The Broken Sister (Sister #6) (18 page)

Her head nodded. Her shoulders slunk down. “I guess so. Do I disgust you?”

“No.” He took both of her shoulders in his hands. Her bones protruded and he let his thumbs gently rub along the ridge of them where they tucked into her neck. “No,
you
don’t disgust me.”

“Why? You have a thing for skeletons?”

“No. Never once before. But I can have a thing for
you
. And I can’t be disgusted by what I like about you.”

“Why would you even want to have sex with me?”

“I can have sex with your body because I find you desirable. Not because you’re so skinny, but neither does it repel me from wanting to. Okay? My reaction to you isn’t the problem.”

“I don’t know why I won’t cry when
anyone
else would cry. I don’t. Maybe I’m a sociopath or emotionally crippled or something.”

“Maybe it’s just not your way. And I think you’ve convinced yourself that how Ally reacts is
the
way. She works through her feelings, lets them out from what you describe. You internalize it all. It doesn’t mean you don’t have them.”

“They all want things of me I could never deliver. From the time Micah left, they wanted me to cry and carry on. I was supposed to be angry and express that. Mom was always, always asking, ‘Are you all right?’ ‘Come on honey, talk to me, and tell me what's going on in that head of yours.’ It was the right thing to ask me, as my mother, but it just… I couldn’t ever find the words or the anger they wanted out of me. I couldn’t answer them how they wanted. It made me incredibly sad for many years. I told them that. But they wanted more from me. I couldn’t express it all
enough
for them. I thought I did express it and they would then want more. More talking, more tears, more feelings. And I couldn’t produce it. I was just…”

“It didn’t make you wrong, Kylie, to need to just feel sad. I’m hearing that you just wanted time to process it without talking or crying about it. Tell me, why did you never see him again?”

“Because… he’s a lying sack of shit! He left us. He left Mom. She didn’t deserve that. We didn’t deserve that. I mean, who would want to see him? He was in jail. After he got out he tried to contact us but we told him to fuck off via email of course, and that was it. There was no reason, ever, to associate with him.”

Tristan sighed heavily as he moved his hand to cup her neck. He prodded her head forward so their foreheads touched. Gently he said, “What if, Kylie, that wasn’t what
you
needed? What if you didn’t need to tell him to fuck off? What if that was what Ally needed? Even your mom needed? But what if, just what if… you need to see him? What if you need to ask him why he left you? Or what he last said to you or when he last saw you? What if you just need to know he’s still alive? What if the closure you need isn’t no contact, but some kind of contact?”

She jerked back from him. “That would be… an awful thing to need. Why should he get any say in my life? Why would I want to see him? After what he did? He hurt Mom. He almost destroyed her. He—”

“Wasn’t
her
dad. He was her husband, Kylie. He was
your
dad. That’s an entirely different relationship. Entirely different needs. Did your mom tell you to never see him again? Hear him out? Let him explain or apologize?”

Kylie hesitated. Her chest rose up and down as if she were breathing hard. She may not usually say a lot, or cry, but there were other physical symptoms that often showed on her. “No. She’d never tell us not to. He contacted her when he was first arrested, first back in town. She was on her way to see him when she decided she didn’t have to do that. She didn’t have to hear him out or ever see him again. In fact, she and Donny got engaged instead. It was all spontaneous. They stopped at the entrance of the police station and Donny proclaimed his love and he wanted a future with her. And Mom realized she deserved that and didn’t owe Micah anything. He’d stolen so much from her. No more.”

“Good for her. Seems a healthy reaction for a betrayed, wronged ex-wife to have. But Kylie, you are
his daughter.
You lost a parent. That isn’t the same thing. You aren’t expected to react how your mother does.”

Kylie jerked a strand of long hair behind her ear. “No, no. She never expected us to. She always told us we needed to do whatever felt right for us, about him. It broke her heart that she put us in this position with this kind of father. Ally and I decided we would react to Micah together and as a united front always, no matter what. We would not let him ruin another moment of our lives. We would not give him another moment to speak his lies to us. We decided.”

“Uh-huh, and yet, Kylie, from what I see, he still has a huge chunk of your life in his hands. I don’t think you let
any
of it go. I think that worked for Ally, not you.”

Her eyes met his and were big with confusion. “I can’t need him. He—”

“Hurt you. But maybe you do need something from him. Maybe you want to get some kind of closure. In some form. To find out the why. To hear an apology. Or to hear him not apologize so you can let it go. Maybe you desire answers.
Your answers
. Not your mom’s answers. Not Ally’s answers. But
your
answer
.
”

Her tongue darted out and licked her lips. “I can’t imagine doing that.”

“You’re not arguing that I’m wrong.”

“I never… No, I don’t know what I think.”

“Maybe you should take some time and decide that; decide what you think and do what you need. Your needs about this are every bit as valid as Ally’s and your mom’s. It happened to you guys all together, but also individually. Maybe you should deal with your end of things just a bit differently.”

“I don’t know.” Her forehead wrinkled as she stared down at her feet crossed under her.

“Hey,” he said, nudging her toe with his hand. “I’d be willing to go with you. If you ever needed to find him. You know emotional support and all that. Or just get there. Where is he?”

“Bend, Oregon.”

“Not so far you can’t drive.”

“No, not so far I can’t drive.”

She was chewing on her lower lip. Dried skin was peeling off it. She often picked at it. He leaned forward and kissed it to stop her. Her hands tucked into his hair. He leaned so far into her she had to fall back on the bed with him on top of her. His hands slid up the sides of her chest and his thumb rubbed along her breast as he lifted up his head off hers. “You know what I haven’t done in a… no, in perhaps years. Maybe since college?”

“What?”

“Spent all day in bed. Wanna?”

Her smile was huge and a surprise laugh popped from her mouth. “If I can sleep at some point. It’s still not even six.”

“You can sleep. In a little while,” he said as his mouth came down and started sucking on her neck. She sighed and her fingers combed through his hair. Her legs moved so her hips let him settle more comfortably into her embrace. 

Her giggle was enough to make something in his heart release and expand. Maybe because she didn’t do it very often. Maybe because she wasn’t very happy, it was like finding gold to witness it in her. Plus, since holding her, touching her skin, talking to her, laughing with her, his headache had finally receded.

And later, when he snuck away and called his grandfather, he lied and said he had the proof. It was done. The Kylie thing was a done deal. They could move on. Leave her alone. That way his grandfather would stay off his back and he’d be done feeling sick that he was spying on Kylie behind her back. And the fact that there was no actual “proof” or “insurance” of their affair? All the better in Tristan’s eyes. At least for now he could look himself in the mirror again.

FOR THE NEXT FEW weeks it became a strange routine for Kylie. She was with Tristan constantly. He came over every day after work now. She got used to getting her homework, studying, and even drawing done while he was around. It was easy to put off at first, but he always had extra work to do, so she started working on hers while he did his. Her grades went up simply because she was consistently working now. They were most often at her place, rarely at his. Mostly because he had the car and took the initiative to come her way. She hadn’t been to a party in weeks and hadn’t slept with anyone but Tristan in as long. It was unheard of for her. And surprisingly, extremely easy.

“Hey, I have to work late tonight.”

Her heart dipped. So stupid to get so reliant on him being around every single day. It was getting out of hand, how much she actually liked his company and looked forward to it. It had become habit. Easy. Expected.

But real life called sometimes. “Okay.”

He sighed into her ear over the phone. “Not okay. It’s depressing me.”

“Oh thank God. Me too.”

“Go to my place. I’ll be back late. I’ll call the manager and tell him to let you in when you get there. But at least…”

“We’ll still each other. Okay. See you later, then.”

Let in by the building manager, she dropped her stuff beside his bed and scrounged for something to drink and nibble on. Surprisingly with Tristan, who rarely said anything in judgement either way about what she ate or didn’t, she found her body-issues were easier to handle with him. He was oddly accepting of her, which went a long way towards building her confidence in him. With Tristan she wasn’t hiding her body, denying it, justifying it or trying to fix it. Tonight she was relaxed and hunger gnawed at her, so she ate some of the crackers and apple slices he had there. The relief was Tristan didn’t hover over her, checking to see if she had eaten or not. He didn’t get offended if he fixed a meal, whether it be Sunday breakfast or Tuesday dinner, and she declined eating it, or only nibbled off it. He just… let her. Not being an issue to him made it a little easier to not make it an issue with her.

Later, she stretched out on his decadent bed and sheets. She could care less for his expensive tastes in stuff. It was all wasted on her, except this bed. She really liked the feel of it. She often indulged in it on Sundays. He was always off working anyway, rarely staying in bed past six or seven. It was more like ten or eleven before she came stumbling out of bed to face the day.

The door slammed shut about eleven. She sat up, groggy, pushing her hair off her face. She was naked and not shy about it, sitting up when the noises finally reached the bedroom, where he clicked the light on as he entered. She blinked in surprise at the bright overhead light. And then froze. Everything inside her froze.

It wasn’t Tristan.

There was another woman.

She was tall, blonde, and elegant. She wore a long, narrow skirt that hit her mid-calf and a professional blouse-jacket in a royal blue that made her hair color pop. She had started to undo her blouse and untuck it from her skirt. She stopped dead, startled by Kylie’s screech from the bed. She stared at Kylie, bug-eyed in shock and surprise, as Kylie stared at her. There was an obvious ease to how this woman felt about being in Tristan’s bedroom.

“Who are you?”

Kylie’s mouth was still dropped open.
Who was she?
The woman didn’t even seem all that shocked or upset she was there.  Maybe it was his long-lost sister? But no, there would be all kinds of drama about Tara showing up here. Who then? She didn’t know much about Tristan’s life outside of here and them. The blaring discrepancy in how much he was involved with her life suddenly hit Kylie. It had seemed fine… almost natural how it all had developed. But she was seeing clearly in front of her she knew nothing about him. Nothing at all. She’d never met his family or friends or seen his work place. She had no idea even who this woman could be. Though many things were falling clearly into place about who she most likely was.

Kylie jumped off the bed, dragging the sheet to cover herself. She felt worse than naked. She felt ripped open and ruthlessly exposed. She didn’t answer but dashed past the woman and locked herself into the bathroom. She grappled around in her clothes she’d left strewn about until she found her pack of cigarettes and lighter. She was shaking. She finally got a cigarette out and lit it. She quickly ducked into a long t-shirt to cover herself and then slid to the floor in defeat. What had she thought? Really? That he was only dating her? He was only fucking her? Had she really thought someone like her could hold the attention of someone like him?

She was many things, but not usually naïve. Or a fool.

She couldn’t even get mad at him. They had never really said they were exclusive. She had just assumed…. oh, so many things, because of how he talked and acted… and because it just seemed like it didn’t need to be a spoken thing. But shaking her head now, she laughed in bitter disgust.

How then was she going to escape this? She still could hear movement out in the bedroom and then the low hum of voices. She swore under her breath.

Minutes later there was loud knocking on the door. “Kylie? Open up, please, it’s me.”

She closed her eyes and let her head fall back on the tub rim behind her. Tristan. Here to say he was sorry. She had not understood the situation. He was just…

“Kylie, please.
Please
let me explain.”

She stood up, finally walked to the door, and unlocked it. It wasn’t like she could hide in there forever. Why be a drama queen about it? Why embarrass herself more than her naïveté already had her totally, epically embarrassed? She sunk onto the closed toilet lid, sucking hard on her cigarette as Tristan flung the door open. He was in a rush, almost panicked looking as he came in. The shock that she’d unlocked the door was obvious in his facial features.

He stood over her, staring down at her. She kept her gaze firmly planted on her knobby, bare knees, poking out from the t-shirt that had ridden halfway up her thighs. She picked at the end of the cigarette which was furiously burning towards her fingers. He dropped before her, kneeling in front of her. He gently took the cigarette and set it in a soap dish next to them. She watched the lazy spiral of smoke fade upwards. He hated her smoking. She kept it discreet around him and never smoked in his place, until now. He often commented when her breath tasted like it.

He was quiet for a long pronounced moment. He finally sighed and shook his head, dropping his shoulders as if in defeat. “It’s not what you think.”

She shrugged. “She doesn’t fuck you? She seemed pretty comfortable, starting to undress from her long day at work.”

“Well… yes. But not anymore. Not now.”

“You don’t have to apologize.”

His gaze jerked up. “I don’t have to apologize?” His tone was higher in volume now. His eyebrows scrunched up. “Why aren’t you freaking out at me? What do you think is going on here, Kylie?”

“We never said we couldn’t be with others.”

“But…. I’m… not. What do you mean we never said? This whole time you… were?” His eyes were huge. She shrugged. How had they gotten so off track?

He leaned back from her as if she suddenly disgusted him. He shook his head. “I can’t believe…”

“I haven’t,” she snapped. “I just mean I can’t be mad. We never agreed this was about only us.”

“It’s been about only us since it started.” His tone was almost despondent. He sat back down on his butt and leaned his head back on the rim of the tub like she’d had hers. “Her name is Morgan Hartley. She and I have been involved for several years. But it’s not like what you’re picturing. We are just friends. We have—no, we
had
sex, as in the past tense, before you. Pre-Kylie. Not now. Anyway, we used to have an understanding. We were companions, friends who had sex. There was never any kind of exclusiveness with it. We were never, do you understand me, ever like you and I. What I had with her was nothing like us, not even for a day like you and me.” As he spoke, his tone rose in passion. He came forward again, nearly crawling to her so his hands were on either side of her, surrounding her in his arms as he again kneeled before her and enclosed her in his arms, gripping the edges of the toilet.

“She crashes here when she’s on business. I told her no more sex. After I met you. Right off. She agreed, but still stays here sometimes. She usually calls and lets me know first. I let her when I’m staying with you. Not when I’m here. You have to believe me, Kylie. I am not having sex with her.”

She blinked and shut her eyes for a long moment before she slowly nodded in the affirmative. “Okay.”

He rocked back on his heels, his surprise obvious. “Okay?” He tilted his head as if waiting for the punchline or for her to continue grilling him or yelling at him.

“Okay.” She nodded as she said it.

“That’s it? A strange woman walks into my bedroom at eleven o’clock and you don’t have anything more to say? You believe me?”

“I believe you.” She answered in a low, even tone.

He shook his head after they shared a long eye-lock. “You’re unlike anyone, any female especially, I’ve ever met.” He leaned forward and surprised her even further when he dropped his face right into her lap and his arms surrounded her, hugging her to him. She stared down in shock. His relief was a physical thing. She finally dropped her hands into his thick hair.

“Ally would say this is where I let others walk all over me.”

He lifted his head, his gaze piercing hers. “I’m not walking all over you. Not about this. Morgan is nothing to me anymore. I don’t know that she ever was much. We had an agreement. I tried a few times to get her to see me more seriously, but she wasn’t that interested, and I didn’t really care that she wasn’t. I more… wanted a different kind of relationship, more than I wanted it
with
her.”

Kylie held his gaze. “What kind of relationship did you want?”

He stared for forever into her eyes. No blinking. No smiling. No twitching. “The kind I have with you.”

Her heart swelled and she shut her eyes tightly as if his words had physically pierced her. “Do you mean that?”

He touched her chin, rubbing his thumb over her jawbone. “You believed in almost one sentence that I wasn’t sleeping with another woman, but you won’t believe I feel that kind of commitment towards you, will you? I mean that, Kylie. I’m not playing you. I’m not seeing anyone else. I don’t want to see anyone else. I can’t even explain what this is with us, I just know it’s strong and real. It’s for real.”

Her eyelids blinked open as she nodded. “It feels pretty real. That’s why her presence disturbed me so much. Then I realized maybe I presumed too much.”

“Presume with me, okay? Expect the world out of me. It’s nothing less than you deserve and I want to try and give it. Emotionally, physically, mentally, in all ways possible, I want to give it to you. But I’ve never sustained a long-term relationship before. Not one where it was like this. So I’m no better at it than you are.”

“So it’s just you and me.”

He cupped her face in both his hands and leaned forward so his lips touched hers. “Just you and me. I promise. Us? This? Is about
no one
else and hasn’t been since the moment you introduced yourself to me as Kylie my waitress. Okay? Please, never forget that. From the first moment.”

Kylie leaned forward to rest her forehead on his. He was almost squeezing her face as if to impress upon her his words. He seemed so sincere, so desperate for her to hear him. She nodded, still unsure however.

“Morgan… she seems…”

“Perfectly suited for me? Don’t say it, please. I know what you’re going to say; she looks like what others would expect. She has the job and demeanor and social standing you think that fits me. But it doesn’t, Kylie. I’ve been dating women just like her for five years. And not one of them ever got into my head, or my heart, or my daily thoughts the way you have. I can’t even explain it to you. I just know it’s real and it’s happened, with you. She isn’t better for me. Okay? I kept sleeping with her because I was lonely and no else came along that sparked my interest. Not like you do. I just didn’t know there could be anyone like you.”

Kylie fell silent. He finally lifted his head and his gaze fell on her face. He reached forward and cupped her face in both his hands again. “What? You’re not saying something. Just say it to me. Don’t tell me what you think I want to hear. If you’re mad say so. If you don’t believe me, tell me. But you have to tell me.”

She lifted her hands to cup his hands with her own. “I think… I think that you are going to chew me up and spit me out.”

Her tone was so quiet he almost had to lean in to fully hear her. He frowned, gripping her jaw more desperately. “Kylie… no. I’m not… I’m not. Kylie, I’m…I don’t want to hurt you.”

“I don’t think you will mean to. I just think it’s going to happen.”

He stared at her, and she stared back. She didn’t know how to explain it. Maybe just because he was older and therefore the world of differences that existed between the two of them. She had years before she was remotely in the sphere of life experiences and circumstances that he and this Morgan Hartley were. She just didn’t see how this could last.