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When my sobs calm down, and I feel like I can speak again without crying, I continue.
“The officer sat me down and told me how lucky I was. I had driven us home without incident, until they think I tried to park and crashed into a parked car on the street in front of the building. I wasn’t going fast enough at that point to hurt myself or Lydia, and we were both wearing our seatbelts. Thankfully no one was in the car on the street or walking on the sidewalk nearby.
“He just kept saying how lucky I was, that no one was hurt and how easily it could’ve been so much worse but I don’t even remember feeling any sense of relief when I found out what happened. I just felt such deep and utter shame. And anger at myself. God, I was so fucking disgusted with myself that I never thought twice before driving home that night, so convinced that I would be fine and that I was being the responsible one by not letting Lydia drive.”
I sit up, not wanting to be held in Walker’s arms anymore as I feel that same shame and disgust for myself rip through my body, leaving behind a film on my skin that I want to scratch off.
“It was one thing when I was only hurting myself with my drinking but the thought that I could’ve hurt someone else…I would’ve never been able to forgive myself if I would’ve hurt any other person that night.”
Walker’s voice is scratchy, dry from sitting silently for so long as he speaks. “But why were you okay with hurting yourself in the first place?” he asks, cradling my jaw, eyes searching my face like it holds the answers he so desperately wants but fears.
“Because a part of me feels like I deserve it,” I whisper honestly, lip trembling.
I’m a sinner, a disgrace in my family’s eyes, the eyes of the community who raised me. I challenged God and His beliefs, so maybe I deserved it. Maybe I was looking for penance and the only place I could find it was within myself, punishing myself.
Walker opens his mouth to say something, but I cut him off, not wanting to hear his assurances or affirmations that I don’t deserve the pain I’ve caused. I crave the comfort of his arms right now but reject the comfort of his words, not deserving of them as I bare this part of myself.
“The rest of that morning was a blur as my charges were laid out for me and I was shuffled around from room to room, before I could make a phone call. But that phone call to Boone…” I shake my head, grinding my teeth together to keep tears from falling again. “That was one of the hardest phone calls to make because when he answered, and I heard his voice, I could instantly tell that it was a phone call that he’d always been anticipating, and the moment was finally here.”
There wasn’t a chance in hell I was calling my parents and while I debated calling Beth, there wasn’t much she could do for me all the way across the country. While at the time we were checking in on each other more, trying to strengthen our relationship after her wedding, I didn’t want her to get a phone call from me in jail.
Boone was my only logical option, as well as my only true friend at that point. But even as the reality of it sunk in that I would need to call him and ask him for his help, my mind still raced with every other possibility, trying to come up with some way to avoid having to drag him into my mess and disappoint him once again.
But Boone’s my family, and I needed him.
“He agreed to post my bail and come and pick me up, if I would finally get help. I think he expected me to argue with him, try to tell him it was a mistake, an accident, it wouldn’t happen again, that sort of excuse. But I agreed before he even finished his sentence, having already come to the decision before I called him.
“I needed help, and I couldn’t do it on my own.”
“I’m glad he was there for you,” Walker says gently.
“Me too. He helped get me into rehab that very next day.”
I spent the next three months at a rehab center, getting sober and untangling the reasons of why I drank in the first place, and how I was going to manage once I was back out into my everyday life and didn’t have the accountability of others like I did at the center.
“That night was the last night I’ve had a drink.” I sit up, wiping my fingers under my eyes, collecting any lingering tears.
Walker’s quiet, studying my face. He’s still as he does so, and I realize that this is the first time I think I’ve been around him where his foot isn’t tapping along to some song in his head or fingers drumming on their own beat. It makes me nervous, and I study him back, wanting to crawl into his brain and hear what he’s thinking. How he’s processing everything that I just told him.
Does he hate me?
By the way his hands still cradle my hips and the fact that he hasn’t pushed me off his lap, I don’t think so.
Does he still want to be with me though? That’s a different question.
And I have to ask myself, if he even should still be with me. I mean, this is what I’ve always been worried about: getting close to someone, falling in love with someone, and hurting them with who I am and what I’ve done.
And I can’t forget that this relationship is different from one I could have with someone who isn’t famous and in the public eye. My past, my reputation, my actions, they affect Walker and his reputation, his career. They affect Hayden, Nikolai, and Reid now too.
My shoulders slump as the full weight of what my past coming to light could do to Walker and the guys, and I start to wish I never would’ve let him in in the first place.
“Walker,” I say, voice cracking.
“No.” He stops me, already anticipating where my mind is heading and trying to stop it. “Don’t think about me, don’t think about the PR, don’t think about the public opinion right now. That doesn’t matter.”
“But it does,” I argue.
“Not to me, it doesn’t!”
