“I love you,” I said, and he said it back, but the pain was in his words, the pain was between us. So many things seemed to be getting between us lately. But I trusted him, trusted us. Trusted what we had.
I was distracted by thoughts of Lucah the entire day, and it was hard to focus on work when all I wanted was to talk to him and hopefully bring him back from where he’d gone. When I’d first met him, he’d often go to that place, but those times had gotten fewer and farther between. Until Ryder. His brother was a constant reminder of losing his parents.
I didn’t think of that when he moved in, but I bet Lucah did.
“You looked like you needed another cup,” Lilia said that afternoon when she brought me my third cup of coffee. I was trying to cut back on caffeine, because I figured it contributed to some of my anxiety and control freakishness. Cutting back was not going well.
“Thanks.”
“Rough day?”
“Something like that. But we just had a therapy session yesterday, so I’m not going to bug you again. I’ve got this.”
She shrugged one shoulder.
“You can if you need to. I’m here. Just over there. Write me a note and make a paper airplane or something.” Paper airplanes made me think of Lucah.
Lucah, Lucah, Lucah.
“Thanks, I’ll consider it.” She went back to her desk and I sunk further into my distraction.
I couldn’t wait for work to be over, and when I met Lucah by the elevator, I wanted to throw myself on him and cry.
But I didn’t. Instead I greeted him formally and kept the three-foot buffer as we rode down to the ground floor. Some of the sadness from the morning had dissipated, but I could still see it on his face.
“Everything okay?” I asked as we walked toward the T station.
“It is now.” His kiss was bittersweet. I opened my mouth to ask him if he wanted to talk about the comment Ryder had made, but then I couldn’t. I realized that I didn’t know how to talk to Lucah about his parents. I didn’t know what to say. I still had both of my parents, and on some level I almost felt guilty for that. It might be crazy, but it was how I felt.
We were mostly silent on the way back home. Lucah was lost in thought, and I had no idea what to say.
Luckily, Ryder and Sloane were around when we got back, so we could talk to them, and not each other. Ryder seemed to have forgotten about the events of the morning and talked freely of his therapy session, and Sloane talked about how behind she was on her fashion show and how she had to fire some of her interns because they didn’t know how to sew.
“You can fire interns?” Ryder asked.
“I can do whatever I want. It’s my company,” she said with a grin and he smiled back.
Lucah put on a performance, smiling and laughing and participating in the conversation, but it was just that. A performance. I knew him well enough now to know when he was putting it on and when he was being real. I suspected Ryder knew as well, but he didn’t make any comment about it.
We got ready for bed silently and I climbed in next to him and I couldn’t take it anymore.
“Talk to me,” I said. I didn’t care what he said as long as he said something.
“What do you want me to say?” He wasn’t angry, just curious.
“You’ve barely talked to me all day.”
“What are you talking about? We just talked when we were having dinner.”
“But you were upset. I can tell. You were using your corporate spy skills to put on a show.” He turned so he could look at my face.
“And what makes you think that?”
“Because I know. I know you. Are you still upset about what Ryder said this morning?”
“No,” he said in a completely unconvincing voice.
“There. Right there. You’re not telling me the truth. I can hear it in your voice.”
He looked at me for a long time before he said anything.
“What do you want me to say?” he repeated.
“I want you to tell me what you’re thinking. I want you to be able to share things with me. Not just the good things, but the bad things. I want to know everything.” I stroked his hair, trying to make him understand.
“I know you do. I’ve opened up a lot, but it’s hard, Rory. I have a difficult time with it. I worked for so long being someone else. It’s hard to remember how to be myself. And when I was someone else, I wasn’t someone with dead parents. I got to be whoever I wanted. It was like . . . putting off dealing with losing them. And now it’s years later and I feel like I haven’t even begun to deal with it. I don’t know how. I don’t know how.”
Just like in the presentation, he was speaking with his hands. His movements were frustrated and angry and hurt. I grabbed them and kissed them because I didn’t know what else to do.
“I’m so, so sorry. I don’t know what to say, and I feel horrible that you can’t talk to me about this because I don’t know what to say or do to make it better. Every week you come with me to my parents’ house and I feel like I’m rubbing it in your face. Hey, here I am, my parents are alive—” Tears streamed down my face, but he held his hand in front of my mouth to stop me from going on.
“You don’t have to say anything. Just having you here, and knowing that you want to know about it, and you want me to talk is enough. I’m not jealous of you because your parents are alive. How could you ever think that? I wouldn’t want you to go through this hell. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, least of all the woman I love. Oh, Sunshine.” The tears kept coming and wouldn’t stop. Lucah moved his hand from my mouth, but only to keep wiping the tears away, even though there were too many and they splashed on the sheets.
“I can’t help it. I feel guilty. And now I feel guilty for feeling guilty, because you’re comforting me and it should be the other way around. I’m so sorry you got stuck with me.” He shook his head slowly back and forth, as if he couldn’t believe what I was saying.
“I don’t know whether to laugh or cry right now,” he said, cupping my chin in his hands. “But I think we need to talk. Not just tonight, but all the time. I don’t want you to hold something in for fear of telling me about it, or upsetting me. Ever. Okay?”
“Okay. But I want you to do the same. I know it’s hard for you to open up, but you need to and I need to. This goes both ways.”
“You’re right. You’re absolutely right. So how about we start now? We’ll tell each other one thing before we go to bed every night. Something that’s been bugging us all day. It can be serious or silly, but we’ll do it every night. How’s that?”