I didn’t need a shrink to know that my issues with guys, with commitment, were because of that. I just needed the strength, and the shoes, to get me through it.
But then it wasn’t completely that. Or even a lot because of that. It was a lot because of him.
Because of Gray.
But thinking of him so soon after remembering the day it all began—the ice, the drowning, everything—that was too much for me to bear.
Especially when I was starting to wonder if Keltan had offered me a life raft, and I’d been too broken to take it.
Because Gray.
And because me.
One Year Later
All the literature with romance and fairy tales painted love like a Monet—beautiful on first glance but a big old mess up close. Because of that, people had unrealistic expectations of those encounters that seemed, for a little moment in time, like they might be it.
Until you looked closer and saw the Monet.
Until you went a year without another glimpse. Because things didn’t get sorted in a week. Or a month. Or even six. When hurt was so deep, so tangled in the depths of you, it wasn’t an overnight type of thing. Men didn’t fix it all.
Keltan wanted me to go about saving myself.
So, I did.
I tried at least.
Or maybe I didn’t.
I threw myself into work and my blog and writing more freelance.
And I learned to pretend the stillness I showed the world was something I saw when I looked in the mirror, that chaos wasn’t lingering beneath.
That was until this day.
Until the sunshine and the beautiful chaos of another club party full of delightful men I still had yet to touch, despite the rules and my heart being ripped up anyway. I’d had less than a handful of wholly unsatisfying sexual encounters with men who ticked all the right boxes except one.
Well, technically two.
The first one being they weren’t him.
The second being more literal.
I did it out of stubbornness more than anything else. To prove to myself that I wasn’t ruined by one sexual encounter, by one small collection of moments with him.
My fake orgasms may have fooled the nameless men, but I didn’t fool myself with any of it.
Rosie, thankfully, didn’t mention it. So, I did the same with Luke.
Both of us were pretty good at living our lives, sucking the marrow out of them the best we could while minding the broken pieces. Dancing around them. That’s what this whole grown-up thing was, wasn’t it? Maybe I questioned the fact that I was one because of my lack of ability to say no to overpriced shoes when I needed to make car payments, and not trying to move myself out of my small hometown. But maybe I really was one because I still did the whole living, smiling and enduring thing despite the brokenness that it took Keltan less than a few moments to see and me a lifetime to fight against.
We watched our girlfriends, our family find it.
Even Bull.
That made my heart happy. Tentatively so, for sure. But despite my knowledge about the absence of fairy tales in this world, I hoped that the magic Amy and Gwen got was reserved for him too.
A few weeks before we got to meet her. Bull’s it. His second chance. Because of what the two of us had, the connection in blood not running through our veins but the blood spilled, I was more than a little protective. Not that I needed to be. She’d been perfect.
“I’m leaving now. Better be ready to get your drink on with Mia. I have now heard through my little birds—if you don’t get the Game of Thrones reference, we can’t be friends—that she may or may not be having some kind of romance with—wait for it—Bull.” Rosie paused. I heard a swift intake of breath on the end of the line and a string of curses.
“Dude!” she yelled, though not at me. I knew Rosie was prone to road rage and drove like a maniac. “You get your license in this century or when Hitler was invading Paris, grandpa?” she yelled.
There was a small pause, and then she launched back into conversation seamlessly.
“Okay, yeah. Mind blown. But she is like drop-dead gorgeous—you’ve seen that for yourself. From the grapevine and my birds, she’s also a little insane by the sounds of it, which is, of course, awesome. But just in case, put your fighting nails on.”
The fighting nails were not needed when Rosie, Gwen, Amy and I had drinks with her at Laura Maye’s bar. Not needed at all. She seamlessly fit into our group, not filling the hole Laurie had left but creating a new space for herself, beside the ghost she didn’t even know existed.
Rosie and I had known. Hence our drinking too many cocktails. No. That wasn’t why. We always drank too many cocktails. This was just another reason we used.