Page 95 of The Lies That Shatter
“Can we talk?” I ask, as I take a few steps closer to the bed.
His eyes narrow a little in shock, and no doubt confusion, but he doesn’t hesitate to put his book down on the bedside table to give me all his attention. “Of course. Is everything okay?”
I shake my head, silently confirming what he already knows, that everything isn’t alright. He moves to climb off the bed, but Ihold my hand out to stop him. I take a big deep breath, gathering as much courage as I can.
“I know since I got out of the hospital that I’ve been pushing you away, and I’m sorry for that. I?—”
“You don’t have to apologise,” he says quickly, cutting me off.
I move to sit beside him on the edge of the bed, and I take his hand in mine, giving his beautiful blue eyes the attention he deserves. “Please, don’t interrupt me, Finley. I need to get this out.”
He chuckles at the firmness in my voice, and I see a spark in his eyes that probably hasn’t been there in weeks. “Okay, I’ll be quiet.” He motions with his hand, pretending to zip his lips closed before throwing away the key.
I roll my eyes at him, but I don’t try to hide the way my mouth tips up into a genuine smile. “I have been pushing you—and everyone else—away since I got back, and I’m sorry about that. It’s not something I consciously did, and until I spoke with Kellan this morning, I had no idea I was even really doing it.”
His brows lift in surprise at the mention of me talking to Kellan, but true to his word, he doesn’t interrupt me. Though I can tell by the way he shuffles on the bed, he’s desperate to say something.
“When I was a kid, and yet another foster family rejected me, I created this place in my mind. It’s where I would go when life got too rough. When I moved homes constantly, when I felt like nobody loved me, or when a new foster parent turned out to be yet another abusive asshole, I needed a place to go where I would be safe. Obviously, because I was just a kid, it couldn’t be a physical place, so I created a place in my head.
“It’s nothing special, and maybe I will tell you all about it someday, but for now, all you need to know is that the place has been my sanctuary all my life. Whenever anything badhappened, and I needed to check out, I left the real world behind and went there.
“So when everything happened with the Whitlocks, it was the only thing I could think to do to keep myself safe. The recurring nightmares of what I went through, and the darkness that came with it threatened to consume me, and I was scared. So I did what I always do…I retreated to my safe place.
“But the longer I was there, the more I forgot about the world around me. I know everything continued on, while I kinda just stayed still. I thought it was the only way I could protect myself, but I know now I was wrong.”
I give his hand a squeeze, letting him know it’s okay now if he wants to talk, which, of course, he does. “It’s not wrong to retreat there to protect yourself, Mac. If that’s what you felt you needed to do, then of course you should do it.”
I reach up with one hand and cup his cheek, the overgrown stubble I’m not used to feels scratchy against my palm. “That’s the thing, Finn. I thought I needed the sanctuary because it’s all I’ve ever known, but that’s not the case anymore. I have you now. You are my safe space, Finn, and I should have turned to you for support instead of pushing you away, and I’m so fucking sorry for that.”
A stray tear slips from the corner of my eye and trails slowly down my cheek. Finn lifts his hand and wipes the tear away with the pad of his thumb. “Sweetheart, I don’t blame you for reacting the way you did. It feels like we’re deep in this relationship, because we’ve had feelings for each other for longer than we’ve actually been together. But the truth is, we’ve only been together for a short time. We still don’t really know what it means to be in this relationship. You didn’t know that you could turn to me, because I‘ve never been here for you like this before.”
Even though I want to argue and tell him that I should have known, that I should have trusted his feelings for me, I know he’sright. This relationship went from zero to one hundred in just a few weeks. We jumped straight in at the deep end before we even went on a date. I’ve been in love with him for years, but I’ve never dated him, which is just fucking weird to think about.
“You’re right. We have been doing the getting to know you part of a relationship our whole lives. We already knew how we felt about each other, and we jumped into the sexual side of things quickly because it had been building for years, but we’ve never even been on a real date.
“Despite all that, I allowed my own self-conscious feelings to cloud my judgement with you, and I shouldn’t have done that. I should have given you a chance,” I admit, a slight blush spreading across my cheeks as I finally talk about how I’ve been feeling.
“What do you mean?” he replies, sounding a little confused.
I take a deep breath, and it takes all my effort not to drop my gaze from his. I know he deserves all of my attention, but some things are just hard to admit. “The scars on my body… The things he did to me. I allowed the wayIfeel about them to cloud my thinking, assuming that you would see them the same way I do. It was Kellan who told me I wouldn’t know how you really feel about them unless I actually ask you.”
A short chuckle escapes his lips. “It freaks me out a little that my brother is capable of giving any sort of good advice,” he jokes.
“I know, but what he said really made sense. Obviously, I can’t show you the emotional or psychological scars right now, but I want to work on showing you those eventually, if I can. For now, maybe I can show you the physical scars, and we can go from there?” I ask, my voice sounding just as shaky as I feel, as I pull my lip between my teeth.
“You can show me them, but I already know they won’t change how I feel about you,” he says, with absolute certainty.
I shake my head, another rogue tear slipping free. “Please, don’t say that. I need you to look at me, to really look at me, and to be completely honest. I know what I see, but I need to give you the chance to see them. They’ve gone down a bit compared to when I was first in the hospital, but they’re still very much there.”
With a nod of his head, a serious expression slips over his face, and I can tell he’s giving me what I asked for. Slowly, I stand. It hadn’t even occurred to me what I was wearing until now. I’ve been walking around in such a daze, barely functioning.
I look down and see my small frame is being swallowed by one of Finn’s T-shirts. As I grab the hem, I’m hit with his scent, and I remember exactly why I choose to wear this. The shirt stops midway down my thighs, hiding the pair of shorts I have on. My feet are being kept warm by a pair of cosy, fluffy socks.
Shit, did I just have breakfast with Kellan dressed like this?Not that he was looking at me at all, but still… I could‘ve at least tried to maintain a little of my dignity. I don’t even wanna think about how rundown I look, or how greasy my hair is.
Slowly, I remove the T-shirt, and as I draw the fabric over my face, I keep my eyes clamped shut. As I move, I can feel some of the scars. Even though they don’t hurt any more, as they’re more or less healed, I can still feel them. They feel tight, like they’re pulling the edges of my skin together in an unnatural way.
Then there’s the fucking itching. The doctors say it’s my old skin healing, and new skin growing, but whatever the hell it is, it creates the most intense, burning itch, that, to be perfectly honest, I barely have the willpower to resist scratching.
