Page 105 of Faking the Goal

I roll onto my side and curl around the pillow, but my anger has already sprung a leak, and all the other shit I've been trying very hard not to feel starts seeping through.

Because he made me feel so fucking small tonight.

The second he said those words, I looked down at myself and actually tried to cover up.

Me.

I tugged at that stupid sheer fabric like suddenly I was ashamed of my own body. Like I needed to hide because he had looked at me and decided I wasn't the kind of woman a man like him could ever want.

God, I hate that I let him do that to me.

I like my clothes.

I like my short skirts, skinny jeans and tiny dresses and crop tops and ridiculous heels. I like my red lipstick. I like walking into a room with my shoulders back and my chin high and looking like I fucking belong there.

Maybe other people see all of that and think I'm desperate for attention.

They're wrong.

It's armor.

It always has been.

When you spend your entire life getting shuffled from one home to another, learning way too young that people can decide whether they want you or not, you figure out pretty fucking quickly that looking vulnerable is a terrible survival strategy.

So I learned how not to.

I learned how to walk into a room like nobody in it could possibly intimidate me. How to smile like nothing hurts. How to flirt before anyone can make me nervous, laugh before anyone can laugh at me, leave before anyone gets the chance to leave me.

And yeah, I learned how to dress in a way that makes me feel powerful.

Hot.

Untouchable.

If life insists on turning every fucking day into some new battle, then fine. I'll show up dressed for war.

My armor just happens to involve significantly more cleavage than Joan of Arc's.

Sue me.

But tonight Kentaro looked straight through all of it and somehow made me feel naked in the worst possible way. And maybe that's why it hurts so much coming from him. Because four weeks ago, I wouldn't have cared.

If he had said that shit the first week we met, I would've laughed in his face, told him exactly where he could shove his precious standards, and gone home without losing a second of sleep over it.

Back then, he was just another judgmental asshole whose opinion meant absolutely nothing to me.

But somewhere in the last four weeks, that changed.

He changed.

Or I thought he did.

We spent all that time together for the feature, and somewhere between the interviews and the rink and Thanksgiving at Sakura Café and this morning sitting across from each other over coffee, I started thinking maybe he was finally seeing past all the obvious shit.

Past the parties.

Past the hookups.