14. Darius

Chapter fourteen

Darius

E verleigh is sad. It’s been a few days since her mom and sister and the evil cat of hot death went home. She’s currently in the library, acting like she’s not sad, which I only know because Hans told me. Hans told me she definitely is, though. In case I had any doubts.

I don’t know what I can do to cheer her up. I don’t even know what she likes besides PB&J and my mouth between her legs. And I can’t go there. Because that’s definitely not what she needs right now. Maybe not ever again. The first time wasn’t a mistake, but we’re taking a step back from that. I don’t want to mess up the good things I do have, and I don’t want to push her or hurt her, so I’m not thinking about that. Not going there.

She was there for me when I had no idea I needed her most, and she told me all the things I didn’t know I needed someone to tell me.

The intimacy of it was nearly unbearable, but I survived. We both did. And thankfully, things haven’t been weird after. I don’t feel ready to tell all this shit to a stranger so they can pick my brain apart, but I do feel better. Calm and peaceful even. No nightmares, and no days of fear and panic, churning stomachs, and compressed lungs and chest such that I can barely breathe. There are also no moments of ending up back there in the painful aftermath that was the downward spiral to the end of my dad’s life.

It wasn’t so much what Everleigh said to me, though that did have a significant impact. It’s that she was there with me. Period. I wasn’t alone. Okay, so I haven’t technically been alone since I hired Hans because he’s a good friend. My brothers and sisters are just a phone call away as well, but none of them are Everleigh. Especially not Hans. I laugh at that in my head, which probably makes me doubly a weirdo.

She didn’t like that I was hurting, but she was there anyway. She didn’t need me to be more than who I thought I could be. Not that she meant I should be in pain mentally or emotionally, but she made me feel like it was okay to feel shitty about shitty things. It was her easy acceptance of me and her celebration of who I am even now that calmed me right the hell down. It makes me want to be better, to try talking to someone again. Maybe.

I just don’t know how. I’m not broken or emotionally stunted. I mean, okay, maybe I should qualify that or something, but I’m a guy, and guys are notoriously bad at this. I’ve also lived alone for a long time. It’s been even longer since I’ve had real friends or felt the bonds of actual family. Yup, I suck. And I’m lost.

“Dude, your thinking is so loud over here that it’s interrupting my book, and this is a good book.” Hans lowers the book, some steamy, hot Scottish-style romance with a guy in a kilt on the front cover. “What’s up?”

“You sent Everleigh to my room a few nights ago.”

“Yup.”

“How did you know to do that? What if I’d lost my shit or something? Said something horrible or made her cry?”

“I know how you are, D. You wouldn’t do that. You needed some calming down that my ugly mug couldn’t supply. Don’t think I haven’t noticed that you’ve been different since Everleigh came here. I’ve noticed .”

Fuck. I guess I’m entirely transparent.

“I wouldn’t have gone to get her if I thought things would go badly. I just thought she’s a new thing you haven’t tried yet. Someone who you might be okay talking to because she seems like a good listener, even if she’s a shit swimmer. Also, she’s shown a genuine interest in wanting to help.”

“With the car and everything,” I choke out. Hans doesn’t know anything about the night in the kitchen. That’s not the kind of help he was trying to get going by sending Everleigh to my bedroom. It just happened that that’s where I was because I sleep there, and nightmares happen when I’m sleeping.

“With the car…” Hans frowns. “So, what are you thinking? That you’d like to read some books or watch some videos?”

“Do we have books?” The library is huge. Of course we have books, but maybe not those kinds of books. The dreaded kind. The self-help kind. Half of the books I haven’t ordered. They actually came with the purchase of the house, like a lot of the furniture. Hans orders lots of books, which I allow whenever he feels like it because he’s an avid reader, and there’s not much else for him to do during the day except that. Plus, it’s quiet. If he were a gamer or liked to hit the gym for eight hours a day, that would be less doable while sitting in my office. Not that he needs to sit there. He just does and always has.

“Yes, we have books.”

“Should I check the pathetic guy who doesn’t want to see another therapist because they’re bullshit, and the last one treated him like an object to be picked apart and examined rather than a person section?”

Hans’ lips twitch. “No, D. I didn’t create that kind of section.”

“You organized the entire library?”

He nods and says, “Yeah, I’ve been here for years. Also, I’m a physicist by trade and overly organized by nature. The place was a mess. You couldn’t find anything when I first got here.”

“But usually they’re by section, then by name and stuff.”

“Right. They’re that way too here. History, science, medical stuff, psychology—”

“Smut romance. That’s probably the biggest section by far, from what I’ve seen you reading lately. God, my grandma would have loved you.”

“And I would have loved your grandma. You should give her props. She’s the reason Everleigh is here.”

“Yeah, about that—”

“She’s in the library, and she seems sad. You should go talk to her. Say you’re in there to look at the psychology section. I’ve already taken the liberty of ordering books on PTSD, trauma, nightmares, grief, death, panic, and anxiety… Just in case you were ever interested. I thought it would save time.”

“Liar. You thought it would be a rare opportunity indeed, and if I wanted one, you better have them at hand. Otherwise, I’d lose interest, and the moment would be over, and that would be that.”

Hans grins. He makes having this conversation so much easier. It’s not really about pride, but damn it, it is rather hard for me all the same. “Exactly right.” He picks up his book, arranges one leg over the other, and resumes reading.

I’ve clearly been dismissed. I’m also not going to be able to concentrate on work any longer, so I get up and find myself heading to the library. Yeah, as if I was going to go anywhere else. Everleigh is practically drawing me to her through some kind of shimmery, otherworldly, more than friendly force I don’t really understand.

I wish we weren’t operating on borrowed time and a contract. I wish this were more our reality. That she just lived here, and we were more than friends. The twinge in my chest and the growing tent in my slacks say that I really wish we were more than friends.

The library is one of the larger rooms in the house, with towering bookcases built into the wall on one side, free-standing cases on the other, and a bank of tall windows on the far wall to let in light. The furniture in here came, like most of the things, with the house. The previous owner had a penchant for a dark, gothic kind of feeling, hence the heavy red drapes hanging from the windows in most of the rooms, including here.

Everleigh is curled up on one of the big red vintage chairs. The velvet upholstery sets off her pale skin. Her hair is a tangle of messy blonde tresses on top of her head—a little staticky from leaning against the chair—her slim legs are tucked up under her, and her head is bent over a book that’s open on her lap. Her little yellow sundress is a cheerful splash of color in the room, but when the door opens and creaks shut, she looks up at me, and her expression doesn’t match.

Her eyes are not so blue today. In fact, they looked tear-stained and washed out. Her cheeks are a little puffy as well, like she’s been crying all morning. It’s one in the afternoon, so she would have had plenty of time to do that.

Why didn’t I come in here sooner? Say something sooner? Like four damn days ago?

“Everleigh…” I want to tell her everything. I want to fall at her feet and ask her what I can do to make it better because it’s in my power to do a lot. I want to ask her to tell me, to rely on me, to trust me.

How could I have gone from relying on almost no one and having so few people in my life to feeling this full now? How could she have taken up residence in my head and in that vast expanse in my chest in just a few weeks? All these years, I’ve been single and alone here, working myself half to death because it was an easier option than not. All these years, and maybe she was always meant to come into my life. Maybe my grandma knew something I didn’t.

“Darius.” My name is an echo of the way I said hers. She offers me a shadow of a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes, but it tries. She’s trying. She’s clearly pushing away her sadness, burying it. But I don’t want her to have to do that. I’d like to bear some of it for her if I could.

“I just, uh, came in here for some books.”

She bites down on her lower lip, and her eyes flick around the room. “Books. Yeah, the library is a good place for that.” Right, so she doesn’t really believe me since I didn’t sound very convincing.

I sigh hard enough to make my shoulders rattle and creak. It’s a big sigh for a big, cavernous room. The house often smells like whatever air fresheners the maid service leaves around, or sometimes like coconut candles because Hans has a penchant for those, but this room smells exactly like what you’d expect. It smells a little like ancient drapes, mildew, and really old books. I like it. Honestly, I do. I can see the allure that libraries hold for people.

“I came to see if you were okay. And to get some books.”

She sits up and extends her legs, flexing her toes like having them tucked up under her has made them go numb. Then, she closes the book and sets it aside. It’s something with a red hard cover. I can’t read the title from here. “Do you want me to help you find them?”

“Uh, they’re in the self-help section.” Damn it. That’s exactly what I didn’t want to say. “I mean, the psychology section. Or something. I didn’t even know there were sections in here.”

“Oh, yes. Hans organized it. He showed me all around the library the first day after I got here.”

I’ve been living in this house for years, yet I didn’t know about any of that. Everleigh is so perceptive. She’s so alive. Having her here has changed everything for me. Everything about me, too. It’s made me want to try. It’s even made me want to sit for another minute in that damn car. She doesn’t make me want to be better. I want to be better. Even a few small improvements would be great because I don’t want to be such a hot mess, even if Everleigh is okay with that.

“What are you looking for, exactly?”

Something that will make me less fucked up. “Come and sit in the car with me.” The best-laid plans always go to shit. At least, I think that’s how the saying goes. I hadn’t planned on it. If I’m surprised, so is Everleigh. She doesn’t even have shoes on. Her feet are bare against the thick rug over the hardwood floor. She looks like a summer child, meant for fields of wildflowers and blue skies, not to be locked away in here.

Not to be so unhappy.

“There’s something I want to try,” I tell her.

Her brows crease inwards. “In the car?”

Yeah, I’d be questioning myself, too, if I were her. “Yeah, in the car.”

“Darius, you don’t have to do that. It’s like torture. It hurts you, and I don’t like that.”

“I know.” I just stand in one spot, totally paralyzed. My breathing has already gone to shit. I’m already spiraling, and I’m not even close to the car. I’m just thinking about it. “I just want to do a bit of an experiment if you’re willing.”

The furrow between her brows only digs in harder, but I can see she’s intrigued, too. “It’s a good thing I know you already because that might be the sketchiest thing anyone has ever said to me.”

A burst of laughter escapes me. She looks at me like I’m crazy, and I don’t blame her one bit.

But she does follow me to the garage, walking barefoot the entire way. I’m dressed to go to a board meeting in the usual immaculate button-down shirt and slacks, and she’s a summer princess, a breath of fresh air. I focus on her instead of the cherry red convertible in the garage. We’re alone in here, and my breaths are coming out more as sharp pants. I want to control them, but I can’t. When Everleigh looks at me, asking me silently if I’m ready, I focus on the exact blue of her eyes. They’re such a light blue with little flecks of darker color around her pupils.

“I want you to get in the backseat with me.”

She blinks at me like she’s trying to decide if I’m joking. “Alright, file that under extra creepy,” she says, but there’s no recrimination, and I know she doesn’t really mean it.

“It’s not like that.”

“Yeah, D, I know.” I don’t know when she started calling me that. Maybe the other night in my room, I think. I hate it when people call me that. Hans does it to annoy the shit out of me, and I only allow it because he won’t stop. But I like it when Everleigh does it because it sounds right coming from her.

She doesn’t open any doors but literally puts her hand on the passenger side and leaps into the back like a little kid. She does it so effortlessly that her dress barely even ruffles as she jumps. God, she’s like a superhero because that was amazing.

There’s no way I can replicate it, so I get in from the driver’s side and slide over the edge of the car to drop into the backseat beside her. It’s crazy small, deep, and totally cramped. Once my ass touches the seat, my knees automatically draw up to my chin. I can feel the panic coming on, the white-hot bands that are going to wrap around my lungs, my stomach, and my brain, but I take a calming breath, as deep as I can force it, which is little more than a hiccup, and turn to face Everleigh.

“It doesn’t matter which seat I’m in. It just generally goes to shit right about now. The thing is, I’ve never tried it with a variable before.”

“A variable?” she asks.

“You,” I reply.

“Thanks,” she scoffs. “I’ve been called lots of things before, but—” I take her hand in both of mine, and she stops mid-sentence. She gets serious fast. “We did sit in here together that one time…”

“Not like this.”

“What do you need me to do?”

Be my shield. “Just wrap an arm around my shoulders and lean in.”

“Like a hug? If you wanted a hug, you could have just said. I’m naturally a hugger. I’d be more than happy to—”

“Yes.”

“Okay.” She scoots closer and slides her arms around me. And. It. Is. Heaven. I close my eyes and breathe in the scent of her shampoo as her hair slides across my shoulder. It feels good. So, so good. I focus on that instead of the images looming behind my eyes. I force myself to keep them open, focusing only on her. Focusing on the way she smells, the cadence of her breaths, and how soft she is.

I’m still roiling inside, still panicking. There is still acid crawling up my throat, and it feels like something is going to tear apart inside me and get sucked into the black hole that is the past, but it’s not so bad this time. Not like it usually is.

If we started moving in this car, I’d have a major meltdown for sure, but right now…

“Can I tell you something?”

She goes rigid against me but then replies, “Yeah, sure. Like this?”

“If that’s okay,” I say to her hair. I like that it smells like warm fruit in the summer. Although I’m not sure if warm fruit is very appetizing, I like it on her. She nods against my shoulder, and her arms tighten around me. I really like it. Everything is okay for a minute. Just for this minute. I’m going to wreck that right away, but I need to tell someone. I haven’t even told Hans half of this shit before. He knows the basics, but that’s it. I guess the only way to say it is to just start, so I do. “The accident was the catalyst for everything that came after. We’d all been lying to ourselves about my dad. Telling ourselves and each other that he was fine, that people just become forgetful. He was too young for anything major to be wrong.”

There’s a hitch in Everleigh’s breath. It’s subtle, but I notice it. She runs her hand over my shoulder ever so gently because she knows it’s the scarred one. It’s so soothing that I close my eyes. Then, her voice comes wafting out, sounding so soft. She holds me, blanketing herself over me to keep me safe, to keep me sane so I can tell her everything I need to get out. “You don’t think it was your fault, do you?”

At her question, my breath punches out of me. I’m not even thinking about being in the backseat of this car right now. I’m thinking about the black mass of crapshit that’s been roiling in me for so many years. “I don’t think it was, not really, but I still feel guilty. I told him right, not left, because he was going to miss the turn. The road forked, and he was going to go in the wrong direction. I told him a little too late. I couldn’t believe he was actually going to miss the turning to get home.”

“What—what happened?” She doesn’t stop hugging me.

This is so much more than I deserve. It feels like she’s fighting for me, being the strong one so that, just for once, I can let my guard down enough to get this out. There’s no eye contact, but it’s like we both need and don’t need that at the same time. I’m afraid I’ll stop if I have to look her in the eye. That the panic will take over again, and that will be that. I’m going to tell her all of it, and I hate this because it still hurts, though not in a white-hot panic sort of way and not in a fear sort of way. It hurts in the sense where, I had a life before that, a solid family unit, a mother and a father, and now all of that is different, and it hurts.

“It was dark. Late. But still. He’d taken that route so many times. It was Christmas, and we’d been at a company thing. Bradford didn’t bother going, and my other siblings went in separate vehicles. My younger sisters went with my mom, and they left before we did. They were tired, so they went home early while my dad and I had to stick it out to the end. It was cold. Like bitter winter Chicago cold. We, uh…after the car went off the road and hit the ditch, it turned over and crashed into some trees. Not old ones, thankfully. Younger ones. They stopped it from rolling, but the car crumpled around them, and it crumpled around me. It was so cold. My dad…he was…he was out cold for a little bit, and that was better. But then he came to, and when he saw me stuck like that, up in the air, he was so panicked. He had a cut on his forehead, and it was bleeding. He kept saying I was covered in blood. That he’d killed me. Until now, I still hear him saying that. ‘Oh Jesus, I’ve killed you. My son.’”

“Oh my god. Oh my god, Darius.” Tears are threatening in her voice, and I can hear them, but she doesn’t let go for a second. Her arms tighten, and she presses herself into me. It forces me deeper into the seat, but that actually quells the panic. She’s more than just my shield. She’s holding me down and keeping me from shattering and changing shape, becoming air instead of a solid, and floating right the heck out of here.

“After the accident, no one could ignore what was going on anymore. My brothers were the ones who said something to the doctors, but I feel like my mom blames me. I was out of it. I was on painkillers and having surgeries and whatnot, and when I got out, that’s when they told me. That dad had dementia. They took his driver’s license away. The board was questioning his ability to run the company, so as soon as I was ready, and by ready, I mean still so fucked up that it was a miracle I was functioning, he turned it over to me. Bradford helped a little bit, I have to say. At least he was nice to me and less of an asshole when I was recovering from those first few surgeries. He never told me it was my fault. He did tell me the things my mom said, though. But to be fair, my dad was her whole world. She loved him so damn much.”

“It wasn’t your fault. You can’t…that’s not how those things work.” She swallows thickly. “My mom…she freaked when Heather was diagnosed and kept saying she shouldn’t have done this or that or that maybe when she was a baby, she’d done something, maybe exposed herself to something when she was pregnant by accident. She was irrational, but Heather put those ideas out of her mind quickly enough. Because that’s not how the world works. The accident didn’t kill either of you. Your dad…well, he could have hurt himself so much worse. He could have been driving later and gotten in a collision with someone else, and they could have been hurt. Anything could have happened. That’s like saying it could have been worse, which doesn’t help at all, and that sounds so callous. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.”

“It’s alright. I get it. I’ve thought that, too, so many times. No one blames me. Maybe my mom doesn’t, really, but things changed after. I’m not around, and I made the company my life, even if I was doing it from the house I bought, this one, while I recovered. I drowned myself in work. It was Bradford who moved to Philly when we expanded things later. I worked like a dog to make that happen. He’s a good face of the company. Blonde, handsome, young. People can think he’s running everything. I don’t mind it at all. The less publicity I get, the better anyway. I just wish—the people I stopped seeing, my friends and all—I wish I had done that differently. That it wasn’t so much work, work, work, hiding away, and licking my wounds. I should have made time. I blamed them for a while, but it was all me. My family…we don’t do things anymore. Not together like we used to. Not even during the holidays. We’re scattered all over the place. My mom and I made our peace a few years ago at my dad’s funeral, but it’s still not the same.”

“I don’t know what to say,” Ev mumbles.

“My dad, he had a good few years, but he deteriorated so quickly. He had home nurses and people my mom hired, the best of the best, yet he still got out one night and made a break for it. He was confused. He wasn’t found for hours, and by then, he’d been outside for so long. Soon after, he contracted pneumonia, and he ended up passing from that.”

There’s the smallest of shifts, and then Everleigh crawls into my lap. It’s a challenge back here because there’s almost no room. She swivels and tucks her legs up and twists so that she’s sideways. She still keeps her arms around my neck, but she looks up at me, and it’s enough to slay me. “I’m so, so sorry all this happened. That all of it happened. It’s mean, and it’s unfair. Life can be so brutal sometimes.”

“You’ve had a few knocks in that department too. I came to see if you were okay, and somehow, we ended up here, and I’m the one who did all the talking.” I blink against the burn in my sinuses that warns me I’m going to lose it soon in a much different way than I usually lose it in a car.

“That’s okay.” She nods like she wants to believe that. Like maybe she does believe it. “Should we get out?”

I can’t believe I told her all that. What’s more? I can’t believe I told her all that in the backseat of a car. I’m shocked to find that the panic has passed, and I’m now just uncomfortable. And not in a good way. Not in a way that I feel like I can handle just yet, but I don’t feel like I’m going to leap out of my skin or leap out of the car or throw up because I can’t breathe, especially since air is vital in keeping one’s cookies from being tossed.

“Has Hans ever threatened to call you Big Daddy D? And is that why you let him get away with just calling you D?”

“What?” I gasp.

She grins and scrambles off my lap, leaping out of the car the same way she got in. She walks around to the other side and opens the door, shifting the seat forward so I don’t have to risk another faceplant trying to get out.

Her nostrils flare slightly, and she can’t keep her smile from nearly cracking her face in half, but it falters at my confusion.

“That bastard,” she hisses. “I knew he was kidding. I asked him about it a few days ago. About how he started calling you D, and that’s what he said.”

“Oh my god. I have never asked him to call me Daddy anything.”

“That’s a relief. I mean, I’m not judging or anything. If you want to go by Daddy, then by all means…”

“You’d call me Daddy?” I realize I’m outside of the car and that the panic never truly set in. The door is closed, and I’m on the other side of it, and I did it. For the first time since the accident, I fucking did it. No sedation whatsoever. Yes, Everleigh was basically holding me down, but in a good way. Then she distracted me when I was getting out, and now I’m here on solid ground again, my feet back on concrete.

She shakes her head. “Nah, never.”

“Did Hans really say that, or were you just trying to distract me?”

“You’ll never know,” she says and shrugs, but then she loses it and tosses her head back and laughs. I wanted to make her smile, and now, look at this. I got laughter instead, even if it wasn’t really me but Hans. I guess it was Hans. “Alright, so he did. There’s no way I’m inventive enough to make that up.”

Oy. “You know what this calls for?”

“Please tell me it’s a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.”

That wasn’t at all what I was going for, but I don’t mind changing my plans. “It’s exactly that.”