“I shouldn’t have had you come over,” I tell him. “I’m really not in the mood to see anybody and it’s not your fault, but I think you should probably just go.”
He crosses his arms.
“So you’re kicking me out, huh?” he asks.
“If that’s how you need to take it then yes, I guess I am kicking you out,” I tell him.
“You know,” he says, “I came over here because I thought you might like to talk about what happened today. I’ve seen this kind of thing happen before, and I wanted you to know that I’d stand with you over the next few weeks while the story goes through the papers and all that.”
“That is very sweet of you to come to me in my time of tabloid nightmare, but I really think I’ve got this handled for tonight, so I’ll talk to you later,” I tell him.
“What did he do to you?” Damian asks.
I cross my own arms.
“I thought we were changing the subject to me kicking you out,” I tell him.
“Seriously,” Damian says, “what happened that made you hate the guy so much? I’m sure he deserves it, but what could he have done to bring out this anger in you?”
“Could I possibly make it any clearer that I don’t want to talk about this?” I ask.
“I just think it might help if you get it off your chest,” he says. “I know that when something’s really bothering me—”
“My dad was a fucking child abuser!” I yell.
Damian’s quiet a moment.
“You mean like—” he starts.
“No,” I tell him, “nothing sexual, nothing like that. He never even touched me. It was my brothers that got the beatings. Me, he’d just lock me in my room all day and any time he would let me out, he would constantly tell me what a useless little girl I was. My brothers, though…”
“I’m sorry,” Damian says in a solemn tone.
“Yeah,” I tell him, “so am I. Maybe you understand, maybe you don’t, but I don
’t want him anywhere near my home. And with Ben today and the picture and those bruises…” I trail off, sucked into the numbing vortex that is my personal hell.
“Bruises?” Damian asks.
I come out of it quick enough.
“We’ve both had a long day and I think we’ve talked enough,” I tell him. “I’m sorry I yelled at you, but I really don’t want to talk about any of that right now. You’re welcome to stay if you can live with that.”
“Well, as your boyfriend—” he starts.
“Get out,” I interrupt.
“I’m sorry,” he says. “I can absolutely live with that.”
I give him a good once-over, looking for any tells, but I’m not seeing any.
My dad doesn’t want money; he wants to reassert his dominance now that it’s starting to look like I might not be such a failure. Damian’s making progress with his ex-not-quite-or-almost-father-in-law or whatever, and that’s great.
Good for him.
I just don’t need someone like Shane Roxy—surprised that’s my real name? —anywhere near my life.
Chapter Twelve