by Malcom, Anne
“Okay,” I whispered, looking out the window. “Okay.”
I took a breath, thinking about lawyers, court testifying.
Then I looked back to Rosie.
“It was rape,” I whispered.
She didn’t say anything, not even when my pause after that ugly word stretched on and on. She waited.
“I’ve never let myself think about what it was. What was really happening to me. Because it was easier to think of it as sex. Like Robert did. Like he assured me it was. And I don’t think at that time, I could’ve handled admitting to myself that along with beating me, my husband was raping me.”
Tears streamed down my face.
I was happy that they were finally being shed. That I was being cleansed with saltwater and ugly admissions. I knew if I held onto this it would kill parts of me that I could never get back.
“Because me saying no. Me crying. The pain. That was all rape,” I said. “It didn’t matter he was my husband. The father of my child, or I’d ‘let’ him do it many times before, because that’s what he said. That’s what it was. But it doesn’t define me. It defines him. In all the worst ways.”
I regarded Rosie.
“I’m ready to do it. Anything I can to take him down.”
And I was.
I would do it. As much as I could alone, but with help.
Without Lance.
Two Months Later
A lot could happen in two months.
Especially when every day felt like a year. Every moment like a week.
Especially when you spent every moment expecting a phone call. An explanation. Expected a knock on the door. A large figure to be waiting outside your place of work. Your son’s school.
When you woke up in the middle of the night reaching for someone who wasn’t there. Someone who had only been there for a week. It didn’t build up the right, the reason to have a reaction this big and dramatic to a man leaving me. I wasn’t a dramatic person. Not by any stretch of the imagination. But it was safe to say my reaction to Lance leaving me with an explanation that was thinner than my heart right now.
Nathan’s was just as bad. He was confused. He was hurt. He was a sensitive being, so he saw my hurt, despite how hard I tried to hide it. So that made it all worse. When I told him I didn’t know when, or if Lance was coming back, he didn’t cry. Which was bad. Which was agony. Because he wanted to cry, I could see the wobble in his lip, the glassiness to his beautiful eyes. But he fought it. Fought it hard enough for his little hands to ball into fists and his entire body to turn stiff.
I wanted to hate Lance right then. To figure out a way to contact him, to see him so I could punch him right in the mouth for making my little boy have that reaction. But even with all of my mother’s fury, I couldn’t hate Lance.
I knew why he wasn’t crying. Because he was trying to be strong for me. He was trying to be like Lance, his hero, the man he looked up to, and the man he’d told me, not two days before, that he wanted to be when he grew up. Of course he’d made me promise not to tell the man himself that, because he wanted to keep his cool, and that had further filled me with warmth.
Now it was pure ice. Shards of my broken heart.
I’d done my best to make this new rental look like ours. Few of our possessions had survived the fire, something that should have absolutely devastated me, considering everything they represented, but I felt strong enough to deal with it. Especially with Lance by my side. Or I’d tricked myself into thinking he was.
Rosie had single-handedly not just restocked my closet but managed to make it bigger than it had ever been in the past. And because she was Rosie, she did it without me being able to stop her. The first night in the house was just her getting warmed up.
Everything that she brought over was me. Was a style that I hadn’t even realized I had. A style I hadn’t been able to afford to have. Hippy but a little bit trashy. I was still a trailer park girl, after all. I’d hated all the beige that Robert had made me wear. The tailoring of it all. No skin was shown. He “didn’t want everyone thinking his wife was a slut.”
I didn’t want anyone thinking that either. I also didn’t want a beating for arguing with him. So I’d worn it. It covered the bruises well at least.
Now I had no bruises to cover and autonomy over my own wardrobe and my life, I hadn’t exactly utilized it, because I was mainly in my work uniform and didn’t have time or resources to go shopping. I’d usually snatch a couple of things at Walmart while getting things for Nathan. Karen and I would hit the vintage stores.
My previous closet might’ve hinted at that, but Rosie was some kind of magician to somehow see that. She was my very own fairy godmother by the looks of the small closet in the master. Nor would she hear a word about me paying her back. And for once, I didn’t argue. I just thanked her and then humored her demands by doing a ‘fashion show’ for her, Eliza, Karen, Polly, and Nathan with every single new thing I now owned. It took over an hour. And over two bottles of wine. Uncontrollable laughter.
In a house that was within viewing distance of the blackened remains of our home. In a time where I was being protected by a man who’d made it clear he wasn’t going to leave Nathan and I alone. In the midst of another man leaving Nathan and I alone when that was the last thing either of us wanted.
It was a gift bigger than some kick-ass clothes—and shoes, purses, and jewelry—it was priceless.
I told Rosie as much, near tears and maybe the tiniest bit drunk.
“Don’t cry because that will make me cry and I can’t do that unless it’s over a kid ruining one of my purses,” she demanded, her voice hard but eyes soft. She reached over to squeeze my hand. “But you need to realize that you’re giving about as good as you’re getting. Maybe better. I need more mom friends. Lucy, Polly, and I are pretty new at this, and it’s like the blind leading the blind. I don’t have a mom to call.” She screwed up her face. “I’m not really sure if I want to take Mia’s advice on everything. ‘Cause yeah, she raised a rock star and all around amazing human being, but those two new ones are a question mark.” She squeezed my hand once more before letting go. “You’re a good mom. You’re the mom I hope that I’m gonna be. You’ve got a great kid. I want to learn from you. So I’m basically bribing you with a few clothes and accessories for a lifetime of mom advice and you picking up the phone at three in the morning to listen to my kid’s cough and make sure it’s not pneumonia.”
I smiled. It was real. Not the tight, painful ones I’d been forcing lately for my son’s sake. “I will take your call at any time, and give you any advice that I can. But I’m also not a doctor, and unable to diagnose pneumonia over the phone, I feel like I need to say that for legal reasons.”
She laughed. “Okay, it’s a deal.” There was a pause. “You can also call me whenever. You know if you need someone to listen to all the ways you feel like killing Lance. I could give you some ideas.”
I bit back tears. Not that that was a change.
“Men attached to Greenstone Security are different,” she continued. “I’m sure you’ve noticed that. And I don’t mean just by the fact they’re all disturbingly good looking and have impossible physiques for the kind of food they consume.” She grinned quickly and the grin disappeared just as quickly.
“But they’re intense,” she said, voice quieter. “They all have wounds. Different ones. Deep ones. Ones that won’t ever heal. Ones that cause them to make stupid decisions like Lance walking away from you because they think they’re doing the right thing.”
She paused for the longest I’d ever seen Rosie pause in a sentence. This was not a woman who paused. But she did.
“These men will cut themselves deeper than they’ve ever known to protect the women they love from hurt,” she said finally, eyes meeting mine. “But that doesn’t mean they’re not just maniacs with emotional knives, cutting all over the place because the world has warped their vision. Lance has many more scars than most. He’s cut himself deep
for you. I know you didn’t want that. Trust me, I know. More because I’ve been the one holding the emotional knife in the past. I was the bastard that walked away. That let my wounds, let my fear make decisions for me.”
Another pause.
“What I did wasn’t right,” she whispered, her eyes on me but far away at the same time. “I wasn’t thinking about what was right for me. I was thinking about what was right for the person I loved more than most anything in this world. None of this makes it any easier, I know. But maybe it makes it easier to understand.” She squinted. “Or maybe I’m just drunk and being too much of a girl. What I’m trying to say is I’m here. We’re here. And we will be long after we nail that dickhead’s nuts to the wall. The Greenstone Security men are all well and good for eye candy and orgasms. But the Greenstone women are where it’s at. We won’t go anywhere. We’ve got your back, in all the ways men getting in their own way don’t.”
There was a promise I had complete faith in trusting.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Just as quickly and smoothly as he was gone, Lance returned.
It was so ordinary I would have laughed, if, you know, my heart wasn’t shattered into a million pieces by the man waiting outside the house I was well toward making a home for Nathan and me.
But he had, broken my heart, that was.
After only one single week as... whatever we were.
But that wasn’t true. We were something from the start. I knew that. I could torture myself trying to argue that fact, trying to convince myself it was all in my head and I was making it into something more than it was because of my past or the situation that I’d found myself in in the present.
I didn’t do that.
I tried to tell the truth, whether it was ugly or not. To my son. To my friends. Family. Most importantly, to myself. It was something I promised myself to do about a year after I left Robert. A year of sorting through the mess of feelings and trauma that he’d left me with. Lying to people was bad. Depending on the lie, and the person you’re telling it to, it could be soul destroying. Lying to yourself was worse. Ultimately, there was no one else in the world who could take care of you better than you. You had to tend to your garden, make it beautiful. Even if it was sometimes using ugly truths.
The truth of what Lance and I had been wasn’t ugly at all. It wasn’t beautiful. There was too much damage there, on both sides. There wasn’t enough knowing. Wasn’t enough sharing.
But it was special.
It could’ve been something beautiful.
Entertaining lies our relationship might have made it easier to get over, but I didn’t want it to be easy to get over. It shouldn’t be.
So, pulling into our new driveway, with Nathan chattering about the fact that yes, he did indeed like ketchup on hamburgers and a lot of other things, so he should give ketchup on oatmeal another shot, I wasn’t even close to getting over Lance.
And there he was, standing at the front frickin’ door. It was only then I noticed the SUV parked at the curb. I should have been more observant. Considering the circumstances. But I wasn’t.
Hence me only noticing the SUV after Nathan screeched “Captain!” at the top of his lungs and I noticed the figure at the front door and the car at the curb.
The worst part was, my very first instinct was relief. Even joy. Every knot in my muscles released. Until my brain caught up, that was. Then they all tensed up tenfold.
“Mom! Captain is back from saving the world!” Nathan yelled, pointing helpfully at the man whose shades were focused on us pulling into the driveway.
The joy in my son’s voice punched me, right in the gut. It was a kind of joy that had been absent for the past two months. A five-year-old’s world is small. They are still collecting experiences, deepening the well of the best and worst things that can happen to them. Nathan’s had been shallow in regards to the worst things that could happen, before Robert came back into our life. Even then, he didn’t gauge it as particularly traumatic, more confusing than anything else. Because his life had been so short, he didn’t dwell on things for a long time, his perception of time was different. That’s why kids as a whole, didn’t tend to hold onto a lot of things that happened to them. They got over tantrums quickly, skinned knees. But Nathan did not get over Lance’s absence quickly.
Lance had created something very big in my son’s small life. So when he left, he left a huge hole.
And because he was a kid, that hole was easily filled back up again, without question, without hesitation.
That broke my freaking heart. Because as much as I loved to hear happiness in my little boy’s voice, I didn’t know how long it would be before it was all sucked out. I didn’t know why Lance was back, how long he’d stay for. I could not promise Nathan that he’d yet again have to figure a way to live around that hole, figure out a way to pave over it. And that wasn’t okay.
I parked the car. Took a breath. Grabbed my phone from my purse, shot out a quick text. Turned in my seat to face my ecstatic kid. “Nathan, when I let you out of the car, walk down the street to Aunty Karen.” I glanced down at my phone as it vibrated, thanking all the gods that my friends had their phones on them constantly and that they worked from home. “She’s going to meet you halfway between here and their place. She’s gonna make cookies with you.”
The cookie thing did not have its desired effect.
Immediately Nathan’s bottom lip jutted out and his eyes watered. “But Mom, I don’t wanna see Aunty Karen. I want to say hello to Captain.”
I swallowed at seeing the hurt in Nathan’s face, telling myself that it was for the best. “I know you do. But your mommy is telling you to go and bake cookies with Aunty Karen, so that’s what you’re gonna do.”
Tears began forming in Nathan’s eyes. “But why?”
“Because I said so,” I uttered, making sure my voice was firm and not full of my own tears. Then, before he could protest any more, I unbuckled my seatbelt, got out of the car and got Nathan out.
He was not a happy camper.
As in arms folded, feet splayed, grimace in place in a very familiar stance.
“Nathan,” I warned in the mom voice I very rarely had to use with my well-behaved five-year-old.
He did not heed the mom voice that usually garnered immediate obedience since my kid also hated getting in trouble. I didn’t even know where he got that from, since he’d never really been ‘in trouble’ apart from one time he used the only expensive lipstick I owned to ‘paint me a picture’ on the walls. Or the time he’d used the crazy fancy cleanser Eliza and Karen got me for Christmas to make a bubble bath.
Even then, as mad as I’d been, he’d been too cute, too sorry for him to get into any real trouble. I was sure he’d grow out of this adorable trait and start acting like a little asshole.
Or he’d just start taking after the big asshole that was standing on our front stoop after a long absence.
“Don’t make me count to five,” I said voice tight.
Nathan stared at me and didn’t move.
I gritted my teeth, both annoyed and impressed.
“One.”
He blinked, his resolve starting to fail, but he held fast.
“Two.”
Nathan’s bottom lip began to wiggle.
“Three,” I ground out, making sure that my voice was threatening, even though I had no clue about what I was supposed to do after five, it was just something I’d saw other parents have success with.
I was doubting my technique when I had to say, “Four.”
But then Nathan relented.
He did that by stomping his foot, scowling at me.
“You suck,” he said.
I blinked at the little human who had never said two words with that much anger directed at me—or anyone—ever. My own lip threatened to wobble, but I swallowed my hurt. I’d have to have a lot thicker skin if I was going to bring up a well-mannered kid, and I needed that thick skin in about thirty seconds whe
n I faced Lance.
“Well, you’re not being that great right now at not sucking either,” I told the light of my life. I then pointed down the street at the figure who I knew was Karen walking toward us. “Go,” I ordered. “Before I text Karen and tell her that naughty boys don’t get any cookies.”
Nathan glared at me for a second longer, until I raised my brow at him and he let out an exaggerated sigh and stomped off.
I watched him storm all the way down the street until he made it to Karen, who waved. I waved back, thinking I needed to stop by Alice’s and get them a thank you for putting up with the no doubt surly five-year-old walking back to their place with her. I stared longer than I needed to, telling myself in the current circumstances, it made sense to make sure that Nathan got in the house safely.
That was lying to myself. I watched them for longer than I should have because I was a coward and I didn’t feel strong enough to face Lance.
Not that it mattered whether I was strong enough. Life happened no matter how weak you felt. I knew that better than anyone.
Plus, I couldn’t very well stand on my new—and hopefully temporary—driveway forever. Lance wouldn’t wait patiently on the doorstep forever. He was here for a reason, and Lance wasn’t really a man to be kept waiting.
Apparently I was a woman to be kept waiting though. Without a call. Text. Smoke signal.
His gaze was on me the second I turned around and started walking toward him. I guessed it had been on me the entire time, but I had made a point to focus on my unruly child and not the unruly alpha male.
My heart was in my throat as I made it up the walk. Lance didn’t move from his position, blocking the door. I couldn’t run into the house and lock him out, even if I wanted to, which I really did.
But he was Lance, he would have just picked the locks. Wait, he didn’t even need to. He had a key.
“Hi,” he said, the very first time I’d heard him utter the greeting. Which was insane, for as many interactions we’d had and I’d seen him have with people, there should have been dozens of instances when he said the universally accepted word when first encountering someone. But he hadn’t.
