Shane (Damage Control 4)

He’s good at faking he’s okay. But he would tell me if he wasn’t, right? I mean, apart from the bits and pieces of the conversation I overheard him having with Seth and Zane. His fear that he’s losing his mind. His decision to see a therapist.

He looks calm, if tired, the skin under his eyes bruised. I wonder if he sleeps enough. If the nightmares haunt him every night or once in a while. If he eats enough, and healthy. If he drinks. If he spends his nights drawing, and what his drawings reveal.

The desire to know him, really know him, is growing with every little thing I find out about him. Like the fact he doesn’t smoke. He never talks about his Mom but kept her note. He doesn’t play games.

If he isn’t playing games, then what is he doing with me?

Not fair, I guess, to ask more of him right now, but still… I’m so confused. After telling a boy you love him, what does it mean when he says nothing back? When he barely talks to you and then fucks you roughly in a dusty room? Is this a mistake? Should I run?

If it was any other guy, I’d say he’s a douchebag and walk away with my head held high, but this is Shane. With his flashbacks and nightmares and his fear of losing his grasp on reality.

Patience. Bravery. These are the synonyms of love.

How long do you wait, and how much do you take before you call it a day and leave? How do you do it when you’ve given away your heart?

How do you live without it?

A few months ago I’d have slept with a guy and not given it a second thought the day after. Now not only I can’t imagine sleeping with anyone but Shane… I can’t stop thinking about it. About him.

Crap.

“Here we are.” I park outside his building, try to smile, even though I’d rather stay here with him rather than go see what got my mom’s panties in a twist. “Will you be okay?”

He seems to be thinking about it. “I?

??ll do my best,” he finally says, and one side of his mouth tilts up in one of those faint, sweet smiles he sometimes gives me and makes me melt.

I like that he’s so honest about all this. He may try to hide his trouble behind glares and stony fronts, but with me he’s open, laying it all out on the table.

As if daring me to back out.

But his gaze is soft, not challenging. As if it’s the opposite. As if he’s daring himself to bare himself to me, laying his fears before me and bracing for the worst.

“Mom says she’s sick,” I say, although I told him that already, right after she called me. “I need to check on her.”

He’s looking at me, long lashes shadowing his eyes. “She’s your family,” he says simply.

“My only family,” I mutter, the thought returning. “She’s all I have left.”

“What about your dad?”

“He left.” I shrug, pretending I don’t care. “He left after Angel died. Didn’t leave an address.”

It hurts after all these years. I understand that he couldn’t deal with it, or the fact my mom was changed by Angel’s death, but he left us. Left me to deal with it, and I was just a kid.

“I didn’t know,” Shane says, his voice warm, so warm I want to wrap myself in it. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. It was a long time ago.”

He reaches for my hand on the wheel, covers it, his palm hot and rough. “I won’t leave.”

His statement hangs between us, vague and mysterious. What does he mean? He won’t leave me? He won’t take his life? He won’t get out of the car?

But then he draws back his hand, opens the car door and climbs out.

I wish he’d climb back inside, that we could lock ourselves in here and ask all the questions and find all the answers. Touch and kiss and not need anyone or anything else.

But life isn’t that way, and we don’t always get what we want. I should know that by now. He nods at me, closes the door and zips up his jacket, then turns and ambles toward his building, dragging the hood over his head, his long hair escaping at the sides and flying in the wind.