I extended a hand that the ogre allowed to dangle in midair. Seconds ticked by. After about thirty of them, I dropped the hand. Not shaking my hand and just staring at me coldly was a serious opening power move. If his intention was to throw me off my game, it certainly worked.
“Ian Conroe, I presume,” he said eventually. He had a heavy Scottish accent.
“Yes,” I replied, going for confusion rather than offense. “And you are?”
“Leaving,” he said, rising to stare down at me from an even more impressive height because the wheelchair made me only about three feet tall. “I’m leaving to let you two talk, as Vanessa hasn’t given me permission to meet you and I’m bound to respect her wishes.”
“Dad, please be nice,” Vanessa said, reaching out to grab his hand. “Please?”
He raised an eyebrow at her. “Oh, now I’m allowed to introduce myself? You were so adamant I’d scare him.”
She gave him a look that could ignite kindling and he relented. He turned to me with a semblance of politeness.
“Donald O’Rourke,” he told me, still not extending a hand to shake. “I hear you’re an entertainer of some sort? A mime was it?”
A mime? A fucking mime? Oh hell, no. Mimes were creepy as hell.
I laughed at his weird joke, although it was forced. “I’m a musician, actually.”
“Charming.” He sounded less than charmed. Maybe I should have said I was a mime. Did he like mimes? I was confused.
I wondered what Vanessa’s prom dates had done when confronted with this mocking ogre of a man. Shit themselves, probably. Thankfully, I was old enough and tough enough not to be too terrified. I was just moderately terrified. I also had security somewhere around here if necessary. They’d hear me if I screamed. Most likely.
“Vanessa told me you wouldn’t like me much,” I told him. This felt bizarre, and honestly, I just wanted to talk to Vanessa. “Seems she was right.”
He smirked. “Well, you haven’t actually done much to endear yourself to me by getting my beloved only daughter admitted to the hospital. What were you expecting? A cookie bouquet?”
“Oh, this is about what I was expecting,” I told him. “I certainly wouldn’t like me much either if I were you.”
I had seen his daughter naked, after all. And more. So, so much more.
“I had my lawyers look into your background,” O’Rourke shared. His voice was nonchalant. Vanessa gasped and her expression was obviously offended.
“Dad.” Her little hands had balled up into little fists, and she seemed furious. “You did what?”
He shrugged his giant shoulders at her. “You’re surprised?”
“Why’d you ask me all those questions if you already knew all about Ian?”
Another shrug. “I wanted to hear how you described him before I made up my mind. Sometimes lawyers can be wrong. In this case, they seem to have been right. He’s dangerous and unstable. A recovering alcoholic with a long, lurid history of bad decision-making.”
I couldn’t argue with any of that, but Vanessa looked offended on my behalf.
“I see,” she replied shortly. Her tone was imperious. “So, you’ve made up your mind after all your research? My take on things doesn’t matter?”
I could tell that Vanessa was not pleased at this turn in the conversation, and even less pleased that I was witnessing it. She was not the type of person who handled being manipulated well, and I had a feeling that this is exactly how she felt. Vanessa eyed her father angrily. O’Rourke had the wherewithal to seem vaguely chagrined in the face of his daughter’s anger. He had to know that her personality wasn’t one to suffer offense lightly. I had a feeling she might have gotten that particular quality from him.
O’Rourke almost cringed, but then turned his full attention to me. His expression returned to obvious disapproval. I wished very badly that I could stand up without immediately falling back over. Having this exchange at three feet tall put me at a distinct disadvantage.
“My mind is not the one that matters,” he said, addressing the both of us. “Vanessa is the only one that really matters here. I want her to be happy and healthy, and if you, Ian, make her that way, then I’ll be happy. If you make her sad or hurt or angry, I’ll be your worst nightmare. Are we clear?”
“It sounds like we want the same thing.” On that one level, I could empathize with O’Rourke. He just wanted to protect his daughter. I didn’t really appreciate the threats of violence, but I supposed that was par for the course. I did have a long history of bad decision-making, and the fact that he met me in a hospital probably didn’t do much to salvage my image. It would be an uphill climb with him, but first, I needed to make sure Vanessa was still willing to give me a chance.
“Great,” O’Rourke answered, oblivious to my inner monologuing. “Well, I’ll let you two lovebirds talk.” He rolled his eyes as if nothing could be more disgusting. “Vanessa, call me if you need me to come remove him. I’ll be outside.”
She shook her head at him. “Okay, dad.”
He brushed past me, trying to maneuver his massive size around the petite room and careful not to touch my wheelchair. With a glare over his shoulder that promised a slow, painful death if I hurt Vanessa, he softly closed the door behind him.
57
Ian
“So that’s your dad, huh?” I shook my head and wheeled myself forward. “I think he really likes me.”
Vanessa snorted. “Yeah, definitely. He’s a huge Axial Tilt fan.” Her sarcastic tone at least told me that she was feeling better.
“Should I get him some merch? Or sign something for him?” I joked.
She nodded. “Yeah. You should sign my ass. With a tattoo gun. He’d love that.”
I laughed.
The idea was tempting. Vanessa had a few tattoos, but none on her round, lovely ass. Yet. My signature would be great on her there, twitching back and forth with every step. The thought of permanently having my mark on her was more than just appealing. It spoke to some caveman desire that I didn’t even know I had and made my heart race. I’d gladly reciprocate, too, if she wanted to put a permanent mark on me.
Despite my current banged up and bandaged state, merely thinking about Vanessa’s ass woke my libido up in a hurry. I reminded myself that sex was not the reason I’d come to Vanessa’s room tonight. It took some effort, but I fought my desire back.
I rolled myself up to Vanessa’s bedside. She was watching me carefully, although her tone was light.
“You never came by,” I told her. “You said you would. I got worried.”
My heart was pounding against my bruised ribs. Vanessa looked at me for a moment, staring deeply into my eyes and then away. She sighed.
“Caroline came by.”
I paused. “She’s in town? She didn’t come to visit me. Then again, my visiting privileges got taken away.”
“What?” Vanessa seemed confused. “They did what?”
I shook my head. “Too many people came by and it was making the hospital staff mad.”
“Oh.” Vanessa shook her head. “Anyway, Caroline told me some stuff about you.”
“She did?” Caroline knew quite a bit about me from the support group. Not all of it was flattering. In fact, almost none of it was flattering. But I also knew that Caroline was my friend and wouldn’t violate the confidentiality of the group. This was something else. And I had a feeling I knew exactly what.
Vanessa was staring at me with enough intensity to see into my soul. “When we ran into each other at South by Southwest, was it a coincidence?” she asked.
I blinked. “No. Not exactly. I mean, it was a coincidence that I saw you, but I, um, might have engineered the situation so we could talk.” I paused. “I’d been thinking about you ever since we met at the support group.”
Vanessa swallowed. “Why didn’t you tell me this before?”
“I didn’t want to scare you off,” I confessed. I ran my hands through my perpetually messy hair. “
I didn’t want you to think I was some kind of creepy psycho that had been looking for ways to get back in touch with you for months.”
“But you had been?”
“Well, no. But only because Caroline wouldn’t help me.”
Vanessa’s expression shifted. “Caroline told me that you called her and asked about me.”
I winced. “Yeah. I should have told you about that, huh?”
“Yeah, you should’ve. You both should’ve.”
“I’m sorry,” I told her. I reached out for her hand, and she let me hold it. I cradled it in my own and noticed her fresh, electric blue manicure. She had beautiful hands. Beautiful everything. God, I didn’t want to lose her tonight. I’d do anything I could to avoid that. Even tell her the truth.
“What did you ask Caroline about me?” Vanessa’s voice was calm, and it worried me.
“I thought she told you,” I hedged. Her pink lips were pursed, and I could tell she wasn’t happy with my answer.
“She did. Now I want to hear it from you.” She frowned and her eyes flashed. “If I have to be the last to know, I want all the facts.”
Vanessa was quite a bit like her dad. Much prettier though.
I swallowed.
It was time to come clean.
The entire last few months had boiled down to this moment. I would either lose Vanessa or win her in the next few moments. I took a deep breath and met her eyes.
“When I saw you, I thought it was love at first sight,” I told Vanessa. “You’re beautiful, independent, stubborn, smart, and strong. I was just instantly drawn to you in a way I don’t even know how to explain... but as strong as you were, you were also vulnerable and delicate in other ways and I had this overwhelming desire to find you, protect you and fix things for you. I also wanted to be worthy of you. It wasn’t very rational. I just wanted to see you again.” I sighed and shifted uncomfortably in my wheelchair. My leg didn’t like being at this angle very much, but I ignored the pain. This conversation was much more important. “I called Caroline and asked her to help set me up with you. She turned me down pretty decisively. She told me a little bit about you, but mostly she said that I needed to leave you alone.”
“She never told me any of this, you know.”
“I think she was trying to protect you,” I told her. “Don’t be too mad at her. I really think she was worried about you.”
Vanessa nodded. “Yeah, I get that. She told me. It’s still annoying though.”
“Are you angry with me?”
“No.” She paused. “I just don’t know what to do.”
I could see indecision on her face, and pain. It made my heart wrench painfully in my own chest. I never wanted to make her sad. I only ever wanted to make her smile.
“Vanessa, I love you,” I told her. “I’ve been in love with you this whole time.”
Vanessa started crying. That couldn’t be a good sign.
“Please don’t cry,” I begged her. I wrapped an arm around her shoulder and pulled her a bit closer to me. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”
She took a deep shuddering breath and brushed the tears away. When she looked back at me, her expression was resolute. I could feel us balanced on knife’s edge.
“I love you too, Ian. But I think it’s time I told you about the last time I was in love.” Her eyes left mine to fix down on her hands. Her left hand, actually. Where her engagement ring once sat. “Before we go any farther, I need to tell you about Sam.”
58
Vanessa
“I met Sam in college,” I told Ian, fighting back tears. “At a party. I was an undeclared freshman without a clue, and he was a junior with a baseball scholarship and a thing for redheads. It was basically love at first sight and we were inseparable. I’d never been in love before and he was my first in every way. I thought it was fate. He wanted to be an EMT, and I wanted to be with him all the time, so I wanted to be an EMT, too. It wasn’t long before we both got our wish.”
Ian sat by my side and listened patiently. This story was overdue, but I had to tell it now. I had to tell it so that Ian would understand why I was so terrified of what would come next for us.
“How long were you together?” he asked.
“Almost five years,” I replied. “More or less. We were very happy. I thought I had my whole life mapped out and just had to connect the dots to get to my happily ever after. I was working in a job that I thought I enjoyed with someone I loved. I thought we’d get married and have kids and have this perfect, normal life. I thought it was what I wanted, and for a while, it was.” Tears pricked at the corners of my eyes and I blinked them away. I didn’t want to cry.
“Until the accident.”
I nodded at him. “When Sam died, I was sure that I was going to die too from the broken heart alone. It was like I’d lost a huge piece of myself, and I think it was worse than it even should have been because I wasn’t really my own person without him.” I trailed off. This was something I’d talked a lot to my therapist about.
“What do you mean you weren’t your own person?” Ian asked. His tone was nonjudgmental.
I sighed. “I’d tied up all my hopes and dreams in him since I was nineteen years old. My identity was totally commingled with him. I didn’t even have dreams of my own that didn’t link to him in some way. I thought I was this independent person, but I really wasn’t. I was very weak without him. I had to relearn who I was again without him. I had to recreate myself from scratch.”
“Is that why you started doing video work?” he asked.
“Not exactly. I literally couldn’t continue as an EMT. I get panic attacks now, especially when I’m in situations that are too much like the accident. I’m glad I was unconscious on the way to the hospital last night because I would have had a complete freak-out in the ambulance if I’d been awake.”
I had attempted to return to my job as an EMT after recovering from the accident. I couldn’t even make it through a single shift. I walked off the job forever.
Just the smell of the ambulance made me jittery and being in an enclosed space spiked my adrenaline. I didn’t even like vans anymore. It was classic PTSD, according to Caroline. My therapist claimed there was no such thing as ‘classic’ trauma since minds are individual, but she agreed that my symptoms were fairly typical for what I’d been through. Either way, it sucked.
Ian kissed my hand. “I had a freak-out for both of us last night. They took us in different ambulances. I didn’t know that you were okay because I couldn’t see you.”
“I’m okay,” I promised him.
He looked unconvinced. “Are you sure?” I could only imagine I didn’t look all that great. But looks can be deceiving. I was more alright than I had been in a long time. I knew who I was now.
I nodded. “Yeah. I know I am. I’ve gotten a lot stronger in the last year since the accident. I really have. I’m so much better than I was. But I was really messed up for a long time. Physically I mended pretty quickly. Emotionally, things took a lot longer. Because when I lost Sam, I lost me.”
“You must have really loved him.” Ian’s expression was indecipherable, but his voice was soft and understanding. His arm was still around my shoulders and I let my greedy heart enjoy the warmth and comfort of it. Even if it was only for a little while longer, I needed his strength. I needed to absorb as much of it as I possibly could, because I had a horrible sinking suspicion that he would be gone soon, and all I’d have left would be a memory. Just like Sam.
“I did. But I was so different then. You wouldn’t have recognized me before the accident. I looked different. I was different. I was a much more conventional, conservative person.”
“You were?” He seemed doubtful and I almost laughed. I thought about all the pastel sweater sets I’d gotten rid of along with my hair straightener, staid, sensible shoes, and subtle makeup. These days, I didn’t want to blend in.
“I was much less outgoing then. I didn’t try to stand out. Sam was kind of c
onventional, so I was too. I liked what he liked. He didn’t like tattoos, so I didn’t have any. He didn’t like spicy food, so I didn’t try it very often. He didn’t even like that I did roller derby, but I insisted on having one offbeat hobby. He didn’t hold me back from what I wanted to do; I want to be clear. He supported me, and he loved me. But because I wanted to make him happy, I think I held myself back from a lot of experiences. Then after he died, I realized that I had to live my life differently or I’d regret it. I couldn’t keep on being the old Vanessa. She died in the accident along with Sam.”
“So, you changed.”
“I did. I’m a totally different person now. I’m reaching for the things I want for the first time. I get the tattoos I want. I dye my hair the color I want to dye it. I wear clothes that Sam would have hated and watch all the horror movies he despised. I’m carving out the career I want. I have to do these things for me because otherwise I’ll be living in Sam’s shadow for the rest of my life. I have to pursue this opportunity with my filmmaking because it’s my dream and I need it.”
“I think that’s good, Vanessa.” Ian didn’t seem to know what to say to me. “You’re healing. It’s good that you’re living the life that you want. I’m sure that Sam would want you to do that.”
I nodded. “Yes. He would.” I took a deep breath. “I know that he would want me to be happy without him, even if that means I become someone he wouldn’t have loved.”
His expression shifted. “I’m sure he would love you no matter what. I do. Anyone would.”
I shook my head at him. “Maybe you’re right that he would be happy to see me this way. I don’t know.” I sucked in another deep breath and tried to remember what I was trying to say. “The point is, I’m on this path now to becoming who I am. I have to stay on this path. I can’t change it for you or anyone. I can’t put it on hold to go on a tour with you. I think I changed myself too much to be with Sam and make him happy, or what I thought would make him happy. I can’t do that again, because if I lost you the way I lost him, I don’t think I could go on. So, what I’m really trying to say is that I don’t think we can be together, because the path you’re on is going to take you away from me. And this time, I can’t follow.”
This One’s For You Page 23