Page 81 of Thunderstruck
Cole:
Do you ever sleep?
Freya:
Sometimes. Are you with Carissa?
I debate how to answer that one and settle on the truth.
Cole:
Not yet. And I haven’t talked to her today, so I might not get a chance to pass on your wisdom.
Freya:
You will.
I’m glad she feels so confident. Icertainly don’t.
Pocketing my phone, I slowly make my way forward and poke my head around the corner. Carissa is sprawled on a gray couch, one hand holding a colorful paperback and the other deep in a bag of Funyuns. Other assorted junk foods lay scattered around her, and she looks…okay. Like the article didn’t bother her too much. I hope that’s true, but I know there’s still a high chanceHot Scoopis going to mention her affair with the politician.
Ethan found the story on a Philadelphia site earlier today, so there’s no doubt other people have found it too.
As I stand and watch her, Carissa is so absorbed in whatever she’s reading that I don’t think she has any idea that I’m here.
I cough.
Carissa screams.
The book flies at my face as Funyuns fly over Carissa’s head. I catch the book, but she’s not so lucky with the chips, many of which land in her messy bun.
“Sorry,” I say, wincing as I look down at the cover of the book in my hand. A cartoon hockey player in skates stands at the edge of a rink, smirking at a woman in street clothes. It looks like one Sage has read, but honestly they all look the same to me.
Curious, I flip to a page in the middle and lift an eyebrow as my eyes trace a scene that definitely falls under ‘spice.’ “I thought you didn’t read these ones,” I mutter, my stomach twisting. It was one of the many reasons I like Carissa.
She isn’t like Sage.
Blushing, she pulls onion rings out of her hair and says, “I don’t, usually. But Kasey likes that one, and the story is really compelling and well written. I mostly skimmed the…uh…” She turns an even brighter red and shrugs.
I grunt. Maybe it was a bad idea for me to show up here.
“You okay?”
I look up, surprised to see concern in her eyes. “Hmm?”
“You’re back to looking glowery.”
I gently toss the book back to her and tuck my hands into my pockets to hide the way they tremble. This isn’t about hockey, or even about the book, but there’s no good way for me to explain the knot in my gut to Carissa when I’m barely starting to understand it myself. “You can read whatever you want.”
She tilts her head. “But?”
But Sage expected me to be aggressive and domineering like some of the men in her books, and I didn’t realize how much I struggled with that until right now. I know I should speak those words out loud. I haven’t been to therapy in a few years, but I still remember the way my old therapist told me I shouldn’t avoid letting myself feel, that I should own what I’m experiencing instead of burying it.
But how am I supposed to tell someone as kind and innocent as Carissa that my ex had a habit of using intimacy to manipulate the nature of our relationship? I didn’t realize it at the time, but the further I get from the situation and the longer I’m around Carissa, the easier it is to see that Sage never truly wanted to be withme. She wanted the man she thought she could turn me into if she made enough promises.
I was only twenty-four when we met after my first winning game as a starting quarterback. Sage was only a couple of years older, but I think she knew, even then, that I would do anything to please her. She made me feel so valued at first, like she needed me in her life, but the deeper our relationship became, the more she pushed me into things I didn’t want. I told myself that I wanted to make Sage happy, that giving in to her fantasies was a part of making our relationship work.
Looking back, I hate how easily I put aside the things I wanted and ignored the way I felt whenever I was with her.
