I pushed open the door, lungs tight, heart full.
My daddy promised…
“I have memories. Lots of them. And they’re all messed up, Elian. As I get older, they become more and more convoluted. It’s easy for you to hate him. But it’s not so easy for me,” I explained.
Elian ran his fingers through my hair and I shivered.
“My perfect, little Layna.” Fingers through hair. Kisses and hugs that he gave to no one else. No one. But me.
“It must have been hard to hear about who he really was. The things he did. I can’t imagine what that would feel like. To know that everything I had ever known was a lie.”
Straight to the gut. His words hurt. They hurt because they were true.
“He used to tell me stories…” I drifted off, not sure why I had mentioned it. That wasn’t something I had ever told anyone.
The stories were special. For me from my dad.
Even if they disguised a more horrific reality.
“Stories?” Elian prompted, and I wished I had never said anything. Why had I brought it up?
Because with Elian, it was harder to keep the secrets.
“He was everything a good dad should be. He loved me sweetly and simply. When I was with him, I orbited around him. When he was arrested and I learned who he really was, I crash landed. I exploded. I was finished.”
Elian ran his hand down my back methodically. Tenderly.
“What about your mom?” he asked and I laughed. A giggle really.
“My mom was an ostrich.”
“An ostrich?”
“Head in the sand,” I explained. His fingers continued rubbing. Continued in their attempts to soothe.
It wouldn’t work. I didn’t calm to touch or kisses.
It would require…other things.
“My brother Matt and I had to deal with everything on our own. And we never saw our father again.”
“You have a brother,” Elian stated, surprised.
“Yes, I have a brother.”
“Where is he?”
I shrugged, wishing I could pull away from him but I didn’t. We were suddenly too close. Too intimate. I didn’t like these confidences.
“I don’t know.”
“Is he still…?” he trailed off.
“Alive? Yes. I just haven’t seen him in seven years. Not since my mother killed herself, and he was taken into state custody. We talk sometimes…”It was my turn to let my words linger and carry off into the silence.
“A father. A mother. A brother. You had a normal life didn’t you?”
I flinched at his use of the word “normal.”
Was it normal?
“Lay with me, little Layna. Let’s look at the stars…”
“Is anything normal? What does that even mean?” I asked defensively. My customary neutrality dissolving into distress.
Elian’s arms tightened around me. “I didn’t mean anything. I just meant that even with everything your father did, he gave you a childhood. A life. You were happy, right?”
Was I happy?
I nodded. Mute. Incapable of speech.
I didn’t want him to say anything else. I didn’t want his amateur analysis about my childhood. I didn’t want to explain all the ways that my father had, in fact, been wonderful.
So I crawled my way up his body until we were lying nose to nose. Dead Green eyes fixed on Coal, Black holes. I forgot agitation as I looked for the man I had met all those months ago. The man with the fake smile and dishonest life. He had fascinated me. Intrigued me. I hadn’t been able to stay away. I had been confident in my choice.
But now?
Where had his life gone? I was suddenly angry with myself. Enraged. I hadn’t seen the extent of his brokenness. I hadn’t anticipated how deep his trauma went.
I kissed his mouth. Hating him for being so weak. Adoring him for being exactly as he was. As I needed him to be.
In this room.
In Elian’s dry tears.
In my twisted desire.
His fingers were clutching and deprived. In another life I would have taken care of him. I would have held him and cooed meaningless words.