Page 51 of This Might Hurt

Jude edges his seat close enough to mine that our elbows touch.

His skin feels electric with frustration.

I do everything I can not to look at him as members of the kitchen staff start carrying out plates of herbed lamb and some kind of chimichurri-style sauce.

I can feel eyes on me as the plates get distributed, and I know what’s coming long before it happens.

With an apologetic glance that tells me he doesn’t want to be doing this, one of the prep cooks puts down a plate of lamb for me and another for Jude and hurries away.

I sit back and study the dish, a trail of blood leaking from the meat to mix nauseatingly with the green sauce.

Everyone instinctively waits for Archie to pick up his knife and fork before starting.

“So Andrew,” my uncle says around a mouthful.

“We’re giving a live interview to a news site tomorrow about Dad’s life and the future of the company.

They’ll want to talk to the heir apparent, of course.

The funeral is happening down at St. Bart’s next Saturday, so write your speech for that, too. ”

I nod, squinting out across the lawn. Is any of this part of my plan? I can’t really remember anymore.

Colin, Archie, and Daxton fill the silence planning some bear hunting trip to Maine this summer like nothing’s wrong while I sit there, contemplating the food I can’t eat. When I glance up, Daxton is watching me as he chews. He flashes me a nasty grin.

Everyone at the table jumps when Jude jolts to his feet, his chair grating backward across the flagstones.

Confused panic leaks down my spine as I twist around in my seat and watch him stride away toward the house and disappear through the side door the waitstaff propped open.

The atmosphere goes suffocatingly quiet.

Thirty seconds pass, sixty, ninety, and he doesn’t come back.

I slowly sink back into my seat, my eyes finding Archie. He raises an eyebrow at me.

“You’re not going to get an annulment if the guy just runs,” Colin points out, sounding amused.

Archie shrugs and goes back to eating. “That’s okay, we can wait for a default divorce. Dax needs to learn patience.”

Five minutes pass, seven. Something inside me crumbles.

For the first time since I left, I reach toward my flatline state, no thought, no friction.

It’s harder now, my body fighting back toward the light of the man who’s ring I’m wearing.

But I keep pushing, crushing everything down to stillness.

It’s not enough; I can still hear them talking about me.

So I claw deeper until I barely need to breathe. Maybe I should never have left.

Footsteps on stone leak into my awareness, much too fast to be one of the waiters.

Jude’s familiar scent fills the air around me.

Archie is looking up at him, genuinely puzzled.

I jump out of my skin when Jude slams a plate down in front of me so hard I’m surprised it doesn’t crack.

Red sauce glistens bright against the white ceramic, topped with broccoli, chunks of tofu.

The chef has made me this before, a curry I particularly enjoyed.

Before I can grasp what’s happening, Jude picks up my dish of untouched lamb and throws it shockingly hard and flat like a frisbee an inch over Daxton’s head into the yard.

It explodes against the corner of a concrete planter, spraying green sauce and shards of ceramic across the grass with a harsh shattering sound.

My heart rips out of flatline, slamming painfully around in my chest. I watch Jude’s tan arm as he picks up my fork and holds it out to me.

His fingers are shaking. Not sure what else to do, I take it.

When I meet his eyes, I have to fight not to shrink away.

They’re dark with more fury than I thought he was capable of.

The silence around the table stretches out, heavy and strained, and I can feel my uncles studying us both, recalculating, their interest rising like animals at the smell of a fight.

White-knuckling the fork, I spear a piece of tofu as my stomach knots painfully.

He found this for me, but I can’t be happy about it when everything’s so fucked and it’s all my fault.

I’m going to throw up if I put it in my mouth.

I stand up much more carefully than Jude did, keeping my eyes on the table.

He was right. If I had listened to him forty minutes ago, followed the plan, none of this would have happened.

“Goodnight. Text me the time of the interview tomorrow.”

Carrick House isn’t as big on the inside as it looks on the outside.

The designers rejected open space in favor of a compact, old-world layout where every room and hallway feel tightly jigsaw-puzzled together.

But when you’re trying to run away from something, it becomes enormous.

I have to rush through the French doors, across the dining room, up the curving front staircase, and down two hallways to find the door that has always done its best to keep me safe.

I can sense Jude behind me, keeping just close enough that he doesn’t get lost, but I don’t look back.

The staff have made up the queen sized mattress in my room with a crisp gray duvet and two pillows.

Some housekeeper ironed all Jude’s stupid t-shirts and cargo shorts and hung them in the closet.

It feels violating, like the house has already started to absorb us.

I want to take down all his things and pile them in the bed, then curl up with my face buried in them so I can’t smell the laundry detergent that has scented everything in this room my whole life.

Instead, I go straight to the bathroom and lock the door behind me, pressing my back against it as I slide down to the floor.

Jude’s toothbrush is standing in the faceted glass next to mine, his shaver plugged into the outlet to charge, a bottle of allergy meds he must have brought tucked on the shelf above the sink.

I bury my face in my arms with a whimper.

This place won’t ever let me go, and now it has him, too.

I twitch at the sound of Jude roughly manhandling the balcony door until he figures out the tricky lock, then jerking it open.

The knowledge that I have to look him in the face again makes me sick.

I put my head between my knees and drift in nothingness for a while.

I’m getting cold, and my whole body feels oily and disgusting.

I let my family do whatever they wanted.

I barely fought. They didn’t have to speak to Jude or even look at him because they knew exactly where the weakness lay, like deep roots.

Without standing up, I kick off my clothes and scoot into the walk-in shower.

I fidget with the knob, then sit there with my eyes closed as the freezing water hits me before slowly turning warm.

I think I fall asleep that way for a while, because when I jerk my head up with a gulp of air, I feel convinced for a moment that I was drowning in the sea.

Eventually I emerge from the bathroom with my messy hair dripping onto the shoulders of my unbuttoned shirt.

My body begs me to take Jude’s hoodie from the closet, but I ignore it.

The tidy, familiar room is empty, hazy with evening light, but the balcony doors are still open and I can make out the faint smell of cigarette smoke.

There are three butts lined up on the stone balustrade, each in their own little pile of ash with no consideration for soiling the pale surface.

They’re all cold. I almost go back inside before I spot him sitting on the railing in the shadow of the wall, almost hidden by tendrils of honeysuckle, staring out at the flat, featureless lawn.

He knows I’m here, but he doesn’t move or look at me.

The crushing waves of anger radiating off of him haven’t cooled off at all, and I can’t make myself move any closer.

It hits me how fucking thorough Archie is in his cruelty.

He wasn’t ignoring Jude tonight; he was putting on a show for him.

How easy I am to bring to heel with a word.

How I’ll sit there, silent and stupid, as they fuck with me until even Jude, who has always been so patient, couldn’t stand to watch anymore.

“I’m sorry.” My voice cracks when his gaze shifts toward mine. “Jude, please. I know I fucked up.”

His forehead wrinkles, his eyes unreadable. “What?”

“I’ll do better tomorrow. I’ll try again. Let me have another chance before you give up on me—” I break off and take an instinctive step back when he stands up. My brain knows I’m not afraid of him, but my body has been turned back into a prey animal.

“Jesus Christ.” He studies me with a painful emotion I can’t grasp at all. “You think I’m mad at you.”

“I don’t know,” I croak, wrapping my arms around myself. “You fucking lost it down there. You’re furious.”

“Shit.” I jump when he kicks the balcony door hard enough to make the glass rattle.

“I’m furious because you’re mine and I stood there and watched those cunts destroy you.

I’m fucking furious because I didn’t know—” His voice wobbles, then breaks.

“All these fucking years, I didn’t know you were here.

I didn’t know you needed me. I didn't protect you.”

I stare at him, the visceral honesty in his eyes.

I can’t hold all of this on top of the shame; it’s too much.

I’m not that strong. For one second, I imagine him here with me since the beginning, curled up in bed or walking to the stables, his smile, his shoulder against mine.

And when the darkness came, he would have fought it for me, kept me whole.

But none of that happened, and I’m not whole.

I’m just pieces of something no one has ever wanted.