Golden

Home : Stories by Zippit : Star Series : Golden

Summary: I now know what it’s like to be used, to be the means to an end, discarded when the moment’s right.

AUTHOR: Zippit
EMAIL: zippit@cryptoffic.com
RATING: PG
SERIES: Star Series
CHARACTER: Dale Earnhardt Jr, Martin Truex Jr, Kevin Harvick, Dale Jr POV
PROMPT: Taming the Muse #73 - Rope (7.18)
COMPLETED: December 15, 2007
WORD COUNT: 1,078
DISCLAIMER: Not real; don’t know them, don’t claim to know them. Only the makings of my imagination. I own NOTHING and am affiliated with NO ONE mentioned here. Not the drivers, not the teams, no one. This is all fiction and fun. In other words...NOT REAL, NOT REAL, NOT REAL. ;-)
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Golden represents the hope and happiness Dale sees in his life now. It also represents him having Kevin’s love again.
Thanks to Catw00man for the beta. All other errors are mine.
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I now know what it’s like to be used, to be the means to an end, discarded when the moment’s right. I promised myself a long time ago, I’d never let myself be used. Wouldn’t let “friends” use me because of who I am. I thought I could trust my instincts. But I never counted on being taken in for a fool by one I considered a part of my inner circle.

I let him tie me up in emotional guilt for close to two years. I’d cheated on him because there was no fire between us. I found that fire with someone else. Someone I now know is my other half, my heart and soul. He keeps me true to myself while Martin, Martin, was a friendship gone wrong and someone I never wanted to hurt because I did care.

I watched him become the champion I knew he could be. The racecar driver I knew was lurking beneath the surface. I was his confidante, his best friend, out here so far from family and friends. I relished the role because I thought I loved him.

I let that platonic love control me when a few months after I’d finally made my choice of Kevin, Martin asked to settle our past, put an end to the issues between us. But it didn’t end. It grew into something else and I repeated my sins in reverse. I cheated on Kevin with Martin.

Martin was desperate and needy and hurting. He needed me to heal the wounds I’d caused. Kevin was…my match in everything, but he had others too. He didn’t need me...or so I thought. I tried to hold it together, tried to make them both happy.

January rolled around and I lost. I had to chose. I chose wrong.

I chose Martin, the one who seemed to hurt the most. What happened next was two years of hell. It started out innocent enough. It was good in the beginning. We were devoted to each other and I thought I’d found what love was supposed to be like.

Then the glow wore off. He was jealous and possessive. I couldn’t talk to anyone who didn’t “approve” of us. We didn’t go out. We became exclusive homebodies and when we did manage to venture out, we retreated as quickly as we could.

I didn’t mind. I needed to prove to him how much I really loved him. I tried again and again, but it never reached the infinitely high bar he set before me. I wasn’t doing enough or the right things. I’d made him a dirty secret for months and I’d forced our “love” to grow in the shadows.

I had no friends. I had no family. I had nothing but him and the house we lived in. It wasn’t even really mine. It was his lake house with some help from me in decorations. He even claimed my identity. I lost the name that had defined me.

He said it was to help deal with the hurt so we could move on and be completely together with no lingering issues. He was mine and I was his. I wrapped myself completely in him like he wanted and it finally seemed to make him happy about us.

I gave and gave and gave. Everything of me to make him happy. I couldn’t see he wasn’t giving me anything in return. He was happy and that’s all that mattered. I was lost in that world. I couldn’t see up from down.

Then I read something…something that wrenched open the door to the past I’d firmly locked away.

There was no emotion in me until then. His words started something, but what I still can’t quite name. All I know is that I contacted Kevin to help me find who I was again. I knew that at the least I had to stop being numb and he was the best one to help me. He’d had me feeling more deeply and passionately than anyone else ever had and with only his words I’d felt more than I had in the last two years.

I told Martin and he flew into a rage. I wasn’t his no more. I wasn’t his puppet and he couldn’t have that. The numbness saved me from him. I couldn’t feel so I couldn’t be cowed into staying. I couldn’t be cowed into doing his bidding.  Not anymore.

Time blurs after that. I moved home, reached out to friends, Kevin moved in. It’s not as it sounds. He…didn’t trust me and I don’t blame him. I lied to him for months, ripped out his heart. The only thing I thought I wanted from him was a friendship. But he knew better.

We could never exist merely as “friends.” It was in the memories that still burned bright everywhere we turned. It was the easy way things came back to us. It was the regret lacing every moment that before was only a dream.

We tried to achieve that level of connection, of more, we had before. It never worked. We always fell short. Always just out of reach. I wondered if there was no saving us, if I’d lost the one thing that would’ve made me happy.

Then I decked Clint.

He spoke what I’d been thinking, fearing, and I could’ve handled that if he hadn’t brought up Martin. Martin. The one who’d ruined everything good only because he didn’t have what he wanted. Like there would ever be a possibility of my going back to him. Not when I know exactly who he is.

It’s ironic how one act of violence would unlock the barriers holding me and Kevin back, but it’s also fitting. Months of subtle lies, hidden truths, and secrets countered with one blatant moment of declaration because right there in that garage, Kevin and I found each other again. An explosion and a connection so deep I’d rather die than give up again.

I know it’s a lesson learned and I should be grateful I had a chance to redeem my mistakes. I only wish the hurt left trailing in the wake had never happened.

I have the love of my life beside me for always and I’ll begin my career at HMS next year. Nothing’s better in life. In truth, as long as I have Kevin, nothing can touch my happiness. He is my happiness. Everything else is a welcome bonus.

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Zippit - zippit@cryptoffic.com