“Because you hit her and she wants answers. So do I! Eli, well…Eli wants to kick your ass.” Good man. A stupid man, but a good man.
“Before she comes inside, I wanna trust that you can be alone with her Vic.” Grace folded her arms as she laid down the gauntlet. She still hadn’t crossed the threshold more than a few inches, but I doubted it was due to fear. I’d seen it in war, when lines start being drawn because things were being taken without permission. I’d taken her trust and she didn’t want to give up anything else.
“You can’t.” I shrugged, trying to portray nonchalance when everything inside me was screaming. Grace couldn’t trust me and she never should have, at least that was true.
“I don’t want to believe you’re anything like Daddy,” Grace whispered, almost too quiet for me to hear. From the way her glare flickered, I assumed Grace was thinking the bruises our daddy had given us were resurfacing on Lenny’s face. She looked at me, face hard, waiting for me to tell her otherwise.
I’d already done more than a bulldozer’s worth of damage. Broken faces, broken friendships, broken families…I laid it all to waste like crushed concrete. If I offered Grace an ounce of comfort, it all would have been for nothing.
“I don’t want to see her,” I replied. “So get the fuck out.” I lifted my hand to move Grace and in that millisecond she transformed.
“Don’t you touch me Vic!” she screamed. “I can go on my own.” I lowered my hands in defeat, following Grace to make sure she really left. As soon as we were out of the apartment, I felt her. My body pulled to hers. If I’d had a soul left, I was sure that would have been tugged to hers as well. She was my magnet. Anywhere Lenny went, I went as well. Gearing up for obliteration, I turned to see her.
Lennox stood in the shadows of the doorway. Her black eye had spread to the top of her cheekbone and up to her temple. Eggplant, maroon, and saffron, the colors were like a violent sunset across her eye—that I had put there.
“She shouldn’t have left us alone,” I said, more to myself.
“She’s probably just outside the door.” With her eyes on the floor, Lenny leaned against the door, refusing to take another step inside. “She’s worried you’re becoming like your asshole dad.”
I reached out to touch the bruise but she flinched. Like an idiot I asked, “Does it hurt?”
“No it’s great,” Lenny replied, sarcasm like a snake bite. “I’m surprised they don’t offer this in spas. You know, get a facial, a mud mask, and then a one-two punch.” I laughed despite the circumstance. Lenny always had a way with words, even when she had a fucking black eye. I took a step closer, expecting her to flinch again, but she held her ground.
Lenny glared up at me, Atlantic eyes stormy. “You’re not well, Vic. You might even be mentally ill.”
I laughed. “You think everyone is mentally ill.”
Lennox punched her cheek out with her tongue. “Yeah that’s great, deflect. I kept wondering these past months why you were so goddamn adamant that I get help—”
“I wanted you to be well.”
“Yeah, sure, that’s all it was. It couldn’t be that you were projecting or anything.” She pointed at her bruised eye and I looked away. “You’ve been to war, you grew up in an abusive home, and you never talk about your birth mom. Are you really going to try and sell me that shit as diamonds? You wanted me well? Sure, okay.”
I stepped back at her accusations. Even after years of living with her, after a constant slew of Lennox, I had somehow gotten it in my head that I could prepare myself. Her words cut through me, nestling deep inside my abdomen like acid. She had such an uncanny ability to strip raw everything I worked to strengthen.
Now was not the time to be raw. I needed my defenses up and unwavering. Superman doesn’t carry kryptonite into battle. I hardened my jaw, placing a hand on her shoulder to kick her out.
Our eyes locked.
“You’re such an asshole.”
There it was again, that fire inside her. For a while it had been so hard to see, but it was back and it was a fucking bonfire. She raised her fist, knocking free the hand I’d put on her shoulder and nearly crashing her own against my mouth. I grabbed it at the elbow. She frowned harder, but it was a mask. I could see the glow inside her, burning away at the facade. She raised her other fist but I caught th
at one at the wrist.
“Let go of me you wife-beating ass,” Lenny said, struggling in my grip.
“You’re not my wife,” I pointed out.
“Oh excuse me, you’re right, I should really get the nomenclature right when talking about my abuser. Ass. Did I get that right? Ass—” I covered her lips with my mouth, shutting her up with a kiss. At first Lenny resisted. She pushed at me and elbowed me, but she was my drug. I needed to have her, and I knew Lenny felt the same way. We were like two heroin addicts who housed each other’s personal brand of heroin.
Lenny bit my lip and pulled it between her teeth. With her now free hands she pounded on my chest. Still, that wasn’t enough. She grabbed my hand and forced me to touch her face. She made me feel it, the place I had hit her. I tried to pull away, because fuck if I wanted to cause her any more pain, but she refused to let me.
Through it I felt everything. I felt her tears fall as my touch caused agony, an agony I had created. Our kiss never broke. I pushed Lenny back against the door and lifted up her shirt. With my free hand I cupped her breast, ecstatic that this time her hiss was of pleasure and not pain.
Lowering my lips from hers, I placed kisses along her skin. From her collarbone down I lavished her skin, watching her face change as I inched closer to her nipple. With my mouth to her tit, I lowered my hand beneath the seam of her pants.
It wasn’t sweet. It was anger and confusion marked by our passion. It was punishment. It was a lashing literally done with tongues. When I entered her with my finger, she grasped the hand that still lay on her cheek, as if I could ever forget.