Page 39

THIRTY-NINE

SAINT

I feel… numb.

Hollow.

Inside and out.

The pain from tonight barely even registers. I push it down, push it out of my head before I cave under the weight of it all, submitting to the demons I’ve been battling for too long.

This moment’s all I get. Because weakness is a luxury that I will never be able to afford. I’m all my mom has, and that means that I have to be strong for her , even when I’m falling apart inside.

Like tonight.

Lennon’s eyes soften as she tenderly strokes my face, cradling my jaw in her palm, using her other hand to comb her fingers through my hair.

She’s gentle and tender, and I had no fucking clue just how badly I needed this.

It feels weak to admit, but fuck, I’m exhausted. My bones are weary.

How much it helps to just… rest.

I lean into her, my eyes dropping shut for a beat as I try to wrap my head around how the hell shit got so bad, so fast. How out of control it spiraled in a matter of minutes.

“My dad got arrested tonight. He’s in jail. And…” I swallow roughly. “I hope he fucking rots in there.”

I feel her stiffen beneath me, her breath stuttering. “Did he do this to you?”

I nod. My arms tighten around her, my thumb sweeping along the sliver of bare skin below the hem of her cropped shirt, more for me than for her.

“I didn’t fight back,” I finally say.

The chaos of tonight comes flooding back, and it feels hard to breathe.

The officers. The flashing lights. Ma’s sobs as they cuffed him and put him in the back of the cop car.

It doesn’t even feel real, yet beneath all of the other fucked-up things I’m feeling, there’s a sense of… relief.

Relief that I shouldn’t feel guilty for, but I do.

Looking up at her again, I shove down a swallow.

“I should’ve known that the other day was just the start of it.

That day at the rink… he was the reason I was so angry, so out of control.

I was so fucking angry that, yet again, he was drunk and high in the middle of the day, and if I hadn’t walked in, he probably would’ve hit my mom. ”

“Saint,” she whispers brokenly, her words laced with compassion.

It’s the first time I’ve ever told anyone.

My whole fucking life, I’ve endured the pain and abuse from him because I didn’t want to be the reason my mother’s heart broke, and tonight only proved that it was the wrong choice. I should’ve spoken up sooner.

Maybe I would’ve saved us both years of heartache and pain.

As I speak, she holds me tighter, and it grounds me.

Makes it more bearable to spill the darkest, most fucked-up part of me.

“Him being fucked-up is nothing new. It’s a daily occurrence.

I don’t know what set him off today… why he lost it.

He broke the kitchen table, destroyed anything he could get his hands on, and then slapped my mom across the face.

In front of me.” The thought makes me so fucking mad that I’m shaking, rage piercing through my chest. “I should’ve stepped in sooner.

I shouldn’t have even let it get that far, but I know how much it hurts my mom to see us fight, and most of the time, when I intervene when he’s pissed like this…

it just makes shit worse. I didn’t know he would turn around and slap her like that, or I would’ve…

” I trail off when the image of him hitting Ma flits into my mind again, sending cold, deadly rage surging inside of me.

“I could’ve fucking killed him, Lennon. If it wasn’t for my mom, I probably would’ve been in the cop car.

Not him. When I pulled him off her, she put herself between us.

She defended him when I was just trying to protect her.

I saw the utter defeat and resignation in her eyes, and it nearly fucking broke me, Lennon. ”

Now that I’ve started, letting all of it pour out of me so I don’t suffocate, I feel like I can’t stop. A dam breaking after suffering a decade of abuse at the hands of the man who was supposed to teach me, guide me, love me.

I’ve spent years, fucking years , harboring anger and hate inside of me, placing the blame on anyone but the person who deserved it the most.

Him.

This vendetta… this revenge that I have against her father, one that implicated her in something she never had fuck all to do with, it’s fucked-up.

I realized that tonight as I came here. When she was the one I craved when at my lowest.

Lennon’s become the only safe space I’ve ever had in my life. She’s trusted me, listened to me, seen me for who I am.

She’s the only person who’s witnessed all the ugly, broken, fucked-up parts of me and stayed anyway. And she didn’t just stay; she pulled me closer.

As my entire fucking life was imploding around me, all I wanted was her. If I were going to break, I wanted it to be with her, wanted her to pick up the jagged pieces.

It terrifies me. I’m scared out of my mind to let her in.

But I’m even more scared to let her slip through my fingers by pushing her away. By ignoring my instincts that scream I need her.

“And then he just started on me. He pushed me against the corner of the cabinet, and that’s where I fucked my ribs up.

Ma begged me not to hit him back, so I kept trying to fend him off without fighting him, which is the only reason he ended up getting any hits in on me.

I couldn’t stand to let him hurt her any more, so I just let him lash out at me.

I just fucking let him, Lennon.” My voice wavers, and I hate it.

I hate feeling so raw and exposed, but I don’t stop.

I can’t. “I could’ve stopped him, truly hurt him without even trying, but I didn’t. For her. It’s always for her.”

“Saint…” she whispers, curling her small body around me. I feel her lips press against my hair, and I exhale the breath I was holding, so lost in thought that I didn’t even notice my lungs burning and my ribs screaming. “I’m so sorry. I’m so fucking sorry.”

I’m sorry too.

But not for my father finally getting what he’s deserved all along. I’m sorry that in my fucked-upness, I dragged her into this. That I was planning on using her to try and fix the shit broken in my head, and I thought the way I could do that was by seeing her father pay for what he did.

He still deserves to, but she doesn’t.

Fuck.

So many things are flitting through my head that it feels like it’s going to explode.

“Is your mom okay?”

I nod against her. “Yeah. The EMT looked her over and said it would be a nasty bruise, but she’ll be okay.

I stayed with her for hours after she fell asleep.

Lennon, she wouldn’t even press charges.

Even after he beat the shit out of me and hit her, she still wouldn’t press charges against him, but I did.

I had to do what she couldn’t. To protect her. ”

“It’s hard to understand what she’s going through, Saint, I know, but if this has been happening for years, your mother is a victim of abuse, and it’s hard to break that cycle.”

She’s only saying what I already know, but it still feels impossible to wrap my head around.

I just want her to be safe and away from him, and it feels like the only way that will ever happen, her leaving him, is if she’s in a casket. Because she won’t go on her own.

Ice floods through my veins. The thought of losing my mom, to him, even at all, makes my vision dance, black spots dancing behind my eyes, sends my heart plummeting into my stomach.

I suck in a breath, trying to breathe through my nose, trying to ward off the panic attack I can feel starting to tighten my chest.

“I’m here,” she murmurs into my hair. “It’s okay, Saint. It’s going to be okay.”

I focus on her fingers creating circles on my back, her soft movements, on breathing one breath at a time.

In and out.

In and out.

In and out.

I don’t know if it’s going to be okay, but Lennon gives me hope that it will be. Somehow, someway, it’s going to be okay.

“I walked all the way here. I wasn’t even thinking, I just stormed off,” I finally say, my voice heavy with emotion, low and gruff.

“I couldn’t sit there any longer, surrounded by the shit he destroyed.

I had to get out. Ma was asleep, so I left her a note on the counter, and then I just took off.

I didn’t even know where I was going at first. I just knew that I had to get out of there and try to clear my head, to process what had happened.

And then… I just ended up here. I think I was always going to come to you; I just didn’t realize it until I was halfway here.

I needed you, Lennon. Fuck… I just needed to see you, to touch you.

I knew I’d be okay if I could just get to you. ”

I’m shit at words, at emotions, at opening myself up and being vulnerable, and I’m sure she knows that more than anyone, but I’m trying.

Even if it all ends up for nothing, I won’t regret her. I won’t regret this.

Somewhere along the way, this stopped being about revenge. The feelings that I have for her are confusing and scary as fuck, but I know now they’re not going away. If anything, they get stronger with every moment like this, where she sees me and holds on tighter.

She sees me at my worst, and it doesn’t scare her away.

Lifting my head, I look at her as she whispers, “I won’t let go, Saint. I promise.”

There’s finality in her words, and it hits me directly in the chest.

Swallowing roughly, I nod.

“Will you stay here with me tonight?” she asks, eyes bouncing between mine as she stares down at me.

It’s something I’ve never done before. I’ve never slept over with a girl.

But I’ve also never been this way with anyone before, not like I am with Lennon.

“Yeah. I’m going to need a shower… all of my clothes are still wet.”

Lennon nods. “Of course. I can throw your stuff in the dryer while you’re in the shower. It might be done by the time you get out.”

My balls have started to shrivel up from being in wet pants with the AC at full blast, so I rise to my feet, straightening my spine as I tower over her.

I wish I could somehow express what tonight has meant to me. How thankful I am for her just… being here. Accepting me for what I am. Not judging my fucked-up life.

Words don’t feel like enough. They never do when I’m trying to express how I feel, but I’m going to try anyway. I’m going to try for her.

I grasp her chin between my fingers and dip my head, pressing my lips softly against hers, unhurried and gentle in a way I’ve never been.

Her eyes are hazy when I pull back to look at her. “Thank you.”

My mind’s racing, a hundred different thoughts at once, things I should say, words stuck in my throat, but that one being the most important. “For all of it. Thank you.”