Chapter 5

~ Ever ~

Ever’s therapy session – 19 years old.

Dr. Cindy Thompson was watching me as I fidgeted in the same chair I always occupied when I came to her office. I hadn’t been here much in the past six months, because I didn’t feel like I needed the weekly sessions that I used to have with her when all my troubles were fresh and seemed never ending. After the last couple days and my confusion over Deck actually standing up for me, I decided it was worth a visit and Cindy worked me in pretty quickly.

“Did something happen, Ever?”

“Doesn’t something always happen? Honestly, I feel like you should be tired of hearing me whine about my life at this point.”

“You know I’ll never be tired of hearing from you, and besides, it’s not whining. You’re dealing with the things in your life in a healthy way. So, tell me what’s going on with you these days. It’s been,” she stopped to look down at her notes. “Wow, it’s been two months since you’ve been in. What changed?”

“Declan Donovan came home,” I informed her.

“Declan, the older brother of Jay? Isn’t he the one in the Army that you told me you used to write to?”

“Yep, that would be him.”

“Why did Declan coming home lead to you here? He didn’t pick up where his brother left off two years ago, did he?” Dr. Thompson was supposed to stay neutral, but every now and again I caught her defensiveness of me coming out, and this was one of those times.

“Just the opposite, actually.” I told her all about Declan’s party and how he told the whole MC off for how they had been treating me. Lucy had filled me in on exactly what he’d said after I left. Once I learned that both Declan and his mom had left the party – one held in his honor – shortly after I did, I had broken down and called Lucy. “So, that’s the gist of it. He stood up for me in a way none of the brothers have ever done. It was something I thought my father and my brother should have done when everything started, or even when everyone treated me differently from the beginning. Neither of them ever did though. I almost wish I had been there to see it happen for myself, because otherwise it’s almost unbelievable, you know?”

“Ever, let’s talk about something different for a minute, because I don’t think you’ve ever explained it. We were always so focused on the incident with Jay being the catalyst for all your issues that we never went back further, and from what you’re telling me, everything goes back far beyond the incident in high school. I want you to tell me about the first time you remember being called ‘the other princess’; and how it made you feel then.”

I bit into my bottom lip as I thought back to the first time I ever visited the clubhouse with my family. “It was about two weeks after I moved in with my dad and his family. He had wanted to take me over right away so all the guys would know who I was, and not be confused if they saw me. Lucy convinced him to wait and give me a little time to adjust to being in a new family before dropping an entire motorcycle club family at my feet too.

“We went to the clubhouse as a family and the first person to greet us was by the front door when we walked in. He was this huge guy, taller than my dad, extremely thick with muscles too, and then everything about him was dark. He had a deep tan, jet-black hair, and eyes so brown they almost appeared black too. He was intimidating to say the least, but as soon as he spotted Anna he reached over and snatched her up into the air then had her straddling one hip while he tipped her back and tickled her belly. I remember, he said, ‘there’s our little princess!’ Then he gave her head a sweet a little kiss and asked if she had been a good girl. She told him she had so he pulled a lollipop out of the inside pocket of his kutte, removed the wrapper for her, and gave it over to her before putting her back down on the ground to join us.”

“Ever, do you need a minute, or can you keep on?”

“No, sorry, I just got lost in the memory for a minute.”

“It’s okay. That happens. So, what came next? He put your sister down and then…” Cindy encouraged me to keep going.

“He noticed me. I had been smiling at the interaction he’d had with my sister too. I wondered if this man would treat me like that once he got to know me. I never had any other family when I lived with my mom, so I kept thinking about how lucky my little sister was. I remember how quickly the easy smile he had for my sister slid right off his face when he looked at me. He was back to being the scary man I thought he was when we’d first walked through the door.

“The man, who my dad had called Crow when we walked through the door, glared at me, glanced over to my dad, and then settled his cold eyes on me again. ‘The other princess, huh?’ I swear, even then I knew the way he said those words he didn’t mean anything nice by them. Lucy looked shocked. My dad just gave him a tight smile and nodded, but he didn’t say anything to the man to correct him or I don’t know, tell him it was okay to be nice to me too. The Crow man looked back down at me, shook his head, and walked away without saying another word to me. He never even said one word to me after that either. In all the years I’d go to the clubhouse with my family, he always avoided me, except the one time his son – who was Anna’s age – asked me to help him tie his shoe.”

“What did he say then?” Cindy asked.

“He just said ‘No!’ really loudly, and then he snatched his son up off the floor and took him over to the pool table. He sat him down on it, and helped him tie the shoe. Crow was a different man again. He was the nice one who gave the lollipop to my sister the day I met him. I think he told his son not to ever talk to me though, because the boy always looked at me strangely after that and would never approach me, no matter how much he needed help.”

“Do you remember how it felt to be treated that way?”

“Yeah, I do, because from there on out all the other brothers in the club seemed to take their cue from how Crow treated me, and for the most part they all behaved the same way with me. If they couldn’t ignore me outright, they definitely weren’t nice or courteous with our interactions. I felt helpless, and I wondered what was wrong with me. Then, I worried all day, and for a lot of years after, that my dad would see in me whatever those men did, and then he would send me away to the bad places that Donna had told them about where no one would ever adopt me or love me again.”

“Did you ever tell your stepmom or dad about how the men treated you, or how it made you feel?”

I shook my head no before I responded. “No, because I was afraid they’d send me away if I said things about their friends that they might not like. I told Toby though, and he said not to worry that they just had to get to know me, kind of like how they did it with the club prospects. He explained how they treated the prospects like crap until they got to know them and until they proved to be good people. Then, they were like family forever. Toby told me that was how things were with me, and that everything would be okay. I asked him if they treated all the kids like prospects at first. I just wanted to know so I could ask how he had dealt with it.”

“And what was his answer?”

“He said it hadn’t been that way with him, so he didn’t think so. He thought maybe it was because I was so old when I got there, and my mom didn’t come with me like his did.” I shrugged my shoulders. Even then I didn’t expect that I would ever be treated like the other kids, but I listened to Toby and I hoped for the best.”

“It never got better, even before the incident with Jay?”

“No, it never got better, but I got used to it all until the whole incident with Jay, then it got worse and even though they all supposedly apologized and asked for my forgiveness it still never even went back to the way things were when I was a kid.”

“Have you attempted to talk to your father or brother about that now?”

“What would be the point? They made it clear when everything went down with Jay that I wasn’t a priority, or even as important as the brothers’ opinions of me. They never spoke up for me when I was younger either. Why on Earth would they suddenly change for me?”

“So you don’t think they learned from their mistakes with the Jay incident?”

“I don’t think they ever acknowledged they made a mistake where I’m concerned. Unless you want to talk about the mistake of me having been made at all, because that’s something they like to talk about at the club even when I’m around. Lucy heard them once when I was with them. My dad was telling the guys that it was the worst mistake of his life – getting with my mom that one night – and that it almost ruined things with Lucy. He was telling them how me being there was a constant reminder of everything, and how it was hard to look at me some days because I wasn’t Lucy’s.”

Cindy appeared taken aback by what I said. “I know Lucy, and I can’t imagine she let that go.”

I smiled at Cindy, remembering my fierce stepmom that day. “It was one of the few times someone stood up for me in that place. Lucy lost her mind. I think she forgot I was there with her for a moment too, because she dropped so many f-bombs even some of the bikers were blushing that day. She told my dad if he felt like he couldn’t look at his daughter then he didn’t need to come home, because there wasn’t a damn thing wrong with me and she sure as hell didn’t see me that way. I just felt sick, because while she was defending me and talking about how much she loved me like I was her own, I still knew that it was being said because my own dad hated me.”

Cindy seemed to be absorbing what I had told her and we both sat quietly for a moment while she processed and I tried to stop shaking. Damn emotions were going to make me end up breaking down again.

Finally, Cindy glanced at me and patted my hand gently. “I know I’ve asked this before, but do you think we could get your parents and siblings in here for a few sessions with you? I truly think it would be beneficial for them to all hear about how much you’ve struggled with feeling as though you don’t belong due to how they and their friends sometimes treated you.”

I shook my head emphatically indicating that was a no. “Not in a million years. First of all, no one outside of Lucy knows I come here, and if they did I don’t think they’d agree to come anyway. I was the accidental child with the woman everyone hated. My dad has his perfect son and his perfect daughter, he doesn’t need me, and certainly doesn’t need the headache I’d become if I had to drag his ass in here to talk about everyone’s feelings.”

“Are you still afraid to make waves and afraid asking them will drive them further away from you?”

“I don’t think you can really fear losing something that was never yours. When I was younger, I had hope that they would be mine in time, but that hope died years ago.”

“What about Lucy? She was very concerned about you when she first brought you here to me. You don’t think she’d understand and be on your side?”

“Lucy is always on my side, but there’s only so much she can do. You can’t make someone love another person and I don’t want her to get on my dad’s nerves trying to make something happen that he clearly doesn’t want, you know?”

“Let’s go back to that first night the social worker brought you to their home. Didn’t you say that your dad is the one who stood up for you against Lucy?”

“Sure, but once Lucy was in my corner, I guess my dad decided I didn’t need him there. Honestly, it was fine until after my first visit to the clubhouse. After that, he just kind of stepped back from me and I don’t know…” I drifted off for a minute, considering it was the first time I’d ever been able to put my finger on the moment when my dad decided he actually didn’t want to care about me. “I guess he saw that his brothers weren’t going to accept me like they had his other children, and he felt like that made it okay for him to feel the way he did since I was coming between him and Lucy in some way.”

“What about your sister? You almost never mention Anna in all of this, except when you talk about why you’re called ‘the other princess’.”

“I smile when I think of Anna, because she’s always been such a sweet little girl. It’s impossible not to love her. Anna is the princess everyone dubbed her. She’s pretty, but somewhat clueless about everything going on around her, I think. No one else’s drama ever really touches her, because she only sees through her rose-colored princess glasses. She’s been shielded and guarded from everything so much I honestly don’t think she’s ever noticed a problem.”

“Don’t you guys have your own sister relationship though? You’re not that far off in age.”

“No. We keep it casual, speak in passing, but we’re basically strangers who grew up in the same house.”

“Why?”

“She has all of their love. Our family, the club, everyone loves her unconditionally.”

“So you’re jealous of her?”

“No!” I struggled to get that single word out fast enough. “I stay away to protect her so that if she choses to like me and want me around as her big sister the others don’t hate her for it. My sister deserves the world. If keeping her mostly out of my life ensures she keeps that world in her palm, then that’s the least I can give her.”

“Ever,” Cindy hesitated a moment before continuing, but I could hear the sad note in her voice as she said my name. “I really think you need to speak to your family about coming in. I think that maybe you’ve been sad and disappointed by people for so long that you don’t fully grasp how everyone actually feels about you.”

I glanced down at my phone then to see that our time was up about 15 minutes ago. “Times up, Doc. I’ll ask Lucy about it, but I’d rather leave the others out of it right now.”

“Okay, Ever. At least that will be a step forward. Why don’t we go ahead and schedule an appointment for next week?”

“Sure,” I agreed, but when I left the building I never stopped to make that appointment with the front desk. Instead, I decided that I was done with therapy. It couldn’t help me any further. I had gone there to talk about my mixed feelings about Deck and all Dr. Cindy Thompson wanted was to talk about the past – the way back past – when everyone started hating me. The past that couldn’t be changed, so why bother to reexamine it when what I had really needed help understanding was in my present? I’d just have to find another way.