I huff, even though his words make my heart flutter. “That sounds a lot like a rescue fantasy to me,” I say, trying to injure this thing before it can hurtme, “like you need a project to help you feel…whatever it is you need to feel good about yourself.”
He flinches; it’s small, but I see it. “This isn’t that,” he says. “If anything, it’s the opposite. I’m trying really hardnotto fix you.”
“Then what is it?” I ask, too loud for how close we are. “Who are you if you’re not holding everybody else together?”
He looks at me for a long second, the muscle in his jaw working. “Someone who just wants to be with you,” he finally says. “However that looks. However you want it to look. For as long as you want it.”
“Don’t—” The word snaps out before I can stop it. I pull my hands into sleeves like I’m hiding some weapon I’m scared I might use. But my tongue has always been the greatest one I have.
I stand up, needing somewhere for the anxiety to physically go. He stands up too, and he looks like he wants to reach for me, but doesn’t.
“Don’t say that,” I tell him. “Don’t say things when you don’t understand what they mean, what they come with. I’ve been hurt…a lot. I’ve never known what it’s like to feel safe. My body doesn’t know anything else besides protecting itself…and sometimes it hurts other people trying to get that done. A face can trigger me, a touch can trigger me, a stupid word or tone of voice can trigger me… I feel like I’m at ground zero with this whole healing process…and that doesn’t feel like the time to invite someone else into the mess. I don’t understand why you would want to be in the middle of my mess anyway. I don’t understand what you’re trying to do here.”
“I’m just trying to stay,” he says, palms up. “That’s all… I’m okay with working through the hard parts, with finding the right ways to care about you in ways that will make you feel safe.”
“Stay until when?” I ask. “Until I break something you can’t glue back together? Until the version of me you like gets drowned out by the one you don’t?”
He opens his mouth, closes it, looks down like he’s choosing words that won’t hurt me. “That sounds like fear talking,” he says—and it lands like a gavel being thrown at me.
“Stop that,” I snap, and the word knocks something loose I’ve been holding shut. The shame rides in on its heels. His hands flex like he doesn’t know whether to reach for me or give me more room. “Don’t therapist me,” I throw out. “You don’t get it. You think you do because you’ve heard the bullet points of my life. But Iwillhurt you. Not on purpose. Just…because that’s what happens.”
He reaches for a calm approach, and I hear the therapist in him, which is the worst possible thing right now. “It doesn’t sound like hurting me is the real problem here.”
I feel myself getting overwhelmed, wanting to run away from this. I’m tired of all the bad parts being front and center for everyone to see and analyze.
“Then tell me, Bash! What’s my problem? Go on! Tell me! Diagnose me! Use me like I’m just another practice patient. Tell me all the things you think are wrong with me!”
I watch as Bash paces back and forth before finally stopping. He looks angry…or defeated? I’m not really sure. I’ve never seen him look like this before. I see the wheels turning in his head as he stares at me. He’s thinking about what he wants to say, how he wants to say it, if he’s going to give me what I’m really asking for, if he’s going to take the open invitation to dissect the darkest parts of me.
“You want to know what I think is wrong with you?” he asks, voice sharper now.
It scares me, scares my heart, that he’s about to flip like everyone else always does.
“Yes!” I yell.
The tears start to fall, and I watch Bash’s expression change instantly. He doesn’t want to back down. He’s not going to. I can see it in his eyes. But he’s also fighting the urge to comfort me, to wipe my tears away, to make me feel okay, like he always does. But he can’t. He can’t, because if he gives in and walks over to me right now, all the walls will come down. He won’t have the courage anymore to say what he needs to say. So even though he takes a step towards me, he forces himself to stop.
“You want me to diagnose you like a patient? Give you this long list of clinical notes to explain why you are the way you are?”
“Yes,” I force out through a sob. “I want to know how damaged you think I am.”
His hands twitch by his sides, and I watch him tuck them into his pockets, restraining himself from reaching for me.
“Fine.” He steps closer now, fully closing the distance between us without even touching me. “What’s wrong with you…isn’t all the scars this world has given you in the last nineteen years of your life. It’s not anything you think you’ve done wrong along the way. It’s not the way you chose to heal. It’s not the baggage you think you carry for everyone to see. It’s not even that you think you’ll hurt me, because let’s face it, I can handle it…I’mtelling youI can handle it. It’s the fear. It’s that you’re scared of anything good happening in your life. You’re scared to be loved…because love has always come with a price tag, betrayal, and uncertainty. You’ve been hurt so badly, so deep down to your bones, that your brain has created walls around your heart; not just to keep others from getting close to you, but to keep yourself from ever needing someone, from wanting someone in a way that gives them the power to hurt you again. And now, when something good shows up, you call it a trick, you call yourself bad first, so no one else gets to.”
Something breaks in my chest.
He searches my face like he wants to make sure I hear every word he’s saying. “You see yourself as ‘too much,’ or ‘not enough,’ or as this mess of scars and pain that you believe somehow makes you unlovable…but all I see is someone who survived hell and still fights to find her light every day. That fear you have, that feeling you carry like a weight, like a weapon to protect yourself, that’s just proof of your strength. That’s proof that you’re still trying, that you still care to be here, even when every demon you’ve ever fought is still screaming at you to give up.”
His voice softens, lowering the intensity in his tone, “You don’t mess things up. You do what any other person would do; you just try to survive. And Lydia…you’ve done more than just survive…you’re learning to live again, even if it doesn’t feel like it yet.”
He lets out this shaky breath, and I can hear the emotions he’s choking back, “The thing is…I want to be here to walk with you through the rest of that journey. I want to be here to remind you every day that you’re not ‘damaged,’ you’re perfect in your imperfections. I refuse to let you believe you need to be quiet about your pain. You’re the only one who can tell your story, and I want to hear every part of it. But more than that, I want you to believe you deserve to be loved therightway after everything you’ve been through. To be safe. To be whole. To be happy.”
When he steps closer this time, he grabs both sides of my face, gently guiding me to look up at him. This moment feels so intimate, like it’s just for us, like the world outside of this moment doesn’t even exist. The problems don’t exist. The self-destruction and self-doubt don’t exist. The fear of letting someone in doesn’t exist. It’s just us, all walls are down.
“So no, Lydia. I don’t see you as broken. I don’t see you as damaged. I don’t see some stupid diagnosis on some stupid piece of paper. I don’t see a villain…I see you. I see your strength. I see your beauty. I see someone I’m so in love with that I think I might actually be clinically insane. Lydia, I don’t want the picture-perfect story. I want the broken picture that tells a story…I want that story to beourstory.”
My brain turns to white noise. “Did you just say you…?”
