Colour My Ugly

by A. Giannoccaro

  We take the short drive to the Garden’s and find a bench to sit on under a tree. As soon as Callum turns to look at me I burst into tears before he can even ask me what’s wrong. Callum knows I hate being touched so he doesn’t touch me he just waits till I seem to have a handle on the tears then he asks his tone a little dark and angry “What did he do?” how he knew that these were Rowan tears and not my normal meltdown tears I am not sure but Callum reads people very well. I think he knew something had snapped in Rowan last night.

  I sniff and wipe my face with the serviette from the cupcakes that sit between us on the bench. “I think he loves me Callum. And I am so scared. Last night… last night.” I can’t get any more words out through the next wave of sobs.

  Callum puts his hand on my shoulder then pulls it away as fast as he can. “I know he loves you Lauri, the thing is Rowan has never loved anyone so he doesn’t really know how. I have known for a while that he loves you. In fact I think he has loved you longer than any of us realize.” Callum’s calm words seem to slow my tears down a little; there is still a bite of anger in his tone towards Rowan.

  “What happened last night Lauri? Why are you so afraid of him loving you? You know he will never hurt you.” Callum devours a cupcake as we waits for me to answer his questions. The same questions I have been asking myself.

  “That’s the thing Cal; he could hurt me worse than anyone ever could because I love him back and I don’t know if I want too. He kissed me last night Cal, and my heart stopped. But he also told me about his heart and his numbers. I don’t know if I can love Rowan the murderer and I know I cannot ask him to be anyone else. I am so torn I want to run away right now. This morning was so awkward. How can I love one part of him and hate the other Callum. I know he will break my heart and it’s all that I have left that isn’t already broken because I never gave it to anyone to break.”

  Callum sighs loudly. I can see he doesn’t have a clue what to say to me. So I keep talking. I think he is just emotionally stunted as Rowan but just fits in to society better fooling us all.

  “I went to tell him I was leaving today and he was crying so I just left. I couldn’t look at him cry, murderers shouldn’t cry, Rowan shouldn’t cry. Have you ever seen Rowan cry? You have known him all your life Callum. Have I broken him?”

  Callum’s shoulders slump his big frame folds in half as he leans over and squints at the floor not looking at me.

  “Only once, I saw him shed a tear a single tear. He never cried when either of his parents died, I only remember one tear in all our years as friends, but it’s not my story to tell you Lauri. What I can tell you is if Rowan cried then something finally touched his heart and made him feel. I cannot tell you what to do Lauri I do know that you have the power to shatter Rowan into a million pieces. I also know that he will never let you go whether you love him or not he loves you and would rather die than let you go.” Callum talks softly as he tries to help me see the Rowan he has known all his life. I have known since the second Rowan walked into my room and revealed himself to me that he wouldn’t let me go, even when he said I could go I know he wouldn’t have let me. Unconsciously I always knew that I belonged to him, the minute he chose not to kill me I became his. I know that the monster beneath the surface will do anything to keep me. I think I have Stockholm Syndrome for a minute.

  We don’t say anything else, there isn’t much more to say right in that moment. But before we leave the gardens I purge the last of the feelings roaring around in me.

  “I love him Callum. But I am terrified of that. I can feel the panic rising in my chest just acknowledging it out loud. I am so scared that when he realizes how truly broken I am he won’t love me anymore. I have other secrets Cal, ones I am not ready to tell him. Ones I may never be ready to tell anyone. There were worse things than my scars Callum things that I cannot let go, things that are turning me into a monster on the inside. I am afraid if I love Rowan I will become just like him.” I see Callum swallow hard and he stops walking before he turns to talk to me.

  “You don’t think Rowan knows how broken you are? He is the most broken person I know Lauri, but the two of you seem to cancel the broken out of each other and that is worth more than keeping any secret. Lauri, for once just this once I am begging will you just let go of the fear and the panic that are constantly paralyzing you and just see what might happen. What you might get if you love him and let him fucking love you, the man never loved anything in his whole life and he chose you.”

  We get in his car and don’t say another word. I know he is right but I won’t say it out loud his ego is big enough without me adding to it. I am still crying when we get to my car. Callum grabs my hand as I reach for the door and looks me in the eye. I can see he is worried. “Just tell him Lauri, everything and for God’s sake’s let him love you, you deserve it.”

  I just nod and get out of his car and into my own. Let him love you, Callum’s words ring in my brain all the way home. My stupid eyes won’t stop crying because I cannot get my heart and my head to agree and I feel like every breath I take is going to burst my lungs. I want to be numb again, I can’t feel like this anymore its hurting me, even without a touching me he can hurt me.

  ROWAN

  “I am the dark I am the light. I am the moon and I am the starless night sky. Fall in love with all that I am or please, do not fall in love with me at all.”

  ~ Christopher Poindexter

  I feel like shit this morning, not just the hangover that a whole bottle of scotch left me with. I am stiff from sleeping on the couch outside all night my muscles creek and ache as I try move. The worst of it is my heart, my heart aches. The heart I always believed I didn’t have is aching in my chest it is heavy with feelings that I don’t want. I am looking at myself in the giant mirror in the gym and I don’t know who is looking back at me. I don’t know who I am, maybe I never have. I want so badly for her to love me all of me the good and the bad, the dark and light, the wine farmer and the murderer. It’s unfair to ask that of anyone I know that but I also know that there is no way to erase the bad and I also know I’ll never stop being the monster that is underneath. I can’t. I was born to be a killer, groomed to be a killer and worse than that I like being a killer.

  I slump down onto the bench and do something I haven’t done ever. I cry. I let the tears flown down my cheeks at forty two this is the first time I have let myself cry. Men don’t cry, men don’t feel, men like me can’t. But today I let myself. I think I have found, loved and lost my only love all in one night. Why did she ask me? She knows who I am. She knows it won’t go away. She is afraid of me. I am even more afraid of her. I am afraid of the heart aching in my chest for her. I can’t help but think if this is what Cassie felt then I finally understand I would hurl myself from a rooftop to make this stop hurting. I will wait for Lauri to love me back even if she never can. I will not let her go. I can’t, she is mine.

  I heard her car pull out a while ago so I know I am all alone now the house is eerie and quiet without her here. I need to talk to someone, but I know she is with Callum so I can’t call him and after she tells him what has happened I am sure he won’t want to talk to me anyways. I do know one person who knows a little about love, Robin. He will think I have gone stark raving fucking mad but I need to talk to someone, anyone will do right now. I shower and get into my car as fast as I can. I don’t even call him to say I’m coming I know he has a hangover too so he is home.

  Amya opens the door that I am pounding on and I see the recognition of my emotional mess her eyes immediately. She just looks at me shakes her head and moves so I can step inside “Oh Rowan. You big fool.” She pulls me through the door. “Robin is in his studio, alone go on up.”

  I traipse up the stairs to the studio where both Lauri and I have spent many hours. My body feels heavy and weak my run did nothing but pull the last bit of life out of me. There is no denying I am addicted to the pain t
hat is inflicted by the tattoo gun as I open the door my heart beats faster it wants that pain. I open the door to see Robin staring out the windows looking at Table Mountain he is deep in his own mind somewhere and I almost feel bad for interrupting him. He turns around and smiles at me, he really is my friend and second to Callum he is the only person who comes close to knowing me. I don’t even know me.

  He doesn’t wait for me to say anything I just collapse in the chair and bury my head in my hands again. Robin speaks from behind me where I can hear he is setting up his table.

  “You love her you idiot, don’t you?” I look up to my friend and smile at his brutal honesty. “How’d you know Rob? I told her. I also told her about the numbers, she asked me. I didn’t want to lie to her I couldn’t lie to her.” I reply defeated and tired and fucking hurt.

  “I have always known, but you needed to find that on your own my friend. What did she say when you told her?” Robin sits next to me and starts fiddling with his gear to tattoo me, I guess he may as well since I’m here pouring my new found heart out.

  I pull my shirt off and answer his question. “She wants time, she is afraid of me Rob. I kissed her though. Before I told her I kissed her and now that’s all I can think of is kissing her, touching her, holding her. Fuck I sound like a girl right now. She has broken me already Robin.” I knew she would, the second I saw her in my house on those monitors I knew she was going to be trouble in my orderly life.

  Robin laughs at me as he starts to draw on my right rib cage, mother fucker that hurts over the bone right now. He says nothing waiting for me to finish my story I guess. I continue to pour my soul out to my friend as he inks script down my side I have no idea what he is writing on me, but it hurts like hell today. I trust Robin he is an artist and has never put a mark on me that I didn’t love, or that didn’t mean something. He works and I talk, I needed this, the combination of the pain and purging these feelings that were killing me from the inside out. I needed this so badly.

  Finally Robin sets his gun down on the table next us and he speaks. Robin is a man of few words always has been but when he does talk he speaks his heart and his mind.

  “Rowan, that woman that opened the door for you today my wife, I love her without a doubt in my mind she is my whole world I know I will die without her. But Rowan, she was all light and she had a really hard time reconciling who I was and the things I have done and for a long time she refused to love all of me. So I loved her enough for both of us until she could love me. You can’t change who you are any more than I could change who I am Rowan. We have taken lives with our hands but we can still love with all our hearts. That’s all I am going to tell you my friend. I listened and I think that’s all you really needed.”

  Robin holds up a mirror so I can see what he has done, my heart stops. God he has reached into my soul ripped my thoughts out and written them on my flesh. Why are feelings so fucking hard?

  Sometimes the only way to live is to die first

  Sometimes the only way to love is with the dark side of your heart

  Sometimes the only way to love a monster is to be one

  Sometimes to live, love and die are all the same thing.

  *****

  The words fill the last of the empty space on my chest and I am amazed at the way they make me feel right then. I know that I need to let myself love Lauri, not only with the darkness in me but with whatever light I may have in me and I need to love her enough for the both of us right now. “Go home Rowan. Go love her. But be gentle, she isn’t just any woman, she has been to hell and survived it.” Robins words are soft but firm, he has done all he can as my friend right now. I have to somehow find a way to do the one thing I was never meant to do.

  Amya and Robin both wave to me from their front door as I drive away towards home with a little less of an ache in my heart and a glimmer of hope.

  LAURI

  “Our mind will trick us but you are a damn fool if you think your heart ever will.”

  ~Christopher Poindexter

  Talking to Callum has eased the storm of feelings that was brewing inside me a little, and I use the drive home to let my heart and my mind catch up to each other I know I love Rowan, I also know as much as I don’t want to admit it I love the monster in him just as much. That monster is who saved me after all. But I am still afraid of him, afraid of how much he can hurt me. But most of all I am afraid to let him touch me because once he does I know that all my defences will be broken down and then he could truly break all that is left of me into tiny pieces.

  I stop at the estate entrance and decide to drive down to the vineyards and walk for a while before I go up to the house. I normally walk here after I have been to Robin to let my mind and body sort of get themselves back together but today, they are together and I just need a little time to accept what that means. The late afternoon air is crisp but not cold and I love the smell of clean air after being in the city this morning. The wind rustles the vines as a walk through them towards the barn that I plan to turn into my dream restaurant. I stop and sit on the concrete loading bay step outside the barn and look out over this stunning place in this moment I know that Rowan is my home and my future I just hope he has the patience to love me slowly because if a fall I will break.

  I walk back to my car slowly, preparing myself to let Rowan love me. If he can really love that is, I am still unsure of how the monster and the lover would exist in him.

  The drive back up to the house is short and the first thing I see is Rowan’s car in the open garage so I know he is here. I wonder if he left at all today. My pulse quickens at the reality of facing him.

  I try to fix my now very wind-blown hair and I wipe my eyes but there is no hope they are red and puffy and I can’t fix that right now. Rowan has seen me ugly cry enough times that this isn’t bad at all.

  I unlock the front door and walk into the house; I can hear Rowan’s music playing from the lounge and a walk towards the melancholy. He is sitting on the couch and I can see he is nervously waiting for me to come in, he is tense and tapping his foot, both hands are clasped together restraining himself. His blue eyes look into mine and I can hear a million words he isn’t saying yet. I am having a hard time trying to form words myself as I walk towards where he sits. I can’t talk yet I know I will just cry again, but I kneel between his knees and pull his face towards mine my fingers lace through his thick dark hair and I notice the grey hair around his temples is more prominent than I noticed before. I rest my forehead against his and just look into his eyes. They always tell me more than his words. He doesn’t move and he doesn’t touch me he just looks into my soul. When I think that my heart may actually burst through my ribs if I don’t, I lean in and softly kiss his lips. It’s the only way I know how to tell him anything right now. There is electricity between us as I kiss him, he slowly returns my kiss and moves his arms around my waist to pull me up onto his lap not breaking our kiss and also not scaring me away. He feels soft and relaxed I like the way I feel in his arms at that moment he isn’t trying to restrain himself or hold back he is just holding me and it feels real. I thought I was home when I woke in my old room six months ago, I was so wrong this is home. Right here in Rowan’s arms this is home after years in hell I am finally home.

  I break our kiss after what feels like forever and finally I can say something. “I love you Rowan, not might, not maybe and not half, I love all of you. But I am afraid. I want to let you love me. But you have to love me slowly and gently I cannot jump off a cliff with you yet. Be patient with me please Rowan.” I can hear the desperation in my plea as I beg him to love me at my pace. He kisses my lips again softly before he speaks to me. His rough Irish voice is shaking and not his usual confident tone. “All I want is to love you Lauri, and for you to be able to love me back. I understand if you can’t love all of me yet I do. But I love all of you and I will love you as fast or slow as you want. I always believed
that I didn’t have a heart that I couldn’t love. But trying not to love you has showed me just how real my heart was by breaking it.” His words demolish any defence I might have had against him.

  We don’t need to say anything more Rowan just holds me close and we sit there allowing ourselves to feel. I stopped feeling for years and he never allowed himself to feel at all so this right here is something new to us both. As we sit there I know I need to tell him about my babies I know that that last scrap of pain and fear and hurt has to be cleared away before we can go forward together. He needs to know that I am giving him a broken heart and that’s all I have.

  I don’t move or look at him I simply start talking with my eyes closed so I know I can get it all out. “Rowan, I need to tell you something else, I am just going to talk and you are going to hold me and be quiet until I’m done please.” I sniff through tears that start to fall before I can even talk.

  He just holds me little tighter and whispers “Okay” into my hair.

  I tell him, I let it all go and tell him how Renzo would get me pregnant then have his devil Doctor come over to the house and rip my babies from my body then beat me and lock me away. I tell him that this happened six times, six times I let myself love the baby growing in me only to have it ripped away and murdered by the devil I had married. How my dreams of a family had been murdered six times and still he didn’t think I had paid enough for my father’s sins. I cry while I tell the story and I am sure voice is barely audible. He says nothing but I feel his hold on me getting tighter and tighter.

  When I am done talking I bury my head in his chest and just breathe in his smell and enjoy the feeling of being safe in his arms. He just holds me; he doesn’t talk or move at all he just holds me as if absorbing the last of pain and taking it away. I think that I can live now, that I can love now. I am ready for Rowan now.