He shook his head.“No.She’s fine.Kid is resilient.”
“Most kids are.Bodies and brains are far more elastic than the rest of us.”
His lips twisted, highlighting the sexy white scar.“Listen … about last night …”
“You don’t have to—”
He swallowed hard, and my attention was drawn to his large Adam’s apple, but only for a second.He was avoiding eye contact and I glanced down to see him wringing his hands together.All I wanted to do was reach out and still them for him.Let him know he didn’t have to explain, apologize or discuss it any further.
“I do,” he finally said.“I need to apologize for my behavior.For the way I just booked it out of here so abruptly and rudely.It was wrong, and I’m sorry.”
“Mabel said you had a panic attack.Was it over something I said or did?”
His head shook again, but then he said, “Yes.”I could tell he was struggling, so I just stood there patiently and waited for him to collect his thoughts.“No.Sort of.You told me your age and it kind of triggered me.”
Okay …
My age triggered him?Well fuck that and fuck him.
“I’m twenty-six.”
It took me a second to do some math, but when I did, my eyes widened in surprise.He was twenty-six and had a thirteen-year-old daughter.“Whoa.And Mabel is yours biologically?”
“Yes.She is my biological daughter, who I conceived with my stepmother.She was …isseventeen years older than me.It was,” he swallowed, “it was not a situation I consented to.She molested me and sexually assaulted me since I was eight.”
My hand flew up and covered my mouth as a river of ice cascaded down the length of my spine.“Oh my god.”
“She was just granted parole yesterday.That was the phone call I received.So needless to say, I’ve been a little on edge.Not exactly myself.”
“Holy shit.”
“Yeah … as you can guess, I’m pretty fucked up when it comes to women and relationships.I … I’ve never had a girlfriend before.I’ve never been in a relationship.Besides Kyla—that’s Mabel’s mother’s name—I haven’t been intimate with any other women.For a while there, I thought that I might be asexual because I never really found myself attracted to other women.But … I don’t think so because I find myself thinking about you.And I think that I have feelings for you.”
He inflated his cheeks like a chipmunk, then pushed the air out before he awkwardly rocked back on his heels.“There you go.That’s me in a fucked-up nutshell.”
“Oh.”
His lips twisted in a cute way.“Yeah.”
I wasn’t buying the casual way he was acting and shrugging this all off.Not for a second.This couldn’t be easy to discuss, not with me, not with anyone.And the fact that his abuser had just been granted parole … if I didn’t know for a fact that Ephram was dead, but was instead just in prison and up for parole too, I’d be shitting bricks and booking the next rocket to the moon.
This had to be a defense mechanism.In fact, I knew it was.Because I did similar things when discussing my traumatic past.I downplayed it.I didn’t go into expanded detail.I gave the cliff notes version with minimal emotion and attempted to redirect the conversation.
He needed to know he didn’t have to do that with me though.
I nodded gently, letting him know I understood and that I wasn’t judging him.“So then, when you found out my age, you became triggered because you think I’m too old for you?”
Tugging his hands free of his pockets, he gestured with them, tossing them in the air a little.“I don’t know.I mean, yes.It triggered me.And I started to think that maybe that’s mykink …you know?That I’m only attracted to women older than me because of whatshedid.That my brain is all fucked up.”He twirled his finger to his temple and bugged out his eyes.
I nodded.Okay, this was starting to make more sense.
Well, as much sense as something this fucked up could.Because this was seriously fucked up.
I thought my life and past were traumatizing, but this was insane.
“Does … does Mabel know about her mother?”
“Mabel and I have zero secrets.She’s too smart to keep anything from anyway.It was easy enough for her to do the math, then start asking questions.”
