Chapter 28
Vulnerability sucks.
Crisis
My heart lives in my throat now. It’s a terrible experience, but I’m learning to deal with the thunder it creates in my ears. I don’t know what compares to the feeling of multiple eyes on my writing while I sit beside someone who I know will have nothing good to say about it.
I’ve never opened myself up to judgment like this before. Not intentionally. Of course, I’ve gotten unsolicited comments tons of times, but willingly putting myself out for slaughter?
That is new.
Every time a pen moves, I want to vomit, so I’m maintaining a dedicated interest in my hands, tangled together on my lap. The moment my mind wanders, I’m done for.
Yet curiosity nags.
So my eyes flick toward Viktor.
My sample work rests before him, untouched.
The top of my head burns.
Dragging my attention up, I find his eyes—wide, stunned, fixed on me, blazing with a dozen questions he can’t ask in front of everyone .
I glance at my pages, then look back at him.
His throat bobs, but he clicks his red pen open, adjusts his reading glasses on his nose, and pours his focus into the double-spaced lines.
When his hand moves, my chest tightens.
A mark. The first of many, no doubt.
Except, it’s a…check?
The first thing he noticed was something good ?
Heart rate picking up, I stare, hanging on his every motion. Another mark. Another check.
Is he only picking out good things because he’s trying to woo me? I’ll lose all respect for him if that’s the case. I can’t trust a man who gives that sort of special treatment only to the people he’s attracted to. Respect and honesty are for everyone—even if that honesty is harsh. Curbing his critique now would mean he knows he’s being cruel when he doesn’t soften the blow.
If my work from ten years ago before he met my childbearing hips was garbage and now suddenly it’s no notes , I’ll know every nice thing he’s said is a lie.
He circles a paragraph. Writes: Transition? Check pacing.
I bite my lip.
He underlines a sentence. Writes: Excessive description.
Given that I saw what happened to the other pages he critiqued last week, I’m counting the number of markings on mine as a major success by the time he’s reached the end. In the white space below the final paragraph he writes: Why didn’t you tell me you were a writer?
Because.
I’m not.
I gave up on doing anything with my writing ten years ago, in the face of a few simple, professionally dismissing paragraphs.
People like Odessa are writers. She took her bleeding copy back from you after facing public humiliation and did everything she could to fix it before coming back for seconds.
I haven’t even looked at the story I sent to you for critique since I came to the conclusion nothing about it deserved such disregard. I’m not a writer. I’m just…lonely. I’m just lonely, and the only thing that will listen to me is a blank page.
Dropping my gaze back to my hands, I wait for everyone else to finish.
This time, Odessa gets the first word in. And it starts with her slamming her pens down on the table as she half rises from her chair. “I need this book.”
My breath catches.
“Please tell me you finished writing it yesterday.”
“W-well,” I start, reminding myself that Odessa is a poor judge of good writing, and this enthusiasm means absolutely nothing, “I should be done tomorrow.”
Viktor’s hand closes into a fist around his pen.
“Shut up! You will not. Can I beta read for you?” She begins vibrating with eagerness. “I need to know more. The tension. The vibes. All of it. I’m obsessed.”
Someone else at our table smiles at Viktor. “What does the professional among us have to say? Personally, I couldn’t see anything that needed improvement. It painted a vivid picture and made me invested in more…but I know I don’t have nearly as trained an eye.”
“There were a few places where the transitions could be smoothed out, and others where description outweighed necessity.” He looks at me. “Part of the trouble with having a vivid style is getting lost in it. You don’t need to include so many of the five senses in such a short amount of time in order to deliver your intentions. Given the sample nature of this, I worry that the rest of the piece is bogged down by them.”
That’s feedback I can definitely stomach. And look for. And…maybe even fix. If there’s any point to that. After all, it’s not like I have any intention of becoming an author now.
This is little more than my attempt at getting some kind of closure. This is the redemption arc Crimson mentioned I should consider.
Consider it considered and carried out. Closure obtained. Everything is better now. Little seventeen-year-old Crisis is healing from wounds that probably weren’t even that bad.
So, why does it feel like I’m suffocating?
?
“You write,” Viktor states once we’re back in our room after both workshop and dinner. He has not yet closed the door behind him.
Clutching my marked-up copies—one of which I’m considering framing, since it is covered in tiny hearts and please give me more!! —I drop heavily into my desk chair, supremely thankful when it doesn’t break on me. “What is writing, really?”
“Putting letters into words and words into sentences, at length, for days.” His chest fills as he drops his sample pages atop his laptop with a delicacy that suggests he will not be framing them. “You write . And you’re a day away from completing a story?”
I wet my lips. “Well.” I clear my throat. “What is a story, really?”
“How many words is it? ”
“Forty-nine…thousand…maybe.”
“Forty-nine thousand. That’s not just a story. That’s almost a novel.”
Almost. “I know. It’s short. Especially for sci-fi. It’s drawing inspiration from some of the installments in The Murderbot Diaries in that regard.”
“When did you start it?”
“A few days ago. Probably.”
Viktor lands in his desk chair, peering across the room at me. “A few days ago?”
“I’ve been averaging seven thousand words a day. With all the time allotted to sit in a room and write, it’s not a big deal.”
“It’s a very big deal,” he grits. “You’ve been averaging seven thousand words a day on top of your day job, and you’ve produced a copy that is nothing short of immaculate.”
“ Immaculate? ”
“It’s one of the cleanest first drafts I have ever seen.”
“You’re joking.”
His brows lower, severe. “Why would I joke about something like that?”
Why, indeed.
Glancing down at my page spackled in hearts, I say, “If it was so good, why didn’t you have anything good to say about it in front of everyone?”
“What do you mean?”
“Too much description. Choppy transitions.”
“A few choppy transitions, and you need to be aware of your description. Everything else, I loved. Waxing poetic about everything I loved doesn’t help you grow as an author.”
“What in the world are you talking about? Of course it does. If you don’t tell me my strengths, how am I supposed to capitalize on them?”
Viktor…stares at me. Then, his eyes trail to the ground.
Something I’ve kept pent up inside for ten years rages to the surface. “Furthermore, some people aren’t as resilient as Odessa who can take a the very foundation of your work sucked and turn it into leaps and bounds of improvement.”
“She did amazing.”
“She did. Because she’s amazing. Not everyone is as amazing. Some of us are fragile, and you—especially given your position as a well-known author—hold a lot of emotional cards for people. One negative word from you can be soul crushing.”
“Critiques aren’t meant to be positive affirmations. They’re intended to help you improve.” He plunges his fingers into his hair, using his right hand, so I guess the sting’s irritation has completely abated now. I should have known from how he was using his red pen without issue earlier. “Is this how you’re telling me I was too harsh with you, Crisis? I’d prefer if you’d just say that.”
“Honestly, you were too harsh with everyone. It’s like you’ve never heard of the compliment sandwich.”
“I don’t see where calculating how to frame actionable information in compliments does anything but waste everyone’s time. If someone’s too soft to handle how they can improve their work, maybe they shouldn’t be professional authors, because professional authors? We get hate emails. And horrible reviews. On our most polished, most clean, most picked apart final drafts. People crawl out of the woodwork to hate us. Because, yeah, some of them don’t stop at the work. They hate us . They draw conclusions about who we are based on our fiction, and they despise us for any number of things, even just failing to get the next book out on their time schedule. I once got a one-star review that said it would have been five stars—if the last book in the trilogy had been out. It was a twenty-four-paragraph-long review. Bursting with hatred and calling me a horrible person because I left a fantasy sequel with trilogy intent on a cliffhanger .”
“Readers are in a different pocket, Viktor,” I snap. “Reader hate, entitlement, and absolutely bone-dead stupid reviews are normal and quite thoroughly inconsequential. Hearing only negative from someone you admire, someone who’s a master in the field, someone like you can be disheartening on an entirely different level. Not everyone is as emotionless as you where it concerns their work.”
“I did not get to this point in my career with positive feedback, Crisis. I—” He stops. Lips parted, he sits frozen, gaze locked on the floor in front of him.
A shiver cuts down my spine. “What?” I whisper.
His eyes close, and he rocks his head back, scraping a hand down his face as he groans. He swears. “I’m…sorry. You’re right. You’ve got to be right.”
“Don’t you dare concede because you just remembered that you’re supposed to be in love with me or something.”
A dry laugh exits him, hollow. “I would never, sweet pea. I’m conceding because I remembered who first taught me that improvement only comes from blood and tears… My parents had strict expectations for their kids to stand out and shine. I showed some potential with writing when I was young. Or, maybe I didn’t. Maybe I just aced the right essay at the wrong time. They fixated on the fact I’d become their great author. It was similar with everyone else, except Kaleb. Zakery sketched in the margins of his papers. He’s our artist , they said. Lukas couldn’t get music out of his head, so they shoved five different instruments at him, gave him voice lessons, and put him on a stage. Kyran was their baby, and he had all of us to protect and guide him, so he was spared the crowds and the niche classes. But they still managed to force him into being an internet sensation before they died. Nothing any of us ever did was good enough or perfect enough. Before the calluses formed, they made Lukas practice guitar until his fingers bled. Not a single kind word, but look at us? It’s likely I internalized that only focusing on where you can be better is how you succeed professionally. I know that’s not how it works outside of a career. I know people are fragile and desperate for love and acceptance. But I’ve put up emotional blockades between myself and work . And it shows.”
That is heartbreaking.
And it does nothing to quell the torrent of guilt that overcomes me.
Stomach sour, I plant my precious pages beside my laptop, open it, and go to an ancient email address that barely sees an incoming message these days.
Everything about it is juvenile, right down to the name: WritingThroughChaos .
It was my internet handle.
Once upon a time.
Unsteady, I rise from my chair and offer my seat to Viktor.
Carefully, he crosses the room, sits, and looks at my computer screen.
His eyes widen as realization immediately collides with him. “You…”
“I’m still not exactly graceful, am I?”
“This is why…” he whispers, putting the pieces together. His eyes squeeze shut. “I’m so sorry.”
“It wasn’t my first draft. Not at all. I tried so hard.”
Limply, he nods. “I’m sorry. It…it really did suck. I could barely follow what was going on. It felt like a fever dream. The grammar was perfect, but completely so. It read stilted and uncomfortable and unrealistic. ”
“I had pounded only break the rules if you know why so deeply into my skull, I couldn’t even bring myself to use slang. Fractions were firmly unloved.”
“It showed. A lot. I didn’t know what else to say. I didn’t have the time for a copy edit.”
“You were everything to me, Viktor. I know…” I manage a tight breath, let it free. “I know I overreacted, and I’m utterly mental …but you were the only entity in this world that felt like a friend. And, I guess, that makes me an entitled reader, judging you in a different way based off your work, but I can’t express where this response put me. For five years, I felt like I had a hand to hold. Then, suddenly, you let go. After I worked so hard to be enough for you, to reach you, to get some small bit of hope from you, I was alone again.”
He turns, looking up at me. “I am so sorry, Crisis.”
I hug myself. “I’ve finally made some peace with it. It was just…our traumas colliding.”
Reaching, he cups my cheek, runs his thumb beneath my eye, and smiles. “I’m glad they did. I’m not happy I hurt you, but I am so grateful the pain led you to me.”
That is probably a very, very unhealthy thing to say. But I can’t find it in myself to care, not when I’m thinking the same exact thing.
Cautious, I lift my hand to his, graze his knuckles. Close my eyes. Pull his touch away. “There.” My voice breaks. “The big secret’s out. Call me a fool for trusting you with it. Begin monologuing about how this whole love thing was just a plot to get me to finally give up the truth.”
“Crisis,” he says, not at all sounding like a villain mastermind beginning his tirade, “will you marry me?”
My eyes snap open. “W…hat?”
“I’d like to marry you. No prenup. Which is stupid, I’m sure you know, but I want your name on everything you already help me handle, and I want to know that you’ll be comfortable if you ever want divorce. I would hand you my part of everything, leaving only what belongs to my brothers alone.” He twists his grip so that he’s holding my hand instead, then he pulls my palm to his mouth. “I was only waiting to learn what I had to apologize for. If my apology hasn’t been sufficient—” He slips to his knees, keeping my hand pressed to the rough stubble of his cheek. “—tell me what you would have me do.”
“V-Viktor,” I stammer, as my face burns . “Get up. Your back .”
He smiles, teeth displayed. “I don’t have back problems for someone my height, sweet pea.”
“You didn’t have them. But then I made you sleep on the floor, and on a dog bed, and I’m positive you have them now.” My mind is spiraling. “I’m so much younger than you. Less mature. I was in middle school when you became a world-renowned author. We’ll have generational gaps. A-and I’m abusive, too. Completely toxic. Like broccoli peanut butter smoothies— with chia seeds!”
“I have survived all those things.”
“Right, sure. But you deserve to thrive .”
He kisses my palm, again, turning my arm into formless plasma. “I don’t need an answer right now. I’ve waited two years already to be certain the attraction that hit me when we first met wasn’t birthing infatuation, which would be unkind to your character once it settled.” His attention drops, to my thighs. “I’m still waiting for the infatuation to settle. But I at least know that I love who you are now, too.”
I clutch my legs together and try to step back. He does not free the hand tethered to him. My heart stampedes. “That kind of consideration doesn’t even cross my mind, Viktor. We are the definition of unevenly yoked. ”
“Yet jumping on yes in order to strip me of everything I have also hasn’t crossed your mind.”
“To be perfectly blunt, I don’t think I trust this proposal? If I say yes , you’ll laugh, call me stupid for ever thinking someone like you would want someone like me, and then tell me to pack my stuff and get out of Sunset. Clearly, the assessments I took to prove I was mentally stable need some updates.”
Pain flickers in his eyes, but it’s the pity that stings. “Shall I write you checks for millions? Hand you everything before you say yes ? Would you like to take pictures of me on my knees, for you, kissing your feet, hopeless? What power can I give you to make you feel safe? It’s all yours. Just tell me.”
My heart cannot handle this. But, more importantly, neither can my knees.
They buckle, sending me skidding to the ground in front of this…man. This very, very handsome, rich, kind man.
Mouth going dry, I stare at him. Baffled. Shivering. Scared . “Don’t you deserve someone better than me? Someone you don’t need to coerce into trusting you? If you’re not lying, Viktor, you are still everything. If you’re not tricking me…you deserve so much more.”
“I wish…” He closes his eyes, turning a kiss against my wrist. “…you could speak to yourself like that. If you accept me, I’d like to become your mirror, Crisis. I’d like to wake up with you in my arms and murmur my adoration into your flesh until it sinks into your bloodstream and changes your opinion of yourself. I want you to see you how I see you.”
“You want me to see myself as an insane girl who hunted you down for years to make your life miserable through numerous minor inconveniences? ”
A guttural sound rumbles from his chest. “Oh, my love, that is my favorite part.”
I think, maybe, I’m not the only one between us who’s insane.
“I need…time to think. I can’t…marry you if I don’t trust you. And I can’t even consider taking your money or blackmail if there’s a chance you’re serious. You deserve a better start to your marriage than that.”
He lifts a shoulder. “It doesn’t really bother me. After all, I trust you.”
“You trust me. Someone who has hated you. For a decade. And could immediately take advantage of you with what you’re offering on a more massive scale than I have ever had access to before?”
He presses his lips together, still smiling. “Yes. Exactly that.”
“Are you insane?”
“Probably. But it does not escape me that you’ve had access to my businesses and my bank accounts in very intimate and unchecked ways for two years. You’re brilliant enough to have made it all the way to my side; you’re brilliant enough to have been Sunset’s downfall already. There were violent ways to hate me, sweet pea. You…” Humor flits across his mouth. “…instead chose to remind me how I’m ever so geriatric…while I can bench press…five hundred pounds.”
I cuss.
As though he has something to prove, he sweeps me up off the ground like I weigh nothing, settling my rump on his forearm.
Gripping hold of his shoulders, I stop breathing.
“You need time to think?” he asks.
Dumbly, I nod.
“Okay. But…” He combs his fingers through my hair, dr aping the strands over my shoulder. “…while you think, understand there is nothing I wouldn’t do to prove I love you. And, if you get lost in your thoughts, stuck on how it’s unkind to be with me because you’re all the lies you’ve taught yourself for years, tell yourself that you hate me again. Despise me enough to make me suffer the blessing that is you.” He slides me to the ground, against his hard body, and I dissolve. “Can you promise me that?”
Pressed against him like this, I’m liable to promise him all sorts of things.
Because all I can do is nod.