“I…I don’t know. It’s your name?” It’s a statement, but I pitch it as a question. Did I get it wrong?
He brushes his forearm across his mouth, wiping me from his face so callously I might as well have been backhanded. “No. No one gets to call me that anymore. You call me Dax, Jules. I’m only Dax to you.”
Those words sting worse than any slap. I grab the blanket and yank it over me to hide from his hard glare. This is not the man I thought I knew.
I’m stunned. I’m so caught off guard, that I don’t know what to say or do. I’m hurt and confused. My default-self wants to scream at him for being such a cold bastard, but a small voice in my head reminds me I’m at this man’s liberty, relying on his generosity. I have to be careful.
“Thank you for being so straight with me,Dax. I’m glad I know exactly where I stand. Now, I would like you to leave.” My voice is quiet but laced with steel and resolve, just like the tone I use whenever I run into trouble with the losers in the Vale. He might have more money and nicer clothes, but his actions just proved he’s no different.
With my back straight, I stare unflinchingly. I hope I keep the hurt from my eyes. I don’t want him to think I’m anything other than inconvenienced by his change in attitude.
My reserve cuts straight through his anger. It’s a visible slice.The second I finish speaking, he crumples. His shoulders turn inward, his back arches as he bends over and rests his forehead upon the end of the mattress.
“Shit!” he yells into the coverlet; the sound might be dulled but the word keeps its power. Enough that I flinch at his ferocity. When he lifts his head, wild desperate eyes search my face. “I’m sorry. I just…”
“You don’t have to explain yourself. Your actions are more honest than anything you might say to excuse them. Please go.” If he’s looking for forgiveness, he won’t find it here. Not tonight.
“Jules, you don’t understand.”
“You’re right, I don’t, but I don’t need to. Leave, Dax. I need you to go.”
“I…I’m sorry.” He walks on silent feet to the door and turns around as if he’s about to say something. I won’t hear it. I have no intention of forgiving him for making me feel so shitty. I lay down and turn my back to him, securing the covers around me. With my face obscured from his sight, my tears fall.
“That…it has nothing to do with you. You didn’t do anything wrong. I just…I can’t…”
He never finishes whatever he tries to say. A silence descends and fills the room. I wait to see if he’s gone but can’t bring myself to turn around. When I no longer hear his breathing, I allow myself to release the choked sob I’ve been holding. It shudders through me with almost as much intensity as my near orgasm. A thought that only makes me cry harder.
I’m a stupid fool. A pathetic little girl.
With everything I’ve gone through, who would have thought I’d shed even one tear on Dax? Everyone in my life lets me down.God, I let myself down all the time and this is no different. Dax isn’t a saint. He isn’t a hero. He’s a man. I need to remember that.
But just for a second, just for that small moment in my shitty life, I’d hoped.
“Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.You’re an idiot from the Vale. A cheaproll in the sack. What right do you have to expect more?” I sob. “Fuck. Why does it hurt? I’ve dealt with worse.” I let loose an ugly snort, realising an even uglier truth. “At least when Eric hurt me, he never pretended to care for me first.”
My tears obscure my vision, and my sobs wrack my chest. A dull hiss fills my ears from the rise in my blood pressure and the strain of trying to contain the noise I’m making.
But the hiss isn’t enough to prevent me hearing Dax’s final, “I’m sorry.”
Or the click of the door as he closes it behind him.
I’ve heard of the walk of shame. This isn’t exactly the same thing, but my gut turns with each step I take downstairs the following morning. The last to rise, I actually consider not leaving the bedroom at all. I have a great excuse too; I’m exhausted from the last seventy-two hours with no sleep. Add all the counts of emotional fuckery and a day in bed could easily be forgiven, but it’s neither my bed, nor my house. I’m hiding. I know it and Dax will notice too, so I force myself to brave him. I have to keep up the charade that I don’t care, even if neither of us believe it.
Music plays from a stereo. A radio station blasts oldies into Dax’s loft-styled mansion apartment. Just like him, this place is a series of contradictions. And just like him, I decided none of it is worth my attention.
My feet come together on the last step, where I have a partial view of Dax and Sylvie at the kitchen counter. They eat breakfast in each other’s company, but pay no attention to one another.
Dax reads from a broadsheet newspaper, something I’ve only seen on TV. Broadsheets aren’t sold in the Vale. We don’t readfinancial sections, or arts journalism, or real-world news for that matter.
Sylvie taps her spoon against her cereal bowl in time to the music. In the full morning light, I can see she’s younger than I thought; I’d say younger than me, but only by a couple of years at most. She’s lovely, beautiful in fact, with skin as clear as porcelain. The paleness of it contrasts boldly against her jet-black hair. She mouths the words to the song playing from the radio and bobs her head in time to the beat. Her lips have a natural apple-red pout that other women pay for. She reminds me of a fairy-tale princess, where I’m morezombie reject.
She looks up and catches my eye. Did she sense my staring? Neither of us moves or speaks. She scrutinises me just as I’ve secretly analysed her, and then she smiles. It’s carefree and wide. Her entire expression relaxes; the sharpness of her gaze and the furrow between her eyes disappears as her smile expands.
“Well, are you coming to eat or what?” she calls over. Her sweet voice comes punctuated with a giggle.
And then Dax stares right at me and my nerves take over.
I wear the t-shirt from last night and cradle my filthy clothes in my arms, determined to find some way to launder them for the day. I’m not even sure where my other things are. They could be in the back of Aiden’s car and on the way to God-knows-where by now.
