by K. Ryan
Before I wrap this up, I have one more thing I need to say to anyone who’s ever been victimized: never remain silent. Don’t make the mistake I’ve been living with for more than a year. The only person who can truly defend you and tell your story is you and if you don’t do it, you can’t expect anyone else to do it for you.
You are your fiercest ally, your most valuable asset, and your loudest advocate. Never underestimate the power of you.
Thank you for allowing me to use this platform for a different purpose today. If you choose to share this post on your own social media platforms, I only ask that you use the picture I’ve included below. I think it’s about time a picture of me was posted online of my choosing, don’t you?
I read through the entire thing twice, left it open on my computer for about 10 minutes as I ran to the bathroom, grabbed some food, and threw a scoop of kibble in Oliver’s food dish. The whole time, my heart thundered in my chest, butterflies bounced around in my stomach, and when I finally sat back down in front of my computer, I blew out my breath in a slow, controlled stream.
Control. That’s what this was.
I took in another breath as my index finger hovered over the button that would send my story out into the online world and beyond. It was only fitting that my platform was the very same one that had been used against me in the first place.
I nodded to my computer screen.
Then I hit submit.
. . .
Finn
Call me a glutton for punishment or whatever, but I never took Emma off my Google alerts. I’d set it up right away when I figured out that the url removal tool actually worked so I could keep an eye on anything new that popped up about her. I just hadn’t been able to force myself to turn it off.
Almost two months later and I still couldn’t let go. It didn’t matter that she’d shredded my heart, not to mention smashed what was left of it when she moved out of our building, because I just couldn’t shake her. Not that I didn’t want to—what was the point of hanging on to something that didn’t want to be kept?
I wanted to move on. I wanted to forget her, but that was easier said than done. You can’t just make yourself forget about the person you know you should be with until the day you die because it just doesn’t work that way. When you love somebody, you don’t let go, even when all you’re doing is just kicking yourself in the balls, even when you know the odds of things working out in your favor are slim to none.
That was probably why I was sitting in front of my computer right now, obsessively copying and pasting links to those goddamn pictures into that url removal. Yeah. I knew exactly how masochistic and just incredibly stupid that was, but nothing and no one could stop me from continuing to do the only thing I had left to help her.
I might have been able to force myself to walk away two months ago...what else was I supposed to do? She’d pushed me away, wouldn’t talk to me, and hid in her apartment until she ran even further away from me. My hands were tied. It’s not like I could force her to talk to me or to stay in our building.
I’d learned from experience that I couldn’t tell Emma to do anything she didn’t want to do. She was difficult, skittish, and terrified of just about everything around her, especially me.
Unless something changed, I just didn’t see how we could ever figure it out. I wanted to figure it out, but like I’d told her that day at the café, I couldn’t keep doing all the work. She needed to meet me somewhere in the middle and who knew when she’d ever be ready to do that?
Of course, her random materialization out of nowhere a few days ago hadn’t helped matters. Just when I thought I was rounding the corner, just when I thought I might’ve found a way to move on, Emma showed up and blew it all away again. In retrospect, it really wasn’t that different from the first time I ever saw her—I’d been content in avoiding monogamy, commitment, and relationships, but lonelier than I was ever willing to admit—and then bam!
What happened a few days ago just threw me into the deep end of the pool again. Flailing my arms, barely keeping my head above the surface, and sucking in water—I was pathetic and I knew it.
To make matters even worse, I technically had a date tonight, too, and here I was, compulsively deleting urls that linked to nude pictures of my ex-girlfriend, who really should still be my actual girlfriend. God, I was even annoying myself—I honestly didn’t know how Sling had put with me post-Emma. He’d only had to physically intervene once and that was to confiscate my laptop long enough to delete the entire Bon Iver’s “For Emma, Forever Ago” album from my music library. I’d been listening to it with the volume cranked up to def con levels for longer than I cared to admit and at some point, someone had needed to step in and save me from myself.
There had to be some sort of meeting I could go to, like an Ex-Addicts Anonymous or something. Anything to kick the habit, especially since I needed to pretend to be a normal, single, well-adjusted guy tonight.
I had about 10 minutes before I had to leave with Sling and Mara to meet Hayley downtown, which I figured was plenty of time to check my Google alerts one last time before finally stepping away from my computer tonight.
Huh.
It looked like Emma added a new post to her blog tonight. She hadn’t posted anything since right after Christmas and curiosity got the better of me—it was all I really had to feel close to her. But when my eyes landed directly on the title of her blog post, “My Story”, I thought my heart might have stopped altogether.
I clicked the link and jumped to the first line, “I know I don’t normally post much personal information on here…”. At first, it took me a moment to really understand what was happening, but as I read through each new paragraph, my lips curled up the side of my face. My heart pounded, heat spread through my chest and rushed down my shoulders, and I found myself nodding at my screen when I read the words, “I did not consent”.
“Damn right,” I muttered.
I couldn’t believe it...she was really doing this. She wasn’t holding back either and between the scope and the depth, she was saying everything she needed to say.
And at the end, when she included a picture of herself and asked readers to share her story with a picture of her choosing, I laughed at my screen and shook my head, collapsing back into my chair.
Wow.
That took balls. Huge, massive balls. I always knew she had it in her; I just never knew what it would take for her to realize it and I wasn’t about to take credit for it either. This was about her—it had nothing to do with me, just as it should be.
“I made our whole relationship about my drama and my bullshit instead of actually letting myself be happy for once...”
She was right. She had made it all about her, but I understood why. I was willing to work through it with her as long as we were on the same page…which just wasn’t in the cards at the time.
“What were you getting out of it anyway, right?”
Her. It’d always been her. That’s what I was getting out of it and that’s all I needed.
My eyes flicked back up to her essay, landing easily on the only mention I’d received, which to be fair, was probably one too many…”the man I’ve been waiting my whole life to meet who I loved.”
Who she loved. I would’ve waited the rest of my life to hear that if it meant I’d still be able to have her in it.
Loud banging on my door jerked me out of that reverie and about a second later, the door swung open to reveal Sling, his eyebrows lifting expectantly into his forehead and his hands spreading out wide in front of him.
“So...are we gonna go or what?”
My eyes still hadn’t left my computer screen. “What?”
“You know we’re meeting Hayley downtown, right?”
I blinked and shook my head. “Huh...oh, right. Yeah.”
Sling just frowned back at me and crossed the short distance between my door and my computer desk. “What’re you doing? We gotta get our asses on the road. Mara�
�s getting a little bitchy about the whole thing and you know I need to keep that shit on lockdown…”
He trailed off when he finally got a good look at what was on my computer screen. As he crouched down to read through Emma’s blog post, Mara appeared in the doorway.
“Guys? What’s going on? We have to leave...like, two minutes ago.”
Sling batted a hand at her. “Hold on, woman. Give us a second here.”
That didn’t appease her and soon, she was squinting at my computer screen right along with the rest of us and after she got through the first paragraph or so, her hand shot up to cover her mouth.
“I can’t believe it,” she murmured and shook her head. “This is…”
“Wow,” Sling exhaled. “I don’t really know what to say here, Finn.”
It’s not like there was much to say. The blog post spoke for itself. Pretty epically, too. Unfortunately, now that the two of them were finished reading it, they were also now staring at me like they half-expected me to leap right out the window or something, which didn’t matter much anyway because we lived on the first floor.
“So…” Slinger started again. “Are you coming with us or should we tell Hayley you bailed?”
I pushed out a deep breath and tugged my hands through my hair. Hayley was a nice girl—funny, pretty, smart, good head on her shoulders...everything I knew I should probably want. Mara had started pushing her on me about a month ago, stating that her friend was, like, perfect for me. I’d went along with it out of obligation and because I thought it was what I was supposed to do in order to move on with my life.
The problem was that I didn’t want to move on, but I also couldn’t just set aside the fact that Emma had torn everything to pieces for no good reason and had continued tearing everything to pieces for even worse ones.
I didn’t know what else to do, so I just nodded and stood up from my chair, leaving Emma’s essay staring back at me from my screen.
The whole ride to Water Street was a blur. My mind just kept replaying it all in my head.
“I’ll never forgive myself for throwing away the best thing that ever happened to me.”
“You got too close and that scared the hell out of me, but I shouldn’t have pushed you away.”
Somewhere along the way, she’d figured it out. All the things that were keeping her from really letting me in, that had her frozen in place and holding me at arm’s length, she’d figured it out. But she’d also owned up to the way she’d needlessly thrown our relationship in the trash. When she’d texted me on Christmas, I’d almost called her. I’d almost interrogated Mara, on Christmas Day no less, to give me Emma’s new address, so I could at least...I didn’t know what I’d even thought I would do.
I’d held back because I didn’t want to wind up hurt again. Because I’d done everything I could think of to keep her from walking away and none of it mattered. She’d just walked away anyway.
But when I slid into a booth next to Hayley, everything just felt off. Sitting across from Sling and Mara felt right, but when I glanced at Hayley, who smiled back at me with excitement and hope glimmering in her pretty brown eyes, the best I could muster was a pained smile back.
I pretended to listen as Mara and Hayley chatted about something I didn’t really care about and perused the beer menu as Sling mimed holding a gun to his head and fake-firing.
“Hey, Finn?” Mara called out to me.
My eyes lifted from the beer menu just long enough to find her gaze shifting expectantly from me to Mara and back to me again.
“What’s up?”
“Don’t you have another pitch meeting coming up soon?”
I pushed out a sigh. Her motive was clear and one sideways glance at Hayley just confirmed it. Mara was nudging and in the process, giving Hayley some false hope. Shit. I felt like a massive asshole now.
“Uh, yeah,” I shrugged nonchalantly and did my best to just focus on the menu for as long as possible.
This time, the nudging came from Hayley’s direction. “So, who are you meeting with?”
“Just some bar a few blocks away. Should be an easy get for the brewery.”
“They always have a little celebration after a pitch meeting,” Mara informed Hayley and my eyes flicked up to her, narrowing ever so slightly. “If everything goes well next week, you should come too, Hay.”
I swallowed tightly, glancing around for our goddamn waiter already. I needed a drink. We’d only been here for five minutes and already, my leg bounced underneath the table to keep myself from bailing. That would be a real dick move, but still, a move I could live with.
When I made the mistake of glancing up from the menu yet again, I found Slinger’s bright green eyes scrutinizing me carefully and I think he knew exactly what was going through my mind right now. I scrubbed a hand over my face and turned my head towards Hayley, who was still smiling at me with that earnest, albeit clueless, grin on her face.
My heart just wasn’t in it. Frankly, my heart had never been in it.
The problem here was obvious: she just wasn’t Emma. It didn’t feel right to sit here without her next to me and until she was, nothing would feel right again.
So, I sat through drinks and small talk, doing my best not to be an antisocial prick. Hayley didn’t deserve this—she deserved someone who was free to really be with her, instead of someone just going through the motions. This wasn’t where I was supposed to be and she wasn’t who I was supposed to be with.
It wasn’t until the three of us were back in the car when they finally called me on it.
“Dude, what the hell was that back there?” Sling shifted around in the driver’s seat to crinkle his nose at me. “You sick or something?”
No. I wasn’t sick, but I knew what I needed to do in order to finally feel better.
“Hey, Mara?” I leaned forward so she could hear me better. “Where is she living now?”
I knew I didn’t need to elaborate and honestly, this shouldn’t have been a surprise to either of them.
Mara pushed out a quick sigh and glanced at Sling, who just shook his head. “Finn—”
“Look, I think we all knew things weren’t gonna work out with Hayley and I honestly didn’t mean to lead her on. I’ll talk to her; I’ll let her down easy, I promise, but please, Mara, just tell me where Em’s living now.”
Mara groaned and ran a hand over her face before finally huffing out a breath. “I honestly don’t know, Finn. She’s been really quiet at work ever since...well, you know. She doesn’t talk to me much anymore.”
Fine. I couldn’t say I was exactly shocked by that development.
“When does she work next?”
“Come on, Finn.”
“No, you come on, Mara. If you don’t know, find out for me. Please. I just wanna talk to her. I have to talk to her.”
Sling shrugged from the driver’s seat. “I don’t know, babe. We all read it, didn’t we? Can you really blame the guy right now?”
“Ugh,” she sighed again. “Fine. I’ll find out, but after that, I’m staying out of it.”
“Thanks, Mara.”
That was all I needed anyway. I just needed to talk to her and find out where we stood. I didn’t think I’d be able to do much else until I did. There was always a way. “I wish I could take it all back, but I know it’s too late…” Even when time, distance, and everything else tossed every obstacle out there in our way, it still wasn’t too late.
We loved each other. I knew it and now, she knew it, too. The only thing standing in our way now was us.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
“More coffee, Ed?” I asked, lifting the coffee pot up to him.
My gruff, yet ever-regular customer, just grunted in response and held up his empty coffee mug. Given how many times we’d done this, we had this little routine down pat. I quickly obliged him by filling the mug to the brim and shot him a quick, knowing grin.
“Food should be out shortly.”
On any other
normal day, Ed would grunt and shove some more food in his mouth. Instead, he pointed his fork down at the newspaper on the table and garbled, “This is you, isn’t it?”
I glanced at the picture next to my story and shrugged. Not much can prepare you to see your personal and highly emotional words printed in a newspaper and the best reaction I could come up with was as little reaction as possible.
“Yep. That’s me. Can I get you anything else?”
Ed studied me carefully for a few moments. His eyes drifted back to the paper and then flicked to me again. Then he shrugged, throwing an easy nod my way. “Good for you.”
“Thanks,” I murmured, a slow smile slipping across my lips. “Did you, um, need me to get you anything else right now?”
He just batted a hand at me. “Nah, Emma. I’m good for right now.”
I blinked back at him in shock. Since when did he actually bother to remember my name? Since when was he actually sort of polite? For lack of a better response, I just nodded and walked away from the table. When I glanced over my shoulder, he’d folded the paper over so he could grip it in one hand to continue reading as he took a sip from his coffee cup.
Hitting the submit button was one thing because while I knew people were still going to read it, I wouldn’t actually have to see them reading it. This was a different story. I wanted to duck into the kitchen and hide until he was finished for reasons I didn’t quite understand. No part of me was ashamed of what I’d written or held any regrets, but watching someone actually read my words made my palms sweaty and my throat itchy.
With only an hour left of my lunch shift, I still had a little side work to finish and since Ed was currently the only customer in my section, I’d probably be heading home as soon as Ed finished up here. I glanced over my shoulder one more time at my customer, who was still reading the article, and swallowed hard.
In the span of 72 hours, my whole life had shifted on its axis. Within hours of hitting the submit button, my blog post had been shared thousands of times, a number which only multiplied by the hour, starting with my initial blog readers and trickling down through the blogosphere and the Twittersphere, or whatever it’s called, at warp speed. So, basically, I went viral. Again.
