Chapter 16
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From the tower, to the castle.
Clara
Mom called me last night, while I was drawing on Lukas and didn’t have my phone.
The physical revolt and dread that shredded through me when I saw the missed call this morning made me wish I were back in his arms, as reluctant to leave as he was to let go.
Now the dull sensation of sickness swirling in my stomach mingles with the guilt that I am intentionally ignoring her call…
but I can’t bring myself to remedy that.
I love my mother.
I love my family.
But…when Lukas said his family was ours last night?
Something inside me swelled and mended. Yes, the broken child within me cried, this is a family. This is what it means to have a family. Your family is mine, and it is right.
A real, true home is somewhere safe, full of people you can count on.
No matter what.
In the front seat of Lukas’s car as we head toward the studio in a city beyond Sunset, I stare at my wrist. He freshened my brand last night, but this time he wrote Lukas’s, and for some reason, that means more than when he signed King with the trained fluidity that implied he’d done it a million times before, for a million other people.
I keep tracing the letters and repeating the promise in my mind.
I am his. I belong. I am loved.
“What if I get this tattooed?” I murmur.
He glances toward me. “Zakery could do it. He did mine. He’s got a whole kit.
He normally keeps his own tattoos covered beneath that jacket of his, but he’s just completely inked, top to bottom, all work he’s done himself.
” Lukas slams on the brakes at a stoplight and looks at me.
“Wait. You’re thinking about getting my name… tattooed…on you?”
I wince. “Sorry. Does that make you uncomfortable?”
His head shakes. “No.” He clears his throat. “That’s… That wouldn’t make you uncomfortable? Tattoos are pretty permanent.”
I meet his eyes. “For someone constantly warning me about how egotistical, commanding, and controlling he is, you’re pretty bad at being egotistical, commanding, and controlling.”
“Sorry. You’re right.” He takes a deep breath and focuses out the windshield. “Get my name burned into your skin, E-clair-a, and let me kiss it while you tell me how much you’re mine, while you beg me to own you.”
Better late than never, I suppose.
A fragile smile lifts my lips as I lean across the console, against his shoulder, and try to breathe through the anxiety.
It’s fine. I’m his. He wants me. He wants to own me.
And not in the way that my parents always seemed to want to commandeer my every move, controlling my every thought and action, making me doubt any piece of independence I could obtain.
Here, with Lukas, I feel more secure than I ever have.
More sure of myself. More capable. I stayed with him last night, because I wanted to, because I trusted him.
And, right now, beneath his shirt, he is covered in glittery marks of me.
Glittery claims that he begged me for. Because our relationship is a two-way street.
He is just as desperate for me to tell him he belongs as I am to belong.
Everything is fine. I’m doing well. I can tell Mom that I’ve been with Lukas this entire time, so I couldn’t return her call.
I’ll tell her I’m working on the autograph situation, trying to get her more than one without making it too obvious.
That way, maybe she won’t think I’ve failed to get her any after nearly an entire month?
That way, she won’t think I’m a failure of a daughter…
even though—no matter what I do—she always has.
My stomach sinks, and I lose my smile.
“What’s wrong, cupcake?” Lukas soothes.
“I wish the people we loved loved us back in the ways we need them to. I feel like Rapunzel from Tangled. I’m just waiting on the moment when everything falls apart, and I have to run back home, but there’ll be no suns in my paintings to let me know I’m a long-lost princess.
I’ll have just been stupid, deluded into thinking better exists when it doesn’t. ”
Lukas’s mouth opens, then closes. He takes a breath, letting it out slowly, before saying, “Are we…talking about the movie with the villain figure directly designed as an example of an abusive parental relationship?”
“I… Yes?”
“Clara, whether I’m your Eugene or not, I’m gonna need you to stay out of your tower, okay?
That’s really important to me. You don’t belong up there in a place where people make you feel scared and less-than all the time.
Regardless of what happens here, with me, you have a place in Sunset.
I can get Viktor to show you whatever homes and apartments are available, and I’ll cover all the costs of getting you placed wherever you like best. You can apply to work at any of the few bakeries around here, and we’ll make sure you get put in production, not front-of-shop.
We’ll make your perfect world happen, so you can stay free, no matter what. ”
That sounds…absolutely wonderful.
Yet, I pout and roll up his long shirt sleeve until I find a mark from my glitter pen. “First, you forget to be controlling, now you’re forgetting to be possessive? What do you mean whether you’re my Eugene or not? Who else is allowed to be my Eugene?”
He sighs, deflating into a smile. “You’re right. I’m keeping you in my castle regardless of your wishes. You belong with me, and that’s final. I’ll get you chained up in my room like Mother Gothel did to Rapunzel, no Eugene to save you from my clutches by cutting your pretty hair.”
I turn my face against his shoulder. “The movie doesn’t really show how Rapunzel dealt with the grief of losing the relationship she had with her abusive mother. She just kind of…finds her real family…and lives happily ever after. I don’t think it’s that simple. I think…it probably always hurts.”
His body moves as he releases a breath. “I think…you’re probably right.”
“I do like your castle, though. Just because it hurts doesn’t mean I deserve to live in a tower.”
Turning his head, he kisses my hair. “Did something happen, cupcake?”
My mouth opens, but I can’t find the words right away.
Finally, though, they spill free. “My mother called me last night. I missed the call. I haven’t been able to bring myself to call her back.
She wants me to send her your autographs, so she can auction them online.
She wants me to bear your child and marry you, or use the scandal and child support to make her comfortable and rich for life.
She thinks…” I wince. “She thinks that’s what I’ve been doing.
Working on getting pregnant. Lying to you about birth control.
Doing whatever it takes to get your money for her. ”
Silence.
It weighs on my lungs.
I squeeze my eyes shut and weather the regrets.
I shouldn’t have said anything. I shouldn’t have.
I’m speaking poorly about my mother. She’s not a terrible person.
She just grew up poor. She doesn’t want that for me, or herself, and this is practically free money in her mind.
So low-effort. A few scribbles as some sort of payment for…
for taking advantage of me and all that.
I’m so stupid. So, so, so stupid.
“Do you want children?” Lukas asks.
I lift my face, stare at his stoic profile. “What?”
“I don’t see how it helps your mother, but I’d be happy to get married and have little ones with you.”
“But…you…aren’t even…comfortable with the process…of creating children. You told me.”
He shrugs. “Maybe I’ll get comfortable if you decide I’m worthy enough to drown.
Maybe I won’t. Maybe I like the idea of trying, with you, forever.
Maybe I like the idea of you saying yes, Lukas, marry me, make me yours for the rest of my life.
Maybe I like a whole lot of what you just said—save the parts where your mother implied you’d take my baby and leave.
I don’t know what nonsense she’s hallucinating, but she’s—” He cusses.
“—stupid if she thinks I wouldn’t fight for custody of a little baby with my hair and your eyes. ”
I don’t understand what’s happening. Did he just propose?
My attention falls toward the little glittery mark peeking out from beneath the sleeve of his shirt.
This has to be a rich person thing. Marriage is a party, an ad, a moment without consequences. He’ll make me sign a prenup, and I’ll have my fifteen minutes in the spotlight with him before I grovel for however many years he wants to put up with me.
After that, it’s divorce. He’ll remarry fast. I’ll suspect he was having an affair. I’ll go down in history as King’s first wife.
Except, one problem…I want to be Lukas Bachelor’s only wife.
“How many children do you want?” I ask.
“As many as it takes.”
My brow furrows. “As many as it takes for what?”
“To get my hair and your eyes.” He pulls into the parking lot of a rather important looking building.
Finding a space, he parks and turns to me, bracing an elbow on the center console.
“I’m not shocked your mother is trying to use me through you.
Do you want to tell her that I’m planning to marry you?
Do you want a few autographed albums to send her?
Do you want me to take over her role of controlling you and make it very, very clear that she’s no longer allowed to tell my girl what to do? ”
That one. Completely, completely that one… But, also. “I don’t want you to feel like you have to play the bad guy.”
“I am the bad guy, cupcake. It pisses me off that she’s in your head when that’s my real estate. What do I have to throw at her to make her go away?”
Every muscle in my body tenses. “I’m sorry. I won’t mention her again.”
“That’s not the solution,” he says. “What do I have to do to you to make her inconsequential compared to me?”
If my research and reflecting thus far is right…I think he needs to mentally and emotionally abuse me for twenty-two years, never missing a single moment to remind me how he carried me in his womb for a grueling nine months whenever I mess anything up, even if I haven’t messed anything up yet.
My attention lowers to his midsection, the abs his tight shirt defines, and I… I think I have some bad news.
He drawls, “I’d have to have given birth to you, huh?”
“Sorry,” I whisper.
He sighs, cupping my face and making me look at him. “We’ll get through this. You’re not alone, Clara. You never have to deal with her alone, ever again.” Lifting my wrist, he presses the ink mark to his lips. “Mine. Remember? Whose name is on your skin?”
“Yours,” I say.
“And who’s allowed to own you?”
“You.”
“And why do you humor my nonsense?”
Because, I don’t say, you love me. In a way that actually looks like…love.
He chuckles at my silence, smiling and releasing me before he opens his door. “Come on, cupcake. We’ll handle Gothel later.”