Page 201 of Spicy Ever After
Oh God, what the hell is happening to me?
“Yes. There we go,” Gwen whispers gently as I wring myself out on her couch.
“I-I—" I hiccup. “Are—are you s-saying… I let myself down… f-first?” The question comes out as a howl because I don’t even need her to answer.
I see it. Holy fucking God.
I see it.
When Gwen speaks, her voice is so soft, even my sobs downshift. “I’m saying that the relationship you have with yourself comes first.” She pauses, I think, waiting for her words to sink in.
I take a few shaky breaths and sit up straighter. “Go on,” I say, my voice thick with tears.
“I’m saying that it’s only with self-acceptance that we can really embrace the gift of acceptance from others.”
I’ve heard things like this before. Who hasn’t? You have to love yourself first.
But I haven’t had it hit me over the head like a cartoon anvil before.
I started it. The whole This-Part-of-Me-Is-Not-Lovable thing.
“I started it,” I say aloud.
Not Beck.
And, yeah, maybe I inherited that belief. Maybe I absorbed it by osmosis. Maybe I didn’t have a choice.
But I was the one who didn’t love me for me first.
HO-LY SHIT.
Another wave of tears assaults me, but it’s not a violent storm. It’s like the tide coming in, washing away the footprints, the sandcastles, the cracked plastic cups.
It leaves me feeling heavy and knocked down, but with one clear wish.
To wrap myself in a hug. To embrace the part of me I’ve rejected. To forgive the part of me that abandoned myself.
To be whole.
Gwen is a study in patience while I sniffle, blow my nose, and blot my face.
I heave a shaky sigh when the swell passes.
“Wow,” I rasp.
I told Beck I was practicing acceptance. I didn’t know the half of it.
“Yeah,” Gwen says with a knowing nod. She gives me another moment before asking, “And how do you feel right now?”
I huff the ghost of a laugh. “Besides wrung out?”
She grins. “Besides wrung out.”
I draw in a long inhale through my stuffy nose. “Relieved… Calm, I think.”
“And how do you feel about where things stand with Beck?”
The question makes my heart ache, but it’s not the stab of panic. It’s the bruise of longing. I miss him so much.
