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When you’ve stared fear right in the eyes, when you’ve tasted bitter despair, you don’t function within the bright, mundane world any longer.
Our relationship operates on a different level of rules and trust. We’re not blind in the dark; we seek it out. We crave it. And I’ve never craved anything or anyone as much as I crave Sadie right now. I need my goddess to exonerate me.
Not Alone
Sadie
When I was five, I remember my mother rubbing a smelly leaf over my burned skin. I had wanted to curl my hair—just like hers—and grabbed the wrong end of the curling iron. It was such a careless mistake, but one I never forgot. I recall the sting, the tears, the pleading to stop as she rubbed—I’d rather suffer the burn than endure the recovery.
She never scolded, just applied the sage to my palm and fingers, then wrapped my hand. For the following week, each time she pealed back the bandage to rub the stinky leaf concoction over my flesh, the pain lessened, and the burn was healed a little more.
My mother had many natural remedies, ones that I mocked—like any kid would—up until the time after my abduction. What wounds the doctors couldn’t mend, my mother continued to treat. And though the scars never completely faded, they would be much worse without her effort. I know this.
The sharp aroma of sage oil wafts through the air now as I apply another generous layer to my mother’s hand, rubbing the soothing emollient into her weathered skin.
“I’ve met someone,” I say, hoping that my voice will clear some of the mental fog separating her from me. “He’s…nice.” I twist my lips, trying to think of ways to describe Colton to the woman who brought me into this world.
Dark. Mysterious. Handsome… Person of interest in a serial killer case…
Only Colton’s description could go from cliché to terrifying in a single sentence. And truthfully, it pains me that I don’t know how to define him. As a profiler, yes, with enough background information, I could outline his life, his psyche, and his personality, and I could paint a very vivid and accurate portrayal of the man. But as a woman…he eludes me. I know what I desire from him. I understand what attracts me to him. I comprehend my most basic, carnal needs…and I feel the deep yearning to connect with him in my soul.
But is that true emotion, or only my darkness reaching out to his? Am I so completely twisted that I don’t clearly grasp the dysfunction between us? How can something so haunting and disturbing reach right into me, beyond the depths of me, and feel this…right.
“More…”
I blink, and my mother’s small, reedy frame comes back into focus. “Mom? More what?” She rarely speaks anymore, only one word sentences and grunts to gesture toward what she needs or wants.
Alzheimer’s is a cruel disease. It strips the people you love of the very thing that makes them, them. By the time I made the decision to move here permanently to be closer to her, she was already forgetting me. No number of visits could remedy that.
She nods her head a couple of times, her thin bun falling loose. “More,” she manages.
“More about Colton? You want me to tell you more about the man in my life?”
She nods shakily, a weak smile forming and stretching her cracked lips. I try my best to match that smile, giving her hope that my life is fine. Normal. I’m an average, twenty-six year-old woman with a new boyfriend and a simple, fulfilling career. She won’t recall any of the details later, but for now, this is the daughter I want her to have.
“All right,” I say, saucing another scoop of sage oil onto my palms. I place my hands beneath her jaw and massage the ointment into her neck, allowing the aromatherapy to work its magic. “He gets me. Maybe not in the traditional sense…but he’s able to look beneath my cover and see the girl I once was, and the woman I want to be. He sees only the best of me, not what I outwardly project to the world, the things we only want others to see—but the real, damaged, unperfected me. And to him, I’m beautiful.”
The word slips past my lips before I can stop it, and my hands still. My entire being freezes like I’ve been struck dumb. I have not uttered that word since I was sixteen—and this is no simple, careless slipup. It’s a profound moment of freedom that scares me more than the word itself.
Colton sees me as beautiful—unsightly, dirty pieces and all. I’ve never desired that before, never allowed myself to long to be beautiful. Up until now, it’s only ever mattered how I viewed myself. Which has forever been like staring into a fun house mirror; warped and distorted. But that blurry girl was me, and I embraced her. I’ve never wanted to be beautiful to anyone—until Colton.
It’s more than an alarming revelation; it’s the ease I’m frightened of, the effortless loss of will to fight against my nature. Being on guard has been what’s kept me safe—kept others safe—and I fear losing that impassable boundary.
But, oh, that moment when I felt what it would mean to be his beautiful goddess…it rocked the very foundation of my existence. Every wall I’ve spent years constructing came crashing down, and I became utterly his. Despite what the future may bring, the reality that will bleed into our dark little bubble, I do not want to lose his faith in me. That fleeting, shimmering chance that the woman he sees really is who I am. I’m only afraid I’m not brave enough to take that final leap.
My mother places a chilly hand atop one of mine, drawing my attention back on her. “Fear…” she whispers.
My eyebrows draw together, and I lower my hands to my lap, keeping hers tucked between mine. “Fear, Mom? What about it?” Did I actually say any of that out loud?
Her hands grip mine and her eyes widen. Her lips move like she wants to say something, and I can see the frustration in her pursed features at not being able to voice her thoughts. “Fear…love.”
My stomach drops. “I should be afraid of love?”
Annoyed, she yanks her hands away from mine and shakes her head. “Love is…fear.” She smiles, so warm and genuine that my own lips tremble.
Placing a hand to my cheek, she nods, urging me to understand her meaning.
I clasp her hand to me and lean into her touch. “Love is fear,” I say, and she nods. “You’re right. We spend a lifetime fearing we’ll never find it, and when we do…if it’s real…we fear losing it. We fear making a mistake. We fear so much that it drives love away eventually.” I meet my mother’s cloudy gaze as I fight back tears in mine. “But you’re saying this is much deeper, aren’t you?”
