Patrick Pushes Monica to Face Her Pain

The doorbell startled her, immediately followed by pounding on the front door.  Patrick.  If she ignored him, would he leave?  She had hung up on him last night and he hadn’t accepted her withdrawal, had he?  Ignoring him all day hadn’t deterred him, had it?  No, he would bang until she let him into the house.  Reluctantly, she put on her robe and slippers and went downstairs.

Monica opened the door and stepped aside to let him enter.  She wouldn’t look at him.  He closed the door and stood with his back against it.  When he spoke, his voice was gentle and intimate and concerned.

“Tell me what your family said to make you hate yourself so much that you can’t accept anyone else loving you?”  Silence.  “That’s what’s been standing between us from the moment we met.  Tell me what happened.”  She shook her head and backed away, stopping in front of the staircase.  “You have to get beyond it, Monica.  Talk to me, please.”

She hung her head and sighed.  Why was he pushing her? 

“Alright,” Patrick relented.  He wanted to wrap her in his arms and kiss away her fears, but he knew how she would respond.  Instead, he walked over to the sofa and made himself comfortable.  “I’m not leaving,” he announced.  He had realized that the state of mind Mr. Weston was concerned about had much less to do with his wife’s death than with the life she had inflicted on Monica – and he could not help until she told him the cause of her pain.

Monica stared at him, panic-stricken.  “You can’t stay here all night!”

“I’ll leave when you talk to me, not before.”

“Patrick, get out of my house!”

“No.  I’m not leaving you.”  Did she truly understand what those words meant?

“Patrick, you have to leave!  I can’t have people thinking you spent the night.”

“Then talk to me, Monica.  Tell me what I need to know in order to help us.”  He crossed his arms and studied her carefully.  Silence and that stubborn tilt of her chin.  What had he just missed about her change in demeanor?  Why had panic turned to defiance?  He blinked.  Suddenly, he felt sorry for Monica and silently prayed that he was doing the right thing.

“I’m the first man you’ve ever had in this house,” he guessed.  “Why?”

Monica opened her mouth but couldn’t find the words for a response.  No, she couldn’t tell him the things Olivia had said to her and about her – it was too painful, too humiliating.  When she did speak, her words were deliberate and controlled.  “Patrick, don’t dig into things you don’t want to know.  Now, please leave.  I have a lot to do tomorrow, and I’m tired.”

He remained silent for a long time, but his eyes never left her face.

“No, I’m staying,” he calmly repeated, still carefully watching her.  “I’ll leave after you talk to me.  If it isn’t tonight, I’ll be right here when you wake up in the morning.”  Her eyes went wide with alarm.

“Patrick –”

“Baby, tell me what happened in this house that makes you so terrified of my being here.”  He watched her struggle again with her emotions, fighting to hold back tears of what?  Frustration?  Embarrassment?  She remained silent as moisture filled her eyes.

“Alright,” Patrick sighed.  “Since you don’t want to talk, maybe you’ll listen to what I’ve observed.” 

“No!”  Tears spilled over along with her anger.  “I don’t want to talk or listen.  I hated living here, and I can’t even think about the things you want to discuss.”  She was trembling. 

“You never let anyone come here because you were ashamed,” he began, ignoring her obvious distress.  Making her suffer was killing him.  “When I showed up yesterday morning, you were so uncomfortable.  Last night, you said you’d never been in a relationship, and everyone at school wondered why you didn’t even let female friends come inside, not even just to study.  Now, you want me to leave before anyone gets the wrong impression about what’s going on in here.  You’re terrified, aren’t you?”  He didn’t give her a chance to answer.  “You can’t handle your feelings for me or mine for you, are afraid for me to touch you, refuse to think of yourself as beautiful even though you are, and do everything possible to keep me and everyone else away – male and female.  Put it all together. 

“You don’t have to say it; I see a woman who was probably humiliated and criticized, whose self-image was smashed by a lack of affection, lack of nurturing, and possibly even physical abuse, and who learned that the safest way to survive was to pretend that your own feelings and dreams didn’t exist.  Did they tell you that you’re worthless?”  He paused, aware that his words were hurting the woman he loved. 

“Those were lies, Monica.  You are beautiful, brilliant, and precious – and you deserve to be loved.  Baby, love does not always lead to pain.” 

“Do a couple of sociology and psychology classes make you an expert about me?”  The angry words flew out of her mouth.  “You don’t know anything!  You can’t imagine the names and the accusations and the public degradation I endured!  Don’t sit there like you have me all figured out.  Don’t talk to me like I don’t know what happened – I know, I just don’t want to remember.  I want to forget.  Can you understand that?”  She walked to the door and flung it open.  “Get out, Patrick!  Just go away!”

Patrick stared at her for a few minutes before standing and walking over to her.  He gently closed the door and stood facing her.

“What did I miss, Monica?  What else happened that’s so awful you can’t deal with it?”

He reached to wipe away a tear, and she slapped him.  Another man might have slapped her back.  That would never be his style.  Patrick gently gripped her shoulders and stared at her.  “Tell me.  What did you do?”

She laughed through her tears.  “That’s the best part, Patrick.  I didn’t do anything.”  The shame and pain in her eyes as she looked away told the rest of the story.  He understood what she couldn’t repeat – the accusations, suspicions, criticisms, name-calling and other demoralizations had all been without merit.  She had never even become rebellious enough to strike back by behaving as she had been accused. 

Undeserved humiliation. 

The burden she carried wasn’t even hers, she had been the victim; and that made her shy, insecure, afraid, and angry. 

Monica tried unsuccessfully to shrug free from his hold.  She looked up at him.  “Are you satisfied?”

“No.  Are you?  We still have a relationship to work on, remember?”

She shook her head in amazement, exhausted. “Go away, Patrick.  I can’t do this.”

“Yes, you can.” 

“I don’t know how.”  Simple words from a life of deficiency.

His hands absently massaged her shoulders.  “Are you telling me to go back to Philadelphia and forget about us?”  He shook his head.  “I can’t do that.”

Monica thought about those words, about the hope that was revived within her heart.  She looked deep into his eyes and felt herself being drawn by his emotions.  The electrical current she had repeatedly ignored sparked in the air between them, only this time she didn’t want to run.  This time, she timidly stepped closer and kissed him, small kisses on the mouth until he moaned and crushed her against him, his passionate lips demanding a greater and greater response.  Her arms slid around his neck and she pulled them closer.

Patrick shook his head and forced an end to the kissing.  His eyes smoldered with desire; he held her against him, her face snug against his muscular chest, his chin resting on the top of her head.  He tried to slow his passion, but his arms were trembling and each thought only seemed to feed the fire.  Breathlessly, he announced: “Baby, we need to slow this down – just a little.  I have to leave now, but we’ll talk tomorrow, okay?” 

Monica stepped away and looked up at him through hurt eyes. 

He softly laughed at her bewildered expression and clarified, “Unless you want me to spend the night, I need to leave.”  She still didn’t get it, so he guided one of her hands to the hard bulge in his slacks.  “You might not recognize the power you have, but I can barely think straight,” he sighed.  “I do know this; when we make love, it won’t be because we’ve lost control and it won’t happen in a way that either of us will regret.” He kissed her a final time and moved to the door.  “Goodnight, Monica.”

She suddenly felt anxious about when she would see him again.

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