Page 137 of Pierce Me

“Ok,” I rasp.

He turns around and leaves the same way he came. I don’t know how I don’t punch him. The words ‘thank you’ get stuck in my throat.

I stumble into my room and just completely fall apart.

The Elliot sisters chat room

Eden: Hey guys.

Eden: Remember that story I told you on our group call, about the boy I met in the woods six years ago? The one who saved me and then I destroyed him, you know, as a thank you? The one who then turned into Issy Woo?

Manuela: Remember? As if I’ve been able to think about anything else all week, girl.

Faith: ‘Remember that story?’ she asks casually, as if she didn’t blow our entire worlds when she told us.

Eden: Ok, fine, you remember, I got it.

Eden: Turns out, I still have feelings for him.

Faith: Big shock. Never saw that coming.

Faith: *sarcasm*

Manuela: We get it, Fee.

Eden: I think I’m in love with him.

Faith: Still? After everything that happened?

Eden: After everything we did to him, you mean?

Manuela: You didn’t do anything, En. I never want to hear you say that. Not ever, you hear? Your kidnapper did these horrible things. You were his victim.

Faith: Ugh. Ugly words filter.

Manuela: Sorry, sorry. I know the therapist said not to use these two words again, but I really needed to.

Eden: Sometimes it’s therapeutic for me too. To use these words, I mean. To remember what happened to me. That I was taken. And that I was the victim. That he was not my ‘dad’, as I still call him sometimes (habit), but something completely different. But with Isaiah… I wasn’t a victim. I wasn’t someone who had been stolen from my family, my sisters and my real dad. Isaiah didn’t know any of that. I was just a girl.

Manuela: A girl he fell in love with.

Faith: Manu, if you’re crying right now, I swear to—

Manuela: Yeah, so I’m crying, what are you going to do about it?

Faith: Nothing. I think I’m crying too.

Eden: Hello? Having a crisis over here!

Manuela: Sorry, hun. You say you’re still in love with him, right?

Eden: No.

Faith: You’re not still in love with him?

Eden: I’m in love with him for the first time. Back then, I was a child. I was in love, or I thought I was, but I wasn’t me. He… I was in my teens, but mentally, I think I was a child, or worse. I was not feeling things properly, it was all a mess. Anyway, brushing past the ugly stuff, I—

Faith: You’re not supposed to do that, brush past the trauma, according to the therapist.

---