by Lauren Helms
~~~
After way too much Taco Bell and a long, hot shower, I finally make it over to Gia’s. When I told her I was on my way over, she said she was hopping in the shower and to text when I got there. I knock on the door and I hear a distant “Just a sec.” Then there’s the sound of some shuffling and I can tell she’s on the other side.
“It’s just you, right, Si?” she asks.
“Uh, yeah.” I’m confused by the question.
Then the door unlocks and opens, and I understand why. There, standing in only a bath towel is the star of all my fucking wet dreams. Her hair hangs wet around her shoulders and I can see the little droplets of water drip down her chest, running to where I can’t wait to be.
“Shit. G, this scene is going to star in all my dreams for months to come,” I tell her, just standing there admiring her.
“Oh my God,” she reaches a hand out and tugs me to her. “Get in here before someone walks by.”
I stumble in as she closes the door.
It takes everything in me not to just push her up against the door, but then she turns to face me and she’s biting her lip. I let out a growl and push her up against the door anyway. She lets out a surprised yelp as I bury my head in her neck, kissing away all the water droplets taunting me.
Her arms go around my neck and in a breathy moan, she says, “Simon, please let me finish drying off.”
“No need, I’ll take care of it,” I say, pushing her hair over her shoulder and following a rogue droplet down to the space between her breasts. She sighs but tries to push me away.
“Not now, Simon. I promise, we can pick back up in a little bit, but back in my room.”
I start to make my way back to her mouth. I kiss her long and deep before detaching myself.
“Fine. But only because what I plan on doing to you would be better with a bed involved,” I tell her, pushing my hand through my hair.
She blushes but that’s when I really look at her and notice something is off. She seems nervous.
She pushes off the door and walks past me, grabbing my hand as she goes.
I follow her to her room and she closes the door even though no one will be back tonight.
I go to her bed as she heads for her dresser.
“Meh, I wouldn’t bother with clothes,” I tell her.
She just smiles but continues to grab some sleep shorts and a tank. She walks past me to go back out to the bathroom, but I lean forward and snag her hand. “Hey, come back. You can’t taunt me like that.” I pull her to the bed to stand between my legs. I catch her rolling her eyes but the sweet smile on her face tells me she isn’t really annoyed.
“How am I taunting you, Si?”
“Just look at you. All wet and naked.”
“Yeah, because I just got out of the shower. I’m trying to remove the distraction. I actually want to just talk for a minute.”
“OK, but at least let me see them real fast. Let me say hi,” I tell her, staring hungrily at her barely covered chest.
“Really?” she squeaks in disbelief.
“Really, really,” I say, as I start to finger the towel where it’s folded under to keep it wrapped around her. She heaves a sigh and lets me pull down the towel.
“Well. Hello, ladies.” I smile and lean in to show them my appreciation.
“Oh my God,” she mutters. But before I know it, she is pulling the towel back up, covering herself. I pout, and she pushes my face away and I just chuckle as I fall back onto her bed.
A few minutes later she comes back into the room and closes the door. She’s so sexy just as she is, wet and naked. Seeing her, standing there in her shorts and tank gets me just as excited. I kick off my shoes and scootch up her bed to lean back into the pillows.
“So, what did you want to talk about?” I ask, realizing that she is just standing there in the middle of the room wringing her hands together.
“G, what’s wrong?” I’m immediately on alert.
“I have some news,” she says quietly.
I don’t say anything but look at her expectantly when she finally looks at me.
“I applied for a writing job several months ago, like right before Morgan’s accident, and I just found out that I got the job,” she says with more confidence.
“That’s great, G! I’m so happy for you.” I stand and reach to give her a hug, but she shakes her head slightly.
“There’s more.” I move to sit back down on the bed.
“It’s for TVEdge.com and I start at the end of the month. And …” she pauses, worries her lip then continues, “and it’s in LA.”
My heart slams against my ribcage. I try to compute the words she just said, but my head feels like it’s filling with water. I focus on what she said about the company and her start date, but the blood in my veins starts to boil and the food I ate a couple of hours ago starts to sit heavy in my gut.
“So, what does that mean …” I barely get the words out without a stutter.
“I’m moving,” she says barely above a whisper.
And my heart plummets.
It breaks open into a million fucking pieces right there on her bedroom floor.
“No,” I manage to growl.
A small cry comes from my left and I clear my head to see her sitting next to me.
“You can’t do this again,” I say.
“I’m so sorry. But I have to,” she says with confidence, but the tremble in her chin and the tears filling her eyes tell me that it’s only a mask.
I clear my throat, because seeing her like this is like a punch in the gut. “Why?”
“Because it’s my dream.” She grabs my hand as she turns more toward me and continues, “I’ve wanted to work for TVEdge since college. Every job I’ve taken was to build my resume for them. And about six months ago a friend contacted me and told me that they were going to start putting feelers out for some new writers. I sent her my portfolio and she got me in touch with the editor in chief. They put me on a ridiculously long trial period. But they called me about five weeks ago and interviewed me. They told me they were going through some management changes, so they didn’t know if the job would still be on the table. But then they just emailed me a couple of days ago and told me the job was mine.” She takes a shaky breath.
“You found out a couple of days ago? And you are just now telling me?” I ask.
“You’ve kinda had some stuff going on, Simon,” she replies. Which is true.
“Fair enough,” I grumble. “But let me get this straight, you interviewed for this job after we started hanging out …” I trail off, realizing that she could have told me at any point. But she didn’t.
“Why the hell didn’t you tell me, Gia?” I drop her hand and stand up to face her.
“I didn’t think it was going to happen. And at the time, we weren’t dating, just getting on even ground. Then everything with Todd blew up in my face. It didn’t come up,” she says, her voice starting to rise.
“It didn’t come up?” I roar. “How the fuck does you moving to the opposite side of the country not come up?” I’m mad now. Full-blown mad so I continue, “You let this thing,” I motion between us, “go on and get further than it ever has before, all while lying to me. Since when did we start lying to each other?” I start to pace and then stop again, looking into her eyes before continuing.
“Oh, well maybe it was around the time you started lying to everyone else. But God damn, Gia, you lied to me. You kept this from me. You let me fall in love with you, again. And now you are leaving. Again,” I bellow, but my anger starts to slip away when I look at her. When I see that she’s a mess.
Tears are pouring down her beautiful face. There are dark circles under her eyes, like maybe she hasn’t slept in days. I shouldn’t have missed that when I came in earlier. I step over and kneel in front of her to grab her shaking hands. She is taking short, shallow breaths, and I can see the anxiety building up in her eyes. Little gasps escape her mouth.
I mutter a curse under my breath and I pull her down to the floor with me.
“Gia, baby, calm down.” I wrap my arms around her to pull her into me. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have yelled.”
“No … no, I deserve it,” she sobs but pushes away from me. “I didn’t mean to not tell you. I fell in love with you again too—well, I never stopped being in love with you in the first place. Every time I started to convince myself I needed to mention it to you, the thought of losing you was enough to change my mind,” she says, calming herself and looking at me straight on. “I wanted as much time with you as possible.”
With a sigh, I pull her back into me and she lets me this time. We sit there on the floor for a while, me hugging her in my arms as her crying gradually slows down.
Finally, she lifts her head to me and asks, “What are we going to do?”
“I don’t know. But we don’t have to figure it out tonight. We have a few weeks, right?” I help her up, pull down the covers on her bed and tell her to get in. As she does, I take off my jeans and pull my shirt up and over my head. I crawl in behind her and flip off the bedside light. I’m not tired in the slightest. But right now, I need the quiet darkness with her all around me.
She snuggles into me as my arm goes around her. After a couple of minutes of silence, she kisses my chest. She does it again, in the space above my heart. Like she is trying to mend the heart that sat whole beneath my skin only moments ago.
Knowing that it’s too late for that, I pull her up and kiss her.
Carefully, I push her shorts down her legs then follow by removing her tank. My clothes slowly follow suit.
She whispers her apologies through kisses and more tears. We don’t stop to wipe them away. We take our time with our kisses, our caresses, feeling everything as if our battered hearts are only a live wire to our souls. We end up making love for the first time. When we find our release, together, it rocks me to my core.
It’s in the moments after Gia has fallen asleep in my arms that I realize it. The most powerful and meaningful moment of our relationship was also our goodbye.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Gia
I start to wake before my eyes are able to open. I’m warm and in Simon’s arms. I have no idea what time it is, but I don’t care. I don’t want to fully wake up yet, because reality isn’t really where I want to be. Last night, after my confession, after the yelling and tears, we made love. Which was the first time, since all the times before were just sex. Lustful, passionate sex. It was clear that last night was different; it was intoxicating and melancholic.
While it felt like it should be the start of something amazing and new, it teetered on the edge of something sad and ending. I’m not sure what will happen with our relationship. I’m not sure what can happen, with me in LA and him here in Chicago. I do know that I will do everything in my power to make it work. I love Simon. I’ve loved him for a very long time. In fact, the love I have for him now is so much more than it once was. But I can’t turn my back on my dream. I would never ask Simon to do that, as I know he won’t ask me to do the same.
My gut tells me this is the end. So, I’m going to prepare for the worst but hope for the best and enjoy the warm comfort of being wrapped up in his arms right now.
My eyes flutter open when he shifts under me. I know he is awake. I turn my head and prop it up on my hand across his chest.
“Hey,” I say softly.
A small, barely-there smile crosses his face.
“Morning.”
I have the urge to tell him that I love him, but I don’t want to sound needy. Not now, not after what I’ve done. Instead of giving into my wants, I turn my attention to how hungry I am. My stomach rumbles loud enough for both of us to hear.
His smile returns, but there is sadness in his eyes. “You hungry? Wanna go get some pancakes?”
My tummy rumbles again in reply. I fight back a giggle and agree.
He looks at me for one long, fleeting moment, like he is committing the way I look right now—in his arms with rumpled sleepy sex hair—to memory. Then he pulls me in and gives me a hug. I take in a deep breath, basking in the warm, spicy smell of Simon. My Simon. Before I can focus on the way it feels in his arms, he lets go and gets out of my bed. He starts to dress, and I watch him.
While ordinarily chatty in the morning, he remains quiet. Another rumble from my stomach breaks the silence.
“You gonna get up so we can get that thing some fuel?” he asks pulling on his shoes.
“Yeah,” I mumble and crawl out of bed.
Fifteen minutes later we are in his car on our way to IHOP.
We don’t talk much on the drive there. While we eat breakfast, we are able to make more conversation. I ask questions about The Race and upcoming tournaments and he responds in one- or two-word answers.
Clearly, Simon is not mentally here with me at this sticky table eating our mediocre pancakes, flimsy bacon, and spongy eggs. At least the coffee is hot. I know we will need to talk about our future sooner rather than later because this tension is almost torturous. The only thing keeping my head above water is the fact that he holds my hand. He’s held it—gripped it really—since we left my apartment.
He pays the bill and before I know it we are in front of my apartment building. He parks the car and I unbuckle my seatbelt. He doesn’t move, just stares out the front window with his hands in his lap.
“Si, you coming?” I ask.
“No.” His voice breaks, then he clears his throat. Panic starts to rise in my blood. He continues, “We need to call it, Gia.”
I can feel the burn of tears hot in my throat. My eyes start to blur as I fight it off and try to sound confident.
“What do you mean, call it?”
He looks at me, finally, and says, “This. Us. You and I are done.”
I hear my startled gasp and feel a tear spill over and trail down my cheek. He is still facing me, but he isn’t really looking at me. Like he isn’t really seeing me but giving me the illusion that I’m getting his attention as he returns the favor and breaks my heart.
“No,” I whimper. “We don’t have to be done yet.”
He looks past me and out the window. “But we are.”
“You said we had time. That we didn’t have to figure things out right now. Let’s take the time I have left in town to really come up with a plan, a way to make this work. I want us to stay together,” I say with more force than I feel I have in me. I can tell he isn’t going to make this easy. I’m going to have to fight him on it. I’m afraid that I might not win.
“You are leaving in a couple of weeks. You aren’t staying and I’m not going. I can’t go on like this isn’t going to fucking hurt like hell when it comes time to say goodbye. Again,” he spits with annoyance.
I start to argue and he fixes his gaze on me. I push on, “We could do the long-distance thing. I mean, you guys are always traveling. I could fly out to meet you when you have tournaments. You come to California a lot, right? You get time off too. I’m sure you bank up the miles with all the travel, so we could make it work.”
“No, Gia. I don’t want to do long distance.” He shakes his head.
“I mean, it would be hard at first. We’d text, call, email, FaceTime. We could do it,” I plead. My voice feels so small. “If we really wanted to make it work, we could.”
He looks at me, his face a mixture of misery and inflexibility. “I didn’t have a choice to walk away the first time. And I let you break my heart. But this time … this time I’m choosing to walk away now and go deal with the million fucking pieces you broke it into by not being honest with me from the start. I refuse to let it keep breaking by sticking around.”
All I can manage is a small, “Please, Simon. Don’t do this.” I reach up and wipe the tears away, so I can see him better. He looks at me—really looks at me for the first time since we crawled out of bed, and his face softens. He reaches over and grabs my head in his hands, using his
thumbs to wipe tears away.
“I love you so much, G. This is going to nearly kill me. But this, you and me, we’re obviously not meant to be.”
I shake my head because I can’t verbalize my disagreement. He leans in and kisses my temple. Letting out a shaky breath, he rests his forehead against mine for a moment, then lets go and sits back into his seat. I want to stay and fight, but I need to get out of this car. I can feel my anxiety rising and I don’t want him to see me like that, yet again. I fumble with the latch on the door but turn back to him.
“Please, Simon,” I cry. But he isn’t looking at me anymore. I take this as my cue to leave. Once I’m out of the car I don’t look back.
I don’t remember how I got up to the apartment on the fourth floor, whether I took the stairs or the elevator. But when I open the door I find Morgan on the couch watching TV.
I know tears are still falling freely. I close the door and stand there in the middle of the tiny living room.
“Gia, what’s going on,” she says, alarmed.
“We’re done,” is all I manage to get out. I resist the urge to let the panic take over. I look at Morgan and see understanding on her face.
“Come here,” she says, holding her arms out. I cross the room to sit beside her. She hugs me for a while, then I lie down with my head in her lap. She hands me a tissue and pulls the blanket from the top of the couch to cover me.
“So just like that?” she asks.
“Yeah, last night he said we had time to figure things out. But this morning it seems as if he made the decision on his own without including me.” I sniff.
“What about long distance? It’s not ideal, but they travel a lot and, heck, they are always in California. It could work,” she offers hopefully.
“He wouldn’t even entertain the idea. He’s done with me. With us,” I sob into her lap. “He said we were not meant to be.” She runs her fingers through my hair as I cry.
“It’s gonna be OK, Gia. It’s going to be hard and your heart is going to hurt. But you have an amazing life in front of you, you’ll get through this.”
