by L. A. Fiore
Gage’s head fell back against the flat pillow. He let out a breath and closed his eyes. Fuck, they all knew. Was she okay? Was she alone? God, he needed to know to ease his mind.
“I’ll leave you to get some rest and see you bright and early in the morning,” the doctor said softly and left the room.
The silence in the air was heavy, deafening and louder than the screeching of Tilly’s scream right before everything went black. Gage shifted in bed, a groan from the pain escaping his throat. “Heather, I—”
“No,” she said softly from her spot. She stood looking out the small window of the hospital room, watching the world outside covered with a pristine white. Never taking her eyes from it, she spoke to him, herself, or to the room, just needing to hear the words out loud. “I should have known. My God,” she huffed, a self-deprecating chuckle. “All the signs were there. You being there to you never home, and even when you were, you really weren’t.” She turned, putting her sad blue eyes to Gage. “I asked you. I asked you if you needed to tell me anything, Gage, gave you a chance. Why, why didn’t you tell me?”
“I,” Gage shifted in bed, moving to sit on the edge. Every muscle pulsating in pain, but it was nothing near the torment he was causing his wife. “I was going to tel—”
“When!” Heather’s voice rose, anger coating every word she spoke. “When, Gage, when?”
“When Scarlett left for her—”
Heather bit out, “Oh, I see, when you saw fit. How long, Gage?” Heather started to pace the room. “How long?”
Gage hung his head and whispered, “Since September.”
Heather halted her steps, her body visibly jerked back like he punched her. “Four months? You’ve been having an affair for four months?” Her voice coated with disbelief.
“Yeah,” Gage said softly. “I didn’t—”
Heather spoke over him as realization took hold. “God, it really was there, all of it. Working late, meetings that you never had before, taking off at the drop of a hat. Dom returning the work trailer.” She shook her head, insight slamming into her, her body swaying, words hard and painful as she kept on, “Your face always in your phone or to your ear.” Heather sunk to the seat behind her. Her elbows going to her knees, hands covering her face. “God, the pain, it’s so...” She paused.
Gage stood, his legs unsteady, body screaming, throbbing as he moved to his wife. He got to his knees. “Heather, please, I’m sorry.”
She removed her hands and the anger was no longer there, but pain and sadness sat heavy in her eyes. “You, Gage. Of all people, you. I never would have expected this from you.” The tears started rolling down her cheeks. “You loved me, loved me like I’ve never been loved before, how could you do this to me?”
Gage put his hands on her knees. “I never meant to hurt you, you’ve gotta believe me, Heather. We were growing apart, wanting different things and—”
“So, you go looking elsewhere?” Her words snappy.
“No.” Gage shook his head. “No, I never intended for this to happen.”
“I,” Heather faltered, a sob breaking her voice. “I… God, it hurts. It hurts so bad.” She told her husband as she looked him in the eyes and pleaded brokenly, “Make it stop.”
Gage knew he couldn’t, but he moved to wrap his arms around her. Heather pushed him away, standing abruptly, causing him to fall back. She moved to the window, gripping the windowsill, and sobbed. The wracking in her body causing her to crumble to the floor. Gage sat across the room on the floor watching his wife fold inside herself as she cried from the despair he’d caused her. A pain he told her he would protect her from. That he’d never hurt her. But here he was causing her to sob to the point that her legs gave out.
He failed.
He failed in everything he stood tall for.
Failed his family.
The woman he loved.
He failed himself.
What kind of man was he?
He began to breathe deeply through his nose, but he knew that wasn’t going to help as his own tears began to stream down his face. He wanted to hold her, take the pain away. Watching her fall apart was the hardest thing he ever did in his life. If you drove a knife through his heart, the pain would be less than he was feeling now. The protective instinct kicked in. He wanted to make it better. Make her feel better. Pick her up and put the pieces together. He wasn’t sure if he’d be able to push that feeling down far enough to move forward.
_______________
Tilly looked outside and watched the snow. A fresh wave of white to coat everything, like a new beginning, a wiping of the board to start over. On her way back from the CT scan, she’d seen Heather. Heather hadn’t seen her, too lost in her pain, and it was pain that carved her features. She recognized it because it was the same look on her husband’s face. They knew there would be consequences. They knew to see if the grass really was greener, there would be collateral damage, a ripple effect, a destructive wave that would roll over everything and everyone they loved. They knew it going in, and still they risked it.
She hadn’t seen him. Since they were brought in, she had yet to see him. Even with all the pain they’d caused, she missed him. Knew that despite what was happening now, they were right to risk it. She only hoped he still thought so too.
The door opened; Luke appeared. He looked older, the weight of her betrayal hanging heavy on him. He didn’t move close to her. He hadn’t touched her since she woke. She couldn’t say she blamed him.
“The kids are at the hotel with Candice. She’ll visit tomorrow.”
She couldn’t think about Candice at the moment. She’d have to pay penitence for that too but right now she knew she was going to be paying it to Luke.
He moved to the window, his back to her. “I’m not going to ask for the details,” he said in a hard whisper. “I’m not going to make you recount these past…” he stopped talking and his hands fisted. “I don’t even want to know how long it’s been going on.” He pulled a hand through his hair, his shoulders tensed, his body held so stiffly that he’d crack if he moved too suddenly. The guilt that hadn’t left her since she woke, weaved through her, causing her to fist her blanket. Her eyes burning, witnessing Karma whipping back around, hurting the ones she loved.
The hardness left his tone when he spoke again. “I could make it easy for you. I could let you walk out of our life. You clearly want to. And I can admit to not being around, to being partly responsible for you looking for what I wasn’t giving you elsewhere.”
He turned then, the tears in his eyes had Tilly’s own rolling down her cheeks. “But I’m not going to make it easy for you. I’m not going to stand back and watch the best thing in my life walk out of it. There needs to be an incentive for you to stay, and I won’t beg you to stay, so I will make the stakes harder for you to walk away because I want you to give us a chance. A real chance to find our way back to each other. We were good once. You know we can be again. You felt it too, Til. I know you did. I love you, love you enough that I can get past this...I can forgive you for your affair.”
She didn’t want to hear it, she wanted to cover her ears and close her eyes, didn’t want to witness her husband breaking, seeking a way to hold onto her. She hated that she’d caused it, hated it more that even as he spoke the words, she knew to whom her heart belonged, and it wasn’t her husband.
Silence fell for a few beats, like the calm before the storm, before he spoke the words that crushed her, wounded her from the inside out. “If you decide to leave me, I will fight for full custody.”
The sob rushed up her throat, her world spinning. There was no cruelty in his words, she could have held onto that. There was compassion, even sympathy. He said he wouldn’t beg, but there was a plea in his voice, an urging for her to hear him.
“I’ll win, Tilly.”
He wasn’t gloating, he wasn’t g
oing in for the kill. It wasn’t even a warning. It was simply said and sadly spoken.
“You need to think about what you want, Til, but if you stay, I will be different. I will be the man you once loved. Give us a chance to find each other again. We have so much history, and yeah, there’s been pain and regret, but there’s love too...so much fucking love. I know you feel it, even if you don’t want to admit it. It’s your choice because what I want is right in front of me.”
He dropped that on her and walked out, the door closing quietly behind him. It was her choice. What kind of choice was that? Either way, she lost. She either started a life with the man she loved, that kind of soul bearing love they wrote love songs and poems about, but she’d lose her kids. Or she kept her kids, the loves of her life, gave up the man her heart ached for, and stayed with a man who had once owned her heart, but had neglected it and could so easily again. Her tears fell harder, her head bowed in pain. Either way, from that moment on she’d only have half a heart. She’d known there would be penitence to pay, she’d been prepared to pay it, but she never imagined it would be so severe.
_______________
Gage held the hospital phone to his ear, staring at the pale blue wall. “Are you sure you’re okay?” He didn’t want to use his cell in case her husband took it. He couldn’t leave his room as nurses crowded the station as they went through a shift change. But he’d find a way to reach her… and he did.
“Physically, I’ll heal, but Gage, it’s all such a mess. I knew it would be, but I didn’t think it would be this bad.”
“I know,” He breathed. “But we also didn’t think this was how it’d come out either. Fuck, I miss you,” Gage said and shifted in bed, his ass growing numb the longer he sat there. “How about when they change shifts, I come get you, we can find a quiet spot?”
“Even with everything going on, I miss you, too. So much it hurts. I’d come find you now, but my nurse is bigger than me.”
Gage chuckled. “There’s my girl,” he whispered, liking that even though all that had gone down, she could still find humor somewhere. “Give me about an hour, and I’ll come to you.”
Her heart leaped at the thought of him coming for her, but hearing those words from him hurt too. She swallowed down the pain, because she wanted to see him more than anything, but she didn’t answer him, her thoughts were somewhere else when she said softly, “I am your girl. I always will be.”
There was a tone to her voice, one that Gage never heard before, he didn’t like it. But somehow, he understood it. With everything going on, he was sure there would be emotions coming from her that he’d never experienced before. Get through all the rubble of the destruction they caused together. “See you soon, baby. Love you.”
Her voice broke, pain sliced through her when she whispered, “I love you.”
_______________
The heavy metal door closed behind them, the sound echoing through the stairwell. Tilly moved to the corner of the landing, setting her back against the wall, eyes to the ground.
“It’s over,” Gage breathed almost in relief that their secret was out, although he didn’t feel as relieved as he thought he would. “No more hiding, Till,” he said with a forced smile.
New Year’s was right around the corner, and he could start the next chapter in his book. Hell. They could write a whole new story together. A story that was held silent for months. Both drowning in one another, finally coming to the surface. Able to breathe for the first time. But was it the breath with her that he really wanted?
“What’s wrong?” Gage asked concerned, moving into her. Her eyes lifted to him then and tears sat at the edge, waiting to spill over, causing Gage to halt his steps a foot away.
A person shouldn’t be forced to choose between what they loved the most, but that was how Tilly felt. Her heart ached, seeing the look in Gage’s eyes, knowing that she felt it too. Having what she wanted so close and not being able to grab onto him broke her.
Her voice was no higher than a whisper, because saying it out loud made it real, and she didn’t want it to be. She held his gaze, those dark eyes she loved so much, ones she knew she wouldn’t see again. Brokenly, she whispered, “I’m not leaving Luke.”
Gage felt a warmth course through his body, his heart began to race, his arm flew out, putting a hand to the wall to balance the wave of dizziness that suddenly racked his body. “Come again?” He questioned lowly.
Watching his reaction had her tears rolling down her cheeks. The words on her tongue grated, like they were being dragged across sandpaper. “I can’t leave Luke.”
Gage’s hard eyes roamed Tilly’s face. A face he loved looking at. A face that over the months of being together, he learned all the expressions of, and what he saw in her features punched him in the gut. “You aren’t fucking with me, are you?” He kept his hand to the cool concrete wall and raised the other to run through his hair as realization rushed through his body.
“I was prepared to walk out of my life, was prepared for the pain I’d cause, the anger and resentment from my kids for breaking up their home. But what I wasn’t prepared for, couldn’t even ponder without it breaking me, was losing my kids. If I leave him, he will fight for full custody.”
Gage’s arm dropped as he closed the distance between them, he pulling her into his arms. Holding her close, he told her, “We can get the best lawyers, Till. We can fight this.” The words sounded wrong as he said them. His arms grew tightly around her, but she didn’t reciprocate the comfort.
She wanted to sink into his embrace, wanted to soak up every second because she knew, after this, she wouldn’t know it again. She knew she was ending them, and it was killing her. But they were the ones who cheated, and they could fight, but Luke was right; he would most likely to win. Even the smallest chance that she could lose her kids, she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t start a new life with Gage when she lost part of her heart. It wasn’t fair to him, to either of them.
“We cheated. We knew the consequences. He didn’t threaten to take them, he’s trying to get me to stay, to fight for my marriage, to fight for him.” Tears filled her eyes, the pain in Gage’s breaking her. “He isn’t the one I want to fight for. Even knowing the damage we caused, you’re the one I love. The one I can’t stand the thought of living without, but then I look at the damage around us. All the pain, all the regret. Starting over, leaving all of that destruction in our wake…” She looked down, unable to stand seeing how she was feeling looking back at her. “From the beginning, we clicked. Like the last part of a puzzle, we fit. Together, I felt whole. Complete. But I always thought being with you felt like a dream, a part of me always feared waking up. That car accident, that was when I woke up. That was when I realized just how much our actions hurt those we love. Can you really start a new life built on that much pain?”
Gage stepped back as if the words she was saying were burning from her body. He felt a tightness enclose around his chest. Without a doubt, he understood what she was saying, the mess they left behind if they’d walk away hand in hand. The memory of his wife sobbing on the floor only hours ago came rushing back. That pain snaked through his body, twisting every organ in it. He tried to take a deep breath but failed. “You don’t even wanna try...” He paused, because the question he was asking her, he was having a hard time answering himself. Gage looked to the ground because, looking into her eyes, he knew what they were saying, and that was goodbye. “Do you?” he finished, raising his head, eyes leveled on her.
The woman in her wanted to fight, wanted to hold on to what she had found with him because she knew she’d never feel it again. But the mother in her, she wanted to make her children happy, she wanted their childhoods to not be tainted by pain and heartache. There was enough of that in life. “What I want I can’t have. Either way, I lose...we both do.” She saw him rear back, but she pushed. “I saw Heather. I saw the devastation. I understand
how she feels because I’m feeling it right now. She loves you.”
Gage’s head fell, his chin almost hitting his chest. He had nothing to say in return because seeing what he did to his wife, to his own daughter. The past, the history that he and his wife held. He couldn’t just walk away from the life he knew, leaving everything in a heap of broken hearts. And more… he didn’t want to.
“We do this, we lose our pasts. On Christmas, I saw my family, maybe for the first time in a long time. There’s a lot there to fight for.” She glanced down, needing to be completely honest with him. Looking up into his eyes, she said, “Luke and I, it was like we found each other again on Christmas. We talked, really talked for the first time in a long time.” She held Gage’s gaze, her heart breaking when she added, “We made love. I thought at the time it was goodbye, but it hurts too much to be a goodbye. Can you honestly say that you can walk away from your own family, that there isn’t anything there to hang on to, to fight for? Are you sure you’re ready to cross that bridge, to burn it down behind you? I want to say I am because I love you, I really truly love you, but I’d be lying if I said I could walk away and not wonder if I didn’t try hard enough. If I let it go too soon.”
His reaction wasn’t what she was expecting, it surprised him, too. Relief moved through him so strongly he reached out for the wall. He looked into Tilly’s beautiful face, the pain etched in her expression, and he understood it because he couldn’t say goodbye to his past either. It was why seeing Heather’s pain destroyed him; it was why Christmas had been so bittersweet, because what he thought he lost, what he thought he’d found with Tilly, he was finding again with Heather.
He wasn’t ready to write a new story, not even a new chapter, but if he hadn’t met Tilly, if she hadn’t come into his life when she had, they would both still be incomplete because it wasn’t just their own eyes they opened. Their marriages weren’t over; they were just off track.
Tears clung to her lashes, her pain matched his own because he couldn’t say goodbye to his past, but he didn’t want to say goodbye to her either. He touched her, needed to feel her one last time. He brushed his knuckles across her cheeks, her tears dampening his skin. “I can’t walk away from my family either.”
