Hello! For those wondering what happened between Lea and Ben, here it is. Though I want to clarify that, (Spoiler alert, for those who haven't watched season 4!) in this story, Ben Davis is not Lea's ex-husband as told on the show. We don't know the name of her ex-husband or what his personality was like, so, instead, I did my own thing and made up his name, his personality and their past as a couple.
I hope you like it!
More notes at the end…
THINGS TO WORK ON
Before moving to the new apartment, they quickly realized they needed to buy several pieces of furniture. It was a quiet spacious apartment, compared to others, and all they had was Shaun's stuff that would only fill up part of his new bedroom, an outdoor table and a grill, they ended up shopping online and everything arrived at the new apartment by the time they moved.
The first few days in the apartment were easy, each was getting used to the new home-work-home commute and, due to work, they were slowly unpacking things, but the new furniture was all set, with Lea's love for building things and Shaun's ability to follow instructions and attention to detail, they did a good job and made a good team so far.
Also, since they were at a new place, Lea couldn't help to notice in the lease that pets were allowed in the building, compared to where they used to live where there was a zero tolerance for pets, so she managed to convince Shaun of getting one. He didn't want a dog and Lea told him she's allergic to cats, so they ended up getting a goldfish which she named Hubert.
Everything felt right and seemed to be going well, though, as days went by, Shaun started to see what Lea meant when she said she was a mess. Little things that were normal for her, were like anxiety triggers for Shaun, and their habits began to clash. Even though he had established some basic house rules, she kept forgetting and falling into her old habits.
She would brush her hair in the bathroom, in front of the mirror, and leave hairs in the sink or not pick her hairs from the shower's floor; she wouldn't load the dishwasher properly, she would leave her PlayStation controller or the TV remote anywhere in the house, making it hard for him to find them sometimes, among other small things that were quiet a big deal for Shaun.
On the other hand, Shaun's constant reminders of what she was doing wrong at home, and the also constant patronizing and belittling masked as jokes, from co-workers, towards her or other female workers, in a way but for different reasons, were triggers for her too, and they were driving her to the edge, but she kept bottling up her emotions, thinking it was somehow a waste of time to talk about them because she thought no one would really care and she didn't want to seem weak and whiny for things that happened years ago, and yes, they happened years ago but they were still affecting her, she just didn't want to admit she hadn't healed yet.
"Hey" Said the young tall guy with a smile, holding his hand out to shake hers. "I'm Ben"
"Lea" She smiled back and shook his hand in a polite manner.
"Yeah, your brother has told me a lot about you"
They kept happily talking the rest of that 4th of July night.
—
"Who was that?" He asked.
"Oh, it was just Mike, Sarah's boyfriend?" She said getting back in the car after buying some snacks at the gas station.
"Why were you talking to him?"
"Because he saw me and greeted me, I asked him about Sarah and he said she was studying but they're going out on Friday. We could go out with them, have some fun"
"Right…" He said as he drove away.
"You wanna go out with them on Friday then?"
"No, I can't, I told your brother I would help him with one of the cars at the shop and we want to do as much as we can that day so we'll probably work till late"
"But you said you'd have Friday off so we could do something together after I'm done with work that day, remember?"
"I never said that. Why would I say that? I just told you I'm working with your brother that day"
"Okay… I'm just saying, that's what you told me yesterday…"
"You're crazy… plus, I don't think we should go out with them… I mean, he seems like a snob and Sarah's not far from it, no wonder they're dating…"
"What? What are you talking about?" She asked incredulous.
"You know, she's like up her ass with becoming a nurse and stuff, she has like this sense of superiority and… I didn't want to tell you this but, the other night, at that party we went to, I overheard her talking with Jess, she was saying something about how what you went to college for is so useless and stuff like that… I didn't want to tell you because you two are best friends and I knew it would hurt you but now, I think you should know…"
Lea frowned skeptically, looking at him "Sarah would never say something like that, maybe you mistook her for someone else, Ben. I've known Sarah my whole life and she's always ben supportive of me as I've been of her, she's not a snob and neither is Mike, plus Jess is in the same field as I am, why would Sarah say something like that to Jess? It would offend her too"
"I'm just telling you what I saw and heard, it was Sarah and Jess, I'm not blind, I know what I saw. I thought you should know and I informed you. If you want to keep being friends with them, that's fine, just maybe you shouldn't think so highly of them. People sometimes are not really who we think they are…"
She looked out of the window, thinking —What if he's right? What if he sees things I don't?—
—
"Again on your computer, if you're not on your laptop, you're on your phone, can't you just leave that and pay attention to your boyfriend?" He said and leaned over from behind her to kiss her neck while she was sitting by the table doing work on her laptop.
She chuckled "I'm working… Would you rather have me in the kitchen cooking a meal and looking after the kids we don't have?" She asked sarcastically.
"Well, maybe. Isn't that what women are for?" He replied and chuckled, then moved his lips from her cheek to her neck and kissed her there.
She sighed amusedly at his comment thinking he was just kidding and mumbled "Men…" before looking for his lips with hers to kiss him as she closed her laptop.
—
"Jeez, if looks could kill, he'd be dead right now" She joked looking at Ben as he picked her from work, but he wasn't amused at all by the situation.
"It's not funny, Lea. Why do you always talk to guys like that? Tell me, you don't want to be with me anymore? Why don't you just leave me then? You like that guy? Go be with him! It's always the same with you. I came to get you so that we could spend time together and this is how you receive me?"
"What are you talking about? Calm down!"
"You always flirt with guys! Are you going to tell me you didn't realize how he was looking at you? And I'm not stupid, I see how you look at other men too! You think they're gonna handle you the way I do? You think you're so easy to be with? They just want to get in your pants, Lea! But you should get with them, see how it goes… I can't be in a relationship with someone like you anymore, you're too much, you're a mess…" He walked away, getting back in his car, leaving Lea standing speechless and puzzled while other people around had watched the whole scene.
She called and texted him that day, trying to solve things and eventually he got back home.
"Hey" She said in a soft tone, looking up at him as she sat on the sofa.
He walked to her and kneeled down in front of her, taking her hands in his, then said: "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have reacted like that, I just… I can't stand see you with someone else, just the thought of you being with someone else… I can't… and these guys just want you for sex, I'm a guy so I know these things, trust me, I just want to protect you because I love you, you understand?"
She nodded a little and shrugged one of her shoulders slightly "I mean, you're kinda right, maybe sometimes I am a bit flirty but I don't realize I'm doing it. I'm sorry… I understand that you want to protect me, and I love you too" She leaned in to kiss him.
—
"I'm sorry I'm late" She said as she arrived to the restaurant in a beautiful black dress, and kissed his cheek, the day of their second anniversary.
"Where were you? I've been sitting here waiting for you, looking like an idiot. You're always late" He asked, sitting by a table in a restaurant.
"Calm down, I'm here now… I mean, forgive me for wanting to look nice for you" She replied sassily.
"Your sassiness won't get us anywhere good tonight, Lea, so don't start. Let's just enjoy the night, shall we?"
"Yes please" She sighed and he picked up his menu, then she added "You like my dress?"
He looked at her again "Yeah, it's short thought… I prefer the red one you have at home but, can't always get what you want in life, huh?"
She rolled her eyes "What's up with you today, can't you just be nice?"
"What did I say? I said I like it but I prefer the other one. Why do you always have to be so sensitive? Can't even take a joke…" He argued and looked back at his menu.
Things eventually cooled down a bit for the rest of the night and they managed to have sort of a good night, even though he kept making hurtful comments every now and then, saying they were only jokes, then they got back home.
He kissed her deeply against the wall, moved his hand up one of her thighs, pulling up her dress and pressing his body against her. She knew exactly what he wanted, it was more than obvious, but she wasn't in the mood, in fact, she hadn't really been in the mood in days, so she tried to push him away.
"Not tonight" She mumbled against his lips.
"Oh come on, we haven't done it in days" He said as he moved his head to kiss her neck, still pressing himself against her.
"I know, I just don't wanna do it tonight… can we just cuddle?"
"It's our anniversary, Lea, and you want to cuddle? We can cuddle all you want later" He reached behind her to unzip her dress.
"Ben…I said no"
"Why not? You're my girlfriend, we've been together for two years, we might as well get married already" He joked "Come on, I'm really horny, do it for me" He added, reaching under her dress again, to pull her panties down"
"I said no, Ben! I don't want to!" She pushed him away with all the strength she had that night and he almost tripped backwards with a small table next to the sofa.
"What the hell is wrong with you?! You've been acting weird. Are you cheating on me? That's it, isn't it?"
"Again with that… I'm not cheating on you, I've never cheated on you! Can you say the same though?" She asked challenging him.
"Of course not! I would never do that to you, I love you!" He said approaching her and tried to kiss her, but she pushed him away again.
"Get off me!" She exclaimed "Don't you understand what NO means?"
"Why are you being such a bitch?! Don't you understand that I love you? Everything I do is because I love you! But you're always so ungrateful!"
"Yeah, I'm ungrateful and I'm a bitch, but you're a narcissistic, controlling asshole! You're never going to touch me again…" She shouted at him angrily as she zipped her dress back up, grabbed her jacked and stormed out of the house.
"Oh so who's gonna touch you, huh? You think anyone's going to want you? You're a crazy, needy little bitch, you need to grow up! Who's gonna want to deal with that?!… Hey, that's my car!"
She got in the car and flipped him off through the window as she drove away.
"Don't come back crying when nobody wants you, I'm telling you!" He shouted and pulled out his phone to call the police and tell them his car had been stolen, but the car was in Lea's name, because she paid for it even though he was the one who used it the most.
—
She woke up from the dream (which were actually flashbacks, not something her mind had made up) in the middle of the night, startled and sweating, her body was shaking and her breathing was heavy and fast. She sat up and looked around in the darkness of her bedroom, then reached for the lamp next to her bed and turned it on, she looked at the clock and it marked 4:56 a.m.
She swallowed hard because her mouth and throat was dry, then took a deep breath to calm down, got off her bed and made her way out of her bedroom quietly to go to the bathroom, there, she leaned over the sink and looked at herself in the mirror.
"You're okay… they're just bad memories now" She muttered to herself, then splashed her face with some water.
Minutes later she was in the kitchen, staring at the pot of water sitting on the stove as it heated, because they didn't own an electric kettle yet, and the coffee maker was filled with coffee for later. She made herself a cup of tea and walked to the sofa, reached for the remote and turned on the TV, which as per usual, was on the weather channel, so she flicked through the channels, trying to find something nice to watch to distract her mind while she drank her tea, refusing to acknowledge she had a problem, then, after she finished her drink, she headed back into her bedroom to try and get some more sleep before having to go to work.
Later, the sun went up and Shaun was up as well, he did his usual workout routine to activate his body, first thing in the morning, then he got ready for work, fed Hubert, ate his usual breakfast, and noticed a few out of place things, but decided to finish his food first before saying anything. Once he finished, Lea was still in her room sleeping, he looked at the time then walked to her door and knocked.
"Lea?"
She heard the knocking as a very distant noise as she began to wake up again. Her brain said "wake up, there's someone knocking", but her eyes were like "leave it, we're too tired…" She rolled over, snuggling more under the covers, keeping her eyes closed, but Shaun continued knocking on the door.
"Lea, we need to talk" He said.
She groaned and covered herself up to her head with the sheets, hiding from the world, she didn't want to talk about whatever he wanted to talk at that moment, she just wanted to sleep.
"Lea…" He said and knocked again.
She groaned again and angrily pulled the covers off herself, then got up and walked to the door to open it. Her hair was a mess, her face was puffy, there were dark circles under her eyes, and she clearly wasn't in a good mood. Shaun's eyes widened a bit as he saw her shocking look.
"What do you want to talk about, Shaun?" She asked exasperatedly.
"You hung the toilet paper incorrectly again…" She rolled her eyes and he continued "Also, I think it must have been you because no one else lives here, so, assuming it was you, you left your mug on the coffee table and it left water stains on the wood, I've told you to use a coaster…" She closed her eyes and took a deep breath trying to stay calm as her hands clenched into fists, and he added "…you left a pot on the stove and the TV remote on the couch. You have to put it on the tray, on the coffee table, because that is where it belongs. If it doesn't have a set place, then it will be in many places and then it will get lost, and if I can't find it, I can't watch the weather channel…"
"Enough!" She shouted startling him, then added "I'm tired of this! Everything in this place has to be your way! We have to make sure to use two pods in the washing machine, we have to keep the cups to the left of the plate, we have to keep the AC at exactly 74 and we have use one very specific, very HARD to find, toilet paper, among other things! And I'm trying to be accommodating but you're not cutting me any slack!"
He tensed up and stood in front of her with his body shaking, and she realized what she had done. —Crap…— She thought and reached out to gently touch his arm but he moved away, like scared of her.
"Shaun… I'm so sorry" She said with guilt in her eyes.
"I have to go to work" He mumbled and turned around to leave, he grabbed his coat and backpack then walked out the door.
Lea sighed closing her eyes again, muttering "I'm such an idiot…"
She walked back into her bedroom and grabbed her phone to text Shaun: "I'm really sorry", then she got a text from a co-worker telling her to bring a comfy change of clothes for later because there would be an all night coding session. —Great…— She thought.
She didn't hear from Shaun the rest of that day and she didn't have the chance to talk to him because she didn't get back home that night, she texted him to let him know that, and then, by the time she got back home the next morning, he was already gone to work.
She slept for a few hours, because she really needed it, then woke up again, ate something and fed Hubert but she noticed he was like too calm or even bored.
"Hey buddy" She said in a sweet tone, bending down to look at the fish inside the tank, then carefully picked it up and took it to the kitchen to change its water, making sure she followed the instructions Shaun had read to her when they got Hubert.
"The pH should be maintained within a range of 7.1 to 7.3 and we're supposed to add 3 drops of Klor-out to neutralize the tap water"
She placed the tank back in its spot, on a table behind the sofa, then sat down on the couch and watched the fish as it swam slowly around the tank.
"Any idea on how can I make it up to daddy for snapping at him?" She asked Hubert. "Hmm… Yeah, maybe I should just apologize… and be honest…" She sighed.
She had the day off so she decided to use part of that time unpacking what was left to be unpacked in the boxes that were scattered around the apartment, but, while she was at it, at one point she turned around and realized Hubert was floating in the tank.
"No… no, no, no, no, no… Come on, why?" She said as she approached the tank feeling her heart sinking to her stomach. "Hubert…" She mumbled and couldn't stop the tears from coming out as she stared at the dead fish, thinking Shaun would maybe get mad at her, not only for her messiness or the fact that she snapped at him but because she killed the fish, too.
—Can't do anything right, can you?— She thought.
That evening, she was sitting on the sofa with her iPad, trying to distract herself from the events of that day, then Shaun got back from work, left his backpack and coat on the rack near the door and walked to the living.
"I think I killed Hubert" She blurted out, looking down at her iPad as she felt unable to look at him, out of shame and guilt.
He looked over at the tank and saw the fish floating in it, then moved closer to have a better look at it.
"Mmh… he is dead… It's odd but, why do you think you killed him?"
She shrugged "I don't know if I overfed him or I did something wrong when I changed the water to clean his pebbles but, he died" Her voice cracked and she took a deep breath as her eyes began to fill with tears again, then added "I get it if you're mad at me…" She sniffled softly.
He was standing behind the couch, looking at the back of her head, listening, then he leaned over a little when he heard her sniffle, like trying to get a glimpse of her face.
"Are you crying?" He asked and moved to sit on the other end of the sofa. "Are you sad?" He looked at her.
She nodded slightly "I'm sad… and angry, and frustrated, and upset, and I'm sorry… I shouldn't have yelled at you yesterday… I can't follow simple house rules and I couldn't even keep our fish alive, so you have every right to be mad at me. I told you, I'm a mess and we shouldn't live together… you were upset yesterday, I hurt you and I told you I didn't want that to happen again…" She sniffled again.
"But I'm fine now" He said.
"But I'm not, Shaun… I'm damaged goods… I'm pathetic" She swallowed as it was hard to admit, then added "There are things from my past that have affected me more than I would like, more than I thought… Hershey, the failure that it was, coming back to California, starting a new job and moving in with you, it's been so stressful and it somehow brought back things to my mind…"
"You want to move out?" He asked with a tone of concern and disappointment.
"No, I don't want to move out…" She shook her head and looked at him with a slight frown "Don't for a minute think you are the problem, I am…" He let out a small sigh of relief and his body relaxed as she continued "…because I bury things instead of woking on overcoming them… the time I spent away and the time I've been back here have served to make me realize that I may need help… Remember when I told you how sometimes people refuse to get help because they don't realize they actually need it?" He nodded some, and she added "Maybe I should listen to my own advices more often…" She sighed and looked down at her hands as she toyed with the edge of her tablet.
"What happened?" He asked and looked at her again.
She looked up at him again, wondering if he was actually interested, but she felt the need to get it out of her chest anyway, so she decided to open up to him.
"When I told you I used to live with someone… it was my ex…" She took a deep breath and wiped a tear off her cheek. "He was controlling, belittling, and gaslighting, just a narcissist… After college, I went back to Hershey and my brother introduced me to his friend, Ben, and then, shortly after, we started dating… long story short, at first he was like the perfect guy but then he changed and turned into an ass, but I loved him, or at least I thought I did, and I was blinded, I was with him for two years until it all really became too much… he crossed so many lines and it took me a while to see it… and then there's my family… they don't know about any of this, because I decided not to tell them, but either way, they're not very helpful when comes to mental/emotional things… thankfully, I got to a point where I realized the bullshit I was buried in, but I was afraid or something, of doing something, leaving him or whatever… until one night when he tried to force himself on me… and I just left… I literally took my stuff next day and left town without telling anyone. I decided to take control of my life in ways that are probably not the healthiest when it comes to coping with what happened, and proof of that is the fact that certain things trigger me, and I took it out on you… I shouldn't have done that… I'm sorry" She wiped tears from her cheeks again.
Shaun stared at the coffee table, listening to her and thinking about the mental and physical abuse that him, his brother and their mom also suffered for years, until one day his dad also crossed a big line and his brother Steve decided it was enough for them and they left too, but their mom stayed with their abusive father, which he still couldn't understand. He didn't understand why people do or don't do certain things, because they didn't seem logic to him, it was like, either he lacked the kind of logic others have or they lacked any kind of logic in their minds, but Lea's experience kinda gave him another view on the whole thing, his mom was probably blinded too, and maybe she was also afraid or something, or maybe she just loved her husband more than she loved her kids, he didn't know for sure, it was kinda hard to understand, and in a way, he wished his mom would have seen things for what they were, like Lea managed to do, and would have walked away with him and Steve back then, he wished she had done more for them, because then, maybe neither Steve or his bunny would have died, but then maybe he would have never met Lea…
After a few minutes, when he snapped out of his thoughts, he looked at Lea who was silently crying on her side of the couch and moved a little closer to her.
"Do you… want a hug?" He said, still looking at her, not knowing if he was going to regret offering such a thing but he did it anyway.
She looked up at him with surprise in her red and puffy crying eyes, since she really wasn't expecting him to offer something like that, because she knew how he was, and she respected that, though she really needed a hug, but she didn't want to make him uncomfortable.
"Are you sure?" She asked.
He took a slight deep breath considering for a second, then stood up and held his arms open for her. She looked up at him hesitating it for a brief moment, then stood up as well and wrapped her arms around his waist gently, she moved her hands up to his shoulder blades and he wrapped his arms around hers for a minute until he let them flop down to his sides while she still held onto him, just tearing up against his shirt.
His brother had been there for him, Glassman had been there for him, even Lea had been there for him when he most needed someone, and this time, he knew she needed someone, so they stayed like that for like a good 5 minutes but he stared at the fish tank the whole time.
"I have to go do something" He said breaking the silence in the room.
She pulled back breaking the hug and looked up at him puzzled. He automatically moved to take the tank from the table, then walked to the door with it and took his keys from the rack.
"Where…" Was the only thing she managed to say before he walked out of the apartment, leaving her there, wondering where the heck he had gone to with the fish tank.
—
She went to lay on her bed thinking about her past, her present, and the things she had to work on, then without planning on it, she fell asleep.
Shaun got back to the apartment with an empty fish tank and looked around for Lea but realized she was asleep in her bedroom. She had left her door open and her stood by the door, watching her for a moment, quietly contemplating her as she slept, and subconsciously started counting her breaths as her chest moved up and down, a technique used to measure the respiratory rate, a frequently omitted vital sign, but hers was within the normal range. He silently stepped back and reached for the knob to close the door. He then ate something quick for dinner and went to bed after that, thinking about Lea's mental health and coming up with a bunch of ways on how he could possibly help her.
In the morning, Lea woke up a little after Shaun. She opened her door and found him on the floor of the space between the sofa and the dining table, doing pushups as part of his morning exercise routine. She usually always woke up by the time he was done with his routine, but this time she had slept so much the day before that her body had had enough and was fully recharged to take on the world once again.
She stood by her doorframe watching Shaun as he did his push ups in perfect form, his feet were pointed to where Lea was, while his head was pointed towards the kitchen. She watched him for a minute and grinned.
"That's it, work those muscled, boy!" She teased him and giggled then headed into the bathroom.
He blushed and turned off one of his alarms with his chin, then stood up from the floor and proceeded to do some jumping jacks.
Lea came out of the bathroom and grinned watching him again, then decided to join him, she stood like a meter apart from him and began doing jumping jacks too, letting out a giggle every so often, which at one point made him laugh some as well, and they continued until his other alarm went off and they stopped.
Lea was panting and moved to lean on the wall between her bedroom's door and the bathroom's.
"Holy sh… wow…" She managed to say while breathing heavily. "I need to get back to the gym!" She laughed.
"Exercising in the morning is very beneficial for a lot of reasons" He smiled and nodded a little.
"I know" She grinned catching her breath. "I stopped going out for a run or to the gym since I left San Jose to go back to Hershey, and oh God, it is showing now!" She giggled.
"You're up early today" He mentioned.
"Yeah!" She nodded and looked at him "By the way… thank you… about last night…for being there, listening…"
He nodded some "No prob" He said, as something he had learned from her, and she smiled, then he went into his bedroom to get his clothes before going into the bathroom to take a shower.
Lea walked to the kitchen and pulled out one of his apples, poured some cereal into a bowl and pulled out of the fridge a yogurt cup, which was what he usually had for breakfast, except for the days when he had pancakes. She placed everything on the breakfast bar, made herself a cup of coffee, and she didn't feel like cooking something so she just grabbed a banana and stole one of Shaun's yogurt cups from the fridge, then she sat on one of the stools by the bar and waited for Shaun to finish showering and getting dressed so they could have breakfast together and talk.
She scrolled through her phone, checking social media and other sites, and when Shaun finally came out of the bathroom, she looked at him.
"We need to talk" She said.
"About what?" He asked with some concern.
"Living together" She said and patted the stool next to her.
"You said you don't want to move out…" He said, tensing up.
"I don't, I promise… but I think we need to talk about our quirks…"
"Oh" He relaxed and walked to kitchen to sit on the other stool. "You're very difficult to live with…" He added and couldn't help to notice the yogurt cup that was in front of Lea.
She followed his gaze and chuckled, getting an idea of what he might have been thinking about "There is more in the fridge and I will buy more later if you want… I just didn't feel like cooking eggs or something today"
"Okay…" He said, then faced his own yogurt, opened it and pored it onto his cereal, and she chuckled again.
"And I know I'm difficult to live with… I know I forget stuff, a lot… but I promise to work on that and to not take out my problems on you or anyone else for that matter…" He nodded as he fed himself, and she added "…But you're not a saint, Shaun. You can be annoying as hell, too…" He looked at her briefly then continued eating while she kept talking "…I don't need you to change… but just as I am willing to work on certain things, I hope you can do the same… we need to compromise, this isn't just my place or your place, it is OUR place… we need to find a middle ground"
He put his spoon down in his bowl for a moment, thinking about her words then looked at her.
"I don't think I can't use one-ply toilet paper…" He shook his head slightly.
"Oh no, you were so right about the two-ply, totally worth the extra $1.50" She nodded.
"But… maybe, the cups can go to the right of the plates… sometimes…" He added and she chuckled.
"All right…" She said nodding again, smiling "Maybe we could make a list of chores that we can assign to each other, you know, divide the responsibilities…"
He nodded with a little smile on his face. "That sounds good"
"Okay" She smiled some more and opened her yogurt "I unpacked a bunch of stuff yesterday. I know I probably didn't put everything in the right place, but maybe we can rearrange it together later?" She looked at him and he nodded with his mouth full as he chewed on a piece of apple.
"We should get another fish" He randomly suggested after he swallowed the apple he was chewing on.
"We don't need another fish, Shaun" She shook her head and took a bite of the banana she grabbed before.
"But you wanted a pet"
"Yeah, I got one… and killed it… we don't need that to happen again" She said and he sighed softly and frustrated, then they both continued eating their breakfast.
When they finished, Shaun rinsed his dishes and put them in the dishwasher, then left for work. Lea, on the other hand, was a kind of a slow eater and wasn't done yet. She scrolled through her phone again and got a text from Sarah.
"Does your new bed have enough space for me?"
I'm sorry if this chapter was triggering for anyone. I chose not to add a trigger warning at the beginning because I didn't want to "spoil" the chapter, but if it caused trouble to anyone's mental health, know that I am deeply sorry.
As a person who used to lived with an alcoholic, abusive dad as a child and a narcissistic step father later on, this chapter hit a little close to home, and was written with a lot of respect and compassion for all those who went or are going through similar situations.
Thank you for reading.