Page 61 of Beautiful Monster

“Why?”

Pulling away, I look down into her wide eyes, those eyes with the world in them. The knowing, wise, welcoming eyes that make me feel like I’m being seen and not just looked at.

“Because I fucking hate myself, Sunny. And I can’t live like that anymore. I don’t do anything worthwhile. I don’t make anyone happy or make anyone fucking smile. I don’t even disappoint people anymore because no one has any faith in me at all.

“At night I want to know that there’s someone in my bed that will be there the next night and the night after that. I’m tired of being alone, Sunny. I’m tired of feeling like loneliness is what I deserve.”

Her hands are on my cheeks now, the soft pads of her fingers, with the scent of acrylic paint wafting to my nose, stroking the unshaven scruff on my face to my neck.

“You don’t deserve that.”

I try to pull away because everything she says and the look in her eye feels like a fantasy—not real. Fiction. Lies.

“You don’t know me, Sunny.”

“Yes, I do. Sometimes, I wonder if I’m the only one who does know you, Alex.”

“No, you know the version of me I want you to see.”

“And how is that not real?”

“Because…I’m rotting inside.”

She grabs my face again, forcing me to look at her with the intensity of a blazing sun so I have no choice but to believe her. “No, Alexander. You’re healing.”

I open my mouth to argue, but nothing comes out. For a moment, as we stare at each other, I am no older than Sunny. I am no different than her. I don’t exist outside of her contact. It’s like staring at the other half of my own soul.

With that…I crumble.

My head falls to her shoulder and she swallows me up in her arms. When my arms go around her, I squeeze her so tightly to my body, I fear I might break her. But my girl is strong—strong enough to hold us both up. And I don’t just mean physically.

“One day at a time,” she whispers in the silence, and I want to kiss her so bad it hurts. It actually stings the backs of my eyes to keep myself from tasting her lips, but I don’t.

I love you.

Those three words settle on my tongue, fused to the surface without the strength to speak them. I can’t burden her with that confession. Love would only tether her to me, and I won’t do that to her.

Her smile against my neck eases away another layer of tension in my body.

When I finally pull away, she stands there awkwardly, and I hate myself for how tense I’ve made things between us. I had to go and do what I did last night, and now the girl doesn’t know where we stand or what I’ll do next. When we’ll do what we did last night again. Fuck, she actually asked when she could return the favor, and it nearly killed me.

But what Sunny did for me today was more than that. These lines have been crossed, but I promised her I’d take care of her, and it’s up to me to walk back over the lines to the side where we both belong.

“So…” she says, carefully, leaning against the counter, and I dread the next words out of her mouth, sure she's going to bring up last night.

“Sunny…”

“Did you get me those chickpea snacks?”

A laugh bursts through my lips, grateful for the way she’s returned the house to normal with just a few words. I take the snacks out of the paper bag and toss them at her. “Knock yourself out, rain cloud.”

“Thanks,” she calls back to me, as she disappears through the door and back to her place in the pool house.

CHAPTER 20

SUNNY

I’m having a hard time with this blue. It’s either too green or too gray, but I need it to reflect the water from the pool. No matter how I mix it, it just keeps turning out wrong, and it’s distracting me. When Alex calls me in for dinner, I ignore him.