Chapter 4 #2
“But you don’t need them. I tell you you’re perfect all the time, because you are. You’re perfect just the way you are.”
His jaw tightened. “Do you have any idea how exhausting that is?”
I searched his gaze for a long time. “What?”
“Do you have any clue how draining it is to wake up every day and have to pretend like I don’t hate my body?
Sometimes, I just want to hate my body, Feloré.
But I have to pretend like I don’t because you couldn’t stand it if I hated it.
Just like you would never admit that sometimes I’m a burden to you. ”
My eyes rounded. “There’s nothing to admit because it’s not true. I do the things I do because I love you. Because I want you safe and cared for.”
“But not happy,” he said.
“Of course, I want you fucking happy, Landry.”
“So long as it’s the happiness I get from living the life you planned for me, right?”
My turn to sigh, long and dramatic.
“Even though I don’t want it,” he said. “Even though I’ve told you time and time again that I have no desire for a spouse or a family, or a human. All I want to do is monetize my time with them so that I might care for myself one day.”
See, that was where he was so wrong. That just further proved my point that he was too young to make his own decisions.
“You can’t tell me you don’t love it, too, Feloré. You can’t tell me you would ever be able to be with a human after being with them.”
I wet my lips. I’d never been with a human, but I knew in my bones it could never compare. But this wasn’t about me—it was too late for me. I’d already tasted the poison and sold my soul. This was my path forever.
It wasn’t too late for him.
“Yeah, see, that’s the difference,” I said, lifting my chin. “I’ll never have the chance to be with a human.”
He dissolved into a groan, rubbing his eyes.
“Have you ever wondered why they feel so good?” I asked.
“Because it’s all they have to offer in exchange for feeding on us like the parasites they are.
They have to give pleasure, because beneath their pretty skin, they know they’re venomous, deplorable creatures.
They’re incapable of loving anything that is not themselves. ”
He shook his head. “That’s not true. It’s not. If you took a minute to just talk to Corbyn, you’d see—”
“Corbyn, the sex demon, doesn’t give a shit about you, Landry. No one gives a shit about either of us. And they never will. We’re all each other has.”
“No, see, that’s the difference. I am not all you have. You have a life.” He jammed a finger at me. “You have work. I only have you, and it’s fucking suffocating me.”
It took me a moment to grasp what he just said. My voice was barely there as I asked, “Suffocating?”
“Yes!” He raked his fingers through his hair and gripped like he could pull it out. “I’m trapped in this room where you won’t let me have my own experiences or make my own decisions. You won’t let me do anything where I might even get a little hurt, and I feel like I can’t fucking breathe, Feloré.”
It hit me somewhere deep and unexpected. I didn’t…do that. I didn’t suffocate him. I loved him.
“I don’t want to be this broken thing you’re plagued with taking care of,” he sighed. “I want my own life.”
I shook my head. I could feel what was coming. All of these hurtful words just so he could say—
“I want to talk to Terrek.”
“No.” I shook my head harder. We’d beaten this point since he turned nineteen, and my answer would never change. “Fuck, no.”
He folded his arms, lifting his chin. “Well, it’s not your decision, is it? I’m not a child anymore. At the orphanage, they chose me to be a concubine the same as you.”
“Doesn’t matter.” I just kept shaking my head like it would make a difference. “You need to have a real life. You don’t need to be owned by them. You’ll thank me one day—”
“It’s my body,” he said, a bite to his tone. “It’s not yours. Just like it’s my fucking life—”
“But it’s my fucking brothel.”
He swallowed.
“I make more than anyone else in it, and trust me on this, if I say no, Terrek says no. It’s as simple as that.”
His sapphire gaze burned with anger.
“So, you can pout, and you can cry, and you can give me that look all you want, but it’s not going to change my mind. Everything I do has been to protect you, which is why my answer always has been and always will be no.”
Did it hurt my soul to see the resentment in his eyes? Like a teen who hated their father? Yes. But one day he would thank me.
He was too young to realize the magnitude of what he was asking and how radically his life would change the second he got this metal bar shoved through his tongue. With the quotas and the exhaustion, he wouldn’t last a week down there.
And if he did, if he somehow made it, it’d change his entire brain chemistry every time he had to watch someone get banished to the fields for not being able to ‘cut it.’
Someday he’d move past this phase and maybe then he’d be grateful he had me to protect him. Me. No one else was willing to sacrifice for him the way I was. Not even himself.
He stretched an arm toward the door, his voice cold as he asked, “My cane. Hand it to me, please.”
I glanced at it, sucking my cheeks. “Are you going somewhere?”
“Never mind, I’ll get it,” he said, starting to hobble toward the door.
I rushed to it, so he didn’t have to. I ran my fingers over the part where he gripped it the hardest as I handed it over. It was an old wooden thing that’d started to splinter in places. I needed to get him another one, but money was tight to say the least.
He took it without a word, leaning heavily onto it as he twisted toward the balcony, starting with baby steps. “No, I’m not going anywhere, Feloré. As I have nowhere to go.”
My eyes rolled shut as I released a sigh, smearing a hand over my face. Shit. It was times like this when I wished we had more than one room. More than one bed to share. It’d likely be days before he even started to forgive me.
“Look, we’re both hungry. I know it’s late, but what if I got us a treat? The market hasn’t closed yet. I’ll get us a honey bread or a citrus. Sound good?”
He didn’t respond, lowering himself into the chair he kept by the balcony so he could watch the birds. Or in this case, the rain. He’d be there for a while.
I grabbed a log from our little stack and tossed it into the fire for him. Then I took my coat from the hook, hesitating by the door. “I’ll be back. Do you think you can stay awake for thirty minutes?”
Silence. Other than the popping of the wood, all that ensued was a long, blaring silence. So, I dare not say it, even if I wanted to.
I love you, Landry. Everything I do is because I love you.