Page 98 of Tears of Ink

“Faith, please wait and listen.”

Ignoring the wheezy pleas of Al from the bed, I glare at the man I used to consider my father. “I have nothing to listen to. You’re a bastard and I said I never wanted to see you again.”

“Faith, please. We need to talk. I need to ex—”

“Honestly, Dad, I don’t know how to explain this in a way you’ll understand.” I hear Eli’s gasp when I say ‘Dad’ but I ignore it. “So, I’ll go old school and tell it to you straight. Go fuck yourself. You’re dead to me, and that will never change.”

My insides tremble with rage, but I manage to turn my back on the failure of a parent by the door and bend down to give Al a kiss on his forehead. “I’m sorry,” I whisper. He responds with a simple nod but the pain in his eyes says it all.

I can’t change the way I feel even if a dying man asks me to.

I breeze past my dad and wait for Eli in the corridor of the hospice. When he comes out and tries to take me in his arms, bending to meet my eyes, I fight him off. “Stop, stop trying to make everything all right.”

“I’m not...”

“You are. You’re trying to fix me, but you can’t.”

I turn and run, desperate for the fresh air outside and soothing balm of the sea.

C H A P T E R T W E N T Y - N I N E

His feet echo after mine along the empty pier. I don’t stop, though. I don’t even know if I want to talk. I don’t even know if I want to breathe. Finally, when I’m over the ocean I sit on the wooden edge, my feet dangling over the sea.

He sits next to me, his hands clasping the metal railing like mine.

“Do you know how many times I’ve sat here and wanted to dive in down there, to fall into the blackness and never surface again?” My words are low, barely audible over the rush of the waves.

“Why?”

I ignore his question, my gaze focused on the dark horizon. “It’s why I understand Lewis’ mum. I get what she did.”

I watch as his fists tighten on the metal pole of the railings. “You need to talk to me. At the moment all I can envision is the very worst, and it’s killing me.”

I shake my head. “I can’t, Eli.” I look up at him though unshed tears. “If I do, you’ll never look at me the same again.”

“Why?”

“Because you’ll finally realise my heart is as black as that sea. It’s why I can’t let myself feel anything for anyone.” I drop my head against the cool metal. “It’s why no matter how my stomach flutters when you knock on my bedroom door at Bowsley; no matter how much I love waking in your arms, I’ll never let myself love you.”

His head shakes. “This was never about love. You know that; it’s what we agreed.”

I’m at war with myself. With what I know and what I’ll know I’ll never have.

“But that doesn’t mean I’m not your friend, doesn’t mean you can’t talk to me,” he adds.

A tear slips down my cheek and then another. I watch the waves come and go in silence until finally I break, and with my words I know I’m going to unravel the secret spell of summer magic we have weaved between us.

Because I am darkness itself and I ruin everything—eventually.

“When I was thirteen, Dad told me he had a new girlfriend.” I shudder a breath but steel myself with a solid control of iron fisted resolution. “I didn’t think much of it. I was always with Dan—it had always been me and Dad, and Dan and Al. Life wasn’t conventional.

“I mean I know my dad used to have flings; he was always popular. But mum had never been around, and I was always his number one girl.”

Eli reaches a hand and places it on my tattoo of strength.

“It was just before my fourteenth birthday when Sandy and Aiden moved in with us. Aiden was two years above me at school. I thought it would be cool to have an older brother, kind of like Dan, but a real brother. Everything was fine. Sandy was high maintenance, but I quickly learned how to keep out of her way and keep life sweet.

“This is the Aiden you screamed about in your sleep the other night?” Eli uses gentle fingertips to pull my face to his, his eyes searching and deep in the dark.