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“Seeley treated you like trash?” Eddie asked, picking up on what I really shouldn’t have let him in on.
“Once upon a time, yes,” I said, nodding, my stomach still twisting at the memory.
“Lemme guess. Back when he was young and stupid?” Eddie asked.
“One could argue that being a gun-running biker makes him a bit foolish still.”
“Can I ask you something?” Eddie said, eyes looking suddenly very wise.
“Sure.”
“When you were kids, right before he did whatever he did to piss you off for life, did you maybe say shit like that to him?”
“Shit like what?” I asked.
“About him being stupid or foolish or anything else a young guy could maybe mistake for you saying that he’ll never be good enough for you?” Eddie asked.
“I never…” I started, but his words suddenly settled in deep, started putting down roots.
I never said that, no.
But every single time I made a comment about him being capable of more or, worse yet, “better,” I was inadvertently telling him that he wasn’t good enough just as he was.
Or, at least, that was what he would hear.
And, maybe, to an extent, there was a part of me that meant it.
“Whoops,” Eddie said as I jumped up and started pacing, my mind running back over endless memories. And so, so many of them made comments about what he could do with his life.
Sure, in my mind, I meant that we could both make it out of the neighborhood, create something stable and safe for ourselves.
But all Seeley would have heard was that I thought the path he was on at the time was shitty. And that, by extension, so was he.
Not good enough.
Amplify that by the fact that Seeley always put me up on a pedestal, then, yeah, everything was suddenly falling into place and making so much sense.
“Did I fuck something up?” Eddie asked, but I was too lost in my memories to pay him any mind.
Suddenly, that last night came back in blinding detail.
He hadn’t initiated anything.
He’d even tried to get me to turn him away several times.
Because he knew he wasn’t going to talk to me again.
If I knew anything about Seeley—and I did—he probably planned to cut ties with me for “my own good.” Like he thought that maybe he would hold me back with his friendship.
But when I initiated, when I refused to push him away, he’d been helpless but to give into something he’d clearly been wanting just as much as I had by that point.
I’d drifted half awake a few times afterward, feeling his hands moving over me, his lips pressing gently on my head or face.
Holding on and cherishing because he knew he would never hold me again.
All that pain I’d felt afterward, all those sleepless nights, all those tear-stained cheeks, all the loneliness I’d experienced, it had all been my fault.
I’d been making Seeley feel like I was pushing him away for years.
