L.W.T.B.B Copyright © 2012-2016 xXMopelXx All Rights Reserved.

Rewritten Chapter Posted - April 8th 2016

Not much to say except for this is a very emotional chapter! It's one that I'm very proud of with little flashback bits of Anna's life (so don't get too confused when you see paragraphs in italics!) Sam and Anna continue to make progress! As always, happy reading! xo

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{ Chapter 15 } : Six Feet Beneath The Ground

          A small fragment inside of me was finally pursuing the courage to face a small set of my demons.

I didn't know from where stemmed this newfound strength. I didn't know why I was only working up the courage to visit his grave one and a half year later, but I was doing it.

Last night I had a huge awakening when I sat around the dining table with my family and Sam, eating the dinner we'd prepared so notoriously. Every seat was occupied, except for that one - that one at the head of the table - where the ghost of a presence lingered.

My dinner had tasted like lead, and not the delicious aromatic meal Sam had helped me prepare. With every swallow, I felt acidic tendrils trickling down my organs until they gnawed at the remains of my insides. A gut-wrenching feeling settled inside of me, like a constant sucker punch to my stomach. The longer I stared at the empty seating, the longer my dinner rolled nauseously inside of my stomach.

My father always sat there. No one had sat there since he left. I think it was an action we repeated consciously - even little Michael - as if to confirm his standing in our lives, as if to solidify the fact that no one could hold that place.

I chose to walk to the cemetery instead of driving.

My decision was still a little clouded to me, just like the rest of my hazy mind. Was it because I wanted the fresh air to clear my head, or was it because I couldn't drown out my guilty thoughts with the deafening sound of R&B music if I drove my car there?

It was past eleven at night and bordering close to midnight. My mom and Michael were sound asleep, and no one knew I'd snuck out from my window using the wooden ladder I kept effectively propped up by the side of our brick wall for rebellious situations like these. No one knew.

Not even Sam.

It was the second week of September and despite it being night, the air was drenched with a sickeningly sticky humidity. The cemetery was a twenty minute walk from my place.

I knew walking alone at night was a foolish decision, but in my state of mind, I was finding I didn't care enough to acknowledge safety first. Emotions fueled my steps.

Last night I had a dream - a memory - of my last encounter, last conversation, with my father and I woke up soaked in sweat, hair matted to my forehead, blood pumping wildly through my veins, and a pounding headache simmering in the back of my neck.

My panting breaths eventually turned into a frantic and unexpected scream that ripped out of me.

No one in my house woke up. No one but Sam.

I knew it was him, because at the other end of my locked door, I heard heavy footfalls - footfalls so heavy they couldn't have belonged to my mom or brother - similar to a giant green-eyed-blonde-haired athlete with an even gigantic heart and caring personality.

He knocked twice gently on my door. "Anna, are you...okay?" he'd asked, his voice barely above a whisper, as if the fear of waking up anyone else in the house loomed over him.

But I heard him clearly. I heard him so clearly.

I was beginning to lose count of how many times he'd asked me that sentence. Are you okay?

I never answered him. Partly because I had uncontrollable silent tears slipping down my face. I was shocked at my own reaction, and...a little bit mortified, if I was being honest.

I didn't want to give anyone else another reason to think of me as damaged goods.

"Anna!" My father's roar split the eerily silence drifting in our house. He ran down the staircase after me. "Get back here!"

I walked faster when I neared the entrance of the cemetery. Stone pillars and a large iron-wrought gate welcomed me to the beginning of my own hell - or freedom, depending on how I looked at it.

"Leave me the f*uck alone!" I yelled back furiously, angrily rummaging through my scattered items. Stuffing my belongings in my bag. Getting ready to leave. I shot everything in my duffel bag.

I never cursed. Lately, I was cursing at everything and everyone, including my father.

God, my heart felt heavy. But I was doing this to myself - causing myself pain with the ridiculous justification that I needed it when I didn't.

I needed to let it go.

My dad's steps faltered and I noticed pain flashing in his blue pools at my hurtful lash. He seemed shocked that I - his oldest and only daughter, the one he'd always showered with affection and love his entire life- was tearing him down verbally with anger-induced words.

I learned the hard way that you should never make permanent decisions ruled by temporary emotions.

This place was like a map etched into the deepest roots of my memory. I'd only been here once for his funeral - unlike my mom who visited frequently - but I knew the route like the pattern of my palms calluses. I could come here with my eyes closed and still manage to get to my destination - the marbled rock that was a marker for the casket that housed my daddy's frame six feet beneath the ground.

"Anna?" My dad's broken voice glided through my train of thoughts. He stood at the bottom step of the staircase, in his flannel pyjamas, hair sticking out in every direction with heartbreak written all over his exhausted features. His eyes gleamed fiercely with emotion. "Why have you turned this way? Why in the world are you so adamant on seeing this boy, when I've told you a million times he's not good news?"

"You don't know him like I do, Dad!" I snapped, my eyes burning with unshed tears. Joey was coming to pick me up. I was running away. I'd had enough of dad constantly badmouthing Joey and his good folks. "I love him."

Cry. I wanted to cry at my own stupidity. I ran towards his grave.

My dad winced like my words killed him. "You've turned sixteen not long ago," he suddenly screamed, his hoarse voice shaking within our walls. My mom entered the dark picture then, with a four year old sleeping Michael cradled to her frame. She had the same disappointed look in her eyes and pinched lips as she stared at me. She didn't say a word and that only pissed me off more.

Silent judgement was the worse.

I wanted her to say it - no, spit it to my face - what a f*uck up I'd morphed into. What a disgrace I was to her family.

She never did.

"The Donalds are terrible people, Anna," My dad murmured in the pitch silence of our house. When he saw me put on my shoes, his eyes, masked with shadows, shot to mine and he suddenly ran after me, trying to close the distance. I put space between us. "They're not to be trusted, I told you! They do bad things, Anna. Stay away from their boy!"

I didn't listen to him. I swung open the door when I heard the sound of Joey's Dodge. He came for me. He wouldn't let me down. My mom finally spoke in the background, something like begging noises leaving her mouth. For a year they'd kept quiet and said nothing about my attitude, about my behaviour. Now after all this time, they were finally speaking. Finally talking.

God. God. God. My vision blurred. I'd been such a f*ucking brat. Such. A. F*ucking. Brat.

I ran down the porch steps and my dad's voice echoed into the gloomy night as I planned my escape from my old life to begin something new with the boy who'd stolen my heart.

"Jodanna!" My father's dejected shout shuttered through my mind one last time. My heart shattered to a million pieces when I saw him at the threshold, barefoot, tears glinting in his eyes. "You leave now, Jodie, and know that I'll be waiting for you. I'm going to come for you - when your senses finally hit you. Know that I might not be as forgiving. I might never forgive you for this."

"Keep waiting," I screamed back shakily, slinging my bag over my shoulder. I was going to break down now. "I'll never forgive you either, so that makes two of us."

I ran to Joey's car, jumped inside and barely glimpsed at my boyfriend as he brought his engine to life. He sped off, but not before I caught one last look at my father's face through the passenger side.

He was crying silently, just like me.

But that's not what killed me.

No. It was the final tear running down his cheek...it felt like the final nail in my coffin.

No, his coffin.

Because he died soon after.

His grave. It was finally in front of me.

My chest was moving and collapsing with something strong as it made room for my demons to release, to escape my tightly bounded confines.

I threw the white rose on his grave - the same one he'd get my mom on their anniversary, his favorite one - and fell brutally to my knees, sinking into the grass and submitting to my cries.

"Oh, daddy," I choked on a sob, the tears freely escaping my eyes in rivulets down the slopes of my cheeks. "I-I'm s-sorry. I-I'm so, so s-sorry."

My words were no use, because he'd never forgive me. He even said it himself. I would never forgive myself either.

The demons rattled their chains, battling, screaming, struggling, but they were held back viciously in their cages by the sadistic and masochistic side of me that refused to set them free.

My tears cloaked his stone as I drained myself of my last tears.

I now knew my mistake, but it was too goddamned late for my shot at redemption.

*            *            *

          Empty and hollow was how I felt on the inside, in my gaping hole of a heart. I'd released tears, but not what I'd originally intended to.

Someday, maybe. Maybe soon. Maybe never.

The longer I sat on the bench in front of my father's grave, the longer I wondered what were my true intentions of coming here. Did I even have any? What did I wish to truly accomplish with this meeting tonight?

It had been pointless in the end, because I hadn't freed myself of my chip. I held on to it fiercely, until the thought of it wrapped around my throat in a vice-like grip, until it choked me of the thousand apologies I longed to pour out to my dad.

Derek Mateus II Sereno

In Loving Memory Of A Brother, Father, Friend and Husband

I didn't think I could cry so much but tonight, the dam inside of me had snapped and I cried until I was drained of every possible drop. I cried until my head pounded with a newly formed headache.

Reaching into my little pink Coach messenger, I pulled out two things: my cellphone and a tiny baggie of tissues. I wiped my tears and checked the time.

It was far too late and if I didn't start leaving now, I'd never find it within myself to move from this block.

The freshly cut grass crunched beneath my thigh high gladiators and the little prickles tickled my open toes with every heavy step I took away from my dad's grave.

A loud sound of rustling resonated behind me. At first I'd chalked it down to a figment of my imagination, until the sound grew impeccably loud and I was convinced that I was being trailed.

My fist closed around my keys. In one of the self defense classes I took a year ago with Layla, I learned how to use a key as a weapon. It was by far the most effective move - and the only one, admittedly, that I remembered.

My blood rushed through my veins and pumped loudly in my system when I felt a feathery touch on my bare left shoulder, causing me to flinch and spin around.

I sought to jab the key at a specifically tipped angle into the intruder's ribcage, when my assault was stopped with a bone-crushing clamp around my wrist.

I gasped in pain and Sam suddenly let go.

I sucked in a few gulping breaths as Sam and I locked gazes in a stare-down. To his credit, he barely broke a sweat at my actions.

"Are you following me?" he suddenly spat, withdrawing a few steps to give me the chance to gather my wits.

I pushed my hair behind my neck as I continued to breathe unevenly. "That should be my line."

Sam's eyes narrowed and he took a mere step closer, as if sensing my reluctance. "Are you okay, Jodanna?"

My eyelids fluttered close with that oddly reassurance sentence. He always asked me if I was okay.

"I'm fine," I murmured the half-truth.

I felt Sam shift closer and I opened my eyes.

The moonlight draped shadows across his face as he stood staggeringly tall next to my father's grave. His eyes, a hauntingly gorgeous emerald, sparked with an emotion I couldn't decipher. He had the most beautiful, most rarest gems, I'd seen on anyone. His jaw clenched tightly and the five o' clock shadow decorating his angular jaw line only emphasized the rugged quality of his otherwise perfect features. The light also did a wonderful job at highlighting Sam's new cuts. One split his bottom lip in an angry burgundy streak. And another bluish bruise marred his left cheekbone.

Enthralled, I stepped closer to him subconsciously, craning my neck to get a closer look. The pads of my fingertips grazed the top of his cheek.

"Are you okay?" I found myself parroting his familiar words.

Sam's chest moved up and down with shallow breaths, and when his dark blond lashes lowered with a falling of relief, I realized a second late that I'd voluntarily touched him.

I quickly dropped my hand away like he was the fire that scorched me.

"I'm fine," he repeated with a hint of mirth. "What are you doing out here alone, Anna? It's late. Haven't I told you once already not to roam around on your our when it's fucking past midnight?"

"Who says I'd listen to you?" I whispered to him, not knowing why I was whispering in the first place.

For a flicker of time, it felt like this moment was sacred and intimate. Like we were here, drawn together, for a reason. We always seemed to wind up in each other's presence and calling it a coincidence seemed like a fluke.

Samuel's throat worked with a swallow. "Barbie, you need to go home now. It's late. Let me take you home."

His pleading tone had pulled me into a reverie, because I'd never heard him like that before. My trance was snapped short when he took a step closer, crowding me until all I could see was his broad chest and tapered waist, leading towards narrow hips, all clad in a simple tautly fitting navy t-shirt.

"I can go on my own." My own throat was suddenly dry and parched from lack of dehydration and the intent look Sam was giving me.

His strong palm latched on my arm and goose bumps arose in the wake of his warmth. "You're out of your mind if you think I'm letting you go back alone, gorgeous."

Gorgeous. Gorgeous. Gorgeous. Of all the times, for some bizarre reason, his heatedly uttered compliment decided to take refuge in my thoughts and play like a damn broken record.

I tugged on my hand until he let go, but the disappointed look on his face didn't go unnoticed by me.

"If you're not following me, then what are you doing here, Sam?"

His eyes burned into mine. "What do people come to the cemetery for?"

With a sharp inhale, my eyes tracked down to his other free hand where I finally noticed he held a bouquet of three pink roses.

My mind raced with thoughts. Had Sam lost someone dear to him? Was it their death anniversary - Oh God, is that why he was here?

I wanted to know.

No matter how much I claimed to want my distance, I was drawn to him in every possible sense of the word, even if I didn't want to be. I felt a connection to him far deeper than before because I always related to those who'd lost someone like me.

"Who're you here to see?"

It was none of my business, but I wanted to know, strangely. After this I wouldn't prod him about anymore secrets.

Sam gave me his profile and his gaze hardened, darting into the distance. "Someone that I used to know."

His dejected words hit me square in the chest, in my heart, like poisoned tipped arrows, and I wept inwardly for whoever that person was.

I understood. I understood so clearly.

"You?"

I didn't think he'd direct the question my way, but he did and I found myself pressing my lips together in a grim line. Terrified of what may escape my mouth.

I turned to walk away when Sam called out to me softly. I wouldn't have stopped, had it not been for the hint of incredulity laced in his voice.

Like a statue, I remained motionless. My words, my guilt, my demons were on full display...my vulnerability. I felt naked as the day I was born, stripped of everything that held me mended together, in front of the one boy I didn't want to think of me as broken.

But when Sam's eyes held in mine in comprehension, I knew he, too, understood, the feeling. My feelings. He understood so clearly.

What compelled me to break the truth to him wasn't the shocked and rigid posture of his strong body. No. It was the sad look he sported upon reading Derek Mateus II Sereno.

"My father." My voice wavered with the admission - I was trapped and liberated at the same time. "I came to visit my father."

Samuel's mouth flattened and his head hung a little as he mumbled, "Let me take you home now, Anna."

*                      *                      *

          Sam walked us home after he deposited his floral arrangement to its rightful owner's grave. He didn't tell me who it was, and I kept my mouth shut.

I was still reeling from the aftermaths of my spoken words. God, did I really tell him about my dad?

We walked side-by-side with a short two feet distance between us. Sam's eyes were glued to the ground and his hands were tucked into his jeans pocket. I, on the other hand, walked with my head held high and my arms crossed over my chest, in a vain attempt to make up for the impulsive slip of my mouth.

"How did you find me?" I finally asked him when the silence became deafening and the crickets had done enough chirping to ignite a conversation between us. "How did you recognize me?"

Sam looked at me for the first time since we left the cemetery.

His mouth twitched with a brief smile and it was the first bit of lightheartedness that had entered the otherwise glum mood. "Don't take this the wrong way, but you're pretty tall and I spotted your blonde hair...and your shoes, to be honest."

I glanced down at my thigh highs. I vaguely remembered him telling me once that he liked my style in shoes.

Nodding, I didn't ask anything more. We were ten minutes away from my house and I wanted to complete this walk in silence. Maybe talking to him hadn't been a good idea.

Samuel Adams had other plans. "When did your father pass away, if I may ask?"

He cleared his throat awkwardly, as if he was shy to ask the question, and I no longer saw the point in lying.

"About a year and a half ago."

Silence strode between us like our steps, before Sam shattered it again.

"How did he pass away?"

My eyes closed again as I was assaulted with old memories and thoughts of daddy.

I spoke through clenched teeth. "It's a long story."

Sam didn't persuade me, seeming to respect my privacy...to some level.

Immediately, I wanted to even out the score and pester him, too. Who was he to ask me such personal questions and jog up painful memories?

"Who are you visiting, Sam?"

Sam didn't like my question. "I already told you, Anna."

"No, you didn't," I shot back defensively as I quickened my pace.

"It's none of your business."

I cut him a glare. "That's hardly fair."

"Life is hardly fair."

I got his message. So I sped up until I was practically fast walking/jogging to my street.

Sam caught up with me in a matter of a few seconds, his long, muscular legs eating up the distance in a few long strides.

"Do you visit him often?" his voice was soft, but I could feel the underlying need to know my answer.

"No."

I was no longer listening to Sam. Not when my eyes encountered my street - the same street where my father first taught me how to play hopscotch, even when I told him that it was a girl's game. The same street where my dad first taught me to ride a bike.

"Why not?"

The same street where my dad last stood, heavy disappointed and tears clouding his face as he watched me run away with Joey Donald.

"Because it's my fault he's dead."

The same place where my dad and I created countless memories with an entire family - backyard camping, block parties, barbecue nights - before I had to go and destroy it all.

I never realized what I said until Sam sucked in a sharp breath and dropped an expletive. I glimpsed at him and my mouth fell ajar when I realized what I'd just admitted.

Tears stung my eyes anew. Sam and I paused in the middle of the empty and dark street, and regret blanketed his features.

"Anna," he started.

I walked backwards, dropping my head and pivoting on my heels. I sprinted up my driveway, the soles of my shoes slapping loudly against the concrete.

Samuel curved an arm around my waist and yanked me to a stop. I tried escaping from him. "Goodnight. I'll see you tomorrow morning. Thanks for walking us home."

I barely choked out the words. He spun me around.

My claws dug into his veined forearms, but he didn't flinch from the pain.

"Please," he begged, face crumpling and eyes seeking mine. "Don't run away. I'm not done."

"W-We've done enough," I threw back, struggling to keep my emotions at bay.

Sam let go of me physically, but his pleading voice held me captive.

"Jodanna, do you need a hug?"

My back stiffened ramrod straight. I looked over at him like he was crazy, because no one had ever asked me that. "You're joking, right?"

He was dead serious. "You look like you need a f*ucking hug, Barbie, so I'm offering."

"I don't need a hug," I stated defensively, but God knows when had been the last time I truly hugged someone as I pondered over my grief.

Moreover, was I seriously considering hugging Sam? The last few times we'd touched it hadn't gone too well. The alleyway. The pool table. My bed. I was reluctant of his touch.

But Sam always took the decision out of my hands.

It was too late to grasp what was going on as Sam's strong hands branded my bare shoulders, kneading and pushing further down my off-the-shoulder black top, tucked basically in my denim short shorts.

One arm wrapped around the nape of my neck, while the other circled my lower back and tugged me closer, every inch of us pressed.

"Barbie." Playfulness shoved aside the seriousness in his voice, entering like a beacon of light. "Now's the time when you hug me back."

I melted and lost the argument, loosely wrapping my arms around his waist. Maybe there was no argument. This was inevitable. My face tucked into his strong neck. "Okay, Beer Boy."

Not knowing how long we stood there, lost in our embrace, time trickled by. It could have been a few seconds, a few minutes, when it felt like forever.

His distinct musky scent wrapped around me like a warm cocoon and I took it in greedily.

"I'm sorry about your father, Jodanna," Sam's rumbled words ruffled the baby hairs at my hairline. "My condolences to you and your family."

He sounded so genuine that it scared me and I began pulling away. Sam only tightened his hold until my every curve was plastered to his hard muscled planes.

Somehow his arms wound around my waist in exchange, and now it was my arms that held his shoulders bracketed.

"You smell...so fucking good," he rasped.

"Right back at you."

I felt his smile before I saw it and I pulled away when it got to comfortable between us.

"I've never hugged you before."

That made me smile because we'd been locked in so many other compromising positions when I was tipsy, drunk and sober, that a hug felt so mundane.

"T-Thank you a-again, f-for seeing me home." I combed a hand through my hair when I felt his intense stare on me, nervousness bubbling inside of me. "I'll just go ahead and o-open the door. We'll have t-to be quiet b-because mom and M-Michael are sleeping."

Sam didn't make a move to climb the porch steps as I did. Instead, he remained rooted to the same spot on the driveway.

A frown slashed my brows as I watched him standing there in the moonlight backdrop, the wind flapping the end material of his t-shirt.

"I left my bike at the cemetery."

I was a bit taken aback by his words. "What?"

Samuel gazed at me with an intense look. "I only had one helmet, so I couldn't have offered you a ride home."

So you walked me home instead because it was late. "Oh...I had no idea."

That statement left me feeling oddly warm on the inside.

His chest puffed out a little and he began walking backwards, a hand pushing in his hair, causing his muscles to bulge. "I'm just going to go back."

I stood rooted to my spot now, nodding solemnly as words just didn't seem to make it past me.

Sam's swaggering figure disappeared down the street and I was struck with a sudden need to show him with more than just words how thankful I was.

Shuffling for my car keys, I raced down my driveway, opened my car and hopped in. My engine roared to life and I peeled out of the street, knowing he couldn't have gotten too far.

I slowed down when I spotted him sauntering down the sidewalk, toying with his cell phone.

I honked once and he got the message.

Sam swung open the passenger side door and slid his big body inside. His scent evaded everything in an instant.

Sam shifted in his seat and husked, "Anna," like a caress.

"Hmm?"

"Thanks. For telling me about your dad."

I took a sharp right. "Don't mention it."

I parked my car along the curb when his bike came into view. I unlocked my doors, but he had other plans as his knuckles brushed knowingly against my skin.

"Anna?" he grated again. And again. Until I looked at him. "I want you to know something."

"What?" I whispered.

Sam leaned forward and the top fuller strands of his hair flopped onto his forehead. I had the weirdest urge to push them away.

"I'm going to tell you something and we'll never mention it again, all right?"

I didn't say anything. Our eyes did the talking.

Sam inched closer and swept a piece of my blonde waves behind my ear, leaving a trail of shivers in his wake.

This. This moment right here is what truly felt intimate.

"I have firsthand knowledge of what guilt feels like and it's a shitty feeling," he whispered hotly, his eyes searching mine for something I wasn't willing to give him. "Don't know why you feel responsible for your dad's death and it's none of my business, but know this-"

He practically closed the distance between us. A few fictional inches were left between our faces, his breath fanning my lips.

"Guilt eats away at you until there's nothing left, Anna. Don't ever let it stop you from living your life."

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Questions:  what do you think of Anna and Sam this chapter? Is our home girl beginning to develop feelings for beer boy? And is our resident bad boy already opening up to barbie girl or what? What did you think about Anna telling Sam about her dad...and who was Sam visiting?!

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