Page 23 of Micro
“Shit! Be careful, babe, we need to get ice back on that.” Lowell practically marched me back out of his room, pulling the door firmly closed, and set me up in the living room, with my arm elevated on a pile of cushions, and an ice pack/aka those poor almost frozen peas, draped over it. Then he fussed over me, bringing me tea, and a bowl of cereal, after I refused to let him cook for me.
“Please talk to me, please don’t hide behind looking after me. I’m so afraid, Lowell.”
He sat across from me, that tortured look still in his eyes.
“Of me?”
“You saw the message?”
His gaze dropped and he nodded. “You don’t need to fear me, but others do, and that’s because I was a fucking monster. I feel like…” he trailed off, but I didn’t interrupt him for fear of him shutting down again, “I feel like the man you brought back isn’t the same one who tried to die out there that day.”
Tried to die?I thought he’d been attacked! I opened my mouth, but he wasn’t done.
“Kinda feel like maybe a version of me did die out there, like the worst of me is still out there, gone forever, but what’s left is broken, incomplete. I’m not… I sound like such a fucking psycho, but I think there was still a little good left inside me, and that’s what you saved. The little that was left.” A tear trickled down his grizzled cheek, and I ached to brush it away, to hide the evidence of his pain, but maybe he needed to feel it, and let it out, so he could move on.
“My god, Lowell-”
“I can never undo the things I did, and I can never make amends, but maybe there’s… maybe there’s a chance that I can still do the right thing.”
I gasped, sliding out of my seat and reaching for his hand.
“Are you talking about suicide, Lowell? That’s not the answer, I promise. You can only make amends by putting effort in with the people you think you wronged. Who were you talking to in your room?”
He squeezed my hand, his eyes staying firmly down and away from mine.
“My… uh… my sister, or half-sister, I dunno. Her and her husband. Didn’t even know she existed until,fuck, I can’t tell you this stuff, but if I did, at least you’d know I’m not worthy of your kindness. I was never worthy of it, Soph, never.”
He had family out there, and maybe they’d believed him to be dead all this time, although from how he spoke, it’s almost like he believed they’d have been hoping for that.
“The man I met, the man Iknow, from spending weeks living here with him, is gentle, kind, supportive, and protective, and makes me desperate for him. He’s smart, resourceful, and willing to put himself at risk for me. He-”
“Babe, that’s not who I was-”
“But it’s who you are now. Why should you judge yourself based on past actions, if you’re not like that now? If you’re a different man now, should you still be punished for your perceived wrongdoing?”
He barked with laughter, a sharp, agitated sound.
“Perceived wrongdoing… if you fucking knew the things I did back then, you’d throw me out, run from me, hide, call the cops… and you should. Some change in my fucking nature now is too little too late, and it doesn’t erase the past. Nothing will. I should have died, but I didn’t. Someday soon Iwilldie for what I did, but you’re right. It shouldn’t be by my hand. That’s the coward’s way out. I’d be stealing their retribution from them. They deserve to finish me, because I hurt people, Soph… Ikilled. People need me to pay for that.”
He lurched up from his seat, while I was still reeling from that one word; killed. He killed someone? He was heading for my landline, and I shot up from my seat, catching his arm as he reached for it.
“Stop! Whatever you’re doing, Lowell, you need to stop and talk to me!”
“I did, and thanks, babe, it helped me figure out that I can end this right now with one call.”
“To these people you think want to kill you?”
“The cops. Let them come and take me away, and if I’m meant to die for this, they’ll get to me in prison. Either way, I don’t deserve this freedom you gifted me with, but I want to thank you.” He grabbed my face in both hands and kissed me softly.
“I’ll always be grateful for what you’ve done for me, Soph. You saved me, and you put me on the right path. Justice. Retribution. Whatever comes for me, I’m ready for it.”
I couldn’t stop myself. As soon as he released me, I slapped him across the face as hard as I could, and the wounded look on his face, as he cupped his stinging cheek, broke my heart, but his eyes seemed to have cleared a little, like he’d shaken free of that mindset he’d been in.
“Soph?” He whispered, his eyes wide and shocked, as he lowered his hand and hovered it in the air, like he wasn’t sure what to do with it.
“Don’t you fucking dare do this to me now, Lowell. Don’t you dare! You’ve become so important to me, and now you just want to leave me alone? You want me to try and manage like this,” I lifted my swollen, bruised wrist, “after all I did for you?” It was manipulative, but I was desperate, and terrified that I’d lose him when we were so close to being together.
“Babe-”
