignoring his stammering for a moment as she realizes what this is going to do to her parents. "Oh my god...what happens on a run stays on a run...unless it doesn't. Shit." She runs her fingers through her hair and sighs loudly. "They're already having some kinda fight..."
Gemma walks in, surprising both of them. She glances at Half Sack and mutters, "Both of you, get out."
"Mom-" Gemma turns her eyes to Honey and she gasps as she realizes they're brimming with tears.
She gathers her stuff quickly and hugs Gemma softly before leaving, Half Sack close on her heels. The office door slams behind them and Honey jumps a little. "I guess I'll go see Abel or something..."
He nods, running his fingers through his hair. "Sure, yeah. I'll call you later."
She nods and looks down, feeling as though he's trying to push her away as she walks to her car and gets in, driving towards St. Thomas.
'I'm being stupid, he isn't hiding anything...he promised he'd tell me if anything happened...' She sighs as she parks in the parking lot and walks into the hospital, getting onto the elevator just as she sees the scrawny girl from earlier being wheeled in, holding her bloody nose. 'Huh. Oh, wait...shit.'
Hoping it wasn't her mother's handiwork that brought the girl to the hospital, she walks to Abel's room in the NICU ward, smiling when she sees Tara there checking his vitals. "Hey, Tara. How's baby boo?"
"Baby boo?" Tara chuckles and shakes her head as she looks down at the tiny baby in the incubation chamber. "He's doing well. Should be out of the chamber soon."
"That's good." Honey smiles and runs her fingertips gently over the cover of the baby's toaster. "I was gonna spend some time with him. Gemma is having a bad day, kicked Kip and I out of the office."
"I bet. I remember those moods very well." Tara looks over at Honey curiously. "Who is Kip?"
"The...the prospect." Honey corrects herself, trying to hide her blush by turning to look out the glass divider. "He's a friend."
Tara hums, finding her reaction unusual but somehow sensing not to ask about it right now. "Well I'll leave you alone then." She excuses herself and ducks out, leaving Honey to sit in the chair and open one of the many storybooks that had been accumulating in the bundle kept under the seat.
o-o-o-o-o-o
Ever since she had shown up he couldn't stop thinking about how she compared to Honey. As he laid facedown on the pavement during the ATF raid, he couldn't help but think about how Cherry would be with him at the clubhouse rather than at the hospital visiting a baby that wasn't even hers. He tried to shut those thoughts down, knowing he didn't care that she wasn't here and that he loved knowing she was able to spend time with her baby nephew.
He just couldn't shake the idea the Honey was a child and Cherry was a woman. Cherry had seen things, experienced things that Honey had been sheltered from.
'Cherry will be gone soon, hopefully, and Honey and I can go back to normal.'
o-o-o-o-o-o
It was almost 10pm when she left the baby's room and as she rounded the corner to head to the elevator, she was surprised to see Half Sack at the nurse's station talking to Tara. She smiles softly as she walks over to him as he starts to walk away. "Hey, Kip. Whatcha doing here?"
"Oh, uhm, club stuff." He blushes and avoids looking into her eyes as he glances down the hallway. She nods, chalking his nervousness up to whatever he was doing for the club.
"Okay, cool." She leans up and kisses his cheek, whispering, "Can I come over later?"
He nods, his hands automatically going to her hips as he smiles at her, a hint of her prospect shining through his cold exterior. "Yeah, I'll text you when I get home."
She nods and starts to walk away, then ducks behind a corner and peeks around at him. He glances around then walks into the room they had been outside of. She stealthily walks back down the hall and her heart throbs in pain as she sees the name on the outside of the door. 'Cherry. Why would he be visiting Cherry?'
Slowly, she sinks to the ground with her back against the wall, her hand pushing the door open a fraction of an inch to hear the conversation inside.
"I'm really sorry, Kip." Her quiet, drowsy voice makes Honey want to punch her already. "I'm really sorry if I got people in trouble."
'She called him Kip.' The thought echoed in her mind like a shout in a long, empty corrider as she rested her head back against the wall, staring into the space in front of her. 'No one calls him Kip.'
"You can't let a club president...have a time with you and then you show up a week later. You know?" Honey peered inside and almost scoffed seeing him playing with the ties on his cut. "Especially with his old lady on the lot."
"I know." She mumbles, almost too low for Honey to hear. "But I'm not here for Clay."
Half Sack looks around, his hands on his hips then he sighs and shakes his head. "Do you have any thoughts about pressing charges against Gemma?"
"Never. I'm not going to." She shrugs and Honey's eyes widen as he leans down close to her.
"Anybody asks, you know nothing about what went down in Indian Hills."
'Go ahead, tell her to stay away from you.' She practically begged in her mind as she pulls her legs up to her chest, tears on the verge of coming out. 'Say it.'
Cherry nods, looking up at him. "I know the way it works."
"Good." He nods and stands there for a moment before sighing. "Why the hell did you get into that cargo truck?"
"You know why."
Honey presses her hand against her mouth, a solitary tear making its slow descent down her cheek as she hears his response.
"No. No. Jesus, that- that can't work. You understand?" Honey peers in again in time to see Cherry grabbing his arm, the arm that he always wrapped around her to keep her close to him. "No, look-"
'You have a girlfriend. Four fucking words, say them. Please, Kip.' She watches as he sits on the edge of her bed, touching her as she leans in so that their faces are only inches apart. "This can't happen, not after what went down." He says to her, not even trying to move away from her as she leans up until her lips are grazing his.
"Just give me one more dance. We can take it from there." She looks up into his eyes as he stares into her brown eyes, so different from Honey's.
"I don't think that's a good idea." He mumbles, already his resolve weakening. 'Honey is...my girl...' The ever present voice in the back of his head whispers, 'But she's young. Cherry is experienced...she knows about the club...and there's no drama about being with her.'
"No?" It was barely a whisper on her lips as she slowly tangles her fingers in his hair.
"No, because- you know-" She cuts him off with a deep, passionate kiss.
Honey watches them through a crack in the door, her heart slowly speeding up until she's sure it's about to explode in her chest. 'He's going to push her away...' Even as she said it in her head, she knew it was a lie.
She watches as Cherry lays back, letting him hover above her as they kissed, no sign of stopping. Her tears cascade down her cheeks like a waterfall, leaving silver and grey streaks from her eyeliner as she realizes that her worst dreams had been realized.
In one afternoon, she had lost the last ray of hope she had found in her life. The love he had shown her the past few months, the tenderness he showed her when he made love to her, the promises he made when they were laying in his apartment, sweaty and exhausted but cuddled close and talking so that they could spend just that little bit of extra time together. All of it seemed false now as she watched him show that same tenderness to the woman beneath him.
Unable to take listening to the sounds of them making out anymore, she lets the door fall shut slowly and quietly before laying her head down on her arms and sobbing quietly to herself, rocking herself subconsciously.
A few minutes later, Half Sack steps out of the room and nearly trips over Honey's leg. "Honey?" His heart beat doubles and he glances behind him to see Cherry relaxing in her bed, her thin lips swollen from his kisses.
"Yes, Half Sack?" She murmurs, looking up at him with makeup smeared eyes.
"You saw." It wasn't a question, nor an apology. His face was shameful but still held the glow of a man who had thoroughly enjoyed a sweetbutt's company.
She nods, looking down at her lap as she mumbles, "We need to talk."
o-o-o-o-o-o
It was just after midnight when they pull into the parking lot and park in their usual spots. Silently they walk upstairs to his apartment, both lost in their thoughts.
He had known that Cherry was the easy way out. No lives threatened for dating her, no sneaking around, just a hot girl to spend time with. Honey was something special to him; unlike Cherry, she had never made a lofe for herself somewhere or had to take care of herself. But she was kind and caring. Beautiful and tragic in a way. She could see beauty and hope in everything, a trait she had demonstrated many times to him, yet she couldn't see it in herself. It was a choice between something average and easy or beautiful but difficult. He had chosen wrong this time and he hated himself for it.
Her mind was awhirl with the memory of him holding Cherry's body against his, the sound of her quiet murmurs against his lips as he hovered above her. She had been a fool to believe all his sweet words. It had all been lies. She had been a fun distraction for awhile then he found himself a new toy.
They sit on opposite ends of the broken down, green couch. Both of them keep their heads down, Honey picking at her nails as a nervous tick and Half Sack pulling at a loose thread on his tshirt.
Finally, when it seemed that neither of them were willing to speak first, he murmurs, "I'm sorry."
She stays quiet for what seems like forever before whispering, "What are you sorry for? Kissing another girl? Lying to me these past three months? Fucking me, leading me on?" Traitorous tears fall from her thick eyelashes and she wipes them away in a hurry.
He frowns, looking over at her in shock. "You think I lead you on?" He grabs her hand gently and sighs when she pulls it away as if he had burned her. "I didn't lie to you, Honey. I love you, I mean every word that I've said to you."
"And Cherry? Did you say those same words to her?" Honey murmurs, her voice scratchy from her sobbing at the hospital.
"Of course not. I only kissed her once, I swear. We talked in Nevada. We danced, then Clay took her away." He chews on his bottom lip, desperately racking his brain for something, anything to make this better.
"Let me ask you something honestly." She looks up at him and for the first time he realizes her eyes. They're a murky greenish-brown. Nowhere close to the brilliant emerald color they had become with him. "What would have happened if Clay hadn't cut in?"
He freezes. He knew exactly what would have happened, he had been ready to make a move when Clay had moved in. Bowing his head in shame, he closes his eyes and doesn't reply. She nods as if a point had been proven. "I told you you could do anything you wanted, just tell me if you did anything. Did almost screwing a sweetbutt not count?"
"It was a tiny mistake, I didn't want to mess things up..." He runs his fingers through his messy hair, groaning. "Shit, Honey, I didn't mean for any of this to happen."
She cracks a humorless grin and looks down at her nails. "Why do...what makes her so muh better than me? Are we really that different?"
"She's older." He couldn't stop the words from spilling over. "We connect more...she's seen a lot of shit and we can talk about more than just the club and sex."
"Wow, I guess that was a pretty intense dance you two had if you're so close already." The sarcasm made his defenses rise and he frowns at her.
"All we do is fuck each other, Honey. What do we know about each other?" He raises his voice a little without meaning to and she stands up, crossing her arms as she walks over to the wall that he had a calendar hanging on, dated two years ago.
"You're 23, your full name is Kip Epps, no middle name because you were named after your dad and your mom didn't want you to be called Junior. You like rock music but hate hair bands, your favorite song is Kashmir by Led Zeppelin, you served in Iraq for one TOD then got honorably discharged after a grenade blew your right nut off. You love cheesy comedy movies, hate anything with Cameron Diaz in it. Your favorite color is red. You always sleep on your right side, facing the doorway." She pauses, letting him absorb all of it. "What can you tell me about me besides the fact that I'm 16 and my name is Elizabeth?"
He opens his mouth but his mind is a blank. He hadn't made nearly as much of an effort to get to know her as he should have, he was too busy trying to make it in the club and whenever he was with her, the easiest way to connect with her was sex. He did know things about her but he couldn't just rattle them off on the spot.
"I...Honey..." He was at a loss for words. There was nothing he could say to fix this. 'Sorry about the skank, wanna go spread your legs and let me smash? Just pull your panties to the side, I'll be quick.' Yeah, that would get him killed.
"You think I'm a child. You're 7 years older than me and you think that makes you so much smarter, but does it really?" She shakes her head and wipes her eyes roughly, walking towards the door. "You had no problems fucking the child every chance you got, what does that make you?"
She opens the door and glances back at him with those murky, unreadable eyes that made him want to flinch. "I don't believe we have anything more to say to each other, Half Sack."
That hurt. She had only ever called him Half Sack around the others. He flinches as his door shuts quietly and moments later he hears the sound of an engine roaring to life followed by the sound of tires squealing as she races out of the parking lot.
o-o-o-o-o-o
Honey parks haphazardly in the driveway, nearly hitting the neighbors trash cans, and runs inside, the tears flowing freely from ber eyes now that the full reality of the situation hits her.
"I broke up with the only man I've ever loved. He didn't love me." She murmurs to berself through quiet sobs as she walks upstairs as though in a daze. As if on auto pilot, she undresses and steps into the shower, paying no mind as the water nearly scalds her skin, turning her body a bright pink as she slowly slides down to sit beneath the spray. She stays there, her mind racing so fast her thoughts barely reister, until the water turns cool, then icy. She shivers slightly as she scrubs her body as if she could scrub any trace of Half Sack or what had happened from her body.
Still in a daze, she puts on a pair of sleep shorts and a tank top then curls up under her blankets despite the sweltering summer humidity. Her dull eyes stare at a small chip in the blue paint on her wall as she slowly drifts off into sleep, her body completel exhausted.