Page 40 of Wrap Around (Forbidden Goals #7)

"Um. No. I've lived here for about a year and a half. Since I got my first contract with Red Valley."

"Really?" She looks around the space like she's seeing it in a new light. It looks more like a show model home than an actual lived in space, I realize. "Do you not spend much time here? Or are you expecting to not stay? "

Well, to be honest, Doc, I'm strongly considering moving in with my sister and her husband, who is also my boyfriend.

"I don't know. We do travel a lot, I suppose. I'm not big on decorating."

"Are you always this tidy, too?"

I huff a laugh. "I have a cleaning person that comes once a week whether I'm here or not, and I'm pretty good about cleaning behind myself, I suppose."

"I can't help but notice the lack of any photos or personal effects."

My eyes cut to the bare walls and shelves that don't have more than a few books and a decorative vase that came with the room setup.

It's set on the exact shelf that was shown on the display, and it's been there since the furniture was delivered and set up for me.

The door to my bedroom is open, showing an equally bare room.

I could say I'm a minimalist, but I feel like she'd see through that.

"Do you feel like you belong here, Gideon?"

I look around me, and my eyes snag on the corner of my suitcase, which is waiting for me just inside the door to my bedroom. Ready to flee this place the moment I can.

Before I can come up with an answer, Dr. Shelton speaks up again.

"I'm not talking about the apartment specifically.

It's a symptom to a bigger issue I'm talking about here, as in, your place on this team, around your teammates and friends, in this country, maybe?

You've moved quite far from home to be here.

Do you feel like you belong in the life you've built for yourself?

" Her clarity squeezes at my chest. Because she's right.

"Because it's common for people with your background—a strict religious upbringing, high expectations, conditional love—to struggle to believe they belong anywhere unless they're meeting certain criteria that is usually self-imposed.

A level of perfection that might not be achievable, for example. "

I shift uncomfortably, but don't say anything.

Instead, I sit with what she's saying, thinking about how I've imagined fitting myself into Silas' life.

How I can contribute so I'm not a burden.

But that's common courtesy. I don't think that's what she means.

Do I think I belong there? Not yet. But could I, someday? Maybe.

"I'm working on it." It's the best answer I can give her, and it's truthful. "Until recently, I'm not sure I thought it was possible."

"But something's changed?"

Holding back a smile, I nod. I'm still unsure how much I can tell her.

What's weird is, for the first time, I really want to tell her something.

And not in the way I usually begrudgingly hand over information that she digs out of me.

She's good at that, don't get me wrong. But this time, I want to tell her because I feel like it's the first good thing to happen to me, possibly ever.

And I find that I also really do want to tell her about the dream. But can I tell her without giving away all my secrets?

I clear my throat and lean forward, resting my elbows on my knees and linking my hands in the middle.

I stare at them, remembering the way they looked bloody in the dream, and how it followed me outside the dream.

How my actions in that dream are haunting me, even though it wasn't real. It felt real. It felt… ominous.

So I tell her about the dream. I don't name names.

I just say that I hurt someone I love, someone from my past, and how it coincided with my recurring dream about my father.

How my bloodied friend watched me fail him again when I didn't help him, but that I couldn't move or speak.

That when I woke up, I thought my hands were still bloody.

Once again, I could feel the ache in my knees, but also in my hands from the way I'd beaten him.

She listens the way Lily does. Quiet, steady, never looking away. Just absorbing it all, holding space for it, considering every word before she speaks again .

"Do you think you're afraid of hurting him in some way? Maybe not the way it manifested in the dream? Or is it that you're not able to forgive yourself for hurting him in the past?"

Holy shit. How did she get that from what I just told her? It's insightful, but it's also...right on the money.

"How do you forgive yourself for something that's unforgivable?"

"Are you sure that it's unforgivable?"

I don't know how to answer that. Silas thinks it is, but he couldn't see into my heart in those moments.

He couldn't feel that blind rage that wanted to punish him.

Even if he'd deserved my anger, even if he'd actually done all the things I thought he had, no one deserves to be treated that way. Hurt that way. Degraded and abused.

I know why the dream of my father's sermon keeps coming back to me, because I've always struggled with whether or not I'm a good person and what qualifies someone as such. Now more than ever, I know that I'm not. Does that make me unforgivable?

Dr. Shelton gives me a moment before asking, "What does forgiveness look like to you, Gideon?"

I don't answer. I can't.

She stands to leave, and I walk her to the door in silence. Her hand lingers on the doorknob as she looks back at me.

"You don't have to know yet," she says gently. "You just have to be willing to look for it. Give yourself a chance. Give him a chance, too."