As You Turn Away (The Walker Boys) (29 page)

She shook her head, afraid to say something else wrong.

“You. You, and my family, and the urge to wake each day and fill that day with purpose.” Jonah pushed her palm into his shirt, and she felt the thrumming of his heart. “You say you love me, Quinn, but you’re my
world
. I know that’s one of those things you aren’t ‘supposed’ to do in relationships,” he said, making air quotes with his free hand. “But fuck relationship rules. Fuck protocol. The only rule I ever made for us this time was that I was going to love you with everything I had.”

Quinn opened her mouth, but she had no words—just tears that fell, pattering like raindrops onto the bed.

“I think of you when I wake in the morning. I think of you before I go to sleep. You’re the first person I want to share good or bad news with,” Jonah continued. “I’m ready to spend the rest of my life with you. Can you say the same, Quinn?” Jonah’s voice gentled, but the intensity was still there. “Do you love me like that? Do you
need
me like that?”

There was nothing she could say in response. Quinn jerked her hand away from Jonah and stood. She couldn’t hear him talk about her
and them
in such an amazing way, when they both knew that even though he put her first, she hadn’t done the same for him. She didn’t deserve to be that important to him; she wasn’t fit to be his world. She stumbled away, halting when she felt like she could breathe without the shrapnel she’d called down lodging in her lungs.

“I—”

“It’s simple, sweetheart.” Jonah rose, but didn’t come near her. “Just open your heart wide, and let me in. I told you once it was safe with me, and this time, I swear it is.”

“I can’t.” She could barely whisper the words, but she could tell he heard her from the way his shoulders fell. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, Jonah.” She twisted her hands together so she wouldn’t reach for him. “You’re right. I’m not really in this relationship. I haven’t made peace with our past, or with my mom’s passing. I haven’t committed to you like you have to me, because I can’t.”

“Why not?” His voice broke the words apart into ragged sounds.

Quinn looked away from him, throat aching. She shook her head, his form blurring through her tears. “You think you know me.” She felt like talons were raking across her chest. “When I left, all I wanted in the world was for you to come with me, or tell me it was okay, that we’d make long distance work. I thought once we were away, and together I could tell you why I had to leave.”

“You left to dance.” Jonah moved; she thought he was coming toward her. “Right?”

She shook her head, blinking. He came back into focus, features twisted. “No. I mean, yes, but it was more than that. My mom…” Quinn closed her eyes, her dream from the other night resurfacing. Nausea gripped her stomach, and she forced herself to slow her breathing. “It was too much, Jonah. You know how she was, and the closer I graduation got, the tighter her control over my life got. I wanted so much more than the life she was forcing me into. I knew I couldn’t live a life under her thumb, her insults, and worse.”

“No. Don’t fucking tell me it’s what I think it is.”

Quinn opened her eyes; Jonah’s eyes were narrowed at her. Quinn felt her face contort, and she stared at her hands, twined together. “Growing up, she insulted and mocked me so often that I started to believe it. The only way I knew to cope was to be perfect, or try. She made it clear I could never
really
be perfect.” She frowned, her legs trembling.

“Quinn…” Jonah knelt in front of her. “Christ, you were a kid. You didn’t deserve that. You know you didn’t. I tried so hard to counteract her hatred with my love.”

“I know.” She lifted her face to his. “She wanted to control me entirely, and things with you and I were bad. We broke up, and I fell apart. I guess she was mad I wasn’t rebounding and fitting into the mold she wanted me to be. She slapped me, and I just. I broke.”

“Oh Quinn.” Jonah sighed. “My Quinn.”

She was crying at this point, but she couldn’t stop. “My entire life, the insults, the threats, nothing ever made me think she’d hurt me. That slap was the last straw. I left that night, called Darren and had him take me to the airport. She chased me into the driveway screaming, and that was the last I saw of her for years.” Her eyes ached; her whole body hurt from being so tense.

“That’s why you left.” Jonah’s voice was hoarse. “That’s why you never came home.”

Shuddering, Quinn bowed her head. “I wanted to dance, but I left because I
had
to. I had to be out in the world and be myself. You
showed
me I could be myself.” She couldn’t hold back her tears, despite wanting to stay strong. The first sob trembled past her lips, then another. “I never told anyone, not Darren or Dad. Lanie knows, and that’s it. I thought about telling you so many times, but I thought I could work through my bullshit on my own. Get over my issues—my fears, my anger. Then once I had, I could give you my whole heart.” More tears flowed.

Jonah took her hands in his and squeezed them tightly. He helped her stand, and led her over to the bed. He settled her in, and then sat beside her. Putting an arm around her shoulders, Jonah pulled her into him. Quinn had no idea what he was thinking, or what else she could say at this point. She’d given him more now than she ever had before; she’d told him everything.

“I’m glad you told me.” Jonah spoke quietly. He shifted so he was facing her. “It explains a lot about you and us both in the past and in the present.” His eyes held hers, and he held her hands again. “It makes me so fucking sad for you.” He sighed. “I knew everything was bad but I don’t think I ever really knew
how
bad.”

“But it’s okay now!” Quinn studied him, eyes moving rapidly from their hands to his face. “I mean, you
know
, and I’m working on it, and—”

“Quinn.” His tone stopped her immediately, and she flinched. “It’s good that you opened up to me. That’s a first step, but there are others.” He squeezed her hands again, and then let them go. “Ones I think you need to do on your own.”

If she hadn’t been sitting on the bed, she would have collapsed under his words. “What? On my own? What does that even
mean
?”

He passed a hand over his face before he spoke. “Quinn, we both did almost immeasurable damage when we left home. It’s taken all summer, but I’ve started making amends with my loved ones, and I know you have too. But we both have individual journeys to make before we can really each be whole.” He frowned. “And I don’t want…I don’t want to be a crutch to you.” He touched her face gently. “I don’t think that I
am
, I’m not saying that. I just don’t want to
become
that.”

“I don’t understand.” She felt fuzzy, like she was wrapped in cotton.

“Sweetheart, you need to work through your mom’s death, and what it means for you. You need to be open with your dad, Darren, and your aunt, about how things were with your mom. You need to be okay, and I can help you with that, but...”

“But?” Quinn echoed Jonah’s words. She felt like all she was, was an echo of a person. Echoing his words, unable to form coherent ones of her own.

“I’ll support you, but you need to find a way to be whole. And if I do it for you, it won’t
mean
anything. So I think we should take a step back from us.”

She’d known the words were coming, but they still knocked the breath out of her. “For now or for good?” She searched Jonah’s eyes and face, but he wasn’t giving away anything.

His pause before answering lasted an eternity. “I told you, Quinn. I’m all in.” His face tightened, and she saw what he was hiding. “I deserve the same thing. I deserve someone who loves me the way I love them. I hope that
you
can be that someone but if you can’t, then it’s not healthy to put my all into a relationship where I’m not getting the same in return.”

Quinn jerked away from him. “What the
fuck
, Jonah.” She backpedaled, putting as much space between them as she could. “I opened up to you about my past, and you made it about you.” She spun, and grabbed her shoes, shoving her feet in them.

“I didn’t—”

“Like hell you didn’t!” Quinn reached for her purse. Her chest was aching like she’d run a marathon as she snatched her jacket off his desk chair. “You were just looking for a way out, weren’t you?” She shoved her arms into the jacket, forgetting her purse was on one of them. Frustrated, she ripped the jacket off, tears stinging her eyes. “Just like you accused me of last time.” She felt like either she was reeling, or the room was; she was losing any control of the situation.

“What?” Jonah’s voice thundered through the room.
“
Don’t
go there, Quinn. Don’t turn this into something it’s not.”

“Isn’t it though?” She felt her pulse pounding, her breathing spiraling into a pant. “All this crap about me needing help and you deserving better? Isn’t it just your bullshit cop-out? If you wanted to end our fling or what the fuck ever we are, you could just say so.”

“This isn’t like last time. I didn’t mean it like that, goddamnit!” Jonah’s face contorted as his voice faded. “Don’t purposefully misunderstand me.” He reached out for her, raising a hand to her face.

“Don’t fucking touch me!” She jerked away, and saw him recoil, but she couldn’t stop. It was like she was outside her own body, watching herself destroy the best thing she’d ever had. “I’m leaving. I’m going to go work on my
issues
. That way you don’t have to worry about me. I’ll be fine.”

Before she could stop long enough to think through what she was doing, Quinn ran out of the bedroom, and toward the front door. She heard Jonah chasing after her, but she ripped open the door and ran outside before he could catch her. Her heart thrummed desperately in her chest as she jumped in her car and peeled out of the parking lot, leaving Jonah behind again.

“Shut up,” Moira commanded. “Stop this sniveling; it’s weak and beneath this family. Instead of lying here in the dark you need to be studying and preparing for your debutante ball.”

Quinn glared at her mother. “Leave me alone.”

She barely got the word out when a slap stung her face. Quinn raised a hand to her cheek, fresh tears filling her eyes. Her mother had never raised a hand to her, so Quinn told herself it was something that would never happen. But the fear it might followed her from childhood, to her preteen years, to this moment.

Her heart raced as she stood, and her hand fell to her side. She’d endured the verbal abuse—slung at her like rocks from a slingshot, or fired like bows from an arrow—for years now. The quiet, cutting remarks, said only when her father wasn’t around, or wasn’t listening. The insinuations that she wasn’t good enough for anyone of social standing, but was expected to find a good match regardless. The warning to stay away from families like the Walkers, lest Quinn’s true nature emerge.

She wouldn’t put up with physical abuse on top of everything else. Moira was a monster, and Quinn wasn’t the child afraid of what was under her bed, or living in her house. She was hurt, but not destroyed. She was broken, but she wasn’t ruined. And she didn’t have to stay where she’d be hurt.

“Don’t you ever do anything like that again.” She surged forward, erasing any space between her and her mother. Moira stepped back; Quinn lifted her face, and drew herself to her full height.

“How dare you!” Her mother screeched the words, but her voice trembled.

“You aren’t used to me having a backbone, are you Mother?” Quinn advanced a step toward her mother for every inch Moira retreated. “You’ve been spoiled all these years, able to
bully
me into being the girl you could shape and control.” She bared her teeth, and Moira literally recoiled.

“Stop this, Quinn.” Moira reached the wall and looked around; finally, she grasped the doorknob. “I don’t know what’s gotten into you—”

“What’s gotten into me,” Quinn said slowly, “is that I’m sick and fucking tired of living my life according to your rules. I’m not going to do it anymore. I’m not going to have to worry about what you’ll say if I’m a minute late, or what you’ll do if I say something you don’t approve of.”

“You’re my daughter whether either of us wants you to be, and you’ll listen to me.” Moira’s words were loud, harsh, but to Quinn she looked smaller than ever.

“No, Mother.” Quinn opened her door, and gestured into the hallway. “You’ll listen to me for a change. You will never put your hands on me again. You’ll stop controlling me and my life. You will stop trying to force me to life your life. Just because you’re obsessed with wealth and material things because you need that to feel good, doesn’t mean I’m the same way.”

Quinn paused. “And do you know how I know all of this?” She smiled. “I’m leaving. I’m leaving this house, and this town, and there’s not a goddamn thing you can do to stop me.” She opened her closet, and pulled out a suitcase. She spared her mother a final glance. “Now get out of my room and out of my life.”