I had a sudden and overwhelming urge to protect Jesse from both his past and future struggles. To drape my arms around him and hold him tight the way he did me when I needed comfort.
“God, Jesse,” I said, wrapping my arm around his stomach. “I don’t know what to say. I’m sorry seems like the worst possible thing I could say. But I can’t think of anything else.” What did a person say to that? How did a person comfort another after that kind of a reveal? I didn’t know. I’d never had anyone show me the loving way to respond.
“I’m sorry works,” he said. “I’m not telling you because I’m looking for sympathy, Rowen. I’m telling you so you know you’re not alone. So you know you can walk away from a tragic past and live a peaceful life.”
A peaceful life. What I wouldn’t give to have one, but I was certain I’d never attain it. People like me, who’d lived the kind of life I had, didn’t live peaceful lives.
“Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” I sat up and twisted on the bale so I could look at him square on. Why hadn’t he told me? We’d talked about seemingly everything else. I wasn’t naive enough to think we didn’t still have some secrets, but I didn’t think they’d be those kinds of secrets. Monumental ones.
As I thought about all of the things I’d written off, it seemed so obvious, I should have figured it out. The lack of any physical similarities between Jesse and the rest of his family, the absence of his baby picture on Neil’s office wall with the girls’, people dropping hints about Jesse’s life not always being so paved with gold. It was all so clear after I’d been given the last piece of the puzzle.
“I was going to, Rowen. Soon.” Jesse turned so he looked me straight on as well. The skin between his eyebrows had been pinched together the entire conversation. “But it’s not something I tell just anybody.”
“Was it because you didn’t trust me enough to want to tell me?” I worked to keep my voice level and my eyes on his.
“Of course not. I’d trust you with my life, Rowen. I trust you implicitly.” His forehead wrinkled, too. “I didn’t tell you right away so you could get to know me, who I am now, before I told you who I was then. I wanted you to know my present before you knew my past. I wanted to know that if you chose to be with me, it was because you loved me. Not because you pitied me.”
I wiped my eyes before the tears forming could fall. “Are you ashamed of it?”
Jesse leaned forward. “No, just the opposite. I’m proud that Dad and Mom saw something in me I didn’t, and they believed in me.” He looked down at where our hands were entwined. He stared for so long, I wondered if he saw something in them I didn’t. “I just don’t see how it’s relevant for every person I come in contact with to know I was adopted. It’s my past. Yeah, I had a rough go of life. But I buried it six feet deep, made my peace with it, and moved on. I’m not going to let my past ruin my future.”
He buried it, made peace with it, and moved on. Could I ever do the same?
Right then, after everything that had happened, it didn’t seem so likely.
“And you had questions?” I asked.
He nodded and his eyes returned to mine. “I had so many damn questions I didn’t know what to do with all of them, but I stopped looking for answers that never wanted to be found and moved on. When the Walkers walked into that adoption agency, they took a huge chance on a troubled boy who likely would have turned into a violent teen. I wasn’t going to repay them for taking that chance by living up to what everyone thought I’d turn into.” He lifted our hands to his mouth and brushed his lips over my knuckles. “You and I are not so different, after all.”
And that was where he was so very wrong.
“Jesse, don’t you see?” I said, my voice high. “Our stories might have started out the same, but that’s the only similarity. You took a bad situation and turned yourself into the person you are today.” I paused just long enough to catch my breath. “I took a bad situation and let it define me.”
Jesse combed his fingers through his hair and shook his head. “No, you took a bad situation, let it define you for a while, and then you decided to overcome it.” He formed his hand over my cheek. “It just took you a little longer than me.”
I wanted to believe that. God, I would have given anything to believe that. But I couldn’t believe a lie. I couldn’t betray myself by accepting a lie.
“That’s the most sugar-coated version of a half-truth I’ve ever heard,” I said, my voice elevating. “Beneath this ‘reformed’ girl you fell in love with is the screwed-up girl I’ve been my whole life. A girl who will always be, no matter how you try to put it, screwed up.” I made myself look away from his eyes. It made what I had to do easier. “A girl with my past doesn’t deserve a guy with your future, Jesse.”
“Oh please,” Jesse said, hanging his head back. “Get over the I deserve this and I don’t deserve this crap and start choosing what’s healthy for you. How about being honest with yourself as to what you want? Because maybe you can have it.” Jesse’s voice had gone up, too. We were both past the point of keeping our cool.
“Healthy? Honest?” I popped up because I couldn’t stay seated any longer. “So easy for you to say. You’re the one living a charmed life with a family who loves you, not the one who will have no one, no one, after this summer! So don’t lecture me on what’s healthy!”