Five Years Gone: A Standalone Contemporary Romance

by Marie Force

  Muncie hands him a key card for a room on another floor. “Your bags will be delivered there. Whenever you’re ready,” he says to me, “you can go on up. Captain West is waiting for you.” He walks away.

  Captain West is waiting for you.

  It’s surreal that John is in this hotel waiting to see me and that he chose this of all places for our reunion. I don’t tell Eric that we’re here because John and I once spent a beautiful weekend here while our apartment was being painted.

  I look up at Eric. “I’m going to go now. I’ll meet you at the other room after?”

  He nods and places his hands on my shoulders before leaning his forehead against mine. “Are you okay?”

  “I don’t know what I am. You?”

  “Same. I wish I could go with you.”

  “I do, too, but it might be better if—”

  “I understand. Don’t worry. Just go do what you have to do and come to me after, okay?”

  “Okay.” I have a lump the size of Texas in my throat.

  “I love you, Ava.”

  “Love you, too.” I’m afraid to move, afraid to leave him, afraid to see John and confront the painful memories. I’m afraid to breathe.

  “Go while I still can let you.” His hands drop to his sides, and he takes a step back.

  I want to cling to him, beg him not to let go, but I can’t do that to him. This is already excruciating for him. I try to imagine how I would feel if we’d come here so he could see Brittany. I wouldn’t be able to handle it, certainly not as gracefully as he’s handling this.

  I swallow the lump in my throat and force my feet to move, to walk toward the elevator, to push the Up arrow, to get into the car and push the number I need. I keep my gaze down so I won’t see Eric, but I know he’s watching me.

  I feel shredded by his pain. This is killing him, but he came with me anyway, held my hand for six hours on the flight and left me only when he had to. I thought I understood the word agony, but I’ve never experienced the emotion as acutely as I do right now, watching the numbers ascend on the panel above the doors. Each number takes me closer to John.

  The doors open and nearly close again before I notice and step forward to get off. I panic for a second, thinking I’ve forgotten the room number, but then I remember and follow the arrows. Standing in front of the door where John waits for me, I’m unable to move or breathe or think or do anything other than stare at the door.

  He won’t be able to answer the door…

  Standing is a huge accomplishment.

  I hold the key card up to the black circle on the door and watch the green light come on. Green means go. I push open the door.

  He’s standing about ten feet from me.

  The first thing I notice is the uniform. I’m not sure what I expected, but it wasn’t the stark reminder of why we’re here, why this happened, where he’s been, why he had to go. In the span of seconds, my eyes travel from his chest to his face, and then I’m crying and moving toward him, drawn to him the same way I’ve always been.

  I’m in his arms, and he holds me just like he used to—firmly, lovingly, perfectly. He buries his face in my hair and breathes me in.

  “Ava,” he whispers, “my beautiful Ava. I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry. I love you so much. I never stopped. Not for one second.” The words pour out of him, as if he’s afraid I won’t give him the chance to say everything he needs to. “I thought of you every day. Everything I did was about getting home to you.”

  I’m sobbing and clinging to him and listening. I listen to every word he says, each of them arrows to my battered heart.

  His face is wet, too, and the realization nearly brings me to my knees. I’ve never seen him cry before, whereas he used to tease me about weeping over sappy commercials.

  We stand that way for a long time. I have no idea how long it is before I begin to sense that he’s tiring. I don’t want to let him go, but his body is trembling.

  “Sit,” I tell him.

  “I need help.”

  The three little words seem to cost him greatly.

  I keep an arm around his waist and support his weight as we move the short distance to the sofa.

  When he’s seated, I notice his face has gone white with pain. “What can I do?” I ask, sitting next to him.

  He shakes his head. “Didn’t want you to see me this way.”

  “The only thing that matters is that you’re alive.”

  “Does it matter, Ava? Does it still matter?”

  “It matters very much.” It occurs to me that this isn’t going to be as simple as I wanted it to be. This isn’t going to be about closure, but rather, about reopening recently closed wounds that never really healed.

  “I have so much I want to say to you.” He takes my hand and looks into my eyes, his blue-eyed gaze as familiar to me as anything in my life. “Beginning with I’m sorry. I hate that I did this to you, the last person who should ever be treated the way I treated you, the most precious thing in my life.”

  Tears run freely down my face. I’m powerless to stop them. He’s saying everything I’ve longed to hear for years, that I wasn’t crazy to wait for him or to mourn him or to yearn for him.

  “That first night we met… I never should’ve left with you or stayed with you or fallen for you. But it was already too late. That first instant in the hallway outside the bathrooms… After that, it was too late.”

  “For what?”

  “To walk away. It happened that fast for me. Like being hit by lightning.”

  I can barely see through my tears.

  “I wasn’t allowed to have a girlfriend, Ava. It was against the rules. And I broke every one of them because I couldn’t bring myself to leave you.” After a pause, he says, “I tried a couple of times.”

  That stuns me. “When?”

  “Remember that weekend I went to Mexico with my unit?”

  Nodding, I wipe tears from my face.

  “I didn’t go to Mexico. I went apartment shopping. I came this close to signing a lease, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I went home to you. Another time, I packed my stuff while you were at work. I was going to leave you a note and tell you I’d met someone else. I wanted you to be so angry you wouldn’t come after me.”

  “I… I don’t understand.”

  “We weren’t supposed to have entanglements, but you were never that to me. You were everything. I couldn’t bring myself to leave you until I had no choice but to go.”

  “I tried to find you. After you left… I went to the base, and I asked people, but no one had ever heard your name. I couldn’t find you anywhere, not even online.”

  “I don’t exist online—or I didn’t until the Pentagon released my name after the video was made public.” The words are tinged with bitterness. “They’re making me do an interview with 60 Minutes that’ll air in the next week. That’s why I wanted to see you now, so I could tell you before I have to tell everyone else.”

  “After the video, I thought I might hear from you. Why didn’t you call me?”

  “At first it was because I was really messed up, and then it was because I was afraid you wouldn’t take my call.”

  “That was months ago.” I force myself to look at his face. He’s gaunt and hollowed, but it’s the same face that’s haunted my dreams. “What took so long?”

  “I didn’t want to come back to you as a cripple.”

  “Because you thought that would matter to me?”

  “No, because it mattered to me.” He reaches for my left hand and zeroes in on my engagement ring. “Muncie told me you’re engaged.”

  I nod, my heart beating so hard, I can hear it echoing in my ears.

  “Who is he?”

  “Eric… He’s…” I pull back my hand and pour a glass of water from the pitcher on the table. I take a sip and then another.

  For the longest time, he stares down at the floor while I wonder what he’s thinking.

  “I stayed in San Dieg
o until last May. I… I gave it five years. I gave you five years, and then… I couldn’t do it anymore, John. I just couldn’t.”

  He nods but doesn’t say anything.

  “John…”

  Turning those piercing blue eyes on me, he says, “I’m too late, then?”

  The shattered expression on his face breaks my heart all over again. “I… I love him. He was there for me.”

  “And I wasn’t.”

  I can’t remain seated any longer. I get up and begin to pace as his gaze follows me. “I didn't know if you were even alive! Every day for years, I scoured the news looking for something—anything—that would give me hope or closure or something, but there was never a single thing about you. I waited for five years. Five years, John.” My voice catches on a sob. “I was by myself with this for all that time, until I thought I’d go mad if I didn’t make a change.”

  “Come here,” he says.

  I shake my head. I’m afraid to go anywhere near him. He’s taking apart my carefully reconstructed life one sentence at a time.

  He holds out a hand to me. “Please. I can’t come to you.”

  I return to my place on the sofa, but I don’t take his hand. I keep my arms crossed as if that’ll protect me somehow.

  “I get it. I’ve put you through hell. I’ll always be sorry for that. Everything that happened is a hundred percent my fault.”

  “No, it was Al Khad’s fault.”

  Shrugging, he says, “A big chunk of it was mine, too.”

  “Not everything that happened was bad,” I whisper, wiping away more tears. “For a long time, it was the most beautiful thing to ever happen to me.”

  “Until it wasn’t.”

  I can’t think of a thing to say that wouldn’t be wrong. It wasn’t like he left because he wanted to. “Did you know you could be gone more than five years?”

  “Hell no. We were told extended deployments were possible, but nothing like this.”

  “Your… your father must be very proud.”

  His face loses all expression. “I don’t know who my father is, Ava.”

  “But you said he was a general, that you grew up all over.”

  “I did grow up all over, because I was in the system. The foster system. I was in a lot of trouble as a kid, and a judge told me I could go to jail or the military. He made it my choice. I chose the Navy. I have no family to speak of. Just you and the people I’ve served with. My lack of attachments made me an ideal candidate for the job I was asked to do.”

  Just you…

  Just you…

  Just you…

  Hearing he has no one else breaks something in me. “You lied to me about so many things.”

  “Only because I had to. Never because I wanted to.”

  At some level, I understand that, but I don’t like it. “My therapist said you’re a national hero for what you did and sacrificed for the rest of us. But what you did to me wasn’t heroic at all.”

  “I freely admit that. I watched the early coverage of the attack, and when I got the call from my command, all I could think about was you and what would happen to you. I was sick about it, but our mission, my role in it, everything about my professional life was and is classified. I couldn’t have told you even if I wanted to.”

  “You could have. You chose not to.”

  “No, baby,” he says gently. “I chose to protect you by not giving you information that could be used against you by the people we were trying to capture.”

  Hearing that, I recoil. “How could they have used it against me? They didn’t even know I existed.”

  “I was unwilling to take even the slightest chance with your safety.”

  “Instead, you nearly ruined my life.”

  “I’ll always regret the pain I caused you, Ava. You have every right to hate me. I wouldn’t blame you if you did.”

  “I wish I did. That would make it so much easier to tell you to go straight to hell.”

  “If that’s what you want to do, I’ll try to understand. But if there’s any chance… Any chance at all that you might still love me as much as I love you, that you might find it in your heart to forgive me and to give me another chance… There’s nothing I want more than the opportunity to make things right with you. All the time I was gone, I dreamed of the life we might have when I came home. I’m being medically discharged from the Navy with a full pension. We’d have the resources to do whatever we want wherever we want. All I need to be happy is you, Ava.”

  “No.” I shake my head as if the word isn’t enough on its own to make my point. I keep my gaze fixed on the four gold stripes on his sleeve. “You don’t get to do this to me. I’m finally in a good place in a healthy relationship with a man who adores me. He put me back together and helped me find a whole new life. I’m sorry, but no. I can’t go backward.”

  After a seemingly endless silence, he says, “Okay.” From his pocket, he withdraws a piece of paper that he hands to me. “My new phone number.”

  “I won’t need this, John.”

  “Take it anyway. If you change your mind…”

  I take the paper and put it in my pocket. “I… I should go.”

  He nods but doesn’t look at me.

  I’m not sure if I should hug him or if he would even welcome the gesture.

  “Could I ask you one thing?” he says.

  “Okay…”

  “If you didn’t have him, would you still be leaving?”

  “It’s not about him, John. It’s about us, and too much water under the bridge to go back to who we were six years ago.” Here come the goddamned tears again. “For a very long time, I would’ve given anything to hear the things you said to me today. But now… I had no choice but to move on.”

  “Thank you for coming all this way to see me.”

  “Thank you for your extraordinary sacrifices in service to our country. I’ll never forget you or the time we spent together.” My voice breaks. “I… I loved every minute of it.” I rush toward the door because I need to be out of here before I break down. And I need to move quickly before I lose my resolve.

  “Ava.” His anguished cry is more than I can bear. “Please don’t go. Don’t leave me.”

  I open the door and wait for it to close behind me before I slide down to the floor, my heartbroken sobs echoing in the empty hallway.

  Chapter Thirty

  ERIC

  This is what torture must be like. Almost an hour goes by, and Ava doesn’t return. I’m like a caged animal as I move around the hotel room, trying to resist the urge to throw a large paperweight through the plate-glass window.

  I can’t take it. I can’t stay in this room for another minute. If she comes back and I’m not here, she’ll call me.

  I take the elevator to the lobby and find the bar. “Maker’s Mark,” I tell the bartender. “Neat.”

  “Coming right up, sir.”

  He puts the drink in front of me, and I pounce on it, downing half of it in the first swallow.

  “Would you like to charge that to your room or start a tab?”

  I withdraw my wallet and hand over a credit card. “Start a tab, please.”

  I’m so tense, my muscles feel like they were carved from concrete. Not even the dreadful aftermath of my breakup with Brittany can compare to this hell. What’ll I do if she tells me she’s going back to him?

  I take out my phone, make sure I don’t have any new texts and then call Rob.

  “Hey,” he says, answering on the first ring. “How’s it going out there?”

  “She’s with him now.”

  “Ah God, Eric,” he says with a loud sigh.

  “I’m dying, Rob. I can’t handle this. The guy is a fucking national hero. I can’t compete with him.”

  “You have been her hero.”

  The phone beeps. It’s her. “I gotta go. She’s calling me.”

  “Hang in there.”

  “Thanks.” I switch over to take Ava’s call. “Babe.”<
br />
  “Where are you?”

  “In the bar. I’ll be up in a minute.”

  “I want to go home, Eric.”

  I signal the bartender for my check. “Then that’s what we’ll do. I’ll be right there.” I scribble my signature, grab the card and run for the elevator. I walk into the room a few minutes later and stop short at the sight of her eyes red and swollen from crying. “Baby.”

  She comes to me, and I wrap my arms around her.

  I have so many questions, but I don’t say anything. I need to take my cues from her.

  “Can we go home? Please?”

  “Yeah. Let’s go.” I grab her bag and mine and keep an arm around her as I walk her to the lobby, where I ask the bellman to get us a cab. I wonder if I should let Muncie know we’re leaving but decide he’s not my problem.

  “Are you checking out?” the bellman asks.

  “Yeah, we’re done here.” I give him our room number, and he makes a note before signaling to a cab.

  “Airport, please,” I tell the cabbie.

  In the car, I put my arm around her, and she snuggles up to me. There’s traffic this time of day, and I’m not even sure we can get on a flight, but since we’re going to the biggest city in the country, I’m optimistic. Every airline flies into New York.

  If I stay focused on the details, I won’t go mad trying not to ask her a hundred questions she won’t want to answer. Instead, I do what I do best. I hold her and I love her and I take care of her. I’ve never been better at anything in my life than I am at loving Ava.

  We end up on a red-eye flight to freaking JFK. I hate flying in there and having to battle traffic into the city, but LaGuardia wasn’t offered, and my fiancée wants to go home. We’ll arrive at five thirty in the morning Eastern Time. Hopefully, we can sleep on the plane.

  “Any chance of an upgrade?” I ask the ticket agent.

  She pokes around on the computer and finds us two seats in first class.

  I hand over my credit card.

  Ava stands by my side, and I catch the ticket agent making surreptitious glances at her, probably wondering about her ravaged face. I reach for Ava, bring her into my embrace and level a stare at the ticket agent that I hope encourages her to hurry the fuck up.