Page 15 of No Right To Love You (Winter of Love #6)

Ocean

Bernard calling my name snapped me out of that moment. A moment I never want to visit again.

That’s the thing with kids who had a parent who was, in his saying, an alcoholic. We crave and need predictability, but he didn’t give me that. Everything that I needed to feel consistently safe was never there. There was no security.

All I ever was, was in survival mode. That was all I knew growing up. Defending myself from his words, proving that I was already doing more than he thought I was an overachiever.

All I ever wanted to do is keep the peace and prevent him from flipping out on me.

The second mom told me about him being around her, I refused for my children to be around him because they didn’t understand.

Just like I didn’t understand as a child what addiction meant.

I blamed myself over and over saying that it was my fault that I couldn’t achieve what he kept throwing my way.

It made me feel insane because no matter what I did, there was no reprieve. No exhale.

I couldn’t even breathe for just one second.

My home, the one place I was supposed to smile in…

was scary to live in. Everything was unpredictable and as an adult, I realized that I checked-out a lot as a kid.

When dad would yell and yell, I would just sit there, staring at something.

He would ask me if something was wrong with me because I barely flinched as he berated me.

As I said… All I wanted to do was breathe. Was it too hard of a request from my parents? The people who brought me into this earth.

I was always stressed out, especially during my high school years. I never knew what I would find when I got home. Sometimes, he wasn’t home and actually made sure everything ran well. Dad was a functioning alcoholic. A recipe for disaster.

There was always this tension. This bubbling feeling of something that would soon erupt. Soon send me off the deep end.

This lifestyle that January and I chose instilled certain things in me that I didn’t have growing up.

I always felt insecure and craved acceptance from the people who never gave it.

At one point, I couldn’t trust anymore. Just like I can’t trust that he won’t do it again.

That he won’t make my children feel this way.

The constant lying, harsh parenting, and manipulation broke me apart. It shattered my entire soul.

I work hard until this day to make sure that I have control and that I make those around me happy. I go far beyond for my wife and children so that they know I would never be like my father. That they have all of me.

When I got help, a therapist told me that because my life as a child was pretty much out of control and unpredictable, I searched for order in everything I did. Everything had to be in control and order.

It was sort of a controlling behavior, but January and I talked about how that would be fair in our relationship.

It took me time to express myself. I struggled to do that and at the beginning of our marriage, it felt unsafe to speak up about things because of what I felt as a kid but after a while… I opened up. To her.

To the woman that my father looked in the eye at our wedding and said I would destroy her next. That everything my hands touched, crumbled. That I was stupid and not a good husband.

He spewed vile things about me from the second I was a kid until now. The worst thing that he said was that I couldn’t measure up to being with her. What was that last question he asked her again?

‘What do you see in him that you’d be willing to give him a chance or let alone marry him to ruin your life?’

What kind of father said those things about the son they raised? The son that did everything and saved their company.

An ungrateful bastard, that’s who.

That’s why when it clicks to what Bernard just let slip through those crusty lips of his, I don’t remember the control that I had over myself or maybe it was the trickling of what had recently just happened.

I don’t black out this time but instead, I swing hitting Bernard sharply in the face. This causes a commotion, but I don’t care because I walk out without looking back. I don’t stop until I hear her. It must’ve felt like I was in deep water because at this point, January was yelling my name out.

“Ocean!” she yells again, and I turn to face her. “Baby… what happened?” she asks, and that insecurity tries to rear its ugly head.

The old me that didn’t have anyone in their corner.

The one who had to fight all his own battles because no one else would dare stand up to do it.

I acknowledged that no one would be able to heal the little boy inside of me, but all those thoughts fly out of the window when January takes my hands in hers.

She kisses my knuckles, something that I wanted her to do the very first time she ever held my hands in hers and her eyes are glossed over with tears shed.

“Are you okay? What’s wrong?”

“If I see that bastard around you again, I’m going to kill him.” I tell her and she nods.

She doesn’t even ask if I was wrong in what I did, instead she wraps her arms around me and hugs me tight.

“I love you, Ocean. Let’s leave.” she says with no hesitation because she knows that I don’t want to be here. This is the last place I can be in after this.

“Let me grab our jackets.” I say.

As I walk away, I think about our second chance at this.

Even though nothing happened where we had to leave each other.

I take this as the second chance that January and I are having.

The chance to be together and change everything.

The night she came over to my side of the house and sat there with me, not making me the villain in the story, healed me a little bit and she didn’t know it.

The little boy in me felt that I had no right to love anyone. That I had no right to be happy but now, as I take our jackets and I slip mine on then slip January’s on, I know that I have to remind him that this is our second chance.

The second chance to heal myself and be happy. We have the right to be loved and to love.

As for the mending with my father, I have no intentions but with my mother, I will slowly include her in my life but as long as he and her love each other…they never gave me a chance to feel safe, so I won’t ever give them another reason to push me to feel unsafe in my love. In my home. In me.