“She wants you for herself,” I say. “She doesn’t want to lose you to someone like me.”
“Lose me?” he huffs. “The only thing I’m mad at her about right now is how she’s treating you.”
I lay my hand on his thigh.
“Thanks for caring,” I say barely above a whisper.
“It’s less than you deserve,” he says gruffly.
My fingers tighten involuntarily. “No, it isn’t!”
Chris’s expression sharpens. “Tully, you have to stop criticizing yourself like that. I know you’ve been hurt but you’re a beautiful person and I’m thanking God that I met you.”
Well, shit.
I sit up, pull the blanket up around my shoulders, feeling suddenly exposed. “I’m not fishing for compliments, Chris. I’m being serious.”
He pulls his arm back to his side and stares out at the flickering lights of our town, his jaw hardened in anger. “That’s exactly what I’m talking about,” he says flatly. “This town has made you believe you’re worthless, and you’re not.”
“Listen,” I insist, “I meant it when I said thanks. You’re nice to me. You’re nice to everyone. It’s admirable.” He snorts, but doesn’t speak, so I keep going. “But honestly? I think you need to cut your mom some slack. She’s worried about me rubbing off on you. It isn’t out of the realm of possibility that she’s right.”
He gives me an incredulous look. “I can’t believe you’re sticking up for her.”
“I’m not sticking up for her. I’m telling you she’s onto something!”
“What?” he snaps. “That you’ve had it rough? That you swear? So what! You’re the least pretentious person I know. You’re funny and smart. You treat me like I’m worthwhile, even though no one treats you that way. You’ve probably had to deal with more crap in your life than she has in all of hers, and she’s acting like you’re some kind of . . . of sickness I might catch.”
I shut my mouth for a second because he’s nailed it. Nailed that feeling in my stomach. That certainty in my head.
I’m not sick. I’m a sickness.
“No, Tully. No. Don’t you dare.”
My head snaps up. “Don’t what?”
Chris leans in. “Don’t tell yourself that she’s right. Don’t convince yourself you’re what’s wrong here. You aren’t. Not to me.”
“You know so little about me, Chris. Honestly—”
“Honestly, nothing! Geez, you’re so upfront and black-and-white about everyone else. Why can’t you see yourself that clearly, too?”
“I do.”
“No, you don’t,” he growls. “It’s like . . . it’s like you look in the mirror and see some kind of monster.”
Not a monster. A flesh-eating virus. A cancer. Ever since That Man . . .
“You don’t understand,” I start. He opens his mouth, but I keep going. “I know what you’re saying, what you’re trying to do. But you really don’t get it, Chris. You see the world differently. I know, because I used to, too.”
His face darkens. “Are you patronizing me?”
I groan and drop my head. “No. Just . . . my life used to look different, okay? When my Mom was around, things weren’t like this. I was happy. And my house wasn’t a dump. And my parents, I mean, yeah, they fought and stuff. But they loved each other. We lived like normal people back then. We even went to church sometimes. I was a good kid.”
He winces. “You still are.”
“No, Chris.” I’m firm. “I’m not. And I’m okay with that. But I get why your mom is worried. Because I would lead you down the trail if I could. You must have figured that out by now?” I make my tone somewhat playful, but I’m serious.
His hand comes up to my hair. “The fact that you’d sleep with me . . . that isn’t a bad thing,” he says softly. “Trust me, if I thought we could do that without it completely screwing everything up, I wouldn’t be arguing with you.”
I shake my head. “Sometimes . . .” I can’t make my voice more than a whisper. “Sometimes I think you can’t want me as much as I want you,” I admit. “I wouldn’t be able to say no if you said yes.”
“Tully, I’ve never wanted anyone the way I want you. It’s the only reason I can wait. I refuse to mess this up.” I think he’s going to kiss me, but instead his eyebrows knit together. “That’s why tonight made me so mad. Mom’s not trusting me to do this right. To take care of you.”
The darkness in his voice bothers me. “She’s afraid for you,” I say. “She loves you.” And she knows you don’t understand enough about people like me yet.
“But she needs to accept that I love you,” he answers quietly, then rushes on when I tense. “I mean, I think I do. I’ve never felt this way before.” Then he looks at me, apparently unashamed that he’s dropped a stealth bomb of infinite proportions.
I freeze, my mind a riot of jangling alarm bells. He thinks he loves me.
“Don’t be scared, Tully. I’m not expecting . . .” He waves a hand. “It isn’t . . . It isn’t anything except the truth. I know you aren’t there yet, and that’s okay. But I want you to know I’m in with both feet, okay?”
I’m searching him. How can he do this? Doesn’t he know what he’s saying?
“Chris . . .”
But he rushes into my hesitation. “You won’t talk me out of it,” he says quietly. “Whatever this is, it’s real, Tully. I’m here and I’m not going anywhere.”
Then he kisses me.
The kiss is long and deep, and I am lost in the rush of his breath mingling with mine, tingling at the warmth of his hand sliding up my arm to tangle his fingers into my hair. His chest is smooth and firm under my palms, and I inhale the piney scent of him, burying my nose in his collarbone when he drags his lips along my neck. He gives a tiny groan as I slide my hands to his nape and let my skin tell him the truth I can’t find words for.
I’m lost in him, and I can feel him losing himself in me—warmth and light seeping in through my palms, heating its way up my veins, into my heart, as if I can absorb his good. I shiver with the deliciousness of it, and he pulls me closer.
I want more.
I should stop him, stop both of us, because we’re giving now; giving ourselves. Giving up. I should push him away for his own sake. But I can’t. And then he’s pushing me down, fencing me in.
Desire for him runs down my arms and pools in my belly and, Lordy, I want him. I curl myself around him and resolve never to let go again. And because I can’t find words, I want him to have my feelings. I want him to understand my truth. I cup my hands on the back of his neck and will myself to give. For the first time, as I begin pouring out of my skin, I don’t hold back. I don’t try to block it. I don’t will myself to shut down.
Instead, I let go. I revel in the feeling of how incredible he is, of how wonderful he makes me feel. I linger over the fear that he’ll leave, and the hope that he won’t.
“Tully,” he whispers urgently against the skin of my neck.
I let myself—let Chris—feel it all, and then, as if there were a glass wall around my heart, the barrier shatters and the tiny shards fall away. In the space left behind, I feel Chris. His love. His fear. His need.
It’s cloudy and faint, at first, like a memory. But it sharpens until it’s all I feel. I gasp. But even in my shock and fear, he’s still there. And his heart is singing to mine. Chris’s kiss becomes frenzied. There are no barriers now. Everything we feel surges through our entwined palms, my dark touch suddenly shot through with his light. With his love.
Chris grunts and stops kissing me, but he’s still pressed against me. His forehead rests on mine, his hands frame my face. We’re both panting, lungs heaving.
“I love you, Tully,” he says.
I’ve never felt so unfettered. “I think I love you, too,” I whisper against his lips, trying to
ignore the tears gathering in the corners of my eyes. His smile is so wide, so open, it takes my breath away.
“This is it, Tully,” he whispers. “This is our Always.” He touches one of my tears and brushes it away, a hint of sadness marring the light in his expression. “I promise. You have to trust me.”
He’s breaking me apart. I’m left wide open. I drop my face into my hands, lean into his chest, hope he can hold my pieces together. He gathers me in, whispers my name, strokes my hair and my back.
And even though I want him with a fire that could light a city, and even though it’s obvious he wants me, too, somehow it’s enough to just lay there.
Unbidden, Ms. Pine’s words from that first conversation echo in my head.
Trust is something you give. When you put it in the right place, it makes your life better. Easier. When you put it in the wrong place you’re the one who gets hurt.
I’m afraid to hope. Afraid to trust. But I think I’m starting to anyway.
Chapter 23
It’s after one in the morning when Chris strokes my hair and sighs.
“We need to get home.”
Home. Inwardly I flinch. I don’t want to move from this place. I don’t want to share him with anyone else, ever.
He pushes himself up on his elbow, leans over me, pushes the hair back off my face with gentle fingers. I put my palm to his cheek, because we’re there, and let him feel my fear.
Chris winces. “I know you’re scared,” he murmurs. “I am, too. Seems like it’s a good thing that neither of us wants the other to leave. But I’ll admit I kind of knew I wouldn’t get slapped down for telling you I love you,” he says with a grin.
“How could you be so sure?” I ask, wondering if there’s a secret to his confidence that I can steal.
“Because when you touch me I feel you, Tully. Even the stuff I think maybe you don’t know you’re feeling. I could . . . I could feel you falling for me.”
I take my hand back and cover my face, embarrassed.
“Stop. Stop it,” he says, mock irritated. Taking my hand from my face, he twines our fingers, then lowers our hands until they rest between us. “You’ve got to believe me. This can’t work if you’re waiting for me to leave.”
He’s being honest. So I will, too. “I do expect that. But I’m also hoping I’m wrong.” He shifts, but I plow on. “Let me finish. I know you mean what you’re saying. I believe you.” I’m still holding his hand, so he knows I’m not lying. “But I also know that there’s so much you don’t understand. I always screw this stuff up. Always. And it’s not like we’re prime candidates for a relationship.”
His expression is serious. “But I think we are. Opposites attract and all that.”
I roll my eyes. “That isn’t what I meant, and you know it.”
“It only has to work once.”
“What?”
“Us. We only have to work once. You said you always screw stuff up. Well, you haven’t screwed up with me. And I’m not going to let you. And I want you to stop letting yourself. It’s like . . . like a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you keep thinking it’ll happen, it will. You’ll leave because you’ll convince yourself you have to.”
I shake my head again. “I’m not leaving you. Not ever.” I’m too selfish to willingly walk away from this. From him. But I know the day will come when he’ll be the one to turn his back. And that’s the way it should be.
He shouldn’t be with someone like me.
“There, that right there,” he says, his fingers tightening around mine. “What were you thinking? I keep getting this . . . darkness.”
I accept defeat. I sit up, take my hands back, and kiss him softly, letting my tongue linger on his lower lip. His breathing quickens immediately, but he doesn’t relax.
“You won’t distract me from this, you know,” he says.
I put a hand on his firm shoulder. “I’m not trying to distract you. I’m accepting that we see this differently. So . . . show me.”
“Show you what?”
“Show me that you’re right. If you’re right, it doesn’t matter. I won’t ever leave, and you won’t either. We’ll have our . . . Something.”
He touches my cheek. “I will.” He hesitates, then, “But we’ll have to make a deal.”
“What’s that?”
“If things get bad and you can’t talk about it, you have to hold my hand.”
I balk. “What?”
He gives me a look. “I get it, Tully. Some of what you’re dealing with, it’s awful. You don’t want to talk about it. And that’s okay. But if you want me to show you that I’m not leaving, you have to be willing to let me in so you can see that I’ll stick around even when it’s hard.”
I blink, terrified.
“That’s it, right there,” he says softly.
“What?”
“Whatever you’re afraid of, what’s holding you back. So I need to touch you. I need to know that you’re okay. That you can handle what you aren’t talking about. It’s the only way I’ll know when you need my help.”
My throat tightens. I’ve never had anyone want to get inside my head. My heart. I mean, even Rudy—who wanted to touch me—only wanted to do it when I was high. But Chris, solid as an oak tree, stares at me, waiting for me to agree to let him in. To all of it.
“I’m not sure,” I say honestly. I’m not sure he can handle it. That he’ll want to.
“That’s why you have to let me do it,” he whispers. “So I can show you.”
I nod. Even though I’m so not sure. But I forgot we were already holding hands.
Chris chuckles. “Always the pessimist, Tully,” he says. “I’ll show you. I promise.”
~
He drives me home and we kiss again in the driveway.
“I forgot to put the new carburetor in Nigel today,” he says.
“Tomorrow?” I’d rather spend it like this. I’ve got a hand on his neck and he laughs.
“Yeah, tomorrow.” Then he turns to me and I feel him. Every tomorrow. Only with you.
I slide out of the Jeep and wave him off. I’m so wrapped up in the giddiness of it all, I forget to pay attention to whether Dad’s truck is outside. When I walk in the door, there are lights on but no sound.
“Hello?” I call hesitantly down the hallway, the burden of this house and my life settling slowly back into place. “You home?”
No answer. I sigh with relief and head into my room to get changed.
—Crack!
My eyes fly wide as my head connects with the hollow drywall, sending a clang through my skull. At first I think maybe the ceiling in my crumbling house has finally fallen in.
Then I see a twisted, unshaven jaw, and I’m bathed in a cloud of stale alcohol and sweat. Dad’s in my face, his hand clawed into my hair. “You’re late. You been out with a boy again, little slut?” On the last word he yanks my head back into the wall again.
I drop to the floor, grasping at his hands, trying to pry his fingers out of my hair.
“I don’t think so.” He pulls me across the room by my hair. I cry out, certain he’ll pull my scalp off. I scramble to follow him, stumble after him out of the room and down the hall, still trying to get a grip on his wrist to stop the terrible pulling. I can hear my hair tearing out of my scalp, each little hair popping under the strain.
He tugs me into the kitchen, then throws me down next to the stove.
“It’s past dinner. Fix me something!” he snarls, pointing at the stove.
“I don’t . . . what?” I’ve got an arm curled over my head to stop him grabbing my hair again. But it doesn’t work. He grabs another handful, lower down this time, and shakes me by it.
“I said fix me some food!” he roars.
Noises creak from my throat. I’m trying to get to my feet—to obey him,
or fight back, I’m not sure—but my scalp shrieks and there’s a terrible ripping sound.
Dad’s standing over me, feet splayed, a thin rope of my hair dangling out of his clenched fist, his shoulders heaving. He sneers, and my self-loathing punches at me. Then the rage arrives. It makes me want to hit him so hard I shatter his teeth.
But the part of me that’s still a little girl wants to cry and plead with him to stop because he’s hurting me and he’s my dad.
He leans down. I flinch, but keep an eye on him through the gap between my arms. My breath rasps in and out, too shallow.
“Get up.” He glares. The pale strands hanging from his fingers flutter every time he moves, stuck to the rough and calloused skin on his hands. I don’t think he even notices.
Slowly, slowly, I shift to my knees, then my feet. But I’m too scared to stand up straight. Too scared he’s trying to trick me. I wrap my arms around my knees, hugging myself to keep my ribs protected.
Then he’s in my face, bloodshot eyes wide. “This is my house and I’m hungry, you understand?” He spits, tiny drops of saliva landing on my cheeks and chin. He stands up straight.
I flinch. “Y-yes.”
“Good,” he growls.
I relax. Just the tiniest bit. Because I think he’s going away.
“Do your whoring on your own time,” he mutters, then he backhands me into the edge of the countertop.
Chapter 24
The next morning consciousness arrives in stages. I’m aware that I’m not sleeping anymore and that I don’t want to move. There’s pain, and it takes a moment to remember how bad it is, and whether I need to take my time before I get out of bed. But after the fog of sleep clears, I remember clearly. I reach for the spot on my head that’s stinging, and wince.
The wince makes my face throb.
The rest of me is fine.
I drag myself out of bed and tiptoe across the floor and down the hall, careful not to wake Dad. It isn’t until I click the light on in the bathroom and catch sight of myself that I curse. There’s a dramatic purple smudge under my left eye, punctuated by a thin red line where the edge of the counter split the skin.
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