Page 125 of Trapped: Until The Darkest Of Night

“Okay.” I stare at the pancake, but I can’t eat it. At least she eats a bit. She has to be fit for the long trip, I don’t want her to collapse along the way. Maybe I should pack her more water. Maybe I still have to…

“What’s wrong, Bren?” Her impatient voice snaps me out of my thoughts. She energetically pulls the pancake out of my fingers and flings it onto the plate. “Say it!”

There’s no point in keeping it from her anymore. “Okay.” Shakily, I grab her warm hands, and as if Lou can sense my tension, she immediately stiffens.

“That day by the river when you didn’t call out to the men…” I begin, forcing myself to keep my voice steady. “You made a decision that was right for you at that moment. Or maybe it was wrong and it just felt right. I don’t know.”

“It still is right,” Lou says so firmly that a hint of a smile crosses my face.

“Maybe today. Maybe for you,” I reply softly. “But what about your family? What about your brothers?”

Lou swallows and her eyes fill with tears. I squeeze her fingers tightly.

“What if in five years, we break up? Then I stole a part of your life and deprived you of an education. And you will hate me.”

“I could never hate you,” she replies a bit muffled. When she looks at me, her face is as open as a book. She is pale, her lips thin, but her eyes sparkle with deep, sincere love.

I carefully guide our intertwined fingers to my cheek, my belly full of burning desire for her closeness. “I believe that you love me, Lou. Please, don’t think otherwise.” I bow my head. “But what if this love grew only because you were so lonely? Like you were the victim who fell in love with her kidnapper?”

Her expression looks pained. “Bren, what do you want to hear? What am I supposed to say? I don’t even know myself. I just know that I love you. I already liked you in the visitor center. I would have fallen in love with you anyway.”

“I’m not sure you’re in a position to judge properly at this point, Lou. So, I decided to make the decision for you.”

“What decision? What do you want?” A dark shadow crosses her face.

I press my lips together, but something happens to my eyes. They get wet and my vision blurs.

“Maybe is a yes,” I whisper harshly. Maybe is a yes. “And someday is today.” Good God, I don’t want to cry. If I cry now, I won’t be able to stop crying and I can’t do that to Lou. She should not leave me with the burden of pity and sorrow. I bite my lip hard and taste blood.

Lou looks at me in complete dismay. “You want…you want to let me go? Today?” The intensity of her confusion disturbs me even more.

“I don’t want to, Lou, but I must. It is too dangerous. Yesterday, I choked you like my stepfather did to me. What am I going to do tomorrow…?” I look at her, but I have the feeling she doesn’t hear me at all, as if she’s far away. “Believe me, I would love nothing more than to stay in the Yukon with you for the rest of my life. Far away from the world and all other people. I would wish for nothing more. If there was a way that would be fair to you, Lou…but there isn’t. We don’t even know what your feelings for me are based on…” Her blue eyes are like two lakes about to overflow. “Lou?” I whisper softly. “Lou…do you hear what I’m saying?”

She quickly shakes her head. “You can’t just send me away,” she chokes out breathlessly. “I won’t go.”

I get up and pull back the RV curtains so she can see where we are. Maybe that will make her realize how serious I am. Maybe she feels something like joy under her bewilderment. When I turn to her, I feel even more miserable. With a stony expression, Lou stares out, almost as rigid as when she sat at the back of the bed, frightened and lost.

“Bren…” she whispers. “How…I mean…what…” Stiffly, she rises and walks to the window by the sink, pushing back the curtain.

I can’t possibly tell what’s going on inside her. She peers outside as if it were a strange world that she no longer fits into. Just like I’ve felt over the years when I’ve had to return to civilization. No, like I’ve always felt, even after Thorson Ave.

“I’ve been driving all day. You…you slept deeply and didn’t notice anything. I wanted to surprise you,” I try to explain to her.

“Grey didn’t eat something bad,” she says darkly. She sounds like she is completely alone in the world.

“He didn’t enjoy the ride.” I put my hands over my eyes. The thought that she might not be able to cope with reality because of what I did to her weighs like an iron weight on my shoulders.

“Why…why, Bren? I don’t understand…”

I lower my fingers. She has turned around, still looking at me with absolute incomprehension. I slowly approach her and wrap my arms around her back. I pull her to me like I never want to let her go. The long branches of the willow appear in front of me as well as the dark blue water and Lou’s shiny body on the wet sand. “You don’t know?” I whisper hoarsely.

“Yes,” she whispers against my shoulder. “But why today? Why after yesterday?”

“The question is if not today, when?” I step back a little and take her head in my hands to get a better look at her. She looks back frightened, her lips trembling. She doesn’t understand. She may not understand how much I am still fighting myself. A man can find memories he has repressed, he can become someone else, but a part of his former self will never be erased, even if he does become a better person. That part is still in me and that part wants to keep Lou. Possessive and absolute. He remembers their encounter at the visitor center and Lou’s big blue eyes full of naivety and trust. “I’m afraid I’ll change my mind if I don’t let you go right now. Right now, do you understand?”

Her gaze flickers. “Now?”

I gently stroke her face, though I’d rather hit something. “There is no other way.”

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