Riley
Ican’t feel anything.
I can’t feel my arms, my legs, my body.
I can’t feel my breathing. I can’t feel my heart.
It stopped, or maybe shattered.
Millions of fragments, which my father is still trampling; or maybe, now, it’s Ian.
“That’s not what I meant.”
I don’t look at him. I can’t.
“All I meant was…it’s too much for one person. No one is that strong. Not even you. And I wanted to help you, I wanted to protect you. In any way.”
A flash of nausea threatens to choke me.
“When I found out about it, I did the first thing that came to mind. I went looking for him. And I hired a private investigator. But it wasn’t easy. I didn’t know that you had—”
“Changed our last name. We did that when Jamie first started to be successful. I didn’t want them digging into our past, didn’t want anyone to find out. I lived like a shadow for all these years, in fear that someone would connect him to me. He was underage when all this happened. The information is inaccessible, while mine… I just wanted to protect him.”
“I understand. You…you did it, you protected him. You risked everything just for him. And I wanted to do something for you. I thought that knowing what I did, if you were to bring it up first, it would be a point in my favour, to face it better prepared. I swear to you, I didn’t want to lie to you or hurt you. I was…honest.”
His words are lost in my confusion, my spite and in my own stupidity.
By this point, none of this makes any sense.
We don’t make any sense.
We’re one big, destructive lie.
Ian finds the courage to come closer to me. He kneels down in front of me and tries to take my hands, but I pull them away sharply.
“Don’t.”
He tries to grab my waist.
“Don’t. Don’t you ever touch me again, Ian O’Connor!”
I slither away from his attempt to hold me and head quickly towards the garage door. His hand hits the metal hard, blocking my escape.
We’re back to the starting point.
“What am I? Your charity case?”
“No, not at all.”
“All that crap about trust, respect…God, I was such an idiot!”
I turn to him, my anger building. “Do you feel better now?”
“What do you mean?”
“Now you’ve done your good deed?”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” he says, raising his voice.
