Broken

I cried for hours that night. I cried until I struggled to breathe, until the muscles in my arms ached from holding my knees to my chest. I cried because I hurt, because I was lost, exhausted, bursting with pain I didn’t understand. There was no cause, no reason. I cried because I was broken, and I’d never felt so alone in my life.

“Guess I couldn’t cope once I found out Santa wasn’t real,” I joke, but I know Theodore sees through my sarcasm. His eyes search mine, like he’s looking for me, the real me. Part of me wants him to find me. The other wants me to run away to my bedroom and cry myself to sleep like I did on that Christmas Day.

“Okay next question. Where were you when you found out Princess Diana had died?”

“My bedroom. I remember falling asleep on the couch the night before and my mother waking me up in the small hours, telling me to go to bed. On my way up the stairs she told me about the crash, but I didn’t think much of it. Then, the next morning I woke up to Max telling me she was dead and it was all over the news.”

“Did you cry?”

“Yes.”

“Yes?”

“Contrary to popular belief, I’m not made of stone, Theodore.”

“I didn’t cry, but Tom did. I caught him in his bedroom watching a special feature about her on the news. To this day he swears it was because he stubbed his toe on the wardrobe.”

“So where were you when you heard?”

“I was on a plane flying back from Majorca. It had been our first holiday out of England and I was buzzing for months about going. Did you holiday a lot?”

“We went abroad once a year. I’ve been to most of the Greek and Spanish islands, as well as Turkey, and Paris a few times. Tenerife was my mother’s destination of choice, though. I know Playa de Las Americas like the back of my hand.”

“You’ll have to take me on a tour one day.”

“I need a smoke.”

I’m stood up and walking to my back door before he can reply. Standing on the patio outside my French doors that overlook the large garden, I pull out my cigarettes and pluck one from the pack, bringing it eagerly to my lips. The movement sets off the security light as I spark up, flooding the dark air around me. I drag in the calming nicotine, admiring the soft plumes of smoke as they swirl into the floodlight.

“Did I say something wrong?”

Turning slightly, I notice Theodore standing in the doorway. “No, Theodore. You haven’t done anything wrong.”

Shoulders hunched, he stuffs his hands into his pockets. “Are you coming back inside?”

“In a minute,” I say, holding my dwindling cigarette in the air. After I force a smile to reassure him, he wanders back off through the house.

Noticing my cigarette has burned to the filter, I toss it on the ground, stomp on it, and light up another. I’m nervous, maybe even scared, but I’m not entirely sure of what. Now that I’m alone with Theodore, my plan to tell him everything doesn’t seem so certain anymore.

When I eventually head back inside I find him hovering by the stairs. “Where’s your bathroom?” he asks.

“There are two upstairs, or you can use the toilet over there.” I nod to the door down the hall, just past the kitchen.

He walks along the hall and I see him reach for the wrong door handle. I almost stop him, even take a step forward, but I don’t. My father was the only other person who knew what I use my study for, and in about three seconds, Theodore will too.

Door open, he stops just inside, not moving even though it’s obvious that isn’t the toilet. Padding over to him, I step past his body and enter the room, studying his eyes as they dart from wall to wall. Confusion laces his expression as he weighs up the framed cover art hanging on the far wall above my desk. Gingerly, he walks a little further inside and stands in front of the floor-to-ceiling shelves that house my books. My books. Books that I have written.

“No fucking way,” he mutters under his breath. I remain silent, nervously awaiting his reaction. “These aren’t…I mean you’re not…”

“JD Simmons? Yes. Yes I am.”

“I-I don’t understand,” he says, blinking rapidly. “He…I mean you…You’re really fucking famous. To me anyway. Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t anyone tell me?”

“Nobody else knows.”

Theodore’s gaze continues to travel down my bookshelves. “So that’s why he only deals with you? Because he is you.”

Nodding slowly, I stare at his face. His eyes are wide with what looks like excitement as he runs his index finger along the spines of my books.

“Why? Why aren’t you shouting from the rooftops about it? You’re letting an invisible man take the credit for all these amazing stories.”

“I don’t do it for the credit. I do it because I don’t have enough room in my mind to keep the stories inside. I do it because I can’t talk to people and I need to get my thoughts out. I do it because when my fingers are on that keyboard I can be someone else.” Someone better.

“Wait…” he says, plucking one of the books from the shelf. “Into the Darkness. David Simon. This isn’t yours.”

I take the book from him and stroke the front cover. It’s been a few years since I’ve looked at this one. “Sometimes I self-publish under that name.”

“Why would you need to self-publish with your success?”

“Those are my gay romance stories. They’re not mainstream.”

“Surely you have the power to make them mainstream? You own a huge publishing house.”

Half smiling, I exhale a short laugh. “It doesn’t work like that, Theodore.”

“So your dad knew? I guess he must have if Holden House is your publisher.”

“He did. He encouraged me. I never planned on publishing anything, but he talked me into it. Holden House wasn’t so big back then, but we took a chance and the rest, as they say, is history. I released a couple that didn’t really go anywhere, then when Secrets in Rome made the New York Times bestsellers list, we were blown away. I’m sure it was pure luck.”