Hammer

6 - I don't need this!

Willow

“Oh my God, Nova! What goes on between me and Trace is no one’s business but ours.”

“It’s everyone’s business when Hammer is pounding his face in because he’s hurt you!” She yells back at me.

My sister had asked me to come over to her new house this afternoon. Nova and Tank moved into this three-bed place a couple weeks ago. She said she wanted to see me, her, and some of the other girls belonging to the club. I wouldn’t have come if I had known she called me here to rag on me about what happened with Trace last night.

Hammer had no damn right to go behind my back the way he did! Okay, I understand why he did, but it still annoyed me.

Even Coral is here giving me hell about Trace. I don’t need it right now. I feel so guilty. It’s not about Trace; it was never going to work in the end. I feel guilty about Hammer and what I feel for him. Cindy was my best friend. I miss her every day and feel twice as guilty for loving the man she adored.

I don’t even know how it happened. One day, he was my best friend’s man; the next, he was her fiancé, and I was happy for them. Then she was killed, and then came the grieving period where I tried to be there for him, to be a good friend. And I think I was. A good friend, I mean.

But somewhere along the way, I began to feel more for him. Okay, I always felt more than I should for him. But I tried to push it away, to not let it show. Hammer was angry with the world and didn’t need me coming along with my stupid crush.

I never said anything to him or anyone else about how I felt. I never showed it at all. But I kept it deep inside, never believing he’d feel anything other than friendship for me. And until that awful day when my throat was cut, and he begged me not to let go, I believed he felt nothing.

I don’t know if it was because I was so close to death or what, but I heard something in Hammer’s voice that told me I meant more to him than he ever wanted me to realize.

Of course, I haven’t said anything to him about it. First off, I’d be too embarrassed. Secondly, maybe I imagined it all. Thirdly, I feel like I’m disrespecting my best friend and her memory by loving her man. Because that’s how it feels in my heart, that he’s still her man, that he always will be. I also felt guilty, like I was cheating on Trace, even if it was only emotional. That is just as bad as physically cheating.

I know one day Hammer will move on from the woman he loved. He’ll fall in love again, but I know he’ll never love anyone like he loved Cindy.

I don’t know what’s worse, Hammer falling for someone else and me watching from the sidelines, or him falling for me and then me constantly wondering if he was wishing I was Cindy.

I hate the way I feel right now. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. I’m in love with a man I can’t have, and I’m seriously pissed off with the man that was supposed to be mine.

How many times has Trace cheated on me exactly?

Three years we've been together. Three damn years, and it was all for nothing. I should have realized that once a man cheats, he never changes.

Yeah, he cheated on me once. Well, once that I know about. We’d been dating six months when this girl approached me one day and randomly told me not to trust Jordan Raina. He was a dog who used women, and sadly for me, I was the one loving him.

I thought she was just some jealous girl who couldn’t handle the fact he was with me and not her. She told me that one day, I would see the light. Boy, have I seen it now.

I confronted him that day. The first time, he cheated on me. I asked him if it was true. Trace cried like a little girl and begged me for another chance. He didn’t mean it, he said. He loved me, he said. I was too young to really understand what a lying bastard he really was. Now I’m stuck, not knowing what the hell to do.

I’m not in love with him. That part of me died a long time ago, but I don’t know who the hell I am without him. I want to hate Trace so badly, but there is a part of me that just can’t.

No one will ever understand the friendship Trace and I had. I’m not stupid by any means, but I understand him. He has a great family; he was well brought up, but Trace has scars that you can’t see on the outside. Scars that will one day ruin him if he doesn’t face up to them. I wish I could have been the one to help him. But I wasn’t.

Still, I will never turn my back on him, no matter what he’s done to me. He’s my friend. That’s all we should ever have been. Friends. Yes, he’s hurt me badly with his lies and deceit, but I can’t force myself to turn my back on him. I won’t. I don’t care what anyone thinks of me for that. I’ll never take Trace back; I’m not stupid. But I know we can salvage some sort of friendship out of this. After I’ve given him a piece of my mind, of course.

“Hammer had no damn right to do or say anything! This is my business, Nova. Please just give it a rest.”

“Oh my God, she’s gonna let him get away with it.” I roll my eyes at Coral and rub my forehead. I’m getting a headache. “You’re gonna take him back, aren’t you? Don’t you dare take him back, girl.”

“It’s not really any of your business whether she takes him back or not.”

“Thank you, Tessa.” At least someone seems to be listening to me.

Tessa is Ace’s Old Lady. Tessa is my age, Ace is quite a bit older, thirty-six years old, but she loves him, and that’s all that matters. Tessa and I have been friends a long time, longer than she’s been with Ace anyway.

“That’s not to say I think you should take the idio.t back.”

What is this?

Pick on Willow Day?

“Babe, he’s no good for you. I’ve been telling you for years. Remember when we were in college, and you had that crush on him? I told you then not to be with him.”

I couldn’t help but have a crush on Trace; he was so handsome, so funny, and so smart. We both wanted to be lawyers back then. No, correction. Trace’s parents forced him to be who they thought he should be. I decided the course wasn’t for me after all, and I changed the course. I took a literacy course instead. I love to write. I also really wanted to be a teacher. I worked hard to be one, and I’m still working hard at it.

I could see Trace wasn’t happy doing what he was doing back then. His jokes and pranks on friends were just his way of masking his unhappiness. I made him see that he didn’t need to be anyone but who he was. That he had to do what made him happy. Trace finished college with his law degree but never put it to use. He joined the Snakes instead.

His parents were not happy at all. They haven’t been the same with him since. But Trace is happier than he’s ever been. But something inside still makes him act the way he does. I honestly believe he has some kind of undiagnosed behavioral disorder.

“I get it, okay? I shouldn’t be with him. I’m not going to be with him anymore. Our relationship is over. I’m not stupid enough to stay with the man after he’s cheated on me. We fell out of love a long time ago. We were just holding on to... I don’t even know what. But Trace is my friend regardless of what he’s done, and I won’t turn my back on him!”

Each one of them huffs in annoyance. I don’t expect them to understand, but I’m tired of being told what I should and shouldn’t do. How I should and shouldn’t feel.

“Can you all just back off? I’ve had enough of this shi.t to last a lifetime. I love y’all, but I’m a grown woman. I can take care of myself. I don’t need any of you telling me what I should and shouldn’t do. And I definitely don't need Hammer smacking Trace around!”

“He was just looking out for you.”

“Well, I don’t need him to, Coral. I don’t need him for anything.”

“You and Hammer would be so good together.”

“No,” I cut my sister off. I’m not going there with them. “There will never be any him and me, okay? In my mind, he will always be my best friend’s Old Man, never mine. So can we please never speak of this again?”

I’m done with this shi.t. I’m so tired of the girls going on and on at me about me and Hammer each time I have a fight with Trace.

There is no me and Hammer!