Chapter 26
LOTUS
A week.
Seven days.
One hundred and sixty-eight hours.
Ten thousand and eighty minutes.
Six hundred and four thousand, eight hundred seconds.
And he never came for me.
Sure, he sent me a few texts the first night asking when I was coming back. He even called once, but he never came for me, and I should have known that was what it would come down to, that he had never loved me the way I loved him but I was hopeful. I was hopeful enough to put myself out there, step over the line, and feel the burn when it all backfired.
I regretted it. I regretted trying to push him to love me when he said from the beginning that he never could. I should have let it be and accepted we could never have a normal relationship. But my pride ... what a powerful entity that can be... refused to have him downgrade and disregard me for one more day. Now I’d lost him and I had no one to blame but myself because I did this to us. I wasn’t satisfied with just his affection, I wanted ... no ... I needed it all.
I needed it all, and in my desperate search to find love, to be loved, I had forgotten one simple fact. You can’t receive love by force; it has to be given willingly. I could beg, I could plead, I could get down on my knees and cling to him, tears streaming down my face as I sought his love, and still his heart would never be mine.
So, I was going to give myself a little more time to sulk, bask in my own self-pity and sordid regrets, then I was done with anything Beckett Fucking Cole. I was done losing sleep without his body warmth to lull me. I was done eating pints of ice cream while wondering why I wasn’t good enough. Most of all, I was done wishing things were different, desperately clinging to the hope of his love, silently searching for his closeness when he couldn’t have cared less about me, now that I was gone.
I would give myself a little more time.
A week.
Seven days.
One hundred and sixty-eight hours.
Ten thousand and eighty minutes.
Six hundred and four thousand, eight hundred seconds.
Then my heart and I were done . . . completely fucking done . . . with anything involving Beckett Fucking Cole.
Chapter 27
BECKETT
Possession is nine tenth of the law. If that was true, then why did it feel like my heart got pulled out of my chest the moment she drove away? Like she had some sort of invisible string tethered to it, granting her the power to manipulate and control its whims at her will. My heart. Her power.
I thought she would come back if given enough time, but two weeks in and there hadn't been a word. I didn't know what she was waiting for, or why she felt the need to make me suffer by her absence, but she had to know I couldn't function without her. Breathing hurt, sleep was damn near impossible, and if I had to make a choice between water and vodka right then . . . vodka would have won out. Hands down. I would have taken anything to numb the pain my chest kept radiating or dull the gloom that loomed over me.
I couldn’t sleep. I was tired, probably more tired than I’d ever been in my existence, but sleep hadn't come easy. My bed seemed way too large for just me and the vast, empty space next to me was taunting me, reminding me that she had chosen not to come back, that once again I wasn’t good enough.
I needed a drink. I needed to vent. I needed fucking guy time because I was tired of moping around my fucking house, that still smelt like her, by the way, and acting like a fucking pussy because I was left behind. That was always the fucking arrangement anyway; I set the damn rules so I didn't know why I was stressing about it, why it pained me to think about, why I cared so much.
I picked up my phone and scrolled through my phonebook, disappointed in the lack of non-work related contacts. My life was fucking sad if my only friends were Ben, Lotus, Myra, and Stan. Lotus wouldn't answer my texts, and I knew for fucking sure if I was in hot water with her, I needed to keep my distance from Myra. There was absolutely no way I was setting myself up for that torture. I could have called Ben. Maybe asked if he wanted to drink, grab some food at a pub. Only I wasn't sure I trusted myself to not spill my guts the second the alcohol loosened my tongue. Stan. That left Stan.
Me: Hey man. It’s Beckett, remember me from the tree lot? You helped me out a few weeks back loading my Christmas tree. Anyway, I’m looking for a drinking buddy. You in?
I stared at my phone as if my sheer will alone would force Stan to reply to my message. It didn’t. I stared for a full fifteen minutes before my screen lit up and my phone vibrated with a message.
Stan: The one with the cute blonde? Sure, man. I’m up for a drink.
I had to take a deep breath, drawing it into my lungs and slowly releasing it back into the atmosphere. Stan. Stan, my man . . . don’t fucking talk about Lotus. I let it slide, knowing he didn’t know any better.
Me: Awesome. Meet me at Shocks in an hour?
Stan: I’ll be there.
I tried to wait it out, so that I arrived around the time we were supposed to meet, but I got antsy. Lonely, more like it. And I just wanted out of this space that had pieces of my girl everywhere. It was like my own prison and I wondered how long it would be before coming home wasn’t accompanied by the weight of lead in my feet and the solid pit in my stomach.
I arrived early, thirty minutes early if I’m telling the truth, and I saw no problem getting a head start on my drinking. It was what I went there to do after all, and what was the point of sitting in a bar and waiting if you didn't have a shot glass in hand and the bottle within reach?
By the time Stan arrived, I had already had my fair share of alcohol. Probably more alcohol than I should have consumed in such a short time, but I didn’t give a fuck. It made my thoughts foggy and that was what I fucking wanted . . . no, that was what I fucking needed to get through another weekend alone.
Stan pulled out the stool next to mine and took a seat, flipping over the shot glass I had waiting and motioning to the bartender to get him a beer. “I thought we were drinking together, man. I’m shit at being a designated driver.”
He poured himself a shot from my bottle and downed it in one quick gulp, his eyes held tightly closed as he absorbed the burn. I nudged the bottle forward again, silently offering him a refill on my dime. He shook it off, then reached up and accepted the bottle of beer the bartender handed off to him.
After taking a swig, he turned on his stool to face me, “Alright, let’s have it.”
I stared at him before taking another shot. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I felt my sentence start to get a little slurred and I made a mental note to calm it down a little, I wanted this night to last, not be done within the hour.
“Like hell you don’t. Let’s face it . . . you don’t call up a person you met once, for five minutes, to come drinking with you unless it’s your last resort. So, let’s have it all. Give me what you got.” He leaned his elbows back on the counter, propping his body up in a way that looked totally relaxed and confident. I bet the ladies loved this guy, hell I might have loved this guy. Shit, no, it was the alcohol turning my brains to mush.
“She lefff me.” Crap, I was sure that was slurred. I folded my arms and rested my head into them, drowning in my own self-pity and embarrassment to be confessing my life to this virtual stranger, my true last resort at companionship.
“What did you do?” he asked, right before bringing his bottle up to his lips for a drink.
“Whattt makes ou thin I did it?” I asked. He gave me a funny smirk and I took that as a sign that maybe I should relax on the drinks a little.
“The way you looked at that girl, you would have thought she created this very earth. You can’t fake a love like that.”
“I miggh hab messt up a littttle.” I held my index finger and thumb up to display a little space, or at least I tried. I couldn’t quite grasp the motion of it.
“Alright, rockstar,” Stan patted me on the shoulder and mad
e an obvious gesture of moving my bottle out of reach. He didn’t have to take it, I had already told myself I was slowing down some, but I had no intention of making a scene in the middle of the crowded bar. “Why don’t you start from the beginning?”
So, I did.
I spilled everything. My life, my job, my ex-fiancée with her manic ways and her disregard for life. My feeling of unworthiness, my fear of being alone but also the terrifying reality that I could love and lose again. I told him about Ben and growing up being an honorary part of the Bishop family, and how nothing ever felt quite like home. We talked about Phil and Janet but lastly and probably mostly . . . we talked about Lotus.
Her incredible eyes.
Her insanely soft skin.
Her sweet messages she would leave me on the mirror when our schedules didn’t intersect.
The pull she’d had on me since childhood.
The way her back arched her body into me when I kissed her just right.
Her crazy, curly hair.
Her. Everything that was just . . . her.
Two hours I spent spilling my guts to Stan and he just sat and listened, feeding me a steady stream of water and bar food between stories, until my words became slightly more coherent and my brain less fogged.
“So what are you going to do about it?” He wiped his hands on a napkin and tossed it down onto the plate of nachos.
“What do you mean what am I going to do about it? She left me, she didn’t choose me.” I ran my hands over my eyes, trying to scrub a gritty feeling away.
“Is that how it happened?” he laced his fingers together and stretched them behind his head, leveling me with a sturdy glare.
“Yea. That’s how it happened.” I stated, returning his glare with a cool one of my own.
“See, from my point of view . . . I think you might be incorrect on this. It sounds to me like this girl loves you, hell . . . you said so yourself that she told you she did. She tried to choose you, but you didn’t choose her in return. Hell, from what I hear, she was practically begging you to pick her.”
“That’s unfair. You know I couldn’t. I had Alexa’s parents at my place and she’s my friend’s little sister. I can’t decide on the spur of the moment such a big decision.”
He scoffed at me. Fucking scoffed. “Let me ask you something. I want you to answer with the first thing that pops into your head, don’t think. Just answer me . . . got it?” I nodded my agreement and leaned in closer as we stared each other down. “Do you love her?”
“Yes.” I blurted out, and then paused as a smirk curled the corner of his lips. Fuck. I wracked my mind, trying to decipher why the hell I had answered yes to his question. Why was my impulse to claim that I loved her but I couldn’t fucking say it to her face? Now, after admitting it to Stan, I knew it was true. A part of me had always known it to be true.
Her leaving me was so much more painful than Alexa’s death and I felt like that made me a bad person for comparing the two. I would never wish Alexa dead, but if I had to choose one pain over the other, I would take the pain of Alexa’s death. The gnawing on my soul that losing Lotus, my blue-eyed girl caused, well . . . it might have driven me to madness. Insanity. A depression so deep you would have needed a rope to pull me out.
“So what are you going to do about it?” Stan questioned while I stared blankly at him. He moved his hand in a prompting motion. “You’re going to go after her.”
I continued to stare until he told me to repeat after him and together we said, “I’m going to go after her.”
“Good boy.” If he had patted my head, I swear I would have ripped his wrist off. “What else are you going to do?”
He stared at me, waiting and I didn’t know what to say because my mind was still caught up on the fact that I had said it out loud. I loved her. “You’re going to talk to her brother, jackass. Let him know you love his sister and get it out in the open so you aren’t sneaking around. Jesus. It’s like I have to do all the work for you. Aren’t lawyers supposed to be smart or something?” He grabbed the bottle of beer and gulped down half of it.
I nodded at his instructions. He was right and I knew it. If I wanted any sort of chance at winning her back, we couldn't sneak around. I had no intention of making her feel ashamed of us, because it was never me being ashamed to be with her. It was all about my insecurities and fears and my inability to see through them, but I wanted to see through them now. I wanted to lay it all out in front of her, tell her all my truths and beg . . . because I wasn't above begging . . . to have her take me back.
I stood up, more determined than ever to go find Lotus and lay down my trials and triumphs to be with her, when the hard grip of Stan’s hand on my shoulder, pushing me down into the chair, caught me off guard. “Where the fuck do you think you’re going?”
“To tell Lotus that I love her.”
He did a dramatic eye roll. “Take a seat, man. There is no way you’re going after your girl acting like a fucking drunk at one in the morning. Take a seat, have another drink, a celebratory one, then I’ll shove your ass into an Uber with strict instructions to sleep it off and think it through.”
What he was saying seemed to be a wise choice of action, and so far, his advice had proven solid, so I did what he said and sat down, grabbed my glass, and took another shot . . . this time feeling lighter than I had in ages.
Chapter 28
BECKETT
I woke up with a slight headache but I was thankful it wasn’t much worse. I was grateful for Stan stepping in when I apparently couldn’t, and dolling out my drinks between food and water to soften this morning’s blow. That dude needed a thank you card, that was for damn sure. Well, if I had been the card giving type anyway.
After coming home last night, I had put a lot of thought into everything Stan said and all the feelings that were forced to surface, and he was right. She deserved better than I had been treating her and if she would take me back, I promised myself and the man upstairs that I would do anything and everything to make her happy again.
Stan was right though, it wasn’t just the bridge with Lotus I needed to mend, it was other bridges too. Which was why I was standing at Bentley’s door, at eight in the morning, carrying a bag of peace bagels ... which in case it wasn’t clear ... peace bagels taste like regular bagels with a coating of guilt and groveling.
I knocked on his door and waited, knowing that the bastard got up at six sharp every morning. That had to be the worst habit imaginable because some days, it just felt rejuvenating to sleep in bed until noon. I heard his feet thump in front of the door before his lock turned and he opened the door wide.
“Hey.” I said, holding up the brown bag in my hand. “I brought bagels.”
He shifted on his feet looking uncomfortable. “I don’t know why you make me do this, man.” He stated, moments before his fist connected with my eye.
I dropped the bagels and took a step back, keeping out of his reach, holding my eye. “What the actual fuck, man!”
“Don’t act like you didn’t have it coming. I fucking made you promise to protect her and you broke her fucking heart. You’re lucky I don’t do more than give you a black eye. Now pick up your disgusting peace bagels and come inside. I’m hungry.”
He turned around and walked inside, leaving the door open for me to follow him, even though I wasn’t a hundred percent sure that was the best idea. Still, I grabbed the crumpled bag and followed him in, closing the door behind me . . . possibly signing my death warrant. I wasn’t completely positive on that one.
I heard the sound of ceramic plates being shifted in the kitchen cabinets and followed the sound to find Ben grabbing a few plates and starting his coffee pot. He turned to me, his brows furrowed, “You know, we worked really hard getting you two stubborn ass people together, and then you ruin it all because you can’t bother to commit. Is it that hard? Really?”
“We? What do you even mean?” I asked, tossing the bag of bagels at him.
&nb
sp; He gave me a look over the top of his glasses, probably designed to make me feel dumb but in reality, it caused my blood to boil a little bit. “Myra and I.”
“What the fuck are you talking about, man? I came here to apologize and ask if I could date your sister and you’re talking all this gibberish I don’t even understand. Did I catch you at a bad time? Have you taken up recreational drugs?”
“You’re cute. You think that everyone didn’t know you guys were together? We practically wrapped her up for you. You didn't think that club video was really accidentally sent to the wrong person . . . did you?” His eyes narrowed a bit. “Oh damn, you did. Fuck man, I had to pay Auggie fifty bucks just to get him in on it, and Myra . . . she was dancing right next to her in the video, surely you saw that, right?”
I didn’t. I couldn’t see anything but red and Lotus whenever I watched it. He continued talking, as if I cared at this point what he'd done, I just wanted to clear the air. Start fresh. “I intentionally sent her out with you to the masquerade. You think anyone around you could miss all the damn sparks that fly off you both? It almost caught the room on fire on numerous occasions! But what kind of a friend would I be if I didn’t taunt and tease you a bit? Make you squirm? But you know what, I thought you were going to be a man and tell me you wanted her, not hide her in the closet when I stopped by.” He narrowed his eyes. “You’re shit at hiding things man, seriously. My sister’s touches are all over that place and you thought I wouldn’t know she was there.”
“I screwed up.” I confessed, taking the plate and bag of frozen peas he offered for my eye.
“You think so?”
“Yeah. I did. I was scared, man. I’m a coward and I chased her away.” I admitted.
Obscured Love Page 20
