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Ronan

T he chokehold this woman has on me is tight enough to suffocate and kill me. It’s pathetic that I wouldn't even fight for my life—I’d simply let it happen. Not because I want to die, but because she’d be the one doing it.

I’ve got my eyes trained right into hers, but when she pulls away to look at my chest, I follow. Her fingers are shaking and moving agonizingly slowly. She’s treading carefully like I’ll shatter physically.

It isn’t the body that will break apart, it’s the mind that will take me back; drag me to the moments of distrust and misguided sense of love. When I was nothing but a plaything to someone’s sick needs.

As her fingertips press against the divot of my sternum, a void opens beneath it, like a black hole. It’s the sensation of a blackout—abrupt and unannounced, without the foreboding of an approaching storm. Numbness creeps in, starting from my toes and gradually enveloping every inch until there’s nothing left to feel.

Except I still do feel . It drags across every inch of my body, not just where she touches me. Her contact is no different from the rest. It scratches at my bones and sends uncomfortable vibrations coursing through me.

She’s not even got her second hand on me when I grab her head. My thumbs press under her jaw, my fingers spread across the sides of her face, tilting her back to stare right at me as I hover over her.

“Stop!” I bark out, causing her to jump. Her hands pull away and she shoves them behind her back.

Her olive eyes look through me, the pinch between her brows squeezes my heart. It’s not you, baby girl. It’s me. I’m defective and will never run properly.

I step her back to the wall, one of my hands moving gently down her cheek to her throat. My grip around it enough that I can feel her pulse rising. All I should want to do is turn her around, shove her face against the wall and slam inside of her. As I’ve treated every hole I’ve ever had.

Except I don’t want that, fuck , I want to see her. Watch her eyes roll back, see the tears I bring to them, and imagine the stars she’s seeing when she comes so hard she has to beg for me to stop.

“I’m sorry.” Her voice strains under my grip.

I shake my head, not wanting her apologies. She’s done nothing wrong, and if I knew how to express to her how badly I wish her touch was different, I would.

The urge to kiss her is gut wrenching. But I know the moment I’ve got my tongue down her throat, she will forget herself and touch me. It may not be right away, but at any point she will lose the restraint she has not to wrap her arms around me. Those soft fingers of hers will touch me and I will then lose composure.

I don’t know what I’ll do, and the last thing I want is to hurt her. It’s impossible to restrain her in this shower.

I’m making excuses, because I could pick her up right now and take her to the bed, grab my belt, and cuff her.

Except I don’t want to do that, because I want her to break and force me to feel.

Her touch is no different. I don’t want that.

I do.

“Fuck!”

I take a step back and slam my fist into the wall beside her, causing her to jump. Before she can stop me, I’m turning my back to her and storming out of the shower.

“Ronan, wait!”

Grabbing the only towel, I wrap it around my waist and leave the bathroom. I hear her screaming after me, but I abandon her, slamming the door behind me. There aren’t many places I can go, but as I grab hold of my sweats, boxers, and the shirt that I’d laid out on the bed, I make my way to the garage.

She won’t run out after me naked, and that gives me enough time to slide my pants and shirt on. Although I’m still soaking wet, I don’t care. I need to get away from her.

For her safety.

For mine.

Violence has been my peace, and I’ll protect Cal from it, hoping that maybe—just maybe—she could be the catalyst to replace it in the future.

I drove through the night without a helmet, without even my damn shoes. I’m confident enough in my ability that I wasn’t concerned about crashing, and only after a few minutes of fresh air, I was back in a headspace that was safe.

I’d left my phone, literally everything, back at the cabin. The only thing I didn’t leave were my fucking feelings for that girl. Damn her for peeling back my skin and getting under it.

I’ve met an innocent thing like her before. Blonde hair, with bright eyes that screamed of trust and safety.

Yet when I look at her, it’s all brand new. Her hair isn’t blonde, it’s the color of the sun that I had sometimes forgot about sitting in prison. Those eyes of hers aren’t just green, they are the grass I would roll around through in the youth I wish lasted longer than ten years. That fucking smile isn’t the innocence it portrays it to be. It’s filthy, and I want it to be mine .

I want all of her to be mine. My dirty little slut that I drown in cum and then bathe, just to fill her further. I’ve only ever taken care of myself, but I want to change that. I’ve seen just what doing the smallest thing for her does to me . I want to be more than just a shell of trauma and break free from the vice-like grip my past holds over me.

I’m just fighting this demon that tells me if I hurt her in the wrong way, I’d become the one thing I’ve run away from for so long. Even if she screams for punishment and aches for the pain, she doesn’t understand the extent of how I can be.

I’m afraid of hurting her beyond forgiveness. I know what it feels like to be unable to forgive, and I can’t imagine her aiming that at me.

I’m such a conundrum.

I don’t deserve her, and I know it all too well. Yet here I am, searching for a way to make her mine. I’m supposed to be leaving, not figuring out how to tell my brother I’m likely going to make his stepdaughter mine.

I can’t, not because it’s forbidden, but if I can’t even let her touch me, what sort of life is that for her? Me screaming at her any time she lays a finger on me, what kind of fucked up shit is that?

I lean forward on my bike that’s been at a stop for who knows how long. I’m parked in front of some river a distance away from the cabin. Away from her.

Why couldn’t that bastard have been an hour later than he said he’d be, and allow the pills to have taken the life I didn’t want? I’d have never known betrayal. What the inside of a prison cell looked like. What true pain was… and I’d have never met Cal.

Could have seen that ‘God’ my mom always talked about.

Now, this world has left me feeling unworthy of even His love. A forgotten, broken son, cast into a world that would rather swallow me whole than offer a chance at survival.

Then throwing someone as beautiful as Cal at me, knowing damn well I’ll only fuck that up like I’ve done with everything else.

Living really is a piece of shit.

AGE 13

“I’m a little busy, Bro.” That’s what he said last week.

“When will you be coming home?” My tone is far more abrasive and rude. I need to talk with him in person. “I’ve not even seen you this year, not even during your summer break.”

He groans. “Listen, I had classes during the summer and Amanda is—”

“Fuck her, Eamon! What about me?!”

I was never meant to be this type of kid. I’d never cussed, and I can tell by the tone of my brother’s voice he is just as shocked. “Jesus, Ro, what is wrong with you?” My fingers squeeze around the phone just as I slam my forehead against the wall. “You need to grow up, I wasn’t going to be there forever. Make some friends.”

Tears I’ve become too familiar with fall down my cheeks, drawing lines all the way across my neck.

“I just… I just need help.” My knees feel hallow as they hit the ground. “Please come home.”

I can tell he is angry by the grunts and moans he is producing on the other side. “Didn’t mom get you a therapist?”

“You aren’t listening to me!” I scream, and with a violence I’ve come far too accustomed to, I throw the phone across the room. The shattering of plastic and wires accompanies my shout of agonizing rage.

“What the fuck was that?” I hear my dad bellow from the living room.

I’m up on my feet quickly, running and slamming my shoulder against the door to the backyard, then bursting into a sprint. I throw myself against the wooden gate as I round the house and run.

I run.

And run.

And fucking run.

I go until my lungs won’t allow me to go any further. Only when my calves are locking, and my legs shake, do I stop fighting to keep moving.

The streetlights that illuminate the sidewalk make me feel too exposed. I’m sure soon my mom will be out in her car looking for me, but I don’t want to be found. I need someone to listen to me, someone that will help me. Anyone that will keep me together, along with my family.

When I slip from under the light, my eyes focus ahead, and I’m wondering if it’s a sign. A church, the interior illuminated as if it is calling for me. Mom talked about a ‘God’ helping when she would pray to him. She said that they struggled to give Eamon a sibling, and that when they started talking to Him, she got pregnant with me.

We never went to church as a family. My dad never wanted to be a part of organized anything other than the cults associated with sports.

I move quickly, slipping through the green metal gates. I’ve lost any muscle I had at one point from playing baseball. I’m so skinny that I’d have been mistaken for a tree branch if I stayed still long enough. My mom thought I’d developed an eating disorder after Eamon left, my dad thought I was doing it for attention.

Neither of them are right.

I hoped my uncle would find me too repulsive to get any enjoyment in treating me.

When I make it to the large, brown ornate doors that have sculpted angels, I attempt to open them. They are locked, of course, because why wouldn’t the place of sanctuary be open for me when I need it.

I move around to the side of the church, carefully climbing up to the edge of a window. Bracing myself, I try to jiggle it open.

Nothing.

I bang my shoulder against it but can feel that I may just shatter the entire window and likely hurt myself if I keep this up. I’ve never broken the law before, but isn’t this place supposed to be a safe haven if needed? I feel like if God helped my mom, he’d forgive me for trying to find shelter.

Jumping down, I scan the patch of greenery until I spot a rock that fits snugly in my hand. With it, I step back to the window, positioning myself just far enough to throw it with enough force to take out one of the smaller panes. The glass shatters and I tug my shirt off, wrapping it around my hand to carefully break away the remaining shards, clearing a path to reach in and unlatch the window.

Once it’s open, I climb up and inside, shutting it behind me.

Silence is what greets me, and as I venture further into the warmth, I suck in a breath that feels free. Scents of wax and paper fill my lungs, and it oddly reminds me of a library.

The space is large, two rows of long dark brown bench style seating are settled on either sides of an aisle. Straight ahead is a statue of a man with his arms out and a thorn crown wrapped around his head. There is something like a tub in front, and a podium. All around are candles, some lit, some blown out. It’s not as bright as I thought it would be, given how it looked from outside.

Maybe it’s all the white and tan colored dressings. Paintings sprawl across the ceiling, but I don’t know anything about them. I can’t look too long because they are naked, the men in the paintings. Women too, and I wish I could say this was the first time I’ve seen a nipple, but it isn’t. I’ve been forced to watch enough porn that I know far too much about what both genders bodies look like without clothes.

Biting on my cheek, I take a seat at the furthest seat from the front of the church. I look down at the floor, at my bare feet, and scrunch my toes.

“I…” I say aloud, and all I hear are the echoes of the wind that’s pulling through the window I broke, accompanying my shattered voice. “I don’t know what I did to deserve this, but I’m sorry. If it was the time I lied to my dad about going to practice when Eamon snuck me away, I promise I won’t do it again. If it’s because of the time I pulled out that kid’s chair and they fell, I swear something had spilled in it and I was saving them from having wet pants.”

Swallowing, I bring my legs up, pressing my feet against the hard wooden seat below me and holding myself. “I’m just sorry. I swear I won’t do any of it ever again. Just… please, make it all stop, and I promise I will be good.”

Rubbing my eyes against my knees, I squeeze tighter, hoping that someone will walk in and hear me.

“I don’t know if you see what he does to me.” I choke on my own sob, tears spilling in full force as I confess to the darkness engulfing me. “Every week he touches me. He tells me it’s all normal or I wouldn’t feel good. I don’t want it to feel good. Please help me. No one sees me. No one hears my silent pleas. I’m scared…”

The sound of a car door is loud in the silence. Then another.

I don’t react, I don’t even move or jump when the wooden door of the church busts open.

“I’m scared…” I whisper.

“Police!” a man screams, and flashing lights cut across me, illuminating the seat in front of me before bouncing back, harsh and blinding. “Put your hands up!”

Shoot me and just end my suffering.

“I said put your fucking hands up!”

I don’t move, but whisper, “What have I done to you, God, that you won’t even listen to me?”

I’m not entirely sure what hurts more, the hit my dad just landed on my cheek or the look my mom is bearing down on me. I can’t take my eyes off of her, seeing the disappointment and regret in her deep blues.

I mouth, “I’m sorry.” But she just shakes her head, tears pooling at her lashes before she blinks, letting them fall as she turns away from me.

The door opens to our small brown room, filled only with the company of my parents, the scent of wood, and the quiet presence of books. When I look up, I see our family attorney stepping inside.

I’ve just seen the judge, and though I wanted to scream out every ounce of my pain, I stayed silent. The attorney’s expression is grim as he meets my dad’s eyes, and with a sinking feeling, I brace myself for yet another blow.

“Since it was a church you vandalized, it’s considered a federal crime. However, because it is your first offense, they are just putting you on probation.”

I don’t know what that means, but when my mom sighs out through her crying, I feel a bit of relief.

“How long?” my dad asks, and I take a step closer to my parents.

I know I’ve disappointed my mom, but I’m so grateful she loves me still. As soon as I’m close enough, she grabs the back of my head and pulls me into her chest. I don’t hesitate—I wrap my arms around her and hold on tight, like she’s the one thing keeping me alive.

Why can’t I just tell you… Why can’t I just be strong like you…

“Twenty-four months.” When the words come from our lawyer's mouth, my mom shakes, squeezing me tighter. “Every weekend he will do community service, and his Probation Officer will see him three to four times a week.”

“That seems a bit excessive—”

“Wait, every weekend?” I ask, cutting my dad off and slightly pulling from my mom. “And I’ll have someone watching me?”

“Yes. Since you live with your parents, they will report to us throughout the week. Your Probation Officer will come to see you. During the weekends, your PO will take you to your community service.”

Heat floods through my body, and I swear my knees wobble.

“Your uncle will be so disappointed, that’s when you guys hang out the most.” Dad scoffs, and I know he also wants to complain that he’ll have to be around more to watch me.

To watch me…

I stumble forward, and my mom takes my near fainting as fear of what my life has turned out to be. But she’d be so, so wrong. This is my way out. He won’t wait two years; he’ll get tired of keeping his distance, and finally I can be free. He will find someone else to hurt.

I’m free, even if I’m being constrained behind what they think is punishment.

“Oh, sweetheart, we will help you.”

“I-It’s okay…” I bury my face into her chest and take a deep breath of relief.

I don’t have to hurt… I’m safe… Finally…