Page 111 of To Have and to Stalk
“You don’t know him.”
“I do know him,” Calder said. “I know those types of men very well.” A bitterness edged his words.
“You don’t know what he had to put up with because I was sick,” I said, a panicky, tight sensation racing up my chest.
“You were sick, Shay.” His hands tightened around me. “You were vulnerable, probably the most vulnerable you’ve ever been and will be, and instead of protecting you, he hurt you. I’m willing to bet you were sicker with himbecauseof him. Because he fucked up your nervous system.”
I inhaled a sharp breath.
The sicker I’d been with Graham, the meaner he got.
I knew the way Graham treated me wasn’tright, but that truth lived in my brain, and some other belief lived in my body.
For years, it felt like my body and I were at war. There could be no trust. I had to be constantly vigilant because I didn’t know what new, fresh hell my body was going to give me. If I exercised, I got sick. If I did everything right, I got sick.
So Graham became my compass.
If I couldn’t trust myself, I could trust him.
“He’s not a good guy for staying with you while you were sick,” Calder continued, voice soft. “He’s a predator.”
I swallowed something thick and sticky, tears burning my lids, grateful he couldn’t see my face.
Slowly, Calder untangled himself from me, hands resuming their massage. We were like that for a few minutes. Staring into the blue-dark night. Only the sound of water and breathing.
“Will you tell me about your illness?” he asked.
“It’s my turn,” I said.
“I know.”
There was a lack of urgency or demand in his words. Instead, there was something soft in them, like he was asking something he knew he had no right to ask.
I took a breath. “I was diagnosed as a teenager with postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome. My tachycardia is mostly under control now, but I have chronic fatigue. It comes in waves. Flare-ups. It’s harder when I’m stressed.”
The words came out robotic, a phrase I’d rehearsed.
And I guess Ihadrehearsed the words, having told them to enough people over the years. That was usually enough. There were no follow-ups.
But of course Calder was different.
“Is that the worst part?” he asked. “The not knowing?”
He refocused his attention to the muscles along my spine, working away tension that I hadn’t known existed, but felt primordial. I closed my eyes, getting lost in it.
“Being alone is the worst part,” I said. “It’s not like a flu, where my mom could take time off for a day or my friends can drop soup off on occasion. Eventually she had to work, and I was alone for hours. Now anytime I get a flare-up, I become that little girl on the couch.” Silence fell. I searched for something to fill it. To squash the needling vulnerability. “My turn. How did you learn to bake?”
“My mother taught me,” he said, voice distant.
The message Void had sent me a while ago came tumbling back.
My mother died because of me. My brother went to jail for me. I’ve done much worse things than stalking. I’m not a good person.
“What did you mean?” I asked, voice quiet. I didn’t have to elaborate, because Calder knew.
His grip tightened on my shoulders. “I should have protected her better.”
Silence fell.
