My lips part, “Why would you think that?”
“Because this isn’t you baby,” He says, “You’re the light but you haven’t been shining, Wills. Tell me what it is so I can fix it.”
“You can’t fix this, Bast,” I sigh, dropping my hands to my lap as I start to pick at the neglected cuticles and raw skin already there.
“Like fuck I can’t!” He clips, “Tell me what and watch me end it.”
His conviction makes me smile, “They’re already dead, Bast.”
“Who hurt you, Wills?” He asks, his voice is strained, like he’s desperately trying to mask his rage, but I know him. I’ve heard every tone of his voice and if he thinks he can hide that from me, he can think again.
“My mother,” I answer him.
Lifting my eyes, I find him already staring at me. He waits patiently for me to elaborate, and I blow out a breath, knowing I have to tell him, if only to ease my burden.
“She was an awful woman,” I explain, “Always was but she got worse after my father left her. My dad did try for custody, but the courts sided with my mother, so I was barely with him. He was a good man, if he had known I think he would have done more, but he’d already put up with so much from her, I figured it was my turn to handle her, if only to give him some peace.”
I drop his eyes to focus on my hands, watching my finger as it picks at a piece of skin on my thumb, small beads of blood well but I don’t stop, needing the physical pain to keep me right here in the present instead of in my past.
And still, Bast remains quiet, listening intently. The warmth of the car has started to seep away, and the early spring chill has started to settle but we’re both in coats and warm enough to continue for now.
“Anyway, she got worse the older I got,” I explain, “To her, I was only as good as the match I could secure. She was running out of money and was relyingon me marrying rich to keep her in the lifestyle she wanted. I had a hefty trust fund from my dad, but she couldn’t touch it and I refused to spend it on her which only made her treatment of me worse.”
Sebastian’s hand clenches atop his thigh where he rests it, curling so tight the skin across his knuckles turns white.
“What did she do to you, Willow?” He asks, his voice quiet but filled with murderous intent, as if he could truly bring her back from the dead if only to murder her.
If I was willing to admit that I loved him then that would only make me love him a little bit more. The only other person who knows about my mother is Olivia and throughout the years of abuse, she was the one who picked up the pieces. For so long I wanted to give my mother the benefit of the doubt, I hoped, and I prayed that one day she would wake up and realize the damage she had caused. I hoped she would then try to mend all the hurts she inflicted upon me but then she died, a sudden heart attack.
My biggest secret is that I was there. I watched it happen and I didn’t phone for an ambulance, not until her skin went grey and her eyes remained open, staring right at me, damning me even in death.
Perhaps that’s why she haunts me now, because I watched her die, and I did nothing to save her.
“It’s not so much what she did, which sure, what she did to me was bad, but it was more what she said,” Iexplain, keeping my secret buried for now. I didn’t believe Bast would judge me for it, but I’ve never said it out loud, to anyone, not even to Olivia. No one knows but me.
“She’d tell me the only thing that mattered was my purity, I wasn’t allowed around boys and if she caught me around them, she’d strip me down and scrub my skin until I bled.” I swallow, “No man will want a used-up whore,” I repeat her words, “You’re no good if you spread your legs, Willow. Do you want to be a whore, Willow?”
“Red,” Bast rasps.
I blink rapidly to clear the water from my eyes, “She would just belittle and demean me every chance she got, bitch to her friends about how terrible of a daughter I was and most of them didn’t see her for what she was and sided with her, so I had her and her friends all gunning for me. They saw every misstep; every broken rule and they would report it back to her. I would be punished, and she would tell me I humiliated her in front of her friends. Then she died and I was free.”
“And your dad?” Sebastian asks, voice barely above a whisper and full of gravel.
“He died,” I answer sadly, “Before she died. I never told her about the inheritance.”
“It’s yours,” He says sternly, “It was never hers.”
“She would have taken it,” I turn my eyes to the windscreen, looking out into the darkened parkinggarage, the only light to illuminate the space is the neon signs to show fire exits. It casts shadows in every corner, the darkness there so deep it looks as if it could go on forever and if you stepped in it, you’d never find your way out.
“Willow, what she did doesn’t define you,” Sebastian reaches across and takes my hand, “Despite her abuse, you’re still the best fucking person I know. You still smiled even against the odds.”
A tear slips free and rolls down my cheek and Bast tracks it, watching it as it rolls down my face and then drips from my chin.
“What if I turn out like her?” I whisper, admitting the truth that’s been tearing me apart inside.
“Listen to me, Red,” Sebastian growls, “Are you listening?”
I nod slowly.
