As she studied the picture, absorbing the bond between Brandon and Matt, for the first time she realized what she’d been missing out on. Matt, even though he didn’t have a mother, still had everything Stella had lacked. Stability. Comfort. Confidence. But more than that, he had someone who put his needs first.
A tear leaked out, which Stella hastily dashed away. Did Matt realize how lucky he was? Did he know what a prince of a dad he had? A man who would kill himself before allowing Matt to be hurt in any way?
She jolted, sloshing her wine, when Brandon’s hands came down on her shoulders.
“Stella,” he said in a low voice. “I’ve ignored this all night. Plus you’re breaking my rules. Anyone who cries in my house has to tell me why.”
“I’m not crying,” she answered automatically.
He chuckled, warm and low next to her ear. Then he turned her to face him and took the wineglass from her sweaty hand. He sighed and cupped her face with his hands. “Stella,” he soothed. “Don’t you ever get exhausted?”
All the time. She dropped her gaze to his firm mouth because seeing the knowledge in his eyes was too much. “I don’t know what you mean.”
His thumbs stroked the sensitive skin beneath her ear. “I mean holding up those walls of yours. Don’t you ever get tired?”
He had no idea how tiresome it was, making everyone think she was just another face in the crowd. That she wasn’t certifiably messed up in the head.
She toyed with the collar of his shirt. “You don’t know what you’re asking. There are things I’ve never told anyone.” As though on cue, her cell buzzed and Stella knew who it was. With a heavy sigh, she drew her phone out of her back pocket.
PLEASE call me. Let’s talk about this, Stella.
Stella shook her head and turned her phone off, still not in the mood to talk to Gloria. Their earlier confrontation was still too fresh in her mind, and she’d yet to work through her own issues. She’d been too busy processing the information.
“Does that have something to do with why you’re upset?” Brandon’s voice startled her out of her thoughts.
“That was my mom,” she found herself answering.
“And you have a complicated relationship with her,” he guessed.
Stella snorted as she sat on the couch. “That’s putting it mildly.” She leaned back, absorbing the soft, cool leather, wishing everything in life could be as soft and giving. “I told you earlier that I never knew my dad,” she said while staring at the ceiling.
“Yeah,” came Brandon’s quiet reply.
“I just found out that I never knew him because my mom never told him about me.”
“Ouch,” Brandon said.
A humorless laugh popped out of her. “Yeah, ouch. I’d grown up thinking he left my mom after she told him she was pregnant. My mom’s been lying to me my whole life.”
“At least he didn’t choose to leave,” Brandon countered.
Stella lifted her head and looked at him. Strong and silent, as though he could chase away her anger and frustration with one swipe of his strong hand. “What?” she questioned.
Brandon shrugged. “Can’t blame him for something he didn’t know about.”
Stella stood. “I’m not angry with him. I’m angry with my mom.” She took two steps toward him. “I’m angry because she’s been lying to me. I’m angry that she never came to a back-to-school night because whatever guy she was with had promised her the world, or how she wasn’t there to celebrate with me with I earned a spot on the Chicago Ballet Company or when I was promoted to principal dancer.” Stella couldn’t stop the words if she wanted to. Brandon remained in his spot, waiting her out with his usual patience. “She wasn’t there when I tore my ACL or when I was taking care of my grandmother while she threw up from the chemo treatments.” She took a breath. “She was never there, Brandon.”
“I know,” he agreed quietly.
She jabbed him in the chest with a finger. “No, you don’t know. No one knows what it’s been like. No one knows what it’s like to have a mom who brings a monster into your house. A man who puts his arm around your mother and then when she’s not looking feels you up in the kitchen and tells you to just go with it because he knows you want it just as much as he does.” A hefty amount of bile rose in Stella’s throat as soon as the words left her. For some people the admission might have been cathartic. To her it was horrifying. To just spew all that ugliness out, with no amount of sugarcoating for Brandon to see, was all her worst fears come to fruition.
She squeezed her eyes shut and spun from him, managing to stay on two feet when the floor tilted beneath her. Perhaps it was the wine. Or perhaps it was the familiar, yet unwanted, anxiety washing over her. Either way, she couldn’t stay one minute more and get another glimpse of the pity in Brandon’s eyes.
“I have to go,” she blurted out.
“Stella,” Brandon said from behind her.
“No.” She shook her head, snatching her purse from the couch and bypassing Duke. He gazed up at her with those soulful brown eyes as though he understood her sorrow. Stella would have loved to bury her face in his soft fur, but that would have made her pathetic. Sobbing into a dog’s neck? Who did that? “I’m sorry, but I can’t talk about this.”
“Really?” Brandon questioned as he followed her down the hall toward the front door. “Because I’m kind of thinking you need to.”
She spun around just as she reached the door, barely able to make out his form when her vision blurred from built up tears. “You don’t know what I need.” And then she was gone. Throwing open the front door just in time for the tears to flood her cheeks. She thought she heard Brandon plead with her one more time, begging her not to leave. What did he know? He had a perfect life with a perfect son and a perfect aunt and uncle who’d doted on him and given him everything a child needed.
A sob broke free as she fumbled for her keys, only to drop them because her hands wouldn’t stop trembling and she couldn’t freakin’ see because of the tears she was unable to control. They flowed too freely, symbolizing years of repressing anger and pretending to be stronger than she really was. Weren’t tears supposed to be liberating? Weren’t they supposed to be freeing or some shit like that? Instead all they did was reveal what a fraud she was, exposing her own weaknesses and mocking her.
Stella leaned against her car and buried her face in her hands while she sobbed out years of fear and frustration and anger she’d so expertly held back. She barely budged when a pair of strong hands wrapped around her shoulders and steered her away from her car. Didn’t look up when Brandon walked her back inside the house and closed the door behind them. Barely noticed Duke nudging her leg with his wet nose or Brandon pushing him away. Not only was she too embarrassed for the object of all her fantasies to see her like a sniveling three-year-old, but she was also too busy with her face in her hands.