The Only Exception

Twenty Two

~Lainey~

I don't think therapy sessions are ever supposed to feel normal. They're meant to make you feel a little uncomfortable so you can get out what you need to. That's not a comfortable thing to do. Not when there's this much baggage to kind of get out into the universe. However, I am well aware that after last month I couldn't just bypass over it and act like the physical abuse and everything else never happened; so I took dad up on paying for them. 

I don't doubt that my dad and Noah love me. I know it's not even a question. They want what's best for me and I thoroughly believe that. They just have other things they would rather put first. Work has been and will always come first. 

I gave myself a few minutes after closing the laptop, looking around the room Spencer had decked out for me. As much as I was in his bed every night, he wanted me to have my own space so I didn't feel like I had to be there with him. I wanted to be though. Being with Spencer was the one place I felt safe right now. I tried sleeping alone a few times over the past 4 weeks but only managed an hour in the bed before I was fighting tears and let myself give in. 

I hate more than anything relying on someone the way I'm relying on Spencer for everything. Internally it makes my chest ache and it is taking everything in me to mentally fight against the habit to side step and handle it all myself. There's nothing wrong with needing help, in needing someone around. 

When I finally emerge from the room, I can hear Spence downstairs. His music playing quietly over the speaker with the odd couple of words coming out of his mouth. I don't know what he's cooking today but it's taking over the house and I have never felt something so fucking good. 

I tiptoe down, wanting to catch whatever he was doing today. Yesterday he was working at his laptop when I came out of an online class. Just silently tapping away on his laptop on the sofa. Today? Today he's sat at the table surrounded in water colours and pads of paper, singing along to whatever the radio is playing quietly on the kitchen counter. 

Not only has Spencer hung around for all of this shit, do everything in his power to find me rather than just leaving me like my father probably would have, done everything to make me feel safe since moving in here, he's made sure life went on as close to normal as possible. He made college offer me virtual classes and as long as my grades are still high, I'll still be able to graduate next month. No catch up papers needed. He has his guys pick up Chelsea and the guys and he hangs around and gets on with them all so I can still have some socializing whilst I'm here with him. 

"You don't have to stand in the doorway Lanes." He lifts his head for a second, moving up on the bench and pointing the end of his paintbrush for me to come sit. I pushed myself forward, shuffling across the floor just to slide in next to him and have him pull my legs up over him. "How was your session?" 

"Hard." I watch his paintbrush moving across the paper, barely feeling the kiss he plants on the side of my face. I don't need to ask him what he's painting for my stomach to flip, butterflies erupting beyond control. 

One month me and Spencer have been here, inseparable, practically joined at the hip but not for even a second was I aware he not only painted but was exceptionally good at it. The portrait he's so carefully adding to looks like it's taken weeks but I haven't seen the paint set before so I know he's done this today. 

Spencer says something but between therapy and this, my brain isn't in the room. He nudges me and I blink, looking up at him with a blank expression which just makes him chuckle, lean over and kiss me. 

"You're painting me." I hear myself say but I don't feel my mouth move. I just stare at his bright face. I don't think I'll ever understand what landed Spencer back in my life. What specific reasons each of us and the universe had to line us up at the perfect time but it had. It had pushed him into my life and slammed the door, locking it immediately so he'd never be able to leave again.