Page 52 of Sugar Baby Mine

Makes sense. That kind of thing follows most career paths, most aspects of the world, and it’s a shame.

My throat bobs with the way I swallow a lung full of air, my chest seizing up as I vibrate with the need to fill the space, the air.

“I thought about being an investigative journalist once”—in the eighth grade—“but wasn’t sure if I could potentially spend months working on one report, let alone years. Then I flipped to publishing, but the thought of reading something I don’t actually like and then having to give constructive criticism on it left me having a panic attack in the guidance counselor’s office.”

“What did you end up studying?”

“Psychology.” I wince. The thought of it brings a stomach ache; I barely muddled through the latter half of the classes.

“But?” he asks, picking up on the change in my tone.

“I couldn’t afford to change my major again and start over with classes. I didn’t do anything to help myself because my heart wasn’t in it, and I didn’t get an internship, so I graduated with zero experience. Doesn’t bode well for job seeking in that field.”

“So…flowers?”

“Flowers are easy. Even though there are so many and the names can be exasperating, they just click in my brain like nothing else.” I sigh, my eyes closing for half a second before a divot in the ice nearly causes me to trip and bring Ben down with me. He yanks me upright and into his side. His hand tightens over mine to flatten our palms, and I jerk my wrist back on instinct like I’ve been burned.

But it’s too late. I’ve been about as obvious about my discomfort with my hand in his as I could be without outright telling him I don’t want him to touch me. I’ve always lacked subtlety.

Self-preservation burns through my veins as he lifts my hand in his now brutal grip, not allowing me any escape. He brings ourhands up, and I don’t even realize we’ve stopped moving until people continually skate past us. My heart leaps up my throat when he flips my hand and his thumb brushes over the raised skin decorating my palm in little crescent moon shapes.

His eyes flicker up to mine, and it’s hard to read him as his lips part with a cold puff of air and he reaches for my other hand. I acquiesce and flinch as he brings them both up to his mouth to press a kiss to each palm. Then he threads our fingers together and turns to glide forward on the ice again.

My heart thunders in my chest.

“You’re not going to ask?”

“If you wanted me to know, then you’d tell me.”

Silence bleeds in the air as we resume skating, and I can barely stand it. I can feel my lungs tightening up, the chill in the air making it difficult to take a deep breath. If I had still been going to my therapist, perhaps I’d have a better coping technique. Maybe I’d have one at all. But I don’t know how to deal with Ben being so respectful. Which is a crime in and of itself.

Historically, I’ve always had a problem verbalizing my anxiety—my feelings about anything. It’s why I turned to a physical outlet for my pain in the first place.

He squeezes my hand again, and it pulls me back down from where I’ve drifted away with thought.

“It’s... hard for me to talk about,” I begin, my lip catching between my teeth before I blow out a raspberry. “But I think I’d like to tell you. Maybe just an abridged version. But I’m not doing it so you’ll feel sorry for me—the last thing I want is pity.”

He stays quiet, just the presence of him gliding closer so I can feel the heat of his arm pressed against mine.

“A few years ago, my parents called the police on me when I came home from college to get my things from my childhood bedroom. I was arrested for trespassing and criminal tampering.” My teeth ache from the way my jaw starts togrind. “Trespassing and tampering with their property because, according to them, I was no daughter of theirs. That ship sailed when I turned eighteen and supported my older sister having twins with a man they disapproved of instead of convincing her to get the abortion they wanted for her.”

Ben squeezes my hand. “That seems ridiculous.”

“It was—remains so to this day. The fact that my sister, who wasnineteenat the time, was being coerced to have an abortion in exchange for remaining under their roof, a part of their life, was insane. Instead, they threw away their relationship with both of their daughters and their grandchildren.”

It burns me up inside to think about it. About them. The words keep spilling out my mouth because now that I’m talking, it feelsso good.

“My parents raised me in my sister’s shadow all my life,the spare, but I was neverperfect”—the word comes out cracked, no matter how hard I try to reign it in—“like they wanted me to be. But suddenly, I was front and center, the backup little toy they always wanted when she became irredeemable. Like she’d never existed in the first place. I couldn’t stand it.”

My breath comes out in a harsh exhale. I bring my hand up and uncurl my fingers to look at the raised skin that decorates my palm in a mix of silver and pink. I can still feel the sharp bite of pain as my nails would cut in—a way to ease the hurt, the anger, the anxiety I would feel, but couldn’t voice aloud.

“I would curl my hands into fists so hard I’d bleed and bleed. It was easy to hide. I never wanted what they did for me. Never wanted to follow the path they laid out for me. So I finally made my choice, and it cost me. But I’d make it again every time. I flew away.”

Ben pulls us to a stop at the gate in the boards, guides me through it until I’m on steady ground, and he pulls my chin up to look at him. I realize my eyes are wet with tears, and he’s blurrybeneath each blink.

“Because you were a bird, and you wanted to be free of your cage.”

My eyes close for a moment, and I nod. I can still hear the buzzing of the tattoo machine as it moved over the skin of my ribs, just beneath my heart, and inked the delicate hummingbird that rests there. The one that I flaunted in front of my parents while the cops were dragging me away from their house for breaking and entering when all I did was use the same key I’d had since I was fifteen.

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