Page 50 of Puck to the Heart
A deep line formed between Ash’s brows, pinching his face into a scowl. “Olivia.” He reached for my hand, and I knew I couldn’t look at him or the gathering tears would fall. “If anyone is being selfish, it’s me.”
Joke or not, I wouldn’t let this morph into an imbalance of power. “But what about this is fun for you? It can’t beenough.”I can’t be enough. Maybe it’s toomuchwork.Again.
“What makes you think it’s not enough? I think I’ve made it clear howmuchI do want all of this.”
“Sometimes this feels very one-sided.”
“One-sided how?” Again, he squeezed my hand then twined his fingers between mine.
“I don’t want to be the only one who gets something out of this. I haven’t even touched you…” The sentence trailed off, realization dawned, creasing his forehead.
“Do you think this is some kind of transaction?”
“Isn’t that how relationships work?” It was how the only lasting one I ever had worked; letting go of an ingrained sensibility of owing someone for every tiny thing.
“It doesn’t have to be. This isn’t a sport or a game with a rulebook, you don’t have to have that kind of back and forth.”
“I wish it did. I still don’t know how this should be.” Such honesty from my own mouth caught me off guard. Admitting uncertainty was tantamount to admitting defeat.
“What do you want it to be?”
“Easy.” It mostly was, sometimes being around him was like breathing, innate. Until it wasn’t, like now, with me floundering.
“In my experience, few things worth having come easy.”
“That feels like a double entendre.”
“It absolutely is.” Yet he hadn’t made a move, no roving hands or scorching kisses along my skin in what I was quickly learning was his favorite move.
I should tell him, let him see the tiny, hidden, aching part of myself longing to be…
Free. Alive again.
“Ash.” Maybe it was time.Just get it out.“Is this the part where we do the tragic backstory reveal?” Like a scene in a book. All my favorite characters had sad stories. Which, when I thought about it, made sense.
Every visible muscle, and there wereso many, on Ash’s body tensed. But he only nodded, taking my hand again.
“When I was in grad school, I dated my undergrad advisor. For almost two years.” The furrow in his brows deepened. “It’s not as bad as you’re thinking. He, Alex, wasn’t my advisor after I graduated, and he was thirty when I was twenty-two, so he wasn’t, like,oldold. When he was my advisor, I only saw him four times a year to make schedules and keep up with course requirements. But we ran into each other at trivia night at a dive bar a few weeks before graduation.” A rueful laugh left my throat as memories resurfaced. “A group of professors always played, and they always decimated the students. So, I wanted towin.”
Ash’s mouth tilted up on one corner, not quite a smile like he thoughtof course you did.
“One of my friend’s advisors was on the team, and he was an ass, and I wanted to beat him for her. We did. Afterward, Alex approached me. He said he hated to lose but was glad we’d beaten the other professor. He…told me he liked how intense I was. Apparently, the guy was awful to everyone, not just students.” I paused, remembering. He’d ruined a lot of my favorites, but damn, I really missed that bar. I went on, “Alex looks like a slightly older version of Brad, which is probably why I hate the guy so much.” My fingers tightened on the duvet, pulling it beneath my chin as if hiding would protect me from the memories. “After that night, I started seeing him everywhere. We’d bump into each other in the cafeteria or crossing the quad, and eventually, he asked me to join him at some alumni event.”
An inhale from Ash made me close my eyes.
“I’d never dated anyone seriously before, and someone like Alex paying attention to mebecauseI was intense, when I learned so young to be quiet, be still, not to like things or at least not to show excitement about them? I thought he wanted mebecauseof that. I was ’fiery…feisty’. His words.”
It twisted something in my gut, remembering how proud I’d been. Howintoxicatingit was to be the focal point of such directed attention. How it crushed me when I finally realized ‘fiery’ meant immature. Enthusiasm I thought was endearing ended up being our downfall because Alex only wanted my affection when it was convenient. Otherwise, I was supposed to be the quiet little girlfriend who cheered him on and looked pretty in a cocktail dress. Who showed up when he wanted me and hid otherwise.
“It went from ‘fiery’ to ‘clingy’, so I tried harder not to let him see that part of myselfneedingto be lov—wanted. But then, he said I was too distant. Too clingy, but inattentive. Too needy, not present. Fortwo years, I constantly boxed away parts of myself, only pulling out what he wanted from me on demand. And itstillwasn’t enough. I told you a little bit about the sex stuff, but it was more than that. Alex was the only person I ever slept with more than a couple of times, only enough to figure out what Idon’tlike. Half the time he made it seem like I was doing everything wrong anyway. Like he was some sex god or something.” That, at least, amused me now, realizing just how much he wasnota sex god. “One day after…after…he rolled over and said, ‘This isn’t working.’ I had to crawl out of bed naked; he didn’t even move. Just watched me put my clothes on and leave.”
“After that, I found out about the others. All ofthat, and he cheated too.” More girls like me, all caught up in his tangled web. “We were going to work together after I graduated. Looking back, it was probably all bullshit. He didn’t have the sway to get me hired so easily, but I was too stupid to see it.”
“Olivia, damn.” Ash’s eyes shuttered, his dark lashes standing out against his skin.
“And I was…alone. All of my friends hated Alex, and he hated them, made me think they weren’t good for me, so I shut everyone out. That way I focused on him and school only. Dad let me move home for a few months while I picked up the pieces, the only person I didn’t completely lock out of my life, not that he would let me. I got closer to my grad school advisor Kit, but in a parental way this time.” A rueful laugh cracked the space between us.
“It’s not your fault he manipulated you.” Ash’s voice was low, almost monotone.
