With a sigh of regret, I told her how my mother had made a bad situation even worse. “Mom. She told me the truth. I guess my…sperm donor dad…bagged out when she told him she was pregnant. She never saw him again. It broke her heart…and she hated me for it. I think she hated me more than Dad did.” It hurt to admit that, but I’d always suspected as much. While Dad took it out in physical ways, Mom was always distant. She never helped me when Dad was on one of his rampages. Over the years, she spent more and more time keeping busy outside of the house and said less and less to me. I think the scars I’d received from her had taken a lot longer to heal. If they ever really had.
Her touch full of compassion, Kiera held me and kissed me. It lightened my heart to have her near me while I dug up these old wounds. Some, I’d never really dealt with before. “You never told your father the truth?” she asked. “Maybe he would have been—”
I knew where she was going with that, but I cut her off. “He would never have believed me over her, Kiera. He hated me. I only would have gotten brutally hurt, and I generally tried to avoid that.” He would have chosen to believe Mom over me any day of the week. I could have had the paternity test in my fucking hand, and he still would have said I was wrong. And in a way, I had displayed my true paternity to him every day…the truth of who my father really was was painted all over my face.
“He had to have known anyway,” I mused, after shooting down her suggestion.
“Why?” she asked, surprised.
Recalling old photographs I’d seen, I gave Kiera a sad smile. “I look just like Dad’s best friend…spitting image. Who knows, maybe that’s why he really hated me…Mom too.” The constant reminder of how I’d fucked everything up for all three of them looked me in the mirror every day. And I knew for a fact that some of my parents’ cruelty toward me was purely because of my face. This face, which had gotten me so much attention over the years…had also brought me so much pain. There were times in my life when I would have done anything—anything—to not look the way I did.
Kiera’s face tightened in anger. So did her voice. “You were innocent. It wasn’t your fault.”
I ran both of my hands down her hair to her cheeks, calming her. “I know that, Kiera.” It surprised me, but I felt better after sharing my painful history with her. Sure, I hadn’t gone into all the gory details, but she knew the truth. Someone, finally, knew the truth. “I’ve never told anyone that before. Not Evan, not Denny…no one.”
Underestimating how important she was to me, Kiera asked, “Why did you tell me?”
I smiled as I stared at her. Because I don’t want you to be disturbed by what I’m going to tell you next. “I want you to understand. Can you imagine, growing up in a home filled with such loathing?” Picturing laughter, warmth, and a home full of happiness, I ran a finger down her cheek. “No, I’d imagine you were surrounded by love…”
I needed to move to make my next set of confessions, and honestly, I didn’t want to spend our entire evening in one spot, missing out on the rest of this amazing view, so I stood us up straight, grabbed her hand, and told her to come with me. We walked along the inner railing in silence while I debated how to tell her about my “whoring.”
I supposed, like the rest of my story, I had to start at the beginning. “I was quiet as a child. I kept to myself. I had no real friends to speak of. I had my guitar—that was my closest relationship.” Remembering my isolation, and what I’d done to break free of it, a laugh escaped me. “God, I was pathetic.”
Not agreeing with my self-assessment, Kiera stopped me and grabbed my cheek. “Kellan, you were not—”
Her attempt was appreciated, but unnecessary. Kissing her hand, I removed it from my skin. “No, I was, Kiera.” Resuming our walk, I continued explaining. “Let me clarify…I was pathetically lonely. And then…quite by accident on my part, I assure you…I discovered something that made me feel, for the first time ever…wanted, cared for…almost…loved,” I whispered, remembering the girl who had shown me there was more to life than just pain.
“Sex?” Kiera asked, interpreting my easy reference.
“Hmmm…” I said in agreement. My father hated me for the lie he was given…and the truth he suspected. My mother hated me for driving away her one true love, for ruining her life. They both despised me, and they both let me know it. Over and over again. I’d needed an escape, and I’d found one…
“Sex. I was young that first time, which you’ve probably already pieced together.” Kiera blushed, and I knew she was thinking about our failed attempt to platonically share a bed. I’d messed up in several different ways that night; giving details about losing my virginity was only one of the things that I shouldn’t have done.
I shook my head as we continued our stroll along our scenic route. We were sneaking glances at the glorious beauty around us, but neither one of us was really paying too much attention outside. What was happening inside was too important. “Probably way too young, but I didn’t know it wasn’t…okay. It just felt like someone finally cared. I started…” Knowing Kiera wouldn’t like this, and feeling a little ashamed, I averted my eyes from her. “I started repeating that feeling as often as I could. Even back then, it was shockingly easy for me. There was always someone, and I didn’t care who, who would want to be with me. I kind of got obsessed with it…with feeling that connection. Who knows, maybe I still—”
Suddenly, it occurred to me that I’d just told Kiera that I used to sleep with anything that walked my way. True, she probably already suspected that, but I felt really strange confirming it. I felt…dirty. Was that how she saw me? Dirty? Stopping in my tracks, I cautiously asked, “Do you think less of me?”
Looking truly sympathetic, Kiera laid a hand on my arm. “Kellan, I couldn’t possibly think any less of you.”
I knew what she’d intended to say, but the way it came out struck me as funny and I laughed. And relaxed. She had a way of making me feel better, even when she didn’t realize she was doing it. With an embarrassed cringe, she looked away from me. “You know what I mean.”
“You really are truly adorable,” I told her, love and amusement mingling in my voice.
“How old were you?” she asked, clearly trying to change the subject and salvage her pride.
A part of me wanted to lie, but I knew that was a defense mechanism. Bucking up, I told her the truth. “I was twelve. In her defense, I told her I was fourteen. She bought that. I don’t think she really cared though.”
Kiera’s jaw dropped in surprise, but she managed to shut it again pretty quickly. I knew it was young, and I knew it sounded bad. There were worse stories out there, a lot worse, but mine still wasn’t pretty. I’d grown up too fast.
Tears were forming in her eyes as Kiera stared at me. I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not. Was she disgusted, or did she understand? Or maybe both. She could completely get it and still be sickened. That was a possibility. Was this a deal breaker for her? Would she say it was all too much, that she couldn’t handle my past?
As if she could see my fears on my face, Kiera leaned over and gave me a brief kiss. My worry vanished. She might be concerned, but she was okay with it…this didn’t change anything between us.
“So, you use women to feel…love?” she softly asked.
Feeling stupid, I looked at the ground. “I didn’t realize it at the time. I really didn’t even think about it, until you. I couldn’t figure out why you were so different to me. I know now that it’s not right…” I raised my eyes to hers. “But it was something. It made me feel less…lonely.” A tear dropped to Kiera’s cheek, and I brushed it away. It made me feel better that she wasn’t judging me harshly for my actions. I hadn’t known. But there was a part of this she wasn’t considering. No one did. Sex was a two-way street, and the girls I generally ended up with knew as little about me as I knew about them.
“Anyway…what no one seems to consider is the fact that they use me too. They don’t care about me.” We started walking again and I looked over the water as I ruminated over all the women I’d been with. None of them held a candle to Kiera. None of them knew me, and accepted me, like she did.
Kiera’s voice broke my pondering silence. “You’ve never been in love?” Her question was tentative, like she wasn’t sure if she really wanted an answer.
Looking back at her, I smiled. “Until you…no. And no one has loved me either.”
Frowning like she didn’t believe me, she said, “Surely, some girl—”
I cut her off with a smile. “No. Just sex…never love.”
“A high school sweetheart?” she tried.
Remembering some of the women I’d been with at the time—a few of them teachers—I shook my head. “No. I tended to…associate…with older women. They weren’t really looking for…love.” Especially the married ones. They’d just wanted a release, and I’d been more than willing to give it to them.
“Some…na?ve waitress?”
I smiled at her subtle summation of herself. “Again, before you…no, no one who cared for me.”
A strange look crossed her face, almost resignation. “Oh…well, one of your fans then.”
She actually looked worried about my history with fans, like somehow I’d fallen for one of my brief encounters. Considering how meaningless those encounters were, the idea of me truly connecting during one of them was laughable. I was an idiot looking for love that way. What the hell had I been thinking? Truth was, I hadn’t been thinking. I’d taken the easy road being offered to me, because I was too scared to attempt anything deeper.
“Definitely no.” I laughed. “That is the fakest sex of them all. They could care less who I actually am. They’re not even with me, when they’re…with me. They’re with this rock-star image that they have of me, but that’s not…that’s not who I am. Well, it’s not all I am.”
Kiera gave me a look that scanned my soul, it was so deep. I could almost hear her thoughts—No, you’re so much more. Or maybe that was just my wishful thinking. Regardless, the idea of her believing that there was more to me than meets the eye gave me peace.
After kissing my jaw, Kiera pulled back and asked, “Roommates?”
I could tell by her voice that she was reluctant to ask this too. I doubted she really wanted to hear about Joey, but she had to be curious about what went down between us. There was really nothing much to tell there. We’d decided one night that sex would be a good idea, then Joey wigged out when she hadn’t tamed me. That was it. It sounded really bad though, and I wished Kiera hadn’t asked. I wished even more my jackass bassist had kept his mouth shut. “I really wish Griffin hadn’t mentioned that one. You must have thought I was horrible. Sometimes I don’t know why you ever touched me at all.”
She frowned, not liking the way I was talking. I quickly redirected the conversation before she could. “No, there was never anything between Joey and me but sex.” I looked up, trying to think of a way to put it that didn’t make both of us sound shallow and hedonistic. There really wasn’t a way to put a pretty light on it though. “Joey…liked being worshipped. When it was clear to her that her body wasn’t my only…temple…well, she was also overly dramatic. She ran off in a huff, with boy-toy number…three, I think.”
Stopping, I turned to her and grabbed her hands. I couldn’t let her think that I was still that person. I wasn’t. “I know I’ve overdone it with women, but I’ve never felt for anyone what I feel for you. And I’ve never felt from anyone what I am feeling from you now.”
For long seconds Kiera stared at me with misty eyes. I could have stared into her eyes forever. Then she gave me a soft kiss, and I knew I was wrong. I couldn’t stare at her forever. Eventually, I would need to feel her lips on mine.
When we pulled apart, Kiera asked me, “So, Denny and me…our relationship?”
“Right…that.” While we continued our walk around the Needle, I told her about how their relationship had struck a chord in me from the beginning. It was so much easier to open up to her now, since I had already told her the hardest parts of my life story. She knew the darkest corners of me, but she still looked at me in adoration. It was almost unfathomable that anyone could look at me that way, especially knowing everything that she now knew. “Well, I guess at first I was just intrigued by it. I’d never seen anything like that. So warm and tender and…real. And the fact that you moved across the country to be with this guy…I can’t think of anyone who would do that for me. The people that I know don’t have relationships like that, and my parents certainly never…”
“Right…” she said, instantly understanding.