"Me neither," I admit. "It's almost scary. Like it's too good to last."
"Don't think about that." He pulls me down to lie against him. "Just be here. Right now. That's all we can do."
We lie there in the quiet, tangled together on the narrow motel bed, and I let myself feel it. The happiness. The peace.
The sense that, for the first time in my life, everything is exactly as it should be.
Chapter 28: Jay
Ivan is on his side facing me, one arm draped over my chest, tracing random, invisible patterns on my skin with his fingertip. I'm trying not to think about how good it feels. How natural. How terrifying it is to let someone this close, to let someone touch me like this.
"Jay? Can I ask you something?" His finger stops moving, rests flat against my stomach.
"You can ask me anything." I mean it. After what we just did, after the intimacy we just shared, there's no point in hiding anything.
His finger starts moving again, but slower now, like he's working up to something. "Before me—before this weekend, I mean—when was the last time someone touched you? Like this. Gently."
The question hits me somewhere soft and unprotected, somewhere I didn't know was still vulnerable. I try to think of a single moment of physical contact in the years since we were separated. A hug, a hand on my shoulder, anything comforting or gentle.
I come up empty.
"You were the last one," I say finally.
Ivan lifts his head from where it was resting on my shoulder. "What?"
"The last person who touched me with kindness was you." I swallow hard against the tightness in my throat. "Before last weekend, I mean. When you showed up at my door. When you grabbed my hand and recited my information. That was the first time in seven years that someone touched me when it didn't hurt."
"Jay, that's—" He stops, shakes his head slowly. "That's too long."
"I know."
"All those years without anyone touching you. Not even a hug? A pat on the back? Nothing?"
"Mick shakes my hand sometimes," I offer, trying to make it sound less pathetic than it is. "Or slaps me on the back. When I do a good job on something, when I finish a restoration he's proud of. That's about it. At least that's something though."
"I'm sorry, Jay."
"I don't—" I close my eyes because I can't look at him while I say this, while I admit how broken I really am. "I've never been good at letting people close. After you, after we got separated, after I spent years searching for you and coming up empty every single time—I just stopped trying. It was easier to be alone. Safer, you know. If you don't let anyone in, they can't leave. They can't hurt you. They can't disappoint you or abandon you or die on you."
The bed shifts as Ivan moves closer, until he's pressed close against my side. His hand comes up to cup my face, gentle and warm, and I feel his forehead press against my temple.
"I'm so sorry," he whispers, and his voice is thick with tears. "I'm so, so sorry you were all alone."
"It's not your fault." I finally open my eyes, turn my head to look at him. "You didn't do this to me. The world did. Henderson did. The system did. You were the only good thing I had, and those fuckers took you away from me."
"I know, but—" He stops, swallows hard. "I can't even imagine what that was like. Seven years without anyone touching you kindly."
"Don't try to imagine. It's over now." I reach up and cover his hand with mine, holding it against my face. "You're here. That's all that matters. You found me. You didn't give up."
He kisses me then, soft and gentle and devastating in its tenderness. All those years of not being touched, not being held, not being wanted by anyone—and now Ivan is here.
When he pulls back, his eyes are wet with unshed tears.
"Don't cry," I say, even though my own throat is so tight I can barely speak. "Please don't cry for me. I'm fine, I swear."
"I'm not crying." He wipes his eyes roughly with the back of his hand. "I'm just—fuck, I hate that you were alone. I hate that I couldn't find you sooner. I hate all of it."
"I know. Me too. But we're here now."
