“That’s over a year old. She’s already out. Wish they had gotten her on more charges so she stayed locked away for the rest of her life,” he said, his tone filled with venom.
I couldn’t help but to look at him, confused, no response quickly coming to mind. He finally stepped away from the couch and approached me slowly. He got within arm’s distance and gently pulled me toward him. Making sure I was looking at him, he finally spoke.
“What is it you expected me to say? Be honest, Fiona. There has to be honesty between us. You have to tell me what it is you’re afraid of.”
Bash
When Charlie finally stepped through the front door, tears streaming down her face, I quickly pulled her shaking form into my arms as she began to sob.
“I think she—hates me. Us. I’m so—sorry, Bash. I should never—have asked Keys or—you to do this,” she said between hiccups.
“I betrayed her. I’ve never seen her look like that. What have we done?” Charlie wailed, and a chill ran down my spine.
“Give me your keys,” I said to her, and she passed them over without much thought. Taking her back out to her car, I got Charlie settled in the passenger seat before adjusting the driver’s side enough for me to fit.
“What are you doing?” she asked as tears continued leaking out of her eyes.
“Taking you to Mom. Let her calm you down while I go talk sense into Fiona.”
“Bash, give her some time. She was really upset.” I shot Charlie a look, and she wisely stopped talking. We reached the house, and I passed Charlie off to Mom, who looked greatly concerned.
“Everyone’s okay, but I need to go talk to Fiona. Can you keep an eye on Charlie?” Ma nodded, and I jogged back to the car, needing to get to Fiona before she twisted everything up in that beautiful head of hers.
Speeding, I tried calling her, but all my calls went straight to voicemail. I wasn’t sure if she had turned her phone off orwas just not answering me. It didn’t matter. I would get to her apartment in the next twenty minutes anyway.
I didn’t imagine it was going to be easy. Knowing Fee, she would be fully in avoidant mode, but I wasn’t allowing that. She would realize soon enough that what we had was bigger, that there was no ignoring the situation. We were in it together now. It was too late for her to pull away.
Using the keys I had to her place, I swiftly made my way up to her apartment, making quick work of the dead bolt when the chain of the door stopped my entrance. I sighed, not wanting to cause a scene, but was unsure how to contact Fee without scaring her. I didn’t have to think too long about that when she stepped into the light, a baseball bat in her arms and fire in her eyes.
Kicking in Fiona’s door wasn’t exactly how I saw our weekend starting, but I wasn’t letting anything come between us. It wasn’t the piece of wood that I was worried about; it was the emotional walls my girl was busy trying to put into place to distance herself.
When I saw her through the crack, my alarm only grew. Even though she was looking and talking to me, it felt like she wasn’t actually seeing me, but through me. I felt her trying to pull away, lashing out so she could lick her wounds in peace.
What she clearly didn’t realize was that it was far too late for her to pull away from me, from us. She had let me in, had shown me what it could be like to live in her light, and I wasn’t letting her take that away.
Full of anger and fear, kicking the door in only provided a moment of relief. I wanted to shake her, to yell at her for trying to put something up between us. But once I got inside, the look in her eyes stopped me cold.
She looked shattered. That was the only word for it. Hurt and angry weren’t enough. It was as if something inside herhad snapped. She looked lost and alone, which was the exact opposite of what I was trying to do for her.
I wanted to pull her into my arms, force her to acknowledge me, but she was locked up tight. Her arms were wrapped around her middle as if she were physically attempting to hold herself together. There were tears in her eyes, and her voice was rough from holding back from crying. Avoiding my instinct to hold her, I took a beat to calm down as I settled myself against the couch.
It gave her some space to breathe, but I also could keep an eye on her. Feigning a calm I most definitely wasn’t feeling, I started the process of pulling the truth out of her. I knew she was upset, but I needed her to tell me what it was she was so afraid of, what secret she didn’t want coming out.
“You had no right!” she wailed before starting a tirade, listing off my multiple offenses.
With every word out of her mouth, she was revealing more and more about herself. I clenched my jaw when she referenced incidents not in the file. It slowly became clearer that Fiona thought reading that file had changed my opinion on her, that I would judge her for the lives her parents lived.
What I learned was that they were two miserable sacks of shits who didn’t deserve to breathe the same air as my girl. I was starting to think they didn’t deserve to breathe at all… They weren’t just neglectful; they were abusive, physically and emotionally. And I was afraid they had instilled a deep belief in Fiona that she wasn’t worthy, that nothing good would stay for long.
I was determined to prove that wasn’t true, but I knew time and action were the only cure. Fiona was losing steam, and I decided to speak up.Time for me to open her eyes to the part of this she is stubbornly ignoring.
“Would you be able to tell me where your parents are now? Right this moment?” She looked stumped by that question, asif it came out of left field. My beautiful, broken girl still didn’t want to deal with the elephant in the room. She had run from her problems years earlier, and was afraid that if she looked back for a second, she would summon the people who haunted her most.
Even as she desperately tried to keep her head in the sand, she still took care of those around her. Whether she realized it or not, she was always on alert, looking to help someone the way she wished she was helped. That was clear simply from her first meeting with Charlie.
Fiona didn’t think she was worth extra attention or help, but she gave it to everyone she cared about. It was time she learned she deserved it. That she had people in her life who cared and worried about her, who saw the real her.
I wanted to make it clear I didn’t mind that she had cut her parents out, that she didn’t want to talk about them or her past. Fee deserved the ability not to have to worry, to escape from the fears so deeply ingrained in her.
