Turning around, I meant to head back to the living room and out the door, but a stack of papers sat on her desk beside the cheap laptop I’d bought for her birthday a couple of years ago. A few of the keys were missing and the Wi-Fi capabilities were shit, but the thing was well used ever since Della decided to take her skills at telling stories, and my past of sharing tales, and enrol in creative writing.
The laptop hadn’t been on her desk when I left this morning.
She’d brought it with her.
Was it an assignment?
Was she hard at work on a project, and this was the printed results ready to hand in tomorrow?
Looking back at the bathroom door, the sound of running pipes and groaning water pressure said I had enough time to spy.
I shouldn’t.
I should run before it was too late.
Just the action of stepping into her room uninvited—the same room I’d slept in for the past few months—and glancing at the discarded bra on her dresser, the pink panties on the floor, and strewn jeans on her bed made my hands clench and belly knot with dangerous things, but the fat stack of pages and bright green Post-it note on top beckoned me forward.
My eyes widened and my heart beat with a different panic as I noticed my old lighter propped on top with a sketch of a fire and the words, ‘It’s been fun cutting out my heart, but it’s time for you to burn. I’m ready to leave and be done with this.’
The words were written in marker, deep and black and full of sharp pain.
Leave?
She couldn’t leave.
Where would she go?
Who would be there to keep her safe?
I stopped breathing as my eyes fell to the title page beneath.
The Boy & His Ribbon
by
Della Wild
My heart froze as the title harpooned me in the chest.
She didn’t.
She couldn’t.
She promised.
Our secrets were our lives.
No one must know.
No one must guess.
I’d taken her against the law.
I’d kept her from everyone’s knowledge.
I’d fallen in love with her even though she was practically my kid.
And yet…she’s written it all down.
Every sordid, broken, pure, delicious thing.
I couldn’t stop my shakes or urgency as I grabbed the paper, tossed off the lighter, and ripped over the first page.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
REN
* * * * * *
2018
I’D NEVER BEEN the best reader—no matter how much time Della spent teaching me—yet reading that manuscript, I absorbed the words through my fingers as well as my eyes.
The story leapt from the pages, latching sharp fangs into my heart. Every emotion and carefully fabricated lie ripped apart my life, dousing me in blistering honesty, pouring its black and white truth into the wounds it left behind.
It wasn’t just words that sliced me, but Della’s voice. Her vibrant honesty. Her fierce tenacity reading aloud the secrets she’d written.
…that was what he did to me, you see? He made my entire life a jewellery box of special, sad, hard, happy, incredible moments that I want to wear each and every day.
*
I can honestly say Ren is my favourite word.
I love every history attached to it.
I love every pain lashed to it.
I love the boy it belongs to.
*
To me, Ren was magical.
He might not have been able to read and write, but he was the smartest person I knew.
*
I wish I could paint a better picture of how much I looked up to him.
How much I worshipped him.
How much I loved him even then.
*
Amazing what love can make someone do, right?
In my toddler brain, I associated him calling me Ribbon with his admittance of loving me. He’d accepted me as his own. He no longer needed to remind himself that I wasn’t born to be his.
*
Sometimes, and don’t judge me for this, but sometimes, I would do something naughty just to have him yell at me. I know it was wrong, but when Ren yelled, he drenched it with passion.
*
How many times do you think a person can survive a broken heart?
Any ideas?
I would like to know because Ren has successfully broken mine, repaired it, shattered mine, fixed it, crushed mine, and somehow glued it back together again and again.
*
I was jealous that he was close to another when I was supposed to be the only one. I was angry that he turned to another for comfort and didn’t come to me. But most of all, I was in shattered pieces because I wasn’t enough anymore.
*
I’m in love with Ren Wild.
It looks even worse in bold, doesn’t it?
It looks like a life sentence I can never be free of…which, in a way, is exactly what it is.
*
But what I do know is I will always love Ren.
I will always be in love with Ren.
And I also know I will never have him.
*
Why do I do this to myself?
Why do I insist on slicing through the sticky tape on my constantly breaking heart and stabbing it over and over again?
Can you answer me because I’m honestly at the end of my limit.
*
The next time Ren and I ran, I wanted it to be for good. I never wanted to tie him to a new place so I could go to school. I never wanted him to feel as trapped as I did. I wanted to be free because maybe, just maybe, away from people and rules and constant reminders, Ren might slip enough to realise he loved me, too.
*
That was my true performance because he never knew how much I sobbed the moment he closed the door, promising to be home soon.
I sobbed so much I couldn’t breathe, and my tears were no longer tears, but great heaving, ugly convulsions where hugging myself didn’t work, where lying to myself didn’t work, where promises that it would get better definitely didn’t work.
I’m sure you can probably guess what I did next?
If you can’t, then you’ve never been in love with someone who was off making a future with someone else.
My breath roared in my ears. My limbs turned shaky and liquid.
I only had minutes to read, but I skimmed as fast as I could, absorbing letters of pain, heartache, and confusion.
I recognised the moments she wrote about.
I remembered the attitude she gave me around Cassie. The jealousy she tried to hide. The possessiveness she never stopped nursing. The obsession of keeping our family just us and no one else.
I had no fucking idea her withdrawal and moods were because she thought I’d replaced her with Cassie. I was so naïve to think she hadn’t seen me sneaking off to make out time and time again.
Fuck.
Even with the kiss she’d given me when she was thirteen, I’d believed her when she said it was purely growing pains and learning what attraction was.
An experiment, she called it.
I’d believed her when she lied point-blank to my face.
I’d chosen to trust what she said rather than focus on what her body language told me. What her eyes screamed. What her sighs whispered.
How could I be so fucking stupid?
How could I be so blind?
How had I not seen how distraught she’d been the night I went out on that second date with some woman I couldn’t remember? How had I not heard her tears or run back to her to stop her from losing her virginity instead of forcing myself to believe I was doing the right thing by finding comfort in arms I was allowed rather than dying for the ones I wasn’t?
My hands curled around the pages, wanting to wring her neck for years of bullshit, while at the same time, wanting to clutch her close and say I final
ly understood. Understood the unrequited pining. Understood the burning jealousy at the thought of anyone else having her but me. Understood the epic heights of such sweet agony and the almost addictive properties of loving someone you just can’t have.
The night she lost her virginity, I’d done that. I’d pushed her into doing something final by believing I was the only one hurting. That I was the only one struggling with right and wrong.
Fuck!
I spun around, one hand latched around the pages and another tangled in my hair.
I needed to get the hell out of here before I did something unforgivable.
But…everything locked into place.
My heart stopped beating. My body stopped shaking. I swallowed a groan as Della stood dripping wet in a towel, glowering at me in the doorway.
We stared.
And stared.
And stared.
I didn’t move.
She didn’t move.
I hadn’t heard the shower turn off.
I didn’t feel her arrive.
I’d been too focused on learning the years of pain I’d put her through to focus on the present.
She’d been in love with me. Was she still? When did she know? How long had she lied? How badly had I ruined this?
Slowly, my heart tripped into beating again, wary and worried, quiet and quick.
With blazing blue eyes and wet blonde hair plastered against creamy shoulders, she padded barefoot toward me.
I stumbled backward, my knees giving way at the delirious perfection of seeing her again, of her seeing me, of us being alone together—away from others and judging opinions.
My lips parted to speak, to say something that could delete the years of agony, soothe months of hardship, and have her love me the same way she did before I’d stupidly run.
But my voice no longer worked, my lungs no longer operated. She closed the distance, bringing familiar smells of vanilla and melon until she reached out and snatched the pages dripping with secrets from my hands.
I flinched as if she’d punched me in the gut.
Tears glittered in her gaze as sadness so deep and cloying seemed to blur her before me. “You read them…” Her whisper fissured with soul-breaking disbelief.
And for the first time…I saw her.
Truly saw her.
Not as a baby.
Not as a toddler.
Not as a child.
I saw her as Della.
Herself.
Her own creation.
A creation I’d had no hand in, no part in nurturing or raising. She was no longer mine; she belonged only to herself, and she’d utterly crushed me beneath her written honesty.
“Ribbon,” I breathed. My voice shook. My hands curled into fists as I took in her wild, wet, blonde hair, the sharp wings of her collarbone, the swell of her breasts beneath the towel, and the long willowy strength of her sun-kissed arms and legs.
The first time I’d used her nickname in far too long.
But I had no choice.
The word was torn from my entire being as I stood staring at the most stunning creature I’d ever seen.
How had I prevented my eyes from seeing?
How had I believed she was merely pretty—just my little Della who needed me to survive?
How had I convinced myself that she loved me only as a friend when everything between us flared hot and forbidden with years of pent-up desire?
She was never innocent like I believed.
She was never pure like I hoped.
She was none of those things.
Not anymore.
She was sin and sex and such sizzling chemistry, my entire body burst into flames.
I couldn’t take my eyes off her.
I couldn’t breathe as explosion after explosion hit me, realisation after realisation, acceptance after acceptance that I’d loved this girl since I’d stolen her yet…here now, this very fucking moment, I fell head over heels, madly, desperately, horribly in love with her, and it fucking ruined me.
Her words…her confessions…I didn’t stand a goddamn chance.
I shot forward, grabbing her tight and clutching her to me.
A hug.
Our first hug in so damn long.
Her body was unyielding—no longer open to my touch. She was braver, stronger, sexier, and having her in my arms, my body shook off the shackles I’d always locked tight and fell away.
I hardened, I groaned, I buried my face in her hair and allowed myself to shake with fear of losing her.
She didn’t move in my embrace. Her back bowed as I pulled her closer. Her breath caught as I wedged us tighter, no longer keeping propriety between us, allowing her to feel how affected I was having her in my arms, wanting her to know I was done lying to her and myself.
That I felt something I shouldn’t feel.
That I’d felt it for years, and this was my confession after reading all of hers.
My hips rocked against hers, seeking an answer, desperate to know it wasn’t too late as I burrowed my nose into her hair, inhaling her, kissing her, wanting to kiss her lips but unable to let go long enough to pull her face to mine.
I was close to breaking.
Emotionally, physically, sexually.
My mind was full of heat and sin, a clawing hunger that had nothing to do with sex but everything to do with finally showing her how I felt about her—how tortured I was because of it.
Holding her again, hugging her after years of miscommunication, bullshit, and dancing a dance we didn’t understand, I felt as if I’d returned home, and the one person who was home no longer knew me or invited me in.
I was cast out into the cold, and my fingers dug harder into her skin as I shook my head against her rigidness, the coldness, the unbreakable ice she bristled with.
Pressure tingled in my spine, goosebumps prickled my skin, and a heaviness that could only be described as regret filled my eyes.
Tears distorted my vision for all the waste, all the mess we’d put each other through by not talking to one another. Not being brave enough to admit there was something more.
There had always been something more.
There had always been fate puppeteering our lives as if we were its own personal entertainment where survival fell away in favour of sex and two people who loved each other more than life itself were forced to break apart to stay bound by society’s rules.
“Della.” I forced myself to unwrap my arms and step back. My body howled at the distance, but I couldn’t touch her when she didn’t want to be touched.
“Please, Della…” I didn’t know what I asked for, but the brittle unhappiness on her face snapped into rage-filled indignation. “I’m sorry.”
“Sorry?” She laughed once, shattering the shocked silence between us, deleting her tears, and choosing rage over disbelief. Instead of stepping into my arms like I needed her to, instead of kissing me as I was begging her to, she hefted the heavy pages of her manuscript and threw them at my face with all her might.
They hit me square in the jaw, shredding my chin with paper cuts, sending me reeling backward as A4 snow fluttered to the floor.
“What the—” I rubbed the impact zone, wincing in pain.
“How dare you!” she seethed. “How dare you walk back in here and think you have any right to read what is mine? How dare you touch me after years of avoiding my hugs? How dare you, Ren! How fucking dare you!”
Her fury roared in my ears, and I backed up as she hit my chest with fist after tiny fist. Tears streaked down her face, mixing with errant droplets from her shower. Her bare toes dug into the carpet, pushing her forward, giving her power to defeat me.
“Get out!” Her cheeks turned red with hatred. “Get out. Get out!”
“Della! Wait—” I tried to grab her wrists as she pummelled me, but I didn’t succeed. “Let me explain.” Every time I touched her, my fingers seared with need. Having her so close made my body crave and harden and do things I’d
always forbidden it to do around her.
It was a traitor, but then again, so was my goddamn heart.
She continued hitting me, her hair flying in damp curls. “There’s nothing to explain. You left! You left me alone. You left me, Ren! I’ve cried myself to sleep, desperate to earn just one more hug from you, and now you’re somehow here and I want nothing to do with them! You have no right to hug me. No right to read something that was never yours to read. How could you? That wasn’t for you! That wasn’t for anyone. It’s not yours. It was never yours.”
“Stop.” Finally, I managed to grab her furious fists, gulping against the heaven of touching her. “What was never mine?”
Her eyes flashed, turquoise fire and navy brimstone. “All of it. None of it. It doesn’t matter. Just…get out! Go back to wherever you ran to. I don’t need you anymore. I can’t need you anymore. This is too hard as it is.” Her lips twisted into a grimace. “You’re making this impossible for m-me—” Her voice broke as a sob stole her breath.
“Della. Fuck.” Tugging her closer, I lost the ability to talk.
Words evaded me. Apologies and explanations and questions.
Only my heart functioned, and that was full of newness.
“You might not need me anymore, but I need you more than ever,” I whispered, holding tight as she struggled. “I’ve been so blind. So fucking blind.”
She stilled, her sudden frozenness unnerving. “What did you say?”
“I said I’m sorry. So unbelievably sorry.”
“Ha!” She wriggled out of my grip, pushing me away. “I don’t want your apology. I don’t accept your apology. You leave after promising you never would, then come back at the worst possible time? No. Nuh uh. I won’t let you make me feel as if I’ve lost my mind. I won’t let you do this to me, do you hear me?!”
“Do what? Come back because I can’t survive without you? Come back to tell you the truth that’s been fucking tearing me apart every day since I left—”
“Stop it!” She clutched her hair. “This isn’t real. I’m imagining this. I’ve finally lost it, and you’re just a figment—”
“I’m not. I’m real.” I grabbed her wrists, yanking her hands from her golden strands. “I’m here. You’re here. And I want to tell you that what I read in those pages…fuck, Della. Why didn’t you tell me?”