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“Oh.”
“So, you do?” He prompted, gliding his fingers down my cheek. The touch caused me to shiver.
“Yes,” I admitted. “He texts me all the time. I never reply, but it doesn’t deter him. He’s extremely stubborn.”
“Why don’t you change your phone number?”
I let out a sigh, nibbling on my lip with nervousness. I slowly tilted my head up to look at him. “I know it probably sounds silly, childish even, but I keep hoping that my parent’s will call me and it’ll all be okay.”
“No,” he breathed, his eyes heated with affection, “it’s not silly. It’s normal to hope for things—even impossible things. Once you lose hope, you lose everything.”
“You’re being oddly insightful,” I muttered.
He chuckled, his lips brushing against my hair. “When you’re so filled with anger and resentment, you tend to shut yourself off from everyone and everything. It allows a lot of time for thinking, so yes, I can be insightful.”
“You know what I hate the most?” I whispered.
“What?”
“Despite the fact that they didn’t believe me, I still love them and miss them.”
“Your parents?”
I nodded to answer his question. “Isn’t that dumb?”
“Not at all,” he spoke, his voice barely above a whisper. “They’re your parents, by nature you’re going to miss them and love them no matter what.”
“I hate myself for it, though,” I admitted. “After the things they said…” I trailed off, shaking my head. I sat up straight, no longer using Caelan’s body for support. “I should never want to see or hear from them again. But I can’t help feeling like if my mom called me right now, and said she was sorry, that she believed me, I’d end up on a plane back to Dallas tomorrow.”
I hid my face behind my hands, ashamed of my admission. I wanted so desperately to hate them, but I couldn’t. That fact made me angry. I mean, I was certainly mad at them, but there’s a huge difference between being mad and hating someone.
“Hey,” Caelan said. “Hey,” his voice grew louder and he grabbed ahold of my wrists pulling my hands away from my face. He was now crouched in front of me. I turned my head away, unable to look at him. I could barely breathe. I felt like I was suffocating—like the truth was killing me. Why had I thought this was a good idea? Why had I shared this with him? It was far too painful having it out in the open. Having him know changed everything, and we’d both be lying if we said it didn’t. “Come here,” he finally murmured. I didn’t move. I didn’t have to. He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me against his chest. We lay down together on the floor, wrapped in one another’s arms. The smell of his soap comforted me and helped to still my racing heart.
“Shh,” he hushed, his fingers tangling in my hair. “Shh, I’m here, Sutton. I’m here and I’m not going anywhere.”
Sobbing, I clung to him—my whole body twined around his.
How was it possible that it hurt to tell the truth, but felt so incredibly liberating at the same time?
“It’s okay,” he whispered, his lips lightly pressing against my forehead in a tender kiss. I found my eyes closing and a soft contented sigh passed between my parted lips. It felt so good to be held and comforted—by Caelan Gregory of all people. He’d frustrated me at first, pushing all my buttons, but I’d known there was more to the addict across the hall. I was right. And he had a heart of gold—even though he couldn’t see it. One day he would, though. I’d make sure of it. He wasn’t all bad like he believed. Yeah, drugs and alcohol are some bad shit, and he could be downright abusive, but there was so much more to him than that. He wasn’t mean for no reason. He was haunted, and when you have monsters hiding in your closet, it makes you lash out. That’s why I understood him when no one else could. We were far too much alike.
“What happened to you—all of it—was horrible, Sutton,” he spoke after several long minutes of silence. “But you’re not tainted because of it.”
I breathed deeply, savoring his words like they were a delicious wine and my taste buds couldn’t get enough. I slowly sat up, my hair falling over my shoulder to brush against the fabric of his thin cotton shirt. “You’re not either, you know.”
He breathed out roughly, his whole body shaking with the effort. “It feels like it. I feel like everyone is judging me, watching me, waiting for me to fuck up even more and do something irreversible.” A frown marred his beautiful face. “Everyone gave up on me after they died. Instead of pushing me to get help, they thought I was beyond it, and let me be. They didn’t try hard enough. And I know I shouldn’t hate them for it, because it’s my fault too, but I was just a kid.”
“We both were,” I whispered, crossing my arms and laying them across his chest where I then rested my head. We stared at each other, cataloging our features, and soaking in one of the rare moments where you were connected to someone who understood you. “Tell me about after they died,” I whispered. “Please,” I added, when his face hardened.
His eyes closed and his whole body shuddered as the memories resurfaced. I knew what it was like to remember things better left buried. Each time you recalled them, another piece of you died. I hated myself for asking such a selfish question—I should’ve left it alone—but I needed him to share a part of himself with me. ‘Always so curious, Sutton,’ my mom used to say. She was right. I had innate need to figure out and understand everything that confounded me.
He wet his lips with a quick flick of his tongue and his eyes opened once more. The pain that shown there was excruciating and I wasn’t even the one that felt it. My heart broke further for Caelan Gregory. My body, my heart, and my soul ached to comfort him, but I knew that’s not what he needed. Right now, he needed me to listen, because he was finally going to open up. We would no longer be two people using each other to fulfill selfish desires. We were crossing a line in to dangerous territory—one where our hearts would entangle and be altered forevermore.
“It was November when I lost them, and myself,” he said the words slowly, swirling them around in his mouth like they were a foreign language. “Two weeks before Thanksgiving,” he snorted humorlessly. “Since you Googled me,” he looked at me pointedly, “I’m sure you know all the gory details. How I found them, like that,” he paused, swallowing thickly. I saw his pulse jump in his throat and his whole body shuddered painfully once more. “There was so much blood, Sutton. It was everywhere. Sometimes I still feel like it’s on me and I can’t get it off, no matter how hard I scrub my body it’s always there clinging to me, reminding me of what happened.” A look of revulsion tore over his facial features. His chest rose and fell with a shaky exhalation. “Sometimes, when it should be quiet, I hear screams…and I can’t help but feel like I’m hearing their last moments even though I wasn’t even there.” My hands fisted, the nails digging into the palms as I fought against the need to provide him comfort and reassurance. I knew he needed to get this out and there would be time for the other later—if he allowed.
“After they died…nothing else mattered to me,” he whispered, staring up at the ceiling away from me for a moment. “I
moved in with my grandparents after.” He chuckled to himself, and then explained the reason for his outburst, “After,” he repeated. “My life exists in before and after. How pathetic is that?” He struggled for composure, but once he gained it, he continued. “I retreated in to myself. I didn’t care about school. Or going to college. Or friends. At that time I didn’t even care about girls.” He gave me a wry smile. “I fell in with the wrong crowd.” Laughing again, he asked, “How cliché of me.” Shaking his head, he bit his lip and struggled for words. “My grandparents didn’t know how to handle me. My grandpa took the tough love route and my grandma…well, I think she was afraid of me. Kyle, my friend since we were in diapers, he never gave up on me even though he should have. He’s tried to get me to go to rehab several times. The last time was a few weeks ago when you found me destroying my apartment. I was so angry that he couldn’t understand that I need the drugs and the alcohol. Without it, the pain is all too real. It consumes me.” He rubbed one hand up and down my back and used the other to scrub his face. “I often wish I could forget everything, but then that means I wouldn’t remember my family, and do I really want to forget them? No.” He answered his own question. “So, I’m stuck in this endless vortex of pain and suffering and hatred and it’s all that exits.”
