by E. L. Todd
“Don’t get mad at me. You shouldn’t be wearing that.”
“I shouldn’t be what?” I snapped. “When did you start deciding what I should and should not wear?” The fun evening turned to shit really quick. Our relationship was perfect until Hawke came up. He always sabotaged our time together without even being present.
Kyle remained silent.
“I asked you a question.”
“How would you feel if I wore a ring an old girlfriend gave me?” He turned back to me, his face starting to turn red.
“I wouldn’t care.”
“Oh really?” He gave me an incredulous look.
“Yes, really. I told you I already had my great love. I’ve never misled you about that. If you can’t handle that, maybe we shouldn’t see each other anymore.”
“Yeah, maybe we shouldn’t.”
“Then go.”
“I will.” He left the seat and threw some money on the table.
I held my ground and didn’t show him how hurt I was. I crossed my arms over my chest.
“Uh…is this a bad time?” Out of thin air, Axel appeared. And he wasn’t alone.
Hawke was standing beside him, holding a beer in his hand. His eyes were locked to mine and he could read all my emotions even though he just walked into the conversation. He picked up on every little detail, knowing I was dying inside.
I didn’t look at him because I didn’t want to give anything else away.
“Not at all.” Kyle hopped back into the seat and pretended everything was fine. “Arguing about money. You know, what couples do.” He didn’t look at Hawke, acting like he didn’t exist.
“Well, can we join you?” Axel asked. “All the tables are full.”
This was a terrible idea, but I didn’t see any way around it. If Hawke and Axel were to remain friends, I’d have to deal with him from time to time. I could handle that but I wasn’t sure if Kyle could.
Kyle saved face and pretended everything was perfectly fine. His arm returned around my shoulders where it was a moment ago, silently claiming me. He grabbed his beer and took a drink, oddly calm.
It was like nothing ever happened.
Axel pivoted his body and watched the band on the stage.
Hawke did the same thing, resting his leg on the opposite knee. His eyes weren’t on me but I could feel his envelopment anyway. With just his presence, he was comforting me, calming me after the fight I just had.
I didn’t like it. I didn’t like the fact he could still communicate with me like that. Wordlessly, we still had conversations.
Axel leaned toward him. “I’ve always wanted to learn the banjo.”
“Really?” Hawke asked. “I can’t picture it.”
“I think Marie would be into it.” He wiggled his eyebrows.
“I’m sure she’s happy with the man she’s got.” Hawke crossed his arms over his chest. “Where is she, anyway?”
“Had to work late.” The sigh Axel released showed just how sad he was. “Her office is so lucky.”
Kyle gripped my shoulder so tightly it was almost uncomfortable.
I couldn’t speak to him, not the way I did with Hawke, so I rested my hand on his thigh.
Immediately, he relaxed at the touch, like that was exactly what he needed.
I sipped my wine then clanked it against his glass, trying to get him to loosen up further. “To good music.”
He turned my way and smiled slightly. “To good company.”
***
Kyle left money in the tab then stood up. “We’ll leave after I use the restroom.”
“Alright.”
He pushed through the crowd just to reach the other side.
“Man, now I have to pee.” Axel set his empty glass down then followed Kyle on their difficult journey through the throng of people.
Hawke remained behind, his unwavering stared fixed on me.
I tried to find something else to look at until I realized there was nothing. He was the only person in my line of vision. With a gentle sigh, I turned my gaze in his direction.
He wore a gray t-shirt with dark jeans. His body was thick and hard like it’d always been. Every muscle in his body was sculpted and defined. Sometimes, he reminded me of a gladiator.
He stared at me hard, sharing a million thoughts at once. I could feel his pain from watching me with Kyle. It was heavy and suffocating. He was drowning in misery, not jealousy. He had no right to complain or think less of me, but he still ached. “I hope you weren’t fighting because of me.”
For the oddest reason, I wanted to laugh. “I know you don’t mean that.”
“Actually, I do.”
“Then that doesn’t make any sense.”
“I want you to be happy. But I also want you for myself. So yes, it is contradictory.”
I eyed the bathroom and hoped one of the guys would come back soon.
“I can tell he’s threatened by me.”
“He has no reason to be.” If Hawke kept popping up everywhere like this, it would be really difficult for me to have a relationship…with anyone. “I told him I would never go back to you.”
“But you said that last time, didn’t you?”
I clenched my jaw in irritation. My past decisions were haunting my current credibility. Neither Hawke nor Kyle believed a word I said. “This is different.”
“No, it’s not. We still have that same connection. It’s never going to go away.”
“The connection was never the problem. You know that.”
“I know I had a lot of emotional baggage—”
“That was never the problem either. Leaving was. I refuse to be with a man when he doesn’t treat me right—regardless of my feelings.”
Hawke remained absolutely still. People still carried on conversations around us, and music played in the background. To anyone watching us, it would seem like we were having a conversation about the weather. “When my world came crashing down, I made a lot of stupid decisions. I’ve never known that kind of hatred. If my father hadn’t had that heart attack, I would have murdered him myself—that’s how insane I was.”
“Stop making excuses.”
“But before that, I was everything you deserved. I made you happy and supported you in every way that mattered. I was faithful to you and always true. What we had was a goddamn fairytale. Even after we broke up, I remained faithful to you. My mind snapped but my heart never stopped beating for you. I walked away from us because I was afraid of what I might do to you. I bought a loaded gun and prepared to murder someone. Imagine what might have happened to you.”
My heart softened at his words but I tried to remain strong. “Hawke, you were upset with your father—not me. You would never do anything to me. When will that get through your head?”
He took a deep breath.
“I pissed you off, got in your way, and crawled on your back to get you to stay. Did you raise a hand to me?”
He remained silent.
“Did you?”
“No.”
“But you keep punishing me for something that didn’t even happen. I always get the bad end of the stick. I’m tired of it.”
“I don’t blame you.”
“Then just drop this. Move on with your life and find someone else. You can have any girl you want.”
“There’s only one that I want.” He held my gaze, oblivious to everyone around us.
“Well, she’s taken.”
His eyes left mine for the first time and moved to the necklace that hung from my throat. I wasn’t wearing a t-shirt or a cardigan to cover it up. The small engraving glowed in the dim lighting, reflecting in his eyes. “Is she?”
On The Town
Hawke
“Dude, I miss my wife.” Axel walked down the strip beside me, his hands in the pockets of his jeans. He was kicking a rock as he went, playing a strange game of soccer.
“What’s she up to?”
“One of her coworkers got promoted so she went o
ut to celebrate.”
“Why doesn’t she just take you along?”
“She says I’m too clingy.” He rolled his eyes. “Whatever that means.”
He probably shoved his tongue down her throat when she was trying to talk to her boss. I could picture it. “Why don’t we swing by? You can say hi.” I’d been spending a lot of time with Axel lately. The one person I really wanted to be with was unavailable. She was probably with Kyle right that second, doing something I didn’t want to think about.
She wore that locket everywhere she went, so I knew I still had a chance—despite what she said. When that locket came off, I’d be in trouble. Until then, I had a reason to keep trying.
There were two brunettes standing together in skin-tight dresses. They spoke quietly to each other, waiting for someone as they stood outside the piano bar. I glanced their way in the hope one of them was Francesca, but when it wasn’t, I looked away.
“That one in purple is checking you out.”
“Thanks.” There was a wad of gum on the pavement so I maneuvered around it.
“You aren’t going for it?” Axel stopped kicking his rock and turned his attention on me.
“Nah.” Being with another woman might make Francesca jealous enough to come back to me but it wasn’t a risk I was willing to take. I’d gone six months without human touch. If that wasn’t a declaration of my love for her, I didn’t know what was.
“Excuse me?” A feminine voice with a French accent came to my ears.
We both turned to see the woman in the black dress.
Axel immediately held up his left ring finger. “Sorry, sweetheart. But I’m off the market. I’ve been married for almost a year now.”
“Uh…good to know.” She dogged him before she turned to me. “Do you have the time?”
“Sure.” I pulled back my sleeve and looked at my watch. “It’s nine fifteen.”
“Is it also time for you to ask for my number?” She held her hands together in front of her ribs, looking thin and curvy at the same time. Her skin was dark like she laid at the pool on a daily basis. She was beautiful.
But she wasn’t Francesca.
“You’re a very beautiful woman and I’m flattered, but I’m not available.”
“Huh?” Axel whispered.
“Take care.” I turned away and kept walking.
Axel came to my side until our shoulders were touching. “What the hell was that? You are available.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Francesca is dating Kyle. You’re free to do whatever you want.”
“But I don’t want to be with anyone else. She’s it.”
“Dude, she’s got to be a Victoria Secret model or something.”
“Probably.” She fit the bill.
“So, what the hell are you doing? It was so hot when girls would come on to me.”
I found it attractive too.
“Is this a stunt to get Francesca back? Because it’s not going to work.”
“No, it’s not an act. I genuinely don’t want to be with someone unless it’s her.” I stuck my hands in my pockets. “I haven’t been with anyone since we broke up—except my hand.”
“Say what?” He stopped in his tracks. “Six months without sex?”
“Yeah.” It wasn’t that hard when you were miserable anyway.
“Does she know this?”
“I told her.”
He rubbed his temple like this information was too much to handle.
“If Marie left, would you have sex with anyone else?”
“No, but that’s different. I married her.”
“Well, I was going to marry Francesca. Remember?”
“Yeah…”
“It’s the same thing to me.”
Axel shook his head before he began walking again. “I’ll never understand the two of you, and I’m not going to bother trying. If you love this woman so much, why did you leave her?”
“I didn’t leave her,” I said quietly. “That was someone else—a man that I’m not proud of. He’s the other version of me, the dark and twisted one who’s a product of a bad marriage, alcohol abuse, and violence. He comes back from time to time.”
“Won’t he just come back again later?”
“No.” I’d figure out a way to prevent that from happening again. If I found a solution, Francesca might come back to me. “I’ll make sure that doesn’t happen.”
***
Making an appointment to speak with a shrink was a difficult decision. I was a man of few words, and I said even less when it came to a professional stranger. But I didn’t know what else to do.
Dr. Katie Goodwin was nothing like I pictured a shrink to be. She was fairly young, not a day over thirty. She had dark brown hair similar to Francesca’s and the vigor of someone still in their prime. Knowing we were close in age made it a little easier. The last thing I wanted was an old, judgmental therapist who thought they’d already seen everything.
Katie rested her notepad on her knee with her legs crossed. She watched me carefully, but not in an intrusive way. There was a balance she maintained, getting close to me but never intimate. “Hawke, what did you want to talk about?”
I would never do something like this unless I absolutely had to. Francesca was the only person I could be open with, but she wasn’t around anymore. “I…I have a problem.”
“What kind of problem?”
“An anger problem.”
“Why do you say that?”
I told her about my childhood and everything that happened up to my mother’s funeral. My father was cremated but I wasn’t sure what happened after that. I never claimed his remains.
Katie didn’t have any kind of reaction. She didn’t seem horrified or even remotely surprised. She probably heard people confess to wanting to murder their loved ones on a daily basis.
“I left Francesca because I was so livid, frustrated, and…I don’t know. I guess I was afraid I might lash out at her and hurt her.” If I ever made a scratch on her smooth skin, I’d throw myself off a building.
“Have you hurt someone in the past?”
I kept one ankle resting on the opposite knee. “My father. Whenever he came after my mother, I did what I had to do.”
“Other than him?”
I shook my head.
“Then why do you think you might hurt Francesca?”
Given someone’s full attention was daunting. “I look just like my father, I have his name, and I have his temper. I’m afraid…I’ll turn into him.”
“Do you want that to happen?”
I shook my head.
“Then don’t let it happen.”
“When I get angry…it’s hard for me to control it.”
“Eliminate the things that make you angry.”
She made it sound so simple.
“And if they do happen, clear your mind. Think of something calm and soothing…perhaps this woman.”
Francesca was soothing. “I want her back but she won’t give me another chance, not that I blame her.”
“Is she afraid of you?”
“Not physically. But she thinks I’ll walk out on her again.”
“Will you?”
I shook my head. “No. I never want to do that again. But she doesn’t believe me.”
“You think coming here will change her mind?”
“Maybe if I can get to the root of the problem, fix my anger, she would reconsider.”
She nodded then made a few notes. “You’re doing this for love.”
“I guess…”
“Then you have nothing to worry about. You’re nothing like your father and never will be. These insecurities stem from your thoughts, not real events. The moment you start to believe in yourself, these episodes should disappear.”
“You think?”
“Yes.” She made a few more notes. “And perhaps you purposely sabotaged your relationship with Francesca out of guilt. You feel responsible for your mother’s death
, and to compensate for that, you’re punishing yourself. You think you deserve this.”
“I guess.”
“Hawke, what happened to your mother was tragic but you can’t blame yourself for it. You gave her every opportunity to leave but she didn’t take it. Instead of getting law enforcement involved, she downplayed the abuse. And when she was taken to the hospital the first time, she still forgave him. All of those things were out of your control.”
I stared out the window and watched a man in his office in the neighboring building. He sipped his coffee then returned to typing on the keyboard.
“What else could you have done?”
I slowly turned my head back to her. “Dragged her out.”
“Against her will? Wouldn’t she have just returned home the moment you were gone? That doesn’t sound like a plausible solution.”
“I could have called the police anyway.”
“So she could deny everything when they showed up on her doorstep?”
“I don’t know. I could have done something.”
“That’s what I’m trying to show you, Hawke. There was nothing you could do. You’re carrying a weight on your shoulders that shouldn’t be there. Once you let it go, you’ll be able to breathe easier.”
There was one solution she didn’t consider. “I could have killed him first.”
Katie didn’t show outrage like a normal person should. She remained as calm as ever. “So you could spend the rest of your life in jail?”
“I could have made it look like an accident.”
“Then you would be carrying that weight.”
“I wouldn’t have felt guilty about it.”
“Not right away,” she said. “But eventually, yes. I have a lot of clients, Hawke. Some of them are emotionally unstable, and some of them are considered dangerous. You fall into neither category. You’re upset over what happened, but you aren’t a killer. That wasn’t an option, and we both know it.”
Memories
Francesca
It was nearly noon when Kyle walked inside. “What’s the genius working on now?”
“Genius?” No one had ever called me that before.
“Yeah.” His arms wrapped around me when he gave me a hard kiss on the mouth. “You know, geek. Same thing.”
I wiped my thumb across his lips and smeared frosting everywhere.
