The Wild Wolf Pup (Zoe's Rescue Zoo #9)(30)

“Like a cyst on my ovary that has burst or endometriosis. And then there is my personal favorite…uterine cancer,” I hoarsely finish, bringing another cigarette between my lips. My hand shakes as I fumble with the lighter but still manage to light the end.

He reaches out, takes the cigarette from my lips and breaks it in two before he grabs my hands.

“It’s not that,” he insists. “I don’t know what any of the other things are but it’s one of those. I’m sure of it.”

“How?”

“How do I know? That’s easy, Princess,” he says, bringing one hand to his lips then the other. “I came back to New York because of you and I’m not done with you. I gave you that ring because I fully intend to grow old with you. You should know by now when I have something in my head it doesn’t disappear. It will happen, Nikki, me and you growing old and relying on Viagra.”

I laugh as he wraps my arms around his neck.

“You should’ve told me,” he whispers.

“I’m sorry for keeping you in the dark.”

“That isn’t why you should’ve told me. You’re not alone Nikki, you’ve got me and I’m in it for the long haul. There isn’t anything in this life you’re ever going to face alone as long as I’m breathing.”

“I have an appointment next week, the doctor said he should have my results by then.”

“I’m there,” he declares, wrapping his arms around my waist and dragging my body against his. “And whatever it is, I swear to you we’ll get through it.”

I underestimated Mikey, it wasn’t about the wedding but the partnership. The vow to stand beside one another in even the bleakest of times. Naively we think the happily ever after is the rainbows and roses crap you read in fairy tales but it’s not. The happily ever after is having the right person to hold your hand and weather any storm. It’s an unbreakable bond between two people. That’s the happily ever after.

I know one thing for sure, even if those test results are bad I still have my happily ever after. I still have my Mikey and nothing can change that.





Chapter Twelve




I stare at my face reflected in the mirror hanging above my dresser and bring my fingertips to the corners of my mouth. I press the pads of my index fingers into my skin and slide them upward, watching as the edges of my lips blossom into a forced smile.

Fake.

Manufactured.

Dropping my fingers, instantly the fake smile falls too and my natural frown appears. Just like the drama masks I keep inside the top drawer of my dresser.

I tear my eyes from the mirror and pull open the drawer, pushing around my lingerie until I find the masks I keep buried at the bottom.

For the longest time those masks depicted the person I was, the person I was before I admitted my truth. I am bipolar and those masks are the two sides of Lacey Parrish. The smile is for the girl I am when I’m not fighting for control over my mind and the frown is when my maker reigns over me. Some people call God their maker, believing he controls everything—Heaven and Earth, but for me the only thing that controls me is my mind. My mind is my maker and for most of my life I have been a victim of the vicious villain that lives inside my head.

I freed myself from the silence and used the only weapon I had against my mental illness—my voice. I sought help and was diagnosed and now I start my day with a daily dose of Lithium. It took some time adjusting to my medication but mostly my maker has been shut down. One would think I’d find relief in that, or it would make my life easier but instead I feel lost—like I don’t know who I am without that voice doubting everything I know and feel.

I guess I’ve become so used to the struggle I don’t know how to live life normally. My therapist tells me it’s natural but what does she know. To her I’m a textbook, just a case study, she has never lived with my mind, she doesn’t know how I became one with my maker.

It sounds sadistic, even to my own ears, but I sort of miss that voice. At least I had an excuse for the devilish thoughts that filled my head with doubt. Now, those thoughts are mine, they are pure and they are real.

I close the drawer, taking the masks and bring them to my chest. I step out of my bedroom and stare at the empty room across from the bedroom I share with Blackie.

I should be on top of the world.

I should be smiling.

I’ve got everything I ever wanted, everything I never thought I’d have, everything my maker tried to keep from me.

And yet today I’m miserable.

There is no voice telling me my happy life will be ripped from me. No voice feeding me lies, telling me I’ve conjured the whole thing up.

The facts that are driving me into a depression.

Cold hard facts that are dragging me down.

I’ve avoided reality for so long I have no fucking clue how to deal with it. I don’t know how to make sense of everything I’m feeling because I’m still learning how to differentiate real life from my illness.

I think people automatically think once someone undergoes treatment they’re healed with a snap of their fingers, but it’s a process, erasing everything and starting fresh. Learning how to exist normally is just as much a struggle as living in torment.

Add adjusting to living on your own with a man to the mix, and the fact that your father has been avoiding you because you fell in love with his best friend, well, I’m fucked and that’s putting it mildly.