Camden by Shey Stahl

 

 

“I hate birthday parties.” That remark comes from Scarlet, who’s already drinking the morning of my birthday in the kitchen of the Sawyer mansion. She poured two shots of Bailey’s into her coffee and, you know, I’m thinking I might want to steal it.

It’s my eighteenth birthday, after all.

“I love them!” That comes from little Ms. Ariah Rose, Shade and Scarlet’s middle child. I know, I know, you can’t believe they have three kids. I don’t think they can believe it either, but they really suck at relying on birth control. Apparently.

Anyways, Ariah, she’s into anything pink and sparkly, including parties. And if you look around at the decorations for my eighteenth birthday, I know exactly where Ariah left her touch on everything.

Shade comes into the kitchen, scoops Ariah off the stool she’s on and holds his six-year-old daughter high over his head. Dropping her down into his arms, he cradles her to his chest. “Baby blue,” he whispers into her hair, tickling her sides. Ariah might be into pink and sparkly, but she prefers her hair blue, the color of her dad’s eyes. If you haven’t guessed it, she’s a daddy’s girl. Tolerates Scarlet, but she adores Shade, as do most of the girls in our family.

“Daddy, take me for a ride!” Ariah squeals as Shade spins her around. She points to the track outside. “Out there!”

The reminder of riding sends a jolt through me. I hold my phone in my hand and look at my last text message to Camden. It’s unread, like the three before that, asking him if he’s coming tonight.

I look at Scarlet who’s next to me, stirring her drink. “Where is he?”

Her eyes soften. “I don’t know.”

She might and she’s just not saying anything, but Scarlet usually doesn’t cover for people. She’s a “you pissed the sheets, lay in it” kind of girl and I dig that about her.

“I haven’t heard from him.” She stands with her drink. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to see a lady about a frozen cock.”

I’m not sure I want to know what that means.

Sighing, I stare at my phone. Stupid fuck. I can’t believe him.

Actually, I can.

There’s a stirring in the pit of my stomach. I know why he’s not here. He thinks I only want him to fuck me.

A memory flashes in my head. I was sixteen, he was twenty-two.

Do you see the memory? The significance of it? We’re the two on the face of the jump, staring off into the sunset. He’s fresh off a win with the Red Bull X-Fighters, high on adrenaline, and I’m struggling through what it means to be a Sawyer girl.

He looked over at me, smiling, his fingertips touching my sticky lips as we shared marshmallows under the moonlight. I pulled, yanked, drew him on top of me as we fought over the last marshmallow. That’s when his eyes darkened. He knew. He had to have known the pull he had on me and where I so desperately wanted this to go.

“Fuck me,” I begged, holding onto him as he kissed my neck playfully.

He drew back immediately, unprepared for my vulgar suggestion, his eyes holding an emotion he kept at bay, but I knew where it was going before he said the words, “Don’t talk like that.”

“Why not?” I panted, vulnerability etched in my words. “Because I’m only sixteen?”

“Age has nothing to do with it,” he pointed out, rolling off me to sit up, his arms hanging over his bent legs, back hunched with apprehension. “You know he’d kill me if he knew about this.” He gestured between us.

“What’s this?”

“You and me.”

“So, it’s because of my dad, not my age?” I ask, watching his eyes. They’re lost, disappearing right before my eyes. The playful side is gone, replaced with reality.

He studied me, considering his next question or move, maybe. “Both.”

“Will you ever?”

He turned toward me, one hand in the dirt as he leaned in. I watched his fingers bury in the sand and then make a fist around a cluster of rocks. “Ever what?”

I stared up at the stars, wishing I was older, wiser, more like what he wanted. But then again, I didn’t know what he wanted. Camden had never been seen with other girls. I knew there had to be some, but he never brought them around. “Fuck me.”

Groaning, he was quick to push me onto the dirt, his upper body covering mine. He searched my eyes, as if he was trying to figure out why I was being so persistent. “Stop talking like that.”

“Why?”

“Because it makes my dick hard,” he admitted softly, his laughter caught in the curve of my neck.

I blushed. God, did I fucking blush. I felt the heat rise up from my neck and pulse in my cheeks. He never talked to me like that before. I giggled, laughed, held onto his shoulders and smiled. If I had any doubt he wasn’t attracted to me, I at least had my answer now.

His sticky marshmallow-coated lips danced along my collarbone but steered clear of my lips. He’d never kissed me. Wouldn’t give my lips that victory yet.

“Will you though, some day?” I asked, rewording the same question and hoping for an answer.

He sighed, his chest pushing out the breath carefully. “When you’re eighteen.”

“Promise me?”

“Forever,” he whispered, positioning himself between my legs. I could feel the product of my words then, hard and ready for me, but he didn’t allow himself to move. He held out. He flashed an easy bright grin my way. I hated the feeling that drew me to him—a familiar compulsion to get lost in the smile that teased, demanding attention.

I breathed out, long and slow, wanting so much to hide what I was feeling.

He raised an eyebrow at me. “I’ll keep my promise,” he assured me, his mouth by my ear, and I believed him.

“You’re like Rapunzel in the tower,” Ophelia tells Tiller, looking like she’s ready to dick punch him.

“How so?” he asks, curving a dark eyebrow her direction as he stands in the kitchen, the sun shining into the room through a pink balloon. It casts a pasty pink aura around him that’s anything but innocent. It’s a warning. What’s the saying with fisherman, red sky in the morning, sailors take warning? That should go for Tiller.

“Because,” Ophelia yells at him, throwing what looks to be a box of something. I stare at it when it hits the floor. Condoms. She threw a box of condoms at him. “Instead of letting your hair down, you let everyone else down.”

Tiller laughs. “Whatever. It’s her birthday. You said balloons, you didn’t say what kind.”

I look down at the box of condoms again. “You got condoms instead of balloons?” I ask, unable to stop the smirk on my face.

“Fuckin’ right I did. I’m not about to be a grandpa anytime soon.”

Commotion fills the kitchen that opens up to the massive family room and the windows that overlook the backyard and track outside. There’s about twenty people in the house, and more outside, yet here I sit, obsessing over one. It’s not even noon, the party doesn’t officially start until the sun goes down, yet, for the Sawyer family, it’s a reason to let loose. Something they enjoy.

311 Sawyer Drive is unlike anything most will ever experience in their lives. Though the parties are calmer than what they say happened when the guys were in their early twenties, I beg to differ. Birthdays are always a reason to live it up here and remind everyone they’re the original misfits of freestyle and have absolutely no regard for moderation, in any sense.

Have you met my uncles and dad yet? Okay, you have in passing, but let me give you a little taste of my side.

Shade, he’s the youngest of the brothers. Dark hair, unnerving blue eyes, and artful ink covering his body. He’s the one playing with his daughters and involved in every aspect of their lives. He adores them, worships his wife, and is never alone. I often wonder if he’s ever been alone. He’s fascinating to me with the gravitation he holds. Hidden behind dark shades, you never know what he’s thinking but it’s deep. Even though he’s mostly retired from events, he still competes in freestyle and is always being pulled in different directions. He’s plastered all over Red Bull commercials, sunglass ads and Muscle and Fitness. He’s a star, always has been, always will be, but here, he’s the uncle who taught me my passion for motorsports and the man behind the larger-than-life creation.

Tiller, my dad, he’s the one who’s now teaching Wyatt to jump off the roof. Been there, done that, and lost my front teeth that way. Black hair he dyes either green or sometimes pink for no reason at all is artfully shaped into a Mohawk; with dark eyes, he has a distinct meanness about him—a violence even he doesn’t understand. He’s terrifying to most, even me, but if you know the shyness that surrounds him, you’d understand it’s a persona. One that was created by others and he lives up to. Sometimes I feel like he’s playing a part even he doesn’t understand or even what he’s the leading role in.

Then there’s Roan. The oldest. The one who holds a roguish twist to his blue eyes, like he’s holding onto a secret you’re never going to find out. He’s my voice of reason. Arrested at fifteen for indecent exposure at the beach—I thought it was a good idea to take off all my clothes—he bailed me out and never told my dad. At sixteen, when I quit motocross, he told me to follow my dreams, knowing damn well where they were taking me, supported me when no one else would and signed me to S3 without question. Even against my dad’s demand he not.

And inside the walls of the Sawyer mansion, these brothers are themselves. Gritty motherfuckers you should never trust. Like when they throw me into the pool after they sing happy birthday to me, or give me a face full of cake.

After the kids are in bed, that’s when things take a turn.

Do you remember when Scarlet said she had to see a lady about a frozen cock?

Take a look around. Ever seen a frozen cock? Well, if you haven’t, it’s talent for sure.

Do you see it? Look at what we’re all staring at. It’s a frozen ice sculpture in the shape of a big fat dick. Even has balls where the alcohol is kept. At the tip, it dispenses piña colada. Yep. White juice flowing out the tip. Classy, huh?

Take it in, friends. This is what a party at the Sawyer mansion is made of.

“Bend at the hip, drink from the tip,” Scarlet tells me, demonstrating.

Do you see her there? Kneeled before it and sucking piña colada out of it?

Shade eyes his wife, smirking. “Why is that hot?”

Tiller watches her, his head tipped to the side. Scarlet stands, wiping piña colada from her chin. “At least I swallow.”

Tiller shakes his head, a smile tugging on his lips. “Would have been hotter if you deep throated it, Northwest.”

If you know my dad, you’re not surprised by this.

“Your mom should have swallowed you,” Scarlet tells him, rolling her eyes.

“Would have done everyone a favor,” Tiller mumbles, running his hand through his hair.

Scarlet stares at the dick. “No way I could deep throat that. It wouldn’t fit.”

“I beg to fucking differ,” Shade says, looking over at her.

“You try.” Scarlet pushes me forward.

“I can’t watch this,” Tiller snorts, walking away.

Rolling my eyes, I bend at the hip and drink from the tip of a frozen cock. By far the weirdest thing I’ve ever done. And that’s saying something.

At some point, while I’m completely shit-faced and wearing only a bikini and a helmet, I’m with my dad getting ready to jump off the roof.

There we are, sitting on BMX bikes and staring down fifteen feet to the pool.

“Do or die, Savage,” Tiller says, adjusting the straps on his helmet.

I glance over at him. At least he’s wearing one. “Probably shouldn’t say die just before we jump.”

He slaps his hand to the side of my head. “Happy birthday!”

I smile at him. Every year since I was five, we’ve done this on my birthday.

“Do it!” Shade screams from below, holding up a bottle of fireball he shouldn’t have been given. Last time he had fireball he set his truck on fire. Inadvertently, but still, Scarlet made him swear off it. But do you see Scarlet still sucking on the frozen dick? She’s had too much to care at this point.

Tiller leans forward on the bike, flicking his wrist at the people below. “Move, motherfuckers.”

People scramble from the pool and before I know it, we’re jumping off, flying through the air. Pause here. Do you see us there, midair, side-by-side? Do you see my smile? It’s one of the few I’ve given tonight but, in that freeze-framed second, I’m weightless in the air, and drunk; I forget about everything else and fly high with my dad.

When we land, we let go of the bikes and go under. Tiller finds me in the water, lifts me up to the side, laughing. “That’s my Savage.”

You don’t care about any of that though, do you? All you care about is when Camden arrives, right? Would he hold up his end of the deal? Would he finally give me what I so desperately wanted from him?

He doesn’t show. I’m not sure if I’m surprised, disappointed or offended. Maybe all of the above.

I tell myself he’s blowing me off. He’s a bad friend.

But it’s more than that. Maybe he’s busy?

Too busy for his friend?

There’s a bajillion reasons I want to come up with to justify why he didn’t come, but one stands out.

I wasn’t important enough.

Shirtless and carrying around a non-alcoholic beer, Dad finds me sitting near the pool and sits next to me, his cheeks red from being burned by the fire pit. He nudges my shoulder with his own. He’s sober now, but truthfully, he’s been battling his addictive personality long before I came into the world, and though he tries, he relapses more than he likes to admit.

“Why so sad?” he asks, sounding like the Joker. He fits the part.

In a rush of tears, I blurt out, “Camdendidn’tshow.” And that’s how it comes out, as one word in a strangled breath. One feeling. Before I can stop myself, I cry into my hands, my heart aching so bad.

Dad stares at me. “What the fuck are you sayin’? You got a nut sac in your mouth? Speak up.”

Never mind the fact that he just asked if his eighteen-year-old daughter had a nut sac in her mouth. He’s not seeing the bigger picture here. My best friend since I was three didn’t show up for me on a day he said he would.

I stare at him. “Camden. He didn’t show up,” I repeat, anger gripping my words.

His brow knots together, his dark eyes heavy on mine. “What the fuck does that matter?”

Dad doesn’t hold relationships significantly. And if he does, we’re not privy to that information. He won’t allow you to see inside his heart, if it even beats, to know. “He’s my friend, that’s why.” I’m careful not to allow the love to enter my tone. He doesn’t know the way I fall apart at the hands of Camden, and he doesn’t need to. “Do you know what it’s like to have friends?”

“Friends?” he grumbles, lifting the beer to his lips. “I’m not friendly.”

“Clearly,” I laugh.

His shoulder bumps mine. “He’s twenty-four. Give him a break.” He takes another pull from his beer. “He’s probably out fuckin’.”

My heart sinks. I hope he’s wrong because today, today Camden let me down.