Reviving Sage

[Chapter 17:]

Damn I'm in trouble, was the only thought running through my head at the moment

Forty-five minutes later after texting Kim I sat in my living room, head downcast, and sanity hanging by a thread as I waited for the telltale crunch of tires against my driveway's gravel.

This is bad, like bad, bad Sage. Shit.

And it was all my freaking fault.

I think that was the worst part of this whole ordeal. If I would have just stayed away from Noah when Kim, and just about everyone else warned me, 'Don't get involved with that boy! He doesn't have a family! He's a womanizer from Compton!'

But I didn't listen. All I saw was a man who was a little older than me,  who'd experienced all life had to offer and more, and who looked at me differently than anyone ever had before.

It was like love at first sight...well lust at first sight but it felt like love.

It started innocently enough, sorta. I was just coming out of my junior year of UCLA and was preparing for my senior year when Kim and I went to a party a couple of her friends from C-block were throwing, and he happened to be there, and I happened to be halfway in love with him from our first conversation.

And yeah maybe from the first time I'd laid eyes on the marvelous hazel hue of his eyes.

We were doomed from the start.

I had, had plenty of little boyfriend's and healthy crushes in high school and a few guys who were friends that I flirted with, but I had never been a sex on the first date type of girl. But, when Noah invited me out a few days later to see a movie I became that girl for the first time in my life in the back of his rinky-dink 2004 honda.

Wow we were cliche...

It was your typical Good girl from a good family meets adopted bad boy with no family to call his own.

Tragic.

Flash forward a few more dates, and late night rendezvous, and we were exchanging 'I love you's' and 'Just one more kiss before you go'.

It was a rush to be with him, to have the sexy bad boy on my arm wherever I went, to know that no matter how many other girls looked his way, and to me with envy, he would always be mine.

Funny how that turned out.

One of the main reasons we broke up the first time was because he cheated on me with one of my dorm mates down the hall, and that was only the first time, not even counting the times that came after that.

Which is why this is still all my fault. I should have cut him loose then, and I shouldn't have gotten back together with him time after time. Even after my father expressed his disdain for him, I still stayed. Even when my mother expressed concern, I still stayed.

    If I would have just taken everyone's advice and 'dumped the chump' as Kim liked to say, I wouldn't be freaking out, I wouldn't be such a romance recluse, and...I wouldn't have Ella.

I closed my eyes and sunk back into my couch. I couldn't live without that little girl,  she was the only good thing I'd gotten out of that toxic relationship.

Oh Ellie...

She was my sun, moon, and stars.

She was everything.

And to think, I thought when God blessed me with her it would strengthen Noah and I's relationship. I actually thought we could be a family. The thought was highly laughable now. Even with a child he still left us behind.