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Chapter Thirty-Eight

RUTH

“ I can’t sleep with you doing that,” I grumble. Rowan’s wrapped around me from behind, and every time I think I’m about to doze off, he’ll press kisses to my bare shoulder, my hairline, down the sensitive spot under my ear. I made him put his underwear back on, but when he went to grab his t-shirt, I snatched it first. It’s all soft and worn-in and smells like his soap. I’m hoping he’s not harboring any delusions of getting this thing back, because there’s no way that’s happening.

“Sorry.” His ministrations don’t stop.

“No, you’re not,” I groan as I roll over in his arms. He doesn’t release me, instead tightening his hold and pulling me until I’m half on top of him, head on his chest and our legs tangled together under the comforter.

A deep contentment settles into my bones as we lay there. It’s like our heartbeats sync up, and we turn into one animal. Rowan’s fingertips trail across my skin, drawing gentle lines between my freckles. I realize I have nothing to say. I’m always trying to fill the silence, my brain going in a hundred different directions at once so I’m constantly playing catch up. But here, with him, I can be quiet.

“Are you gonna tackle me if I try and use your bathroom again?” he says, his stubble tickling my shoulder.

I stiffen. I didn’t know Rowan was coming, so it never occurred to me to hide the charts I still have tacked up. Marshall’s words ring through my head ‘ like kindergarten’ and I flush red at the thought of Rowan seeing them.

“No?” I squeak.

“I don’t care if it’s a mess. I really have to pee.” He starts to scoot back in the bed, and I panic, my hand latching onto his forearm in an attempt to stop him.

“Wait, give me a second.” I dart out of bed and race toward the slightly open door. “I’m gonna go first!”

Rowan’s suddenly stood in front of the door with a face like he’s about to tackle me to the ground. Damn football players. “What is this?”

“Nothing!” I know I sound hysterical. “I have to go.”

“You’re full of shit. Tell me what’s happening.” His eyes are wide, his dark eyebrows knit together as he stares down at me with an expression that’s half confusion, half distress. I know I’m freaking him out and I hate it, but the thought of having to explain the charts kind of makes me want to throw up in my mouth.

I take possibly the least rational course of action, and try to make a break for it. I make it about two steps before he catches me around the waist and throws me back onto the mattress. All the air escapes my lungs as I gasp in surprise. I try to get back up, but he’s leaning over me, arms braced on either side of my head so that I’m effectively caged in. This would be kind of hot if I weren’t about to crawl out of my skin.

“Explain,” he orders.

“There’s nothing to explain!”

“Don’t bullshit me.”

“I’m not. Rowan, this is ridiculous.” I squirm a little, trying to get out from under him, but he presses a knee between my legs to stop me from rolling.

“Stop giving me that. I’m not buying it.” He leans down further into my space.

“Do you not trust me?” I plead, knowing it’s a dirty move.

His face softens. “Of course I trust you.”

“Then leave it.”

“I’m worried about you.”

Well, shit. His eyes are so earnest that any further protests catch in my throat.

“You don’t need to worry,” I whisper.

“Then tell me what’s in there because I’m kind of freaking out.”

“I just-”

“Or at least tell me why I can’t see it.”

“It’s embarrassing.” I look away, unable to meet his eyes as I say it.

“You’ve met Trevor,” he says as he moves off me, opting to sit next to me on the bed. “I have a pretty high threshold for embarrassing behavior.”

I say nothing. I know I’m being unreasonable. I’m well aware that Rowan wouldn’t say anything mean about my ADHD; he probably wouldn’t even comment. But I can’t stop hearing the comments from Marshall, or my mom telling me to stop using my disorder as an ‘excuse.’ My whole life I’ve been told that this is something I need to hide, that if I just try harder I can overcome it, that it’s my attitude that’s holding me back.

I’ve spent a long time trying to unlearn everything I thought I knew, but I’ve not made it all the way. It took me six months to tell Georgie, and we were living together, so it was pretty obvious. She hadn’t been especially surprised when I’d finally come clean, but even now, she doesn’t always seem to understand that when I forget stuff, it’s not from a lack of caring.

“Okay,” he sighs, falling back until he’s lying beside me. He picks up my hand and presses a kiss to it before placing it on his chest. I melt as his thumb brushes back and forth across it. “I really do have to pee, though, so go hide whatever it is because I’m not about to knock on your roommate’s door.”

I stare up at the ceiling, knowing what I need to do. Am I really going to throw cold water on this whole night by keeping this from him? He’s my boyfriend now, and I don’t want to have secrets, especially one that’s such a big part of who I am, but I’m just so fucking scared.

Maybe I need to rip the band-aid off. I mean, he’s going to find out eventually, right? It might be better if I tell him while he’s still basking in his post-virginity-loss glow. I try to psych myself up as I pull back my hand and fold my arms over my face.

This is Rowan. This is Rowan, and I trust him. He’s never given me any reason to think he’d be an ass about this.

I repeat to myself over and over, he’s not Marshall, he’s not my mom, he’s Rowan.

“Just go,” I say through my hands.

“Yeah?”

“Yes,” I groan, not able to look at him. I feel him get up, moving like I’m going to change my mind. Before he goes in, he drops a quick kiss to my cheek.

“Thank you.” He nips my earlobe, and then he’s gone.

I hear him shuffling around in the bathroom, and nervous energy fires through me. I can’t lay here anymore so I stand up and wander over my dresser. There’s clutter scattered all across it and I start tidying, putting stuff into random drawers and stacking bobby pins back into the ceramic dish I bought at a flea market to hold them in. I’d thought having a cute container would get me to actually put them away, but it only lasted a week before they were thrown across my room again.

Rowan shuts the bathroom door behind him as he comes back in. I wonder if he’ll pretend he didn’t see them, but he’s never been one to act dumb. “You didn’t want me to see the charts?” He doesn’t sound mad, just a little confused.

I shake my head but don’t turn around. He comes to me, wrapping both arms around me and resting his head on my shoulder.

“Why not?”

“Because it’s dumb,” I mumble.

“What is?”

“I am.” I spin in his arms. “I can’t even remember to brush my teeth if I don’t give myself a gold star.”

“Ruth, that’s nothing to be ashamed of. I’m sure plenty of people have the same issue.”

“I just hate it.” I lean against him, letting him take my weight. “You know I have to make them myself? I tried to download one, but they’re all for toddlers.”

He takes a long moment before speaking, his fingers playing with the ends of my hair. “One of them was about your medication.” He speaks carefully, like he’s afraid of setting off a landmine. “You never told me you had ADHD.”

I feel myself physically bracing for his judgment, but when he says nothing, I realize he wants an answer.

“No.” I don’t really know what he wants from me right now.

“Why not?”

I chew on my lip, trying to find the words to explain.

“Ruth, it’s not that big a deal,” he says before I can get there. I frown, feeling the indignation build at the way it sounds like he’s minimizing this.

He must see his mistake because he rushes out, “I mean, yes, it’s obviously a big deal to you-”

“To me?”

“No!” His arms tighten like he’s afraid I’m going to bolt. “Yes, it’s a big deal and I’m really grateful you told me-”

“I didn’t exactly tell you.”

“Then, I’m grateful you let me see the paper you have taped up across from your toilet,” he sasses. “I’m really happy that you opened up to me. It means a lot that you trust me with this. I understand that it’s important.”

“Are you mad at me for not saying anything before?”

“Of course not.” He frames my face with his hands, forcing me to look right at him. “But I hate that you were afraid to.”

“I wasn’t afraid, per se…”

“You nearly put me in a chokehold when I tried to go in there,” he says flatly.

“I mostly keep it to myself. People can kinda be assholes about it.”

His face darkens, and I think for a second that he’s about to leap off into the night to find anyone who’s ever been mean to me and beat the shit out of them. He presses his lips to my hair and takes a few long breaths. “I’m sorry that happened.”

“It’s just made me a little cautious.”

“You don’t need to worry with me.”

“No?”

“Of course not, I really don’t care.” He wrinkles his nose. “I mean, I care , but like, I don’t care, you know?”

“I don’t know if I do.” I giggle, flustered Rowan is probably my favorite. He’s definitely the cutest, especially when the tips of his ears turn red.

“I’m really fuckin’ this up, aren’t I?”

“It’s not your best work.”

“Is there anything I can do to be helpful?” he asks.

I think for a second. I don’t think anybody’s ever asked that before. “Patience, I think?”

“Nothing else?”

“I don’t think so. I just need a bit more understanding, more time with things.”

“Well, that’s easy.” He starts walking us backward toward the bed. “If you think of anything else, you tell me, okay?”

“Sure,” I sigh as we lie back down. He immediately pulls me into him. As we get settled, something springs to mind. “Actually, there is one thing.”

“Shoot.”

I take in a breath so deep my chest aches with the force of it. “Have you heard of rejection-sensitive dysphoria?”

Rowan rolls so that he’s leaning over me. “No?”

I psyche myself up to explain, knowing I’m about to open the part of myself I’m the most insecure about. “It’s basically-um, okay, so it’s essentially that if I feel rejected, even if it’s a really tiny thing, I kind of spiral.”

“Okay?”

“Like, I just get really in my head about it. What’s wrong with me? Did I do something? It turns into a whole thing and I find it hard to stop.”

It feels like he’s looking right into me as he takes in what I’m saying. “Is that what happened after you kissed me?”

My cheeks start burning. I had really been hoping he wasn’t going to bring this up. “I thought we agreed to never talk about that again,” I groan. I try to roll away and hide my face in the covers but he doesn’t let me get far.

“We’re not going to, it just helps me understand a bit better.”

“I don’t think I had an unreasonable reaction to that. It was basically the worst day of my life.”

“It wasn’t that bad.” He chuckles.

“You said we weren’t gonna talk about it!”

“We’re not, we’re not.” He pulls the covers up over my head. “I didn’t say anything. Go to sleep.”

“No, I’m gonna lie here and relive my humiliation,” I pout, my voice muffled by the comforter.

“Okay,” he mumbles, shuffling around as he gets settled. “Can you do it quietly? I have an early training.”

“You’re the worst,” I grumble as I pop my head out.

He kisses my shoulder. “Night.”