Not Catching Love (Accidental Love #5)

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Six

Derek

“You remind me of a little boy I used to foster.”

I freeze in the doorway to the art room and yank myself out of sight. My dance class has been called off because stomach flu has hit the nursing home, and I thought I’d see if Xander wanted to go somewhere instead. Now, I’m worried that I’ve stumbled into the wrong end of a conversation.

“I wish someone like you had fostered me,” he says.

I need to walk away, but I can’t bring myself to do it.

“I miss those days,” she says. “Oooh, Toby used to want to kill some people over what those babies went through.”

I glance around the doorframe and find Xander and Bethany sitting side by side, painting.

“Why did you foster kids?” he asks. “We’re hard work. Most of us are so fucking messed up and impossible to deal with.”

“Impossible is a lie people tell themselves when they don’t want to put in the work. In all our years, only one child had to be removed, and it broke my heart.”

“What happened?”

“She was violent toward the others. It was one of the hardest decisions I ever made.” Bethany lifts a shaky arm to paint some more. “I had five other children in my care though, and I couldn’t give her the one-on-one time she needed. I think about her a lot.”

He shoots her one of those side-eye looks he’s perfected. “You do?”

“Yes, I think about all of them a lot. Still remember every name. Kept a notebook with the thing I liked most about each child.”

I can tell he’s debating whether to continue the conversation. “What sorts of things?”

“Javier was seven. Used to be very particular about his teeth and would remind us all, morning and night without fail, to make sure we’d brushed so we didn’t get cavities. Lauren had this one doll she always sang ‘Once Upon a Dream’ to as she was falling asleep. Nevaeh would cry when someone picked a flower because it meant the flower would die. And Rose—she was the one I had to have removed—I remember seeing her braid Lauren’s hair one day when they didn’t know I was watching. Told Lauren she could be a doctor if she wanted to.”

“No one ever wrote notes like that about me.”

“How do you know?”

Xander shrugs. “They all hated me.”

“How many foster homes were you in?”

Xander huffs. “If that’s supposed to be a farmhouse, you need to get your eyesight tested.”

“They do it here frequently, thank you very much. Your frog looks like a goat.”

“What goats do you know that are green?”

“You’re the one painting it. ”

With them moved on to safer topics, I tap on the doorframe and walk in. “I think the farmhouse and the frog both look amazing.”

Xander looks at Bethany, and they share a look about my lack of art skills, something the residents love to remind me about.

I throw up my hands. “Sorry. They’re both terrible. Happy?”

“Much.” Xander stands and gathers all the equipment up.

“You don’t have to stop because I’m here.”

“Bethany needs a nap,” he says, and at first, I assume he’s being his snarky self, but she nods.

“I’m dead on my feet this week. That damn stomach flu better not get me as well.” She squeezes Xander’s shoulder and leaves.

As he packs up, I debate whether to bring up what I heard, but it feels like being a sneaky liar not to.

“I eavesdropped on some of your conversation,” I tell him.

“I know. You think I didn’t see you lurking at the doorway?”

I catch my laugh in time. “I thought I was being sneaky.”

“You weren’t.”

“Damn. There goes my life in crime,” I mutter, helping him carry the paintbrushes to the sink.

The only sound is the rush of water from the tap and the paintbrushes knocking the side of the glass jar. “Go on. What did you want to ask me?”

“Nothing specific, but … could you tell me about it? Any of it?”

He smirks. “I could, but once I get started, I tend to trauma dump. Then you’ll want to give me sympathy, which isn’t something I want because I don’t connect with any of it anymore. ”

“I think … well, it’s part of you. I’ve been, umm, reading up on neglect.”

His head shoots toward me. “Why?”

“Because I want to know you. I want to support you— not be your carer, just support—with anything you need. And I think the more I know about you, the better I can do it.”

“I don’t need support though.”

“Lie.” He shoots me a glare. “Everyone needs support.”

“Even you?”

I want to talk about him, not me, but he does this a lot. Challenges me to share something with him first before he feels comfortable enough to share right back. The problem is, I’m not sure what to share. It needs to be personal so he knows I’m letting him in, but I don’t want to try and make my life sound bad because it wasn’t.

“When my grandad died, I needed a lot of support. I was eighteen, but we were close from the minute I was born, and then suddenly, he wasn’t there anymore, and it took a lot to adjust to. That’s the biggest example I can think of, but there are always moments of doubt. Always moments where I question if I’ve made the right decisions, especially when it comes to you.”

“Why me?”

“I don’t want to hurt you. I … feel … a lot. For you. And I can’t show you that, but I also don’t want you to think it’s because I’m playing with you or that I don’t care. Every day, I go back and forth on whether we should even be friends or if I should leave you alone. Am I taking advantage of your neglect without me even realizing it?”

“No.” His answer is fast. “If you were, you wouldn’t be questioning yourself. Besides, I might have my issues, but I’m not a pushover. I happen to have a really fucking good bullshit radar and don’t trust people easily. My brain plays tricks on me sometimes, but that doesn’t mean I’m an idiot. I know what I want.” He drops his eyes to the floor and whispers, “I’ve been waiting my whole life for you. Just you. I’m not going anywhere.”

Somehow, that both makes me feel amazing and like fucking shit. I swallow around the lump building in my throat, nose oddly prickly. Instead of fighting myself on it, I reach for him. Xander folds into my arms like he’s always meant to be there.

“I’m sorry I can’t give you more right now. You deserve everything.”

“And who says you’re not already giving me that?”

I squeeze him tighter, and he squeezes me back.

Then he talks, and I’m not expecting what he says next. “I was in seventeen different homes. Five were where my nightmares came from. The other twelve ranged from okay to really good, but by the time I got to experience the really good, I think I was broken. I made them move me twice before I got too attached.”

I uselessly want to apologize, but then I remind myself he doesn’t want the sympathy. “Is seventeen normal?”

“Nope. I think three is standard. My parents tried to get me back a couple of times but couldn’t stay clean long enough. I was in short-term places and care homes in between, plus there were ten long-term arrangements. Two of those, my parents—I don’t even know why—complained and had me moved. Five, like I said, were awful. Two were amazing, and the last one … the last one was this super-educated and well-off couple who took in older foster kids to help set them up with the skills they need. Driving, bank accounts, college applications, that kind of thing.”

“That sounds helpful.”

“They also separated me from Seven.”

The weight in those words leaves me speechless.

“When I was five, my foster brothers tied me in a thick plastic bag and laughed as I tried to get out. When I was eight, I put on a lot of weight, and my foster parents put me on a strict diet, locked the cupboards and fridge, and would make me run around the neighborhood every afternoon, and I couldn’t come back until it was dark. At thirteen, I counted how many days I could go without talking before someone noticed. One hundred and eighteen, by the way, and it was only after the fourth visit from my caseworker that she realized something was going on. But none of those things hurt as much as losing Seven did.”

“Why?”

“Seven was really angry when I met him, but something changed, and he got his act together because he was determined to look after me. It wasn’t good on him, either, when we were separated. They worried he’d done … things. To me. But the only thing he ever did was love me when no one else would. I’d had the health anxiety plenty before that, but those months are where it got really bad. He was the only reason worth living, and I knew that if I was struggling without him, then he was struggling without me. They wouldn’t let me contact him. They wouldn’t tell me if he was okay. I had panic attacks every single night, thinking he’d been arrested, or stabbed, or was living on the street. I thought I’d leave there and never be able to find him again, and the thought of that was so paralyzing I couldn’t breathe.”

I hold him closer, tears pricking at my eyes. “Seven’s everything to you.”

“Yeah.” He pulls back, and no matter what he says about being unaffected by it all, I can tell it still haunts him. “I don’t think I’m capable of letting him go. I’m sorry.”

“Nope. If I can’t be sad for you, then you don’t get to be sorry about that.” I cup his face and tilt it up until he’s looking at me. “How did you find him?”

“I didn’t get better. Even with meds and psychiatric visits and appointment after appointment with psychologists. They even put me in a goddamn psych ward. When nothing worked, my caseworker stopped fighting it. I was almost eighteen, so it’s not like they could hold me forever. She called Seven, and he came and picked me up. He’d found a tiny one-bedroom, and he was working at a fast food place during the day, a bar at night, and building his tattoo portfolio with every spare moment in between. He said that he knew I’d need him and made sure he was ready.”

“I think Seven just became my favorite person.”

Xander scowls, and I can’t help it.

I lean down and brush my lips softly over his.

He chases me for more, and it hurts not to let him. His eyes flutter open, and when that bright purple hue appears, I hate it. I overwhelmingly, unreasonably, flare with hatred over it.

“Seven, Molly, Madden, Rush, Christian, Gabe. Those men are all in your life. You’re not alone anymore, Xander. You’re not waiting for your person. You’ve found them.”

His pink tongue swipes over his lips. “And you?”

“I’m already yours in all the ways I can be.”