“You had it worse,” she said. “Ramona had it worse, even. Her mother left when she was thirteen, so she really knows what it’s like to deal with that kind of rejection, and she—”
“I don’t want to talk about Ramona right now,” Daphne said softly. She turned so she was facing April, one leg hanging off the dock and the other tucked under her as she leaned closer. “I want to talk about you.”
April blinked at her. “I…We…”
“You sort of do that a lot,” Daphne said. Her voice was so quiet. So close.
“Do what?” April whispered.
“Deflect,” Daphne said, then smiled a little. “I think that’s the right term. Put the focus on other people instead of yourself.”
“Did you learn that in therapy?”
“I can’t afford therapy,” Daphne said. “Though god knows I need it. My parents were adamantly opposed to any kind of psychology that wasn’t from a Christian point of view and provided by a pastor, and I—” Daphne froze and pursed her mouth, exhaling heavily through her nose. “You did it again.”
“Did what?” April said, laughing nervously. “I have no clue what you’re talking about.”
“You change the subject, or you make things seem like less than what they are. Things that bother you or things that have hurt you. Or you make them not about you at all.”
April scoffed. “That’s not…I don’t…”
But she trailed off. She shut up, because shit, Daphne was right. She wasn’t sure when it happened, when she’d started making herself smaller, more palatable. Maybe it was when Elena left her, or maybe it went back even further than that, back to when she was a loud and strange little kid, begging her mother for a Rainbow Brite party and in love with the stars.
She didn’t know.
Didn’t matter, really.
All that mattered was that it was true, and she’d known it was true for a long time. But hearing Daphne say it, someone who had no reason to sugarcoat anything, who had only met April a few weeks ago. FortheDaphne Love to see her so clearly, so completely—that was different. That was…
That was everything.
She reached out and twined her fingers with Daphne’s. She didn’t look at her. She just held her hand, and let Daphne hold her hand back, and looked out at the water under a waning moon.
After a while, she pulled Daphne’s hand into her lap, held it there while she looked down at their fingers, watched as Daphne ran her thumb over one of her silver rings, a moonstone at its center.
“I don’t really know what to do about it,” April said. Daphne squeezed her hand tighter, and April finally looked at her. Her face was a blur in the dim light, but somehow, she could see her perfectly. “I’m a mess.”
Daphne frowned, but her eyes were soft. “Everyone’s a mess, April. You knowIam.”
“Tell me,” April said.
“April,” Daphne said. “We’re not talking about—”
“Please,” April said. “I hear what you’re saying, but talking to you…” She shook her head, staring down at their fingers tangled together. “Talking to you helps. Sometimes I wonder if it’s the only thing that does.”
Daphne inhaled sharply, and April waited, running her thumb over a freckle on the back of Daphne’s hand. Daphne’s grip tightened.
“When I left home,” she finally said quietly, “it didn’t feel like a choice. It felt like life and death. Maybe not physically, but in every other way. And I’m still a mess over it. The more time that goes by, the farther I get from Crestwater, Tennessee, the more I know it’s true. Since then, I’ve had one major relationship in my life, and not only was it built on lies, but I let her walk all over me. I let her own me.”
“Why?” April asked.
Daphne sighed. “Because I wanted to be owned. I still do, in a lot of ways. When I lost my family, I felt completely untethered. I couldn’t find my footing, I had no place to land, no place to return to on holidays. I took classes I couldn’t afford just so I could stay on campus during the summer. I had Vivian, but I didn’t knowhow to be a friend because I had no clue how to love myself. How to beme. I’d never been allowed to, and the sudden blast of freedom in college was overwhelming. And then…”
“And then Elena.”
“And then Elena.” Daphne wiped her eyes with her free hand. “I don’t know. She was aplace, if that makes sense. She made me feel safe. She made me feel like I belonged to someone.”
April didn’t say anything at first, but something glowed warm in the center of her chest. An understanding. A sharing.
