per·sua·sion

56.

Jessica

By the time he's finished explaining everything, my head feels like it's spinning, and I don't even know where to start.

Should I be mad? or thankful? Had it been for Jenna, would he have told me any of this? Or would he keep lying to me?

It's been practically two months since they set up this so-called arrangement, and once again, I'm left to feel like the joke, the one everyone is laughing at, the one everyone feels sorry for.

"Please say something," he says more like pleads. I blink, making him come back into focus. All I can do is shrug "come on, yell at me, roll those gorgeous olive green colored eyes at me, anything but silence. I can't handle it" he's standing now, his hands in his hair.

Is this what an out-of-body experience feels like? I'm so confused. I'm looking at this man, a man that I love, that I thought loved me.

I mean, doesn't he? I know that when he says it, I believe it. When he touches me, I can feel it, but how does someone lie like that and still say I love you?

He knew about what I was forced to do, and he just sat there time after time while it tortured me to keep it from him. He let me cry in his arms as I told him, thinking he would reject me afterward when in actuality, he already fucking knew.

All of the late-night chats, the movie nights, the intimacy was any of it for me, or was it just for him?

"We were just trying to protect you, keep you safe," he says softly, breaking the silence between us yet again while sitting back down on the bed

"By lying to me, you are both to blame, but you..you are just selfish" I'm shocked by my own words, but it's how I feel.

He made it about him, about how he was feeling, and it was torturing him. He couldn't handle it, so he used me repeatedly to make himself feel better.

Did Kristen tell him what to say? What to do to get me to let my walls down? Are they closer than he claims?

She let me practically fangirl over him and said nothing. How did I not see this? How did I miss the signs? I knew Kristen used to live in London before returning to the United States and had a boyfriend named Robert.

This must have been why he pushed so hard when it came to me trusting him? "you can count on me, Jess; I won't let you down" the words brought me so much comfort at the time, so much hope.

I feel my hands go into my hair, pulling it. "None of it was real, was it Hero? I was just another notch, like Alex said. I would be something to ease your conscience."

I watch him flinch at my words "you know that's bullshit," he pulls me to him "yes, how we met wasn't conventional, but from the minute you smiled at me with those dimples, something clicked inside me.

Once wasn't enough for me. I needed to be a part of your life," he pauses, and I can tell he's trying to find the right words to match his thoughts.

"It's like my soul recognized you first, and everything else just needed to catch up" I look into his eyes, the eyes that I had grown to love so much as his words hit me, making me think back to when I first heard his voice before even seeing his face and how I felt a connection to him without even truly knowing him.

"Jess," Kristen says through the door

"Yeah," I reply sharply.

"Xavier is here to see you."

"Be right out," I sigh. I want to believe him. Everything in me is telling me to. He leans forward, trying to connect his forehead with mine.

"Will you help me?" I ask, leaning back. The words come out harsher than I mean them to.