Page 83 of Damnation
God, I don’t think I’ll ever get over the effect his voice has on me, all warm when he says my name. But no, this time I have to stand strong. I won’t let it enchant me.
“What the hell do you want?” I say fiercely, crossing my arms.
“We need to talk,” he begins with a serious look on his face. His voice is low; he sounds anguished.
“Oh, sure. Now that you’ve decided it’s time to talk, you assume I’ll automatically agree?”
“I didn’t feel like talking to anyone,” he answers miserably. My eyes go wide. I am about to completely lose my temper.
“I am notanyone, Thomas! I’m your girlfriend, in case you forgot.”
“I know.”
“No, it doesn’t seem to me that you do know. You spent the night out drinking while I cried over you. You’ve ignored me all day, and now you show up here hoping for what? My forgiveness? Maybe my understanding?” I shake my head fervently. “Well, you’re not going to get it.”
“Listen to me…”
“No, you listen to me!” I am a raging river, unstoppable. It’s as though all of today’s accumulated rage has finally found an outlet instead of just eating away at my insides. “I made a mistake, okay? Probably more than one. But you have also made a lot of mistakes with me. Yet, despite all your temper tantrums, despite the nasty things you say to me or the unflattering comparisons you make, I have never shut you out. Not like you, pushing me away yet again. You…you just pull back into yourself, Thomas. You shut out everything around you. And I’m tired of being pushed away. I am your girlfriend, and I want to be yours all the way. Otherwise, this is all just a huge waste of our time.”
He stares at me, motionless. His jaw is clenched. His eyes areblazing. Then, without asking my permission, he walks past me into the suite, planting himself in the middle of the room. I glare at him, but I don’t fight him, because if we are going to have an argument, I’d rather do it inside the apartment than in the dormitory hallway.
“You know I’m not good at this stuff; you’ve always known that. I don’t know how to make a relationship work…not the kind of connection that you want to have with me. I don’t know how to do it. I break things; I don’t build them. You knew who I was from the beginning, Ness; you knew…and you still said yes.”
I frown, clucking my tongue indignantly against the roof of my mouth. “So because I said yes, you think it’s okay to be an asshole like this?”
“No! But how do you not understand that I’m trying here?” He puts his fingers to his temples, frustrated. “I’m trying as best I can, but sometimes it feels fucking impossible, and I just screw up one thing after another. Today, I needed to be alone. I had to get my thoughts in order, away from everything and everyone. Do you think I like the way I reacted? That I feel proud of the things I said? The person that I am?”
“I don’t know,” I answer, arms still crossed over my chest and refusing to look him in the eye.
“You don’t know?” He seems shocked, maybe even wounded.
“No, Thomas, I don’t know. Whenever I start to think I understand something about you and we’re making some progress, you turn it around on me, and everything goes upside down.”
He sighs, wiping a hand over his face. He turns his back to me and puts his palms down on the table in the living room. “I wish I was different than I am. You don’t know how much I wish that, Ness. You don’t know how exhausting it is to live with myself every day of my life. It’s a constant battle, and I always lose in the end.”
The suffering that I can hear in his voice renders me mute. And I wish I had the strength to stay angry so I wouldn’t be moved by his words. But I don’t. I hurt for him. For how he feels,whathe feels. For the part of him that wants to be different but never can manage it. Now that I know what he’s going through, I can’t ignore it. I walk over andput my hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry you are feeling this way, but I really would have preferred that you talked to me about it. Instead, you just cut me out. It can’t work like that,” I explain to him, calmer now.
“I lost control but not for the reason you think,” he admits, turning to face me. “Not entirely, at least.”
“Why, then?” Thomas doesn’t answer, so I find myself forced to push him. “Tell me. Why did you do it?”
After what feels like an eternity, he lets out a trembling breath. “Yesterday, before Logan showed up, I talked to my sister.”
I frown, alarmed. “Did something happen? Is your father…?”
“He’s still alive,” he answers, taking another breath. His Adam’s apple moves laboriously as he swallows. “My mother wants to see me.” He sits down in the chair, staring into space. His chest moves up and down in irregular jerks. “I’m going home tomorrow.”
I stare at him, paralyzed for a few seconds. “You said yes…” I say incredulously.
“Yeah, but I regretted it immediately,” he answers, putting his face in his hands.
I kneel in front of him and gingerly uncover his face. “I think you were right, though. This is a big step forward, Thomas.”
“Actually, it’s bullshit. I was jacked up from winning the game, you and I were in a good place, and it didn’t seem like such a horrible idea at the time. Only once I’d hung up and my head cleared a little did I realize that I’d just made the biggest mistake of my life. I came over to talk to you about it…” He lowers his eyes, rubbing the back of his neck. “And then what happened, happened.”
“If your instinct was to say yes, maybe that means part of you is ready to…” The more I talk, the harder he shakes his head.
“I can’t go back there, Ness. To that house. With my mother, my sister. Confronting all those memories. The memory of my brother…”
