Page 49 of Come Back for Me
“I’m so sorry. You never deserved that from anyone, least of all your father.”
“No one deserves to be hit, Ellie. No one. It doesn’t matter whose hand it comes from—it’s wrong and unforgivable. I vowed that I would never be like him, and I want you to understand how much I mean it. I would never hit someone in anger unless I’m trying to protect what’s important to me.”
I lift my other hand and gently touch his cheek. “You don’t have to try very hard to convince me. I see who you are. There isn’t a trace of that man inside you.”
His fingers wrap around my wrist, pulling my hand down. “I’ve worked really fucking hard to make sure of that. My brothers as well. The night we met was probably the lowest I’ve ever felt. My father was in a state for months before my graduation. He was drinking more, finding ways to catch me off guard. I knew I had to get out of here, and I wasn’t smart like Declan or Jacob so there wouldn’t be any scholarships. I didn’t play baseball like Sean, so sports were out. I knew it was jail or the military, so I enlisted while I was a senior and never told him. That night, I let him know that I was leaving, and he lost it. He came at me hard, yelling and saying things I will never forget. He punched me, and I swung back. We fought, man to man, and it was the first time and only time I had let my emotions get the better of me.”
“You can’t for one minute think that any of it was your fault. You were defending yourself.”
He runs his hand over his face. “I fought my father when he was out of his skull. I don’t fault myself, but make no mistake that it wasn’t because I was pissed. I had ten years of rage from the beatings he inflicted and the hell he put us through built up inside me.”
It’s different. I know he probably won’t see it that way, but this isn’t the same at all. He didn’t go looking for a fight, he responded to what was in front of him.
“And if I had gotten a bat and took it to Kevin’s head, what would you say to me?”
“Good.”
“But you fighting off your own attacker is different how?”
Connor’s hands clench and then he rubs his leg, seeming uncomfortable. I understand him in a way that maybe no one else can. I’ve lived it, fought with the guilt, and spent years thinking that maybe in some way I did deserve it because that was what I’d been told. I’ve fought every day with the decision to stay one minute past the first time.
Being a victim doesn’t just happen in the moment, it follows me every second. I recognize it, and I hate that it’s a bond we share. I’m also grateful I’m not alone.
“Regardless,” Connor begins again, “a few hours after I woke up without you there, I was on a bus to basic training and haven’t come back until he died a few weeks ago.”
So many questions float around in my mind. If Connor had come back, even once, would it have been different? If I’d run into him, I would’ve felt something or maybe he would have fought for me. There are a million what-ifs but only one truth, and it’s this moment in time.
“I’ve often wondered if I was being punished for that night . . .”
He gets to his feet so fast that I gasp, but then his hands are on the back of the swing, steadying the movement. “Don’t ever say that. What we shared isn’t something that anyone would punish someone for. How could it be?”
“Because it was wrong of me! I was getting married the next day. I didn’t regret what we did, I still don’t regret it, but I should have never ever gone back to that room with you.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I married him. I went through with it, and all the while, I . . .” I can’t say it. If I do, it’ll be a mistake. But then I look up and see the look in his eyes, see the way he’s silently begging me to give him my truth, and God, I want to. “I wished it could’ve been you. The man who smiled at me with the softest and most loving expression. You looked at me as though you needed me, and I know it was wrong, but I needed you.”
When he sits back down, his head falls in his hands before turning to look at me. “I did need you.”
“But we weren’t each other’s to have.”
“No, I guess we weren’t.”
I lean back, turning just enough to still be able to look at him and wondering if the moment we’re sharing now could’ve been our daily life. Would we be sitting on the porch, talking at night, enjoying an honesty I’d never known existed until this moment?
“If things had gone differently that night, if I were braver and stayed, do you think we could’ve been something more?”
Connor lifts his body back up, his arm going across the back of the swing. I can see how easily I would fit into his side, as though I were made to go there, but I stay where I am because we’ve yet to talk about Hadley.
“I don’t know. Sometimes, when I envisioned what we may have been, it was so much more, but I think that the fantasy of that time was just that. I was fucked up when we met, dealing with emotions I wasn’t mature enough to handle. That night was peace, but in the morning, it was gone . . . like you.”
“I was never gone, I was lost.”
“And what about now?”
I look away, letting the question settle over me. “I’d like to say that I’m finding my way. I’m not lost, but I’m not found. I’m . . . hopeful that I’ll be able to get where I should be.”
Connor takes my hand in his. “That’s all any of us are doing, Ellie.”
