He wanted the truth. He wanted a reason for all my crazy. Well, now he was getting it.
“Love rapes your mother right in front of you while she weeps, telling you that Mommy’s ok,” I hoarsely whispered, my throat strangled with years of emotion. “It touches you in ways and in places that it should never, ever touch you, trying to murder the last bits of your innocence. It kills you, cripples you. It leaves you damaged beyond repair.”
I stood before him, naked and bleeding, my impaired soul exposed for him to witness every ugly scar. “That’s love, Blaine. Why the fuck would I want that? Why would anyone want that?”
Blaine stepped towards me, his arms outstretched, ready to fix the broken girl. But I didn’t want his sympathy. I didn’t need him to save me. I wanted him to save himself.
“Kam, baby…” he rasped, his horror-stricken eyes glazed with tears. “Baby, I’m so sorry. Please, let me…”
“No,” I deadpanned, moving out of his reach. “No, don’t try to make this better. You can’t make it better. And I don’t want you to.”
“Just let me…”
“Seriously! Stop it, Blaine! I don’t want your charity! I’m not your little pet project! Stop trying to push me into being what you want me to be! I am not your mother!”
Blaine stopped his advance and looked at me with confusion and pain marring his face. He was just as open and injured as I was, plagued by my horrid account. I had him right where I needed him. And, as excruciating as it was, I said goodbye to the man I loved more than I hated myself before slipping on my cold, unfeeling mask and I went in for the kill.
“I am not what you want, and I don’t want to be. I don’t love you, Blaine, and I never will. So let’s stop wasting our time and face the inevitable,” I spat as I gestured between us. “This is over. Done. There was never a future for us. Never a happily-ever-after. And the more we keep pretending there is one, the more I despise the thought of it. Goodbye, Blaine. It was fun while it lasted. But let’s not keep forcing something that’s not meant to be.”
Blaine’s expression was completely solemn as he looked back at me, waiting for the punch line to a cruel, tactless joke. But he knew just as well as I did that it would never come. He knew that what we had had crumbled into a heap on the floor leaving nothing but a mess of ashes. In a matter of minutes, I had managed to taint countless tender kisses, heated caresses, and longing stares. Things that we both held onto like lifesavers in the tumultuous storms of our pasts. Things that gave us hope for a future without pain and guilt and fear.
All of it. Gone.
I had successfully pushed away the only man I ever gave a damn about because I was too afraid to love him. But not only that, I was too afraid of what his love would do to me. I knew how shitty life could be. I knew, sooner or later, his love would hurt me. And being that I was now so vulnerable to him, my heart exposed and on display for him to see and crush in the palm of his ink-adorned hand, there would be no coming back from that. I would have no chance of survival.
Without a word, Blaine turned and walked out of my room while I stood there, steeped in my own hatred and affliction, numb and completely still. I didn’t move after I heard the front door close. I didn’t even blink as reality began to set in. I couldn’t. I couldn’t feel it. I couldn’t let myself believe it, even though it was what I caused.
Blaine was gone. And he was never coming back.
The mind is a tricky thing.
You can tell it to ignore the signs. To play dumb and let shit happen, even though you know it will only screw you in the end. To continue on like a damn fool, setting yourself up for failure.
Ignorance is bliss.
And the mind is a bliss-seeking, stupid motherfucker.
I knew all along that it was coming. I knew Kami would selfishly hang on to her insecurities like a shield in an attempt to protect herself. And in the process, she would hurt anyone that attempted to penetrate the armor.
She was smart. That was what I should’ve done. But instead, I was a sucker. The sucker that fell in love with the girl who was terrified of the mere mention of the word. The fool who sacrificed his heart time and time again, thinking someone would actually see that he was so much more than the rough exterior.
Love was a bitch. And she was squeezing me by the nuts.
I didn’t realize I was at Dive until the smells of beer and fried food assaulted my nostrils, making me even more aware of my afflicted state of mind. I bypassed the questioning looks and whispers, grabbing a beer from the cooler and slid onto a barstool without so much as a cordial greeting. I didn’t care. I was done caring. Caring got you nowhere. And that’s exactly where I was. Nowhere.