Perfectly Damaged

by E. L. Montes

  He bends at the knees, meeting me eye to eye. “I just wanted to show you that you’re capable of doing what you love. It may not be with a paintbrush, but you captured something and created art, regardless.”

  I quickly pay the cab, climb out, and shut the door behind me. Unable to properly survey my surroundings, I dart for the apartment complex, clinging to the bag in my hand. It’s too dark out, and even though the streets are quiet at this time of night, you can never be too careful. After entering the building, I climb the steps to the third floor and knock on apartment C-10.

  I knock again and again and louder again until I’m banging on the heavy wooden surface, my knuckles reddening. “What the fuck?” He sneers. “I’m coming. I’m fucking coming,” I hear distantly. A deadbolt unlocks, and the knob screeches as it turns before the door opens.

  His sluggish blue eyes scrunch then widen when he recognizes it’s me. “Jersey Girl? What are you doing here?”

  “I couldn’t sleep.”

  Logan opens the door, allowing me in. “So you came all the way down here at two in the morning?”

  I nod, walking past him and straight into his living area.

  He shuts the door, locking up. “How’d you get here?” Logan asks with a yawn, walking my way.

  “Taxi.”

  He shakes his head. “You need to learn how to drive.”

  “Will you teach me?” I ask nervously.

  A soft chuckle rumbles in his throat. “Yes, one day. But for now can we sleep?” He reaches for my arm and drags me to his room.

  “I’ve never been in here before.” I look around, taking in his very plain bedroom. There’s only a stream of streetlight shining through the blinds, so I can’t make out much. The only thing I can see clearly is his grey comforter.

  “You are wide awake.” He yawns again, climbing into bed. He stretches on his back and waves me over. I place my duffle bag on the floor by the bed, then nestle and relax beside him. Logan snakes an arm around my shoulder, my head leaning against his chest. I wrap my leg over his and shut my eyes. This feels good. Peaceful. In his arms, just being held by him is where I always want to be.

  I wake up to his touch, his hand softly stroking up and down my arm, his lips sliding along my hairline. I smile, inhale his natural scent, and exhale. My lashes flutter, struggling to open. “Morning,” he whispers.

  “Mmm,” I moan.

  Chuckling, he kisses my forehead. “I have to get ready for work. Do you want to stay here?”

  I nod into his chest.

  “Okay. I’ll pick you up after my shift. Are we still going to the lake house or do you want to hang out here?”

  Shrugging, I keep my eyes shut, too tired to pry them open. “Whatever you want.”

  His lips trace down, leaving a peck on my nose. “All right. We’ll go to the lake house.” His mouth leads back to my forehead where he leaves another caress. “We’ll stay the night.” I can sense him dip low before his lips touch my chin. “Then we’ll drive back Saturday to make it in time for dinner with your parents.”

  I smile, nodding and agreeing with the entire plan. “Now get some rest,” he whispers. Leaving my side, he steps out of bed. As much as I’d prefer that he stay, I still feel like he’s here. With his scent lingering, I breathe in the comfort and drift back into a peaceful sleep.

  “How was work?” Jenna asks, climbing into my truck. She places her duffle bag on her lap, buckles the seatbelt, then leans over and kisses me. “What’s the smile for?”

  I nudge my head toward her lap. “What’s in the duffle bag? Carrying deadly weapons or something?”

  “Ha. Ha. Funny,” she mocks. “No, I have my weekend stuff. It’s better than dragging around my suitcase.” She shrugs. “And I may have something for you in here.”

  “Lingerie?” I grin, wiggling my brows.

  “I didn’t know you were into wearing that kind of stuff. If I’d known, I would’ve purchased you a blue, skimpy lace number to bring out your eyes.”

  “All right, smartass.”

  She laughs. “You set yourself up for that one.”

  “This is true.” I pull out of the parking lot and begin our drive to the lake house.

  “It’s nothing big, just a little something you can use in the future,” she says as she unzips the black bag and starts rummaging through it. I reach a red traffic light and look over. Jenna hands me a clear plastic bag. I quickly peek in. Arching a brow, I meet her smile. “Gift bags and wrapping paper?”

  She nods.

  “You got me yellow gift bags and wrapping paper,” I clarify.

  She nods again.

  “Well, aren’t you the major wiseass.”

  Her laugh bounces around my truck. “Well, it does benefit me.”

  I steer with one hand, my other finds its way to hers. I bring our entwined fingers to my mouth and graze her soft knuckles against my lips. “Why yellow?” I mumble against her skin, my eyes on the road.

  “It’s my favorite color.”

  “Is that so?” I ask.

  “Yep. It’s bright and pretty and cheerful.” She sighs. “It reminds me of the sun.” Jersey Girl pauses. Squeezing her hand around mine, she whispers, “I spent most of my life in the dark. Yellow allows me to visualize the light. Even if it’s just an image I paint in my head and not reality, I’ll take it.”

  I press my lips firmly against her hand. Jersey Girl will probably never know this, but yellow will now and forever be my favorite color too—because I want her to be happy. I want her to be surrounded with brightness in her life. I want her to fight through the darkness and find her light someday.

  We’re walking hand-in-hand into the lake house when a chorus of applause goes off. I tear my eyes away from Logan and see Santino, Charlie, Bryson, and Blair are all in the living area. Everyone, except for Blair, is smiling and clapping. “It’s about damn time!” Santino hoots.

  “You guys are dicks,” Logan states. He shakes his head, smiling good-naturedly, and guides me up the stairs. More whistles and cheering trails up when the door to Logan’s room closes behind us. “Sorry about that. If I’d known there was going be an audience, we would’ve stayed at my place,” Logan says as he walks across the room and places our bags on the ground.

  “It’s okay.” I look down and fiddle with the edge of my white camisole. I’m suddenly nervous. I desperately want to continue what we started in my room yesterday before my father intruded, but I know we have to get past a few things before that can happen.

  “So, what do you want to do?” he says, removing his boots. “Want to go out by the dock? In the lake?” He goes on, stripping off his T-shirt, “I’m gonna hop in the shower, wash off this sweat and sawdust. You’re more than welcome to join me,” he jokes with a broad smile. But we both know there’s seriousness hidden behind the humor.

  “I’d like to talk.”

  His grin weakens. “Is everything okay?”

  I cross my arms, hugging myself. “Yeah. I… I just figured you probably have a lot of questions for me and I want to answer them all.”

  “We have plenty of time for that. I don’t want you to feel pressured to spell out everything at once.”

  “Logan, I’ve kept things from you for so long. I don’t want to keep anything from you anymore. Can you honestly say you don’t have any questions for me? About my disorder, my triggers, what started all of this?”

  He bows his head, twisting the cotton fabric of his white T in his hand. “I do.”

  “Well, I want to answer anything you might find confusing.” I walk over to Logan and place my hand against his face, showing him the sincerity in mine. “In my opinion, the hardest thing anyone can do is accept someone else and all of the baggage that comes along with them. And you did that for me.”

  “Because I care for you.”

  “And I will never understand why. But the least I can do is be honest with you from here on out. It’s challenging for me to tell you everything. I’m embarra
ssed about most of it, but I trust you and I know you won’t judge me.”

  “I won’t.”

  I smile. “I know. So take your shower. I’ll wait for you by the dock. Okay?”

  He nods, lowers his head, and lightly caresses my lips with his before turning and stepping into the bathroom.

  I’m sitting by the edge of the dock, admiring the sunset, the crisp scent of the lake, and the light warm breeze crashing against the tall tree branches, when I hear footsteps from behind. There’s no need to turn around. I catch a whiff of his fresh shower gel before he takes a seat beside me.

  Logan scoots close enough so that the sides of our thighs are pressing against one another, and our feet are swinging in unison. He takes my hand in his, securely weaving his fingers between mine. “Let’s talk,” he says.

  “What do you want to know?”

  “Let’s start with the beginning. Why did this happen to you?”

  I shake my head; my gaze focuses on our hold. “I will never know why, Logan. But I can tell you when and how it started.”

  “Okay. Let’s start there.” He brings our hands up to his mouth, gently kisses the back of my hand, and then places them back down on his thigh. I think it’s his way of safeguarding me, of expressing in his own little way that no matter what I disclose to him today, it will never change his feelings toward me. A restful breeze whips by and instantly I’m okay.

  Breathing in and out as calmly as possible, I begin. “It was senior year of high school. My grades weren’t all perfect, so I was desperately trying to study my ass off so I could ace my SAT score. I wanted to be like Brooke.

  “God, she managed to make everything seem effortless: school, getting into college, sports, and boys. Anything. You name it, she did it well. Nothing was difficult for her, which made my parents proud—especially my mother. I just wanted my mother to recognize me once in my life. Even before I was diagnosed with psychosis, our relationship was rocky.

  “I think maybe she knew deep down I’d end up like this. I don’t know. I was in therapy when I was younger, starting when I was about ten. I suffered from depression as well as lack of social skills, which freaked my mother right out. So maybe she knew.” I shrug. “Anyway, back to senior year. I focused on trying to bring my grades up. They weren’t bad—more than average, really—but not perfect.

  “I spent months studying: at home, the library, even at Eric’s place. I barely slept. I was a living, breathing zombie—if that’s even possible. I became obsessed with academics just so I could be on the receiving end of that look of pride on my mother’s face, just like she had given Brooke so many times before. Not even my talent impressed her. She never understood my art. It’s funny. You know how some people say you’re your biggest critic?” I chuckle, knowing that was never the case for me. “My mother was always mine.”

  I picture the me from four years ago, at seventeen: the scared girl I’ve tried to rid from my brain as she struggled, trying to comprehend why this disease chose her. I stretch and tighten my fingers around Logan’s. My throat throbs with fear before I gain the courage to continue.

  “It was a Sunday morning. I was in my bedroom, studying. The SAT exam was the next day and I was under a lot of stress. It was beautiful outside. Eric wanted to spend the day outdoors, but I just wanted to be locked in my room with no distractions. It’s how I spent most of my summer that year and most of the beginning of the school year. Eric and I had gotten into a minor argument—nothing big, more of a disagreement.

  “I didn’t care. I just wanted to study. So there I was in my room with my nose in a book when I heard my name being called. It was so clear and loud. I looked up at the door, but there was no one there. I brushed it off as nothing and went back to studying. After a few seconds I heard my name again. I quickly looked up, searching around the room, but I was completely alone.”

  “What did the voice sound like? Like someone you knew?” Logan asks.

  “No. It was a male voice I’ve never heard before. When I heard my name for the second time, I got out of bed and searched around my room. I opened the door to look out. No one was there. I closed it and then walked over to my bedroom window. I thought maybe the gardener or my father was in the yard. But from what I could see, there was no one.

  “I sat back on the bed, confused but easily distracted by the way my mind was racing with how much more I had to do. There were just so many notebooks and textbooks and highlighters and pens and scraps of paper. To say I was overwhelmed would be an understatement. Then the voice came again. It was closer this time, so close I actually felt it coming from behind me. It said, ‘You’ll never be good enough for her.’ I remember it like it was yesterday—how the goose bumps rose on every inch of my skin, the fear lodged in my throat, the sound of my breathing, its spastic rhythm matching my heartbeat. I finally found the courage to look behind me, but there was nothing there, only the headboard.”

  Logan lets out a deep breath. “That must’ve been fucking scary for you. Especially at seventeen.” He shakes his head. “How long did you deal with the voice in your head before you were diagnosed?”

  “Voices. It started as one voice and then it multiplied. They were getting louder and it was distracting. I couldn’t focus on school. It was difficult to keep up with a conversation. It was very scary. I just wanted them to go away, but it kept getting worse, to the point where they were telling me to kill myself. And then I had a breakdown with Eric.

  “The voices were telling me he was seeing someone else. I didn’t know what was real or not. I didn’t know the difference between my own thoughts and the voices at that point. Everything began to blend together, and it drove me nuts. Finally, after three weeks of living through hell, I contacted Brooke, who was away at college. I was hysterical over the phone with her.

  “She couldn’t understand a word I was saying. She was going to call our dad, but I begged her not to. So she did what any loyal big sister would: she drove the five-hour trip from her university to be by my side. When she got home, I told her everything that was happening to me, and she encouraged and finally convinced me to tell Dad. He took me to get assessed. I had several evaluations done, and that’s when I was diagnosed. At first they thought it was schizophrenia, but as my depression worsened, I was reexamined and my diagnosis was changed to schizoaffective.”

  I look over at Logan, expecting a reply or comment or something. He meets my gaze, and his hand reaches up and caresses my face. “Within the last four years, was there ever a time when you didn’t hear the voices?”

  I nod. “The first two years were very difficult for me. I didn’t want to believe I was sick in the head. Eric and I had split up, Brooke was away at school, my mother grew more and more distant, and Dad was working on expanding the company. I’d never felt more alone in my life. I went to a local college because that was all I could handle, and my father felt it was best to stay close to home. The new medication I was taking at the time was making me zone out. It stopped the voices, but I felt dead. I had no feelings—highs or lows—and I didn’t care about anything or anyone.

  “So I stopped taking my medication. I lied to everyone, including my psychiatrist. They all thought I was still on my meds. I started to feel alive again, awake. I was able to focus more. But it only lasted a week. After that, the voices came back along with paranoia. I thought everyone was out to get me, that no one took my best interests to heart, and that they were all crazy and I was the sane one. And I definitely didn’t want to continue on with the medication. I hated the way I felt and the person I was becoming. I didn’t feel like me anymore.

  “One day, I was told—by the voices—it would be best if I were dead, that it would be better for everyone who had to waste their lives taking care of me. And I thought they were right. I hated that Brooke drove back home every weekend just to be with me. I hated that Dad began to work from home on the weeknights that Charlie couldn’t stop by because he was afraid to leave me alone. And I hated that I
managed to drive my mother further away. So I did what the voices asked me to do.”

  “You tried to kill yourself?” Logan looks shocked, pained.

  I nod.

  “Jersey Girl,” he lets out shakily, and I can tell that the news of how I attempted to take my own life is hitting him hard. And with those two words he mourns for the girl I was. They’re an apology for the past, a thank you for the present, and a plea for the future.

  “I know. Trust me, I know, Logan. I was at a really low point in my life.”

  “How did you do it?” He cringes for even asking.

  “I stabbed myself. I took a big knife from the kitchen and I just jabbed myself in the middle of my stomach—it’s what the voices instructed me to do.” I lift my shirt just beneath my breast, revealing the three-inch scar. The scar is located where it’s mostly hidden when I wear the thick strand of my bikini tops—which is probably why he’s never noticed it before. Logan traces a finger over the clumpy skin, which is barely noticeable against my tan.

  I roll my shirt back down, suddenly embarrassed by showing myself in the first place. I keep my eyes down as I continue my story, my voice lowering. “It went pretty far in. I remember it burned; it was a sharp burn, hurt like hell. But I wanted the voices to go away, so I twisted the knife deeper. And then I remember collapsing. I’d lost a lot of blood, but Brooke…” The ghost of a smile tugs at my lips. “I guess she was my guardian angel that day since she’s the one who found me on my bedroom floor, covered in my own blood.”

  Logan brings both hands to my face and forces me to look at him. “You are never going to do that again.” I nod, agreeing with him. “I’m serious, Jenna. If you ever feel that way again, if you ever feel the urge to harm yourself, come to me. Okay? I’d lose my fuckin’ mind if I ever lost you.”

  “I’ll try,” I say truthfully. That’s a promise I can never truly keep. When I’m triggered, pulled under and dragged into a dark place, it’s difficult for me to come out of it. He presses his lips to my forehead, and then brings my head to lie on his shoulder.