Dreamcatchers

Part 8

Matthew was despondent for the rest of the day.
He went to his bedroom as soon as we returned from the police station. He briefly emerged at suppertime when the smells of chicken noodle Soup reminded him he was hungry.  Though he emerged from his cave of despair, he spoke not a word to me as we ate.  He hadn't even reacted this badly when I told him what I'd seen in the dreams.  Knowing that Dominic Cross was really out there and that the police were finally going to do something seemed to trigger whatever feelings about the kidnapping Matthew had managed to repress.  It was clear that the kidnapping didn't affect him during the day, but his memories of it manifested in his nightmares.  He was finally having to deal with the emotions he had hidden away for his entire adult life.
I sat in the guest room after washing the dishes and putting the leftovers away.  For once in my life I didn't want to be alone.  Ever since my mother's death, solitude had been my friend.  I think it was my way of not having to deal with my emotions.  If I didn't get close to people, I couldn't get hurt.  I wouldn't have to care.
Now, here I was sitting in Matthew's guest room swallowing the tears that threatened to spill over.  I had invested in Matthew.  For the first time since I was sixteen, I had someone to care about.  What had driven me to find Matthew in the first place?  Why had I made the decision to put my life in the path of another person's?  Avoidance was the only way to not get hut, yet here I was in the house of a man who was basically a stranger to me, crying over his hurt.
But he wasn't a stranger.  I'd felt his emotions, his fear, during the nightmare dump.  He had confided in me things he hadn't told anyone outside of his family and doctors.  I had told him things that no one knew about me.  Matthew was the person I was closest to in this world.  After two days, this man was the one person in my life that I couldn't imagine losing.
When I saw the time on my phone, I noticed that it was only eight in the evening, but I was beyond exhausted.  Emotions tended to tire me out faster than physical activity and today had been an emotional roller coaster.  I decided that instead of dwelling on my emotions and Matthew's withdrawal, I would try to go to sleep.
But I was too afraid to close my eyes.  Each time I did, I could feel the fear that being alone left me with.  Spending the night with Matthew last night had been the easiest night of sleep I'd gotten in years.  I wanted that again.  But he wasn't here.  He wasn't there for me like I needed him to be.  Maybe he didn't feel the way I did.  We had just met.  Sure, he told me that the kiss we shared was the best he'd ever had, but maybe that was just Matthew making me feel better.
I felt the bed shift a few hours later.  I had just been lying in the bed unable - or unwilling - to fall asleep.  Had I been to afraid, or was I just hoping that Matthew would join me again like he had the night before.  We lay in silence for several minutes before Matthew pulls me toward him.  I turn so to see what little of him I can in the dim light of the bedroom.  "I'm sorry," he said finally.  In that moment, my tears returned.  It wasn't fully crying, but there was definitely some moisture in my eyes.
"Why are you sorry?" I asked, but I think I knew where he was headed with the apology.
"I've shut you out since the police station.  You don't deserve that from me.  I was so floored by what Officer Jacobs told us that I didn't know how to handle it.  Dominic Cross is my kidnapper.  He hasn't been arrested, tried, or convicted, but we know he is the one.  I was so shocked when you told me you knew who kidnapped me.  At that point, though, I could just pretend you were wrong, even though I knew you were right.  I hate him for what he put me through.  I hate that, no matter where I am or what I doing or how long it's been, he is still with me, haunting my dreams and blackening my soul.  So, I'm sorry that I ignored you today.  And I'm sorry to just show up like this.  I can go back to my room if you want."
"No," I replied immediately.  A strangled laugh emerged from Matthew's lips.  He pulled me as close to him as he dared.  We were so close that only our faces weren't touching.
"You deserve better than me."  The only reason I heard what Matthew said was because he was so close to me.  "You deserve someone whole and unbroken.  I can't be that person for you."  I could see the tears in his eyes.
My heart was breaking.  "You don't want me?"  I could hear the sadness in my voice, but I didn't pull away from him.
"Jaylyn, you are all I have wanted for the past two days.  You walked into my classroom with an urgent matter to discuss and I was hooked.  Since yesterday, you are all I can think about.  Even when I'm not trying to think about you, you're there.  How is such an affection possible in so short a time?"
I was confused.  "Then why are you saying that you don't deserve me?"
"Because you, Jaylyn Miles, are just as broken as I am and you need someone whole that can help put you back together.  You need someone who can comfort you and protect you, love you and cherish you, laugh with you and hold you when you cry.  I can't be that person for you.  There is nothing I want more than to love you, but I can't.  We are too broken.  We would only break each other more."
"No!" I extracted myself from his grasp and flew from the bed out the room.  I grabbed my suitcase on the way out the bedroom door.  I collected my coat and my purse and had the front door to Matthew's house open when I finally heard him behind me.
"Jaylyn, where are you going?  It is too late for you to be driving."
"Where am I going?  I am going home, Matthew. I am going home to a place that has never once in my life felt like a home.  I am going back to my mundane and fearful existence. You don't deserve me, Matthew? What kind of a line is that?  You deserve more than me!  You deserve to be happy and to have someone whole in your life, too.  As much as I do, but maybe what we need isn't someone that is whole.  Maybe I need someone that is just as broken as I am.  Maybe I need someone that will hold me when I cry, not because he loves me, but because he knows what I am going through.  Maybe I need a person that won't tell me everything will be okay because in his experience, he knows it might not.  Maybe I need someone that is so broken that putting him back together also heals me."  I took a deep breath.  My eyes were hot and tears were unabashedly streaming down my face.  He needed to see me like this.  He needed to hear me out. "Matthew, when are you going to realize that I have been in love with you since I first saw you?  Since I saw the man that scared little boy in the nightmare became?  I do love you, Matthew. It is completely crazy how heart-stoppingly in love with you I am.  But Matthew, I can't make you love me.  I can't make you want to take a chance on me.  I can't make you do anything."
I turned back toward the door.  I could hear his breath coming in ragged spurts behind me.  I knew from my speech that he had tears in his eyes.  I knew that if I turned around and looked at him one more time I would never leave, not matter how much he didn't think I should stay.  Without turning around I finished what I had to say to Matthew.  "There is so much more to life if you just open yourself up to the risks.  I did that when I broke the IDEAS rules and came to find you. I did that by falling irrevocably in love with you.  I am doing that now by walking away.  I pray with all of my heart that Dominic Cross is found and put into jail for the rest of his life for what he did to you, but if you can't get passed it and see that I am here, wanting and loving all the broken pieces of you, then you will never have me."
With that, I walked out of Matthew Connors's door into the new life that awaited me.