by Lewis, R. J.
I ignored the guy entirely after that. When I went home, I was unsure of what I’d find. Would he silently stew and ignore me? Would he start an argument? What was I coming home to?
There was unease in my footsteps to the front door. A gut feeling told me to turn around and walk away, maybe go and see Lexi and spend the night at her apartment to blow off some steam. Jaxon had every right to be pissed off, and I didn’t want to be in the midst of it. This was ironic since he was always my target during my rage fits.
When I walked into the apartment, I threw my purse on the kitchen counter and looked around. All the lights were still on, and I could hear the sounds of the bathroom pipes bellowing. Jaxon was in the shower.
I strolled to the living room, taking in the strange look of cleanliness. In fact, now that I’d taken notice, the whole apartment was sparkly clean. No dishes in the sink, no laundry on the floor, no clutter of mess on the lounge coffee table, no food or crumbs on the couch. When had he done this?
In the middle of my contemplation, he walked out of the bedroom in nothing but a towel draped around his hips. I hated that I never stopped to take in his beauty in that very moment. He was hotter than the burning embers of hell, and I hadn’t complimented him in what felt like an eternity. His wet hair, now over an inch passed his chin, was dripping in water, and when he stopped in a strange stiff stance to regard me, it started pooling into a puddle at his feet.
“I’ll clean it up,” he said quietly, noticing my gaze on the puddle. His voice was strangely cool, and his face reserved, hidden in an emotion that I couldn’t put my finger on. The air was heavy with uncertainty. It made my chest constrict. This was the calm before the storm.
“When did you clean up?”
“Been cleaning up for days actually, but you never noticed.” His voice now sounded accusatory. I immediately went into defensive mode.
“What, am I supposed to notice everything you do?” I retorted.
“You seem to notice every single tiny thing I don’t do.”
“What’s your point?”
“You drag me down for my wrong doings, and never praise me for what I do right.”
“What, do you want a cookie, Jaxon?”
“No, Sara, I don’t want a cookie.”
I rolled my eyes at him as I walked past him, but he grabbed my arm gently and turned to me. “Why did you do it?”
“Do what?”
“You know what.” His eyes searched my face, and his pain now had broken through his reserved countenance.
“Why didn’t you stop it?” I bit back, glaring at him.
“Is that what you wanted? You wanted me to react violently? What do you get out of that, Sara?”
“A demonstration that you care.”
“I demonstrate I care about you every damn day.”
I ripped my arm out of his grip. “Well, don’t you worry, nothing happened because I’m not like you. I wouldn’t let a random person kiss me, and whatever the fuck else you did with her.”
“You know I did nothing,” he angrily rebutted.
“Whatever, Jaxon.” I made my way into the bedroom and he followed, stopping at the doorway as I took off my flats.
“Do you enjoy hurting me?” he asked, gripping each side of the door frame so tightly, his knuckles went white.
“Oh, here’s another sob story,” I grumbled.
“You do, don’t you? Why? What have I done?”
“Nothing. You never do anything around here.”
“Nice change in subject, but on that note I have long hours at work, Sara. Then I stay up most of the night waiting for you to come home while I’m shattered.”
I faced him now, clenching my hands in fists, and gritted out, “Well, I work long hours too, Jaxon. No one is forcing you to wait up for me, or to go and stalk me at fucking work. I’m busy all the time now. I’m bettering myself.”
“And I’m not?”
“You’ve never accomplished shit in your life,” I spat out, raking him up and down with disgust. “I’m busting my ass off so I can become a lawyer, so that I can go places in life. And what are you going to end up doing? Look after cars in some dodgy garage your whole life?”
He took a deep breath, and his chest shook, as if breathing was suddenly difficult. “So now it’s a problem with what I do?”
“It’s a problem that you don’t want to do better.”
“Since when is status so important in life? I know I won’t be earning a million dollars a year, but it’ll give me what I need, earn me enough to take care of us–”
“I’ll be earning my own way,” I interrupted him, crossing my arms across my chest. “I won’t need your pennies. I’ll be depending on myself.”
“What is this fucking obsession with depending on yourself all the fucking time?” His voice rose in frustration. “We’re a couple! We’re meant to take care of each other. That’s why I came here. I wanted to do this all for you, told you that there was no pressure, no reason for you to work because I had money–”
“Money you made by being a criminal! That’s ironically all you have ever been good at! Breaking and entering and stealing other people’s hard earned income. How could you think for a second I would be fine with using up that kind of dirty money?”
He closed his eyes momentarily, took a deep breath and opened them again. Calmly, he said, “I understand the apprehension, but I’ve completely stopped doing shit like that in forever. Give me some credit on that at least.”
“That’s what you say! Who the fuck knows what you’re up to? You could be thieving any time you want right now, fucking girls behind my back too. You could up and leave me any day without the decency to tell me!”
“I would never cheat on you!” All patience escaped him now, and he looked wild with anger. At that point, I’d never seen him so dark before except for the time at my house when he’d defended me against my father. “I never have! I’ve never deceived you! I agreed that night in bed after Prom to be yours and only yours! You can blame me for everything else I’ve done wrong by you, but you can never say I cheated!”
“I see you flirting with girls all the time,” I lied, and I really wasn’t sure why I was lying either. Maybe it was to get a reaction out of him, and maybe a side of me wanted to believe he was doing it.
He was in disbelief, gritting his teeth so loud I could hear them. “I’ve never flirted with anybody. Nor did I ever try to rile you up with jealousy by talking to some fucking drunk dimwit.”
I’d heard enough. I didn’t want to be confronted about the guy at the bar. I went to leave the bedroom, but Jaxon wouldn’t let me through. “Move!”
“No. You’re going to talk this through with me, Sara. Every time we argue, you flee and I let you go. It has never done us good, either. You just get angrier and angrier.”
“Shut up and move, Jaxon!”
“No. You’re going to talk–”
“What is there to talk about?”
“US!” he growled, leaning down to my level so that we were face to face and inches away. “You’re going to tell me where my girlfriend is!”
“Among the crowd of girls you’ve fucked, where do you want me to point?”
His eyes widened. “You’re such a bitch.”
“Yeah, well at least I’m not a fucking loser like YOU!” I attempted to duck under his arm, but he pushed his body in front of me. “Jaxon, I swear to fucking God, MOVE!”
“We’re going to talk.”
“No, we’re not! You can’t force me to talk to you!”
“Well, then I’m not going anywhere. You think you can constantly have your way, well fuck that, I want to have my way once in a while too, Sara.” He was saying all of this while I was hopelessly pushing him. “Stop acting like a banshee, and just calm down.”
“You can’t force me in here!” He’d never been so glued in the doorway like this before. In previous fights, he’d stand there and attempt to talk reasonably, but if I told him no
, he’d move aside and let me through. “Move or I’ll call the police!”
“And tell them what?” he sneered, ignoring how harder my shoves were getting. “Stop flailing, Sara…” Out of hysteria for not getting my way, I made my hands into fists and punched him like mad on his chest, screaming for him to move. He took the punches like a champ, moving one hand to his chest to block them. I tried knocking the towel off of him with my leg, but he ducked and weaved me like a pro, knowingly protecting himself.
“I hate you!” I screamed, and then I grabbed the arm he was using to block the doorway with and dug my fingers as hard as possible into his flesh, clawing at it as deeply as I could. He hissed and grabbed me by the shoulders, telling me to calm down as I attempted to knee him in the balls. He shoved me into the door, knocking me breathless for a second as the back of my head thudded.
“What is your fucking problem?!” he hollered, looking down at his arm. “You don’t try and hit me again, Sara. Don’t you fucking dare!”
“Or what?” I breathlessly retorted. Some loose strands of hair were over my face and eyes, and I must have looked like a panting madwoman on a high.
His face went dark as he bore his eyes into mine. “I’ve let you get away with this far too long. Hurt me again, Sara, and I’ll defend myself.”
I scoffed and pushed him hard again. He barely budged, but I knew the physical contact was grating more and more on his patience. He was about to lose it. And I wanted him to.
“What are you going to? Are you going to hit me?” I slapped him on the chest with both hands. “Go on! I dare you! Hit me!”
“Stop it–”
I slapped him hard against the face, and that was the last straw. He grabbed me by the shoulders and squeezed hard; his face went bright red, coming at me until he was inches from my face. I tried to squirm away, but he overpowered me. “Stop it,” he begged hoarsely, and I could feel his breath against my face. Desperation scraped out of him, making him shudder against me. “Stop it, Sara. I love you. Stop this.” He tried to overcome his anger by kissing me, and when his mouth touched mine, I’d gone off like a rocket.
I didn’t know I did it until he flinched back in horror and let go of me abruptly.
I’d dug my fingernails into his cheek and clawed at him the second his lips had touched mine.
He took a step back, his eyes wide with terror and brought his fingers to the deep clawed marks starting from his cheek bone and ending just below his jawline. The claw marks swelled, turned bright red, and bled. He looked down at the blood on his fingers, breathing slow with a look that brought every angry cell in my body to a halt.
When I saw his eyes go red from unshed tears, my whole body began trembling. I couldn’t move or think straight. I just watched him. He turned away from me as a ragged breath escaped his lips, and then he went to his dresser and pulled out a pair of jeans and a shirt. I watched him hastily dress in front of me before hurrying out of the bedroom without so much a glance in my direction. I heard the sound of his car keys and the loud slam of the front door.
Then it happened.
Everything just… hit me.
I looked down at my hands, at my fingernails that were rimmed in my love’s blood. My whole body shook and one single image flashed in my mind: my father. The monster that would beat on us with a rage that had me peeing my pants in bed most nights. You’ve turned into him.
“No,” I sobbed out loud. The tears fell mercilessly down my face. The emptiness in the apartment was suffocating me. All I wanted was Jaxon here again and I wanted to erase the entire night. No, fuck that, I wanted to erase half the year I’d spent in this monstrous state.
I’ll be different. I’ll beg for his forgiveness again. He’ll take me and he’ll forgive like he always does and we’ll be perfect again. I’ll stop trying to be so independent. I’ll stop thinking he’s going to deceive me. I’ll stop all that bullshit and I’ll be the perfect girlfriend. I swear, I will. No more of this shit.
Only that wasn’t enough. The promises I was making to myself were hollow because I knew how out of control my anger had become.
I’m a poison, and I’ve poisoned my relationship. My love means nothing. It’ll change nothing.
I fell to my knees and then cradled myself against the door, rocking my body to and fro, sobbing out loud and muttering incomplete sentences. “I don’t know what to do… Tell me what to do… I’m so sorry and... Oh, my God. Oh, my God, what the fuck did I just do? Oh, my God, I won’t do… I don’t know wh…” The pain in Jaxon’s eyes kept flashing before me. In fact, the pain I’d been inflicting on him relentlessly was now a slideshow in my head. He was perfect. He’d always been perfect. He did change for me, and I wronged him by doubting it.
It became all too clear what had to be done. I had changed, but he hadn’t. And my change might not have permanently damaged us at that point, but it would as time progressed. Our love would be a shell of what it once was, and to ruin what our love was at its pinnacle felt like the worst crime imaginable. I didn’t want to outweigh good memories with the bad. I didn’t want to destroy more and more of our love to a point we’d forget why we were even in love. No, the rational thought at that point was to preserve what we did have.
I need help. He deserves better.
Something in me snapped. Jaxon would never let me walk away. He would beg me to stay and I would agree, and this horrible cycle would repeat itself, and that nightmare of destroyed love would turn into a reality.
No. You have to just do it. Do it now before it’s too late. Before he changes your mind. Remember the pain you feel now forever and let it remind you why you’re going to do this. Because you’ve destroyed him, destroyed that confident man who thought the highest of you. Let him look back at whatever good memories of you he does have… It’s the only way.
My legs felt like lead when I stood, but my body moved like a machine being directed its orders. I packed a suitcase and filled it up with as much clothes as possible, until it was billowing from the top and I had to press down on it as I zipped it closed. I grabbed my wallet off the night stand and paused at the framed photo of Jaxon and me. It was a close up of us, shoulder to shoulder, and I was smiling at the camera while he was looking at me with a small smile and eyes that spoke volumes of his affection for me. I grabbed it and stuffed it inside, and then I grabbed two other frames around the apartment: one of us at Prom and one of us kissing in front of the Christmas tree last December before everything had changed. These were good times, good memories. This was before I tainted us.
I hovered at the front door of the apartment holding onto the suitcase with one hand, and the phone with the other. I looked down at the phone, half tempted to call Jaxon up and beg him to come home. He usually went out for an hour or so after a bad fight to blow off some steam. Then he would return and try again… and again. A teardrop fell from my eyes, and it was a teardrop on fire because it ignited the scorching pain of what I was going to do in the next minute.
Breathing unsteadily, on the verge of panic, I looked down at the phone and slowly rested it on the kitchen counter. After another moment of doubting what I was about to do, I pushed on through with one thought only: Jaxon deserves better, and he will find better.
I opened the door. “I’m sorry,” I cried, as if the walls could hear and reiterate it to Jaxon when he came back.
And then, without a final glance back, I walked out.
PART TWO: A Change in the Air
Ten
Five years later…
Sometimes I dream of what would have been. I see Jaxon’s face, his chin length dirty blonde hair blowing in the wind, and the smile that could give life back to a mummy; I would see myself cradled in his arms, his mouth to my lips, and his words in my ears, telling me I was beautiful, perfect, but most importantly… that he loved me.
Then I awoke, tears streaming down my face, and remembered the awful reality: Jaxon wasn’t here.
I sat up in bed and looked
over at the clock on my night stand. 4:03am. I’d been waking up every morning for the last two weeks at around this time, and when I tried to go back to sleep, I’d find I couldn’t. Being in bed alone and cold makes you reflect on things, makes you reflect on the important things, really.
But I wasn’t alone this early morning. I looked over at the tall, lean man lying next to me, keeping a safe distance away. I didn’t cuddle, and he respected that. I made out his long face, black eyebrows, big lips, high cheekbones, black ruffled hair.
Daniel Hale was a gorgeous man. And he was broken. Like me.
To get my mind off of the pain in my heart, I remembered the day I met him three years ago. The day I was out of money and struggling to get a job. On my way to the interview at the firm that had miraculously contacted me, I’d taken a nasty spill in the busy streets of Winthrop, knocking the contents of my open purse everywhere. Warm and gentle hands went around my shoulders, sitting me up on the concrete sidewalk. The man who’d helped me up was wearing a navy pinstriped suit tailored to a tee; his black hair was slicked back, and his brown eyes wide with concern.
“Are you okay?” he asked soothingly.
I nodded. “Yeah, I’ll live.” I turned away from his gaze and bent down to pack away my things.
He crouched down beside me and helped. “You’ve got a bad scrape on your knee.”
I looked down at my knee, but cursed out loud at the rip in my knee length pencil skirt. “Shit!” I swept my fingers over the tear and shook my head in anger – an anger I was still not entirely good at suppressing, I might add. “Dammit, this is the last thing I need right now!”
“You got someplace to be?”
“Job interview.” I stood up and swiped furiously at my skirt, removing all the bits of grime and dirt of the city.
I was at it for a while before I noticed the man was still standing beside me. I looked up at him and sheepishly smiled. “I’m alright. Thanks for stopping and all…”
