Chapter 26 #5
“I know you’re not, sweetheart. But it’s your opinion that matters when it comes to this.
” I drew her right back to the chair in the kitchen and settled with her on my lap.
I always felt a bit more grounded with her weight on me, anchoring me to the earth, and I could only hope I made her feel the same with my arms around her.
“Do you wanna talk it out? Do you want to wait until later? Another day?
“I don’t know. I haven’t really interacted with my past since Max was born. In a way, I always felt it was my own rebirth. That’s when I became Jeannie, a mom, and I fully escaped Juniper Stardust Aurora Wolfhunde and the prison she was locked in.”
I had always thought there was a story to that name, perhaps something fanciful and humorous, but that clearly wasn’t the case.
We fell quiet again, and Jeannie idly traced the veins on my hand, my palm, my knuckles, and then my wrists before she spoke again.
“I was raised in a commune. At first, I didn’t really know it was any different to how anyone else was being raised.
Sure, our church services were kind of weird, and I spent a lot of time learning about our leader, but it was what I was used to.
Then, they pulled me out of school in fifth grade because of all the ‘heretical’ things they were teaching us.
“And it wasn’t even the usual stuff, like evolution and the world being really old. It was things like Sex Ed, the Trail of Tears, and even some advanced math. I have a theory now that it was things our leader struggled with in school, and he really seemed to hate every indigenous race ever.”
I nodded softly, but it was like horror music was playing in my head. I had been leaning toward things like alcoholism and an emotionally abusive environment, not a fucking cult. God, it was so much worse than I thought.
“And like, that’s just what it was for a while.
I made do. It helped that I was friends with the librarian we had in the commune.
She was the leader’s aunt, so he had a soft spot for her even though she didn’t believe in half of his rules.
She would always tell me back in her day, her brother—the previous leader—was always punishing her for speaking out.
She’d been given the position as a librarian for a punishment, to isolate her, but it just made her more.
.. her. I owe her a lot really. Without her, I probably wouldn’t have—” She cut herself off, and the look of rage that crossed over her features caught me off guard.
“You see, it was right around when I was fifteen that our dear, beloved leader started to come on to me.” I couldn’t help it; this time I did growl, my lips automatically pulling back from my teeth. Jeannie’s eyes went wide with shock, and I quickly controlled my expression.
“Sorry.” I said, and it took an awful lot of willpower to beat back the surge of violence from within my alpha. Fifteen. FIFTEEN? That was a child. A literal adolescent. How utterly pathetic and disgusting did one have to be to go after a minor?
Thankfully, Jeannie seemed to settle, and didn’t take my aggression as any sort of threat or disapproval toward her.
“I didn’t get it at first, just thought maybe I was that good of a kid.
But then, when I did realize it was wrong, I ended up going to my parents.
I thought they could tell me what to do to discourage him, or explain to me how I had accidentally led him on.
Because it had to be my fault, right?” She licked her lips, and I braced myself because I knew that worse was coming.
Now that I knew the beginning, and I knew the end, all I had to do was extrapolate what was in between.
“Instead, they told me that I should be proud of being recognized. They’d always told me I was special.
That wasn’t really how they said it growing up, I believe they said I was weird, or that nobody’s brain worked like mine, but apparently that was close enough.
Try as I might to explain to them, they never seemed to understand why it was uncomfortable or even why it was a bad thing at all. ”
Of course they fucking didn’t! Now, I regretted not jumping right onto her stoop and ripping their stupid, old heads off their bodies.
I didn’t like to think of myself as a violent bear, but it was clear to me now that one of the reasons Jeannie had fought so hard to be the best mother she could be was because her own had failed her so thoroughly.
“It was at my sixteenth birthday celebration that our leader cornered me and I had to reject him. He wouldn’t back off, so I kicked him in the balls. As you can expect, that went over about as well as a triple-decker chocolate cake at a gluten-free convention.
“He didn’t tell anybody, because then he’d have to admit a little girl kicked him in the crotch, but the social ostracization was pretty instant.
My parents lost their position in the church.
Our rations were cut. Every night, they screamed at me, telling me I had ruined everything because I was an ungrateful child. ”
I…
I had no words.
Jeannie was powerful, brave, and I’d always been impressed with her. I’d sensed there was some trauma in her past, but I couldn’t have imagined the extent of it. God, I wanted to shift and wipe out that entire commune. I wanted to hunt down her parents and—
“I made it another six months before I ran away. I’d like to say that was that, but I didn’t really get into the best scene.
I was couch-surfing, hitchhiking, going to whatever parties I could.
I drank a lot. I tried some substances I didn’t like, and I made out with a whole lot of people. I was pretty damn lost for a while.
“But then I met this guy. I thought he was literally Prince Charming. Jacob Keller, a twenty-six-year-old cross-country truck driver who told me I was so mature for my age and the most beautiful woman he’d ever met.
I should have known then. What kind of grown man is interested in a teenager?
But at the same time, he was so much younger than our leader, it seemed appropriate. ”
“You don’t have to keep going if you don’t want to,” I murmured, stroking Jeannie’s cheek with my free hand.
Her tone was still full of pain and anger and everything else one might expect, but I picked up something triumphant underneath it all as well.
Despite all these awful, terrible people, she had persevered.
She had become a successful, amazing woman who made the entire world better just by being in it.
“N-no. It’s good to get it all out. Like it doesn’t have as much power over me anymore or something. It’s not such a secret.”
I nodded and brushed my lips over her forehead. It was barely the ghost of a touch, but hopefully it let her know I was thoroughly and completely there for her.
It seemed to do the trick, because she smiled softly and continued.
“We had a sort of whirlwind romance. I guess you could say he was my first love. We traveled across the country, and I got to see so many things I never did. The commune was up in Washington, so you can imagine how different everything was.
“We actually lasted longer than you would expect. Nearly two full years of honeymooning. And you know what? I’m sure it would have kept going for at least another couple if I didn’t get pregnant.
I thought long and hard about whether I wanted to keep the baby.
I knew it would be hard. And I do believe people should have a choice.
But to me, it felt like my journey involved having a kid with the love of my life.
“As you can imagine, Jacob didn’t agree, so he pushed me out at a rest stop in North Carolina and drove off. I could have chased him, but seeing his taillights disappear into the distance while I stood there in the dead of night told me he was gone forever.”
“I… I’m so sorry, Jeannie. I really am. You never deserved any of that.”
“You’re right. I didn’t. But you wanna know what’s crazy?”
That was a very wild thing to ask after the full story she just told me, but I nodded instead of pointing that out.
“It was actually the lot lizards who saved me.” Lot lizards?
“All those women who were probably more tired than I was, colder, and plenty of them had substance abuse issues—” Ah.
Suddenly I understood the term. “—they found me standing there in the parking lot hours later and took me to this dive hotel, let me stay with them, made sure I showered and ate. The next day, they took me to one of the ‘good’ drivers who brought me to a shelter here for unwed mothers and survivors of domestic abuse. I never really thought of what I went through as domestic abuse, but all those amazing women made me see I had been taken advantage of.”
“Jeannie, I would like to hug you now,” I said, my voice shaking.
“You are hugging me,” she said, gesturing to my arms wrapped around her waist.
“You know what I mean.”
“Yeah, I do.”
“So, may I? Only if you’re comfortable.” Although every single atom in my body was longing to hold her, to squeeze her, to shield her from anything that could ever hurt her again, I knew she was in such a tricky and tremulous position that I needed to make sure she was okay with every step I took.
Too many people in her life had failed her, had violated her consent in one way or another, and I would never be one to join that list. I would launch myself into space before I did that.
“Please,” she said, wrapping her arms around my shoulders and leaning her head against my cheek. “Just hold me for a while. You always make me feel so much better.”
If I could have that engraved on a piece of wood, I would hang it over my entryway with pride. I was even tempted to rent one of those planes with a trailing banner behind it.
It wasn’t the right time to gloat, however, so I held her until her scent settled and her heart stopped thundering. Once she was calmer, I lifted her chin and stared into her eyes.
“Thank you so much for sharing this with me, Jeannie. I don’t take it lightly. But please, there is just one thing I need to ask you.”
Nerves played openly across her face, and I hated that I was making her uncertain, but my question was vital. “What is it?”
“You understand that none of this is your fault, right? None. Every single one of these people failed you when you were alone and vulnerable.”
She stared at me. Stared some more. And then stared a bit longer. I almost wondered if I’d burst into full Creole with how she was… yup, still staring.
“Jeannie?” I prodded gently.
“Sorry, it’s just, uh, I don’t think I’ve ever heard that before. Probably because I’ve never told anyone in my current life about my old one. It kind of took me by surprise.”
“That’s okay. I’ll keep on saying it as long as you need to hear it.”
I didn’t expect her to lean forward and kiss me, but I welcomed it. It was gentle, tentative, and salty from her tears, but lovely, nonetheless.
When we parted, I was so flooded with fondness and affection that I wanted to see her smile one more time.
“Do you want me to take care of those assholes for you?” I said sincerely.
“What do you mean by that?”
“Whatever you want it to. Make them dinner. Run them out of town. With a sniper rifle. Whatever you want.”
That finally did it. A giggle burst out of her. It did make me feel pretty great about myself that even in very serious times when discussing the worst of the worst, I could still bring joy to Jeannie’s life. She certainly brought so much to mine.
“No,” she said finally. “But thank you. This is something that I need to do.”
“I understand. As long as you know you don’t have to do it alone.”
“I know.” Another sweet, tiny soft kiss. “Now, I believe you said something about a roast chicken?”
“I believe I did.”