Page 41 of The Intimacy of Skin

I leaned closer to him, bumping our shoulders together as I continued. “But I can see how much she loves you. She takes care of you.”

Looking back at the rushing water in front of us, Crew shifted so he was leaning back slightly.

“You’re right, she does. She meddles a lot, though.

Sticks her nose in places she shouldn’t.

Especially when it comes to you.” He glanced at me, though it was only for a second before he turned back to the water. “How did you get into the house?”

I put my hands behind my back, leaning my weight against them. This way, I could look up at the clouds above us as they turned gray and covered the sun. I wondered if Mother Nature purposefully let the sunlight out for a little bit, knowing Crew needed it, before she let the clouds take over again.

Honestly, I wasn’t sure how Crew would react to what I had to say. I’d do it all over again if I had to, but I knew the oddest show of affection or care could scare him.

Humming to stall even a moment more of time, I let my head fall back and closed my eyes. “You weren’t acting like you usually do. It’s your eyes, Pretty Boy. They give you away.”

I couldn’t see him, but I could hear a shuffle from his side. His shoulder brushed mine as he turned, pushing me slightly off-balance.

“What the fuck does that even mean?”

Dropping my head back in front of me, I opened my eyes. Crew was looking right at me, facing sideways. When I looked into his gaze, I could see it.

His body language was an act. The scowl lines, the downturned eyebrows, the menacing clench of his fists. I could see through it all because the mounds of ice he held in his eyes were dripping and waning under fear. Just beyond the horizon, a large cage sat, abandoned by everything around it.

Inside that cage was the real Crew. I’d seen glimpses of him more and more through our time together. I hadn’t broken the lock completely, but the bars were eroding. Getting weaker.

Reaching slowly so I didn’t scare him, I cupped the side of Crew’s face.

He startled a bit, which broke my heart.

“When you’re sad, or when you’re anxious, the small lines here”—I traced the indentations with my thumb—“get narrower. When you’re panicking, or angry, your eyebrows turn ever so slightly, and a storm brews in your eyes.

” I caressed his eyebrow, smoothing my thumb over the scar there.

“I can see the real you in your eyes, Crew. They’re a portal to your soul.

And you keep the real you under lock and key, don’t you? ”

“I-I don’t understand.” Crew shook his head, my hand moving with him. “That doesn’t make sense. You—okay, so you pay that much attention?”

“Absolutely, I do.” I pulled my hand away, forcing my attention to the water once more.

“I care about you. What I see the least is when you’re happy.

When you’re happy, all the clouds in your eyes disappear and they sparkle.

” I couldn’t hold back my smile as I thought back to earlier when he realized where we were.

“Fucking sparkle, Crew. It’s the most beautiful thing in the world.

But I knew something was going on, and when you blew me off, that made it even more obvious. ”

“I’m allowed to not want to hang out with you, Price.”

I nodded. “Of course you are. I’m not saying you’re not.

I’m saying you were getting quieter as the days went on, antsier and more anxious.

You went to the back of the restaurant more often.

I could see a massive fucking hurricane brewing in your eyes and then you canceled our usual meet-up.

There were massive red flags that I couldn’t ignore. ”

Crew was silent. I gave him time to process what I was saying, to understand that I wasn’t trying to take away his free will, but that I was trying to protect it.

He had looked so sad. I knew in my gut that something was wrong. Something was haunting him more than usual. I was scared he’d do something detrimental, like hurt himself.

And I’d been right in the worst kind of way.

I scrubbed a hand over my face, deciding to let it all out at once after a few moments of silence.

“I texted Willow asking if she was at home. When she said no, which meant you’d lied to me, I got a bad feeling.

The kind that gnaws at you and begs you to do something.

So, I told her I needed to see you. That I needed to check on you.

She didn’t ask any questions, just told me where to find the spare key and asked me to keep you safe. ”

Bracing for anger, or some sort of sassy comeback, I waited. The breeze picked up, and the clouds had gone gray, adding more of a chill than before. It nipped at my skin, but I didn’t move.

Until Crew lay on his side, placing his head straight into my lap.

He faced away from me, giving me a view of his grown-out hair.

There were at least four inches of brown amongst the bleach blond, clashing together.

I wondered if he was going to dye it blond again.

It reminded me of the time he’d mentioned “needing” to be blond, though he never explained that part to me.

I was still mildly in shock at how Crew cuddled up into my lap. Speechless, even. I’d expected him to get angry that I texted Willow like I did.

“Did you tell her I was okay?”

“Yes.”

“Did you tell her what I did?”

“No. You didn’t need emergency medical assistance, so I didn’t want to betray your trust. I know all too well what it’s like, Pretty Boy. But if you’d hurt yourself to the point I couldn’t help you, you bet your ass I would’ve told her.”

He nodded, his head rubbing against my thigh.

“Makes sense. She extended her stay at her friend’s house.

Must’ve thought we needed more time.” He moved onto his back, looking up at me.

“She knows I do it. Or did it. I hide it from her now because she just tries to take it away from me, which only makes me do stupider shit.”

I understood that. “Like that pill in your box?”

Chewing his lip nervously, his eyes widened. “You saw that?”

I nodded.

“It’s just an off-brand Tylenol,” he defended quickly. “It’s a reminder, sorta. To never do it again. That shit sucked, and I still get phantom symptoms from it.” His body shuddered against me.

Relief picked apart the tension in my muscles one by one. I knew it had to be something like Tylenol, but the idea it was there had scared the shit out of me. It would’ve been better if he’d never attempted it, but I was glad he didn’t have plans to do it again.

I ran a hand through his hair, letting the strands fall between my fingers. “You know you can talk to me, right? Whenever you feel like cutting. I won’t take it away from you, but I also don’t want you to get hurt.”

His body stiffened slightly. “That’s the point, isn’t it?”

“You know what I mean. If you were to cut too much, or too deep—” I shook my head. “Just know I’m here, okay? Anything I can do to make it better, or easier. Whatever you need.”

There was beauty in the sun, and then there was beauty in Crew. How his face relaxed, his body following suit against my lap. “I know. I’ll try, but I’m not used to people seeing me like this.”

God, I’d never get over the slight drawl in his accent. The way he said “try,” as if the y had dropped off and was cut short. Just him accepting and knowing that I’d be there was enough for me, so I let it go. I hoped more than trusted that he knew I was serious.

Crew took one of my arms, bringing it close to his face.

I let him do as he wished, knowing he was staring at the small scars there.

When he started to move his fingertips over them, I couldn’t help but jolt a bit.

Nobody had done that to me before, so it felt…

weird. The way he concentrated as he went over each one made it better, his brows furrowed as he traced them under the camouflage of my tattoos.

He didn’t let go of my arm, but he looked at me and spoke in a hushed tone. “You said there was some shit going down with your parents. That you felt it was your fault. Can I ask what was going on?”

The question made me flinch internally for a minute.

I’d made peace with a lot of what happened, but the memories still hurt.

“You know how my dad was an addict?” I waited until he nodded.

“He got hurt when I was really young. Had to get back surgery. The doctors put him on Oxycodone. He got hooked immediately and mixed it with alcohol further down the line. It wasn’t so bad at first. But when it got bad, it got awful.

Nodding off at the kitchen table, making huge messes, getting angry because he didn’t have any oxy, so he’d drink himself into a drunken rage. ”

I looked away from Crew, too afraid I’d start to cry if I didn’t.

“He never hurt me, but he hurt my mom. I can’t fucking stand rough shit because every time I see it, or I see a bruise, it reminds me of Mom.

I loved her so much, Pretty Boy.” My voice cracked, forcing me to clear my throat.

“Anyway, Mom stopped homeschooling me abruptly, so I was in a new environment with all these new kids I’d never met before, my dad was yelling all the time, and my mom was crying constantly.

Dad started forgetting to pick me up from school, so I had to switch to the bus. That was a culture shock by itself.

“But then he started forgetting to unlock the door to the house for when I got home. My scratching got worse and worse until I found cooking, and then Dad yelled about that. The mess I’d make, the amount of food I’d make, everything under the sun.

Mom took Dad’s side every time. She never protected me, and Dad never got sober.

They got a divorce out of necessity when I was a teenager, though it didn’t last long. ”

Crew linked our fingers together, holding my hand tight. “Did your mom go back to him?”

I nodded, gripping his hand tighter to keep the tears at bay.

Knowing how unimportant I was to them hurt.

“Yeah, she did. He said he was sober, and she believed him. This time around, he stopped hitting her, but she enabled him. I don’t really understand it, to be honest. She stopped showing up to my events at school, and when it was my birthday, she’d be too busy trying to get money to feed his addiction to even tell me she loved me.

The day she didn’t show up for my graduation, I knew I’d lost her completely.

I moved to Crescent Planes and the rest is history. ”

“I’m so sorry, Prince Charming.” His words were soft, and when I looked down at him, his eyes were full of sorrow. It was different, though. The sorrow wasn’t for himself, but for me. “Did you have any friends growing up to help you like Willow did me?”

I huffed a pitiful laugh at that. “Not a single one. I was lonely at school and even more lonely at home. I didn’t have my first friend until I started at The Arch. Her name was Samantha.”

“Was?” Crew’s frown turned deeper.

Shaking my head, I tried to explain. “Sorry, bad choice of words. She didn’t die; she just slowly ghosted me a while back.

With her out of my life for apparently no reason, I couldn’t find it in myself to open up to someone new.

But I was lonely, so I did the only thing I could think of to keep the itching at bay when cooking stopped helping. ”

The tickle of Crew’s hand running up and down my arm almost imitated the itching I was trying to avoid. But his skin on mine felt so right, I didn’t stop it.

“Is that when you started to pay for sex?” There wasn’t an ounce of judgment when he said it.

I nodded. “And I drowned myself in alcohol while cooking a million recipes a day.”

Admitting it was painful. Muscle after muscle relaxed, the weight of my secrets shedding off them. With each taut coil that unwound itself came a burning sensation; one of shame and disappointment in myself. Crew didn’t tease me. He didn’t look at me any differently than he had before.

I think that was what saved me. He beckoned me to get closer, folding my body almost in half to obey. A whisper in the wind, barely audible above the rushing water around us, he told me a secret of his own.

“I’m glad I’m in your life now.” His palm pressed against the side of my face, mimicking how I held him earlier. “I’ll be your friend, Prince Charming. Hopefully, I can make the itching better.”

At that moment, I was swimming in the water below us. Wave after wave crashed into me, my legs barely holding against the current. Crew’s face was hazy and discordant in my vision, so close while simultaneously so far away.

“You do,” I whispered back.

He calmed the war constantly raging between my soul and body. I knew when he finally decided to leave, I’d attempt to break the barrier myself by ripping my skin open until everything came out.

A plea stopped just before my lips, playing repeatedly in my head instead.

I don’t want you to be my friend. Be with me. Love me for who I am.

Just let me love you and love me back.

Don’t leave me.

Don’t leave me.

I don’t want to be alone again.