59 - Welcome Discomfort

DAMIEN

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The boathouse felt contaminated. The scent of turpentine and oil paint, usually a balm to my frayed nerves, now reeked of vulnerability, of a catastrophic lapse in control.

Her scent lingered too, faint floral notes mixed with the earthiness of the lake and the phantom sweetness of her skin.

I scrubbed at my hands with a solvent soaked rag, trying to erase not just the paint, but the memory of its application, the feel of her skin yielding beneath my touch.

Each stroke of color I’d laid upon her had been an admission, a brand of intimacy I hadn’t intended and now violently regretted.

Rain lashed against the windows, a fitting soundtrack to the storm raging inside me. I’d shattered her. I’d seen it in her eyes— that wide, wounded look that always managed to pierce through my defenses. Good. Let her break. Let her understand that proximity to me came with a price, that my world was not a sanctuary for soft hearts and naive hopes.

But the image of her tear- streaked face,