Take Me in the Dark Read Free Page A

pushing him away. “I can’t do this anymore.”
    “Can’t do what?”
    “Give you all of myself and not get anything in return. Be with you.”
    He steps back. “You want to be with him?”
    I laugh. “Is that really what you’re worried about? Did you hear a word I just said? I don’t want to lie and be content with your lies anymore. It doesn’t matter how much I want it, it’s fucked up.”
    “You’re not fucked up.”
    “Says the guy in a mask.”
    He looks away, saying nothing. I’m right in front of him and he doesn’t even want to look at me. At least not when it comes to the truth.
    “I want you more than I want to be happy,” I admit. “I want you so fucking much that I’ll give you everything until I’ve got nothing left. It’s sick. It’s fucked up. And do you know what’s even more fucked up? Right now, I want you to push me up against this piano again and fuck me until I can’t even feel anything anymore. I don’t want to think about everything I just lost. I don’t want to think about you being in my life or not being in it. I don’t want to think about how much it hurts to love someone who hides behind a mask.”
    He hangs his head. Still doesn’t look at me. It feels like an eternity before he answers. “Alright.”
    Alright. Not, let me show you my face . Not, let me remove this mask and let you see me and know me . Just alright.
    He stands. His fingers drop to his sides. I’m amazed he can be relaxed. I want to yell at him to fight for me. I want to yell that I mean more to him than this. But I don’t.
    Fear twists in me. This might really be the last time I see him. Is this really how I want things to end?
    A moment ago I’d been so strong. I’d asked him to leave if he couldn’t give me what I needed. But maybe I hadn’t been as strong as I’d thought. In the back of my mind, I’d thought that he wouldn’t be able to leave me. I’d thought that he needed me as much as I needed him. I’d thought that his obsession matched my own. I thought my words would bring out that part of him that would fight for me—that couldn’t live without me no matter the consequences were.
    But it didn’t happen. He didn’t need me as much as I needed him. So he begins walking to the door.
    “You’re leaving, then?” I ask.
    He doesn’t stop. Doesn’t respond. Doesn’t slow as I get up and dart across the room, grabbing the back of his shirt.
    His muscles tense beneath my grip. Those beautiful, hard muscles. Those cruel scars. If I spread my hands out over his back, I’d feel the soft marks they’d left on his skin.
    “I can’t show myself to you, Laura.”
    “But aren’t I your mollyasha solla or something?”
    “ Solnyshko moyo. ”
    Damn. I wasn’t even sort of close. “Yes. That.”
    I push my head between his shoulder blades. Feel his sharp intake of breath. “You are. Always.”
    “Then why are you leaving?” How can you go so easily without even trying to fight for me?
    He puts his hand on the doorframe. “You were never for me.”
    “What do you mean I was never for you? What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
    “I can’t give you what you want. I shouldn’t have even come to you in the first place. I shouldn’t have written.”
    “But you did. That means something.” It means everything .
    He laughs humorlessly. “I wonder if you’d think the same way if you knew.”
    “Knew what?”
    He turns quickly, pushing me up against the wall. His fingers move over my face as if memorizing it. His breath is heavy through that ridiculous mask.
    “I wrote many letters before sending you that first one.”
    I frown, not understanding what he’s getting at. “Okay. It’s not weird to want to put your best foot forward, or to decide if you even want to—”
    “It’s more than that. I wrote lots of letters. Years of them.”
    Years of them . My body involuntarily shivers. Just how long has he watched me?
    “Does that scare you?” he asks, though he