Chapter 14

Winnie

F or ten years I vowed to never step foot inside Gram’s house again, and yet here I stand. Barely past the threshold and already I’m hearing my dad’s voice louder than ever. Taunting as I bring a Hammer into the house for the first time, another thing I vowed never, ever to do.

What do you think that boy really wants from you, girlie? We all know it ain’t true love and it sure as hell ain’t gonna be a salad! Ha! Ha!

I realized it on the drive back from Whispering Glen: my father made me feel like my appearance, my body and its inadequacies, was the only thing about me that meant anything. And in the process, he damaged what really mattered. My soul. My heart. My ability to believe, really believe, with 100% faith, that someone could love me. Because he and Gram, the people who were supposed to love me unconditionally, couldn’t .

The Hammer brothers are attracted to me. Mind-blown, but so what? Watching the shows made me think they might all even have romantic feelings for me. Again, mind-blown, but so what? At the end of the day, when it comes to a life partner, a soul mate, a ‘til-death-do-us part, they all deserve someone who won’t forever question their hearts. Someone whose doubts in herself won’t leave her constantly wondering why, second guessing their words and actions.

I sniffle, and tell myself it’s okay. I may never end up with the kind of love I yearn for with any of them, but they’ll always love me as a best friend. I will never doubt that. And I will not destroy that. Just because 1 Girl, 10 Hammers ended, just because the summer will eventually end, doesn’t mean my friendship with any of the boys will end. I won’t let it.

Maybe the only reason I’ve been unable to envision my happily ever after with anyone other than a Hammer brother is because I thought my boys were a pipedream. Never going to happen, and therefore, safe. Maybe I just need to stay away from romantic relationships, period. I’ve survived almost thirty years of being single. What’s thirty more?

I’m going to need a bigger cottage, though, I warn myself. Because I’m going to seriously need to expand my collection of toys.

Gav watches me warily and I suspect the way my eyes glaze over from my thoughts of new dildos are concerning.

I glance at my phone. My battery charged in the car, but it’s getting low again. “Is there electricity?”

“We called the power company as soon as you said yes,” he confirms. “You want me to…?”

“Yeah,” I whisper and brace myself. A second later, the lights flicker on .

He whistles under his breath. There’s still a litter box in one corner, but from the scent I can suddenly name, the carpet was the preferred place to pee.

“Who would let that man have a cat?” I shake my head and put away my phone.

Gavin sniffs and clearly catches a whiff of the same smell I had. Even his gross-I-smell-piss face is adorable. “I think it was more than one.”

“Damn.”

I glance around the room, finally. Tears flood my eyes as they land on it. The recliner.

What the fuck do you think you’re wearing? You ain’t leavin’ the house in that. My God.

Bile rises in my throat and I cover my mouth.

“I’m here,” Gavin says. “We can leave anytime you want to.”

I take a moment to make sure everything threatening to come up stays down.

“You know how girls wear short skirts and their parents are like, you can’t wear that out, it’s not appropriate, it shows too much and might tempt the boys? Or it’s against the school dress code. Whatever.”

“... I guess?”

I raise my finger and point at the recliner.

“My dad sat right there on the first day of middle school. I got a cute skirt from the mall. Your mom took me to buy it, actually. ”

“I don’t remember you ever wearing a skirt, other than your prom dress.”

That dress was floor-length. With sleeves. Gavin went with his girlfriend, the most popular girl in our grade. I went with my lab partner, a guy named Bert who told me, after we got there, he didn’t dance.

“You don’t remember me ever wearing a skirt, because the one I got for the first day of middle school was the last. My dad told me I couldn’t wear it.”

He frowns, genuinely puzzled. “Because it would tempt the boys or was against the dress code?”

I shake my head. I can’t bear to look at him as I say, “Because my thunder thighs would gross people out.”

It’s extra humiliating to say, because, well, my dad probably did save me from a lot of teasing that day.

“If he was still alive I would kill him,” Gav says, matter-of-factly. I look at him again and see the rage etched on his face.

But he’s not going to let it out. He’s going to restrain whatever he’s feeling, keep the anger under the surface and under control, because that’s what I need him to do.

“What a piece of shit. Him, not you. I’m so sorry, Win. I’m sorry he spoke to you that way and I’m sorry your own grandmother let him.”

I don’t tell him that not only did Gram let him, she often laughed.

“Everyone at school felt so bad for me when dad went to jail, again, but it was a reprieve for me. Gram would at least leave me alone. To dad, I was like some scab he couldn’t resist picking at. For a long time, I hoped she would die. I had this fantasy that if she did, your parents would adopt me, the way they did all of you.”

“I think Mom had the same fantasy,” he says.

I take a deep breath and try to steady myself. “Come on. Let’s do the grand tour. Say hello to all the ghosts.”

He’s by my side in the blink of an eye. But this time, he doesn’t hold my hand. He puts an arm around my shoulder and pulls me close. Together, we walk from room to room. It’s like a museum of misery and I’m so grateful he doesn’t let me go, not even for a minute.

Haunted as I am by the rooms, which are more wrecked than the house was in my memories, and that’s saying a lot, I manage to open up to Gav. I tell him things I could never say before. I show him where Gram sat, eating her snacks – the ones she never shared with me because “more snacks are the last thing you need,” and as I share the pain with him, he hugs me tight.

Last, I lead Gavin into my childhood room, and I brace myself for the horrible slam of memories. It surprises me when it’s not as overwhelming as I expected. Maybe because at this point, I’ve shared enough of the horror to make it bearable. Or maybe because Gav is the greatest shoulder to lean on, somehow passing his strength on to me. My room is a trash heap, and smells like an entire family of cats had been locked up in here at one point. But the purple crayon-drawn window with a view of a family of 12 stick figures, all grinning, is still hidden behind my bedroom door. I actually manage a real smile as I show him, crude as it is.

“I desperately wished I could see you, your brothers, and Anna and Popsy from my bedroom window. Since I couldn’t, I drew my own version of you. ”

It’s a dumb, childish scribble, but it was the only thing about my room I ever liked. This old drawing of the Hammers is how I see them all, still. A beautiful sea of smiling faces, always happy to see me.

When we finally turn off the lights and shut the front door behind us, I’m still holding on to Gavin but not with the tight grip of dread which I held onto him with before. Now I just don’t want to let him go. Not yet. Not while I feel light in a way I never have before. Buoyant. My stomach is fizzy from the elation of having tackled the most dreaded moment of my life. My heart still races.

“That was intense,” I say, and I’m glad when Gav doesn’t move away from the doorstep but pulls me closer.

“You are the bravest person I have ever met, Win.” I can’t see his face but I hear the emotion.

“I’m not brave,” I say with a small laugh. “I ran away from the internet trolls for how many years? I only just managed to pull on the big girl pants necessary to watch 1 Girl, 10 Hammers.”

“You finally watched it? That’s huge! What did you think?”

“I think I’m more grateful than ever that you turned down the network’s stupid spin-off. I’ve already dealt with my bullshit excuse for a family and countless internet trolls, scrutinizing every aspect of my appearance. I can’t fathom the scrutiny that would come with a dating show.”

Before I can tell him the rest, that watching the show made me more confused than ever, he says my name in a way that make chills shoot down my spine.

He looks down at me, frowning. “Pooh Bear. If we were doing a dating show right now, I’d look straight into the camera filming us.” His dark eyes flash with determination. “I’d tell those trolls to go screw themselves, and then...” His voice softens as his fingers skim down my cheek, and he adds, “I’d kiss you, and I’d probably never stop.”

I stare at him in the dark, and my heart rate jumps into high gear. It’s his lip ring. Moonlight shines on it, and my senses flood with memories of his mouth on mine. And his tongue ring...

I shiver, even as my entire body floods with warmth.

“Are you cold?”

“No. I’m remembering what happened this morning,” I admit.

He nods his understanding, and the air changes between us, grows heavier. He pulls me closer to him.

“That minute was the most incredible minute of my life, Win,” he says, his voice growing more emotional. “I’d give anything to have whatever it is that Max has had with you. Anything. My left nut, even.”

He’s joking, but I can’t manage to laugh. Not as I stare at him, unable to tear my gaze from the intensity in his eyes. I could drown in it.

“I was so fucking jealous when I found out.”

I’m still trying…I have to break away, or else I’ll do something stupid, like blurt out that I’m in love with him. No. Way. Because then I’d have to clarify that I’m not choosing him as my favorite, that I’m in love with them all.

So I do the only thing I can think to do before I drown myself in my own verbal embarrassment, and that’s to stand on my toes, circle my arms around the back of his neck, same as I did earlier, so that I can run my hands through his gorgeous midnight hair. But now, I waste no time, and pull his mouth to mine and kiss him. I run my tongue along his lip ring, drawing it gently between my teeth. When I kiss him again, softly, he moans against my mouth and my pussy clenches.

And then he grabs my ass and fits me up against him, kisses me hard, scraping his barbell against my tongue in a way that has me bucking closer, so I can feel all of him.

There he goes again, making me soak my panties. Not to mention destroying all of my rational thought. How can I think when he’s as hard as this, and I’m melting into a puddle of warm goo?

But thinking be damned. My instinct take over, rocking my hips into his, allowing the pleasure to wash over my body until I break my mouth from his to gasp his name.

My cry does all sorts of things to turn Gavin on even more and I lose track of all time and space after that, my only dimension being his kiss. The softness of his lips mixed with the hard lines of his body, his nipples with their barbells, which I would suck on if his shirt weren’t in the way…

Does his shirt need to be in the way? No. His hands rove over my body and I decide that my shirt doesn’t need to be in the way either–

Do you really think he wants to see that blubber, baby beluga?

And just like that, I come crashing back down. It’s like cold water thrown on me all of a sudden, and I pull away.

“You okay, Pooh Bear?”

“Oh my God.” I’m gasping as I untangle myself from him and take a few steps backwards as it hits me my dad’s voice, Gram’s voice, the ghosts that haunt me… they’re not in that damn house. They’re inside me. I’ll never escape them.

What the hell am I doing?

“Sorry, I’m so sorry,” I say to Gavin. He calls after me as I turn and run, but I don’t stop. I don’t stop as his voice gets closer. I don’t stop when his footsteps echo behind mine. I only stop when he catches up to me and pulls me back into his arms, when I’m sobbing against his chest.

It all comes pouring out as he strokes my back.

“I’m so damn conflicted,” I admit into his chest, the fabric of his shirt clutched in my fingers. “I want you,” I sob. “I want you all, but–”

“No buts, Pooh Bear,” he whispers into my hair. “You’re allowed to want everything you want.”

“But–”

“No buts,” he kisses me on the forehead. “You’re allowed to have everything you want.”

“But I literally told you all we can only be friends. I ended my friends with benefits thing with Max. I don’t want to hurt any of you. I don’t want any of you to hurt me. But I want you. But I can’t keep changing my mind. I can’t…”

I trail off and take a breath and inhale the intoxicating and familiar scent of him. “It’s like my worst nightmares,” I gesture back at Gram’s, “and my wildest, best fantasies are both coming true at the same time and I don’t know what to do!”

“Hey,” he says firmly. “You can do whatever you need to do. Except run from us. I’m not going to let you do that.”