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He clears his throat. “Did you report it?” Immediately, he shakes his head. “I’m sorry. That was the wrong question.”
His stubble prickles the pads of my fingers as I rub his jaw. “At first, I didn’t even understand that what was happening was wrong. He was my boyfriend and he cared about me and people who care about you don’thurtyou. At least, they’re not supposed to. My brain tried to come up with an explanation, any explanation that wasn’t the truth. It wasn’t until after that I couldn’t stop shaking. I told my resident supervisor and she called the police and went with me to the hospital but in the end, even with the rape kit, I was told it would be a hard case to prove. He said, she said, I wasn’t a virgin, and all that. I moved out of res...just bad memories. I went to therapy.”
He tucks my hair behind my ear, brushes his thumb across my cheek to collect my tears. His fingers are soft on my lips. “Thank you for telling me. I’m sorry that happened to you. I’m sorry that the people who were supposed to protect you didn’t do more.”
I shrug. “It’s fine,” I say even though I’m crying. “I’m fine. It wasn’t overly violent or anything. It was just...it hurt. He hurt me. More than just my body, you know? He taught me there are not nice people out there. And that some people are so broken that the only way they can feel whole is to break someone else.”
“I don’t know how...” He stops and starts again. “I’ve never met someone who...” His frustration surrounds him like a heat haze hovering over asphalt. “I’m sorry. I know that’s not true.” This time he speaks slowly, like he’s choosing each word carefully. “No one’s ever told me before and I want to make sure I do right by you.”
He leans closer, tentative and slow, his forehead to mine, his palm over my heart.
“You have,” I say. “I’m not sure there is a right thing to say,” I amend.
“I promise to always be careful with you. To respect you and listen to you.”
“I know. That’s why I told you. I trust you. Jesse, you’re...” My heart is in my throat. “You’re my best friend.”
He holds me against his chest, presses his mouth to the top of my head. “You’re brave,” he says. “I want to be brave like you.”
“Oh,” I say, eloquent, like a true academic. Is this what adoration feels like? It’s one thing to feel brave around Jesse, it is entirely another for a brave person to think I am brave, too. To say it out loud.
“Your teeth aren’t chattering anymore.”
I didn’t notice they’d stopped.
“It scared me,” he says.
“I’m sorry,” I say like a reflex.
“Don’t be. That’s a normal response to trauma.”
Sometimes what I feel for Jesse, how I feel for him, is almost too big to fit inside my body. Like I’ll die if we’re not skin to skin, like if he’s beside me I can do anything. I’m not sure if this is how friends should feel about each other, and maybe this is exactly why the study doesn’t want us to do the thing we just did. I’m filled with so many questions, like how do we know when to stop, orwillwe stop? All I know is that Jesse is worthy of the softest parts of me, the parts that are still growing, pink and thin-skinned and sensitive to light. His strength isn’t in his muscles or his size. It’s in his heart, in his ability to see me so completely I can’t hide the jagged parts of myself, nor do I want to.
That feels like friendship, being our most honest versions of ourselves. It feels a little like love, too.
Chapter Eighteen
Jesse
I convince Lulu to stay. It doesn’t take much since once we get off the floor it’s long past midnight and we both need showers. She gives me her keys and I have to adjust her seat all the way back, then move her car into my driveway. She sits on my bed, finger combing her wet hair, wearing my sweater and a pair of sweats rolled at the ankles.
“I hope I didn’t use up all the hot water,” she says.
“Don’t worry about it,” I say. I’m just eager to get cleaned up. The water is lukewarm but that’s good. I’m still running hot on the smell of her hair, her skin in my nose, the feel of her against me. I need to drown out the sound of her moans still echoing in my ears and wash away the way she looked at me. Like I am someone. Like I am precious to her.
Lulu isn’t in my room when I get out of the shower. I find her on the couch, curled up with Betty, an afghan my grandmother knitted over her legs. I sit on the edge of the couch, wrap my hand around her ankle. “You take the bed. I’ll take the couch.”
She shakes her head. “You’re too big for this couch. Why’d you buy such a little couch when you’re so tall?”
She’s sleepy. Bed rumpled on a sofa. I want to see what she looks like in the morning. “We’ll share the bed,” I say. “Just sleep,” I tell her when she tees up another objection on her lips. She waits for me as I double-check the locks on the front and side doors, shut off the lights, check Betty’s water.
“Do you have a side?” she asks.
The center.
“You take that side,” I say, pointing to the spot she lay the last time she was here.
With her in it, my bed overflows. It makes no sense how one person can take up so much space in a king-size. She rolls toward me and I lie on my back staring up at my popcorn ceiling. The last time I had someone else in my bed, I had a job I loved. I had a body I felt strong in. I don’t feel strong enough, worthy to hold the things she’s told me. Her words are a baby bird in my hands. I could close my fist and crush them, crush her. But she chose me to hold this with her, and I want to honor that.
