Chapter 42 June
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
June
There wasn’t another person in the world that could hate me as much as I hated myself right now.
I hadn’t slept all night. After I’d left Madi and Dallas, I’d been swallowed whole by self-loathing. They didn’t deserve the way I spoke to either one of them and I hadn’t meant half of what I said, but pushing them away was the only thing I knew.
I didn’t know how to give us the chance.
I pressed my forehead to the counter, squeezing my eyes shut. I’d made myself go through the motions this morning. Got up, made coffee, got dressed. I felt like a robot, cold and unfeeling.
Except I wasn’t unfeeling at all. I felt too much.
My phone started to ring and I sighed, answering without looking. “Hello?”
“You are such a bitch.”
I immediately sat up as my mother’s voice spewed venom through the speaker. What the hell had I done this time?
“I tried picking Laura up from school and they wouldn’t let me. Do you know how humiliating that is?”
“What—why were you trying to pick her up?” I asked, panic setting in.
“I wanted to take her for the day considering you and your brother never let me see her.”
Something fragile snapped. All of the patience I constantly fought to have with her, the way I tried to be the better person.
I didn’t have it in me this time.
“I wonder why that is,” I snapped. “I wonder why. Do you ever think about why or are you so caught up in your fucking fictional version of reality that you can’t see you are the fucking reason we don’t want you around her?”
She sounded like a banshee. “You are the reason. Because you hate me so much even though I’ve done everything for you. You’re keeping me from my granddaughter. My granddaughter. You can’t keep me from her, I won’t accept this.”
“She’s not even my daughter,” I snarled. “She’s my niece. My niece. Take this up with Ethan—”
“We both know you have your claws in him. He doesn’t pick up my phone calls like he used to, you manipulative cunt.”
A hollow laugh left me, a dry, tired smile twisting my lips. “Well, then don’t expect this to change.”
“Do you know how embarrassing it was to show up to see my granddaughter and find out I’m not on that list? That I was replaced by your two heathen friends? Including that bitch who’s dating those two gay men—”
“If you say one more negative thing about the people I love, I will make sure you never see Laura again. Ever.”
She scoffed. “The people you love? You don’t love them. You don’t know what love is.”
You’re wrong. You’re so wrong—
“You don’t know what it’s like to sacrifice everything for your children only for them to turn their backs on you.”
Without skipping a beat, I snapped. “You’re right. I don’t. But I do know what it’s like to have a mother who hates her daughter.”
“I don’t hate you. You’re just unlovable.”
But I’m not.
I pressed my fingers to my eyes. It was the same argument we’d had a thousand times over the years. The same fucking one. I was the problem, I was the failure, I was the reason everything was the way it was.
“Stay away from Laura,” I finally said. “Stay away from Ethan. Stay away from me.”
“If you don’t add me back, I’ll report him.”
“What?” Shock rattled me, my bones going cold.
“I’ll report him to CPS. That he’s hitting Laura.”
“Why would you do that? He’d never hurt her. He’d never lay a hand on anyone.”
“Add me back,” she growled.
“No,” I said firmly. “Make all the threats you want. Call CPS and do that and find out what happens when you lie.”
“Do it. Do it or else—”
“No.” I hung up.
The temptation to throw my phone across the room was all consuming. I’d never do that, though. Growing up with a mother who threw things had left its impression, and since age five, I vowed I’d never be like her.
Instead, I stood up from my stool and went to the back of my shop. I yanked open the cooler door and stepped inside. The heavy metal slammed shut behind me.
I was shaking. I hated it. I hated it when she made me feel this way. The tears were there, hot and threatening and making me feel weak.
I was so tired of being strong. Being the eldest daughter was a fucking curse. I didn’t ask for this, didn’t ask to be at the center of her hatred, yet here I was. It was always me. Always.
I wiped away the tears and took slow, deliberate breaths.
This had to stop eventually. Right? All her vitriol would eventually shrivel up. That was the lie I told myself because it gave me hope.
One day she’d stop making me cry. One day her words wouldn’t get to me. But until then, I’d be damned if she ruined Ethan’s life. He was trying. He was trying so hard, and he was getting better, and I wouldn’t let her harm him.
Always the protector. Always the sacrificial lamb. It was my role in our family and at this point, I’d accepted it. I wore her hatred and disappointment like a red cloak.
Just as long as it kept her from hurting my brother and niece.
She’d never been physically violent. At least, not directly.
She’d maybe punch a hole in a wall or scream or shout, but growing up, I’d always been able to digest those outbursts easier than the quiet, leeching comments.
The disappointment in my appearance, in my choices, in my hair, in my clothes, in my tattoos, in my piercings, in my sexuality, in me.
Always in me.
“Fuck,” I breathed out.
Anger was as powerful as it was exhausting, a wave that always left destruction in its wake, breaking down my carefully built peace, shattering all my beliefs about myself.
A muffled voice came from outside. I closed my eyes for a moment as I pulled on the mask. It wasn’t a comfortable one but it was the one I’d mastered over the years.
I stepped out of the cooler. “Be right there,” I called. Fuck, my voice had a slight tremble to it.
One more deep breath and I prayed my composure was believable. I walked down the hall, training my eyes on the floor and taking one step at a time as I came back to the front.
“Sorry, I—” I cut myself off as I met Dallas’s warm eyes.
Concern immediately pulled his brows together. “Fuck. What happened, June?”
No.
I spun around and ran. I couldn’t do this. I couldn’t be seen by him of all people right now, because if he looked at me for longer than three seconds, I’d break. And I wasn’t supposed to be breakable. I wasn’t supposed to be fragile.
Rough hands circled my wrist and yanked me back. I gasped as Dallas pinned me against the wall, his face inches from mine, our breaths coming out in huffs.
“I’m sorry,” he rasped, immediately gentling his grip. “I’m sorry. But what the fuck? What is wrong? What happened?”
I curled my fingers into his shirt. “I hate you,” I wheezed out. Hot tears started surging to the surface, everything spiraling. “I hate you. I hate you so much. Why did you come in? Why are you checking on me? After I spoke to you the way I did yesterday, why would you ever want to see me again?”
“Because I care about you—”
“Why do you care about me?” A sob loosened in my chest and I felt like an animal. Wild and trapped and broken. “Why does anyone care about me? Why? I don’t matter. I don’t do anything right, I can’t be what everyone wants me to be, I can’t do this.”
“June,” he whispered, his voice cracking. “Who hurt you, baby? Talk to me. Please.”
Every muscle in my body snapped like a rubber band. I sank forward, but his arms were around me, lifting me with ease as my face fit against the curve of his neck and I cried.
I hated crying. It made me feel weak. I’d trained myself from an early age not to shed a single tear, no matter how devastated I was, because it just led to me getting screamed at.
So why couldn’t I stop? Why did my chest feel like it was breaking apart, the agony of feeling unloved consuming me?
Every sound I made was ugly and I wanted to stop, but I couldn’t.
“I’ve got you,” he murmured. “I’ve got you.”
Suddenly we were sinking down, but he didn’t let go of me, even with his back against the wall. He held me to him as he sat down on the floor, rocking me slowly.
Fingers worked into my hair, massaging the back of my head in a way that chased some of the tension away. But it meant my face was pressing against him. I sniffled and shook my head, mortified as a trail of snot wet his shirt.
“I hate this,” I choked out.
“It’s that bad, huh?” he whispered. “Letting someone see you like this?”
All I could do was nod.
Evie and Avery had seen it on the rare occasion. Mostly I saved this for when I was alone and no one could perceive me.
A deep breath shuddered through me. My eyes squeezed shut, my temples throbbing as he continued to rock me. Comfort me.
“My mom called me,” I finally got out.
“It was bad.”
I nodded. “She tried to pick Laura up from school today and found out we took her off the approved adult list. She was replaced by Avery and Evie. So now it’s me, Ethan, and the two of them. But not her.”
“Because she can’t be trusted.”
“She threatened to call CPS and tell them Ethan is hitting Laura if we don’t put her back on the list.”
“What?” Dallas jerked back. “What the fuck? But he’s not. He’d never do that.”
“No, he wouldn’t. And when I pointed out that that’s easily proven to be a lie, she just started screaming at me.
Just a dose of pink-haired whore and cock-sucking bitch and a whole lot of other things I won’t even repeat.
” I finally took a long breath. “I can handle it when she hates me. But putting Ethan and Laura at risk . . . Laura has already gone through so much. I can’t see her go through more. I can’t.”
“What do we do? We’ll help. All of us will help.”
I felt myself relaxing more and more. “I don’t know what there is to do. Ethan is trying his best, but I’m worried she’ll do something terrible.”
“We should talk to him,” Dallas said. “And maybe make a plan with Laura. I know the idea of her going through something else is terrifying, but maybe actually talking to her about her grandmother would be smart. She’s not oblivious.”