Crashed (29 page)

No, no, no,
I want to scream at him to try and drown out the sounds I can’t believe. I try to cover my ears like a fucking little kid because it’s too much. All of it—the words, the fear, the fucking hope that I just might in fact be a little bent and not completely broken—is just too much. But he’s not having any of it, and it takes every ounce of control I have to not take a swing at him as he pulls my hands from my ears.

“Uh-uh.” He grunts with the effort it takes. “I’m not leaving until I’ve said what I came to say—what I’ve pussyfooted around saying to you for way too long—and now I realize how wrong I was as a parent not to force you to hear this sooner. So the more you fight me, the longer this is going to take so I suggest you let me finish, son, ’cause like I said before, I’ve got all the fucking time in the world.”

I just stare at him, lost in two warring bodies: a little boy desperately begging for approval and a grown man unable to believe it once he’s been given it. “But it’s not poss—”

“No buts, son. None,” he says, turning me around so he’s not touching me from behind knowing I can’t handle that still all these years later, so he can look into my eyes … so I can’t hide from the absolute honesty in his. “Not a single day since I met you have I ever regretted my choice to choose you. Not when you rebelled or fought me or drag raced down the street or stole change off of the counter …”

My body jolts from the comment—the fucking little boy in me devastated I’ve been caught—even though he’s not angry.

“… Did you think I didn’t know about the jar of change and box of food you hid beneath your bed … the stash you kept in case you thought we were going to not want you anymore and kick you out on the streets? You didn’t notice all the change I suddenly left everywhere? I left it out on purpose because I didn’t regret a single moment. Not when you pushed every limit and broke every rule possible, because the adrenaline of the defiance was so much easier to feel than the shit she let them do to you.”

My breath stops at his words. My fucking world spins black and acid erupts like lava in my stomach. Reality spirals at the thought that my biggest fear has come true …
he knows
. The horrors, my weakness, the vile things, the professed love, the stains on my spirit.

I can’t bring my eyes to meet his, can’t push the shame far enough down to speak. I feel his hand on my shoulder as I try to revert back to focusing on the numbing blur of my past and escape the memories tattooed in my fucking mind—on my fucking body—but I can’t. Rylee has made me feel—broken that fucking barrier—and now I can’t help but do anything but.

“And while we’re clearing the air,” he says, his voice taking on a much softer tone, his hand squeezing my shoulder. “
I know, Colton
. I’m your dad, I know.”

The fucking floor drops out beneath me, and I try to pull my shoulder out of his grip but he doesn’t let me, won’t let me turn my back on him to hide the tears burning my eyes like ice picks. Tears that reinforce the fact that I’m a pussy who hasn’t handled anything at all.

And as much as I want him to shut the fuck up … to leave me the fuck alone … he continues “You don’t need to say a word to me. You don’t need to cross that imaginary line in your head that makes you fear an admission will make everyone leave you, will prove you to be less of a man, will make you the pawn she wanted you to be …”

He pauses and it takes every ounce of everything inside of me to try and meet his eyes. And I do for a split second before the fucking door to the patio, the sand beneath my feet, and the burn of oxygen in my lungs as my feet pound down the beach calls to me like heroin to an addict. Escape. Run. Flee. But I’m fucking frozen in place, secrets and lies swirling and colliding with the truth. The truth he knows but I still can’t bring myself to utter after twenty-four years of absolute silence.

“So don’t speak right now, just listen. I know she let
them
do things to you that are vile and repulsive and make me sick.” My stomach pitches and rolls, my breath shuddering at hearing it aloud. “… Things no one should
ever
have to endure … but you know what, Colton?
That doesn’t make it your fault
. It doesn’t mean you deserved it, that you let it happen.”

I slide down the wall behind me until I am sitting on the floor like a fucking little kid … but his words, my dad’s words … have brought me back there.

Have scared me.

Changed me.

Fucked with my head so memories start pushing through the wormholes in my fucked up heart and soul.

I need to be alone.

I need Jack or Jim.

I need Rylee.

I need to forget. Again.

“Dad?” My voice is shaky. The sound of a little bitch asking for permission and fuck me, right now, isn’t that what I am? On the fucking floor once again about to throw the fuck up, body shaking, head racing as my stomach revolts?

He’s sitting on the floor beside me like he used to do when I was little, his hand on my knee, his patience calming me some. “Yeah, son?” His voice is so soft, so tentative, I can tell he’s afraid he’s pushed me too far. That he’s broken me more when I’ve already been fucking shattered and held together with scotch tape for way too long.

“I need—I need to be alone now.”

I hear him draw in a breath, feel his resigned acceptance, and his unending love. And I need him to go. Now. Before I lose it.

“Okay,” he says softly, “but you’re wrong. You may have never said the words aloud—may have never told me you loved me—but I’ve always known because you have. It’s in your eyes, how your smile lights up when you see me, the fact that you’d share your beloved Snickers bars with me without asking.” He chuckles at the memories. “How you would let me hold your hand and let me help you chant your superheroes as you lay in bed so you could fall asleep. So words, no, Colton … but you told me every day in some way or another.” He’s silent for a moment as a part of me allows the fact to sink in that he knows. That all the worry I’ve had over all of these years that he didn’t know how much I felt didn’t matter.
He knew
.

“I know your worst fear is having a child …”

The elation that lifted me is choked by fear with his words. This is all just too much—too much, too fast when for so long I’ve been able to hide from it. “Please don’t,” I plead, squeezing my eyes shut.

“Okay … I’ve thrown a lot of shit at you, but it was time you heard it. And I’m sorry I probably fucked with your head more than you needed me to, but, son, only you can fix that now—deal with it now that all of the cards are on the table. But I have to tell you, you’re not your mother. DNA doesn’t make you a monster like her … just as if you were to have a child, your demons won’t be transferred to that new life.”

My fists clench and teeth grind at the last words—words that feed off the worst of my fears—the urge to break something returning. To drown the pain that’s back with a vengeance. I know he’s pushed me to the breaking point. I can hear his quiet sigh through the screams of every ounce of my being.

He stands slowly and I tell myself to look at him. To show him that I’ve heard him, but I can’t make myself do it. I feel his hand on the top of my head, like I’m a little boy again, and his uncertain voice whispers, “I love you, Colton.”

The words fill my fucking head but I can get them past the fear lodged in my throat. Past the memories of the chant I used to say that was followed by the brutality and unspeakable pain. As much as I want to tell him—feel the need to tell him—I still can’t.

See, perfect example
, I want to tell him, to demonstrate how fucked up I am. He just bared his fucking self to me and I can’t give him a goddamn response because
she
stole it from me. And he thinks I could be a parent? She made my heart black and my core rotten. There’s no way in hell I could pass that on to someone else if there were the remote chance it could happen.

I hear the door shut and I just remain on the floor. The outside light fades. Jack calls to me, tempts me, allows me to drown myself in his comfort, no glass needed.

Confusion fucking swamps me. Drags me under.

I need to clear my fucking head.

I need to figure my shit out.

Only then can I call Ry. And God
I want to call her
. My finger hovering over the fucking Call button. Hovering there for well over an hour.

Call.

Call End.

Call.

Call End.

Fuck me!

I squeeze my eyes shut, head fuzzy from however much I’ve drank. And I start to laugh at what I’ve been reduced to. Me and the floor are becoming best fucking friends. Fuckin’ A.

It’s not hard to go up when you’re already at fucking rock bottom. Time to ride the fucking elevator. I start laughing. I know there’s only way to clear my head—my only other fucking high besides Rylee—that will help keep the demons at bay for a bit. And as much as I need Rylee right now, I need to do this first to get my shit figured out. My right hand fucking trembles as I go to push Call, and when I do, I’m scared out of my fucking mind, but it’s time.

Head straight.

Then Rylee.

Motherfucking baby steps.

“Hey, douche bag. I didn’t realize you knew my phone number it’s been so fucking long since you’ve called me.”

Such a fucking old lady. God, I love this guy.

“Get me in the fucking car, Becks.”

His laughter stops in an instant, the silence assuring me he’s heard me, heard the words I know he’s been waiting to hear since I got the all clear.

“What’s going on, Wood?
You sure
?”

What’s with everyone fucking questioning me tonight? “I said get me in the goddamn car!”

“Okay,” he drawls out in his slow cadence. “Where’s your head at?”

“Fucking seriously? First you push me to get in the fucker and now you’re questioning the fact that I want to? What are you, my goddamn wet nurse?”

He chuckles. “Well, I do like my nipples played with, but shit, Wood, I kinda think you touching them would give me a reverse boner.”

I can’t stop the laugh that comes. Fucking Beckett. Always a bucket of fucking laughs. “Quit fucking with me, can you get me on the track or not?”

“Can you get the slur out of your voice and put down Jack, because that’s a dead giveaway your head is still fucked up … so I’ll repeat my question again. Where’s your head at?”

“All over the fucking place!” I shout at him, failing miserably to not sound drunk “Goddamn it, Becks!
That’s why I need the track
. I need to clear the shit from it to help fix me.”

There’s silence on the line, and I bite my tongue because I know if I push he’ll hang the fuck up on me. “The track’s not going to fix that fucked up head of yours, but I think a certain wavy haired hottie could do that for you.”

“Drop it, Becks.” I bite the words out, not in the mood for another shrink session.

“Not on your life, fucker. Baby. No baby. You really gonna push the best thing you got going for you out the fucking door?”

And session number two begins.

“Fuck you.”

“No thanks. You’re not my type.”

His condescending tone pisses me off. “Stay the fuck out of it!”

“Oh! So you are going to let her go? Isn’t that a song or some shit? Well hell, since you’re gonna let her go, I guess I’ll give her a run then.”

Motherfucker
. Are my buttons that easy to push tonight? “If you’re smart, you’ll shut the fuck up. I know you’re pushing me … trying to get me to call her.”

“Wow! He does listen. Now that’s a news fucking flash.”

I’m done. “Quit fucking around, do your job, and get me on the goddamn track, Beckett.”

“Be at the track at ten tomorrow morning.”

“What?”

“It’s about time. I’ve had it reserved for the past week waiting for your ass to get with it.”

“Hmpf.” He had me pegged.

“You won’t show.” He laughs.

“Fuck off.”

“You wish.”

I blow out a breath and roll my shoulders, welcoming the burn as I stretch my warm and thoroughly tired muscles. I desperately needed this run—the escape into our backyard and through the gate of the neighbor behind us so I could get away undetected from the persistent press.

I look up from my stretch and something across the street catches my eye. I’m immediately on guard when I see the dark blue sedan across the street with the man leaning against it, camera in hand with a telephoto lens blocking his face. Something about him strikes me as familiar, and I can’t put my finger on it … but I know my little piece of freedom—by secret passage—has been compromised.

The thought pisses me off and although I’ve yet to engage with any press, my feet have a life of their own and start walking toward him. My mind running the verbal lashing I’m about to give him over and over in my head. He watches my approach, the shutter clicking at rapid fire pace, the camera still blocking his face. I’m just about to start my spiel when I’m about fifty feet away and my phone rings in my hand.

Even after many days of no contact, my pulse still races at the sound, hoping it’s Colton but knowing it’s not before I even look at it. But I’m taken back a bit when I look at the screen and see Beckett’s name. I stop immediately and fumble with my phone, worried that something’s happened.