then coiled in on itself into a solid, icy core. There were voices in my head, but they didn’t belong to me. They belonged to spent circumstances, to pain, to crushed expectations and juvenile bravado. They were so loud, so overpowering, that they contracted my muscles and chilled my skin, numbing me to all but the piercing agony of impotence.
I could have said yes to holding his hand. I could have said yes to curling up beside him and letting myself bend into his care. I could have said yes to spending more time together and saying bedtime prayers with Shayla and sharing Christmas trees. But accepting his affection? Allowing his pursuit? Opening myself to the pain of dashed hopes and faded love?
No.
I couldn’t.
Scott was instantly concerned, the suddenness of my transformation bridging the abyss of his guardedness. I saw him clasp my arm, but I didn’t feel his hand. I felt his breath against my face, but I didn’t hear his words. I had reached an impasse a lifetime in the making, and there was nothing, not even Scott’s kindness, that could draw me back from my self-inflicted sanction.
I rose from the couch, and the motion subdued the clamor in my mind. “I’m sorry, Scott,” I said. And truly I was. I was sorry for him and sorry for me and sorry for my daughter, who so deeply loved this man.
“Shelby, I was only saying—”
I shook my head and felt a jagged emptiness crushing my heart. “I know what you were saying, and, Scott . . .” The tears were too close. I wouldn’t allow them. I took a calming breath. “You’re so kind, Scott. So loving to Shayla. So . . . so a lot of things. All of them good. But I’m Shelby. I’m Shelby, Jim Davis’s daughter, and I can’t let you in. Not this way. Not with . . . You said attracted and pursue—and I know what those mean. And I like you too much to—to inflict myself on you.”
He was standing too, his hand on my arm, his eyes boring into mine with confusion and worry and something like affection. It was the affection I found most terrifying.
“I can’t care for you, Scott. Not the way you want. So . . .” I heard a sob and felt a spasm in my chest. There was grief on my face, dripping in hot regret down my neck. “I’m sorry.”
I went to the door and held it open—my eyes averted, my resolve firm—and tried to wrap some poise around my tears.
Scott stopped in front of me. “I can’t leave you like this.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“Shell . . .”
“I’ll be fine, Scott.” The anger in my voice took him aback.
“Can I call you tomorrow?” A muscle was working in his jaw and his eyes seemed edgy.
“I’d rather you didn’t.”
He took his coat from the rack near the door, clearly tortured at the thought of leaving me this way.
“Thank you for . . . Thank you for saying it, Scott. It means . . .” How could I tell him what it meant to me? “It means a lot to me.” I hoped he could distinguish my sincerity behind the layers of fear and distress and pain.
He nodded, slipped into his jacket, and with a final, laden glance, he left.
I wasn’t sure how long I lay on the couch, flooding the silence with inconsolable despair. I had found a friend in Scott, a kindred spirit, a source of comfort and contentment and challenge and joy. And in my ignorance, I’d hurt him. I’d let him imagine the impossible and dismantle my reserve. I’d crushed us both. And the desolate places in my heart groaned in solitude and grief.
I’d spent my life until then clinging to God while I’d raged against the people at the root of my brokenness. But on this night, my world had shifted and I found myself railing at God as I clung to the people I loved—like Scott, who deserved so much more than I could give him, and Shayla, whose innocence I feared crippling. Why had I been born into a destructive vortex that had made the thought of loving so intolerable? Why hadn’t God intervened? Why hadn’t he stilled the forces that had rendered me powerless and damaged? Why couldn’t I trust myself enough to love sufficiently? How was I supposed to live the rest of my life in this paralyzing fear of personal failure? My anger was opaque and rough, craggy