Chapter Thirteen #2
What the hell? What would Kayla care enough about to be texting me like this?
Again the spelling is right and it makes sense so I think she must be sober but I can’t imagine any sober person texting like that.
All cryptic and angry for no reason. I don’t hide, I hid enough as a child for a lifetime.
I try to think if it could be anyone else but apart from my family I haven’t had anyone truly hate me for who I am.
Whatever she wants to hold over my head I won’t let her, I just need to find out what she is talking about first. It can wait until we land though.
Aiden’s hand rests low on the bottom of my back, but not low enough to be inappropriate, as he guides me to our gate.
Still my eyes dart around as we walk. The chances that Kayla is here are slim to none but the weight on my chest doesn’t take that as a comfort.
She wants to date me again and holding something over me to get it isn’t her usual MO – no, that is usually begging and then a drunken swing to yelling that I ruined her when I broke up with her.
Aiden senses the tension in me but doesn’t comment on it.
I let him take the lead as we walk to the boarding desk.
My eyes seem to snap from person to person trying to find her pixie cut but it has been so long since I’ve seen her that she might have grown it out by now.
She could be hiding in plain sight and I wouldn’t know until she wanted me to.
I have been able to take her texts with a grain of salt because I know she is struggling but that is not my cross to bear.
I block the number from the second text as I slip into the seat beside Aiden, I think this might be what she wants.
Maybe she is sober enough to be feeling her rage at my marriage, she doesn’t know how fake it is.
Maybe she is seeing it as a betrayal and is trying to scare me back into her arms. Little does she know it is having the opposite effect, if anything she is pushing me closer to Aiden.
Who better to hide from a crazy ex behind than a six-foot-three hockey player who put a rock on my finger?
“Are you scared of flying?” For the second time today Aiden’s voice brings me out of my stupor.
“What?” I ask, shaking my head to clear it of all thoughts of Kayla and her drunken nonsense.
“You just got super tense when it was time to board, if you don’t like flying you should have told me.” He is being too sweet for his own good. I’m not afraid of flying but he knows that, if I were, I’d probably keep it to myself so I wouldn’t be any trouble.
“No.” I fumble for an excuse, not wanting to worry him with my nonsense. “I’m scared about meeting your family is all. They might not like me.”
“Trust me, darlin’, everyone who meets you falls under your spell, they are going to love you.
” His hand wraps around mine, I have never met a man as open with physical affection as Aiden.
He never shies away from touching me, a hand on my back or folding my hand in his.
If he thinks it will bring me comfort, he will not blink before giving me that reassurance.
“You have to say that, you’re my husband.
” I nudge him gently in the ribs, I want him to know that even though meeting his family does make me nervous (even if that’s not why I’m tense right now), I won’t go back on our plan.
I’m in this by his side for as long as he needs me.
Until I have done my part as the doting wife.
“Lyndsey, trust me when I say I never say something I don’t mean, my family will like you because they think you love me and I love you, they wouldn’t try to get in the middle of that.
” His family is worlds apart from mine. My family love to get in the middle, that’s why it was so hard to hide my sexuality from them.
There was no privacy, every little thing I did was under a microscope to make sure I didn’t stray from the path they wanted me to walk, and if anything tried to interfere they would be in the middle of it before I could blink.
I do wonder what my life would have been like with different parents but it is too painful to consider because I didn’t get different ones.
I got parents who care more about making God happy than making sure their children are happy.
Aiden’s family seems nice: despite the adversity and trauma they have suffered, they are bonded together stronger because of it.
“I want to go over the plan again.” I shake those thoughts away too. A small metal tube in the sky isn’t the right time to be dissecting my childhood and my parents’ minds. He rolls his eyes but humours me anyway, not commenting on my almost obsessive need to change the subject.
“When did we get married?” He turns in his chair so he is facing me fully, pulling me along with him until I’m cross-legged in the chair with both of our hands joined together between us.
“May twenty-sixth.” I remember the entire plan, but what better way to distract myself from my phone than to go over the lies I’m about to live for at least a few weeks?
“Good, why didn’t we invite everyone?”
“It was last minute, we couldn’t go another day without wearing a ring.” I make an overdramatic gagging sound that makes Aiden roll his eyes.
“When did we start dating?” I don’t think he notices but with every question his thumb traces the ring on my left hand.
“That’s a tricky question, we didn’t go on our first date until July last year but we had been seeing each other casually since last April.
” We had to make it sound believable. Aiden isn’t the type to jump into a relationship – sleep with someone, yes; but introduce them to his family, not so much.
His sisters would be suspicious if we met and started dating right away, like he may have lost his mind because of a pair of pretty green eyes. His words, not mine.
“See, we have it down, don’t stress your pretty little head, darlin’. You’re going to be perfect.” He must think I’m still tense because he lets go of my hand to lift his to cradle my cheek as he speaks. He wants me to take the words to heart and I can see the sincerity reflected in his eyes.
“Show me pictures of your sisters so I know which is which. I don’t want to embarrass myself.” I should pull my head away from his touch but I don’t. I don’t melt into him either, I stay stock-still, unwilling to disconnect from the warmth of his hand.
“Okay, but I swear it’s unnecessary.” He waits a beat himself before he pulls his hand away to slip his phone out of his jacket pocket.
We sit shoulder to shoulder the rest of the flight.
We thumb through pictures from childhood all the way up until today.
He regales me with stories of his sisters bossing him around good and well their entire lives.
The reverence he talks about them with puts an ache in my heart.
I wouldn’t be surprised if my brother Peter never said my name in his life, never mind talked about me with love and affection.
Aiden tells me about his parents and what his grandfather was like before the people he loved started to die.
The entire flight I sit with my phone wedged under my thigh.
I don’t know why. I put the thing on airplane mode so no texts would come through anyway but a part of me is scared that the minute my phone reconnects it will be flooded with more thinly veiled threats.
So I tuck it away. I tuck my phone away but I also tuck the thoughts away.
Push them to the back of my mind and try my hardest to focus on the now, on Aiden’s stormy eyes and his fuller bottom lip.
I wish I could be one of those people who live solely in the moment so for now I pretend to be.
I’m pretending to be a wife, what is one more thing to hide from the light?