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Ryan won, but then I don’t think Rory or I tried that hard. My son needed the sweet taste of victory and he got it.
Loving? Double-fucking-check.
We’re at the arcade and pizzeria in town and we’ve played until Ryan has probably spent enough money to feed a third world nation. It was good… better than good. That laughter that I realized this morning Ryan hadn’t been giving me? It was out in full force tonight. So much laughter and that cute giggle he gives that it too squeezed my heart and brought me pain. Ryan laughed so much that I fucking kid you not, my child was glowing from that shit. His face was alight with… happiness.
I hadn’t seen it in so long. Fuck, maybe even since Ryan began to realize he didn’t have a woman in his life. Babies need their mothers, there’s a special bond between them. I had heard that shit often, but I didn’t believe it. Ryan’s mother is a fucking she-bitch cow who’d rather have diamonds on her fingers and blow in her nose than hug her child. The few times she’s been in Ryan’s space, she’s proved that over and over.
The most painful thing about it was that she proved it to Ryan. He was young, sure, but my child is smart and he was faced with this reality almost immediately. He shouldn’t have had to and I fucking tried to protect him, but shit bleeds through and Vicki… she’s so fucking full of shit that you smell it coming for days. I’ve tried to make up for it. Sometimes I succeeded, often I failed.
I never expected to have a child, it wasn’t on my plans for life. The way I grew up… it marked me and I never wanted the responsibility of a child because I sure as fuck didn’t want to mess his life up.
I never wanted to mark him.
But, I have. I’ve marked him with my anger, my fear of losing him, of him getting hurt… and my choices. I’ve marked him and I fucking hate myself for it. Coming to Montana was a new start. A chance to try and mend those marks. A chance to give Ryan a normal life, without worrying Vicki was going to try something else.
At first, she wanted Ryan because it was a connection to me and she could use him for money. I’ve paid her so much dough just to get rid of the bitch that it’s staggering. Fury asked me once why I didn’t just fucking kill her and end it all back then.
I should have. I was weak. That’s another thing I would have changed if I could go back. I didn’t want to do that. I didn’t want to have my son look at me one day and see hate in his eyes, all because I killed his mother. Back then, I stupidly thought there was still time for her to change. That she’d magically look at Ryan, this beautiful little boy who made the world better, and want to clean her shit up to be a part of that—to nourish it. It never happened. With Vicki that truth is compounded in my head daily these days. Now I’d end her. I’d fucking strangle the life out of her with my bare hands. I’d do it without regret.
But, it turns out that as stupid as Vicki is, she’s also smart. Because she never comes at me alone, and never in a way I can get my hands around her fucking throat. One day it’s coming. I know it and I’m prepared. I just hope I can shield Ryan when it does.
“Noah?” Rory asks softly, like she’s afraid. “Are you okay?”
I look away from my son. Correction, I’m staring at his hand on Rory’s stomach and the way her fingers are lightly dancing over that hand. I’ve been staring at it this entire time, feeling this burn in my gut and… resisting the urge to snatch him and run.
How fucked up is that?
I force my gaze to lift to Rory’s face.
Beautiful. So much fucking beauty my balls ache and that squeeze on my heart comes back, but more intense. Her green eyes are glued to my face as if she’s trying to read the lay of the land, see what is in my head.
I could tell her that she doesn’t want to know. I don’t want to be in my head… I just don’t have the choice.
“I’m good,” I tell her. The words not truthful, but I can’t remember a time when I was good, so I’m at least at my norm.
“You’re quiet,” she says.
“Fighting old ghosts,” I tell her, giving her that small bit of honesty because she’s done nothing to prove she doesn’t deserve it. Still, the mistrust is there. I’m expecting her to show me that I was wrong to soften toward her. I’m fully expecting for her to prove she’s as bad as the others and yet, I’m still letting her near my son.
