Sinclair

Chapter Sixty-Two: Suffer In Silence

One thing about me is that I adapt really fucking fast. I've always had to. Back when my father left us for the first time and Mom fell into a depression so deep, she only got out of bed to go to work and cook for Odin and me, the responsibility of most of the household chores fell on me. I adapted to all of it so quickly--vacuuming the living room carpet every night after doing my homework, cleaning up Odin's toys before bed, sitting a bottle of water beside Mom's bed so she wouldn't have to get up a trudge through the living room that always set her into a fit of tears that she tried not to show in front of Odin and me, doing the laundry, and entertaining a then two year old Odin. I adapted to it all so damn fast that my mother, when she came out of her depression had laughed and said, "You're better than me in every way, Freyja."

I still remember the relief I felt at seeing her smile for the first time in eight days.

So, it's really no surprise that I'm able to haul myself through the harrowing mess that is the shitstorm that's been wrecking my brain ever since the day I came back. When a nightmares of large men with overpowering strength dragging me to a place I can't see plague me, I lie there—careful not to wake Sinclair since he's been almost as sensitive as me when it comes to my newfound PTSD—and breathe in and out while I stare at my plain white ceiling.

When the fear of being alone starts to gnaw on me, I go to my window and look. What wold have embarrassed me just a few weeks ago—the guys huddled in cars outside my house to keep out of the cold—fills me with security instead. Sometimes I make them food or drinks and give it to them, talking to them for a few minutes to soothe myself.

I learn to become normal Freyja again. The guys who have been assigned to watch me drive me from place to place since Sinclair doesn't want me going anywhere alone anymore. They drive me to see Carla and Sonny. Mom and Odin come to see me from time to time, too. That's when I truly feel at my most calm, when my Mom's around.

At time, I just want to toss myself into her arms the way I did when I was a kid and cry. I want to tell her about everything that's happened to me. I want to tell her about how scared I was and how I wondered if I would get out of there alive. I want to tell her all of my troubles so badly that sometimes I catch myself starting to tell her before I make myself stop. She'd hate Sinclair in earnest if I told her that. These days, she's been trying to warm up to the idea of me and Sinclair's will-we-won't-we relationship, but if I tell her what happened to me she'd absolutely do everything she could to put a wedge in between he and I. And while I wouldn't blame her for feeling that way, none of this is Sinclair's fault. He feels shitty enough as it is.

So I bite my tongue.

I haul myself through day after day until two weeks whole weeks pass by. I wish I could say I was proud of myself for not cracking or having a mental breakdown of sorts, but situations like this was what I was used to in a sense. Not being kidnapped and almost murdered, but being thrown into a whirlpool of chaos. I know all about that and I know how to deal with it. You just stay still in those tossing waves because the more you struggle the deeper you sink. So you hold still and get through each day one by one until that whirlpool settles and you can see the surface again.

Sinclair walks in while I'm in the middle of contemplating all that. I'm standing by the window, looking at the light dusting of snow coating the ground when I hear the familiar sound of his boots.

I close the window as he comes in and he looks at me, raising an eyebrow.

"Were you a little warm or something?"

I give him a deadpan look. "A little."

I watch as he sinks onto the couch. Although I've been pulling myself through all this shit pretty well these past couples weeks, Sinclair has not. It's not a huge change that just anyone would notice. In fact, I'm pretty sure no one else has noticed but me, but he's been different. He doesn't make the same flirty jokes he used to or make innuendos out of everything I say and he doesn't try to initiate sex with me.