I mean, I get why he’d want to ask this, but I don’t want him to.
Because I don’t know what his answer is going to be. Because I’m afraid his answer is going to be something I won’t want to hear. Because I’m… just scared out of my mind.
And I’ve had it.
I want to go to him. Ihave togo to him now.
While both my mother and my father turn around to look at me, I keep my focus on the guy I love to pieces. Whose eyes have come to rest on me, and they look so intense and shiny that it’s not a gaze anymore, or a stare or a look.
It’s a touch.
A pull. A gravity. A force.
His reddish-brown eyes are the life running in my veins and my bloodstream that give me the push to run. To tear down the stairs and all the while I’m running to him, I can see.
I can see things moving inside of him as well.
As if my own brown gaze, my thumping footsteps are affecting him the same way.
Are making his chest shudder, his feet shift, his mouth part.
And then I’m there.
Between him and my parents.
I take him in, his shaven jaw, his short hair, those eyes. The bruises. His split lip.
Then I step up to him. I stepbesidehim.
I grasp his hand.
I clutch it — or rather his fist — like I wanted to all this time and turn around.
To face my parents. My dad and his seething features; my mom and her somehow both compassionate and cautious eyes, holding that lone rose.
That has the power to completely break me down.
It’s slightly intimidating to be doing this, facing my parents like this, but I’ll do anything to support and stand by the boy I fell in love with when I was only twelve.
I take a deep breath and go, “Mom, Dad, I love you both and I really appreciate your concern. I also get where it’s coming from, and I can see that this is not easy for you by any means. But you don’t have to interrogate him like this. He’s standing at thedoor. You haven’t even asked him to come inside and —”
“To fix it.”
He speaks, cutting me off.
He also unfurls his fingers and threads them with mine. And I have to lock my knees together to keep standing. At the sheer joy, the sheer relief, the absolute delicious heat and roughness of his hand, sliding into mine.
My parents have switched their eyes over to him now.
And even though it hasn’t gone unnoticed that I’m holding his hand, they choose not to comment on it.
“To fix all the things I’ve done in the past,” he says, his voice grave, his features determined. “To fix what I did last night. To not only somehow make it right but also to make sure that it never happens again. And it won’t.” His grip tightens. “It willneverhappen again. I will never put your daughter in a situation where she can be hurt; where I can’t protect her; where I fail to keep her safe. You don’t have a lot of reason to believe me or believe whatever promises I make but someone once told me that a promise is an oath. It’s a pledge. It’s a word of honor. It’s a covenant, a commitment and a vow. A promise is a bond and my intention is to protect that bond.”
I’m scratching him.
I’m scratching the back of his hand, his knuckles. His fingers.
I don’t intend to but it’s involuntary.