Page 43 of Unwrap Him

Something I don’t particularly remember, though I know it happened… just like this.

Two-year-old me in the backseat of my parents’ car, strapped into my car seat and shivering with fear. My parents losing control of their vehicle…

Skidding off the road, directly into a telephone pole.

I’m not sure how it happened. I never needed the grisly details of my parents’ deaths. All I know is that they both died that night.

They died doing the same thing I’m doing right now. And that horrific moment, that flit in the blink of an eye, changed the course of my entire life.

It brought me to where I am right now…

Sliding on ice.

Terror racks my limbs as my car collides with a snowbank. The car comes to a jolting stop, and nothing is damaged. I’m not hurt. I don’t think I was even going that fast.

But I’m fucking shaking. I’m struggling to breathe, tears welling in my eyes as I look around, seeing nothing but white all around me, just barely remembering to shift into park. I’ve never been so afraid in my life.

And I think I’m having a panic attack. Great.

Whipping off my seatbelt, I fight to calm myself down. My heart is racing at a dangerous pace as I curl at the waist, holding my head in my hands and just trying to pull in air, though it’s not enough.

My body is convulsing with tremors, icy cold hands gripping at my throat and my face.

Breathe, Jesse. Just breathe.

You’re fine. You’re alive.

Sobs gasp from my shivering lips, tears flowing down my cheeks. My parents are gone… They fucking died, and I never got to know them. It’s something I’ve carried for sixteen years, and I think I brought that into my relationship with James.

I’ve always been acutely aware of the fact that he isn’t my father. He tried his best, and he did a damn good job giving me everything I could ever need as a child, into a teenager, and now into an adult. He’s been nothing but supportive and loving, no matter what.

It made me fall in love with him when I shouldn’t have. It made me want him for something else… As anything but a father.

But he doesn’t feel the same. He never will, and that’s the most devastating part. Because if I can’t even have him for what he is to me, then what was the point of losing my real parents?

“Why…” I cry harder and harder, banging my forehead on the steering wheel.

Just… why?

Sudden lights in my rear windshield catch my attention. I look up with wet eyes, vision blurred, at a large SUV that’s stopped right behind me. A Good Samaritan, likely stopping to make sure I’m alright.

I cry even harder.

I’m not alright. Not even close. I’m fucking lost.

I barely process the large form staggering up to my window as I wipe my eyes frantically, trying to look less like a fucking infant crying in my car. But rather than just knocking on it, the person yanks open my door.

It’s James.

Holy fuck, now I’m shaking all over again.

“Jesse, oh my God.” His voice breaks as he reaches inside the car and grasps my face with cold hands, looking me over for any sign of damage. “Are you alright?? Are you hurt?”

My breathing is still too labored to answer him. So I simply nod. And keep nodding while he launches his entire torso into the car and takes me in his arms, hugging me to an almost strangling degree.

But it feels good. It feels so good in this moment, I’m crumbling to pieces in his arms.

“Baby, I thought I’d lost you,” he whispers into the crook of my neck, breath warming me as he practically climbs into the driver seat, clutching me for dear life. “I thought you were gone… I can’t lose you, too, baby. I can’t fucking lose you, too.”

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