Page 85 of Paper Thin Love

From the corner of my eye, I see Dash move. He reaches out and takes my hand.

I almost moan. I didn’t realize how unloved I was until Dash kissed me.

I want to be loved and touched, cared for and caressed.

I know Dash’s definition of love isn’t normal, nor is it healthy. But in my world, it’s better than the versions of love I’ve seen others show.

Gently, Dash guides my hand to rest on his thigh. A bit of the tension in his neck vanishes.

As I start to smile, he averts his gaze. Does he realize that our time is running out? A single note has the power to alter our course and he will be obligated to repay his debt to me.

As he touches me, our fingers effortlessly entwine, just like breathing.

He hasn’t asked me if I’ve tried to hurt myself again. He knows I haven’t. Art is what I needed, a new outlet I could control, an expression of my hurt and fury for the world to see. In the end, I just wanted my pain to be acknowledged. Art allows others to view it. Dash knew me better than I knew myself.

I curl my fingers around his, the dirt from my sketch now staining his palm. I want to kiss him. I want so much more. I might die if he refuses me. It’s the only time I experience a sense of being alive.

He’s been careful not to show me much affection during the day. There is always someone watching and the more they think we care about each other, the bigger the target on our backs.

“I can’t survive this.” I whisper. I can’t keep enduring endless days imagining Dash’s lips on my body. I can’t keep hoping he will have sex with me. I can’t survive the hope and fear that one day he will let me go because that was the bargain we struck.

I was the one who placed a timer on us.

“Sure you can. If I can survive here with a broken leg, then you can survive, Mila.” He replies as he swipes his thumb back and forth over my hand.

“Why haven’t you slept with me? Why can’t you touch me outside of that shower?” I mutter as I glance around, ensuring no one else can hear.

“This isn’t real.” His eyes shoot a piercing gaze at our hands, searing the flesh from them.

“Yes it is. That shower doesn’t wash away our connection.”

“This is a game, Mila.” He scans the classroom.

“I can’t survive you, Dash. Give me either your cruelty or your kindness.” I glance up at him. His beauty shatters another fragment of my heart.“Then smother me with it.”

His jaw clenches.“You don’t get to decide my actions.”

“Nor you mine.”

His lip twitches up in satisfaction.

I gulp and direct my gaze towards my bag. It feels like an arctic wind is coming from it. That damn note has a heartbeat of its own, radiating the cruelty of the letters inked on it.“I want to feel you inside of me. I want you, Dash.”I want you before you leave me.

Is it selfish? Yes. I don’t care.

His fingers turn clammy around mine.“Why haven’t you asked me what happened to Mr. LeBlanc?” He counters.

I swallow.Because I don’t want to acknowledge the monster that you struggle to keep hidden from me.

Is that monster capable of killing Mr. Leblanc? Sure.

Did he? I honestly don’t know.

The new dance teacher is…amazing. Uplifting, kind, strict only when she needs to be. The class loves her. It wasn’t my doing. I was too weak, too much of a coward to tell my father.

I kept my hands clean and…I hate it.

“It wasn’t me.” Dash states as he slips his hands free of mine. The vacancy of his touch is like torture.

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