Page 89 of Playing With Danger

“I wasn’t ever going to tell you about him.”

“I know.”

“That’s fucked, baby.”

Nothing needed to be said, so she didn’t. She knew it was fucked. I knew it was fucked so she let that lie.

“I knew it was fucked when I told you I needed to end things with you. I knew before I said it. I knew as I was saying the words. And I regretted them as soon as I said them. No excuse for me being a dick but you deserve an explanation.”

I slid my hand between the pillow and her cheek, my thumb grazed the corner of her mouth, over her soft skin, and once again I was soaking in her goodness to drown out the ugly.

Taking more from her than I deserved.

“His drinking didn’t get bad until I was about twenty. Before that he was just disconnected. He took me to school, went to work, I took a bus home, he came home, dinner was takeout or a frozen meal. Sometimes he cooked an actual meal. When I got older sometimes I’d cook. He didn’t go to my practices. He made it to one or two of my games. When I started to drive, he never went to another game. I did the grocery shopping. He barely spoke to me but he wasn’t drinking. He was simply hiding. No more fishing trips. No more batting cages. No more telling me he was proud of me or he loved me. No more tossing a ball in the backyard or watching a game on TV. My dad was gone. And I watched, all of it. I was a teenage boy who loved and looked up to his father and that’s what he taught me. Love was a weakness.”

Sophie nuzzled her face into my palm. I took a fortifying breath and rushed to get the rest out.

“I’ve never had a woman for more than a few weeks. I never wanted a relationship. A wife. Kids. None of it. Then I met you and I knew I’d go the way of my father if it meant I had you for however long it took for you to realize I was broken. I’d make it worth it until you saw me for who I really was. Today wasn’t about me not wanting you. It was me being a coward and leaving you before you could leave me. Before I had to see the disappointment in the eyes I love so much. Before you could tell me what a piece of shit I was for leaving my father to live in the rat hole to drink himself to death. My mom and sister were taken from me and my father is forcing me to watch him slowly kill himself. That’s all I know. The people who I loved the most left me. Then there’s you.”

She immediately stiffened. I fucking hated I did that to her. I made it so she braced for an emotional blow.

Christ.

“My Sophie. Brave. Strong. Standing toe-to-toe with me, not letting me get away with my bullshit. Being the strength we both needed because I was too weak to face my fears.” I leaned closer to her, trapping our hands between our chests. “I need you to know, if I came home and you weren’t here I was going to find you. I took your warning, baby, and I came home to battle. I wasn’t going to let you leave me. I’ll fight for this, for you, for us. But you need to decide if this is what you want. Twenty-seven years of grief and fear doesn’t disappear after one night of facing it. I let go of some of the guilt tonight. Logically I understand I can’t make my father do something he’s not ready to do. But that doesn’t mean it still doesn’t feel like shit. It’s gonna take time to work this out of me. And the choice is yours whether or not you stay for the ride or get off now.”

Sophie still hadn’t relaxed, not the way she was holding herself, not her grip on my hand, even the muscles in her thigh thrown over my hip was contracted.

I’d seriously fucked this up.

All of it.

“Baby, you don’t?—”

“How did you leave things with your dad?”

Oh, yeah, I’d fucked it so badly she was avoiding the conversation we needed to have about us.

“I put the picture back on the wall. He settled down. Tomorrow or the next day he’ll run out of booze, sleep his bender off, then call me. I’ll go over, clean up his mess the best I can, give him his keys, and wait for the next time he falls into a case of liquor.”

“His keys?”

“Only thing I can do to protect him is take his keys so I know he won’t drive to get more booze when he’s like that.”

“He doesn’t drink like that all the time?” she sheepishly asked.

“He’s an alcoholic. He drinks all the time, but like what you saw? No, that’s an every-few-months treat.”

And the benders were coming more frequently. What used to be a twice-a-year event—my mom’s birthday and the anniversary of the accident—turned into adding Vivi’s birthday. Then he added their wedding anniversary. Now, I had no clue what sent him spiraling, but it was more than four times a year.

“Do you think…” she trailed off.

I waited for her to finish. When she didn’t, I told her, “You can ask me anything, baby.”

“Do you think he wants to die?” Her question was so soft I barely heard it.

“Yep.”

“Do you think he hasn’t done anything permanent because of you?”

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