by Gemma Weir
“She has nothing to feel guilty for,” I say again, trying to reassure both him and my sister. “She moved on and started living her life for the very first time without having to deal with me and all my bullshit issues. I’ve never been anything but happy for her.”
“Oh god,” Serenity’s sobs get louder.
Looking to Granger, I’m surprised to find his brow drawn low, his eyes full of sadness and anger.
“I don’t understand what’s going on,” I sigh.
“Honey,” Granger starts. “Imagine if I told you that the way I need you, the way I love you was toxic and evil. How would you feel.”
“I’m toxic, not you,” I say slowly, my breathing becoming erratic.
“Calm down,” he coaxes, pulling me onto his lap and wrapping his arms around me. “I love you.”
“I know,” I nod.
“The way you see yourself, the way you think you impact on other people is warped.”
“No, it’s not. I’ve seen the way people react to me. I didn’t imagine that.”
“Have I ever reacted that way?”
“No,” I shake my head.
“Has my family ever reacted that way?”
I take a moment to think, then realize that no, they’ve never shown any signs of hating me, of getting sick of me. “No.”
“Do you know why that is?” he asks me slowly.
“Because you love me and they love you,” I tell him.
“I’m sure they’d make a real effort to love you if that was the only reason. But, honey, it’s not. The reason I love you, the reason my family all love you, is because you’re an incredible person.”
I shake my head, rolling my eyes as I dismiss his words.
“What happens if I hear you talking bad about yourself?” Granger warns, and my butt cheeks clench in response to the memory of him spanking me.
“I didn’t say anything bad.”
“I can hear your thoughts,” he chides. “You are fucking incredible, Alice. I knew it the moment I saw you and I fucking hate that you think you’re this terrible person, because it couldn’t be any farther from the truth.”
“You weren’t a needy kid,” Serenity says, her sobs subsided until her voice is just ragged and tiny tremors run through her shoulders.
“Yes I was,” I laugh. “I needed you for everything.”
“No, you didn’t. By the age of ten you basically looked after yourself. You made us both lunches, you cleaned the house, took yourself to school, you raised yourself.”
“That’s not true. I came to you for everything.”
“You never ever came to me until you’d done everything you could to sort whatever it was you needed on your own. When you started your period, I was on an overnight fieldtrip from school and you waited until I was home and unpacked before you even told me and asked me what to do. When we moved to Florida, you were eight and you were so terrified of being alone in the trailer at night and you wet the bed, you stripped the bed and changed the sheets rather than wake me up and ask me for help. You are one of the most self-sufficient people I’ve ever met.”
“No,” I shake my head.
“Yes. When I joined the army, I hated myself for wanting to leave, so I told you that I needed to do something for myself, I made you think you were the reason I was going and it was bullshit. I broke up with my boyfriend and I was angry at Mom and Dad, it was never about you, I just needed an excuse to go and so I said all those things to you. I never imagined you’d believe them. I never dreamed that you wouldn’t see through all the lies. I’ve spent the last ten years thinking you hated me for spewing all that shit to you and that’s why I stayed away. I was so ashamed of what I did, I didn’t think you wanted to have anything to do with me. You never called or visited and I didn’t think I deserved to ask you to come, or to expect you to want to talk to me, and until Granger called me, I had no idea that I should have been hating myself for ruining your life.”
My lips part and I stare at my sister, but I can barely see her through the haze of bewildered confusion that’s settled over me. “No,” I say. “No, that’s not true. You didn’t lie. I’m needy, I’m clingy and dependent and people hate me as soon as I they get to know me.”
“People love you, they always have. You were always surrounded by friends and I was jealous at how carefree you were because I was so angry all the time.”
“I don’t have friends, people don’t like me,” I argue, jumping up from Granger’s lap.
“Come here, honey, you need to eat, so let’s just all take a time out while we have lunch. You guys can talk some more after we eat,” Granger says, twisting his fingers with mine and not letting go. It’s his way of reminding me that I don’t get to walk away, that he’s here so I need to stay too. Instead of feeling restrictive, it calms me and I let him pull me back down into his lap, uncaring if my sister or her boyfriend are bothered by me sitting with him.
Lunch is awkward to say the least, even though the food is delicious. Granger and Phil somehow manage to fill the strained silence with inane chatter, and even though he’s not exactly who I expected my sister to be in a relationship with, it’s clear that he’s a nice guy. When we’ve all eaten our fill, there’s nothing else delaying me and my sister delving into our apparently much more messed up than I realized relationship.
“Look, I’m not sure what rehashing all this stuff is meant to be doing. You have your side of things and I have mine,” I say, just wanting to be an ostrich and stick my head in the ground. “Why don’t you explain what made you come now?”
“You got married,” she chokes out.
“Okay,” I say slowly.
“You got married.”
Blinking, I wait for her to say more, but she doesn’t and Phil finally clears his throat and speaks. “I’ve been trying to get Serenity to marry me for the last five years and she’s refused. She said she couldn’t get married without you and she couldn’t just call you after ten years to come to her wedding.”
“Oh.” My lips snap shut and I swallow thickly. “So you want to know if I’ll come to your wedding?”
“No, you fucking moron,” Serenity screeches, jumping up from her seat. “I want a relationship with you, I want my sister back. I want you in my life and I want to know what I can do that will ever make you forgive me for being such a selfish bitch and messing you up completely.”
Granger chuckles, and I elbow him. “Why are you laughing?” I question.
“Because the two of you are so similar. You assume the absolute worst about yourselves and you’ve forgotten the most important thing.”
“Which is?” Serenity snaps, her arms crossed across her chest defensively.
“That all this stuff that put a wedge between you happened when you were kids. Alice, you were thirteen and Serenity, you were barely eighteen. If you had parents who gave a shit about you this would all have been sorted out within a week of it happening, but instead it’s been left to fester for the last ten years and it’s molded both of you into who you are now. Theres a lot of water under the bridge, more than you can hash out over lunch, but this is just a starting point. Neither of you is going to just accept what the other is saying and move on, I think too much has happened to both of you for that to happen. So maybe you should just try to get to know each other as who you are now, as adults.”
“I agree,” Phil says. “You can’t fix the past, but you can move forward.”
“I don’t need you to fix me,” I say to my sister.
“I just wish I didn’t break you in the first place.”
Rolling my eyes, I start to tell her yet again that I’ve always been this way, but Granger covers my mouth with his hand, silencing me. “I love you,” he whispers into my neck.
I melt into him, my man, my husband, my antidote.
Epilogue
Alice
My cell rings, but I ignore it. My head’s resting on Granger’s chest, both of us damp with sweat, his cum dripping d
own my thighs. Today is our six-month anniversary. I know it’s not something most people celebrate, but Granger and I seem to be able to find an occasion to celebrate whenever we want to escape and have a night of crazy, intense sex.
All of the building work is finished on the house now, and we have our own self-contained three bed apartment that connects to the main house through what used to be Granger’s bedroom door. But sometimes it’s nice to get away, so we bought a tiny fishing cabin an hour away from Rockhead Point where we can run away to when we want some time completely alone.
When I think back on the day my RV broke down, I can barely take in how much my life has changed. Back then I was happily alone, moving with the seasons, a gypsy never making any roots, always on the move. Now my roots are so tangled to this man and our life, that I know trying to free myself would end with me withering and dying.
Our relationship is unique, and for a lot of people it probably wouldn’t work. Neither of us likes to be without the other, so we still work together and spend all our time together, and I wouldn’t want it any other way. Granger’s business has really flourished, and as well as doing custom pieces we opened a showroom at the mill where customers can come and buy his one off pieces.
My relationship with my sister is getting better all the time. She still feels like she needs to fix whatever she thinks she broke all those years ago, but we speak at least once a week now, and the whole family are going down to West Virginia in a couple of months for Serenity and Phil’s wedding.
Sometimes I wonder if Granger’s idea of us being fated to be together is actually true, because what are the odds that my shitty old RV would break down, here in the town he lives in, on a day where he was driving through town, and that he’d stop and check I was okay.
No matter what twist of fate or serendipity or whatever brought him into my life, I’m grateful for it. Granger owns me heart, body and soul and I wouldn’t change a thing. I’m still needy, clingy and dependent, but these days I know the only person I act that way with is Granger, and that’s because he needs me to be needy, he likes that I’m clingy and he loves me to be dependent.
I know who I am, and that’s okay, because I might be poisonous, but he’ll always be my antidote.
Claimed By The Mountain Man
Montana Mountain Men #4
Coming Soon.
