Compulsive (Liar #1)

by Lia Fairchild

  “My heart thudded as I ran around the yard, calling his name. I went to the side where our old trampoline stood with a broken net. He wasn’t allowed to jump alone. His shoes and socks sat in the dirt next to it, so he definitely had been there. I picked up the dusty shoes and held them up for Dad to see. Like usual, he was doing nothing. He just stood in the middle of the yard staring, except he had this confused, worried look on his face. I raced to him and shoved him as hard as I could. ‘What’s wrong with you? Do something!’”

  “Gray.”

  Daniel’s voice took a moment to register, but I looked down when I realized why he interrupted. My hand fisted the material of his pants and pulled it away from his thigh. “Oh…I’m sorry.” I opened my hand, releasing the crumpled fabric.

  Daniel placed his hand over mine. “It’s okay. Do you need a break?”

  “No. I’m going to finish. I have to.”

  Dad’s eyes popped wide as he stumbled backwards from my blows. “Goddammit, little girl. He probably just got ahold of some candy and is hiding in the house eating it.”

  He pushed past me before I could protest. I followed him to the door, but stopped short. I would have seen him come in no matter how hard I had been concentrating on my project. Besides, I knew Noah, and this didn’t feel right.

  I ran back to the middle of the yard. “Noah!” I did a complete 360 as I racked my brain. Had I heard him playing in the yard? Had I even heard Dad’s voice that whole time? I’d already checked the side of the house with the trampoline. Then, heat smacked my face so hard I got dizzy. My stomach flipped upside down as I turned to the opposite side of the house and sprinted around the corner. “Noah!” Oh, God. Please, no. Please, don’t do this to me again. As soon as I got past the edge of the house, I could see the gate was open. We’d never had a lock on it because Noah was too short to reach the latch. But, he’d been climbing so much lately. I ran toward the open gate screaming, “Daddy! Daddy!”

  My whole life up to that point I’d never felt afraid. I’d been sad or angry or disappointed. I’d never let fear get ahold of me, because I wanted to be strong for Noah. So that I could take care of him. But, as I stepped out of the safety of our home, not knowing where my brother was, terror gripped me with such force I froze for several seconds as the world spun around me. My first instinct was to run back and get Dad, but something caught my eye. I turned my head to find a nightmare had begun. No. Mrs. Watson’s gate was open, too, but they were out of town. She’d told Noah that when he’d asked her about swimming just the other day.

  My limbs felt heavy as I ran through the gate to her backyard, the muffled sound of my heart thumped and echoed in my head. A screeching, terrifying sound that I’ll never be able to fully describe left me when I saw a small body with black shorts and a red shirt floating face down in the pool. There were so many blank spots after that, like when a movie skips while playing off a DVD. One second I stood outside the pool staring at my three-year-old brother. The next second I was in the pool fighting to flip him over. I bobbed and pushed and cried and prayed until the world went black.

  Arms groped at me, causing my body to move this way and that on top of a cold hard surface. Two slits opened over my eyes to reveal a soundless scene of frantic faces moving in and out of my vision. My chest ached. My stomach felt bloated. Slowly, my ears crackled and cleared, giving way to voices saying things I didn’t quite understand, until I heard my name. How do they know me, I thought for a split second before recollection hit. Tears streamed down my face as I began to thrash around.

  I left my head to the side when I heard my dad’s voice, saw him kneeling down a few feet away. He scrambled over to me, but I fought to see beyond him. “Noah.” I’d tried to shout it, but my lungs only produced a raspy strained attempt. Noah lay on the concrete, flanked by two other grown-ups, only his feet and head visible. His stillness shot a dagger through my chest. I cried out. When my dad tried to comfort me, I pushed him away. I tried to crawl to Noah. “Noah!” My father held me down. His words were disjointed, but I knew what they meant. “No,” I screamed. “This is your fault! You killed him!” Arms held me down as I fought and yelled, “Your fault! Your fault,” writhing to no avail until all that was left was a lonely, horrific realization of wanting to die because the two people I loved most in the world were in heaven.

  When they lifted his impossibly small body to carry him away, I summoned my last bit of energy, raising my hand to my mouth. I kissed two shaky fingers and sent them up to the sky.

  Daniel gripped my shoulders and turned me to face him. A compassionate gaze took me in, led by those midnight blue eyes filled with sadness. His hand slid to my face, and his thumbs rubbed across the wetness on my cheeks. “I’m so sorry, Gray.” He held me there, his expression growing more intense with each passing second, as if he was attempting to will the hurt from me to him. Then, he pulled me to his chest, wrapping his arms securely around me. I hadn’t noticed before that Granger had jumped up on the couch at some point and was now resting his chin over my leg.

  “I can’t even imagine what that was like for you.” Daniel stroked my hair, as I held in an almost choking breath, barely able to hold back a floodgate of sobs. “Thank you for sharing that with me. I know it wasn’t easy. But Gray…it’s okay if you let go now. I can feel your whole body tensing next to me.” Had he read my mind, or was it that he knew me so well? Seeing my brother lying dead on the ground next to me turned my world upside down and gutted me to my core. Worse than when my mother died. I think a part of me felt the loss as a parent would, and ultimately, I turned into the same empty vessel my father had become when my mother died.

  “I’m here, Gray.” His words and his movements then felt nothing like a therapist and everything like a man comforting a woman, but it still didn’t ease me enough to let go. “It happened,” he continued. “You lived through it the best way you could, but you never accepted the pain and the loss and acknowledged that it’s always going to be a part of who you are. You’re strong enough to do all that now…and I’m going to be right here with you.”

  A powerful burst of air exploded from me, and the dam of tears let loose. “I loved him so much.”

  “I know.”

  “I let him down.” My words chopped out.

  “You were a child yourself.”

  “Why couldn’t it have been me?”

  “Shhh. You can’t think that way.”

  I took a few calming breaths, hoping to get the words out before I closed myself off again. “It doesn’t make sense to take the two best parts of our family and leave two broken people who’ve amounted to nothing.”

  His hand stopped moving and stayed on my back. “I’m not going to let you say or believe that. No one knows why someone is taken from us. I wish I could tell you why you lost your mother and brother, but I can’t. What I can tell you is that you and your father had horrible circumstances to deal with. It shaped part of who you are.”

  “I knew my father wasn’t good enough to take care of us. I knew it. I shouldn’t have trusted him. It was his responsibility. His fault.”

  “I know you have a lot of anger that has built up in you. That anger and that pain are the source of a lot of the things we’ve talked about.” Again his hand moved across me, over my head, down my back. “I think it’s also kept you from becoming all you can be. It’s stopped you from growing and reaching out…and loving.”

  Some of the calm I’d felt was giving way to anger. “I know what you’re going to say…that until I forgive my father, I’m never going to be okay.”

  “Gray, I wouldn’t tell you you’re never going to be okay, but yes, I do think a huge step would be forgiving your father.”

  “I’ve tried.” I pushed myself up and out of his hold. I cleared the tears from my face with my sleeve. “Okay, that’s a lie, maybe I haven’t. But, I can’t.” I turned toward Granger and brushed my fingers over his head. “I don’t know. I just don’t know how I can do that. I can
barely stand to be around him.” Part of me understood that forgiving my father would mean sharing this with him as well.

  “We can talk more about that another time, but it’s a necessary step for healing. Not for him…for you.”

  I didn’t respond because it was something I didn’t have the strength to face. Instead, we sat. On the couch between a man and his dog, sitting in silence, I released a lifetime of tears and pain. When my breathing came under my control, water continued to puddle and leak from my eyes. A welcome exhaustion came over me that lulled me back into Daniel’s embrace. That was where I stayed until my eyelids pulled me over to sleep.

  CHAPTER 24

  --------------------------

  A jingling sound stirred me from sleep in the early morning hours. Sun beamed in from the partially open slats of the French doors. Granger stood at my feet and shook his head, sending his collar clanking again. Daniel moved, making me aware of the weight of his arm still draped across me. I adjusted my position, noting his and smiling at how uncomfortable he looked and must have been for the hours we were asleep.

  “I’m sorry I fell asleep,” I whispered.

  “It’s fine, really.”

  Something in his voice sounded so alert that I turned to him. His phone rested on the arm of the couch with what looked like his email on the screen. If he were on it, he’d have only had one hand to work with since the other had been around me.

  “Were you awake this whole time?”

  “I rested my eyes a bit.”

  “God, I feel terrible. How long was I out?”

  He glanced back to his phone. “About four hours. It’s after six.”

  I collapsed back into the couch, running my fingers through my demolished hair, feeling drained and embarrassed. “I don’t even know what to say.” When he didn’t answer, I turned to find him staring at me, smiling.

  “You don’t have to say anything. You had a breakthrough last night. It was a good thing. I’m glad I was here. I’m glad it was me you chose to share that with.”

  His expression was clear, but his words confused me. Was he patting himself on the back, because as my therapist, this was a win? Or, did he feel happy for me because he cared about me? I thought about bringing up the sketches, or even what he hinted at last night. After what happened, that seemed pathetic. It wasn’t the time to push. “I guess I do know what to say.” I sat up and pushed to the edge of the seat, turning to face him. “Thank you, Daniel.” Instinctively, I looked away when his eyes met mine. But, I owed it to him to tell him face-to-face so I reconnected with his gaze. “For everything. Coming to the club…bringing me here and letting me stay and talk…I know those are not things you’d typically do for a patient.”

  Seeing my questioning stare, he responded, “You’re right, they’re not.” He sighed and picked up his phone. Then, he got up from the couch and rubbed Granger under the chin. “Let’s get you out, boy.” Granger trotted behind him to the back door. My eyes followed him. “We both know from the beginning I haven’t treated you like any other patient.”

  “I know…I’m sorry.” It came out almost as a question since I wasn’t sure an apology fit the situation.

  I followed him to the kitchen where he stood on the other side of a dark granite island, busying himself with making space on the counter. “You want some coffee?” He pulled two mugs from the cupboard, even though I hadn’t answered.

  His distant demeanor unnerved me after what I’d shared last night, after what he’d said to me last night. “That’s it? That’s all you have to say about it?”

  “Look, it was a long night for both of us. I thought coffee might help, and then I should get you back home.”

  “You’re right.” I turned my back to the island and folded my arms across my chest as I ambled back toward the couch. “I’ll pass on the coffee, though. I’m ready to go when you are.” I’d never been needy or insecure with men before, so I chalked up the lump in my throat to the emotional overhaul of the previous night.

  Before I realized it, Daniel arrived behind me, his hands enclosing my arms from behind. “Gray, please, don’t read into this. It’s not about anything other than the fact that complicating things between us now is not a good idea.”

  “I don’t know anything else but complicated.”

  “You will…soon.” His arms slipped around me, enclosing me into him. The solid feel of them made me delirious with expectation, yet denied of dreams that seemed an impossible world away. “Coping will get easier. Life will become clearer. Options more available. One step at a time, Gray.”

  Why did he have to be so damn logical? “I’m not trying to be ungrateful here. I appreciate what you’re doing for me. It’s just…”

  His grip on me tightened. With him behind me, we were safe, but his hold felt desperate. “I know. Believe me…I know.” His soft, husky voice cut through me. I let my lids fall closed, imagining Daniel turning me in his embrace so he could kiss me. One of my hands moved from my own arm to his bicep, running the length of it. His breathing grew louder in my ear, and his chest moved against my back. Heat pooled low in my belly as my own breathing picked up. We lingered this way, me frozen with fear of making a wrong choice, waiting for Daniel to take the lead. We both knew he was the main obstacle holding us back. A moment later, my phone sounded from an unknown position and Daniel’s arms loosened and fell. “You know what they say,” he said playfully.

  “Saved by the bell,” I whispered listlessly. I followed the sound of my phone to the couch and then rummaged around in the cushions. The sound stopped before I found it. The screen showed a missed called from Nathan and a text, Call me.

  “He’s a good man,” Daniel said, watching me.

  My brows rose before a grin pulled at my cheeks.

  “Who else would be checking on you at this hour?”

  “You’re right. He is a good man…and so are you.”

  He shook his head and turned away. “There are times when I’m not so sure about that.”

  “How can you say that? Especially after all you’ve done for me. After all you’ve had to put up with.”

  “Helping people isn’t always easy, but you really haven’t seen all that I am. You don’t know everything about me, Gray. I might not be the man you think.”

  I reacted before I had a chance to wonder how true that was. “And I might know more than you think.”

  His head snapped to me, eyes narrowed with something that resembled suspicion or worry. I didn’t back down, determined to show him that I wasn’t as clueless as he thought. He broke the connection first when Granger scratched on the door. “Well…I’m glad you have Nathan in your corner.” He opened the door, and Granger hopped inside. “I can see he really cares about you.”

  “He does. Although at times I’m amazed he’s still around.”

  Daniel’s smile told me he didn’t buy my denial.

  “We’ve shared a lot. And I’ve been there for him almost as much as he’s been there for me. We’re sort of stuck in this pattern that goes nowhere, you know?”

  “I get it. But being there for each other always counts for something.”

  A sting of sadness stabbed at my heart, remembering our last confrontation and still Nathan came to the bar for me.

  “What are you thinking?”

  “Nathan and I got into it a few months back. He said that he thought we were bad for each other. That we were enablers.”

  “I’m sorry. You never told me that before.”

  “I’m not sure why I’m telling you now. In fact, this probably isn’t the time or place. All I seem to do is suck up your time.”

  “You know that’s not true. In fact, most of the time we spend together you’re paying me...” He shot me a toothy grin. “…in a way.” I returned his look with my feigned insulted expression. He snatched his keys from the counter. “I’d like to see you this week so we can talk more. For now, why don’t we get you home?”

  * * *

&nb
sp; I texted Nathan from the car, telling him that I was okay and on my way home, but he hadn’t replied before I arrived. When we pulled up to the bar so I could get my car, I told Daniel I was fine, even though he offered to follow me home. I’d thought about the time I’d gone to my car and spotted him in the parking lot waiting for me. That caused my mind go to those sketches I’d found. What about me inspired him to do it?

  I’d had enough of awkward goodbyes, so when we pulled into the lot, I simply thanked him. I thought about mentioning that had no one come for me last night I’d have made the choice to back out on my own. Or that I’d have taken a cab home and not driven. It seemed moot at this point. I promised I’d be in his office for our regular session, and then I exited with a bit of sadness, hoping for some last words of encouragement that never came.

  When I got behind the wheel, something wouldn’t let me drive home. The car wandered about the streets, and I watched the city wake, examining the souls of strangers. I arrived at the cemetery without noticing the path I took. And when I knelt down between my two most beloved, I let my words be spoken out instead of in my head.

  “I didn’t come here to make either of you any promises. We all know I’m not good at keeping them. I just came to say I love you. And thank you…for being the best part of my life. People say to appreciate the ones you love while you have them. I did that. I know I did that. Some things are fuzzy…some memories incomplete, but I know in my heart I was thankful for both of you. I always understood how lucky I was. I just had no idea then I would get so little time with you.” I licked salty wetness from my lips, surprised I still had tears left. “So, you see, sometimes appreciating someone you love is not enough. Sometimes we get screwed out of a good thing. I know I sound bitter, but I miss you both so much. I miss what we never had the chance to experience. I think this whole time I could never figure out who I was because you were both gone. You were supposed to help me…to show me who I could become.” I stood, still staring down at them. “I guess it’s up to me now.” I placed a hand over my heart, raised two fingers to my lips, and then pointed them to the sky.