by S. J. Hooks
Drawing a deep breath, I hold it up, my eyes sweeping across the image. It’s a group photo. A dozen or so young people face the camera, smiling faces all around. Most of them are dressed in faded jeans, T-shirts, and plaid shirts. To the right of the center, there’s a young man who catches my eye. His dark hair reaches his shoulders and his smile is happy and relaxed, his arm thrown around the shoulder of the girl next to him. I glance over at Simon. His shoulders are tense and his mouth set in a hard line.
“When was this taken?” I ask.
“It feels like a lifetime ago. I was just nineteen.”
I look at the picture again, at the girl next to him. She’s petite with wild red hair and a pretty smile.
“Who is she?”
“My wife.”
My eyes snap up to his, my mouth falling open in shock. “You were married at nineteen?”
He nods, then rubs his face with his hands. “Remember how I told you about going to school in England? My parents were American, but my father worked abroad most of his adult life. Lots of travel. My stepmother usually joined him, and I was sent away to school. It was easier for them, I suspect. I didn’t see them all that much, even during holidays.”
“I’m so sorry,” I tell him, reaching for his hand again. “Are they …?”
“Long gone,” he says in a monotone. “Good riddance.” He looks at me. “He was an abusive bastard, and she couldn’t have cared less what happened to me. I don’t miss them one bit.”
“I’m still sorry—for you,” I whisper, “that you had such an awful childhood.”
“Thank you,” he says softly, stroking my hand before drawing a deep breath. “When I graduated at eighteen, I was more than ready to get away. First chance I got, I put an entire ocean between us and came over here. I’d inherited quite a bit of money from my father’s mother. She was nice, as far as I remember. I had a plan all set out. I would start here on the West Coast, buy a car, and drive across the country. But I never got any farther than Seattle.”
“What happened?”
“I met Donna.” He shakes his head. “It was so strange. I was sitting outside a café downtown, planning my trip, when suddenly this girl comes up to my table and sits down, asking me if I can spare a cigarette and buy her a coffee. She looked hungry and a bit worse for the wear, but still very pretty. I said yes. After that cup of coffee and a few cigarettes, I left the café with her, and all of my plans behind.” He glances at me.
“That sounds really romantic,” I whisper, trying to ignore the acid in my stomach.
Simon shrugs. “I was an eighteen-year-old virgin who’d barely spoken to a girl before that point, and she was pretty candid about what we’d do if I got us a room somewhere.”
I try for a smile. “But it wasn’t just a one-time thing.”
“It wasn’t. For the next three years, I barely left her side. It turned out she was homeless when I met her, and it felt good to save her from that. She was so different from anyone I’d ever met, free-spirited and wild, but with absolutely crazy mood swings. One day she’d be bouncing all over the place and the next she’d stay in bed all day.” He shakes his head. “With what I know now, I can see that she was not okay. I didn’t realize it at the time, of course. I was too blinded by it all.”
“Blinded by love?” I whisper.
He sighs. “I know I’m supposed to say that I’ve never felt that way about anyone before, but we agreed on honesty.”
I nod.
“I did love her—with all the naiveté and excitement of the teenage boy I was. I loved her very much, and married her, but I wasn’t at all prepared for what came next.” He shoots me a quick glance. “The group of friends we hung out with … there was a lot of alcohol and pot even in the beginning. We partied hard. But then another guy started hanging around and he brought harder stuff, pills and powders. I guess I was sensible enough not to partake, but I can’t say the same for Donna. She took whatever he gave her even though I told her it was a bad idea. The drugs made her different, mean. I thought about leaving once or twice when she was really bad, but … I loved her. I took care of her as much as I could, making sure she ate, staying with her whenever we went out to make sure she’d be all right. It went on like that for a while. Then we found out she was pregnant. We hadn’t exactly been careful all the time.”
I chew on my lip as I watch him, dread building up inside me. I know how this story ends, how it changed him from the happy-looking kid in the picture to the man I met in that strip club, closed off and reclusive.
“We never talked about having kids, but I wanted it. So I took action, removing both of us from the party scene. I told her we were done with all that, that we’d be good parents, that we’d give our kid the great childhood we were deprived of, starting immediately. I spent some of my inheritance and got her into a rehab program. We went shopping for baby stuff. For a little while it seemed like everything was going to work out.” He stops talking, scrubbing his face with his hands.
“But it didn’t,” he says, his voice now hoarse. “I’m sorry, I can’t.”
He’s out of the car before I can react, standing stock-still as he faces the ocean, his coat flapping in the wind. I join him, standing quietly by his side and listening to his fast breaths. Eventually he calms down, putting his arm around me to pull me against his tall frame. We stand there for a while, listening to the crashing waves, and even though it’s freezing I don’t consider moving. I like being here, by his side. This is the first time I’ve truly felt like his equal.
“Are you all right?” I ask.
“My therapist has high hopes for me,” he responds dryly.
I gaze up at him.
“Sorry,” he says. “Talking about this brings up a lot of things I’d rather keep buried forever. But you deserve to know.” He looks out over the water. “They’re both buried in Seattle.”
“B-both of them?” I stutter, trying to grasp the magnitude of such a loss. “Donna and your son?”
“I named him Sean,” he says softly. “Maybe someday I’ll take you to meet him, if you want?”
“Of course I do,” I whisper, a thought occurring to me. “Do their deaths have to do with the scars on your stomach?”
“Yes, but not in the way you probably think. They weren’t attacked. Just me. After she got pregnant everything changed,” he recounts. “Donna did the rehab program and I got a job. It was just part time at a record store. I didn’t really need the money at that point because of my inheritance, but I loved it. I loved coming home and having her there. I felt like I finally had a real home of my own.”
His expression darkens. “Then she started disappearing,” he whispers. “I’d wake up and she’d be gone and wouldn’t return for hours. She said she needed space, that I was smothering her—always watching her and hovering over her. We fought a lot. I was worried about her and the baby, and I didn’t think she was taking good enough care of herself. She accused me of being controlling, and looking back, I can see that I was. But only because I was afraid—afraid of losing her, of losing everything that meant something to me. She wasn’t being careful and I had to take control of the situation. I had to. But it didn’t work.” He pauses, staring into space. A gust of wind makes me shiver and he focuses on me again, leading me to the car. It’s still warm inside, but he takes my hands between his, rubbing them gently.
“I have issues with control, as I’m sure you’ve noticed,” he says. “There’s a reason for that. The more Donna pulled away, the harder I clung. Or maybe it was the other way around. I don’t know. But I suspected she was using again.”
“She was pregnant,” I whisper.
Simon shakes his head, giving my hands a tug. I know what he needs. He needs me to take care of him now, to show him I’m not going anywhere. He pushes his seat back to make room for me in his lap, wrapping his arms around me as I sink into his embrace. He gives me a gentle squeeze, sighing.
“She stopped coming home for days on
end, and I went to see our friends. They told me she was off somewhere—that she’d been coming around a lot lately. I had no idea. I got … very upset. I asked if she’d been doing drugs. They said yes, like it was no big deal. They were my friends. Why hadn’t they told me? Or tried to stop her? All of them were so fucked up. Addicts.”
He swallows audibly. “She came home that night, and I looked at her, really looked. Her skinny arms and vacant eyes. And that swollen belly she took with her whenever she left my sight. She was hurting our baby and I couldn’t do a thing about it. I lost it. I just lost it.”
I sniff quietly, my eyes welling up with tears. I’ve never heard his voice like this before—so raw.
“I screamed at her. I called her awful names. I threw things. I accused her of fucking her drug dealer. I knew he’d want payment for whatever he was giving her, and she didn’t have a dime. She didn’t deny it. She screamed right back at me, hitting me and pushing me. Said she couldn’t be a mother, that I hadn’t given her a choice, that I was forcing this life on her. She didn’t want it, didn’t want me.”
I can’t hold back my tears, but I do my best not to sob, not wanting to interrupt him.
“She was right. I never asked her what she wanted. I only saw what I wanted. I realize that now, but back then I didn’t. All I could see was her betrayal. I hated her, and I told her as much. I was so angry with her. She ran out. I didn’t follow.”
He draws a shaky breath. “It only took me a couple minutes to realize what I’d done. It wasn’t just Donna who left—she carried our baby. I looked for her, but nothing. My former friends wouldn’t help. I filed a missing person’s report and walked all over the city, handing out flyers with her name and picture on it. I was sick with worry.”
He clears his throat above me, and I reach up to rest my hand on his shoulder.
“About a week later, in the middle of the night, I woke up to screaming—hers. I remember seeing the drug dealer above me, his face partly in the shadows, and the flash of the knife a moment before he started stabbing me. I managed to roll away from him, and he mostly hit my side. All the while, Donna was screaming at him, telling him she’d already found my money, begging him to stop. At least I know she didn’t want him to kill me.”
He shudders, his breaths coming faster. “The pain was excruciating. I think I blacked out. I made it into the hallway somehow, and a neighbor found me and called 9-1-1. There was so much blood; I thought I was going to die. Sometimes I wake up and I can still feel the blood clinging to my clothes, to my skin. I can still smell it.”
“Oh my God.” I can’t stop myself from whimpering as I cling to him.
“I was still in the hospital recovering when I got word that she’d OD’d. And the baby … they tried a C-section, but …”
“Oh, no.” I cry, stroking his head. There’s nothing I can say to make this better, but I try just the same. “I’m here. I’m here, Simon.”
“I held him.” His voice cracks. “He was so little, but so beautiful—even with all the wires and the mask on his face. And he was strong. He fought to live. He wanted to live. I held him and he lived for almost two hours. And I whispered to him that I loved him, that I was his dad, that I wanted him more anything in the world. I held him until they made me let go.”
“I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry,” I whisper, holding him tighter. No wonder he reacted so strongly when Luke was sick, no wonder he rejected the idea of being in a real relationship for so long, and no wonder he got a vasectomy. After experiencing such a profound loss I’m amazed he survived at all.
He’s silent for a long time, his breaths tickling my neck. “I buried them together,” he says, his voice hoarse. “She didn’t want him, but I couldn’t bear the thought of him being all alone in the dark. Do you think that was right of me?”
I nod, pressing my lips against the top of his head. “You did everything right. It wasn’t your fault, any of it. You did everything you could to help her. There are just some things you can’t control, no matter how hard you try, even if it’s unfair and not right at all.”
“I know,” he whispers. He turns his head away, wiping at his face. Eventually, his stuttering breaths even out.
“Thank you for telling me,” I whisper.
“Now you know what kind of man I am,” he says, his voice sounding hollow. “The kind who tries to control the people he loves, who loses his temper and drives them away.”
“That’s not who you are,” I say softly, tracing his features with my fingertips. “There’s nothing wrong with wanting control. It makes you feel safe. I didn’t leave because you wanted to control me. I felt safe within your control. You’re good and strong, Simon. You survived, and I’m so grateful you did.”
He hugs me to him. “I thought about ending it all. After I buried them, I wanted to die too. But I realized if I were gone, there wouldn’t be anyone left to remember him, to love him. He may as well never have been born.” He draws a deep breath. “It’s been so many years, but I still think about him every day. I remember.”
“You’ll always be his dad,” I whisper. “He was loved.”
He nods, his eyelids fluttering as wetness coats his long lashes. “It happened on Christmas. I’d bought presents, even though he wasn’t due until February. I’ve never celebrated since. After the funeral, I left. I went back to the apartment for some papers and a photo album, but I left everything else behind.”
“The Indiana Jones movies. You said you had them once, but not anymore.”
“I lost everything. I had no one. I studied. I worked. I found … distractions. But I never had anyone until I met you.” He opens his eyes and looks at me. “You made me feel again. You and Luke. I didn’t want to, and I fought it hard, but it didn’t work. I thought I could keep it all separate, that I wouldn’t cross any lines. You and Luke downstairs, me upstairs. I thought I could control everything, setting up the rules of our arrangement.” He moves closer, touching his forehead to mine. “But you didn’t just move into my house. You moved into my heart, both of you.”
“Simon,” I whisper, leaning in to kiss him softly. “It was the same for me. I tried to convince myself I shouldn’t care for you, and I tried to fight my feelings. It didn’t work.”
He smiles, rubbing his nose against mine. “What a pair we make.”
I return the smile, hesitating for a second. “What was different about me? Why did you invite me to your house that first night? Was it because I reminded you of Donna?”
He exhales. “In a way, yes. There’s no real resemblance. It was the look in your eyes as you left that club. I recognized that look—sad and lost. You were so thin and pale, but beautiful too.”
“Do I still remind you of her?”
“No,” he says immediately. “I thought you were troubled and frail, but I couldn’t have been more wrong. You’re strong and capable, sweet and gentle. I can’t tell you how happy I was to realize that, knowing you wouldn’t be as reckless as she was. And when I found out about Luke, how you’d do anything to take care of your son … I was in awe of you. Complete awe. I thought I could help you, maybe even save you, but it turned out to be the other way around. So, no. You don’t remind me of her at all. That’s not why I want to be with you, Abigail.”
“I understand your need for control a lot better now, why you needed me the way you did.”
He hums in agreement. “What happened to me—I never want to feel that helpless again. Having you at my beck and call, knowing you’d do whatever I told you to, it was a complete rush. It’s why I wanted an arrangement in the first place, one where I called all the shots. A real relationship isn’t like that. I know that I’ll have to give up control and trust you to make your own decisions.”
“Can you?” I ask softly.
“Yes. I know I can trust you. Please just be patient with me?” He kisses the tip of my nose. “You know what they say about teaching an old dog new tricks.”
I smile. “I like your old t
ricks too. We’ll figure out the balance together.”
He turns serious. “Abigail, in the spirit of honesty, you need to know. Being with me comes with … difficulties.”
“What do you mean?”
“My therapist thinks I have post-traumatic stress disorder, and my issues aren’t just going to disappear—even with therapy.” He holds my gaze, continuing. “I have triggers—that’s what she calls them. Christmas is one of them. Sharing a bed is another. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to …” He trails off, his tension evident on his face, in its lines.
“I hurt you,” he whispers, “that night Luke was sick, and I fell asleep in his room. When you tried to wake me, I hurt you. I didn’t mean to, and I’m so sorry, but it happened. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to sleep with you, as much as I want to. Can you live with that?” He scoffs and continues before I can reply, “Can I even ask you to live with that? A life with no Christmas and separate bedrooms, not to mention all my other issues.”
“Hey,” I say softly, “none of this is that much of a surprise.”
He blinks, bemused.
“I already knew you had a good reason for the sleeping arrangements, and as for the Christmas thing, I just wish you would’ve told me. We never would have decorated your house if I’d known. It was meant as a happy surprise for you, to show you what it’s like not to come home to an empty house after a long trip. I wanted to show you how much I care about you, how much Luke cares. And you’re not a violent person, Simon. When you pushed me away, I was more startled than hurt and I haven’t thought of it since. I’m not afraid of being close to you.”
He exhales. “That night, I was already on edge. We left things in such a bad place before I went away, and I didn’t know what to expect when I got home. I was going to apologize to you.”
“You were?” I ask.
“Yes. I felt awful. You gave me so much of yourself the night before I went away. You let me push your limits without hesitation.”
“I liked it. All of it.” I blush, remembering all the things we did.