6
W ade excused himself to go shower. Cory placed the coffee carafe back on the warmer, put the milk away and washed their mugs. She smothered another yawn, considered getting dressed, then discarded the idea. It was just too early to bother, especially when she didnât have anywhere to go.
But she did have a lot to think about. Wandering into her living room, she curled up on one end of the couch, tucking her robe around her legs, and put her chin in her hand thinking over all Wade had shared with her that morning.
She wished she knew what had unlocked his silence but she had to admit it was good to know something about him even if it wasnât a whole lot.
But she wasnât at all surprised to find out heâd been an abused child. Nor did it surprise her to learn that the navy had given him what he needed. Often abused childrenneeded order in their lives, clear-cut rules to follow, after being subjected to the unpredictable whims of mean adults. The regimented lifestyle took away the fear of never knowing what would bring retribution down on their heads.
And apparently heâd needed to take charge at the same time, or he never would have gone into the SEALs. Maybe thereâd even been an element of nobodyâs ever going to get away with treating me that way again.
She didnât consider herself an expert, but in eight years of teaching sheâd certainly seen enough kids fighting these same battles, and few enough who were willing to talk about it. It was sad how they became coconspirators with their abusers, protecting their tormentors with silence and even outright lies.
And often, even when she thought she had enough to report it to the authorities, nothing came from it. Without physical evidence, as long as the child denied it, there was little enough anyone could do.
The thing that had always struck her, though, was the incalculable emotional damage that must come from being so mistreated by the very people a child by rights ought to be able to trust.
Well, sheâd always wondered about that, and now she was looking at it. He seemed to blame his job for his inability to make connections, and perhaps it was responsible in large measure, but she suspected the seeds of the problem lay in his childhood. If you couldnât trust your own parents, who could you trust?
She closed her eyes, chin still in her hand. As always, when confronted with something like this, she wanted to help, but in this case she didnât see how she possibly could. This was a man who must be what? Thirty-eight? Thirty-nine? She couldnât just step in like some delivering angel.He wouldnât want it, and honestly, she didnât know enough to be much help. The best she could do was listen when he was willing to talk.
He had turned out to be a good case for not judging a book by its cover, though. If her ears hadnât become properly tuned through teaching, she probably would have thought all along that he was a hard, harsh man, sufficient unto himself, needing no one and nothing. Thatâs certainly what he had tried to become, and the image he tried to perpetuate.
And she had to admit she felt a lot more comfortable now knowing that he wasnât the stone monolith he had first seemed.
Listening to him had also made her think about her own situation, and doing so made her squirm a bit. Yes, terrible things had happened to her, and her entire life had changed as a result, but how could she truly excuse her waste of the past year? Terror and trauma could explain only so much. The woman she had once believed herself to be had turned out to be a weakling and a coward.
She gave herself no quarter on that one. Some of it could be excused, but not all of it. After all, look what Wade had managed to achieve out of his own trauma as a child. He may have drifted for nearly a year, but then heâd taken a stand to make something of himself.
She hadnât even tried.
But even as she sat there
W ade excused himself to go shower. Cory placed the coffee carafe back on the warmer, put the milk away and washed their mugs. She smothered another yawn, considered getting dressed, then discarded the idea. It was just too early to bother, especially when she didnât have anywhere to go.
But she did have a lot to think about. Wandering into her living room, she curled up on one end of the couch, tucking her robe around her legs, and put her chin in her hand thinking over all Wade had shared with her that morning.
She wished she knew what had unlocked his silence but she had to admit it was good to know something about him even if it wasnât a whole lot.
But she wasnât at all surprised to find out heâd been an abused child. Nor did it surprise her to learn that the navy had given him what he needed. Often abused childrenneeded order in their lives, clear-cut rules to follow, after being subjected to the unpredictable whims of mean adults. The regimented lifestyle took away the fear of never knowing what would bring retribution down on their heads.
And apparently heâd needed to take charge at the same time, or he never would have gone into the SEALs. Maybe thereâd even been an element of nobodyâs ever going to get away with treating me that way again.
She didnât consider herself an expert, but in eight years of teaching sheâd certainly seen enough kids fighting these same battles, and few enough who were willing to talk about it. It was sad how they became coconspirators with their abusers, protecting their tormentors with silence and even outright lies.
And often, even when she thought she had enough to report it to the authorities, nothing came from it. Without physical evidence, as long as the child denied it, there was little enough anyone could do.
The thing that had always struck her, though, was the incalculable emotional damage that must come from being so mistreated by the very people a child by rights ought to be able to trust.
Well, sheâd always wondered about that, and now she was looking at it. He seemed to blame his job for his inability to make connections, and perhaps it was responsible in large measure, but she suspected the seeds of the problem lay in his childhood. If you couldnât trust your own parents, who could you trust?
She closed her eyes, chin still in her hand. As always, when confronted with something like this, she wanted to help, but in this case she didnât see how she possibly could. This was a man who must be what? Thirty-eight? Thirty-nine? She couldnât just step in like some delivering angel.He wouldnât want it, and honestly, she didnât know enough to be much help. The best she could do was listen when he was willing to talk.
He had turned out to be a good case for not judging a book by its cover, though. If her ears hadnât become properly tuned through teaching, she probably would have thought all along that he was a hard, harsh man, sufficient unto himself, needing no one and nothing. Thatâs certainly what he had tried to become, and the image he tried to perpetuate.
And she had to admit she felt a lot more comfortable now knowing that he wasnât the stone monolith he had first seemed.
Listening to him had also made her think about her own situation, and doing so made her squirm a bit. Yes, terrible things had happened to her, and her entire life had changed as a result, but how could she truly excuse her waste of the past year? Terror and trauma could explain only so much. The woman she had once believed herself to be had turned out to be a weakling and a coward.
She gave herself no quarter on that one. Some of it could be excused, but not all of it. After all, look what Wade had managed to achieve out of his own trauma as a child. He may have drifted for nearly a year, but then heâd taken a stand to make something of himself.
She hadnât even tried.
But even as she sat there
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