Falling for Faith Read online

  “Oh…” I muttered. “I actually better get back to my place to study a bit. Thank you though.”

  With that, Faith stood up from that couch. “I’ll drive you home now,” she offered.

  As I walked past Susan, I offered her a slight smile, which she returned in the form of a wide grin.

  When Faith and I were about to walk out the door, Susan shouted up to us. “Hey Joey, you should come for family dinner next week. We would all love to have you.”

  I looked over at Faith and felt something wash over me. “I’ll be there,” I answered, as Faith smiled back at me.

  Chapter 7

  My hands were sweating as we pulled into the driveway. Actually… correction - my whole body was sweating, which isn’t an easy feat to accomplish in February in the Northeast United States. I had done a good job of avoiding adults during college. Of course, there were my coaches and professors that I couldn’t really avoid if I wanted to stay in school, but I had worked hard to keep all conversations to a minimum. Now here I was throwing myself into a situation where I would have to hold a prolonged conversation with two adults. Not only that, but I actually wanted to impress them. I really liked Faith so I wanted her family to like me.

  I felt a hand on my shoulder. “Hey,” Faith soothed. “There is nothing to be nervous about. My family is really chill.”

  I wanted to believe her, but I had my doubts. I grew up around religious adults and none of them had ever liked me. For whatever reason, they all saw me as some sort of anti-Christ. I had no reason to believe her parents would be any different.

  I took a deep breath and opened my car door, following Faith into the house.

  “We’re here!” she yelled, as we made our way into the kitchen.

  An older woman was standing by the stove, wearing an apron and stirring a pot. It looked like a scene from a 50’s movie and I expected to see her husband sitting at the table, reading the newspaper and smoking a pipe while she did all the work.

  Faith walked over and stared into the pot, then gave the woman, who I had to assume was her mom, a questioning look.

  “Dad is really trusting you to stir his special sauce?” she asked.

  Before her mom could answer, a man entered the room and stole the spoon from her mom. He rolled his eyes playfully at both of them.

  “She told me that she wanted to impress our guest, so I said she could have five minutes.”

  He took a fresh spoon and dipped it into the sauce, then proceeded to take a bite. As he did, he closed his eyes and gave a satisfied grin.

  “Good news. She didn’t ruin it. It still tastes as amazing as always,” he reported. Then he turned toward me and reached out his hand. “Joey, it’s great to meet you officially. I feel like I know you after watching you compete the last four years and with everything Faith has told us.”

  I looked over to Faith who had a slight blush on her cheeks, but tried to give her a reassuring smile. Before I could say anything back to her dad, her mom grabbed ahold of me and wrapped me in a big bear hug. I tensed up under her touch and she must have noticed because she backed up quickly.

  “Sorry,” she apologized. “We are a hugging family and I guess I also feel like I know you. I forget we never actually met. I love watching you compete. The way you breeze over hurdles is just mesmerizing.”

  “Thanks,” I muttered. “It’s very nice to meet both of you as well.”

  I knew I wasn’t hitting any home runs on this first impression, but if Faith’s parents were unimpressed, they were good at hiding it as they smiled widely at me.

  There was an awkward moment of silence that was thankfully interrupted by Susan coming in. She kissed both of her parents on the cheeks and hip checked Faith, then turned to me.

  “Hey Joey,” she said cheerfully. “Congrats on the national qualifier yesterday. Do you think that time will be good enough to get you in?”

  I shrugged my shoulders. “Probably not, but it’s a better time than I had at this point last season so I feel good about it.”

  “You’ll get there,” Mr. Hopkins said with a wink. “Is there anyone to push you at conferences now that Howard graduated?”

  I was surprised that Mr. Hopkins knew so much about my event. Cameron Howard had been my biggest competition in the 60, 100, and 400 meter hurdles since I started college. We were constantly going back and forth on the leader board for conferences, but luckily, I had somehow always beaten her when I needed to. Truthfully, without her around, there was no one in the conference that was getting times close to mine at this point.

  “I’m honestly not sure,” I admitted. “Luckily the 60s go so fast, there really isn’t any time to think. I just want it to be outdoor season though. The 400 hurdles are my favorite to run.”

  “And you’re amazing at them,” Mrs. Hopkins chimed in. “You run the hurdles faster than half of your open 400 runners run the race without hurdles. I never understood why you’re not on the 4 by 400 relay.”

  I shrugged my shoulders even though I knew exactly why. Coach didn’t think I was enough of a team player to be in a relay. She thought it took teamwork to win a race. I was always under the impression that it took four fast runners, but whatever.

  We continued to talk about track until dinner was ready and I was surprised how comfortable I had become. Luckily, they had found the one topic that I could talk about for hours.

  I took a seat between Faith and Susan at the table. “Faith, do you want to say the prayer tonight?” her Dad asked as Susan reached over to grab my hand. Instead of grabbing her hand, I just stared at it like an idiot.

  Faith looked over toward Susan. “Joey actually doesn’t believe in God, so she doesn’t have to join us in the prayer.”

  Susan nodded and placed her hand on her own leg. I glared at Faith, annoyed at her for telling her family this when things had been going so well, then I looked at Mr. and Mrs. Hopkins who were already staring at me.

  “Oh… I… I mean...umm…” I stumbled over my words not sure what to say.

  Mr. Hopkins smiled over at me. “Don’t worry Joey. We’re not going to force you to do anything you aren’t comfortable with. We respect your beliefs.”

  I had never heard an adult say they respected anything about me so it felt good to hear those words. As I looked around the table at the Hopkins family, I could tell they meant it.

  I reached my hands out toward both Faith and Susan. “No, I’d like to join you,” I said.

  Faith gave me a look that was meant to ask if I was sure and I nodded back in response. Unlike Susan who had grabbed my hand, Faith intertwined our fingers together.

  As she prayed out loud, I honestly didn’t hear a word she said. All I could hear was the sound of my own heart beating in my chest at the feel of her hand in mine.

  When I heard her say amen, I kept my eyes closed for a few extra seconds and quickly said in my head, “God if you’re really there, then thank you.”

  When I opened my eyes, Faith smiled over at me and squeezed my hand before letting go of it. The loss of her touch coursed through my body, making me feel more alone without it.

  The rest of dinner went smoothly, but I still felt relieved when Faith offered to drive me home as soon as the meal ended. Mrs. Hopkins pulled me into another hug before we left and this time I let myself melt into her.

  Chapter 8

  Once we were in the car, I exhaled loudly and Faith laughed. “Now that wasn’t so bad, was it?” she asked.

  I shook my head. “Your family is great. I have to admit that I actually had a really nice time.”

  When we got back to my apartment, I wasn’t ready to say goodbye. I looked at the time and saw that it was only 8:30.

  “Would you maybe want to come in and watch a movie?” I asked.

  Faith immediately shut off her car. “I would love that,” she beamed.

  It was endearing how excited she seemed to get over everything and I found myself walking behind her to watch her skip joyfully to
ward my apartment building. After about a minute of this, she turned around to see where I was.

  She rolled her eyes when she noticed I was about ten feet behind her. “Do I need to remind you that only one of us actually knows where she is going and it’s not me?”

  I ran to catch up to her and directed her toward the stairs. “It’s up here and to the right,” I instructed.

  When we got inside, Julie immediately walked out of her room, a smile growing on her face when she noticed I wasn’t alone.

  “Hey Joey,” she snickered. “I didn’t know we were having company tonight.”

  She then stuck her hand out to Faith. “Hey, I’m Julie. I’m on the team with Joey and your sister.”

  “It’s nice to meet you Julie,” Faith said in return. “You run the short sprints, right?”

  “I do,” Julie grinned, giving me a look that said she was impressed.

  I cleared my throat. “Well, we were just about to watch a movie. Do you want to join us?”

  “Nah, I still have a lot of studying I need to do, but you two enjoy yourselves.”

  “Alright. We’ll watch in my room so we don’t bother you,” I offered, knowing that our living room television sat against the wall to her bedroom.

  “I appreciate the sentiment,” Julie mocked. “You two have fun watching your movie.” She turned to wink at me while she walked away.

  Once we were in my room, Faith looked around at the bare walls. “Very minimalistic,” she said with a raised eyebrow.

  “Yeah, I’m not much for decorating,” I admitted.

  “I like it. It’s very you.”

  I laughed. “I’m not sure if I should take that as a compliment or not.”

  “You should,” Faith reassured me. “I like this room and… I like you.”

  I gulped as I stared back at Faith. I had no idea how to respond to that. What did she mean when she said she liked me? It had to be platonic, right? Before I could respond, Faith was looking around my room again and her eyes stopped on my Super Nintendo.

  “Wait, you have an old school Super Nintendo?” Her eyes lit up as she asked the question.

  I couldn’t help but smile at her excitement. “Sure do. It’s a classic. New video game systems might have much better graphics, but in my opinion they just don’t compare to the older systems. Maybe I’m just nostalgic.”

  “Well, I couldn’t agree more,” Faith said with a smile. “Do you have Super Mario brothers?”

  I scoffed. “Is that seriously a question? Why would I have a Super Nintendo and not have the greatest game ever invented?”

  Faith’s eyes lit up again. “Can we play?”

  Soon, Faith and I were sitting close in front of the small tv in my room, both fully focused on the game in front of us. Ok… Faith was fully focused. I kept stealing glances over at her. She just looked so cute playing the game.

  Unfortunately, the distraction wasn’t good for my game play though and Faith had to keep sharing her extra lives with me every time I died. Once she only had one life left, she kept playing until she lost it. When she finally did, she surprised me by throwing down the controller and growling loudly.

  I picked up the controller and mockingly pet it. “Whoa killer. Be careful. These things are sensitive.”

  A sweet smile returned to Faith’s face. “Sorry. I just get overly competitive sometimes.”

  I grinned back at her. Man, I was smiling a lot more lately. “You don’t have to apologize. I like it. How did you get so good at video games anyway?”

  “My brother and I used to play. Since he was so much older than us video games were the one thing we had in common. He had me playing from the time I could hold a controller in my hands. Susan wasn’t as agreeable to it, so it was kind of our thing.”

  “Oh..” I mumbled, while I stared at the controller in my hand. I hated how I always shut down whenever the subject of her brother came up, but I was really bad at this stuff. Since I was so closed off to others, I wasn’t used to anyone opening up to me.

  Before Faith had a chance to say anything else, I asked the question that had been burning in my mind. “So.. What happened to him?”

  Faith was silent for a few moments and I worried that I went too far with that question. “It was a car accident,” she said finally. “He had just turned 17 and didn’t have his license too long at that point. One night he was driving too fast and lost control of his car. A seat belt probably would have saved him, but he wasn’t wearing his.”

  I dropped the controller and put my hand on top of Faith’s. I rubbed my thumb across hers, but didn’t say anything. I could tell that she had more she wanted to say.

  “I remember when I found that out I was so angry at him. I honestly remember thinking ‘how could you do this to me? How could you be so stupid?’ Then of course I felt guilty for feeling that way. I went through all of the emotions - guilt, anger, sadness, jealousy. I was jealous of my parents for having more time with him than I did, jealous of my friends who still had their older brothers. Heck, I was even jealous of my brother. I was jealous that he didn’t have to deal with the pain of losing someone. I know it probably sounds crazy, but it was a lot for my little fifth grade brain to comprehend.”

  “I don’t think that sounds crazy at all,” I replied sincerely. “What I do find crazy is that you went through all of that and were still able to become the person you are today. You’re so strong and successful, not to mention super positive and optimistic.”

  With my words, Faith’s lips twitched slightly to form a small smile. “It wasn’t easy,” she admitted. “But the way I saw it, I had two choices. I could shut out the world or live the life my brother would never be able to and I felt like I owed it to him. He made my ten years with him so magical. He deserves to have that magic live on.”

  “Faith…” I started to say and then stopped myself. There were so many feelings I wanted to express in that moment. I wanted to tell her how amazing I found her. I wanted to confess how I thought she was changing me. I really wanted to admit the feelings I had for her.

  “Shhhh,” Faith whispered. “You don’t have to say anything. I’m actually enjoying the quiet right now and just having you close.”

  Then, to my surprise, she removed her hand from mine and laid on her back across my floor, using my lap as a pillow. “Is this ok?” she asked, while staring up into my eyes.

  I looked down at her and couldn’t get words to form, so I just nodded my head. I watched her close her eyes as I ran my hand through her hair. I never thought I could be this comfortable with another person. While I had never been much for talking or opening up to others, I still didn’t enjoy awkward silences. That was one of the main reasons I avoided people. But there was nothing awkward in the silence between Faith and I. There was more communicated in that silence than could ever be communicated with words.

  I’m not sure how long we sat like this, but I was surprised when I looked at my phone and saw that it was close to midnight. Faith’s breathing was shallow so I could tell she was sleeping. I was pretty sure she had been for awhile, but I was enjoying the moment too much to wake her up. I gently shook her shoulder then leaned down to whisper into her ear.

  Faith slowly opened her eyes and when she focused in on me, a smile immediately took over her face. She yawned through her smile. “Sorry. I guess I fell asleep.”

  I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, trying to calm my beating heart. Her sleepy voice was absolutely adorable. “That’s ok. I probably should have woken you sooner, but you looked so peaceful. It’s almost midnight though,” I informed her.

  She took her time sitting up, clearly not worried about the time. “I guess I should probably go.”

  Instinctively, I almost told her she didn’t have to, but I didn’t want it to come across the wrong way given my history. I just worried about her driving tired.

  “Are you going to be ok to drive home?” I asked.

  Faith’s smile grew when she noticed
my worry. “I’ll be good. I can make it a mile without falling asleep. Don’t worry.” She then reached out and squeezed my hand adding, “You’re really sweet Joey, you know that?”

  I groaned in response. “Don’t go spreading that around.”

  “You’re right. We wouldn’t want anyone to find out that Joey McGolden actually has a heart,” Faith quipped.

  I shrugged my shoulders. “Expectations would only lead to disappointment once people find out you’re wrong.”

  Joey looked at me in a way that made me feel weak in the knees. It was almost like she was looking right through my eyes and into my soul.

  “I don’t think I am wrong,” she said quietly. “I think your heart is bigger than most people. I think you care too much and that’s why you try so hard not to care at all.”

  I didn’t know how to respond to that. Even though I had never thought about it that way, I was pretty sure she was right. Although, I would never admit that to her.

  Before I could say anything, Faith winked at me. “But don’t worry. Your secret is safe with me.”

  “Well thanks,” I laughed.

  In that moment I felt both happy and extremely scared. This girl understood me. She was breaking through all of the walls that I had spent years building up. It was scary and exciting at the same time, but for once I was actually looking forward to seeing what the future might hold.

  Chapter 9

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” I asked, as Faith turned off her car.

  She turned to me and gave me a look that said she thought I was crazy. “Of course I want to do this. They are your friends. I’m excited to meet them. Plus, wasn’t this your idea? Why are you trying to back out now?”

  It’s true. It was my idea. But I honestly didn’t think it would happen. When I suggested that Faith hang out with my boys after this week’s volunteering, it was a test. It was a test that I was sure she was going to fail, especially after I described them as lazy stoners. I knew it was an unfair description and I actually felt bad as I said it, but this was my way of pushing away from her. If she judged my friends unfairly, I could tell myself she wasn’t the person I thought she was and maybe this crush would stop growing. But of course Faith had readily agreed to hang out with them, completely ignoring my less-than-stellar description.