Secrets In Silence ✓ [Secrets Book 1]

[Chapter Thirty-One] Addison

                                           No single decision you ever made
                       has led in a straight line to where you find yourself now.
                            You peeked down some roads
            and took a few steps before turning back.
                                                       You followed some roads
                                                                             that came to a dead end
                          and others that got lost at too many intersections.
                       Ultimately, all roads are connected to all other roads.
                                                   ― Deepak Chopra

Chapter Thirty-One – Addie

I have absolutely no idea what to do about my feelings for Liam. Being with him is amazing; he's understanding and sweet and pushes the right amount to show he cares. I have feelings for him I've never felt.

I thought I loved Than but at the time  I was young and stupid, I thought any positive emotion from someone was all that mattered, in the beginning he was so good to me. He was respectful and sweet. He was a gentleman and then one day, it all just changed. He would do little things at first, that's always how it stared, right?

They would hit you once or 'accidently' do something, and then they would say sorry, they would be way kinder than they had been for a while, and then it would happen again, and each time it would be less and less time in-between, they would be less sorry, the accidents would get bigger.

You don't realize just how bad it's gotten until it pretty much slaps you in the face, or in my case, until the knife came out. Than loved his knife, it was a military like knife I think. it was black and lipped open and he spent a lot of time sharpening it. when he did it the first time, I couldn't believe it.

I tried to tell my parents and leave and they didn't care, once he saw they wouldn't do anything, there was no more 'sorry', only angry. It went from occasional accidents and being sorry to being hurt daily and only occasionally he wouldn't hurt me.

The knife was occasional, at first, but with time everything gets worse.

No one wants someone with a story like mine. I was beyond damaged in so many ways and Liam was not. Liam is from a place where things that happened to me aren't heard of. He looked horrified when I told him what the scars were from, and those are only some of the physical ones. We didn't even get into the others or the emotional ones.

I was so beyond fucked up and he didn't deserve that. He deserved someone so much better, someone who can be the girl he wants and needs. Someone he could settle down with and marry. He needed someone that wasn't me.

I wish I could stay, but maybe it was best I was leaving. We would have whatever we had this summer, and at the end I would leave. He would get over it and find the right girl. Maybe I would come back to visit, maybe I would come back when he got married.

Or maybe I would cut all ties; that would probably be the easiest.

It would be so hard to hear about who he was with, it would be so hard to hear about how everyone was doing and what goes on down here without being able to be apart from it.

My emotions seemed to be all over the place on this topic, and in three and a half weeks I guess I would do what felt right. It felt weird, knowing there was now less than a month until I left. Three and a half weeks felt like no time.

My heart squeezed uncomfortably at realization that I had been here for eight and a half weeks, and I only had three and a half left to go. I had already been here so little time and there was even less to go. I knew it would be best, but I wanted to be selfish and just stay here and never go home.