There has never been a moment in my life when I’ve felt well and truly loved. Accepted and wanted. My parents hadn't wanted me. I’m the accident that should have been 'taken care of', the disgraceful child whose silence they bought. After all, when you have as much money as my father, why should you actually show emotion or feelings?
My father, Davison Bennett Roberts, III, is a third generation banker. His father’s father opened up the local branch, and the rest was, as they say, history. I don’t remember my father ever really ‘liking’ me. Hell, I don’t even really remember him liking my mother, either. He worked and worked, and when he finished he worked some more. When he wasn’t at the bank, he was in his office at home. And when he wasn’t consumed with whatever it was that he did, he was off screwing the hot little secretary, or teller, or college co-ed slut.
Always absent from my life.
Always reminding me, sometimes without his words, how un-important I was.
He was the first strike against mankind, in my eyes.
All the resentment that I held towards men, and my reluctance to start a relationship now, could all be traced back to the man who called himself my father.
The worst part, though… with all his busyness, and lack of care, he still made time to bring the wrath of Davison Roberts, III down on me at every opportunity. My 4.0 grade point average was never going to be good enough to please him. The extracurricular educational clubs that I was allowed to join were never going to help me amount to anything. Plain and simple, I was just never going to be enough.
He didn’t want me, but he still wanted to sling his holier than thou attitude and self—righteousness my way. I’m not sure, even to this day, what he was attempting to teach me. He made it clear from early on that he would never allow a woman to run his company, so I was convinced he just liked to beat me down.
Literally.
He didn’t take his hands to me often, but when he did, it wasn’t pretty. And that was strike two against mankind.
Growing up, I didn’t have many people that I would consider real friends. I had plenty of playmates who were the children of my father’s associates. Those were the sort of children that my parents had allowed me to befriend. Those friends didn’t want me because of me, but because of who my father was and how much money he had. You know, the kind of kids that walked around in their designer clothing, their backs so straight you knew that they had to have a rod shoved so far up their assholes that there was no way that they would be anything but fake.
As I got older, I was once again reminded that people only saw what they could gain by being around me to get closer to my father. Boys never wanted to date ‘me’; they wanted to date my family’s money and connections. The closer I got to graduating high school, the more painfully obvious it became that the boys I dated would never really like me. They were only there to hopefully gain something towards their future careers by being with me.
The only people that mattered to them were… themselves.
And there you have strike three.
I could only trust myself. I made a promise to myself that when I was old enough, I was going to get out of here and finally, be me. No one was going to tell me whom I could have as friends. Men wouldn’t know who my father was so they would love me as me, and not as the daughter of Davison Bennett Roberts III. I would find people who loved me… for me.
And I was never going to need a man.
I am Denise Ann Roberts. Strong, proud, and independent. A loyal friend, godmother, and I radiate fucking happiness so that people will never see how lonely I really am.
Funny thing about these masks that people put on. I look like the happiest woman in the world. I look like I have everything that I want out of life. That everything is perfect. And that is exactly what I want people to see. But, inside? Inside, I’m dying. I’m not happy. I have amazing friends, and I know that they love me, but I am completely alone. Just like I have been my whole life, and the best part, the big kicker in my ass… I only have myself to blame.
Why? Because I have pushed the one man that I love away from me, and I keep pushing, even when he keeps coming back for more. I’ve found the one man out of millions that might be able to prove me wrong. That might be able to love me back unconditionally and never change.
And every single day that I have to pretend to be okay, to be happy, it’s slowly killing me.
Three Years Earlier
Two long years and finally, finally, Izzy is living. Her beautiful smile is plastered all over her face, and that twinkle is back in her eyes. Nothing but worry has consumed me since that day she called me to come get her from Brandon. To come save her.
I had slowly watched her leave me. No, not in the sense that she wasn’t my friend, but she was stolen from me. I watched her become the me that I used to be. A shell of my former self, afraid to move because of the people that tugged the strings to my life.