Her eyes shot up, relief flooding through them before she cleared her expression and nodded. Emily pushed herself to a stand, and walked over, sitting on my bedside, holding out her left wrist for me to see.
Lucy sniffed at it, running her tongue over the lines as I studied them carefully. There was a really dark one running up the length of her arm, and many others running across it.
“I did,” she answered. “Not for long. A few weeks. Everything just…it came to a catalyst. My dad’s wife’s kid was a drunk. He was beating the shit out of me since the affair started, but it got worse after my mom and sister died. He moved in and blamed me for everything bad in his life. Grey showed up and I pushed him away because…”
My eyes lifted to hers when she paused, and I could see that the pain was still there. The suffering she had gone through last year still lived within her, deep and excruciating. “I never wanted anyone to suffer because of me,” she told me, her eyes filling. “Ever. But he wanted to. He fought for it. Every single day he fought to be there in the suffering with me. I thought what was going on in my head was so much darker and so much worse than he could handle. Despite knowing what he did, despite finding out about his family, I still questioned it. Because there was no way he could ever possibly understand what they had put me through. What I put me through every single day.
“But eventually,” she shrugged, a smile touching her lips. “Eventually the pull of our atoms was too much to ignore. We fell together just as the universe had always intended.” She flipped her hand over, showing me the ring. “He proposed not a year after we first met, and we’re getting married in December.”
I searched her eyes for a moment before looking back at her hand. I watched as my hand, of its own accord, reached out and gently flipped her hand back over. My fingers ran the length ofthat long, thick scar, my mind racing and slowly ticking away at the same time.
I didn’t know what I was thinking until the words left my lips, and then it was all I could feel. All I could know. It was all I could breathe. “What if mine is a broken he can’t ever learn to love?” I asked, my eyes slowly lifting back to hers. “What if my scars are too deep?”
Her smile fell, such intense emotion in her eyes, I wondered how she was able to feel it so fully.
She slid her hand over mine and leaned in. “He already does, Olivia. You two aren’t the kind to say it, I’ve seen and heard enough of the both of you to understand that, but what you need to understand is thatlovecan be expressed in more than just words.”
Emily looked over, placing a hand on Lucy’s head. “Love can be expressed in sacrifice. In the giving of all that you are and all that you believe in.” She glanced at Merlin and smiled. “In the absolute trust of a not so innocent heart.”
I had to clench my hand to keep from reaching for the collar I knew wasn’t there. It was a habit I had gotten into that I still couldn’t break.
There was sadness in her gaze as if she knew exactly what I was fighting. “Love is everything all at once,” she told me. “Even if it doesn’t make sense to the people on the outside. And while you go through all of this, while you figure out how to walk again, how to breathe again, how to feel the strange new beat of your own heart again, you need to understand that healing for you and love for you doesn’t have to be healing for us and love for us. You don’t have to explain yourself to anyone, not a single person, you just have to figure out how to heal in a way that will one day turn these new wounds of yours into scars you can wear with pride.”
I felt, for the first time in a long time, tears burn the back ofmy throat, and I could feel something like sorrow growing in the pit of my stomach, but there was something else too. Something familiar and unfamiliar at the same time.
Emily straightened, offering a small smile. “I’ve been reading your books,” she told me, glancing to the book on the table beside her chair. “I think your type of healing may be closer to our boys than you probably realize. Your heart will tell you what you need, okay? Don’t force things that don’t feel natural and don’t expect to ever feel like you did before again. It won’t happen.”
I searched her eyes. I already knew the truth of that. Olivia Rose was dead. She was. That weak, whiney bitch was never coming back, ever. She had let too many people take advantage of her, beat her,hurther. Too many people had ruined her. But me? I was different. I was stronger, and I would never let anyone elseevertouch me again. I had gotten a taste of blood in that room, and I wasn’t going to ever let it go. “My name is Olivia Kingsmen, I am a writer, I am unbreakable, I am Claimed.”
Her smile widened, her eyes glistening. “Yes, you are.”
27
Olivia
October 28th, 2022
Istood in the bathroom staring at the mirror, still fully clothed, the steam filling up the room, the scent of berries surrounding me.
Emily wore her scars with such pride. Onesshecaused. And since finding out about them, did I see her as anything less than beautiful?
No.
No, I didn’t. I had heard her story, I knew what she went through, I knew Rae had scars too. Scars of torture just like mine, so why couldn’t I be as proud of my wounds as they were of theirs?
Lucy pushed her head under my hand as Merlin continued to play in the puddle of water I had left in the sink for him.
I glanced down, scratching her head. Was this how it would always be? My silence and her worry.
I didn’t want her to be like this forever. I wanted her to be a normal dog again. I didn’t want her suffering because of me, but I also knew that she would never get better if I didn’t.
I needed her to get better. I needed her scars to be worth something.
I swallowed, scratching her head before turning back to the full-length mirror.
I stared at myself for a long time before lifting the bottle I held in my left hand and taking a long, deep drink.
When the warm buzz finally hit my veins, I set it down and slowly began taking off my clothes. The sweater first and then the sweats. Not much of anything, I suppose.
