39. Logan
39
***Logan***
“ D o you remember the night my dad left?” I’d been thinking about that night a lot and I wondered if Brooke ever thought about it. We were sitting on the sidewalk under her mural, sharing a bag of chips and a root beer from the gas station down the street. The sun was bright and I’d dropped my sunglasses onto her nose. She looked good in them.
Brooke hadn’t taken her eyes off of me since we’d left the bathroom. She didn’t look freaked out by what I’d said. She looked warmer, more open. “Of course, I do.”
We’d never really talked about it. I couldn’t help wondering how she remembered it. “Tell me.”
She frowned and lifted her hand to brush my hair off my forehead. Her touch was so soft that I couldn’t stop myself from leaning into it. “I wanted to see what some of the other girls at school were talking about.”
My face scrunched as I stared at her in confusion. “What?”
She blushed but she didn’t look away. “You were kind of a hoe, Logan. You slept around. The girls talked about it. They always teased me about you and your body, about all of you, really. I pretty much had a detailed image of what y’all looked like naked before I ever saw you naked.”
I was still confused. “We didn’t sleep around that much.”
“Sure, you did. But I didn’t and I was curious. You three were everything to me and I think I felt left out. You were giving this huge part of yourselves to everyone but me. At least that’s what it felt like.” She frowned. “So I decided to make it happen. The seeing you naked part.”
“You were giving plenty of yourself away, little bunny. We heard our fair share of shit in the locker rooms for a while. Until we started beating the shit out of anyone who dared utter a single word about you.”
“Seriously?”
I scoffed. How had she not known that? “There’s a pretty simple explanation for how you managed to keep your virginity for as long as you did, despite the guys you were chasing.”
Her face tightened and then she laughed after a few seconds. “I did get ghosted a lot, didn’t I? I just thought I was bad at blow jobs, or something.”
Growling, I cupped the back of her head to pull her closer. “No. That never happened. You never touched another man besides us.”
Smiling, she just shrugged. “Anyway. I decided I wanted to see y’all naked and I made it happen. I accidentally ran into the locker room when I knew you were in there alone. I was supposedly hiding out from Principal Jimmy because I wasn’t supposed to be on campus after getting suspended for that whole cupcake thing that we’re not going to talk about.”
I jolted. “Holy shit. I think everything that followed made me forget that part. You little pervert.”
Her smile was more reserved and a little sad as she continued. “I thought I was just going to see you naked and figure out what everyone was talking about. Instead… Instead, I saw the bruises. You were covered in them, Logan.”
I’d dealt with the memories of the abuse so they didn’t bother me as much anymore, but I hated the way Brooke’s eyes filled with tears as she continued. It made me want to go back and protect her from ever seeing them.
“Your back… Every part of your spine had a bruise. I’d never liked your dad and I’d known he was an asshole to you but I didn’t know he did that. I never could’ve known. You hid it so well.”
I wiped her eyes and tugged her closer. “I turned around and saw you standing there, a look of rage on your face, and then you let out this animalistic sounding scream and took off. I knew exactly where you were going.”
“I wanted to kill him.” She said it quietly but with so much ferocity that I knew she still felt that way. “I sprinted all the way to your house. I don’t even know how I got in, but suddenly I was standing in front of your parents with a baseball bat in my hands and I was screaming.”
I swallowed, an image of her in that pose still one that haunted me some nights. He could’ve snapped her neck so easily. He was a giant of a man, as big as I was as an adult, maybe bigger. I’d sprinted out of the locker room after yanking clothes on and Noah and Colt had spotted me running like the devil himself was chasing me. We’d gotten to my yard when the screaming started. Brooke, barely at my father’s shoulder, was screaming at both my parents, threatening my dad for what he’d done.
“You know, I’d never fought back before that day.” I searched her face and cupped her cheek. “He went after you, though.”
She pushed the chips out of her way and crawled into my lap, straddling me right there in broad daylight on one of the busiest streets in town. “I couldn’t understand how he would hurt someone so special. I wanted to hurt him. If he hadn’t lunged for me when he did he would’ve taken a bat to the skull in the next few seconds. You saved me, though. You shoved me out of the way and you fought him.”
It hadn’t been pretty. Colt had to pull me off of my own father in the end. That night, father dearest had packed his shit and left, never to be seen again. Mom was angry at me for running off her great love, or some shit, and life had still been hell. It hadn’t been violent, though. “I’ve thought about that day so many times over the years. You never hesitated. It didn’t matter that you were a kid still and that my dad was massive. It didn’t matter that I hadn’t explained things. You just ran into battle for me. No one had ever done that for me.”
Her head dropped to my shoulder. “And then I abandoned you.”
I stroked her back. “Do you think you had feelings for us back then?”
When she looked at me, her eyes were full of sadness and regret. “I did. I didn’t know back then, I guess. I didn’t understand it. You three were my everything. My world rose and set around you. We’d been there for each other through everything. When I went to find my deadbeat dad, you were there. When Colt’s mom died, we were right there. I think I knew when I asked you guys to take my virginity. I wanted it to be special and not a horror story like the ones I heard at school, but I think I just wanted it to be y’all. After we’d kissed, though, I couldn’t go back to pretending.”
“You went cold after that night.” I cupped her face. “Why?”
“I was scared.” She let out a broken laugh. “I’m still scared. I’ve never seen a healthy relationship in my life, Logan. I don’t know what one even looks like, much less how to be in one. And I’m skipping from beginner level to fucking expert by trying to be with all three of you. I feel like one wrong step and I can bring the whole thing down on my head. The only thing different is that I’m not a little girl anymore. I understand what the fear means now.”
I went still. “What does the fear mean, Brooke?”
She licked her lips and took a deep breath. “It means I’ve probably always loved you.”