Fuck Buddy (18 page)

CHAPTER THIRTY
LIV

“I need you to promise me you won’t say anything about what I’m going to tell you, ever,” I said.

Chloe shook her head as she inhaled a deep breath. “I’ll tell you what you
need
. You need to start trusting people. Whatever you and I talk about is between us, always. You make me feel like we’re sixteen. And who in the fuck dressed you this morning? You look like shit.”

Her hair was dirty blonde with pink highlights. Dressed in jean shorts, Chuck’s, and a vintage
Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars
tee shirt, she looked cute. I, on the other hand, looked like I had just escaped a mental ward.

Wearing jeans, old combat boots from high school, and a light jacket over a tee shirt I had worn for the last four days, I could have passed for a homeless girl.

“I feel like shit, too,” I said. “And I’m sorry. I do trust you.”

“Then act like it.”

“Okay.”

I shoved my hands into the pockets of my jacket and fixed my eyes on the far corner of the table. After what seemed like an eternity of silence, I found the nerve to speak. “You said when we first met and talked about stuff that most people who are like we are just end up this way. You said there’s not anything that makes us like this. That we weren’t abused. You said we’re normal. You said that.”

She raised her hand between us. “Hold up. You’re doing what you always done. You’re twisting shit around, Liv. What I said was that nothing
had
to happen to make someone have the desires or characteristics of a submissive.”

She cleared her throat and continued. “Statistically speaking, there’s ‘X’ amount of people in this world who were mistreated as kids. So, statistically speaking, there’s ‘Y’ amount of people who are submissive and have been mistreated as kids. I don’t know what ‘X’ and “Y’ are, but I know they’re significant.”

I glared at her. “How’d you know I was talking about being abused as kids?”

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” she snapped back. “You mentioned it, that’s how.”

I rubbed my eyes with the heels of my palms and tried to collect my thoughts. “I’m sorry, I haven’t slept for a week.”

She leaned against the edge of the table, narrowed her eyes, and stared. “You said this was an emergency. What the fuck is going on?”

After a few seconds of preparing my perfect response, my bottom lip began to quiver. “Luke and I broke up,” I sobbed.

“Oh shit. I’m sorry. What happened?”

In response, I cried uncontrollably for some time – partially due to exhaustion, but more as a result of being completely heartbroken. After exhausting myself of tears, I took a choppy shallow breath and wiped my eyes on the arms of my jacket.

“I uhhm. I…”

“I found out.”

“He was cheating?” she asked.

I shook my head. “No.”

“When he was a kid. His uhhm. His mother abused him.”

Keeping my response brief made saying it much easier than I expected. The abuse, as far as I was concerned, was ten times easier to accept than being without Luke. Speaking about it seemed to hold the same values.

She sat up straight. “I’m sorry. His parents divorced when we were in middle school, right?”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

After what seemed like an extended period of awkwardly fidgeting in my seat, she broke the silence.

“So what happened between you two?”

“I found out about it, you know, about his mom. And I couldn’t get over it,” I said. “All I could think about was that his mom abusing him made him the way he was. And it creeped me out to think about having sex with him. Like, if I was having sex with him, I was condoning or approving his mother’s behavior.”

She stared back at me as if I had three heads. “What?”

I shrugged. “What?”

She glared at me for a moment, leaned against the back of her seat, and slowly shook her head. “Let me get this straight. You find out Luke was abused as a child and instead of supporting him, you broke up with him. You decided if you supported him that you’re supporting his mother’s abuse? So you fucking walked away?”

It sounded bad the way she worded it, but I nodded my head nonetheless.

Her eyes narrowed to slits. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

A few seconds later, and the crying began again.

“I don’t know,” I blubbered. “It’s just…his mom…his mom made him that way…it’s just…”

“It’s just what?” she snapped.

“Gross. It’s gross,” I cried.

“Really? The same guy you were bragging about a few months ago is gross now? Because his mother abused him?”

I nodded.

“You selfish
bitch
,” she hissed.

I had called Chloe in an act of desperation, hoping for sympathy and advice. It didn’t appear she was willing to give much of either. I was beginning to feel smaller and smaller.

“And I thought you went to school for graphic design.”

I wiped the tears from my eyes. “I did.”

“Oh,” she said. “There for a minute I was thinking maybe you went to medical school and I didn’t know about it.”

I stared back at her, confused. “Huh?”

“You’ve diagnosed Luke. You’ve decided that his mother made him the way he is. What if she didn’t? It’s common medical knowledge that a small percentage of people in the lifestyle are abused. So who’s to say his abuse caused his kink?” She crossed her arms in front of her chest. “You don’t have a medical degree, so it’s sure as fuck not you.”

I wiped my nose with the back of my hand. “So you think maybe he was just born like that?”

She leaned forward slightly. “You’re as dumb as a sack of sand.”

As I prepared to respond, she turned her palm up and held it between us. “You’re done thinking.
Done
. I’m doing the thinking for you from here on out.”

I chewed the inside of my lip and nodded my head.

“Okay,” she said. “You’re just freaking out. He was abused. It’s fucking sickening, especially when it’s a mother doing it. We think of our mom as someone who will always nurture us. And when one of them does that? It’s pretty hard to accept. I’m sure that’s part of what’s got you all fucked up. Personally, I’d like to tie his mom up and throw knives at her.”

“But. That’s no reason for you to abandon Luke. He needs your support, and you need to find a way to give it. Here’s my idea.” She extended her index finger. “You and Luke. Together. You confront her.”

“What? Confront her? I can’t do that,” I responded.

“Sure you can,” she said. “Confrontation is the quickest way for someone who was abused to start to recover. It allows the abused to feel empowered, finally be heard, and more than anything, it’s cleansing.”

I slumped in my seat and stared. “Says who?”

She cocked one eyebrow.

I covered my hand with my mouth.

She nodded. “You guessed it.”

I lowered my hand. “Oh my God, I…”

“Save it.” She chuckled. “I don’t need you tossing my ass to the curb.”

“So, Luke and me both? At the same time?” I asked.

“Yeah, if he’ll agree to it. if you’re both there, it’ll make it much easier on each of you. This might sound crazy to you, but basically you grew up with him. His family was your family. His mom abusing him probably makes you feel like she let you down. Almost like she abused you.”

What she was saying made perfect sense. As crazy as confronting Luke’s mother sounded, somehow as I considered it as being a viable solution, I began to fill with hope. Within a few minutes, I was convinced it just might work.

“I think it’s a good idea,” I said.

“It’s a great idea,” she said with a grin.

I pushed my cup of coffee to the side, realizing I hadn’t so much as taken a drink. “Thank you.”

“One more piece of advice?” she asked.

“Sure.”

“Take a shower,” she said. “And change clothes,”

I nodded my head and stood, eager to see if her idea would work.

She opened her arms. “If you do talk to her…”

Exhausted, I held her in my arms, appreciative to have her as a friend. “Yeah?”

“Be sure and let it all out. All the anger, all the feelings, everything. And tell Luke to make her apologize. If she will, it’ll make a big difference.”

“Okay,” I said.

“Good luck,” she said. “And let me know how it goes.”

“I will.”

As I released her I caught a whiff of myself. Chloe was right, I needed a shower. Maybe after a long bath, I thought, I would feel good enough to call Luke.

And I hoped he still loved me enough to answer.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

LUKE

“I just need you to listen. Like, for maybe a few minutes without talking, okay?” Liv asked.

We had simultaneously sent each other text messages wanting to have a talk. After sitting on her porch waiting for her to get home for almost half of an hour, I was willing to listen to whatever she had to say.

“Okay,” I said.

She looked like hammered shit, and smelled like she hadn’t taken a bath in a week, but seeing her was comforting.

“So I’m going to be honest, like
really
honest. And it wasn’t that I lied when we talked before, but I didn’t tell you
everything
.”

I nodded. “I’m just going to listen.”

“Okay,” she said as she rubbed her hands together frantically.

Apparently, she was pretty excited about whatever she had to say.

I studied her as she gazed down at the floor. There were dark circles under her eyes, her face had absolutely no makeup on it whatsoever, and her hair was a matted mess. She was wearing an old tee shirt I had left at her house when I was a senior in high school, and although it was the middle of summer, she was dressed in jeans and combat boots. Despite her odd outward appearance, as she sat and mentally prepared for whatever it was she intended to say, she was beautiful.

She took a long deep breath.

“So when I found out about your mom it freaked me out I convinced myself that her abuse made you crave the things you crave sexually and I felt like if I enjoyed participating in those same things it somehow made me a part of all the abuse or that I condoned it or something I don’t know but the whole thing freaked me out and I didn’t want to lose you as a friend and I knew if we kept having sex it would freak me out so I broke up with you but it drove me crazy and I’ve been crying for a week and I haven’t slept or taken a bath in a week either but I talked to Chloe and she said if you and me together confronted your mother that it would be the first step in recovery and I really need you back so I was wondering if you’d consider that?” she blurted in one long breathless sentence.

I raised my index finger and inhaled a shallow breath. As I prepared to respond the best I felt I was able, she interrupted my thought process.

“Wait,” she snapped. “I’m not done.”

“Okay.”

“So I want you and me to go talk to your mom. Will you do that?” She asked. “Okay, I’m done.”

“Wow.” I widened my eyes and shook my head.

“So you…” I paused and thought about everything she said, realizing I was speaking more out of excitement than preparedness.

“You want to confront my mother? About the abuse? You and me?”

She nodded her head eagerly.

My eyes fell to her feet and slowly raised to meet her gaze. “It’s something I’ve been wanting to do for a long time, but never thought I’d be able to without beating the shit out of her. If you’ll go with me, I think it’s a good idea.”

She clapped her hands together. “I hope this works.”

I chuckled. “But you’ll need to take a shower and change clothes first.”

She jumped from the couch. “I will. Get it set up. When do you think we can do it?”

I shrugged. “I’m guessing if we ask, it’ll never happen. If this is what’s between you and me being together, I say we just go to her office. Fuck it. She interfered with my life, I say it’s time we interfere with hers.”

“I’ll be ready in fifteen minutes.”

“Take your time.”

As she took a shower, I thought of what I wanted to say. It seemed odd that Liv’s resolution to our problem was the same resolution I had thought of for years, but never seemed to develop the courage to proceed with.

The more I thought about it, the more prepared I felt I became. I didn’t want to be my mother’s friend, her enemy, or her son, for that matter. As far as I was concerned, she forfeited her right to be my mother when she chose to do the things to me that she did.

I wanted to say what I felt I needed to, walk away, and hopefully live a less complicated life as a result.

One with Liv in it.

She stepped through her bedroom door and into the living room. She looked gorgeous. I wanted to get up, hold her in my arms, and give her a long passionate kiss. I wished things were the way they were before, but realized the healing process for both of us would take time.

“You look gorgeous,” I said.

“Thank you.” She tossed her hair. “Are you ready?”

I felt I’d never actually be ready.

It had been thirteen years.

Thirteen years of nightmares. Thirteen years of guilt. Thirteen years of feeling abandoned. Thirteen years of wanting answers. Thirteen years of wanting an apology. And, thirteen years of wanting closure.

“Yeah,” I said. “I am.”

It was time for me to get closure.

And to begin a new chapter in my life.