“Do you want to talk about what happened? You don’t have to, but I’m here if you do. Sometimes just saying it out loud helps.”
“I don’t know, it’s so painful and dark.”
Lex simply watches me, digesting every word I say. “What happened at the coffee shop is painful and dark, or something else?”
It was the exact right question to ask, because, for the first time, I feel like I could tell him some of it. I want to open up to him, to bloom into a flower.
“No, the coffee shop was bad, scary, and embarrassing, really. But that was nothing like what I knew growing up with them.”
Lex picks up my hand and kisses the back of it before putting it back down.
“You can tell me as much or as little as you want. I’m right here, listening to anything you have to say.”
“I don’t know what there is to tell you, specifically. You saw what he did to my back. But that was… there were years of that. My entire life, I’ve tried to figure out ways to cover up the marks.”
Lex grits his teeth and his body tenses, but I know I can’t manage his anger for him. I just have to stick right here with what I’m feeling. That’s as much as I can do.
“It wasn’t like everybody in our community did that. He just had really high expectations of me. He is the leader of our religious community. He has to set the example, and I was not an easy child. Or at least, so I have been told.”
“Easy or not, no child deserves that.” His tone is gritty and dark and dangerous. I know in my gut that if my father was here right now, Lex would likely hurt him. I can’t blame him for that. Even I want to hurt my father sometimes. Want him to feel the same pain he’s inflicted on my mother and me, but hurting him wouldn’t change what’s already occurred. It wouldn’t make the scars on my back disappear or the pain in my heart.
“Besides, I’m sure you were an angel,” Lex’s voice softens.
“I don’t know about that,” I smile lazily, “but you are right. No child deserves to be treated like that. I would never let a child be harmed. I would do anything to protect them.”
I never realized how deeply the protective mechanism was when you had your own child at play. The fact that I could never hurt my baby, but my dad could hurt his was a stark new reality. It told me more about his screwed-up psychology. It made it more about him and less about the religion and the community.
“A lot of people think of our way of life as a cult.” I shrug, not knowing how to speak to that or elaborate. “But it was built on some really great spiritual principles. It was extraordinarily conservative, which is probably no surprise, but it was also one of the few that was based on feminist philosophes. And it was for the greater good, supposedly. Sort of like your family. Y’all take care of each other. That is the way the church is.
“Our community shared money, houses, resources–everything was shared. Nothing was ever held back for the individual. But from childhood, I always felt the need to be an individual. I didn’t want to have to suppress the things that felt important to me. I wanted to explore my ideas, explore the world, and make a life for myself that was my own. But that was not something I was ever allowed. Within the community, there are certain things expected from every woman, I never checked any of those boxes. Always an outsider. That’s why no one wanted to marry me when it was time.”
“Time? What do you mean?” Lex’s confused expression makes me cringe. I don’t want to tell him this part because I know how messed up it truly is.
“Most girls get married as soon as they turn sixteen—”
“You get married at sixteen?”
“Yeah, it’s the norm. My dad always picks who gets married to who. In the early days of our community church, everyone was married to everyone. So, at sixteen, girls and boys alike were sent to elders to teach them about sexual ways, and then they became married to everybody else, and you scheduled coupling times in a private room as often or as little as you wanted. It was a way of removing the ego from the relationship. To bring things back again to bettering the whole rather than the one.”
“What the fuck! I am not trying to put down your religion, but that is some fucked up shit!”
I chuckle. “It is some fucked up shit. You’re not offending me because it is not my religion, not what I believe in. It was the environment I grew up in, but it was not me. It never fit with me. That is why I had to go out and find a way to become disowned. I needed a way to make space for myself. To go on to school and to find out what I wanted to do and who I wanted to spend time with.”
“How did you do it? How did you get away?”
“You, Lex. You helped me,” I say, but he just stares at me, trying to put it together.
“I snuck out to lose my virginity. I knew if I wasn’t pure, if I had sex before marriage, they would disown me.”
“So, you would have slept with anyone that night?” His question holds disappointment and hurt.”
“I thought I could,” I admit. “But when I first walked into that bar, I had changed my mind. I was going to walk right back out. Then you showed up and changed my mind again. I think it was always meant to be you, Lex.”
Relief flashes over his face. “What happened then? You went home and told your parents?”
“Yes, they were so mad. My dad beat me like he never had before. I thought he might kill me at one point, and worst of all, part of me wanted him to.” Dread seeps deep into my bones as I think about that night. The scars on my back will forever be a reminder of that night, of a past I long to forget.
“I’m sorry, Jude. I wish you would have told me. I never would’ve let you leave. I wish I had known, I would have protected you.”
“I know you would have. I just didn’t know then. All I ever wanted was a normal life. To feel safe and not like I would get a lashing if I did the wrong thing again. I was tired of walking on eggshells, being scared, and anxious. I wanted to have the right to choose things for myself. To not have to live under his authority or any man’s authority for that matter. To go to school, to have my own things, and to decide what I want to wear for myself. I wanted to choose. I wanted to have a life where I get to consent.”
Lex grabs my hand in an instant, and his green eyes are blazing. “I promise you, Jude, that no matter what, and I’m talking truly and honestly, no matter fucking what, whether you and I stay together, get together, never be together again–it doesn’t matter. As long as you live, I will protect you. And my family will protect you, too. Pops has already said that regardless of what happens with us, you have been adopted by the family, and he expects to see you every week at dinner. He even made a point of saying, he is not asking. You get to choose, of course, but if you are open to it, it’s there for you. As fully and as deeply as you want.”
Lex pulls me to him as my arms curl around his neck.
“Jude, I swear by all things good and holy, that part of your life is over. I will not let them hurt you ever again, and I will never try and control you like they did. Here you can be whoever you want, do whatever you want. I will never let anyone dictate your life again, least of all me. I want you to be happy and to make your own choices, okay?”