by Lacey Dailey
When I stagger into our suite, greeted by darkness, I refuse to let myself feel any level of distress.
I refuse to react to the drilling in our chest, hollowing out a hole where the love we had for Gia used to be. It’s empty now, and I refuse to react to the burn in our nose or the mist lining our eyes. I refuse to dwell on the painful tightness in our throat or the way our lungs constrict, robbing us of air. I refuse to acknowledge the sob that escapes our lips when I find the bed empty and unused.
There are no words in any dictionary or in any language that can even begin to describe what the loss of her feels like.
It’s not something I’ll allow myself to dwell on. It’s not something I’ll let break me. After today, it’s not something I’ll shed more tears over because we weren’t supposed to experience this.
We weren’t supposed to fall in love.
We were never going to ask any human being to understand the way we work or to love the both of us as one. When Gia came along, there was nothing we could do. We loved her recklessly, fully, and without abandon. We gave her a piece of our heart, and though she disappeared with it, it’s not something we will ever regret.
She was worth it.
The memories of her will be enough to get us to the end. The extra thump in our heart will be there forever because there wasn’t supposed to be a Gia, and damn it if we’re going to cry over losing something we weren’t even supposed to have in the first place.
I take a few profound gasps, sliding off my shoes and collapsing onto the bed I’d shared with her. Switching always exhausted me in a way playing for a sold-out crowd never would. Navigating my own pain was hard enough. Trying to keep up with Aiden’s was unbearable at times.
I don’t know how long my eyes are closed when a door slams. I smack the floor trying to scramble out of bed. Heavy footsteps I can only assume belong to Landon pound through the suite. The light in the bedroom flicks on, momentarily blinding me and causing moisture to drip down my cheeks.
It takes several long moments for my eyes to adjust and find the will to re-open. The instant they spot the person perched in the doorway, they sag from their sockets. Aiden surfaces almost immediately, and here we are, frozen as she stares at us.
She looks pissed.
Violent pants rock her chest. She grips the doorway with one hand, her other hand braced on her chest. She’s wearing the shorts she was wearing at the pool yesterday and a loose T-shirt. Her face is wiped clean of make-up, her wild hair contained in a braid.
She adjusts the angle of her gaze, looking Aiden and I up and down. It takes me a long moment to understand she’s trying to figure out who’s standing in front of her right now. I’m just about to throw her a bone when she shocks the ever loving shit out of me and figures it out herself.
“Maxwell.”
I don’t know what I was expecting it to be like if she ever found out about Aiden. It was never supposed to happen. Now that it has, I can say with absolute certainty, I didn’t expect her to look like she was two seconds away from blowing my head off.
“I understand why Aiden ran from me.” She takes a deep breath and one step inside the room. “I truly do. I don’t know all the details yet. I’m hoping you’ll tell me. But you tell Aiden if he ever scares me like that again, there will be hell to pay.”
I’m too startled to say anything.
“This is the second time I’ve been up all night worrying about you. Vegas is a scary place, Maxwell!”
Wetness pours down my cheeks and drips off my chin. She’s looking at us—looking at us with the same love in her eyes that was present yesterday. She isn’t horrified or examining us like we belong in a freak show.
She isn’t running away.
I inspect the room, taking note of her suitcase in the same spot it’s always been. Her shoes are flung about the room and her hairbrush is lying on the dresser that holds the TV. It doesn’t seem like she even considering packing her stuff with the intent to never come near us again.
She’s staying.
With one hand on my stomach and the other thrown over my face, I start to sob. Over my unstable heartbeats, I make out the sounds of her rushing toward me. She throws herself at me, wrapping her arms around my waist.
An inhuman sounds tears my chest, and the grip she has on me tightens. My tears fall into her hair.
I can’t get a grip on what’s happening inside me at all. Relief? Love? I don’t know. It’s coming from Aiden and I both, and it’s crushingly overwhelming. Our body is shaking, clutching hers desperately while she holds us steady.
“Shhh. It’s okay. Let’s lay down.”
I let her lead me to our bed and lay down beside her, placing my head to her chest and wrapping my shaky limbs around her body. I convulse, squeezing her in desperation. Suddenly, I can’t fathom what it’d be like if she were to ever actually leave.
“I’m sorry.” I choke, pushing my wet face into the soft cotton of her shirt. “I never wanted you to find out like that. I’m sorry.” I’m selfish, and she deserves a better apology. I let her fall in love with me, refusing to expose who I really was. “I’m so fucking sorry.”
“Max.” She blankets me with her gentle voice. All the anger from a few minutes ago is gone, replaced by tender whispers and soft strokes of her hand in my hair. “I cannot even begin to imagine how difficult it must be for you to try to explain that to somebody, and I’m not upset at all you didn't reveal him to me right away.”
“You’re not?”
“Of course not.”
I didn’t believe in miracles, or anything of that nature. Though after tonight, I might start. “You didn’t run away.”
“Where else would I go if I weren’t with you?”
My breath slams out of me. “Gia…”
I’m a words guy—always will be, always have been. I use them best when I’m singing for a crowd. It’s normally me who wrecks people with the use of words and emotions. Right now, I’m the one being pulled apart from the inside out.
“Aiden’s your devil side, isn’t he? The one that saved you?”
“Yes.”
Her fingers dance along my spine. “If he saved you, why do you equate him with the devil?”
That’s not a question I’d been asked out loud before but it was one I asked myself many, many times. “I don’t know. If anything, he’s an angel. He protects me from things he knows would clobber me. Without him, I would crumble. I think maybe I started referring to him as my devil side because people would associate him as a bad part of me. He’s not bad, Gia. He’s just Aiden, and I’m Max. Together, we’re two jagged parts that somehow fit without really knowing why we broke in the first place."
“So, you’ve always had Aiden?”
Her voice is weighted in nothing but love, curiosity, and patience. It makes having to expose myself so much more bearable. “I don’t really know how to answer that. I’m not sure where he came from. I have a small idea of why I have him, but nobody holds the details like he does. I’ve always been aware of him though. Always.”
Her body shifts from under mine. I’m seconds away from losing my shit and begging her not to leave when she slides downward and tangles her legs with mine, resting her head on a pillow so she can focus on my face. Her knuckles run down the side of my face, ridding it of leftover moisture.
“You don’t have to explain this right now if you feel like you can’t.”
“I want to explain what I can.” Her hand drops. I grab it quickly, pressing it back against my cheek, liking the warmth it brings. “I don’t have all the answers. Only like half of them. Aiden… he, uhm, he has the other half.”
“Aiden.” His name on her lips isn’t scary anymore. “Where does he go when you’re with me?”
“Sometimes, he leaves. Sometimes, he hovers.”
Her forehead wrinkles. “Hovers?”
“Yeah. Aiden and I are aware of each other. I haven’t been around others who are like us, but Dr. Hanna used to
say we’re lucky because we're able to manage it in a way others like us can't.” It seemed weird to consider Aiden and I lucky, but she never used any other word. “Sometimes, if I don’t want him to be aware I just block him. Sometimes, he’ll go willingly.”
“Why would he do that?”
“Same reason I go away willingly. We have issues dealing with things. Triggers.” She doesn’t speak for several beats. There are dozens of questions swimming in her eyes, and it’s likely she isn’t sure where to start. So, I take us back to the beginning, summoning the handful of memories I have. “I lived with my birth parents until I was eight. I don’t remember a lot. Not because of how young I was, but because Aiden was there, taking my place.”
I haul her body so close to mine, not even air could pass through. “I didn’t know why I was given Aiden until I was ten.” I pause, unsure how to explain the rest with only fifty percent of the details. “We split when the abuse started. I don’t know exactly when it happened, and I don’t know the details of the abuse he endured at the hands of my biological parents, but I know that’s why we have scars on our lower back and thighs. I have no memories of the pain, and I don’t search for them. Aiden is the one who holds the pain, and he does it so I don’t have to. Aiden endured the abuse. I’m the one who existed afterward.”
I feel her tears through my shirt and slip my fingers through her hair, kissing the top of her head. I don’t stop talking because the words are flowing from my mouth in a way they never have before. I’m afraid once I close it, the flow won’t restart. “I used to tell you I don’t like the person I become when I’m angry because I wanted to confuse you or freak you out or something. Truth is, I love Aiden because he handles the things I can’t. I hate violence, Gia. It’s my ultimate trigger. I fade to black at the first sign of violence. Years of extensive therapy tell me it stems back to when I was barely a toddler. My father was violent towards my mother and my mother was violent towards me because she couldn’t retaliate towards my father. Just the threat of violence has me shaken to my core. Aiden steps in then.”
“Do you just… disappear?”
“In those instances, yes. He usually blocks me out because he knows I won’t be able to handle it. Sometimes, he surfaces when violence isn’t involved. The time I just took off after talking to Landon is a good example. I got scared and didn’t want to commit to a dream I’ve had for a long time. He wanted to surface and commit for me. I freaked out because if he really wants to surface, I can’t always stop him.”
She shifts, adjusting her head so she can peer at me through strands of golden hair. “So, he surfaces when you’re afraid?”
“Yeah. Usually, when I’m panicking intensely.” My girl is trembling and working really hard to hide it. She’s breaking for me and the things Aiden endured without fully understanding how it’s possible. "Aiden's part of me, Gia. There is no me without him. We're a unit. An entire system that works just a little differently than everybody else's."
With a lot of protest from me, she escapes the contraption that is my arms and legs wound around her. With kind hands, she holds my face. A tear slips from her cheek and lands on mine. Her eyes sear my soul. “I’m sorry you’ve spent forever hiding such an immense piece of you.”
Not once has anyone ever thought to apologize to me for making me feel as though I had to conceal Aiden. It was always me. Apologizing to my moms because I’m different. Apologizing to Dr. Hanna because I couldn’t remember things like Aiden could. Apologizing to my first ever teacher for forgetting everything I learned the first week of school because I was too scared to surface and let Aiden do it for me. I’ve spent a lot of time apologizing for surviving, and yet nobody has ever apologized to me for making it so damn hard.
Of course, it would be her.
Gia Maria.
My sweet girl with a patient heart and enough ambition for both of us. All she wanted was a summer to figure out her life. She got me instead—a musician with a can of beans so big, she’ll be siphoning through them forever.
The devotion in her eyes tells me she doesn’t care what she has to fight through in order to be with me.
With us.
She captures my hand, pressing my palm to her chest the same way she did the first time she told me she loved me. With watery eyes and a wobbly smile, she patiently waits for me to find the words under the mess. Gia’s here.
And she isn’t leaving.
18
Aiden
"Aiden."
Her voice punctures the silence I typically revel in. The sound is delicate—tender and soft and kind. Everything I'm not. The reason I stay away, so it can be everything Max is.
"Aiden."
Rapping my fingers against my thigh, I sit in an ugly desk chair and watch the sun come up through a window bigger than our apartment back home. I don’t ask how she knows it’s me. I just sit here, my nostrils flaring with each nervous breath that escapes me.
Slowly but surely, I spin in my chair, the beats behind my ribcage desperate to answer her call. Those beats are enslaved to her, and they grow louder, stuttering inside my chest when our eyes meet for the first time. She’s sitting up in bed, surrounded by white sheets and wild hair. Her eyes, baby blue and filled with innocence, fight sleep just to look at me.
She untangles her arm from the sheets, reaching for me, silently beckoning me toward her. I want to tell her Max is the one she really wants. It’s him who deserves the happy ending. I am good for nothing but sarcasm, curse words, and throwing fists. But when she offers me a warm smile, a plea swimming in her eyes, I abandon my spot and stalk towards her.
I offer her my hand. She takes it almost instantly, tangling our fingers together and pressing it to her heart the same way she does with Max.
I lift my gaze to the ceiling, focusing on how fucking overwhelming it feels to touch her for the first time.
It’s just skin touching skin but why does it suddenly become easier to breathe?
“Hi, Aiden.”
“Hi, Gia.”
She pats the spot beside her, tugging at my arm until I’m seated close enough to crush her. “I was hoping I’d see you again.”
“If you want an apology for clocking your old man, you won’t get one. He’s a prick, Gia. If he touches you again, I’ll light him on fire.”
She falls silent and her fingers twitch against the back of my hand. I want to kick myself for covering her in word vomit when she’s so used to Max’s demeanor and not the grumpy asshole I am on a daily basis.
I flinch when she snorts. Our eyes meet, and she throws a hand over mouth, doubling over in laughter. I don’t know what the fuck is so funny. Maybe she thinks this is all one big joke. I can assure her, ain’t nobody enough of an asshole to pull this sort of prank.
“Something funny? If you think I’m joking—”
“No!” She severs our connection, waving both hands in front of her face, making a poor attempt at trying to control her laughter. “I believe you, Aiden. I’m just—” She drags her hands down her face, dropping them heavily in her lap. “Overwhelmed. Max dumped a bucket load of beans on me last night, and I was expecting you to do the same. I wasn’t expecting you to express how terribly you wish to ignite my father on fire.”
I cock an eyebrow, watching her shoulders shake with leftover chuckles. “Me wanting to pound down your dad is funny to you?”
“I don’t know.” She admits, and I’m still trying to understand how she’s sitting next to me and not Max, calm and collected. She ain’t panicky at all. I am not Max, and she still leans against me, resting her head on my shoulder and wrapping both her arms around mine.
Maybe she hasn’t fully woken up yet.
“I guess with everything that happened yesterday, my father’s surprise visit is the last thing on my mind. I suppose I’m just surprised it’s the first thing on yours.”
“You’re surprised I want to beat down the man who put his hands on you? Really, sweet cheeks?” My shoulder blad
es flex. “I know we just met, but I’m not cool with people fucking with you. That’s rule number one. Write that shit down so you don’t forget.”
Her head shifts, and she gives me a look I’ve seen her give Max many, many times. She’s exasperated, and damn if her pursed lips aren’t really fucking adorable. “I don’t see you writing that down, Gia.”
“I don’t really think I’ll need to, Aiden. I doubt I’ll ever forget that.”
“I’ll write it down for you.”
“Awesome. Thank you. Should I keep it in my purse?”
“Keep it wherever you want, baby. Just don’t lose it. Yeah?”
If I’m scaring her, she doesn’t make her fear known. She just stares up at me, absorbing the truth behind my threat. I will never tolerate people messing with her. Max hides from violence. I embrace it. I’ve been fighting it off since the second I opened my eyes and wailed in pain for the first time. I will not subject her to anything in that same capacity, no matter how dull or severe.
Gia Maria does not suffer. Not on my watch.
“You’re gonna push all my buttons, aren’t you?”
“Looking forward to it.”
She smiles against my skin, pressing her lips against my bicep. I bite back a groan. “Does that mean you’ll stop hiding from me?”
A better man would say no. It was Max who saved her. It was Max who pulled her from that shit stain she calls a father. It was Max who loved her first.
I am a strong man, capable of enduring the type of pain that makes people wish they were dead. I do not possess the strength required to hold her in my arms and ignore Max as he tells me that I deserve to love her too.
I’m madly in love with this woman, and I can’t bear to let Max love her all alone.
Gia is mine too.
She doesn’t know it yet, but between Max and I, she’ll never need anyone else. There’s nobody on this planet that could love her more than the two of us combined.
Even so, I won’t bombard her. “Would you like that? For me to be around more?”
