SCARS Read Online Free

do?”
                  “So there’s no one to comfort you?”
                  “Don’t get me wrong. Ellen is great. Couldn’t ask for a better soul sister. She down for whatever. I cry every day. In the beginning it was much worse. I hadn’t mastered the side effects. And the management of my disease, at least the HIV has nearly killed me on more than occasion. Ellen was there every day. Putting out the crisis of near death. She’s very protective of me. But the crying gets to her.”
                  “How do you mean?”
                  “She has a day. Her pains. Her losses. I’m complicated and a lot of work, but I’m a really good friend. The kind that will go to bat for you when no one else will. You were alone on that bridge. You needed someone. Anyone to care. And I cared. I…didn’t want you to die.”
                  He took my other hand and started rubbing my knuckles gently. It relaxed me and drew me in a hypnotic way. If he left now I didn’t want to think about what pit I would end up in.
                  “What went down on that bridge has never gone down between me and another human being. I used to be this cut up. Live for the day kind of guy who had a very, very dark side. I’ve done some things. Illegal things. That you couldn’t possibly imagine. To get away from it I joined the service and realized rather quickly it was the exact wrong place to be. I fucked up and every other brother out there died but me. I should’ve died. Better men than I am died that day.”
                  “I don’t judge people, James. Not for their pasts. Because it’s already been done. And not for their future because that’s yet to happen. People take advantage of that all time. But when I looked in your eyes last night I saw a lost soul…I saw myself ten years ago on the day I was in my GP’s office and he was telling me that Kevin had given me HIV. A month before I had walked in on him and his latest flame, a former friend mine. I went to the bridge and sat where you saw standing a first. I was too scared to do it. Ellen came looking for me. We sat there for a long time not saying anything. She stayed until I realized I wanted to fight. That I didn’t want to die.”
                  “I’m glad you had her. I’m glad you showed up when you did. My soul isn’t worth a damn. There’s a risk to being in my life. I’m not always a nice man. I’m not a good man.”
                  “How many lives have you ruined?”
                  I look flashed in eyes. Countless I was sure of. Murderous maybe. Cruel even.
                  “Maybe this was a mistake.”
                  He went to pull away from me. I surprised myself when I held fast.
                  “You want absolution. You want redemption. You want forgiveness.”
                  The look in eyes was unmistakable. He desired all of these things and more.
                  “This is crazy.”
                  When he looked at me, my walls crumbled all over again. I was his beacon of hope. He was…temptation…he was my hope for a second chance at life.
                  “Tell me you won’t hurt me.”
                  “I can’t promise that.”
                  “I don’t care.”
                  There in the coffee shop, we sat there in silence gazing at one another. This slope was slippery. There was danger ahead to be sure. I could see it in the way he was looking at me.
                  “Let me in, angel.”
                  He didn’t have to ask. The door was standing wide open for him to come in. I took a breath. And there in the coffee shop his fingertips traced down my cheek and closed my eyes. Yes. I was going to fall. Hopelessly. Madly. Recklessly. I only hoped he