God, did his truth undo me . . . every single time.

I blew out a deep breath and looked at him out of the corner of my eye because I could feel him watching for my reaction.

“Growing up, everything had to be just so. My father was particular about every minute detail of my life. To start off with, he always wanted a son and was disappointed I was a girl from the second I was born. That was the first in a laundry list of disappointments I burdened him with throughout my life. What I wore, how I did my hair, what kind of makeup I used, who my friends were, what my room looked like, everything was subject to his approval and nothing ever lived up to his standards. He hated everything about me and everything I did, so by the time I was ten or eleven I figured out it was easier to just keep everything bland and neutral. He had a harder time picking apart beige and cream. Ivory and black and white became staples and made it so that I could fly under his radar for the most part.” I shook my head a little as we finally reached the brightly lit store. “I carried a lot of that over into my adult life as habits, but I guess as I got older the bits and pieces of things I liked for myself worked their way into my everyday without me really noticing it.”

I gave him a lopsided grin. “And I actually really like that poppy-colored wall. I’m keeping it even after Poppy moves out.”

He let go of my hand and put a palm on my lower back as he ushered me into the store in front of him. Quietly, so that only I could hear, he asked, “What happened with your mom, Sayer? If your dad was that nasty and controlling, why didn’t she step in and stop him? Why did she stay with him? Why didn’t she protect you from him?”

Those were questions that had tormented me and helped me keep my heart encased safely in ice to this day. I couldn’t help my fingers from curling into my palms and digging in so hard that it hurt when I answered him.

“She loved him. She really, truly loved him, and it killed her. It never mattered how mean and terrible he was to her. She tried every single day to please him, to be the perfect wife and to make me the perfect daughter. All she wanted was his approval, some form of affection and kindness, and he knew it, so he delighted in purposely stringing her along and tormenting her.” Memories churned and slipped out of the iron hold I had them in. They twisted around all the emotions Zeb had unleashed inside of me, and they made my guts hurt and the place where my heart was supposed to be throb painfully.

“He had affairs and told her she wasn’t as pretty as his mistresses. She would starve herself, she would work out endlessly. She changed her hair, got plastic surgery, and he mocked her, told her she could never be perfect. He wanted a son since she screwed up with me, but she was sick, not just in the head, and couldn’t maintain a pregnancy to full term. He considered her worthless, but she still tried time and time again for him. Her life was nothing more than trying to reach an unreachable finish line where he would finally love her as much as she loved him. She died because she knew she was never going to make him happy and she couldn’t live with the fact. She left me with him, knowing how he was and what he was capable of. I don’t think I’ll ever forgive her for that.” I was heartless. I was cruel. I was a terrible person for feeling that way, but it was true. If I forgave her, it meant the floodgates would open and there would be no holding back all the painful, ugly, agonizing things that lurked inside the dark. If I let them free with forgiveness there would be no more ignoring them, and I wasn’t sure I was strong enough to survive that.

Zeb didn’t respond as he guided us toward a section of brightly colored kids’ bedding. Already I could see a set with both Superman and Batman logos as well as a set with a train on it. Zeb zeroed in on a set that had a bunch of vintage cars and trucks printed on the fabric and went to town picking out a matching rug and curtains for the room. It was fun to see his excitement and my heart turned over knowing that Hyde had a father who loved him and would never put him through the kinds of horrors I had lived through. My truth was a lot more unpleasant and a lot harder to digest then Zeb’s.

I complied when he asked me to pick out another set of bedding for the room. I went with a wildly colored geometric pattern that had shapes going in all directions. It wasn’t cars and trucks, but it wouldn’t clash too badly with all the other stuff he had decided on and it was busy and fun. It served the purpose of making the space more kid-friendly so that both Hyde and any court inspector who might swing by would know that Zeb was rearranging his life for his little boy.

The price tag on the haul was completely reasonable and the cashier who checked us out had a nose ring and dreadlocks and barely blinked an eye at Zeb in all his tatted-up and bearded glory. I silently chastised myself for taking him to the pricey department store in the first place. The mistake made me feel stupid and disjointed. So did the lingering silence between the two of us as we trekked back to his Jeep.

He threw the bags in the back and then walked over to open my door for me. The Jeep was splattered in mud and various other dirty things from being parked outside his jobsite, so he wouldn’t let me get in without a boost up. He laughingly told me he couldn’t afford to replace my pantsuit if I got it dirty, and now I was wondering if that was something he was really worried about.

He put a hand on the door handle and one on the indent at my waist. He bent his head a little so that we were almost eye-to-eye and told me softly, “Your dad was an asshole and I wish he was still around so I could kick his ass, but your mom . . .” He shook his head slowly from side to side. “Sometimes who we love can’t be controlled. I watched my sister struggle with it for years. She hated what her old man did to her, but she loved him, too. If you let all those things you did to survive your dad and all that resentment you have toward your mom fill you up, you’ll never have room inside for all the things you actually want to feel. All that valuable real estate is taken up by things from the past and there’s no room for the future to build on.”

I pulled my eyes away from his as he wrenched open the door and put both hands on my waist to help me inside the vehicle. When he climbed up next to me on the driver’s side, I let out a little sigh and muttered, “I’m not sure the ground is stable enough to build on whether or not the past gets cleared out.”

He craned his neck to back out of the spot and reached over to put a hand on my thigh. “It just takes someone with the know-how to do it. Lucky for both of us, I’m a certified expert at building on shaky ground.”