Page 153 of Jayson
Jayson. Not a weapon. Not a warning. Just… me.
After, we lie in the afterglow, the world hushed and breathing with us. She curls against me, her breath warm on my throat.
Somewhere in the back of my mind, I hear Lila’s laugh—light and bright and finally unburdened by grief.
You found the light, Jaybird.
Yeah, little sis, I did.
And this time? I’m keeping it.
58
KEIRA
Iused to believe pain was something you escaped.
That if you ran fast enough, far enough, hid deep enough, you could outrun it. Leave it behind like a shadow that only clung to your heels because you were too slow.
I don’t believe that anymore. Pain isn’t a shadow. It’s a scar. And scars don’t chase you. They live in you.
The afternoon light spills across Tayana’s office in soft amber ribbons. Everything smells faintly of sandalwood and citrus, like warmth was bottled and lit on fire. She sits across from me, legs crossed, her notebook closed beside her. No pen. No pressure. Just space. And silence.
“I don’t want to talk about what happened,” I say, voice steady.
“That’s okay,” she replies. “You don’t have to.”
I pause. Swallow. Then I add; “I just want to talk about what it made me.”
Her gaze sharpens, softens, holds. “What did it make you?”
I stare at my hands. The same hands that clawed through darkness, that shook with rage, that once trembled too hard to hold a pen.
“Empty,” I whisper. “For a long time. Like someone scraped me hollow and forgot to fill me back in. And then angry. So angry I didn’t even know where to put it. I wanted to scream and break and burn and—” I cut off, voice shaking.
Tayana doesn’t interrupt. Doesn’t rush to comfort me. She lets it linger.
“And then scared,” I continue, softer now. “Not of them. Of me. Of what I might do. What I might become.”
I lift my eyes. Meet hers.
“But now… I think it made me stronger. Not better. Not healed. Just… harder. Like it tempered something in me. Or maybe just exposed what was already there.”
Tayana nods slowly. “Trauma doesn’t disappear,” she says. “But sometimes it reshapes.”
I nod, even though my throat is closing again.
“Do you think it’ll always be a part of me?” I ask. “Even if I’m safe now? Even if I move on?”
“Yes,” she says, without hesitation. “It will always be a part of you.”She leans forward just slightly. “But it won’t always be the loudest part.”
I blink fast. “What if it is right now?”
“Then we let it be loud. And we don’t try to silence it with shame.”
The tears hit without warning. Not a sob, not a breakdown—just a slow, quiet leak down my face. My body doesn’t even move. I’m just… crying.
Tayana reaches for the tissue box and places it beside me, not in my hand. Another invitation, not a rescue.
