Page 21 of Finding Lexie
There was a moment of silence before Midas asked, “You had it bad?”
Lexie didn’t respond, not sure what to say. She didn’t want this man to pity her. She was fine. She’d survived and was satisfied with where she was in her life.
“When I joined the Navy, I was so naïve,” Midas said. “I grew up with loving parents and two great siblings. Karen was a pain in my ass, but I would’ve killed anyone who tried to hurt her. I guess that’s what older brothers do for their little sisters. Max was always trying to be like me. He even joined the swim team, and the little shit broke one of my records.”
Lexie smiled. She didn’t know a lot about Midas, they weren’t really friends in high school, so she drank in each and every bit of information she discovered about him.
“My parents were happy, treated us kids like we were the most important things in their lives, and we always had awesome Christmases with a ton of presents. When I asked for all the trendy clothes, they usually bought them for me. I had lots of friends and didn’t really have to work all that hard in school for good grades. I was spoiled, I can admit that now, though my folks did a good job of trying to make sure we appreciated what we had. But when I joined the Navy…all of a sudden, I was nothing. Just another grunt who’d been a big fish in a small pond in his hometown, and then I was this tiny little minnow in a huge ocean. It was definitely a shock.”
“I’m sure you didn’t stay a small fish for long,” Lexie commented.
He chuckled softly, and she felt the rumble in his chest against her own since they were pressed together. If she’d been in this hole in the floor with anyone else, Lexie would’ve been extremely uncomfortable. But something about Midas made her relax.
“I learned really fast that it didn’t matter where we all came from. If we were going to make it through boot camp, and then SEAL training, we all had to work together.”
“Embrace the suck,” Lexie said with a smile.
“Exactly. Over the years, I’ve seen a lot of shit. People acting like assholes toward each other. Disrespecting their children, their wives, their neighbors. Fighting over something they probably didn’t even understand. Have you seen the movie World War Z?”
Lexie blinked at the change in topic.
“I have a point,” Midas said.
“That’s the movie with Brad Pitt and the zombies, right?” she asked.
Midas nodded. “Yeah. Anyway, there’s a part when they’re running from the zombies in Jerusalem, and Pitt’s character looks back and sees a boy in the mayhem, crouched down in the middle of the street with his hands over his head. All the zombies go around him without even looking twice at the boy, even though they’re biting everyone else. You’re kind of like that kid.”
Lexie scrunched her nose and frowned. “In what way?”
“Everyone else around you is fighting and clawing for something. Food. Power. Money. And then there’s you. A calm light in the darkness. Giving out smiles and food. Making friends in the most hostile territory. It’s like the dark can’t touch you.”
“Um, I think you’re forgetting that I was kidnapped and taken hostage,” Lexie said dryly.
“No, I’m not. You were kidnapped, and that sucked. But they didn’t touch you. And trust me, that is a fucking miracle as far as I’m concerned. Most hostages aren’t so lucky. They kept you reasonably healthy and alive.”
“They wanted money,” Lexie felt obligated to mention. “If they killed me, that would’ve cut their ransom in half.”
She felt him shrug.
“All I’m saying is that I’m realizing you’ve always been that way. You went out of your way to befriend the socially awkward kids at school. You gave up your own lunch money to buy someone else a sandwich. You volunteered to be in a group with the kids no one else wanted to work with. You’re a good person, Lexie. And while it completely freaks me out that you’ve probably been inviting complete strangers into your home and feeding them for years, it’s obvious you love what you’re doing.”
After a long moment of silence, Lexie blurted, “I joined Food For All to get away from my father.”
She felt every muscle under her go taut.
“Explain,” Midas bit out.
“He didn’t hit me, but he wasn’t very nice,” Lexie admitted for the first time ever. She’d never talked about her dad to anyone. Partly because she hadn’t been very close to any of her coworkers. She wasn’t around any of them long enough. Between her switching locations frequently, and them doing the same, it was a part of life to meet someone one day and have them be gone the next. But something about lying in the dark with Midas, and the fact that he knew her from so long ago, made opening up not as difficult as she might’ve expected.
“He was never sure what to do with a daughter. He was also an alcoholic, always being fired from jobs for showing up drunk. We didn’t have big fancy Christmases. I think the last time we had a tree was when I was in elementary school. When he got drunk, the last thing he thought about was making dinner for me.”
“Where was your mom?” Midas asked.
“Gone. She left when I was little. I barely remember her. She and my dad fought all the time. My memories are of yelling and me hiding in my room when they went at it. Anyway, we moved around a lot, which was why I ended up in Portland my senior year.” Thinking about that year, and when she’d met Midas for the first time, made her think about how difficult school had been for her. “I’m not stupid,” she said a little fiercer than she intended.
“I never said you were…” Midas told her, sounding confused.
She felt his fingers lightly stroking the arm that was around his belly. She didn’t know when he’d started doing so, but she couldn’t deny that it felt amazing…comforting.
