I finally get the courage to look up at her and I’m surprised by what I see. There’s no pity. No sadness. No empathy. Her face is impassive but her eyes reflected of the torture I feel inside. I see myself staring back at me in their depths and I realize she’s no stranger to the darkness.
The darkness that fills us might be there for different reasons but it tortures us the same. I realize if anyone in the world could understand the self hatred and disgust I feel for myself, it would be her. I shudder to think of what put the darkness in her.
“I think I finally realized why I’m so drawn to you,” I say with a shaky voice. Her eyebrows lift with interest. “The darkness, it haunts us both. I can see it in your eyes.”
She looks down at our clasped hands and I know she understands. It’s hard thing to admit, having something like this buried deep inside. Most people don’t understand what it means and if you’re lucky enough to find someone who does know, they don’t talk about it either.
Preacher’s words tickle my mind. She’ll be worth it. I push them aside, refusing to focus on them. Instead, I focus on her, watching her thoughts float across her face.
Fuck me, she’s beautiful. The dark blue dress compliments her creamy white skin perfectly. It hangs along her body with ease, giving emphasis to the natural length of her limbs. The dress was fairly modest, except for the slightly see through material covering her shoulders. The way it bunched and gave was more than enough to tease me, leaving me aching and curious to reach out and run my finger along the line of her collar bone.
She runs her fingers through her short hair and I catch the glimpse of red. My eyes focus on the small hand tucked into my own and smile, her nails are painted red. I can’t help as my heart rate picks up. Did she do that for me? My heart pounds harder, faster in my chest, as I drink in the sight of her.
She reaches for her pad and pen, concentrating hard one the words she scribbles down.
I do know the darkness but I also know the light. She pauses, chews on the end of her pen and finally continues. Your friend, he lived in the light and it was his dying wish was for you to find it again. His last words were made out of love, they weren’t wasted on you.
She stops and studies me for a moment. I can see the hesitation in her eyes but I need her to finish. “Don’t stop,” the words are like a plea, coming from deep down inside me. I need the truth.
Saying otherwise dishonors him.
Damn, I shudder from the impact of her words. She's right but I still can’t help thinking his words should have been for his family and not for me.
Who is she?
“Who?”
He said, ‘she’ll be worth it.’ Who is she?
“I don’t know. The woman I’m supposed to be with,” the words surprise me, they were easy and they made sense. I sat quiet for a moment contemplating everything with this new perspective. Her brown eyes watch me warmly. Every word Preacher said, even what Kingston said, replays in my head. I can’t let her believe last night was her fault. It wasn’t. It was mine.
“Last night was not about you Alice. It was about me,” she tilts her head, listening intently. “My meeting with King didn’t go as planned. He said some things to me and I overreacted. I took it out on you. I shouldn’t have”
My heart skips a beat and I swallow hard. I'm worried my story is going to push her away. She deserves to know it but I don’t know if I'm ready to give her everything tonight.
“People leave me Alice. People I love. I don’t know why,” I lace her fingers with my mine, gripping her hand tightly. “Maybe I can’t love them the right way. Maybe I’m not worthy of love. But they always leave.”
She nods slowly and writes something down, That’s not true.
“I was married once, did you know that?”
She nods her head, squeezing my hand. Of course she knew, it's been mentioned enough times in front of her. I look down at our hands and take a deep breath. Using the strength from our connection, I find the ability to continue.
“Her name was Crystal. All I wanted to do was take care of her but we were young and too inexperienced to understand what we were doing,” I pause. “I loved her but it wasn’t enough. I couldn’t give her the life she wanted, no matter how much I tried.”
We sat for a few beats, the silence was nice. Her eyes watched me carefully, ready to rescue me at a moment’s notice. My heart clenches from the look on her face. I like knowing she want to rescue me. Thinking about Crystal and my past, makes my heart ache but with Alice here beside me, it didn’t ache nearly as much as it used to. I’ve realized over the years I was never really in love with Crys and I'm pretty sure she wasn’t in love with me either. We used each other to cope with the things in our lives we couldn’t control. After a while our coping mechanisms didn’t work and it ended dirty because of it.