As many times as we’d argued, for as much as we’d been through, never had a moment been so heavy with finality.
“I didn’t mean… to fall in love with him,” I finally cried, my words a jumble of tearful breaths.
He looked as though I’d shot him straight through the heart.
The long, empty silence between us, him emotionless, me sobbing, was the most confusing moment of my life.
We were hanging on by that moment.
I knew his next words were about to change everything between us; every comfort, every emotion.
His temper, usually so controlled, flared, and I cowered beneath his accusing glare. “Do you expect me to stay with you now?”
I opened my mouth, balking, trying to find the right words before realizing that there were no words. “No… no I don’t,” I realized, trying bravely to meet his eyes. “I can’t expect that of you-”
“Vivian,” he cut me off, his voice controlled and laden with ice. “You can sleep here tonight. Tomorrow, I want you gone.”
His words almost didn’t make sense to me.
This was Matthew, predictable, loyal, forgiving Matthew.
Matthew who I’d walked out on, had walked all over, and had hurt so much that I was beginning to hate myself.
The pain in my chest caved in, consumed me, and I struggled for air. “Gone?” I whispered, pathetically, so fucking pathetically. I fought with the battling urges to protect myself and yet to give in to the heartbreaking finality of what was happening between us.
He stood, running his hand through his hair. “You can stay with your parents. Or go back to him. It’s not up to me.”
“You hate me,” I cried, shaking my head, nausea brewing at the worst possible moment.
“No.” He stopped and turned at the doorway, his eyes focused on the ground. “I’m ending this before I hate you.”
He turned and left without another word.
. . .
I cried.
I cried for the past, for our son who we’d lost, and for all the ways that I’d hurt him.
I cried because he was right.
I’d kept him waiting, knowing all along, deep in my heart, that I’d already given in to Keaton.
Around two I got up to vomit, and I heard him come to the door.
“Are you okay?” he asked, so genuinely concerned, and my temper ignited.
“No, I’m not okay, just leave me alone,” I hissed, wiping at my mouth.
He turned and went back downstairs without another word.
It was nearly four by the time I flipped my tear-dampened pillow again, reaching for my phone.
Anxiety kicked in, and I crawled out of the bed, checking my text messages.
Nothing.
I didn’t want Keaton to know that Matthew was done with me… that we were over. I didn’t want Keaton to ever think that I’d chosen him by default, and I couldn’t fight the overwhelming urge to protect my own ego.
My first meeting with my new acting coach was at four the next day, which was good, since there was no way I’d be able to sleep knowing Matthew was lying downstairs on the couch hating me.
My suitcase was still mostly packed from the trip to LA; I began pulling my remaining clothes from their hangers, neatly folding them into piles on the bed.
Color coded, arranged by season.
I have no car. I’d been driving Gram’s Cadillac in Pennsylvania, and then Keaton drove us everywhere in the Ferrari. I considered calling for a taxi, but I had no idea where I was going.
“What are you doing?”
Matthew’s voice startled me. I glanced up at him once, continuing to pull my clothes from the drawers.
“I can’t stay here.”
“I said tomorrow-”
“Fuck you, it’s tomorrow!” I screamed, fighting back the reemergence of mortifying tears. “How in the hell do you expect me to sleep here after what you said? You want me gone, I’m gone,” I cried, struggling to close my suitcase.
He pinched the bridge of his nose, adjusting his glasses before sighing. “Please calm down. This isn’t good for the baby-”
“Don’t talk about the baby!” I shrieked, trying to wrangle my stampeding hormones. “You hate that it’s Keaton’s! Don’t try to act like you care one fucking bit about what happens to this baby!”
“Vivian,” he growled through clenched teeth. “I care. I care about you, and I care about that innocent baby. What is happening between us has nothing to do with how I feel about the baby. Do I hate that you slept with him? Yes, of course I hate that, I hate it so fucking much. Do I hate that you love him?” he fired. “Yes I hate it! Do I think for one minute that, baby or no baby, you’re ever going to feel the same way about me again? No.”
“How can I!?” I raged. “You lied to me. You knew how I felt. You knew I’d want Rory to live. You let him die! I shouldn’t be here! It should have been me!”
“Oh my God Vivian, this again?” He wrenched my suitcase from the bed, slamming it to the floor. His biceps bulged beneath his gray t-shirt, and I could see the twitch in his jaw as he struggled for control. “Your parents had the final say. How many more times do we have to go through this?”
“You told me that you agreed with them!”
“Of course I agreed with them, I loved you, I was devastated, and I couldn’t imagine a life without you. And if the baby lived, and you died? Then what?”
“Don’t call him ‘the baby!’ Call him by his name,” I sobbed, wrenching away from him as he reached for me.
“Rory. If my son had lived,” he corrected gently, lowering his voice, “then you wouldn’t be here right now. You wouldn’t be carrying this baby. Did you ever stop to think that you were supposed to be a mother?”
The heavy hush permeated the room.
I took a gasping breath. “I was… am… so immature. So young. So stupid,” I whispered, brushing furiously at my tears. “I shouldn’t have walked out on you. I shouldn’t have left you standing there in the driveway… I shouldn’t have left… I hurt you… Matthew I’m so sorry that I hurt you,” I breathed, the words sounding foreign to my ears.
I’m sorry.
I couldn’t remember ever telling him that I was… and meaning it.
So filled with remorse, I dropped to the bed, burying my face in my hands. “I’m sorry. You were so much more mature… so grown up. You handled what happened like an adult. I just… I ran.”
He stood where he was, so still. “You’ve already apologized for that.”
“I didn’t mean it before,” I admitted, my head beginning to pound. “I didn’t feel it before. I feel it now.”
He lowered to the bed next to me, careful not to touch me.
“When we met,” he began, in almost a whisper, “you had never been in love. Everything that we did was new. Every time I kissed you, you believed that I’d be the one kissing you for the rest of your life. That’s gone now, Vivian. You found someone else, and I can’t change the way that you feel about him. I don’t want to. I wouldn’t want you to stay with me for the way that I used to make you feel. That’s not how this works.”
The silence stretched between us. Finally, he looked down at his hands, running his thumb over his palm.
“I’ll drive you to your parent’s house, if that’s where you want to go.”
I nodded. As estranged as I was from my parents, I knew that they’d never turn me away. The embarrassment of showing up at their doorstep, pregnant again… this time with another man’s baby… completely defeated me.
“Thank you.”
He turned my way, and I met his eyes.
“Did you kiss him? When we were in LA?”
I nodded. There was no point hiding the truth. “During the read. The audition. I swear, that was it.”
He cupped my face in his hands, and I crumbled again, letting my forehead rest against his lips.
“Will you kiss me good-bye?”
I didn’t expect his words.
Before I could even attempt to decipher my feelings about right or wrong, his mouth claimed mine.
There is something to be said for kissing someone who you were once in love with. No matter why the two of you are no longer together, your five senses take over your heart and your brain shuts the fuck up.
His tongue found mine, and I cried out as he held me steady in his palms. His kiss was imploring, righteous, and it was obvious that he’d set out with something to prove. With my mouth occupied and devoid of protest, his hands slid down my arms, over my sides, and finally settled at my waist as he urged me back on the bed.
“Matthew stop-”
“If he hurts you, I’ll kill him, you know that, right?” His strong body pressed to mine, and I remembered all the times he’d coaxed me, slowly bringing me to the edge of oblivion.
I considered, for all of five seconds, making love to him.
Did that make me a wishy-washy tramp? Maybe. Did it make me real? Absolutely. I judged myself before I could give into the rampant hormones, flattening my hands on his chest.
“Please… let’s just get in the car, please,” I begged softly.
He pulled away to stare down at me on the bed.
As though I’d broken whatever spell had come over him, he released me suddenly, pushing back and climbing to his feet.
“Right.” He turned and grabbed my suitcase, leaving me lying on the bed.
It was five thirty in the morning by the time he pulled into my parents’ driveway. He gathered my bags, walking ahead of me.
“They’re probably sleeping,” I realized. He ignored me and rang the doorbell anyway, and I cringed, looking down at my feet.
My dad answered the door.
I smelled coffee; I knew he was up, reading the newspaper, probably on his second cup. He took one look at me, and then Matthew, holding the door open wider.
“Oh, sweetheart.” He opened his arms, and I gave up trying to be brave, finally letting all of my emotions tear me into tears.
“I can’t stay.” Matthew spoke behind me, dropping my bags by the door. “Vivian will fill you in. Bye, Mr. Hale.”
“Matthew,” my dad called, hugging me tighter. “Thank you.”
I turned to see Matthew nod. He gave me one more fleeting look before walking away.
Spellbound
K
It was killing me not to text her.
It was pissing me off that she hadn’t texted me.
It had been two days since she left LA, and twenty-four hours since I’d shown up at my mom’s house in Pennsylvania.
Robin lowered the cup of coffee to the table in front of me, and I thanked her.
“So, let me get this straight. She left here and went back with Matthew. A month later, she calls you and tells you that she’s pregnant.”
“Right.”
“And that she isn’t sleeping with Matthew, and that she loves you.”
“Right and right.”
She tucked her short, black hair behind her ears, folding her legs beneath her on the chair as she sipped her own coffee. “And you cast her in your movie, and she goes home to Matthew.”
“Rob, this coffee is weak.”
“Fuck off and make it yourself then.” She tapped her long, black fingernail against the kitchen table. “So you’re just going to jump in your Ferrari and drive to Ohio. And do what?”
“Oversee her acting classes.”
“Bullshit Keat. Come on.”
“I want to know her. Where she came from, who her friends are, who she is.”
“Then you Google her.”
“That’s not enough. I want to meet her parents.”
“She doesn’t even talk to her parents!”
“How’s Luke?”
The abrupt subject change forced her to roll her eyes. “Luke is… Luke. Madeline wants to move to Chicago, but he’s not ready. She threatened to leave him. Fucking bitch.”
I wanted to get up, go to the cabinet where I knew my mom kept the liquor, and douse the weak-ass coffee with a shot of vodka. However, I didn’t feel like dealing with the fall-out lecture from Robin.
“Why are you always so… pissy?” I asked rhetorically, tipping the mug to down the last of the coffee before sliding my chair back. “You need to get out of this small town. Come to LA with me.”
She rolled her eyes, twisting the stud in the top of her ear. “And leave Mom here, alone? Come on.”
I moved behind her, pressing my hands on either side of her head to drop a kiss to her hair.
“You can bring Mom.”
“Oh, right, that’s just what you need. I can see the headlines now. ‘Keaton Thane’s crazy, drunken hillbilly mother crashes red carpet premier.’ That’ll be fucking fantastic.”
“She’s not crazy. She’s an alcoholic. There’s a difference.”
“Not much, and not when she’s not willing to help herself, or admit it.” She set her own coffee down, standing. “Keaton, just let Viv come to you. At this point, she’s got you both wrapped around her little finger. Fingers. That’s not fair. Ugh, she’s making me hate her!”
“Robin, don’t hate her.” I shrugged. “You can’t hate her any more than you can hate me. We’re very much alike, I’m starting to realize.”
“Then what are you doing?” she demanded.
“I’m giving her some space. I’m hoping that the whole thing with Fowler will just self-destruct on its own.”
“Hoping? You’ve never been one for hoping. You act. You make things happen. That’s what I love about you.”
I ruffled her hair, and she cringed. “Thanks. I’m stopping by her gram’s house before I leave. Please think about LA.”
She took a deep breath, letting the air out slowly. A quick smile teased her lips.
“You know what this means, right?”
I raised my eyes. “What’s that?”
“I’m going to be an aunt.” She reached for me, giving me a huge, un-Robin-like hug. “And you’re about to be someone’s daddy. Are you okay with that?”
I squeezed her back, nodding against her shoulder.
“I’m okay with that, Robin,” I admitted, pulling away to smile down at her. “Honestly, I can’t wait for that.”
She grinned, and I almost didn’t recognize her as her smile lit up her face. “It’s no fucking wonder she’s pregnant. You two couldn’t keep your hands off of each other that weekend. If I had to walk in on you groping her one more time,” she teased.
I returned her grin. “That was some weekend. Sorry,” I tried, and she shrugged.
“It couldn’t have worked out better. Now go. It’s a four hour drive.”
I pulled into Gram’s driveway around noon, and found her bent over the flowerbed, pulling weeds. “Keaton!” she cried, and I offered her my hand, helping her stand on her feet. “Honey, you look so much better than the last time I saw you. Healthier.” She reached for my cheek, pinching, and I tried to hide my amusement.
“Thanks Gram. I’m actually on my way to Ohio. To Vivian.”
I left my sentence at that, waiting for her reaction.
She brushed her hands together, letting the loose soil catch the wind. “You know she’s back with her parents?”
The expression on my face was enough of an answer for her.
“I talked to my daughter-in-law this morning. Vivian showed up at home with a suitcase. Matthew dropped her off and left.”
“What happened?” I asked quietly, tucking my hands in my pockets.
She sighed, crossing her arms over her chest. “That’s not for me to discuss, sweetie. But I’m sure Vivie will tell you, if you’re going to see her.”
“Of course. You’re right.” I smiled, nodding toward her front door. “Can I get you a drink before I leave? Help with anything?”
“You can go get my granddaughter, honey. That’s all you need to do. You kids like to complicate everything nowadays.”
I couldn’t hold back my smirk.
I kissed Gram’s cheek, waving to her as I slid behind the wheel.
The drive was easy, a straight shot down the turnpike, and then about forty-five minutes through Amish country. Over and over I considered calling Vivian, asking her what happened with Fowler. More than anything, I wanted to make sure that she was okay.
I pictured her, covered in hives, sick, crying her eyes out, and sped up.
The acting coach I’d hired for her was an LA native, and I was lucky that he was on the East coast at the moment. Elias Roberts had worked with actresses that I admired like Halle Berry and Kate Beckinsale, and I’d read that he could coax even the most difficult students into brilliance.
I didn’t expect Vivian’s training to be complicated, but given that she was inexperienced in film, her stage habits would certainly be hard to break. During her audition, I’d been so caught up with watching her that I’d neglected to pay attention to the aspects of her acting that would need coaching. In reviewing her audition tape (at least ten times before I passed out) I noted that her gestures and expressions were too large for the screen. She was used to acting for the thirtieth row from the stage, and the camera would only depict her as an over-actor.
It wasn’t anything I couldn’t work with and was definitely not something I hadn’t seen before. Eli would help her act “smaller,” giving her the guidance that she needed.
I’d left the top down on the Ferrari the entire drive, and as I approached her town, the clouds began to cover. Pulling over at a gas station, I put the top on the convertible, recognizing that the weather was changing quickly. The approaching autumn only reminded me that we had less than two weeks to begin filming on location in Utah.
Before it started snowing, and before Vivian started showing.
I knew her parents’ address thanks to a quick call into Kathy. As I pulled into her subdivision, I noticed the similarity in the colonials lining Elm Street. At least thirty years old, but well maintained. Everyone’s grass was cut the exact same length, and I counted a disturbing number of hostas planted along each sidewalk. Maybe the ugly plants are the landscape mascot of Ohio.
Before A Perfect World: Movie Trilogy, Book Two (The Movie 2) Page 6
