Page 60 of Taking The Virgin

He starts walking away, but I’m not about to let him escape that easily.

I know that this is only his awful past gripping him. I’ll help him find a way out of it. I’ve done it before.

“Where are you going?” I ask with a hitch in my voice.

“Back to New York.” He’s talking over his shoulder. “You can come back with me and forget everything you saw here, because if you don’t, it’ll only drive you off the deep end, too. You can do the job I hired you to do for the rest of the month with me, or…”

“Orwhat?”

My voice is thick, because I can’t believe he’s giving me this ultimatum. It’s true that I haven’t experienced the horrors he has in this house and I have no idea what it’s like to try and help his parents over and over again, but I can’t just leave them alone.

It feels like a betrayal. They’re not bad people, just sick. And this house and the clutter can be managed, can be sorted out with a lot of patience. I’m not the type of person who turns their back on those inneed.

This house, and the real people suffering in it, reminds me of my own home. My own family. I refuse to let it fall apart without so much as an hour of effort tohelp.

As he stops at the car, he sees that I haven’t moved an inch, and something clouds in his eyes. It’s almost as if he hates himself because this is the only way he’ll keep his sanity. But then the anger returns.

“If you stay here for even another second,” he says coldly, “I don’t ever want to see you again.”

I can’t believe this is happening, that he could be so callous.

I can’t find the words.

Finally he just shakes hishead.

We stare at each other, and there’s a moment that I think he’ll relent, just as he always does withme.

He grits his jaw and slams his way into the car. I let him doit.

Then I let him burn rubber down the road, leaving me to fend for myself, suddenly realizing that I have no idea what to do with his parents.

Or all the agonizing debris that’s falling down around me, too.

As I stand in that yard a few more minutes thinking that maybe he’ll cool off and turn back around to pick me up, I gradually feel the emotional wounds opening up inme.

He’s gotten angry with me before, but this time it feels different. I just saw his nightmare come to life in that house, and I walked in there with a fresh Sunshine Day point of view and basically told him that everything he’s feeling, all of his bad dreams, are easy to cleanup.

I crossed a line, and I’m not sure there’s any coming back fromit.

But maybe he will return forme…

After I wait a little longer, I finally realize that things between us might really be over. But I can’t walk away from these people who are in such need. I know all too well what it feels like to be left to sink or swim on my own. I have to try to repair this damage, even slightly.

Even though my heart feels as if it’s just been wrenched apart and left in broken pieces all over the place, I go back into that house, nearly choking on the smell again.

I haven’t cried yet, but I nearly start when I see his parents sitting there with smiles on their faces, happy to see that I’ve come back when most people they meet probably neverdo.

I don’t sit down. I stay standing as I tell myself that I’ll cry over Owen later.

Mr. Gregory heavily leans on his cane, suddenly looking downtrodden, as if he hoped to see Owen with me, but now knows that his son has left forgood.

Mrs. Gregory looks almost as crushed as I feel, as if she also thought that, maybe this time, Owen would get over all the trauma they’ve caused and he would decide tostay.

I swallow back my throttling grief. I’ve got to be their rock—my ownrock.

“He wants to help,” I tell them. “But from what I’m seeing, you won’t accept what he has to offer, and that’s killing him. He can’t watch you live likethis.”

For a second, I think they’re going to sink right back into the denial I saw when I arrived. Everything’s fine here. We’re comfortable in thismess.

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