Fever

by Carnal, MJ

  Syreeta “Ree” Jennings: For pushing me, and pushing me, and pushing me and then sending me chocolate (lol). For laughing with me, getting frustrated with me, and believing in me enough for the both of us. I am grateful to have you in my life and am honored to call you my friend. Oh yeah, and for Timmy and his great ideas! No new friends …

  Lisa Chamberlin: I wish I could just say “thank you” and feel like that’s enough, but it’s not. You put your things aside and picked this up for me to help me with a blurb, but did so much more. You’re an angel and I’m grateful to call you my friend.

  Barbie Bohrman: I don’t know what I would do without your support, sick brain, and sense of humor. I’m pretty sure our twisted souls have met before, maybe killed together in the past, JUST KIDDING! …

  Mimi: Oh my goodness. What would I do without your eyes?! lol Thank you for being there for me every single day. Thank you for lending me your time and your eyes and making me go back and change words like “whisper” and “quiet” (I’m whispering this LOL). Love you!

  Angie: Thank you for EVERY SINGLE THING that you do for me. For being there for rants, laughs, screams, and cries. Thank you for pushing me the way you do and believing in me as much as you do!

  My writer girls who know my struggle, understand my worries and rants and accept my crazy. I don’t know what I would do without you: SL Jennings, Madeline Sheehan, Barbie Bohrman, Gail McHugh, EL Montes, Karina Halle, Sydney Simon, MJ Abraham, Willow Aster, Mia Asher, Lb Simmons, Lisa DeJong, K.A. Linde-Write on.

  Lori Sabin: Best. Editor Person. Ever. I can’t express how much you mean to me because there are no words in any language I know that will suffice. Thank you, not only for editing, but for being you. This world needs many more Loris in it, your existence lights up the world. I love you.

  Regina Wamba: Your covers. No words. Thank you for being such a pleasure to work with and for creating amazingness. I am IN LOVE with this cover.

  Angela: Your formatting knows no bounds. You take the words I write and make them appear as beautiful as I hope they read and that’s an art in itself. Thank you for doing what you do AND for putting up with my SUPER crazy ass! <3

  Paige Chaplin: Thank you SO very much for letting me use YOUR music and YOUR lyrics in my book. Your beautiful voice and lyrics are inspiring. Thank you for sharing your talent and for letting Nick Wilde pretend it was his ;).

  Stephanie Johnson: Thank you for your support! Your cookies are to die for. Thank you for making them with such love.

  More people I love:

  My KBs: There are way too many of you to name, but thank you for talking books with me. I like to say that I’m part of the best book club ever, and that’s because of you.

  My Crazies: Jennifer Mirabelli (thank you for sending me a load of corrections as you read <3), Jenn Diaz, Diana Almanzar, Donna Sanderson, Allison Phillips, America Matthews, Jodi Stipetich, Christine Estevez, Juliana Cabrera, Orchita Rahman, Kim Rinaldi, Willow Dolbear, Nancy Godinez Daisy the Rockstar, Dyann Tufts, Erin Hunt, Fred Lebaron, Ciara Martinez, Jenn Linn Dale, Shawna Vitale, Stephanie S Brown, Shey Houston, Robin Stranahan, and SO many others! If I forgot you, it’s not bc I love you less. I swear!

  My mother in law, Barbara: for taking my kids, feeding them, and giving them back to me unharmed and bathed. If more women had mother in laws like you, there would be less men left on the market. If more men had mothers like you, we’d have a lot more gentlemen.

  My mother: for giving me life and telling everybody she knows that her daughter writes books.

  Blogs that make the world go round: Angie’s Dreamy Reads, My Secret Romance, Shh Moms Reading (Christine, THANK YOU for everything!), Autumn Review, Fiction and Fashion (my fab three!), Aestas Bookblogger, Devoured Words, Rockstars of Romance (I LOVE YOU, M!), Little Black Book, Stories and Swag, Up All Night Book Blog, Nose Stuck in a Book, Reading Bliss, sandwich making book bitches, Bridger Bitches Book Blog, A Love Affair With Books, Gutter Girls Book Reviews, #BookNerd, Three Girls and a Book Obsession, G & C Book Blog, Book Addicts not so Anonymous, Rotten Apple Reads, The Hopeless Romantics Book Blog, Reviews by Tammy & Kim, Three Chicks and Their Books, The Book Blog, fictions our addiction, Book Boyfriend Reviews, The Suburban Eclectic Review, Books Books Books, Reality Bites! Let’s Get Lost!, Sinfully Sexy Book Reviews, Rumpled Sheets Blog, First Class Books, Book Crush, Lives and Breathes Book Blog, Escape Into A Book, Chapter Break, Books, Babes, and Cheap Cabernet, I Love Indie Books, Group Therapy Book Club Blog & Review, Mean Girls Luv Books, Kassie’s Book Thoughts, Sugar and Spice Book Reviews, For the Love of Books, Lustful Literature, Books to Breathe, Jessica’s Book Review, True Story Book Blog Wild Wordy Women House of Vetti Booky Ramblings

  A very special shout out to Patty Eunfeno, who was looking forward to reading this, but was taken from us before she got the chance. I know you’re reading it from heaven, I hope I made you proud!

  Turn the page for a preview of:

  ***

  People are inherently afraid of the dark. There are no two ways around it. Even if you are in a dark place with another person, or a room full of people, the physical presence doesn’t erase the fact that total blackness is still an isolating event.

  It’s the unknowns of darkness, the shallow feelings of disparity that leave you confused and looking for a way out. It’s the phenomena of experiencing cold fear - the idea of not knowing what lies ahead of you; what obstacles are there, both physically and metaphorically.

  Darkness is also a state of mind that can’t be controlled; it controls you. The only time the inky blackness can be constrained is when you learn to accept your fate and move toward any speck of light where the smallest bits of hope can be forced upon you. Light filters away the nothing and infuses rays of other colors bright enough to change cold fear into a warm security.

  Emptiness remains to be an unwelcome companion, even though I feel an outside presence around me. The sadness seeps through my pores and forces me to stay in the somberness of this state of inertia. I can hear sounds, none of which are immediately familiar. I strain to identify any detail that would be obvious to me and I come up with nothing.

  An indiscernible amount of time passes. I learn to accept that now my mind is only able to see the forever of a night clouded so heavily, it obscures any presence of light in the sky. The fear slowly fades away as I learn to grow accustomed to the calmness isolation brings. I quickly learn that running around in the dark is pointless. Of course, there are limitless places to go and each one of them is infinite.

  Except, there is no end, no light, no details or color.

  It is depressing.

  It’s the despondency that forces me to admit that I don’t want to be alone anymore. I want to escape this hell where my mind has left me behind. I am growing desperate to leave the isolation. With each passing moment, I’m finding that I need to feel the light and put the darkness beyond my reach. Like watching the pallet of a pale sunset, the night will always fall behind.

  Streaks of color appear behind my eyes, like watching a movie in fast-forward. It moves by so fast, I can’t grab on to any one flash long enough to see faces or places. It was all just blurs and lines of moving pictures. I try to remain optimistic, despite the obvious.

  I feel hope and a determination to fight my way from the unknown to something that is more concrete and welcoming; a place where I could at least be in the company of others. I absorb the outside details that have become more vibrant; voices and mechanical sounds in my surrounding parameters seem to dominate my time.

  I concentrate on trying to translate what is being said.

  “Why are you even here?” one says, with a bite in his tone.

  “Because I love her and I will do anything for her,” he responds.

  “She doesn’t need you. She needs me. I’m her husband. I’m the father of her two kids.”

  The fight outside me matches the fight within me.

  I know that I prefer the darkness and isolation - I
can feel it in my soul, but I also know that I can’t continue alone, here, like this. I am growing tired; and I can’t let this become a permanent place for me. I need the energy and the warmth that only light can bring. Like running from the dreaded thundercloud that threatens to soak you to the bone, I flee the drama of the storm and head toward the area outside the gloom of gray and mist, the area where the clouds are like the softest dream, and the rainbow shines further than the eye can see.

  I also know that leaving the dark and securing the safeness of the light also means having to face those things that you left behind. The dark is where you hide your sins and your wrong doings in life; those trappings of the immoral that you know your mind put away for a reason. Yet, the light beckons like a winged temptress promising salvation. Forgiveness.

  That’s where I am now, at the edge. Do I run back to the dark where all my secrets lie and hope for the best, knowing I won’t make it much longer; or do I face the sordid past I unknowingly created and walk toward the brilliance of colorless lights that I know will save me?

  I am ready to face the consequences.

  I open my eyes.

  ***

  I’m beyond pissed and fear paralyzes me. My emotions are swinging like a pendulum. Siena has been in a coma for almost a week now.

  I don’t even know how I got here. My life has gone from happily married with kids and a house surrounded by a white picket fence, to shit in the blink of an eye. I sit here beside my wife, holding her hand, staring at her face, willing her to wake up from her perpetual sleep. I study her face, and aside from the bruise above her left eye and a few scratches, she’s just as beautiful as she was the day I met her.

  I talk to her a lot. The doctors and nurses say that it’s the best thing for her. I’d like to think that she can hear me, that she can feel me holding her hand; that she can sense that her life means more than anything to me. I talk about our daughters, Alexis and Zoe, and tell her that they are waiting at home with a batch of brownies they baked especially for her. Siena loves chocolate; the darker the better. She thinks milk chocolate is a travesty and white chocolate shouldn’t even be considered chocolate at all. I tell her that her mom and Noel have been by to see her.

  I tell her I love her. I want to tell her that she’s ripped my heart out, but I don’t. I just simply remind her about the first time we said we loved each other. Oddly, what I can’t remember is the last time we’ve even shared our crazy back and forth declaration. Sure, we’ve shared ‘I love you,’ as we’re all accustomed to do. Mostly, we all just say it out of habit; in quick passing. Rarely do we say it and take the full meaning of it in when it’s said; the rawest emotions of the words as they are spoken to the most important people in our lives are hardly ever expressed. I realize I can’t specifically recall when we really meant it; when the emotions were there. It makes me both angry and sad. Staring at her face, I know now; it was the younger us, when life was less complicated, when life was easy. When love was easy …

  “Siena.”

  “Yup.”

  “I love you.”

  “I love you too. Truly. Madly. Deeply.”

  Where had those days gone?

  I try not to let the tension or disappointment I feel seep through my voice when I speak to her. It’s been one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. I won’t lie. My anger simmers at the thought of her betraying me. I want to come apart at the seams with the rage that I have managed to keep in check. Ever since he showed up, it’s been increasingly impossible to not be consumed by uncontrollable urges to shake her awake and demand answers. It is a true test of my control and patience.

  I have plenty of time to think.

  I can’t help but wonder where the hell do I go from here? What the fuck do I do about my wife when she wakes up? If she wakes up. Of course her medical situation trumps all at this point, but can I look past what she’s done?

  Can I forgive?

  I know I’ll never be able to forget.

  I sit here and look back at the last few years and wonder how the hell I got here. How did I miss what was going on behind my back? I pull at my memories and analyze the facts.

  Was I just blind?

  Or, did I choose not to see?

  Could I have been too wrapped up in work and life that I missed the signs?

  I just can’t see it.

  I cannot pinpoint the moment that she walked away from me and into the life of another man.

  ***

  I know my time with her is limited. Nick has no idea I’m in here. Noel convinced him to leave Siena’s bedside so they could eat in the cafeteria downstairs. Noel may not like what is going on between me and Siena, but she knows I love her. When she sees me walking into Siena’s room, she turns her head. Like the past three years, she pretends she doesn’t see anything and gets on the elevator. I quietly sit in the chair beside her bed.

  I am numb. That pretty much accurately describes my current mental and physical state. The last time I saw Siena was almost a week ago. We were at dinner, doing our best to avoid the elephant in the room: deciding where our future was going. I wanted her to leave Nick and move to New York with me. The girls are young enough to adjust to the change, and Siena’s home office is in the City. It’s an argument we’ve been having for the past year. We ended up fighting. She was in tears and I walked out. I said things I regretted - the moment they slipped though, I knew I couldn’t take them back. But they had to be said.

  Now she lays motionless; a tube down her throat, breathing life into her. The repetitive whirl of the machine and the modest rise and fall of her chest are the only things reminding me that she’s still alive.

  I stare at her beautiful face, which is decorated with cuts on her cheek and a bruise over her left eye. Her hands are cold. It makes me incredibly sad. I take her right hand in mine and rub it. As I absentmindedly make circles in the palm of her hand, I notice her eyelashes flutter. The movements are so fast, like the flash of butterfly wings in motion. If I hadn’t memorized every movement on her face from the last 3 years, I would have missed it. Equally quick and efficient are the steady stream of nurses that shuffle through her room and fret over her like a well-orchestrated production. They all tell me the same thing: talk to her. She can hear you.

  I think it’s crazy, how can she hear me? Certainly, if she can hear, wouldn’t she be awake already? And if she can’t hear me, then I’m just some shmuck, sitting here talking to a person in a coma. I know she can’t respond. My internal war – to talk or not to talk – ends when I realize that I have nothing to lose by telling her exactly what I feel — what’s in my heart.

  I turn her music on and pick one of her favorite playlists. Sunday Morning plays quietly in the background and I start talking.

  “I love you and you love me. But, it’s not that simple. Nothing worth fighting for ever is.”

  Add to your Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18300160-the-one-who-loves-you?ac=1

  Sydney’s author page: https://www.facebook.com/sydneysimonauthor

  ***

  Temporary Bliss

  Copyright © 2013 by BJ Harvey

  Edited by Jennifer Roberts-Hall

  Cover Designed by Renae Porter, Social Butterfly Creative

  Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the above author of this book.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

 
***

  Chapter 1 - “Stupid Boy”

  Chapter 2 – “The First Time I Ever Saw Your Face”

  Chapter 3 – “Sex on the beach”

  Chapter 4 – “Kiss Me”

  Chapter 5 – “Variety is the Spice of Life”

  Chapter 6 – “I’ve Been Waiting All Day For Sunday Night”

  Chapter 7 - “Hard Day’s Night”

  Chapter 8 – “Hungry Eyes”

  Chapter 9 – “Hot in the City”

  Chapter 10 “Come & Get It”

  Chapter 11– “You Can Leave Your Hat On”

  Chapter 12 – “Blurred Lines”

  Chapter 13 - “Temporary Bliss”

  Chapter 14 – “Good Girl”

  Chapter 15 – “Everything Has Changed”

  Chapter 16 – “Here Comes Goodbye”

  Chapter 17 – “Just A Fool”

  Chapter 18: – “It’s All Your Fault”

  Chapter 19: – “Ready To Love Again”

  Chapter 20: – “Easier In Bed”

  Chapter 21: – “When I Grow Up”

  Chapter 22: – “Change is Gonna Come”