It’s been a couple of months since Stone left. I actually welcomed the tension-free zone I was living in. It felt like a burden had been lifted, even though I thought about him every single day, every moment of the day. I understood what Stone said. My love for him was always forbidden, a taboo, something people frowned upon, something people couldn’t understand. But the love I had for him was pure. It wasn’t tainted. It was innocent. But, I wasn’t the same innocent little girl he knew when we were kids, fending for ourselves because our parents were pieces of shit. Drug addicts…losers. Stone had to grow up fast…take care of his father. He had a fucked up life, and his father didn’t care. Somewhere along the line, he came to us for a reason. I believed that. I believed it was fate. He was meant for me and only…me. I never had a childhood. I never knew what it was like to have a mother’s love. She only loved them. Her men ; their dicks and how they made her come. She never read a story to me at bedtime. She never made me breakfast. We never sat at the dinner table together. She didn’t tell me I would bleed when I got my first period. Stone bought me my first girlie pads after I bled through my clothes at school. He asked Lisbeth to get me some from the girl’s locker room. That day, I didn’t hate her as much . My mother taught me nothing except how to be a whore. How to shoot up heroine. How to roll up a joint. How to shop for lingerie and she told me I should swallow when I suck a man off. My childhood was ruined because I was too busy dragging her up from the floor, or cleaning up her bloody face after they gave her a beating when they were done fucking her all night long. Too busy buying her drugs, melting her heroine…shooting her up when she couldn’t find the vein. She came to me so that I could take care of her.
Where was she when HE came for me? Where was she when HE was finished with her and she wasn’t enough for him? I remembered the looks; the smiles; the candy; the gifts. I remembered his scent. I remembered his touch. I remembered his eyes and the way he stripped me of my clothes without even touching me. I remembered a lot of things. Things Stone never knew about . Things I wish I could take back …but I couldn’t. I wasn’t innocent anymore. I was tainted. Spoiled.
***
I believed Stone when he said we couldn’t be together, so I had to make the best of whatever relationship he allowed me to have with him. I loved the way Stone came and picked up the kids every weekend. I appreciated how he never stopped being their daddy. Daniel always stood in the kitchen by the door at exactly the same time every weekend, his Ninja Turtle blanket wrapped tightly in his arms, waiting for me to open the door so he could run into his arms. Stone and I barely spoke. It was hi and goodbye, a stolen glance here and there. I wanted to show him I didn’t need him. I wanted to prove to