Page 72 of Paint the Town, Dove

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SHUT UP!

I locked those memories away.

Every day, every single day, I forget for a reason.

Ryden’s an artist, I was bound to see it coming.

That’s whattheydo.

They write, they sing, they draw – that’s their outlet.

Mine was hurting things.

Hurting people.

Hurting myself.

I was rude, abrasive. My hobbies included boxing and ripping down the freeway twenty over at night on my Ducati.

Sometimes no helmet.

I needed to feel the rush of death, danger. Craving the edge of life at all times, it made me immune to pain.

There were far things greater to look out for.

My therapist, Sue, she’d been telling me I had problems going on that didn’t even break the surface. But how can you battle an invisible demon? How do you know what wards to put up when you don’t know what you’re up against?

But this feeling… hearing Ryden singingoursong.

Because that’s – that’s exactly what it was…

Those demons just broke through my wards.

And I couldn’t fucking breathe.

***

Block it out, block it out.

My foot weighed on the gas like an anvil as I weaved through traffic, the lone soldier in my head focusing on the only place I could scream and no one would hear me.

I forgot for a reason. I forgot for a reason. I forgot for a reason.

It was only until the siren lights filled up my rearview that I stepped off the pedal, shaking my head, cursing the world – this fucking place and all the people in it.

“Miss,” he said to me.How the hell did he get here so fast?“Miss,” and knocked on the glass.

Thisclose, I wasthisclose to socking a cop in the face.

Smiling sweetly, I rolled down the window. “Officer.”

He had a square jaw, great big beautiful dark eyes. My type,if I had one anymore.

Everyone reminded me of Ryden.

Everyone I despised, everyone I adored, everyone.

He was my heart.

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