The Book of Matthew (The Alex Chronicles Book 1) by K.T. Doyle

un-tucked his white dress shirt and rubbed my hands up and down his long, bare back. “I love you, Bobby.” I reached down and tugged my dress up further in silent invitation. Then I started tugging at his belt.
    Bobby froze and looked at me. “No, wait! Don’t!”
    “What’s the matter? Don’t you have a condom?”
    “No.”
    “We’ll be extra careful.”
    “It’s not that. It’s just, I can’t do this.”
    “Can’t do what?”
    He climbed off me. “I can’t have sex with you.”
    I shot up. “Why not?”
    “I just…can’t”
    “But I was saving myself for you. For tonight.”
    “I’m saving myself too,” he mumbled.
    “You are? For what?”
    He shrugged and started pulling tufts of grass out of the ground.
    My lips were dry and cracked. I moistened them with my tongue.
    “Are you scared?” I asked. “I’m scared. But we’ll do this together and then it won’t be.”
    He looked at me. “I’m not scared.”
    “Then what is it? What are you waiting for?”
    “I just can’t,” he said.
    “Why not? You love me, right?”
    He shook his head. “I can’t. I’m sorry.”
    Tears formed and dripped down my cheeks. “Why?” I sobbed.
    “I have to wait,” he said.
    “For what?”
    He looked me in the eyes. “Until it’s right and just in the eyes of God,” he said calmly.
    “What? When the hell will that be?”
    “Many years from now, once I’ve met the woman I’m meant to be with and we’ve fallen in love. I’m saving myself for the day I get married.”
    My heart shattered. At that moment I felt my first pang of regret for going to the Spring Formal with Bobby Fraser, the boy who loved God over me. I knew I’d never display that photo of us together. The moment I got home it would go in the trash. And then I would tend to my wounded heel.
    The bloody foot I could deal with. But how would I handle my bleeding heart?

 
     
     
CHAPTER 8
     
     
    I.
     
    All the trees that lined the sidewalk along Main Street were completely bare. The sun had fallen from view and the moon clung low to the horizon. Frigid December air forced its way down my throat and into my lungs.
    I hate the cold. But on this day I didn’t mind it; shivering reminded me that I was still alive when everything around me was dead.
    I slid off the curb and glided across the street with Kentmore Hall in my sight. I was on my way to my last private guitar lesson of the semester. Of course, I was early. It was 5:45 p.m.
    Matt said he’d be late. Said he had something to do. I showed up early anyway. I needed the time alone to think. I hate the cold, but it always makes me think better.
    I sat on the curb, huddled up into a ball, and trembled from the icy air. To keep my face warm, I buried my head deep and hard into the folds of my winter jacket. The streetlight buzzed above my head.
    I was weary of pretending. Pretending that I was okay with whatever my relationship status was with Matt. Pretending that I wasn’t angry—at Matt for never telling me what he thought our status was, or at myself for all the times I could’ve confronted him about it and didn’t. All the pretending had made me numb. And the numbness almost had me convinced that Matt’s non-commitment didn’t matter, that I was okay with how things were, that we didn’t need titles to define our relationship.
    I lifted my head to breathe fresh air into my lungs and to stretch my muscles. When I opened my eyes, Matt was standing in front of me. He was slightly out of breath. His sudden presence startled me.
    “Oh, hi,” I said. I was unable to see his dark eyes in the dim light. “I thought you said you were going to be late.”
    “That thing I had to do took less time than I thought,” he said.
    Matt unlocked the door and ushered me inside. He started climbing the steps to the second floor but I stayed behind, staring at the kitchen door. There was no desire to go inside anymore, no invisible force willing me to figure out my place in