“It’s fine, Nox. I know you came here for something,” Zoe said, obviously still annoyed.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
She waved me off.
“Just ask what you want,” Zoe said sharply.
I had come here to ask Zoe a question, figuring that if we were never going to acknowledge “the night” then maybe we could still be friends. That didn’t appear to be the case; Zoe seemed to be harboring some resentment unrelated to Dean. Zoe was my first real friend, and somewhere along the way I’d screwed that up.
“What is it?” Zoe prompted me.
“I . . . um . . .” I eyed my suitcase. It had fallen over to its side because I had once again overstuffed it with every contingency item I could manage. I wanted to pick it up and run to Vic’s. I wanted to Google “how to be a good friend” and then come knocking on Zoe’s door afresh. I had been stupid to think that Zoe and I could go back to the way we were. What had been the way we were, anyway? Apparently, Zoe felt we had had a shitty friendship.
“Nox, just spill,” Zoe said.
“How are you happy?” I blurted out. Here goes nothing right? I already have the reputation of a selfish taker, so I may as well get some advice before she cuts me out of her life altogether.
She and Lissie had been dating since I introduced them at the bar. I’d seen their relationship statuses change on social media. They posted pictures of themselves together—cooking dinner, out on the town, curled up on a couch eating popcorn. Their relationship was going well; they were happy together. Happy. I only understand the meaning of that word from reading the dictionary entry.
Zoe squinted her eyes, puzzled. “What?”
“How are you happy?” I repeated. “Before Dean—” I caught myself, realizing this was the first time Dean had been mentioned since that night. Quickly, I started over. “Uh, before when I’ve had boyfriends, everything would be going great, but I felt compelled to break up with them, because I was convinced there might be something better. Like, I would think to myself, ‘this can’t be all that’s out there.’”
Zoe raised her eyebrows.
“I know. It sounds so egotistical.”
“No, it sounds naive.”
It was my turn to raise eyebrows. I’d been called a lot of things, but naive had never been one of them.
Zoe continued. “Love, life, they aren’t fairy tales. You don’t meet a man (or a woman), fall in love, and live happily ever after. Happiness is constant work. If you want to be happy, you have to work for it every day.”
I nodded my head, processing, disbelieving. How is it possible that happiness is work? It was contrary to everything that I had been told, contrary to everything that the world put out. Happiness was something that happened. One minute you were sad, and the next moment everything fell into place. You weren’t supposed to have to continually work for happiness. If you were sad, something was wrong with you. You took pills, or you changed your friends, or you changed your significant other. I told her as much.
Zoe shook her head vehemently.
“God, no! That’s why this world is so fucked up. Everyone is so goddamn lazy.” Zoe wrung her hands together. “Sorry, I mean, we’ll work for everything but happiness. We’ll work for a car or we’ll even work for a boob job, but we won’t work for happiness. Because we think that working for everything else will make us happy. But when it doesn’t? We switch gears. ‘Maybe it wasn’t a boob job I needed, maybe I need a nose job.’ ‘Maybe it wasn’t a new car I needed, maybe I need a new house.’ So on and so forth until we are up to our eyeballs in debt and just plain miserable. Divorces upon divorces, debt upon debt. It happened to my parents. It’s happening to my siblings.” Zoe paused, apparently thinking about something. Probably her siblings.
I didn’t even know she had siblings, some kind of friend I am.
“It’s happening to me,” I mumbled. I looked up at her, nonplussed and completely out of whack. “What do I do?”
“Be grateful.” Zoe bit her lip. “Try to look at what you have instead of what you don’t have. Cherish the moments when you are truly happy.”
“What if there is something or someone out there that will make me happier?” I remembered how I decided to drop out of school because I didn’t think it would make me happy. Instead I picked up event planning. I remembered all the boyfriends I’d left, thinking I’d find better ones. But if I hadn’t left them, I wouldn’t have found Vic. So, wouldn’t that mean if I left Vic, I’d find someone better? I rubbed my hands over my face.
“There is always going to be someone or something else,” Zoe said, entirely serious. “The world is huge. There are over seven billion people on the planet. The idea of soul mates is absurd. You will find someone who will love you and who you will love back if you’re looking for that someone. But will you be happy? That’s up to you, doll.”
I absorbed her words. She was right. I would always find something or someone, but that doesn’t mean it would be better than what I had now. It just meant that I would find it.
“Zoe, you should be a therapist,” I said, utterly serious.
“No way,” Zoe said, laughing.
“Why? You’re great at it.” This was the most eye-opening conversation I’d had in a long time. And I’d had a lot of therapists try to help me figure out how to be “happy.”
“I really wanted to smack you when I opened the door and saw you there. I don’t think good therapists hit their clients.”
I shrugged. “Some do.”
Zoe’s jaw dropped.
“I’m kidding! Well, sort of.” I twiddled my thumbs, wondering where to go from here. Zoe had just given me great advice and proven to be a great friend, again. I was a mooch and basket case, again.
“Really, thank you, Zoe. I’ll be a much better friend from here on out. I just need a little help.” The words came out on their own volition; it startled me. I just need a little help. It was almost exactly what Vic had said. He wasn’t good at love and he had fucked up with me, taking me for granted. I suddenly saw how easy it was to take for granted someone you cared about deeply. I had been doing it with Zoe, after all. It was so easy to throw stones until you realized you were living in a glass house.
“It’s not as romantic as you might think.” Before I could say anything in response, Vic continued. “I left my parent’s house. I was seventeen with no GED and nowhere to go, so I enlisted with the army. I thought I could do a tour and then go to college on a G.I. Bill. They’d pay my way, and then I could get a career and a family. I don’t know. Some American Dream bullshit.”
“And that didn’t happen?” I blurted out, stating the obvious.
“What the fuck do you think?” Vic asked.
I recoiled at his harshness, looking away.
Vic sighed. “No, Lennox.” He sighed again. “No, it didn’t.”
I turned to look at him. He was staring out the window, but whatever he was looking at, I couldn’t see it.
“I was plucked out of my squad and the rest is history, er, classified. Fuck.” Vic stood up and poured himself a drink. He stopped when the glass was half full with alcohol then appeared to reconsider and poured the glass all the way up.
“Do you like your job?” I asked, unable to stop myself. Sitting on the couch that had been my bed for the last few days, I wanted to know everything about him. Like the pillow I clutched to my chest, Vic kept even the simplest of answers locked tight.
Vic stared at the murky, brown liquid in his cup before taking a long swig. After he was finished, let out a resounding ahh and then answered,
“I thought I did.”
I had moved in with Vic. It wasn’t passionate kisses and hot, steamy, sex. It was me on the couch and Vic in his bed. Long, awkward silences engulfed us while we figured out how to navigate the situation.
I don’t know what I’d imagined it was going to be like. Just because Vic professed his love for me and I had (secretly) forgiven him, we were going to monkey fuc
k our way into a fairy tale? Yes, actually, that’s kind of what I imagined.
That didn’t happen, obviously. This was our first conversation in four days. Four days. He’d found me examining one of his guns (with my eyes only; my hands were behind my back). Vic promptly launched into the story of how he’d joined the army and became a big-bad commando dude.
It’s not that we hadn’t seen each other in four days, we had. We just hadn’t said anything. There was one time that I walked into the bathroom and found him naked. Dear God, the color of my cheeks on that day. But did we say anything? No. The moment just evolved into yet another elephant in the room. At the rate we’re going, we’ll have enough elephants for our very own African wildlife sanctuary.
I wanted this conversation to keep going. Forever. I wanted us to be like before, where we could talk and talk, and I could bare my insides to him and not care that he saw my gross guts. At this point, I would give up kissing him forever if that meant we could at least have our conversations again. Living with him, being so close to him, yet feeling like he was on another goddamn planet, was torture.
“Are you trying to torture me?” I blurted out before I could stop myself. I wasn’t very good at the whole think-before-you-speak thing, which was kind of ironic, considering how much time I spent in my head.
Vic looked like he’d been smacked in the face. I was getting used to seeing that expression on him. It happened a lot when he talked to me.
“What?” he asked.
“You say you love me. You force me to live with you. Then you tell me to sleep on the couch, and you don’t talk to me for four whole days. What the hell, man? I thought you said you were going to be better? This is agony.”
I like to fancy myself somewhat of a tough girl. I listen to tough music, I’ve been through a harsh life, I can handle my shit. With Vic, however, I’m silly putty. I soften and mold into his hands. It’s annoying. I can’t take much more of it, I’ll tell you that. I rarely give someone a chance, much less two chances. Vic is staring down the barrel of his second chance and he’s fucking it up. Fucking me up. And I’m letting him.
“Agony?” Vic whispered. He scooted next to me, setting his empty glass down on the table. Absentmindedly, I thought about coasters. His table was spotless, no glass rings anywhere. Vic had just sat a glass down with no coaster. He was going to stain his pristine table.
I nodded, too embarrassed to look at him.
“Hey,” Vic said, tilting my chin toward him. “I told you I’m no good at this. I need help. I don’t like the idea of you in agony, babe.” Vic lifted me up and settled me on his lap, his chin resting on the top of my head.
Once again, Vic had surprised me with his tenderness. He undid my clasp on the pillow. My arms felt empty without something to hold, but then he started to stroke them tenderly.
I struggled for words. Before Vic, I had never been one to show weakness. Now, even struggling with vulnerability somehow makes me look more vulnerable. Ain’t that a bitch?
“Have these past days been okay for you?” I finally managed to get out.
“Hell, no!” Vic exclaimed. I jumped at his loud voice, banging my head on the underside of Vic’s chin. Vic readjusted me so I wouldn’t make him bite his tongue if I jumped again. “I want you in my bed not on the couch.”
“So why haven’t you done anything about it?” I probed.
“I don’t know what I’m doing, babe,” Vic murmured. “I don’t know what we’re doing. I was taking your lead and you were leading quiet.”
I frowned. “Well, I don’t know what I’m doing either.” Everything had become so fucking confusing. I don’t know if what I’m feeling is real. I was fucked from years of therapists telling me that my emotions were fictions created by my own delusions. Anytime I got angry, sad, mad, even happy, a therapist would step in and tell me that my emotions were not my own. They were the result of my mental illnesses. There was an emotional flatline that I needed to maintain. It was the ideal.
I have only ever had one therapist that actually helped me. She taught me that my emotions were not something to ignore, nor were they fictitious. My emotions were a biological and chemical part of me, and they existed to help me. I needed to stop trying to figure them out, stop trying to control them; I just needed to learn to recognize them and not let them control me. Easier said than done, though, right?
Especially since that therapist only lasted about two months. She moved or some shit, something to do with real life. And then, I was back to being told I was delusional and overemotional.
Toward the end of our relationship, I had thoughtlessly shared the “delusional and overemotional” diagnosis with Dean; of course, he promptly used it against me. Dean had a nasty, albeit skilled, habit of making me question my emotions. Anytime I got out of line he would say, “Lennox, you're emotional. I haven’t done anything; this is just your condition making you think I have.” And then I would question myself. If you’ve been told your entire life that what you believe is fake, wouldn’t you question yourself too?
So, here I am with Vic. Maybe he is perfect for me. Maybe he is the one or some fairytale shit like that. But, my decision-making skills and logic have been so utterly gutted over the years that I don’t know. I don’t know up from down, right from wrong, yes from no anymore. People say trust your gut, go with what you feel, but I don’t know what I feel. I shared this with Vic.
Vic opened his mouth to reply, but a new song had come on and with it changed the entire mood of the room. There’d been music playing the whole time we’d been talking, but nothing noteworthy. It was what I called “suped-up elevator music.” It was indie shit that made use of computers and obscure instruments. I hated it, but apparently Vic didn’t, so I hadn’t given it any mind. Besides, I had been busy displaying my heart on Vic’s coffee table and watching it leak blood all over the polished glass.
Anyway, Vic was about to respond to me when this new song came on; try to have a serious conversation when Twisted Sister comes on the radio. Seriously, try it. “We’re Not Gonna Take It” started blaring softly through the speakers, and I couldn’t help but mumble along. It’s too goddamn catchy. I looked at Vic and he was singing along as well. Before I knew it, we were both headbanging and doing our best impersonations of glam rockers.
Vic pulled me off of the couch and twirled me around.
I mock-played a guitar, up to my chest.
“Slappa da bass?” Vic asked, quoting “I Love You Man” and mimicking my horrible air-guitar skills.
I laughed, falling back onto the couch as the song ended. I was hoping another Twisted Sister song would come on, but instead a bluesy folk song I’d never heard started playing.
With that, the moment ended. Vic sat on the couch next to me and pulled my hand in to his own. As he started to stroked the back with his thumb, I mentally prepared for whatever speech he had in store for me. Everyone always has a way to fix me and to make me feel.
“I can’t tell you how to feel,” he said.
I blinked, stunned. That was a first. Remember how I said everyone and their mother had told me how and what to feel?
“But—” Vic continued.
I lowered my eyes, here it was. There was always a catch. I braced myself.
“No, look at me when I say this, Lennox.”
I looked back at Vic. His eyes were starless voids. There was no color, no hint of brown or green, just pitch black. Like a cave with no wind. I shivered.
“But, I can tell you how I feel. I love you Lennox. More than I want to live, more than I care to live, I love you. I’ll love you until you break my heart. I’ll give you the broken pieces of my heart as a goddamn offering to you, because you own it. Whole, shattered, alive, or dead; you own my heart no matter what condition it’s in. I’ll stay with you until you figure out how to feel. I’ll stay with you even if you never do.”
I blinked, breathing his words in. No one had ever made that kind of declaration to me. I didn’t k
now what to say.
“Now, let’s go to bed.” Vic offered his hand, not giving me a chance to respond. I took his hand, letting him lead the way.
Fucking Vic, loving Vic, and living with Vic are all entirely different entities. Fucking Vic is hot, mind-bending, and sometimes universe-expanding. Loving Vic is all-encompassing and at times spine-snapping with its intensity. As for living with Vic, well, let’s just say it’s a journey.
You would not believe the quirks he has.
For instance, a towel can never touch the ground. Ever. If it does, it is immediately put in the laundry hamper. No ten second rule with this guy. A towel cannot be used twice, either. That one I sort of understand, but still, I’m of the “I’m clean when I get out of the shower, so my towel is clean too,” mentality. Sue me. One time, Vic caught me picking up a towel off the ground and putting it on the rack—he almost burst a blood vessel.
However, instead of bursting a vessel, he punished me . . . sexually. Sometimes, I drop towels in his eyesight just so that happens.
Another idiosyncrasy that he has: You can’t let dishes soak. They have to be cleaned and put away the minute you finish using them. What about those stubborn cooked-on cheese and grease stains? Vic doesn’t care. You will stand there and scrub until they come off. No soaking, ever. At least, not in front of him. A lot of my living here consists of doing things without him knowing.
I’ve never been in a healthy relationship before. Dean was my first healthy relationship, and I think we all know how “healthy” that was. I don’t know the rules. Do I tell him everything? Do I tell white lies? This is all new to me. I don’t want to mess anything up with Vic.
Yes, Vic is slightly obsessive-compulsive. Maybe more than slightly. He’s also ridiculously stubborn. He’s trying though. He doesn’t let his anger get out of control around me, and I know better than to push him now. (I’m looking at you, missing dishes).
He gives me a new cellphone every week and takes away the previous one I used. He says it’s a burner phone, something the bad guys can’t track.
You Own Me (Owned Book 1) Page 19