Chapter 15 #2
The tears come. Just like they always do when I’m mad at him and madder at myself. I shouldn’t be. I know I shouldn’t blame myself. But how? How do I stop? How do I move on when he won’t fucking let me?
He wants me to be afraid and alone.
But I’m not alone. Not anymore.
With angry swipes at my damp cheeks, I remove the tears I hate so much and walk out the back door. Squinting at the bright sun, making summer known, I take a minute to watch the waves. Letting my chest rise and fall along with the crests. Letting it penetrate me with that mystical healing it holds.
I can do this. I can be different, this time. I can fight back.
Grady answers my knock on his sliding glass door.
“Hey,” he says, a concerned wrinkle around his frown. “What’s wrong?”
“Show me how to fight back.”
“I will,” he says, pulling me inside by my hand. “Tell me why you’re crying.”
“Shit.” I swipe more at my face. “Still? I don’t want Paige to see.”
“She may not be able to tell, but I can.” He rubs his thumb under my right eye. “What happened?”
“I lost a job. Even though I expected it, I’m still mad, you know?”
“Because of him?”
“Yes.” I don’t want to explain it, yet, because it’s still a raw, festering wound and I wasn’t lying about Paige.
I only want her to see me smiling and whole, even if it’s not quite true.
I liked it when she said I had a pretty smile.
I liked it a lot. It may have been the first honest compliment I’d had since before I started modeling.
“Okay,” he says, letting me ignore my reality for the time being. “Let’s go.”
Grady’s parents are in the living room with Paige.
His dad is also named Grady. When I asked the younger of the two if he was a junior, he laughed, saying it was worse than that, that he was the third. It’s cute, though, how he has that connection to his dad, who he is obviously close with.
Grady, the second, not the third, goes by Gray.
Which I also found cute because he’s Gray Steele.
Gray laughed about it and it made me more comfortable with him because he doesn’t take himself too seriously.
Even though he grumbles a lot, and Paige has taken to calling him Eeyore, I think it’s an act he puts on for his loved ones.
I greet them with the happiest smile I can muster. Maggie sees through it, her eyes soft when she returns my hello, but she doesn’t ask.
“Hi, Lulu!” Paige jumps up from the puzzle she’s doing on the coffee table, the scene of a park with several dogs playing in the grass.
“Hey, Paige, your hair looks so good,” I tell her, admiring the braid crown she wears.
“Thanks! My grandma does it for me because my dad doesn’t know how.”
“Hey, I’m learning,” Grady protests.
“Yeah, you’ve gotten a lot better,” Paige tells him, but I see the side-eye she sends to Maggie and I laugh.
“My skills lie elsewhere,” he harrumphs.
“You save people, that’s just as important,” Paige tells him, nodding.
“All right, let’s go teach you two how to punch jerks,” he says.
“Yeah! You ready, Lulu?”
“I’m so ready,” I tell her excited little freckled face.
“Me too! Dad says I can’t do it unless I tell a boy to leave me alone and he doesn’t. So, first we have to learn to yell no really loud.”
“Okay, let’s go yell no at your dad as loud as we can,” I say, holding my hand out to her. She takes it eagerly, and I feel like I won a prize in winning her trust. I don’t know anything about kids, having never spent much time around them. Yet, there’s a need inside me to be friends with this one.
“I’m not sure you know what you got yourself into, Son,” Gray says. “Holler if you need any help.”
“Will do, Pops.” We follow him down the hall and into the garage where he has a punching bag, pull-up bar, and some free weights set up in a makeshift gym.
“After your fingers are healed, we’ll work on some tactics that take both hands.
For today, only your right. I don’t want you reinjuring what is barely healed. ”
“Understood,” I say. I’m not wearing anything to brace them together anymore, but they still ache a little when I’m not careful of them.
Grady explains that he wants to see our natural instincts, first, saying he’s going to pretend to attack Paige and wants her to yell and fight back.
She narrows her eyes at him, widens her stance and says, “I’m ready, buddy!”
He does a good job of stifling his grin, but I notice the twitch around his eyes before he launches at her. Not too fast, yet enough for her to flinch before she remembers herself.
“Noooooo! Stop, you big creep,” she yells as loud as she can, her arms outstretched in front of her. She hesitates a second, then throws her tiny right fist at Grady’s shoulder as hard as her body allows. It’s enough to nudge her off balance, but Grady catches her.
“Nice job, kiddo,” he praises. “But this is how I want you to make a fist.” He shows her how to tuck her fingers under her thumb instead of the other way around.
Even though I know that already, I mimic her.
Then, he tells her to take a small step back with her right foot, putting her weight on it and using it to lunge as she punches.
She practices several times before he moves her to the large hanging bag, telling her to beat the heck out of it.
Now, he stands in front of me, face serious, gaze lingering on where I looked different the first time he saw me. What was purple and yellow has vanished. Outwardly, anyway.
“No left hand,” he reminds me. “Same stance I showed Paige. The only difference is I want you to aim for my throat.”
“What?”
“You fucking heard me,” he says low enough that Paige can’t hear over her yelling at her imaginary enemy.
“You aim for the windpipe. I’ll block it, you won’t hurt me.
But that’s your target. Muscle memory is what we’re going for, so you don’t punch anywhere but there, for now.
Do it, do it hard, it will give you the chance to move away. ”
“Okay,” I say weakly, and he raises an eyebrow. So, I take a deep breath and say with more conviction, “I’m ready, buddy.”
Without warning, he lunges toward me, and I punch the air where his shoulder would be if he hadn’t moved away quickly.
“Focus on my throat, move faster,” he says. I try again, and this time, he catches my fist in his chest. “Better. Again.”
We do this until my brow is drenched in sweat, and I land a dozen or more fists in the right location. He only stops because Paige interrupts.
“Dad, I have to go poo,” she whispers.
“I’m not going to stop you from doing that, kiddo,” he says, suppressing his laugh as she runs off, the door that leads into the house slamming shut behind her. “Are you going to lose more jobs because of him?”
“It’s likely.”
“Is there anything you can do about that? Again.”
I punch and let the question ping-pong around my head. This is why I hired Vivian. I shouldn’t be afraid to use her. But I am.
“Again.”
If I let the tabloids know, if I let his carefully kept secrets out, he’ll retaliate.
“Again.”
Pierre will do everything in his power to ruin me.
“Again.”
He could thoroughly bury my career if enough people act like Shania did.
“Again.”
If they all take his side, what’s left for me?
“Again.”
A sob comes unbidden when I take aim next.
“Let me hear it, Lou. Let it out. Again.”
“If I fight back,” I say through clenched teeth, “he’ll try to ruin me.”
“Isn’t he already trying that?” That makes me pause. It’s so obvious. When you’re used to ignoring it, it’s hard to see, even when you’re ready to stop ignoring it. “If you don’t fight back, he wins. If you do, maybe he won’t.”
“I’m scared.”
“I can only imagine,” he says, placing his palms on my shoulders. “I’m not trying to persuade you one way or another. I have your back.”
A wave of possessiveness crosses his features. It’s the same as Pierre, but so different, too. Confusion ebbs and flows, washes away my reason, only to force it back in with the next wave.
Grady is not Pierre.
Grady is good.
I thought Pierre was good.
Pierre is not Grady.
Grady is safe.
Pierre once was too.
Damnit, Louisa.
No, here, I’m Lou. Except, I’m both. I can’t be Lou without Louisa. Can’t be strong enough to overcome the pain if I don’t remember it. Learn from it. Heal from it. Lou can’t fight for Louisa if she pretends she doesn’t exist. I can’t fight for myself if I don’t learn how.
“You have my back here, but I won’t always be here,” I say. “My job takes me all over the world.”
“Then, it’s time for you to defend yourself,” he says. “Again.”