Page 11 of Caged
“I want to apologize to you for our scene last week. I realize that something I did upset you, and I want to assure you that was not my intention.”
I still wasn’t quite sure what exactly that was, but I’d learned long ago it was easier to apologize anyway.
Janie gave me a soft look. “You don’t need to apologize. It wasn’t you, it was me. I freaked out.”
“Why?”
She looked around, a slight pink flush rising on her cheeks.
“I’ve never kissed a woman before,” she said.
“You didn’t like it?” I asked, trying to not look surprised at her admission.
That had been the best kiss of my life. I was going to be extremely disappointed if she told me that she’d hated it.
“No, I uh, I liked it. It’s just that, besides the fact that I’ve never kissed a woman, I’ve never had a woman go down on me or...you know, use their hand on me like that and it just, well, it created a lot of confusing emotions for me.”
“I didn’t realize any of that.”
“How could you?” she asked.
“It’s more than that though, isn’t it?” I pressed. “We were joking about if we’d have another play session, and that’s when you became upset.”
“You said you wanted to keep me forever, and you said I was yours,” she reminded me. “It felt like too much, too soon.But then later I thought, maybe you were just kidding, and I overreacted, and then I felt embarrassed.”
I reached across the table and took her hand in mine.
“I wasn’t kidding. I’m pretty much never kidding about anything,” I confessed. “But I’m sorry that it felt like I was pushing you, Janie. I’m not very good at the rules of social interaction. I tend to say whatever is on my mind, but I know it can throw people off.”
She squeezed my hand, and I let out the breath I was holding.
“It’s okay, it’s just that the last person who was talking about spending forever with me in the beginning of a relationship turned out to be a controlling asshole who tried to isolate me from my friends and family,” I explained. “I took a lot of crap from him for way too many years and when we broke up, I promised myself I wouldn’t let myself be controlled like that again.”
Even though I normally struggled to pick out subtext, I was pretty sure I was reading the subtext of this conversation loud and clear.
“Did he hurt you?” I asked, my voice deceptively calm despite the anger building inside me.
Janie pulled her hand away, almost shrinking into herself.
“He was mostly emotionally abusive,” she said quietly. “Insulting me. Tearing me down. Making me think that I was the crazy one. Until the night I finally defended myself and spoke back to him. I don’t know what my issue was that I allowed it to go on for so long, but let’s just say that being punched in the face was the final straw for me. The first time he hit me, that’s when I left.”
I’d never felt true rage before that moment. Whoever this man was who’d abused Janie, I wanted him to suffer.
“What’s his name?” I asked.
She frowned. “What? Why does it matter?”
“I will ruin him,” I vowed.
I was going to hire a private detective and dig up all the dirt I could on this guy. I had no doubt that a guy like that had a lot of dirt to dig up, and when I found it, I’d make him regret the day he ever hurt my woman.
“It’s none of your business,” Janie said firmly, the wall back up between us.
She gathered up the rest of her lunch and her tablet and stepped away from the table.
“I have to get back to work. See you around.”
Janie
