Page 116 of Feels Like Forever

I gulp, and it makes my throat hurt more than it already does. The breath I suck in feels sharp in my chest, but I force the words out. “I n-need to t-talk to you. Ineedto ta-alk to you.”

“You—? Okay. Yeah, okay. You’re safe, though?”

“Ye-es.”Physically, anyway.

He pauses and then asks more softly, like he knows what I’m thinking, “Did you have another nightmare?”

Thinking about it puts a roiling feeling of illness in my stomach, sends the memories of the pain and fear spiking through me again. “Yes-s.”

I worry for a horrible second that he’s going to say he’s too busy for this or that he doesn’t want to hear—

“Okay, I’m coming.” His voice is still soft, not annoyed or hesitant. “I’m coming over right now.”

Oh, thank God.

“Need me to keep talking to you?” He’s back in the noisy part of the bar. He must be walking through it to leave.

Knowing he’ll be here soon is comforting enough; I think I need his travel time to pull myself together a little bit more. I don’t want to be a sniveling mess when he gets here. I want to be able to form sentences properly.

“N-no.” I breathe jaggedly for a second, sniffle, wipe at my leaking eyes. “Tha-ank you.”

“Of course. I’ll be right there.”

We hang up, and I wobble my way out of bed. I feel deeply uneasy and filthy and wrong, like I always do after my nightmares, but I don’t let myself crumple again.

I make my feet walk to Rae’s room to see if she’s still sleeping safe and sound. She is, so I close her door almost all the way and head to the kitchen. I smack at the wall until the light comes on, then get to gulping down a glass of cold water.

Then I start pacing around the living room.

Pacing and thinking.

Preparing.

I’m scared.

I know now that I’ve been unable to really talk to him about Bud and Thad becauseI’m scaredof being brushed off the way I was with my mother. I’m scared of feeling crushed again.

But I also know I shouldn’t be afraid because Landon isn’t her. He isn’t going to treat this like it’s nothing.

But what if he’s disgusted? What if this is uglier than he imagined? What if I tell him and he looks at me differently? What if he—?

No. No, no, no. He won’t. He won’t think I’m as disgusting as I feel. He’s always sickened by the people who hurt us, not sickened by us for being marred by whatever they did. It’s the thought of irresponsible Kelle that he can’t stand, not Rae’s fingers. It’s my mom he can’t stand, not the parts of me that she twisted—

A quiet knock comes at the front door. I nearly trip in my haste to get to it.

But when I see him, something in me weakens.

I know I should be letting him through the doorway, saying something, doing something other than lifting my fists to my mouth, which is quivering because I’m about to cry again because I suddenly feel pathetic. But I can’t seem to do anything else right now.

He looks at me with concern that’s serious and also gentle and patient. I can tell he has shoved his hands through his hair several times in the last few minutes. He’s breathing like he ran from his car to the elevator and then from the elevator to me.

He blurs as tears fill my eyes.

Embarrassed, I shut them.

But I don’t shut him out.

Even feeling this pitiful and stupid and broken, I can’t shut him out.

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