Page 49 of Pieces Of You

I realize I’malmostcrying, andalmostis as real as I’ll allow myself. Tears would be woeful, really, because nothing Dean said is news to me. My motherwasa drunk. And itiswhat ultimately killed her.

“Are you okay?” Holden asks, and even though he’s right next to me, he seems so far away. So distant.

“I’m fine,” I lie.My ex-boyfriend just unintentionally bared my entire fucking soul to you. That’s all.

Minutes pass, and I can feel him watching me, but he doesn’t say a word. I stare ahead; my mind consumed with all the things I wish I could say. I’d spent so much of my life forced into silence, and now that I have the freedom to speak, I can’t seem to find my voice.

“What’s going on, Jameson?” He rarely calls me Jameson, and I really shouldn’t know that, considering how little time we’ve spent together. I feel him shift and then aclickas he flicks on a lamp on the side table. The light creates a soft glow throughout the room, but it feels like it’s a spotlight on all my secrets.

I lower my head, focus on the notepad on my lap. There’s nothing but black ink and deep, harsh scratches marring layers of pages.

Holden must follow my gaze because he heaves out a sigh. It’s not the “beauty” that he’s used to seeing.

But I’m used to it.

Iamit.

Orwas.

“She wasn’t a bad person,” I blurt out.

“Who?”

Finally finding the courage to face him, I say, my heart in my throat, “My mom.”

Another sigh, and then he’s taking the notepad from me and ripping off the first few pages. He discards my ugly emotions by throwing them over his shoulder, and then he drops the notepad back on my lap. It’s a blank canvas. A fresh start. “I never said she was.”

I keep my eyes on his. “You don’t have to say it out loud for the thought to exist.”

“Who gives a shit what I think?” Dropping his head forward, he pinches the bridge of his nose, his eyes shut tight. It’s only now I realize he’d just spent however long manhandling a drunk Dean in the shower and most likely getting him to bed, and now he’s here—having to deal with my bullshit. He must be exhausted. “You told me that you draw as an escape, sometimes as a necessity.” He pauses a beat, eyes meeting mine. “Did your mom drink for the same reason?”

Without pause, without hesitation, I breathe out a, “Yes.”

He nods as if he already knows where this is going. “Were you there?”

“For her drinking?” I ask.

Shaking his head, he replies, “No. For the things she was trying to break free from.”

Break free?

Of all the things my mother tried and failed at,breaking freewasn’t one of them. Still, I answer, “Yes.”

Holden’s reaction is as instant as it is visceral. Eyes closed, he balls his fists, his chest rising with an inhale that seems to calm the sudden storm. When he opens his eyes again, they lock right on mine. I try to look away, but I can’t. I can’t seem to stop looking at him. Like a moth to a flame. Or a gnat to garbage—not that Holden is trash… it’s just… I don’t know what the fuck either of us are thinking. Or doing.

Orfeeling.

Before I can get a word out, his arm is sliding beneath my thighs, and he’s scooping me up and settling me sideways on his lap. He holds me to him, my cheek to his chest until there’s nothing between us.

No space.

No air.

Only a million reckless, fleeting emotions.

“I need to say two things,” he says. “One, I’m sorry about your mom. And you—having to be witness to it. No kid should ever have to be around that.” His lips press to my temple, soft and warm, coating me with an emotion I’m too afraid to discern. “You know, I grew up in a town with fewer than two hundred people. My mom—she got pregnant with me at seventeen. It was the most scandalous thing to happen in that bible-thumping town for decades. They ostracized her the second the rumors started.” He must see the confusion set in my features when his gaze slides to mine, because he adds, “What I’m getting at is that before I could even talk, my mom instilled in me one simple rule for life: when it comes to judgment from others—fuck everyone.”

I let out a giggle, but it’s one that filters out with all my withheld emotions, and I don’t know if I’m truly laughing or crying.

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