Chapter Two

It seemed to take no time at all for this – for us – to become a regular thing. Within a week, he was texting me throughout the day when we were both working then calling me at night to chat for hours before grabbing a few hours’ sleep and dragging ourselves out of bed the next day to do it all over again.

I almost couldn’t believe how quickly it got hot and heavy. We went from sex that I’d thought was just a one-night-stand at the time, to talking all the time and forming this intense emotional intimacy. I enjoyed the emotional intimacy as much as I knew I had enjoyed the sex, perhaps even a little more. Although I didn’t want to tell myself that. I didn’t want to confess to myself just how much I liked him because really, it all felt a little too good to be true.

The times we saw one another for dates (we went on actual dates now, that didn’t have sex right after, he told me this was because he wanted to get to know me), he was often insecure about if he was doing a good job and being a good date, asking me if everything was okay. He was so concerned about what I thought, it almost made me laugh.

When I would be holding back chuckles though, he would catch me. “What?” He would ask.

“Nothing, it’s just. I don’t know, you always seem so self-conscious.” I would tell him.

He would look uncomfortable before informing me, “It’s just that I really like you, and I want to do this properly.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

He swallowed. “I don’t date, I don’t know what I am doing.”

When we had these moments, where he showed me just how different he was from me, we would often stare at one another, as if we were seeing one another for the first time. This deep eye gazing would sometimes make me feel a little odd, so I would look away.

There were things – plenty of things – which I didn’t want him to know about me. I had my secrets, and I wasn’t ready to let him know those. I wasn’t ready for that kind of intimacy yet.

I was glad we were only dating, and that we weren’t sleeping together after these dates. I wouldn’t want to fall into a happy after-sex coma and have my bad dreams come back.

The nightmares were the hardest part of leaving the force. If I was still a cop, I would be able to see one of our psychologists and talk about them, now though I could see a shrink at a private practice and pay through the nose to hear about how my dreams were normal considering what I had seen. I knew that wouldn’t help. It wasn’t the kind of help I needed.

I didn’t want to hear about how normal my reactions were to the extraordinary situation, I wanted to hear about how I could make the dreams go away. I didn’t want them, or need them. I didn’t see what possible purpose they could serve me.

When I had a nightmare, I would wake up with a start, as if the threat was in the room with me. Then when I calmed down and my eyes adjusted to the darkness in the room, I would realise it was just another dream, and that I was okay. Nothing could hurt me now.

The guilt though, as I tried to force myself back to sleep was awful. I would be replaying those images in my mind, of me holding the gun but unable to pull the trigger, of seeing my colleague fall, of feeling paralysed and unable to help him. Of knowing he could be dead as I let the bad guy get away.

These dreams though, they didn’t happen on the nights that Jack kept me up talking. When that happened, even as I was tired the next day, I would feel better because I hadn’t woken to one of those dreams – one of the awful nightmares – before having to go off into my now normal civilian life.

That first few weeks with Jack were pretty special. We spent plenty of time together, holding hands and making plans. We would go on dates, gazing into one others eyes and talking about all manner of deep personal stuff. Everything but my past, which seemed to hang around me like a shield, something that stopped me from getting too close. Or rather, stopped him from getting too close to me. I couldn’t stand it, the thought of him getting too close to me drove me mad. I didn’t want him to see all of this darkness.

But then, he seemed to understand a whole lot, and I felt like I could trust him. I felt like I could get close to him, like we could really be together. Sometimes I would get close to telling him, to letting him know who I really was, and what I really was dealing with. I would get close to telling him about me, about what I was dealing with, to letting him in, then the tantalizing feeling would go.

Usually when he said something stupid, the feeling of wanting to be close and tell him dissipated. He said stupid things a whole lot. Jack’s not-so-hidden talent was saying stupid things without thinking.

I wondered if anyone in my life would understand why I was dating this guy from the outside. A tradie who couldn’t keep any silly thought to himself, who had to just tell other people every little thought he had. Who had to let you know what he was thinking.

Why did he have to let me know all of the stupid things? I didn’t want to know. I just wanted him to be normal.

We developed our own little pattern where when I would be getting close to him he would say something stupid to push me away, then I would go away, then he would pull me back. This constant push-and-pull not only served to show me that this guy had serious issues with intimacy too, but he also didn’t need to know my stuff. He wasn’t ready.

The push-pull also showed me that the relationship wasn’t one which I could rely on for my emotional needs, as much as Jack was trying hard to be there for me, and to be the man I needed him to be, he just couldn’t. It wasn’t in him.

That was fine, I thought as I pulled back a bit emotionally, he didn’t have to be my boyfriend. He could be the bit of fun on the side while I did all the boring things I had to do in my life like going to work and being an adult. Things I didn’t want to do, but had to do.

Jack was like a breath of fresh air. Even as he had a job, and did all of the adult things he had to do, sometimes he was still a boy.

One evening after I had just arrived home and we’d been seeing one another for about three weeks, I heard a loud roar in my gravel drive way. Wheels were hitting the gravel and an engine. Right away, I was on edge. I was always on edge these days.

I got up from the kitchen table where I had been sitting doing some paperwork and walked around to the side of the house where I saw a man, dressed all in black with a helmet dismounting from a sports bike. After years on the force, I knew enough about bikes to know this one by sight. These bikes were always getting pulled over by police because the riders would be doing tricks on them.

The man looked big and a little intimidating. He turned as if he could feel my eyes on him through the lace that covered my window, then turned away quickly, as if he didn’t want me to know I had been spotted. Something in this movement unsettled me. I stood rooted to the spot and stared out the window.

My heart was pounding inside my chest and all my senses were alert. I was rooted to the spot but my mind was already three steps ahead. I would run, right out my back door and jump several fences to get to the street behind my own then I would –

Then, as if unbidden, that little voice in the back of my head woke up and told me it was okay, I could move normally. This wasn’t a scary situation that I imagined, this was just a motorbike in my drive way. In my drive way outside my safe home. I was safe. It was okay.

I let myself breathe then, and continued talking myself down internally. Something in the way Jack – and I knew it was Jack somehow – had moved, something in what he had just done had bought me back to that moment, the one that I always dream of, where I couldn’t do anything and my colleague got shot. The moment that changed his life and the trajectory of my own career forever. I breathed, I couldn’t do anything else but focus on my breath. This was what the shrink had told me to do when I’d seen them after what happened. They told me I would be dealing with this for years to come.

I managed to bring myself away from the window and sit down. I hugged my knees on the couch and breathed. It felt like an eternity until Jack was knocking on the door, and even as I could hear him knocking, I was far away.

A part of my brain wanted to go and let him in, to grab a beer from the fridge and drink together, but then there was a part of me that really didn’t want that. There was a part of me that wanted him to leave. That wanted to stand up and shout at him. To tell him that what he just did was not okay, that he wasn’t allowed to let me feel like this, let alone be the reason that I felt like this.

I wanted to be safe and protected, and he wasn’t letting me feel safe and protected. He was the instigator of these feelings. It was all his fault.

The knocking got louder.

I ignored him. In my own head I blamed him. I got mad, then I got sad. I let my body move through what it needed to move through, even as that little voice inside my head told me it would be fine, that this wasn’t a real problem. That I had this. I knew I had this.

I was breathing heavily, head between my knees, when I heard feet scuffing across the carpet. I sat up straight and my eyes grew wide as I looked at Jack.

Jack was standing there, in my living room, staring at me. But, how could that be? The door had been locked. I knew it was locked because I never left it unlock even when I was home. Cop habits.

“What are you-?” I managed

Jack shook his head then told me, “The door was open. What’s wrong?”

I couldn’t hold back the tears then as I cried. The messy, ugly crying of a girl who had been caught in the middle of tears. In the middle of a moment, perhaps not the best moment to be caught in the middle of either.

“I’m – I’m – I’m –“ I struggled to find the words and just sat there while he took me into his arms and held me there. He held me tight and close and cried and cried. I couldn’t do anything to stop it, I couldn’t do anything to express why I was doing it in the first place. My tears were just flowing.

The nightmares were one thing, but having these tears come out now as I sat on my couch fully awake, crying into Jack as he held me, unsure himself why I was crying was something else entirely.

Jack seemed expert at this holding a girl while she cried thing, and held me closer than I could have imagined. He said all the right things, he told me what I needed to hear from him. He told me I didn’t need to tell him what was wrong, that he was here for me. That it was okay to cry, and to let it all out. That I wasn’t weak for feeling this way.

It felt odd, that this awkward tradie guy who always said the wrong thing knew exactly what to say. That was until I reminded myself that I had spent so much time talking to this guy about how I felt, and that I had told him so much about myself – even if I hadn’t directly told him about what had happened with my work as a cop or even that I had been a cop in the first place – he knew me enough to know what I needed now, and that was fantastic.

Even though I had locked-jaw when it came to talking to him about what was wrong, I felt like I had achieved something here. His entrance on the bike, the loud noise and the concealed face, had been enough for me to feel uncomfortable but I had been able to pull myself out of this spiral I would sometimes get into when I was in similar situations (when my PTSD was “triggered”). As anyone who has had déjà vu could tell you, you can’t really tell why you feel this way, you just do. You just feel like you’ve been here before. It’s the same for when your PTSD is triggered, only you feel just as bad as you did the first time and really can’t help yourself.

Plenty of therapy and work on myself had helped me identify the feelings I would get as I would be triggered, so I knew what was going on.

Between the therapy I had received and Jack somehow knowing what to do, I had this. I was recuperating much quicker than I normally did.

Jack went to the kitchen and made us some tea. Something we never drank together, but something he said would help.

As he pottered around the kitchen, He told me, “When we were kids, my brother would get weird sometimes, so my mum made us tea to calm him down.”

I shook my head at that comment and Jack looked me in the eye, “I have not told you about my brother?” He asked.

Scanning my brain, I couldn’t remember. I thought it might be the PTSD though so simply shook my head. “No, I don’t think you have.” I said a little unsure.

“Oh, that’s weird.” He told me his voice a little far away, “I have mentioned my sisters haven’t I?”

I nodded. Yes, I knew he had an older sister and a younger sister. That made sense. I couldn’t remember a single thing about the brother though. Why couldn’t I? Surely he would have mentioned the brother at some stage.

“Okay…” He started, “Anyway, my brother is two years younger than I am.” He told me.

“Okay.” I agreed, “I am sorry. I don’t remember anything.”

Jack nodded before looking me over. I could see in his eyes that I didn’t look good, and being kind he said, “It doesn’t matter, you don’t need to hear about it.”

“What do you mean? No. Tell me about your brother and tea. I want to hear it.” I told him.

Jack chuckled while looking at the ground between us, then down at his own tea cup. “Well,” He started, blowing on his tea as if to cool it, “my brother had a rough childhood. He always got in trouble. When he needed to calm down, or when mum needed to talk to him like an adult if he’d been bad, she made him tea and sat down with him. If there was tea, the rest of us knew to stay away.”

I raised my eyebrow. “You knew to say away?” I asked.

“Yeah.” He told me, “Because there was tea.”

The idea of it made me laugh. My laughter came a little harder than I knew it normally would, as my feelings were a little exaggerated right now as I was coming down after feeling the effects of this weird triggering, but that was okay. Laughing was good, laughing was positive. I needed to do it.

“What?” Jack asked.

“So, your mum would boil the kettle and you guys would all make yourself scarce?” I asked.

Jack nodded, his face passive. “Yep. We would.”

“That’s so funny!” I told him as I laughed harder.

“What’s so funny about that?” He asked me.

“It’s just,” I couldn’t think of why it was funny, but it was, “I don’t know. I just find it funny.”

Jack shook his head at me then sipped his tea. I sipped some of mine too and he asked me, “Good tea?”

“Yes.” I told him, “I don’t feel more adult because I am drinking it though.”

“Oh god.” He said before rolling his eyes at me.

I shook my head before asking, “So, what’s your brother’s name?”

“John.” He said simply.

“John? Your mother called your bother John?” I asked.

“Yeah, she did. What’s wrong with that?” He asked.

I was laughing again. “Your brother is John, and you’re Jack. What was going on there?”

“What do you mean?” He was looking more and more confused the more he spoke, but I couldn’t help it. This situation was kind of odd, right from the first.

“Just, the J names. What’s with all the J names?” I asked.

Jack shook his head then and smiled, he got it. All of his siblings had been given J names. It was a little odd when I thought about it. His smile grew a little before he put his mug down and took mine off me to place beside his. Then, he was kissing me. His kisses were soft, tender. Healing.

I know sex can’t heal you, but this, all of this, felt healing. Spending time with Jack always felt great, but right now as he gave me his body it felt as if he was doing it just for me, doing it to please me and to cheer me up. It was as if he knew if he gave himself to me everything would be just that little bit better. Just good enough to get me through whatever was upsetting me, even as he didn’t know what it was. Or that it had been something he had done without meaning to upset me.

We made love for hours, every time he would cum, he would keep things going by using his fingers to get me off, or by using his mouth to kiss and lick me, to bring me to orgasm after orgasm after orgasm.

Never in my life had I had sex like this, sex that felt so fulfilling, that felt so intimate and powerful. When we were together, it was like nothing else in the world mattered. It was as if he could disappear into the bedroom with me and not have to emerge into the real world. We could enjoy each other, get lost in each other.

Jack had an open mind and could easily fulfil any of my sexual wants and desires with very little effort on his part. It felt like the sort of sex we both wanted came naturally to the other, like we were made for one another sexually. We liked the same things sexually. Things between us though, felt a little too good to be true sometimes. The relationship was so wonderful, then the sex was also wonderful.

The relationship, no. I told myself. We weren’t in a relationship. This was just what it was, we were only having sex and dating, that was it.

When we were both spent though at the end, and were cuddling talking about whatever came to our minds, I occurred to me to ask, I knew so much about his sisters (even as I hadn’t met them) and his mother and father, but I didn’t know a single thing about his brother. He genuinely hadn’t mentioned the guy through all of the hours upon hours we spent talking on the phone. How had he never been mentioned before?

“Hey Jack?” I asked, my head resting on his chest, eyes closed.

“Hey yeah?” Jack said, tiring to be cute. I shook my head a little and ignored him, smiling into his chest just a little bit.

“Your brother, what’s he doing with himself now?” I asked, hoping to open up the conversation a little, and get some more information on why I hadn’t heard about this guy before. A brother who was close in age should be a bigger topic I thought.

Jack cleared his throat, then there was silence. “Ah…”

“What?” I asked.

“He’s in prison, sweetheart.” He told me, his voice a little too even.

I wanted to throw myself up then and demand why I hadn’t been told, that I had to declare these associations at work, but then reminded myself that I wasn’t a cop anymore. That it didn’t matter who I knew or who they knew, that criminals were not my problem anymore. I let out a breath and released the thought.

I couldn’t shake the uncomfortable feeling that I hadn’t been told this already though. Why was it a secret?

“Oh. Okay.” I said, trying to sound calm and not let on how alarmed I was to have this news thrust on me right after sex, “So, what’s he in for?”

Silence. Too much silence. A beat, two beats, three. “I don’t know.” Jack lied. I could hear the lie in his tone. Jack wasn’t always a good liar.

I propped myself up on my elbow then so I could look him in the eye. “What am I going to do with this information, Jack?”

Jack shook his head at that. “Could do anything.”

“Don’t play dumb with me.” I told him, a little too much aggression showing in my voice. I cleared my throat a little to try and hide it.

“I am not playing dumb, I literally don’t know.” He told me, lying again.

Cops have a good sense of when they’re being lied to, we have to. It’s important for you to assess a situation well before you get yourself in over your head. I am – or I was – a good cop after all, because I have good senses and an ability to spot this stuff from a mile off. Jack though felt guilty about lying to me so it was easier to spot. Plus, we were in an intimate relationship and intimate partners have a better sense for one another when it comes to lying than strangers do. In my experience anyway.

I knew he was lying, but wondered how much I wanted to push this. Why was it so important anyway?

“Does he have the same last name as you?” I asked, wondering if I knew the brother.

Jack nodded.

“Okay. Was the crime violent?” I asked.

It took Jack a moment too long, but he shook his head.

So, the crime might have hurt someone, or it might have been a crime that was violent, but Jack didn’t want me to know about it. I stared at him, he stared back.  Neither of us were going to stop this bluff.

Then, I broke the stare and looked around my room. The place needed a clean, I needed another shower and needed to go out. I would deal with this stuff later. I really didn’t have time now, Jack wasn’t even supposed to be here. I had things to do.

“I’m sorry to kick you out-“ I began, and Jack was standing beside the bed before I could even finish my sentence.

He nodded, and started putting his clothes back on.

When I showed him out, we shared a kiss and he was gone. This time I knew not to watch him, I simply let him go and waited for the noise to subside.

After he was gone I had a shower, grabbed something to eat then as I left the house I realised the lock on my door wasn’t quite right. When I inspected it, I saw that the front that faced the street had been tampered with. I could still lock the door, but someone had picked the lock.

Jack had picked my front door lock when I hadn’t answered. He must have, I realised as I stared at the broken lock.