12. Eleven

I slammed the door shut and leaned against it, wrapping my arms around my body like a shield. My chest was tight and my eyes were watering like I was going to cry again, but I couldn’t understand why. Nothing was happening that should’ve had me so upset. So what if I’d just made out with Boone? So what if he’d been sweeter and more patient with me than I deserved? So what if he’d said all the right words to make my heart melt?

He”d done everything right, so why was I in here trying to remember how to breathe and not in his arms where I belonged?

I needed to punch something. I needed to scream. Needed to shower and wash away all the blurry memories of strange hands on me so that only the memory of Boone’s touch remained.

Fuck, I felt so disgusting. So… filthy and used.

He deserved better than me.

Tears stung my eyes, but I fought them with every fiber of my being. I sank to the dirty floor and tried to calm my pounding heart.

My head throbbed and I wanted a shower. No, I wanted to boil all my skin off and scrub myself down to the bones, but even then I knew I’d never be clean.

It wasn’t Boone’s fault. He wasn’t the one who’d made me so dirty. That had been Harold and his friends. All those other men had broken me and used me up. There was nothing left in me for Boone. There wasn’t anything left for anybody.

I crawled in my bed, pulling my pillow against my stomach. My insides felt hollow, like someone had scooped them all out and left a big hole behind where I knew a normal man would feel things like love and contentment. I didn’t have those things. Harold and his friends had excised that part of me, amputated part of my soul. I’d never get it back.

I flinched at the sound of Boone knocking on my door.

“Xion?”

Panic clawed at my throat and I buried my face in the mattress, telling myself I didn’t want to answer him. I didn’t want him to come in and hold me and tell me everything was going to be okay. I liked being alone. Alone was safe. No one could hurt me if I never let anyone in.

“Xion, please. Talk to me. I just want to know you’re okay.”

Fuck you. I blinked and pushed tears away with the palm of my hand. Fuck you for making me feel this way. For making me feel anything at all. It wasn’t supposed to be like this.

“I’m coming in,” Boone announced and opened the door.

I scowled and turned over so my back was facing him, but that didn’t deter him from coming to sit on the bed beside me.

His hand came to rest on my shoulder. “I meant what I said before Xion. It’s okay if you don’t want to do this. I know you been through a lot. I want more than just sex from you. I hope you know that. If all I get is to keep looking after you and to keep you safe, I’m okay with that. But if there’s anything you need from me that I can give you, I want you to tell me. Don’t matter what it is. If I can get it, it’s yours.”

A heavy silence settled over the room.

I shifted my head against the pillow. “I need to sleep.”

He sighed and the mattress shifted as he stood. “Okay, then. I’ll be right outside if you need me.”

My chest clenched and I started to panic at the thought of him leaving me. My hand shot out and closed around his wrist, holding him in place.

“Harold Spencer,” I said, my voice breaking slightly. “I want that fucker’s severed dick on a silver platter.”

Boone ran his fingers through my hair and gently kissed my cheek. “You get some sleep, Pup. I’ll take care of everything.”

He left and I hugged my pillow against my body, wishing it smelled like ash and oil, like Boone. I wished for the scratchy feel of his beard against the back of my neck, and the feeling of arms around me, even though I didn’t know what either of those things felt like. That didn’t make me long for it less.

That fucker. How dare he make me miss him?

I jerked awake with a gasp, my heart pounding and a scream caught in my throat. My limbs were pinned and I couldn’t move. Why couldn’t I move? Panic had me flailing and fighting against the straps that had me pinned down. I couldn’t escape, but I could fight. I could make it more difficult for them, make them have to work for it, make them—

“It’s all right, Pup. I’ve got you,” came Boone’s voice from the dark.

No, he was the dark. Somehow, I’d gotten tangled up and turned around in his lap, my face turned into his chest. His hands were wrapped around my wrists, holding back my fists. There were no restraints. I wasn’t in that awful room.

I let out a choked sob of relief, my body sagging against his. Boone released my wrists, but maybe he shouldn’t have. I didn’t know what to do with my arms now that they were free.

Boone shifted away as if he were going to leave, and I panicked again.

My hands shot out, grabbing onto his damp tank top with white knuckled force. “Don’t leave me!” I whimpered even though all I wanted was to be alone with my grief and guilt. That’s what I knew, what was familiar.

Boone let out a long, low sigh and his bare arms closed around me. “Never. I’m here as long as you need me.”

I didn’t know what to say to that, so I said nothing and buried my face against his shoulder. The room was hot from the heat being up too high and we were both sticky with sweat. Everywhere we touched was too hot, but I couldn’t bring myself to move away from him. Was it weird that I found his scent so comforting? Maybe, but I was too emotionally strung out to give a shit about being weird or crazy. For once, the voices in my head kept their commentary to themselves as I pressed my nose hard against Boone’s neck, breathing him in. My hands trembled where I held onto him, even though I tried so hard to be still. We didn’t talk. Didn’t move. Honestly, it felt like we didn’t even breathe. As long as he held me, we existed outside of time and space in a place where the shadowy figures from my nightmares couldn’t reach me.

“I was having a nightmare,” I said eventually, as if he didn’t already know.

“I know.” Boone’s fingers combed through my sweaty hair. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“No.”

“You don’t have to.”

I swallowed. “Thanks.”

A long, thick silence hung in the air around us like a heavy blanket. My fingers started to ache from how tight I was holding onto him, so I relaxed my grip. I didn’t know if it was the proximity, his scent, or the way the bristly hairs of his beard were scraping against my cheek, but my body was starting to react to the closeness in a way I wasn’t sure about. I wanted him close to me, wanted to keep breathing him in, keep feeling his heart beat against mine, but I didn’t want this to turn into something sexual. It didn’t feel sexual, even if my body was starting to have other ideas.

God dammit, why did my stupid dick have to ruin everything good in my life? Why did I ever ask to change medications? Everything was easier when I was practically dead below the waist. Then I didn’t have to think about all this shit.

“I have a lot of nightmares too,” Boone said.

I lifted my head enough to look at him, but he wasn’t looking at me. His eyes were fixed on the wall in a blank stare I knew too well. He was there, in the room with me, but his mind was somewhere else. I didn’t want him to go—not his body, not his mind—so I pulled him back to me by putting my arms around him and ignoring all the confusing signals firing in my brain.

“About the army?” I asked.

“Shit I did overseas,” he half mumbled. “I wasn’t really army. I wasn’t really anything. I was… a ghost. Sometimes, I still feel like I am. Like nothing is real. Like I’m not real.”

I swallowed and let my chin rest on his shoulder, staring at the opposite wall. “I know what you mean. I feel that way sometimes too.”

His chest swelled with a big breath, and he turned his face. “Listen, Xion. About earlier… This doesn’t have to be more than you want it to be. If you ain’t interested in me like that…”

“I am,” I said firmly, leaning back to look at him. “It’s not that I don’t want sex. I do. I want to be normal, but I’m not. I’m trying, but everything in my head is so mixed up.”

“I know.”

“Just don’t treat me like I’m fragile.” I meant for it to come out as a snarl, but it sounded more like a plea. “I’m damaged, not broken.”

Boone seized my face in his hands. “You are not damaged.”

“Then what am I?” My jaw trembled. I clenched it to keep it still. “What do you call something that’s been used and beat up and thrown away so many times it winds up in a junkyard with all the other—”

“Trash?” Boone finished and brushed his fingers over my cheek. “Xion, you’re not trash. I’m not going to throw you away.”

“Why wouldn’t you?” I released him and hugged myself. “Everybody else has. I’m fucked up. I don’t work right and I can’t be fixed. I have voices in my head constantly telling me I’m stupid, that I should just go kill myself. And maybe they’re fucking right. At least then I wouldn’t be a burden on you or anybody else anymore!”

“Don’t you ever fuckin’ say that,” he growled and pulled me tight against his chest. “Don’t you ever say you’d be better off dead! You’re not a burden, do you hear me?”

“Then why doesn’t anybody want me?”

He squeezed me tighter, his arms trembling. “Oh, Pup.”

I blinked and hot, angry tears fell. Turning away, I reached up to push them away. I hated that I cried when I got pissed off. It made me seem weak and pathetic.

Boone pulled me back to his shoulder, squeezing his arms tight around me. “Fuck all those assholes out there. Fuck the bounty, and Shepherd, and everybody else. I don’t care if you never let me touch you again, or if you hate me. But I’m not letting you go, you hear me? I’m gonna take care of you. You just got to stop running from me, dammit.”

I dug my fingers into his ribs, resisting the urge to hug him back. Give me a reason to stay, I thought, but out loud I said, “Okay.”