Rowen exhaled. “Now that I believe.”
She could still make me laugh, even when I’d hit rock bottom. “That’s a relief.”
She lifted her head from my chest to look me in the eyes. It had only been a few days since I’d last looked into them, but it had seemed like years. Hers still looked the same, although I knew the ones she was looking into didn’t. “I’m not going to ask you what’s going on, Jesse, because I have a good idea. A really, really good idea, and most of it’s all thanks to me. I know what I did wrong, I just want to know how to make it right.”
From the looks of it, she’d gotten about as much sleep as I had the past few nights. She was still beautiful, of course, but everything that had happened had taken a toll on her. “Please, Jesse, just tell me what I need to do to make this right. I messed up, I f**ked up big time. I never should have kept the internship from you, and I should have known that sorry excuse for a woman was the one who gave birth to you. I should have called more. I should have just hopped on that bus when the hundreds of whims came up. I should have been here more for you. I should have been everything you’ve been to me. I should have been more careful to not make such a nasty mess with us like I knew I was prone to do. I should have done so many things differently, but I can’t change that. I can’t change the past. So, please, tell me . . . how can I change the future? What can I do to make this all right?”
Her words alone were enough to bring a man to his knees, but her expression was what made me feel like my heart had just been ripped from my chest. Her whole face was twisted with agony and one tear fell from the corner of her eye, and I wanted to die right there. I wanted to die before I had to watch another one slip from her eyes.
“You don’t need to worry about making anything right, Rowen, because you didn’t do anything wrong.” I couldn’t look at her face and keep talking, so I focused on the wall behind her.
Her head whipped from side to side. “Please don’t say I didn’t do anything wrong. That’s just as bad as you saying you’re fine.”
“It’s true.”
“No, it’s not.”
“It is.” I didn’t mean to upset her, but I clearly was.
“Keeping the internship from you?”
I stared holes into the wall and answered, “I understand why you did it.”
“Bringing you face to face with that woman again?”
I bit the inside of my cheek. “You couldn’t have known who she was.”
Every word I said appeared to be making her angrier. I didn’t understand why. All I was trying to do was lift the guilt she’d taken when I should have been me to bear it.
“And what about the times I missed your calls, or couldn’t come out to see you, or had to work when you were in town? What about all of the times I had something else to do when I should have made you the priority?” Rowen’s default when she didn’t want to cry was to get angry. I still hadn’t figured out how to distinguish between genuine anger and masked sadness.
“You were busy. I understand.” I shrugged and dropped my eyes.
“Stop it, Jesse. Do me a favor and cut the act out.” Rowen shoved my chest and broke free from my arms. “Why are you pretending like nothing’s happened? Why are you pretending like none of this is a big deal?”
“Why? Why am I pretending?” I wasn’t touching her, and all of the darkness I’d been holding back came flooding in.
“Yes, that’s what I asked.”
“I’m not pretending for me, Rowen. I’ve already lived through it all. I’m pretending for you.”
“Oh, in that case . . . why don’t you stop pretending and give it to me straight? I’ve been through some shit in my life too, Jesse. Stop protecting me from whatever it is you’ve been through and what you’re going through now and tell me already! I can handle it!” She hadn’t started out shouting, but about halfway through, that changed.
I tried to keep my voice controlled, but it quivered instead. “You think you can handle it? You really think you can handle it?”
She lifted her arms at her sides. “I’m ready.”
“You’re ready to hear that the first memory I have of the woman who should have been my mother is her hitting me across the face with a cheese grater? You’re ready to hear how my first memory of the man who should have been my father was him stopping his wife from drowning me in a five gallon bucket of water because he didn’t want the trouble of disposing of my body?”
To Rowen’s credit, she’d started out with her shoulders squared and her chin high, but with each word out of my mouth, she crumbled a bit more. There simply wasn’t a way to stay strong when discussing those kinds of horrors. Crumbling was the standard response. I was doing it myself.
“You really think you can handle it, Rowen? Because that’s just the tip of the iceberg. That’s the first paragraph of chapter one in the five years I spent at those people’s mercy.”
Lifting her shoulders again, she cleared her expression. “I can handle it.”
I cried out on the inside. Why wouldn’t she just cry mercy and walk away like we both knew she needed to? I wasn’t sure who it was harder on, me or her, but I knew one thing: that kind of openness would either sever our relationship permanently or forever bind us together.
I was, of course, hopeful for the latter, but I knew it was a false hope.
“You can handle knowing that, on the weeks I was actually fed, it was dog kibble tossed on the basement floor, most of it just out of reach from where I was chained to a water pipe? You can handle knowing that I went without a shower for years, and I was so covered in my own filth that the police officer who found me had to run upstairs so he didn’t vomit in front of me? You can handle knowing that the only words I knew until I came here were four letter words I’d never repeat because those were the only words I ever heard? Rowen . . . you can’t handle all of this. No one can.”
She wiped at her eyes. Oh my god, she was being so damn strong, but I knew she was hurting. I could feel the pain sweeping through her. I wanted to wrap her up in my arms and comfort her until my words were erased from her mind. I wanted so much I could never have.
“Neil and Rose figured out a way to handle it. I can too.”
“That’s right. They did. And there isn’t a day that goes by that I’m not overwhelmed with gratitude that those two walked into my life. But the difference is that they knew my background and what they were getting into before falling in love with me. You, though . . . you fell in love with me before you met my demons up close and personal.”
“So did you,” she snapped back. “You fell in love with me before you knew what you were up against, and it didn’t stop you. Don’t act like I’m one of those people who will run at the first sign of a jaded past, Jesse.”
“I know. But look at us now. You’ve moved on from your past, and I’m drowning in mine. And Rowen, mine’s the kind that will take us both down if we let it.”
“I’m stronger than you think I am.” She crossed her arms and stepped toward me.
“And I’m weaker than you think I am.” I stepped back. “All of this has proven that. Don’t be blind to what’s happening. Don’t pretend like you can or even want to handle the shit I’m going through.”
These words, more than any of the others, appeared to really piss her off. Her eyes narrowed. “I can’t fix you. But I’ll be here for you while you fix yourself. And I can handle it. I can handle all of it.”
What more could I say so she got it? I was toxic. I would infect her if she didn’t get out. “You can handle knowing that that woman was so convinced I was possessed by a demon that she used to beat me with a wooden cross until I passed out? You can handle knowing I used to pull three-inch slivers out of myself for days afterward? You can handle knowing that I had one special trinket I guarded so territorially that when one of them came within a few feet of it, I charged them, bit at them, behaved like a wild dog so I could keep my one special thing secret? You can handle knowing that I’d gone without food and water for so long, when I was rescued and taken to the hospital, the doctors could tell where and what ribs had been broken without having to take X-rays?”
Another tear slipped from her eyes. I wanted to stop so badly, but I had to keep going. It was the only way to get her to see me for who I was. “You can handle knowing that those people up and left one day, leaving me for dead, and the only reason I was saved was because someone walking by heard a loud sound and reported it? That sound was me, pounding my head against the water pipe, trying to kill myself. I was trying to kill myself at five years old, Rowen.” My voice was getting louder, my own tears coming to the surface. “That is the man in front of you.”
“Jesse—” she choked out.
“No.” I shook my head vehemently. “No one should be expected to put up with a person with the kind of past I have. No one should have to.” I knew what I had to say, but it didn’t want to come out. I had to take a few breaths and remind myself of all the reasons I needed to say it. “You have to save yourself, Rowen. I’m past the point of saving now.”
One month had changed everything, one month had upended my world. A year ago, I’d been a person who’d moved on from my horrendous past to claim a hopeful future. A year later, I was a person about to be swallowed up by my past with no foreseeable future. I’d been a fool to expect I could put it all behind me. I’d been an even bigger one to believe I had.
After another tear fell from her eyes, Rowen glared at me. “You know, I recognize a pushing away act from a hundred feet, Jesse. You should know that since you were the one who called me out on it.” She marched toward me. She didn’t stop until her chest bumped into mine. “Now it looks like I’m the one calling you out on the same thing. So I’ll repeat your words back to you . . . Don’t push me away, Jesse Walker. I’m not going anywhere.”
A woman like her was every man’s dream. A woman who couldn’t be shaken and would stand shoulder to shoulder in the face of a storm. I’d found that kind of woman and, beyond all belief, she loved me. And I had to let her go.
I had to let her go because I loved her.
That was what I reminded myself of when I cleared my face and met her eyes. “I’m not pushing you away, Rowen. I just want you to leave.”
There was the turning point. There was her resolve crumbling in front of me. She was about to fall apart. I didn’t think there was room for it, but I managed to hate myself a little bit more in that moment.
“You’re just saying that. You’re trying to hurt me and push me away because this is your twisted idea of protecting me.” Taking a deep breath, she looked up at me and her hardened expression fell. “I’m not leaving you until you can look me in the eye and tell me you don’t want me anymore.”