Page 87 of Dark Ink

“Breathe, Rian. Just breathe.”

* * *

Every time I woke up was worse than the time before. Because with each new awakening there was a little less ache in my bones, a little less fever in my mind, a little less acid on my skin. Because every time I jerked awake, lurching like I was falling off a cliff, I was a little more present, a little more lucid. And that was worse than the physical pain.

Knowing was worse. Being unable to escape the truth of what I’d done was worse. Facing myself was so much goddamn worse.

This time when I woke up, I heard voices in the hallway. Seeing Eithne’s face there in the doorway was a sun brighter than any that could have shined the day Conor and Mason dragged me from that wretched place. If I’d been stronger I would have shielded my eyes. If I’d been braver I would have let a pained moan escaped from my still parched lips. As it was I simply closed my eyes: a man defeated. The tears that pricked at the corners of my eyelids stung as if made of acid.

I was aware of Eithne moving toward me only by the soft creak of the old wood floors beneath her gentle step. I never would have believed she would have gotten that close had it not been the light indentation as she sat beside me on the sweat-soaked mattress. When her fingers reached for mine, I squeezed my eyes shut more tightly. My heart fluttered erratically, my skin burned, the craving, the need washed over me like pounding waves.

“Eithne,” I whispered, hating myself more and more with each word. “I…”

I…what?

Want you?

Need you?

Love you?

She squeezed my fingers. I fought back nausea that twisted my stomach like a dirty rag. I’d put the woman I loved through hell and there I was, thinking I could beg her to stay? I should have told her from the second I heard her voice to run, to leave, to get away from me. With what little strength I’d recovered, I should have pushed her away. I should have said terrible things to get her to turn her back on me, to never want to see me again. I could have done any of these things for her own good. But hadn’t I? Hadn’t I?

I was going to beg her to stay.

To say I hated myself, my weakness, my cowardice, my cruelty, was an understatement. The self-loathing made me gag.

Eithne brushed her fingertips across my cheek and my skin felt like brittle parchment; I wasn’t sure how I hadn’t shattered into dust. I wanted to moan in misery as I leaned into her soft touch. I was a terrible human, accepting love I did not deserve.

Eithne’s voice was low when she spoke. Barely louder than the pitter patter of rain that had just started on the drape-drawn windows. Her words seemed to take a long time to travel to me. Like they were fallen leaves, meandering to the earth on a late autumn day, a day not unlike the first I ever laid eyes on her. When her words brushed against my skin they were as light as a feather. It wasn’t until they sank into the depths of my soul that I knew they were heavier, weightier. It wasn’t until I could feel them pressing down against my chest that I knew they would drown me.

“I love you, Rian…but…”

I opened my eyes. But.

Eithne’s beauty was haunting. Her skin had paled since I’d last seen her. The hollows of her cheeks more defined. Her hair was damp, as if she’d just taken a shower. As if that’s what she’d been doing all this time I’d been gone, trying to get clean. I thought she looked cold, her lips a shade of winter berries, her lips trembling slightly. There was a clarity in her eyes despite the shimmer of tears on the surface, like she’d passed beyond a veil and could see more than I could see. She was already a ghost, there at the edge of my bed. Slipping away. Unreachable.

“I’m sorry,” she said and as she shook her head, tears streamed down her cheeks.

For a moment, all I felt was numb. They say that, don’t they? That when you drown there’s pain at first. Panic and fear and pain. But then it passes, right at the end. They say there’s even peace. I watched Eithne as if from the bottom of a lake. It was only when her lovely face shimmered that I realised I was crying, too.

“My whole life,” Eithne continued, wiping already at her nose with the back of her hand, “I’ve lived for other people. I thought I had to. I thought there was something inside of me that I had to make up for, to cleanse myself of, to rid myself of like a poison. I always saw myself as less than, undeserving, and it wasn’t that I wanted to feel that way. I wanted—I wanted nothing more than to feel the way you made me feel, Rian.”

I squeezed her hand. Eithne choked on a sob and she clutched at her stomach like she was detoxing, too. Like she knew, as I did, the brutality of unmet need, a pain worse than hunger, worse than starvation.

Sucking in a trembling breath, Eithne spoke, her voice shuddering, “I thought if I could just earn love, work hard enough, sacrifice enough, one day I’d be enough. I tried so hard for my father and so, so fucking hard with Stewart and it was never, never enough. And…and…”

Eithne cried and she sounded like a wounded animal. Harsh and raw and real. She looked away toward the window, to the drapes heavy in the dim light. Though I didn’t think she saw anything. It was like gasping for air after being under the water for too long; she didn’t notice the shoreline, the trees, the sun. There was only relief. That’s what looking away from me did for her, for my little Raglan Road girl: it gave her relief.

I squeezed her hand once more, this time because I needed strength. Strength for what I knew she was about to say. Strength for what I had to hear.

When Eithne looked back I thought I saw hesitation. A little flicker of doubt. Maybe she saw for one last time the good in me. Or the good that could be in me. Maybe she saw what I could do with another chance. Maybe she tried to convince herself just one last time that she could help me, fix me, love me just a little harder. Old habits die hard.

“Say it,” I whispered.

Eithne’s face crumbled and her tears stained my own cheeks as she leaned down to kiss me. Between the desperation of her lips against mine, she said, “I can’t do us anymore.”

It was a loss of everything, all at once. The heat of her lips gone. The presence of her fingers interwoven between mine gone. The weight of her beside me on the bed gone. A trap door opening beneath me. Me falling. All of me. All at once.

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