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“Okay, that’s okay,” he said, but she could hear the worry.
“It’s not okay.” She barked out a mirthless laugh. “I know it’s not okay. But this is me. This is what I am. A freak.” She nodded. “This is good. It’s good that you see this now. It’s good you know what I’m really like before things get too serious between us.”
“You’re not a freak and things are already serious between us.”
She ignored him because she knew better. “I went to a clinic, years ago. Saw a psychiatrist and tried to get him to fix me.” She looked at Joe. “He said he wouldn’t. He said there was nothing wrong with me. That I was just built this way and no amount of therapy would fix it. Do you hear what I’m saying, Joe? I’m unfixable. This is it. Forever.”
He shook his head. “I didn’t hear that. I heard you tell me that a professional said there’s nothing wrong with you. And he was right.”
“Yes, I’m so normal that I’m hiding in a bath,” she scoffed, fighting back tears. “I’m so normal that I can’t bear it when people get upset. Anger is worse. I feel it in the air. It presses in on me, making me insane from the tension. Raw emotion makes my skin crawl. I feel it inside of me. It’s loud and painful and I just want to run to get it to stop. My skin hurts. Touch is painful. Lights are too bright. Noise is too loud. Whatever you hear or see, I experience magnified a million times over.”
“I didn’t realise.”
“Hypersensitivity, they call it. There’s actually a name for it. No cure, but a name. Add to that my OCD problems and the fact I get paralysed with shyness and I’m just delightful to be around.” She felt a tear run down her cheek as she cocked her head. “You still want me, Joe? You still think I’m normal?”
“Baby.” His voice was agonisingly soft.
She shook her head. She’d been so foolish to hope for a future. To think she had a chance at normal. Normal was for other people. The best she could hope for was uneventful.
“I don’t want to see you anymore,” Julia said, her voice trembling. “I want this thing between us to be over.”
He shook his head. “I don’t accept that.”
“Why? Do you think if we just try hard enough I won’t be like this anymore? You think you can fix me, Joe?”
He reached for her again but stopped himself. “You don’t need to be fixed.”
“Right.” She gave a brittle laugh.
“You don’t need to be fixed.”
Unfortunately, his decreeing it didn’t make it so. Things didn’t work that way.
“Leave me be,” Julia said wearily. “I can’t be what you want. All that would happen would be that you’d realise the same thing, sometime down the track. And then you’d look at me with such disappointment. I couldn’t bear it. Not you,” she whispered. “Not from you.”
“Joe,” Ryan called from the bedroom. “We need to head out.”
A muscle in Joe’s jaw throbbed. His fists clenched and unclenched on the edge of the bath.
“Give me a minute,” he called to Ryan.
“Just go,” Julia said as she closed her eyes.
“I have to, I don’t have a choice, but hear this first.” He gripped her chin. “I love you.”
She jerked, but didn’t shake off his touch. “You can’t.”
“I do.” His voice was pure conviction. “Do you hear me, Julia Collins? I love you. The you who’s brilliant and organised and caring. I love you. The woman who feels too much and can’t process it. I love you. The woman who needs a man like me. A man who sees her. A man who can protect her. A man who believes, one hundred percent, that she’s perfect just as she is. A man who loves her.”
“Joe,” Ryan called.
Joe gritted his teeth. “Think about this while I’m gone. Think about the fact that I see you, I think you’re perfect as you are and I love you.” His eyes were molten pools. “Give me a chance,” he whispered. “Let me show you it’s the truth. Let me love you.”
“We need to go.” Ryan sounded tense.
“You don’t get to give up on us. You don’t get to tell me what I think and feel, now or in the future. You don’t get to do that.” He stood. “I won’t let you.”
And with that, Joe strode from the room, leaving Julia stunned and alone, wondering what had just happened. And if she had it in her to believe he meant what he said.
