I met him when I was in high school. I had just come home from school and was dripping wet. My high school is only a block away from my stepfather's neighborhood (my mother moved both of us and my cat, who got hit by a car trying to go home, to his house). After shutting the door, I dripped on the rug and yelled at the top of my lungs, "MOM, YOU ARE NOT GOING TO BELIEVE WHAT THAT BITCH NIKKI WATSON DID TO ME TODAY!" The rain had only heightened my infuriation throughout the day. Suddenly, a gorgeous male stepped out of the hall. My mouth dropped as I stared at him, unable to tear my blue eyes away.
"Um, hi!" I squeaked out, wanting to ask my mother why a college hottie with good arms was in the hall of my class, or "wherefore", my new favorite word, since I found out it was a fancy way of saying why (although I'm not a fan of Shakespeare, I love the way Juliet says, "Wherefore art thou Romeo? Would a rose by any other name smell so sweet?" Aside from those lines, I think stuff most girls see as romantic is stupid). I knew there must've been a logical reason wherefore he was standing in our living room, but I needed my mother to tell me. However, instead of yelling, "Mom, wherefore is a yummy hottie standing in our living room?" like I meant to say, I blurted out, "What are you doing here?" all the while picturing him without clothes, letting me use my mouth on his maleness, throbbing beautifully at my kiss. Rather funny because I'd never seen an actual naked guy before, unless you count sneaking my mom's porn up to my room when I found out she had some. To be honest, it wasn't that good. Rather dull.
"I just came to see my dad," the nude image was saying in a deep, sexy voice as I stared at him intensely. Really, this is what males are said to do; I've always thought of myself to have a bunch of virile traits. However, I was sure he wasn't picturing me naked, not after the way I'd just screamed like a two-year-old.
"You've got the wrong house then," I informed him as disappointment enveloped my senses.
"He's my son," my stepfather announced as he came around the bend, his bald head shining as the overhead light bounced off of it.
"You don't have a son," I reminded him.
"Yes I do. From my first wife."
"Ohh. Then wherefore haven't I met him before?"
My stepfather laughed with a teaspoon of nervousness. "She's nosy," he told his son. "Um, Saffron, this is Sam Burgess, my son." A tiny bit of pride found its way into his tone as he uttered the words, "My son." "Sam, this is Saffron, my stepdaughter."
"Yeah, my dad named me for my eyes." I didn't look at Jake, my stepfather, but out of the corner of my eye, I saw him flinch. It really irks me that he thought all he had to do was marry my mother and—bam!—I see him as a father. I mean, I liked him and trusted him then, but I still sometimes felt the urge to remind him he wasn't my father to me and never would be. I loved my father, for, though my mother divorced him because of his womanizer ways, he never hurt me and always treated me like a father should treat a daughter, and I never stopped loving him for it. There was no way I was going to let my mother's husband whisk me away from the one person who loved me more than anyone. "My mom was zonked out when I was born. The nurse asked Dad for a name, and he took one look into my big blue eyes and said I was Saffron."
"That's a lie," Jake utters bitterly, so eager to believe anything horrible about my father. "The latest girl he was sleeping with that wasn't your mother was the real Saffron, and it was all he could think of."
I glared at him fiercely and told him to shut up. In front of Sam. I really couldn't help it. It infuriated me more than the cold air surrounding my damp clothes and hair. How he could say such awful things about the father I adored so...well, it was enough to make me decided I didn't like him after all as the hairs to the back of my neck rose in my defensive mode.
"I like your name," Sam uttered to me in that wonderful voice, causing his father to shoot him an annoyed look, which he ignored. "It's pretty." I guess he was also mad at his father for making such a comment though I have no idea what he stood up for me after I called Nikki Watson a bitch.
I smiled at Sam, thinking, I like seeing you without clothes. "Thanks. I like yours. Short and masculine," and sexy, I added mentally, not ever wanting to tear my eyes from this sexy babe in front of me.
I was fourteen then, on my way to fifteen, and Sam was twenty-two and a bit behind in college. He finished two years later than he should have, as age twenty-four.
Now I am nineteen and in college. Still I see Sam often enough. Even though I wanted to get away from home and experience freedom (not to mention, show Jake that I don't need him after all), I couldn't stop my wishful thinking that maybe...just maybe...but I am not his type. He was the reason I turned down the three guys and one girl who asked me out in high school, but with my natural blonde hair, I don't have a chance. He digs brunettes and has never once dated a blonde. Nevertheless, ever since I first set eyes on Sam, he's the only guy I want. And the way he treats me...ooh. Sometimes, it is wonderful, but sometimes it hurts. He's so nice and respectful to me, and all I want is for him to want me, to kiss my mouth and take me to bed. Still, it is a bit nice to be respected.
"So, um, what are you doing here?" I utter softly as I look at Sam and hope beyond hope that he has gone stark raving mad and is here because of me. "I mean your dad is gone overnight on a business trip..." and my mother is dead, I fill the blanks mentally and plaintively. I try not to let anyone see my pain of my loss in my eyes. Nobody is supposed to know my mother's death affected me, but it did. I told her everything before her death, like how Nikki Watson thought pantsing me in front of a bunch of nerds was funny and how she once thronged me (lifted my shirt and revealed my thong) in front of everybody in the PE locker room (which is how I met my best friend my own age, by the way).
"I know. Dad called me. He said he didn't like you staying alone all night."
Damn him he did, I think, feeling my mouth twist down from a soft smile that was on my face because Sam is here into a hard frown.
"You mean he doesn't trust me?" Sam looks away, those muddy brown eyes that are breathtaking to me darting hastily. "My God!" I fume even though I keep my voice from rising. "I've never even been on a date before! I never asked to date, and he thinks I'm going to throw a huge party?" I ask with disbelief, knowing I shouldn't really let my fury at his father be revealed in front of Sam but unable to help myself. Besides, he always catches me at the worst time anyway; what more do I have to lose? If he wants to hate me, he should already be there. Maybe he does but conceals it well.
"He's suspicious about that, yeah. He doesn't know whether you're secretly dating somebody, you've got an online boyfriend," oh heck, I never even use the Internet! What is wrong with Jake? I scream inside. "—or you're gay," he continues, paining me more than ever at that suggestion. Just knowing that he thinks it's a possibility that I'm gay when I want to jump his bones...yeah, it's enough to make my stepfather sound like a nice neck to wring for putting the idea in Sam's head. But maybe he didn't, I tell myself to be fair. "In any case, he doesn't see your reluctance to ask him for permission to date as a good thing."
"That's just great," I mutter in a tone that says I don't think it is great at all. Sure, I wanted Sam to come over for me and should be happy that he did...but there was never a thought in my head that he'd come over to baby-sit me. Deciding to change the subject, I flop on the couch. "Have a seat," and I pat the spot next to me as I wonder once again wherefore I had no idea he existed from the time Jake and Mom got married when he was...fifteen and I was...seven until he was twenty-two and I fourteen. Wherefore? I wonder (some things never change). Sam sits down next to me, making me have to force myself to keep myself from kissing him on the mouth. The urge is as strong as the urge to breathe after being under the water in a swimming pool for five minutes. "Do you mind if I massage your shoulders?"
"Not at all," he replies in that respectful tone of his. "I had a long day at work and could really use it." Of course, he thinks nothing of it. Even though we hardly know each other (aside from my bursts of hysterical words), I suspect he thinks of me as a sister. I mean, it's not like we even met until after I hit my teen years, but the kind of guy he is...he'd probably see us together as nothing less than incest. You know, if he could look past my blonde hair. Too bad I could never think of him as family, especially not a brother. I never had one, so how the heck would I be able to think of him as one?
"You should be a masseuse," he murmurs happily as my hands work their magic, proving how little he knows me.
"I am," I reply, gazing at his broad shoulders and aching to tell him how I feel about him. But how do I feel about him? Oh, yeah, how nice. Go up to a guy and say, "I'm in lust with you." That's a good way to dig your grave and have him think his horny friends can get a little something off of you. That is assuming a guy so respectful (albeit hot) like Sam even has any less-than-respectful friends. "You know your dad isn't going to buy me stuff, and since my dad died of testicular cancer and mom killed herself..." because she did love Dad and couldn't live without him...or for me... I wipe tears from my cheek with my arm. "Sorry. I mean, I just...you know your dad gives me a place to stay and eat and helps me pay for college but that's it." I pull away from him. "Let's focus on you now." I smile softly into his gleaming brown eyes. "So you think you're going to ask Sarah to marry you soon?" Sarah is his girlfriend. I know he really cares about her and is going to marry her some day. She is really special to him. More so than he is to you, I tell myself when that familiar ping of jealousy hits my stomach at the thought of him loving Sarah.
He sighs heavily. "No, Saffron...we broke up, actually."
"What?" My voice has an edge to it because I want it to be because he secretly likes me so badly that it hurts because I know it's not true. My brain knows it's the fattest lie since the numerous old wives' tails floating about. "Y'all were perfect for each other!" I all but wail. "What happened?"
"She said that she only said she'd be my girlfriend to be nice to me because I asked her, and she just couldn't take being my girlfriend anymore."
"She's crazy." I want to wring her neck for saying something so hurtful to him, to Sam. What in the hell is that idiot's problem? Can't she see he is way too good for her? "An utter idiot." Who I'd just love to sink my teeth into at the moment even though I've never been furious enough to actually bite another person's flesh before. I know that if she were here right now, I'd definitely do it. Who couldn't find Sam comely to begin with? Gr, that hateful moron!
"She's very smart. A straight-A girl when she was in school. A psychiatrist now."
"That doesn't make her smart," I snap. "Sorry. Ooh, I am just so furious with her!" I can't help but utter.
He laughs weakly. "Well, so far as I know, everybody makes you mad but me." Then he gazes into my eyes. "Or do I make you mad?"
