Page 8 of Don't Look Away

It’s such an abrupt change in topic, I blink. “Wow, way to avoid a topic.”

With a shrug, his lip curls up into a half-smile, like he’s not even trying to deny it. “I want to know everything about you.”

“Wow,everything?” I laugh. Fine, I’ll bite, but only because I don’t want to talk about what I saw in that basement. I still shudder at the memory. “My mom…yeah, I’m not sure what to say about her. She’s a narcissist, and she really only thinks about herself.”

Roman rolls over onto his side, tucking the pillow more firmly under his head. “What was your childhood like?”

“Ah, it was mostly just me and my mom. I didn’t have many friends, until middle school, when I met Bree.” I smile a little. “It was us against the world. And her house was a refuge for me.”

“Until your mom left…” he supplies.

“Yeah, she joined this spiritual healing group that turned out to be a cult. I was in sixth grade, my grandma came to pick me up, and she said my mom was gone.” I shrug, remembering that moment. “I was confused. I didn’t know what she meant. And then she explained that my mom had moved to Florida with this healing group.”

When I got older, I looked the group up, and it’sclearlya cult. The members all sit around worshiping one woman they call Priestess, giving her their money while they all eat mung beans and sing kumbaya. It’s disgusting.

“Did she ever visit you after that, or call you.”

“Nope,” I say, tears stinging the backs of my eyes. God, it’s been so long since I’ve thought about any of this. I haven’t even delved into it with Dr. Cunningham. There really hasn’t been time. We’ve been mainly focused on helping me through the aftermath of the attack. “I reached out to her once, in high school. I found her information on the cult’s website” I shrug. “She never responded.”

A tear escapes and rolls down my cheek. Roman reaches over and pulls me against his chest, enveloping me in his warmth. Then he buries his face in my hair and inhales deeply. “Fuck our parents,” he says.

I laugh, wiping the tears away. Honestly, my mom doesn’t deserve any emotion from me at all. “I have my grandma, though. She’s been great.”

He rolls back onto his back and sighs. “Yeah, sometimes, all you need is that one person. My brother was that person for me, growing up.”

“You still have him, though, right? I mean, after he serves his time and all that.”

“Yeah,” he says. “That’s true.”

I groan and bury my face in Roman’s warm chest. He’s still a bit sweaty, but I don’t mind. “I really don’t want to talk about sad things.”

I just found out my best friend is dead—just thinking those words is so surreal, almost like they can’t possibly be real–so the absolutelast thingI want to think about is my attacker. Fuck him.

Roman pulls back a little and lifts my chin so I’m looking at him. “I’m just trying to understand, Lux. You’ve been through a lot, and you’re about to face a lot more. I need to know how to help you.”

“Don’t worry about it. I have a really good therapist.”

The same therapist I’ve been ghosting for the last three days. My grandmother must have called him with the news about Bree, and he’s been texting nonstop, trying to set up a session. But a session means reliving every sordid detail of what happened with Bree, and I just don’t feel ready for all that yet.

“Lux…”

Ugh.I push out a harsh breath and roll onto my back. “Fine. I know you won’t let up until I give you my whole life story, so…what do you want to know?”

Roman reaches out and with the tip of his finger, he traces patterns on my stomach gently, almost reverently. “The guy who attacked you, was he someone you dated? How did you meet this guy?”

I close my eyes and draw a strengthening breath into my lungs. I’ve already been through a lot of therapy surrounding my attacker, so it’s not as painful to explorehim, as a person. The event that led to his arrest is still quite painful, though, oddly. I guess I still haven’t quite worked through that.

“Last summer, I was at the mall with Bree and a couple of other friends, and he just kinda….walked up to me, and introduced himself.”

Roman lifts himself up onto one arm, head in his hand, completely engaged. “Wow, bold move.”

I shrug. “No bolder than picking me out of a crowd and insisting I’m now yourconsort.”

“But that’s a long-standing tradition, to be fair. I didn’t invent that.”

“Okay, fine. I’ll give you that.Anyway….he seemed nice, and he was cute, so I gave him my number. He called me almost immediately, which probably should have been my first red flag, but…I don’t know, at first, I thought his eagerness was cute.”

I still remember him walking up to me in the mall. He was holding a stack of papers, so initially, I thought he was trying to sell me something. It wasn’t until he started talking that I realized he was hitting on me.

---