“Let me finish!” she scolds, rounding my desk until she’s at my side and I’m forced to turn and face her. “I thought you were happy. Then one night–out of nowhere–you sneak out under the cover of darkness, never to be heard from again, until I randomly got divorce papers–of all things.”
A slow stream of tears begins to make its way down her flushed face.
“Put yourself in my fucking shoes for one goddamn minute and tell me how you’d feel if the love of your life left you without a fucking word.”
The love of her life.Her reality hits me like a hard punch to the gut. I’ve always known what she meant to me, but she’s right. I never stopped to consider her. Well, I thought I was. Except, I thought wrong.
“I thought you’d be better off without me,” I admit quietly.
“Why would you think that?” She lowers to her knees and scoots closer to me, placing both hands against my calves. “Did I do something to make you feel that way?”
I let my head fall, partly to avoid her seeing the tears threatening me and partly from the pure shame of it all. “No,” I whisper. “It wasn’t you. It was all me.”
“Tell me,” she pleads, desperation lacing her breathy tone as her voice cracks.
How in the hell do I admit that I let my piece of shit father get in my head and fuck it all up for us. My thoughts flit to Demi. She’d tell me to man up and just fucking tell her.Fuck, I miss her.
“My mother died giving birth to me.”
Raegan sucks in a choked gasp as one hand flies up to cover her mouth.
“Yeah. My thoughts exactly. My father has always blamed me for her death. His disdain for me started simple. Like snapping at me for little things or berating me for not getting a good grade. I remember being in the first grade and just knowing I needed to do better if I wanted him to be proud of me. It wasn’t until about fourth grade, when my teacher asked him at parent teacher conferences if Mrs. Adler would be joining us. She was a brand new teacher. It wasn’t her fault, she didn’t know.”
My heart pounds a heavy and steady thumping rhythm against my ribcage, increasing in pressure and speed with every bit of information I recall. My elbows rest against my knees as my hands find my face. A feeble fucking attempt at hiding my pain.
Raegan’s hands wrap gently around my forearms, tugging them from my face until they fall and drape over my legs. “Hayes, look at me.”
My eyes shift to meet hers and to my surprise, they’re met with sympathy and compassion. Not what I was expecting.
“Keep talking,” she instructs, reaching up to wipe away a rogue tear with her thumb. “I’m here with you and I’m not going anywhere.”
I clear my throat. “After that, he lost whatever filter he’d been holding onto since I was born.” My brows furrow as she holds eye contact with me, nodding for me to continue. “He made sure to tell me, multiple times a day, that I was the reason my mother died. As I got older, he started adding onto it to make sure I always knew I’d never be able to keep a woman safe when I couldn’t even protect my own mother. He even went so far as to tell me more than once that he’d wished I’d died and she’d survived.”
“Oh my fucking god, Hayes,” she exclaims, then lifts onto her knees and moving further into me. Her hands cradle my face cautiously, but still she holds me steady to meet my gaze with her own, tears effortlessly falling to the ground in front of her now. “Your mother’s death wasnotyour fault. You were a baby. There was nothing you could have done and I’d be willing to bet your mom would have wanted it this way. She would have wanted you to survive so you could live your life. What mother wouldn’t want that for their baby?”
“Rationally, I know that. I think,” I admit.
“You think?”
“Yeah, I emancipated as soon as I could and moved in with Ryker. His parents helped me get into therapy. It helped a lot, until I let you get hurt while we were fucking around.”
“Baby, that was an accident,” she cries.
“I watched you sleep that night, after we got home from the hospital. It was like six years of hard work to eradicate my father from my head went down the drain in a matter of seconds. I heard his voice so loud… so clear. You were just proof that everything he’d said about me was true.
“I know it doesn’t make sense, but I loved you too much tonotleave you. I was so twisted up inside, I couldn’t see any other option. I had no choice, Angel.”
Raegan crawls into my lap, straddling me, wrapping her arms around my neck and nuzzling her wet face into my neck. I return the gesture, wrapping my arms around her middle, tugging her into me and burying my tear streaked face into the soft skin of her chest.
We stay like this for a while. Holding each other through more than one cycle of tears. We cry… then pause… then cry some more. My hands eventually rub circles against her back and she sighs.
I’ve done more therapy since I tucked tail and ran from my wife. I thought I’d always feel the weight of my fathers abuse, like it was just this unavoidable hitchhiker I had no choice but to carry. Fuck if I don’t feel lighter all of a sudden.
Raegan sits up suddenly, her green eyes bloodshot and puffy from all the crying. She slaps me playfully on the chest before asking, “How the fuck didyou build all of…” She pauses, to wave her hand haphazardly in the air, before continuing, “thisandend up a Dominant who teaches bondage classes?”
“A lot of fucking therapy and a best friend that wouldn’t let me fall, no matter how hard I wanted to sometimes.” It’s the fucking truth. My therapist played her part, but without Ryker, I wouldn’t have survived and ended up here.
“Why didn’t you come back for me?” Devastation and sadness are all I hear in her question.
