“You weren’t there—”
“Obviously not. But you want to know what I think?”
He nodded. “Yeah, I do.”
“I think she got scared. I think you’re more than she was expecting. Physically, and just who you are. I think when you really let go, like she thought she wanted, it was scary for her. She wasn’t ready for it. Didn’t know what she was asking for. I think she faked how bad she was hurt to make it your fault so she wouldn’t have to feel bad.”
He tilted his head to one side. “Maybe.”
“Think about it.”
“I am.” He nodded. “I was…loud. Wild. I mean, I wasn’t…uh. I wasn’t, like, pounding super hard. You know? Like, I wasn’t so lost in things that I wasn’t aware of how much force I was using.”
“You would never hurt anyone. Even letting go, you wouldn’t.”
His eyes flicked to mine. “You think so?”
“I know so. Down to my bones.”
“You barely know me.”
“I know you better than you think.” I swallowed. “We may not have known each other a long time, Ink, but the time we’ve spent together has been…intense. Personal. Real. Quality counts for as much as length of time, if you ask me.”
“I hurt her, Cass. No way around it.”
I shook my head. “I think she twisted things to hurt you because she was scared. And then she ghosted because she was ashamed.”
“Cass—”
“No. I don’t buy it.”
“I’m telling you the truth.”
I moved up so my face was closer to his. “I know you are, Ink. I’m not questioning you, I’m questioning her.” I rested my head on his chest. “So after she left, you…what?”
He sighed. Stared up at the sky again. “Shut down. I was so upset, so angry at myself, so ashamed, so…rejected, in a way, that I just…shut down. Put the part of me that had anything to do with women, with sex, dating, all of it, put it all in a box, locked it up inside me, and never opened it again.”
“Oh, Ink.” My cracked heart broke for him. “Ever since?”
He nodded. “Couldn’t handle the thought of hurting anyone else. And the way she left, it was rejection. Worse than Elizabeth Grace. Compounded on it. She had told me she wanted everything I had to give, and all I ended up doing was hurting her so bad she left most of her belongings behind. How do you come back from that? After everything else I had been through in life, that was the last straw. I shut it down. Focused on tats.”
“You never dated again? Never did anything with anyone again?”
He shook his head.
“It’s been years, Ink.”
He nodded. “Yeah.”
I waited, but he didn’t seem inclined to fill the silence. “Maybe it’s none of my business, but when you say you shut down everything to do with sex, does that include…things on your own?” Why was I tiptoeing around it? “Meaning, you stopped masturbating, too?”
He just nodded. “Everything. Just shut it down. Cut it out of my life.” He glanced down at me. “And then I met you.”
I bit my lip. “And something about me woke it up, huh?”
He let out a slow breath. “Yeah. Hell if I know what.” A laugh. “No, I do. It’s that I’ve never been as attracted to anyone the way I am to you. Physically, but also just who you are. I dunno.”
“But you’re still…”
“Keeping that part of my life shut down is automatic now. Habit. Ingrained. And the fear and the self-hate that comes with it, it’s as strong as it’s ever been.” His brow furrowed. “You’re strong, Cass. But you’re tiny.”
“And you’re even more afraid of hurting me, because I’m short.”
“Not just short.” He wrapped his hands around my waist. “I can touch my thumbs and middle fingers around your waist.”
“You have the biggest hands I’ve ever seen, by several orders of magnitude.” I put my hands on his, keeping them in place on my waist. “But yes, I’m a small person.”
“I know you’re strong. I can see exactly how strong you are. Physically, sure, but mentally, and emotionally, too. You’re strong. I’m not at all doubting you.”
“You just don’t trust yourself.”
He shook his head. “Not at fuckin’ all, babe…”
He hadn’t engaged in any kind of sexual or romantic activity of any kind, for years.
Fear of rejection cuts deep; memory of rejection cuts deeper yet. And clearly, the fear of being hurt is as powerful as rejection, but the memory of having hurt someone is more powerful than just about anything.
I wanted to take it away. Make him feel better. Restore his ability to trust, both himself and others.
To trust me.
To trust himself with me.
Where do I even start?
He was looking at me sideways. “I know that look.”
I snorted. “What look?”
He tapped the tip of my nose. “The one you got on right now, Little Sparrow. It’s a look that says you wanna try and fix me.”
I just smiled at him. “I don’t think ‘fix you’ is the right way to put it. You’re not broken.”
He frowned. “Feels like I am.” He lifted up to lean on one elbow, gazing down at me. “Here I am, got a gorgeous, talented, smart, sexy woman interested in me, wanting me. Can’t bring myself to do shit all about it, even though I feel like I’m fuckin’ dyin’ for wanting you. I just don’t know how to get past my fuckin’ damage. How to let go of the…the vise grip my shit has on me. I want to, Cass. So fuckin’ bad, I want to let go and just be with you. But I don’t know how.”
“I don’t want to push you into anything you’re not ready for, either.” I sat up, and shifted to sit on his lap, wrapping my legs around his waist, resting my arms on his shoulders, toying with his long fall of thick black hair. “But I guess I just wonder if…” I trailed off, not sure how to say it.
He tilted his head to one side; he brushed an index finger through my hair, over my temple and behind my ear, then down my jawline to my chin. “Wonder what, Cass?”
“If maybe you and me could…sort of ease into things, somehow.” I dragged my fingers down through his beard. Tugged on it. “As I see it, your hold up is two different but related things. One, you’ve been rejected so harshly and in so many different ways, you don’t trust me to not hurt you and reject you—deep down, you’re afraid of that happening. Part of you worries it’s inevitable, that I’m just going to do that, somehow, at some point.”
“Cass, I don’t—”
I touched his lips. “I’m not offended by it. Your life has forced you to put that up as a defense. I get it. I have issues like that myself. This thing with you is a lot, and it scares me. I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing with you any more than you do. I just know I like who you are, I’m attracted to you physically, and I want you. I want how I believe you can make me feel—physically, at least, if nothing else.”