a forbidden door, a Pandora's Box, and once opened, there is no turning back. It’s entrenched in who we are, it becomes the very fabric of our existence. But when pain is caused by someone that is in our hearts, it becomes a drug, intoxicating and all-consuming until it swallows us whole.
“You make me happy and I don’t know what to do about that.”
“You’re so fucked up, you know that, Kyler? So fucked up. What a moronic thing to say. I scare you because I make you happy? Do you even know how stupid that sounds? And here I thought you were actually intelligent.”
“I didn’t say it made sense. I’m a fucking mess. I’m fucked up, Maddy. You don’t even know the half of it.” I felt like I was slipping. My mind was already a complete shit show. It had been for a very long time, but I’d managed to keep it under control, living day to day, just going through the motions of life, waiting for the day that it would end and I would die. Then Maddy showed up and lit the dark corners of my world. Light that I didn’t know I wanted or needed.
“Then tell me,” she pleaded, walking towards me slowly, as if I was a stray cat that would either sprint and run or attack her. The truth of the matter was she wasn’t wrong. With Maddy, I felt unpredictable. One minute I wanted to shout at her and the next moment I wanted her to lie on my bed, her beautiful hair feathered on my pillow as I kissed every damn inch of her senseless.
“I can’t.”
“Kyler, you can’t keep doing this. You’re giving me whiplash.” She placed her hand on my shoulder, singeing me with her touch, just like she had already branded my heart. Her words hung heavy. I knew I was a complete asshole to her. I knew that I ran hot and cold, but I also knew I didn’t know how to stop it. “I deserve better than what you have given me.”
“Don’t you think I know that?” I turned to her, my hands cradling her face, my lips itching to press against hers. I was so cold, and the only thing that gave a remnant of warmth was this sweet girl standing before me. “Don’t you think I know what a gift you are? My whole life has been a nightmare. I live in darkness. There’s been nothing and no one until you, my sweet little mouse.”
That’s when she started to cry, not perfectly rounded tears that gracefully dance on skin, but the kind of tears that have to be unleashed before they drown you. Madison was in pain and I had a feeling that I’d placed most of it there. I felt the ground below me shift at the realization that I was destroying the only goodness I’d ever seen in the world.
Because I was an asshole. Because I was no good. Because I was ruthless.
“I hate that I make you sad,” I whispered, pulling her head up. I needed her to see my eyes, I was desperate for her to know me, but I was so petrified that if she truly knew what I was she would leave. Using the pads of my thumbs I wiped away the cascading tears continuously falling down her cheeks. “I’m an asshole. I want to be better. I want to be what you deserve, but I don’t know how,” I admitted. “Teach me.”
“Just talk to me,” she said, between bouts of sniffles. “I knew something was wrong. I could tell.”
I felt my shackles rise like sharp pins poking, letting me know that danger was near. My fight or flight instincts kicked in to help me survive.
“What did I say?” I asked, desperate to know just how much I had revealed to her. I had no idea that I talked in my sleep. I’d avoided sleeping in the same room with anyone else for a very long time, repelled by the idea of being vulnerable with another person. Even my own mother had been shunned when I was ten.
“You just sounded afraid and you kept telling someone to stop.” The blood in my veins turned to ice at her words. “You also kept saying you don’t want the candy anymore.” She gazed up at me. “Kyler, did someone hurt you when you were little?”
The question was simple, the answer not as much. I wanted to tell her everything, but at that