Chapter 13
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A monster in love is still…a monster.
Lukas
She did not reject me; she said no. She did not reject me; she exercised her power of choice. She did not reject me; she proved to me that she is growing so beautifully and so safely in my care. Because of me. My efforts. My guidance. Me, me, me.
My fists pound against the punching bag in the workout room; heavy breaths rake through my lungs. I have been in here since five in the morning, wailing away on this bag after a sleepless night.
My sheets caught her scent for the brief moment she was buried in them, and the vanilla almond of her flesh clung. Haunting me. All night.
She did not reject me.
This is a good thing.
Except she did reject me, and this is a bad thing, and everything sucks.
So she can tell me no. Woohoo. She’s not supposed to want to. She is never ever supposed to want to. Furthermore! I wasn’t even asking to sleep with her, I was offering to sleep beside her. Together. Innocently. Her body in my arms. Her everything…close…driving me mad with adoration…
And, yet, she still rejected even that much.
Breathing heavy, I let loose a string of curses and beat the pulp out of my stupid bag.
Exhaustion plagues my poor crying muscles by the time I know I need to take a break, and I startle, yelling, when Viktor enters the room.
Letting the bag swing to a still, I rip off my gloves, swallow hard, and meet his dredging gaze. “Oh, Viktor.” I clear my throat. Who yelled? Not me. “Morning.”
“…morning.”
“Treadmill?” I ask, pointing toward the line of three on the other side of the room, near the full-wall mirror, which is there, presumably, so we can stare at ourselves as we die.
Viktor does not abide my deflection even as he heads toward the treadmill he normally uses and starts a warmup pace. “What’s going on?”
“Going on?” I toss my gloves by the bag and start my own treadmill one level faster than Viktor’s. Because. I’m competitive, and need to be the best, and am sick, twisted, and demented in every way possible. “What do you mean?”
“You’re not a skittish person. Most days. The exception to the rule…is when you’re anxious.”
Anxious? Bah. I’m not anxious. I’m never anxious. The stage fright was beat out of me at five. I’ve never been anxious since.
“How’s Clara?” Viktor asks.
I tense. “Excellent. Why? Stop thinking about her. Don’t think about her. Never think about her.” I might growl that last line, but who cares?
“What did you do?”
“Nothing.” I put her in my bed, told her to make me hers, and was left bidding her goodnight at her door. I did nothing to her. And this is fantastic.
I’m proud.
I’m so, so, so flippin’ proud of her.
I just also…hate myself…and everything else.
I’ve spent this entire morning beating thoughts of coercion out of my head. She’s fragile. One teeny tiny little suggestion that I’m disappointed she didn’t want to stay with me last night, and she’ll crack—reverting to old habits, begging to satisfy my needs in any way she can.
Despite knowing that it’s wrong, every fiber of my being wants her to grovel for me. Confirm that she does want me. Explain why she rejected me.
But that is not to her good.
Rejection does not require reason.
Saying no does not come with an essay.
She needs the basic human right to feel safe telling me no. And I need to not screw it up just because I want the dang essay.
It’s a compulsion. A sick, twisted, horrific compulsion. I need to know my flaws. I need to fix them. I need to be perfect. I need to be…
I need to be enough.
And it is in this exact moment I realize…Clara and I are the same.
We are exactly the same.
My legs cease function as the truth hits me between the brows, and I shoot off my treadmill.
Viktor cusses, hopping off his to reach me in my heap. “Lukas,” he states, crouching while I sit—stunned—on the padded ground. “Are you okay?”
“Am I a people pleaser?” I ask, hollow.
“What?”
I fix my attention on him. “Am I a people pleaser? Does my ego hide the fact I am terrified of not making people happy? Does the spectrum of narcissism extend to people pleasing? After all, what is people pleasing if not manipulating someone’s opinion of you.
It’s just…softer. Seems more…self-destructive. ”
Viktor stares at me. “Lukas, just a few months ago, you made someone piss themselves when you threatened them. If there’s any people pleasing in you, it only applies to those you care about.”
“Is that curable?”
Viktor’s eyes narrow. “Is your one good trait of caring deeply for those you love…curable?”
I take offense to that. “I have plenty of good traits. My hair, for instance.”
Unamused, Viktor continues staring at me. “What. Happened?”
Feeding my burning lungs air, I mutter, “I propositioned Clara. She said no. Which is fantastic. But I haven’t slept all night, and I don’t know how to spare her from this feeling of rejection I’m facing when it’s not hers to handle and isn’t conducive to her continued growth in safety.”
“Why did you proposition her?”
My nerves pinch. “Because I—” I cuss. “—wanted to, Viktor. I want Clara. I want her so much it burns and aches and I’m losing my mind worrying she may never want me enough, worrying I’ll let my selfish streak get in the way of giving her what she needs because of what I—” I swear. “—want.”
“What does she need?”
“A friend,” I snap, and air pours from me.
“She needs a friend, Viktor… Someone who stands by her, supports her, protects her. She needs a friendship like what Crisis and Crimson have. An unbeatable bond that she can rely on. No matter what. When it’s hard to rely on herself, she needs someone who can promise her that she is reliable, because she is so beautiful and impressive and creative and… and stunning.”
“Is that what she needs? Or is that just the kind of bond you’d like to have with her?” my rotten brother asks, voice indecipherably level. “I think we both know that whatever Crisis and Crimson have is borderline obsessive and co-dependent—exactly the kind of thing you crave.”
I roll my eyes, because he’s an idiot.
What I want is to put her on my piano and tell her to play my body like its keys.
What I want is for this burning need to own her to go away, or get so strong it kills me.
What I want is for her to look at me the way Crisis looks at Crimson—with nothing but selfless adoration and stable tranquility.
Yeah. No, duh, I’m the one who craves that kind of a bond.
Screw what Clara needs. I can barely see past my selfishness on a good day, and I have never wanted anything this badly. “I don’t know,” I whisper.
All I know right now is that I shouldn’t be congratulating myself for not turning her on her stomach, pinning her hands above her head, and making her ask for me in spite of her no. I gave her the bare minimum. I don’t deserve an award.
I just can’t get the picture of how she would have crumbled so easily had I pressed even for a moment out of my head. I regret doing the right thing.
I sicken myself.
“You are not a good person,” Viktor tells me, star brothering. “None of us are. But you are good at communicating.”
“I can’t communicate this.”
“Why not?”
“Because, if she knows what I want, it’s as good as mine.
It’d basically be manipulating her. She is so unfathomably kind.
She’d sacrifice herself completely for anyone if they’re sweet enough about it.
She needs to know what she wants. And I need to be okay with that not being me.
” A cuss leaves me, and I feel like a child again, curled up, panicking after a failure left my back blazing.
The memory of my father’s belt buckle hitting me is raw in my brain.
In this moment, I’m a child again while Viktor looms nearby, stable and kind and a voice of reason in the darkness of the pain we all endured.
“I love her, Viktor. I love her. She makes me so happy, and I don’t even know why.
I don’t know what’s different about her beyond that—” I swear.
“—look in her eye that screams supplication. I shouldn’t be wanting her for her submission.
She’s just…everything about her…is precious.
She puts little stickers in her rainbow recipes, and she hasn’t sung yet, but every time she hums while she’s baking, pressure builds like hope in my chest that her remarkable voice might bring forth words, and that I might know them, and that we might turn to each other like we’re in a musical and harmonize so perfectly nothing else will ever give me the same high.
” Gripping my hair, I whisper, “I am not a gentle person, Viktor…yet she’s as delicate and soft as a cloud.
I can’t crush her in my fists. I can’t bottle her.
I can’t have her. At the root of it all,” my voice breaks as tears fall, “I’m not good enough for her. ”
Gentle, Viktor rustles my hair, and I look up to catch his smile. “Lukas, that feeling is exactly what will make you good enough for her.”
“Don’t give me hope,” I hiss. “I will abuse it.”
“No, you won’t.” He rises. “Not if it means hurting someone you love.”
My heart fragments.
He offers me his hand. “It’ll be okay. Promise.”
Gripping his hand, I swallow bitter helplessness, and dare to hope that he might be right.