It was my mother that reached out to me, begging me to not give up on my own child. Against my better judgment, I forced myself to let her back into my life. We went to the doctor’s appointments together and started preparing my place for our son’s home coming. Heather moved back in during her eighth month of pregnancy.
For the most part, we appeared to be happy. On the inside I had built up this wall that kept her out of my heart. She’d lied before and she’d do it again. I was so sure of it.
Jacob Nicholas was born on a Tuesday. He came out with a head full of hair and big gray eyes. I loved him from that very moment. I named him after my uncle that had been the only father I’d ever known. Heather argued with me about the name, but wouldn’t tell me the reason. At the end of the day, I won out on the argument.
We were filled with excitement and hope, but unfortunately, Heather’s postpartum depression got the best of her. Since I already had so much pent up animosity towards her, it only took a couple of rough days to send me over the edge.
I went out one night and hooked up with an old classmate. I knew what I was doing. It was an asshole move, except I didn’t care. I was so pissed at her; so hurt that she could destroy me and expect me to forgive her. I wanted her to pay, even if it meant that I’d have to share custody instead of living with my son.
When I finally went home, three days later, all I wanted to do was make her feel the pain that I felt when she broke my heart, so I told her what I did.
At first she got really quiet and retreated to our bedroom. When I went to check on her moments later, she was in a ball in the corner of the room, sobbing so hard that I was wondering if she could catch her breath at all.
I’d done what I set out to do, but also, I’d set in motion a life that would never be fixable.
I thought hurting her would make me feel better. Instead, it made me feel worse. Then of course, I put up a stronger wall. It actually pissed me off that she was willing to forgive what I’d done. I wondered if she was forgiving me, so I would forgive her.
For the past five years, our on again off again relationship was like dangling off a cliff on one toe. It was no longer about forgiveness, it was about letting go of the past.
Apparently, Heather had her own demons to tend to, but fixing me was her favorite thing to do. She wanted me to be this perfect guy and I just couldn’t handle it.
Her constant phone calls annoyed me so much that I avoided them. I was finally getting her out of my system and I felt okay with that decision.
Still, when I heard that her mother died, I knew she couldn’t handle it on her own. She was already too broken to manage it by herself, so I had my dad fill in for me at the Bed and Breakfast, packed a bag and showed up in her driveway. It was the right thing to do.
The ride was uncomfortable. We had been split up for a good six months this time. I’d kept myself busy at work and only talked to her when I picked up Jacob. I was pretty positive that she didn’t know how to take me just showing up like I did. Then of course, Jacob wanted to know if I still loved his mother. It was a question that I asked myself everyday.
I still cared about Heather, but as far as loving her, I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to use those words again. Too much time had passed. Too much hurt.
I could tell she was a wreck when we got to her moms. That woman did everything for her daughter. I could only imagine how hard it was for Heather to lose the one adult that loved her unconditionally. It had to be devastating.
I’d gotten Jacob situated in the guest room, after letting him get a quick shower. When I noticed that Heather hadn’t comeback inside, I went out looking for her.
The poor woman was still in a ball, in the passenger seat of the car. I approached the window, noticing that she was too busy crying to have noticed me standing there.
She jumped, startled, as I opened the door and offered my hand to her. “Why don’t you come inside?”
“I don’t think I can,” She sobbed. “It hurts so much, Jessie. I just want her back. I miss her so much.”
“I know, babe. Come one. I’ll help you.” I reached in the car and came out with Heather rested against my shoulder. With my arm around her, I walked her into the house where her mother had raised her. I couldn’t be positive, but I think she kept her eyes closed until we walked into her old room. When I closed the door behind us, she wrapped her arms around me and I didn’t pull away. I held her close. “Jacob’s in the spare room. I brought your clothes in here already. Is there anything else you need?”
She looked up at me with swollen eyes. “Don’t leave.”
“I told you that I’m staying with you the whole time to take care of Jacob.”
Heather shook her head, while her bottom lip quivered. “No. Stay with me tonight. Please, just hold me until I fall asleep. I can go and talk to the pastor in the morning. I just can’t do it tonight. I don’t want to be alone.”
Her head was pressed against my chest again. I felt so sorry for her, but kept my guard up. “I’ll stay in here until you fall asleep, but nothing has changed between us. We can’t be together, Heather.”
She nodded, agreeing with my terms. “Okay.”
I could tell she was sad about it, but too upset to argue with me. I was staying with her, which was exactly what she wanted me to do.
I held Heather in my arms, the whole time wishing that there was something I could say to make the pain go away. As much as I pretended to hate her guts, I still hated that she was torn up like she was. The problem was that Heather fed on false hope. I could say one thing and she would think it meant so much more.
It took her about an hour to stop sniffling and fall asleep. After tucking her in, I snuck out of the room and looked for the number to the funeral home. I wasn’t sure if they were expecting her to make an appearance, but it was too late for her to go over there anyway. I wasn’t surprised when the machine came on and it said that they were closed and would reopen in the morning.
I shook my head and hung up, thinking about Heather beating on their door and begging to go in and see her mother in her casket a day early. That woman made me crazy. I needed to help her through this and move on. Being with Heather was nothing but a bad decision that I didn’t want to make again.
After checking on both of them, I headed into the living room and pulled a blanket off of the back of the couch. There was no need for me to find the remote, because my ass was too tired to stay awake. It was going to be a long week and I needed to be rested to tolerate it all.
Chapter 3
Heather
I woke up alone in my room, knowing that Jessie had done exactly what he said he was going to do. He’d waited until I’d fallen asleep to leave me in my room alone.
I don’t know why I even got my hopes up when clearly he was done being with me that way. Jessie was doing his fatherly duty and that was all it was. He wasn’t trying to get into my good graces. I don’t even think he cared about me. He was just here to make sure I remembered to feed and bathe our son, like I would forget that kind of stuff.
It was still dark outside, but the clock read five in the morning, so I decided to stay awake. It wasn’t like I was going to be able to rest for a few more hours with all that was on my mind.
Since my mother had been sick for a long time, she’d made all of her own arrangements, so all I needed to do was finalize them. Not only had she done that, but she’d marked certain items in her house for who she wanted to have them. It was disturbing, at first, when I picked up a vase and someone’s name was on a sticker on the bottom. I was in shock, but the reality of it hit me hard. My mother knew she was dying, and as much as she tried to pretend everything was going to be fine, she knew her time was running out.
It took a while for me to be able to accept it. She sat me down and explained that she didn’t want me to have to do anything when she was gone. She’d wanted me to keep the house, hoping that one day I would raise Jacob in it, or use the money to get a place close
to where we lived now. The only thing holding me back from moving was Jessie.
I found him on the couch, sprawled out with his leg on the floor. The blanket had fallen off and he was snoring loudly, with his mouth open. It should have been annoying, but after being without him, I missed it.
I walked over and picked up the covers, spreading them evenly over his body. He stirred and opened his eyes, seeing me standing there. “What time is it?”
“It’s five. I didn’t mean to wake you. I just wanted to cover you back up.”
He closed his eyes again. “Thanks, babe.”
I knew he was half asleep, but it still gave me butterflies. It was good to smile about something in the midst of being in so much emotional distress. My day was going to be long and awful. It wasn’t just about burying my mother. It wasn’t just about having to explain to my son that heaven isn’t a place that we can visit, or seeing my mother’s friends from church and work and having to hear their stories about her. It was all of that bunched together. I suppose that people get through it every day. My circumstance isn’t special, but she was all I had as far as support.
Now, when something went wrong, or I just wanted to hear her voice, she wouldn’t be there. For the first time since the third grade, I wished that I had a father.
All I could remember was that day he left for work and never came back. I remember crying because my mother was crying. I remember the police coming to our house and my mother crying some more.
After a while, my brother and I just stopped asking about him.
When I turned twenty-four and realized that I’d almost cost Tyler Mitchell and his wife their children, I had a nervous breakdown and had to be hospitalized for anxiety attacks. Every single time I went out in public, I would freak out and think I couldn’t breathe and that I was dying.
Upon further examination of my mental stability, my doctor claimed that I was bi-polar and put me on medication to control my compulsive behavior. He didn’t want to hear that I’d loved the same man since I was a young girl. He didn’t want to hear that he’d promised me things and never followed through with them. He just wanted to fill me with drugs and show me the door. It was kind of a pattern for me.
Men just wanted to use me and then throw me away. I couldn’t get away from it.
Once again I felt alone, with nothing to look forward to.
My mother saw what was happening to me. One night, after a long shift from work, she sat me down and told me a story about a miserable man that beat his wife and tried to touch his eight year-old daughter. As sickening as it was for me to hear, I knew she was telling me the truth.
My father was the first of many.
He didn’t leave us like I’d believed. My mother filed a report and had him picked up at work. She testified, along with one of his coworkers that they’d seen him touching me inappropriately. He died in jail at the age of forty-six. By that time, my mother had given us a good life and long but forgotten about the torture that she’d endured herself.
I had to see a therapist more often after I found out. Even though I couldn’t remember it, I still couldn’t shake the feeling of being molested by my father. My mother assured me that it never went far. She claimed that my brother told on him right away and she confronted him. When he attempted it at work and got caught, that was the end of the road for him. It still made me feel dirty.
What kind of father touches his own children? What kind of sick bastard would do something like that? I didn’t have to hate him. For the life of me, I can’t even remember what he looked like and that doesn’t bother me. The less I can remember about that the better.
I thought about finding his extended family, but what good would that have done? They’d probably say we were liars and make me feel even worse about myself, not that I needed more reasons.
Something else pivotal happened in my life when all of that madness was going on. I remember being in the third grade and being sad. My dad was gone and my mother was always crying. I was having bad dreams and having accidents in my pants.
Third grade is too old for that to be happening. I remember that we went on a field trip to the circus. All the kids had their moms there, but mine had to work. I got upset and went into the corner and peed my pants.
When I came back to sit down, the children noticed and began to make fun of me. One kid, out of the whole class, came walking over and grabbed my hand. That one kid whispered in my ear that it was going to be okay.
That kid’s name was Tyler Mitchell and it was that day that I fell completely in love with him.
Sadly, he would never return the same feelings and after years of desperate attempts to win him over, I’d managed to fuck up my life and reputation, so bad that nobody would ever forgive me.
I was a bitch, tearing through relationships like they meant nothing, because none of them could give me the one thing I really wanted. I suppose that’s why I went off the deep end and got involved with Rick. I stopped caring about my life. I just wanted to give up. I didn’t care about myself enough to realize that I was well on my way to putting myself six feet into the ground.
Jessie saved me from myself, even when I wasn’t expecting it. I think that’s what was so beautiful about my love for him. It was a surprise. He didn’t know about the things that I’d done, so for the first time, I wasn’t being judged. He loved me for the person I was trying so hard to be.
Of course, it was short lived. Once he got a glimpse of my past, he was out the door, getting as far away from me as he could. I couldn’t blame him or fight him over it. Nothing was ever going to change. If I wanted Jessie at all, I had to take the little bit that he was offering. I just wasn’t meant to walk down an aisle in a white dress and say beautiful vows to a man that I loved more than life itself. I was never the type of person to get a happily ever after. That fantasy was shattered the moment I tried to sabotage someone else’s life, for my own gain.
It was a shame that I was sitting in my mother’s kitchen, feeling sorry for my life, when in a few hours I’d be putting my mother into the cold ground. This was her day, not mine. It was a day to celebrate a strong woman who died too soon. She’d want me to hug my son and be happy for what I had in life and I was determined to try to do that for her.
Jessie startled me when he walked into the kitchen and grabbed a coffee cup. “How are you feeling?”
I shrugged and leaned against the cabinets. “I guess as good as I can be. Sorry I woke you.”
He added cream and sugar and took his first sip of coffee. “I didn’t sleep good either.”
I looked at the floor. “You could have stayed in bed with me. It isn’t like we’ve never slept together before.”
He cleared his voice, sat his coffee down and pinned me to the kitchen cabinets. His mouth was so close to mine. “I could have, but you and I both know what happens when we’re in bed together. That’s not happening anymore, Heather. We need to stop doing this shit to each other.” He walked away, leaving me feeling so empty.
“I love you, Jessie. I know you don’t want to hear it, but I need you to know it. One day we’re here and the next we may not be. I don’t want to leave this world without you knowing that.”
“You’re being dramatic. Nothing is going to happen to you. Our relationship problems have nothing to do with love. It’s about trust. Without that, we can’t make it work. I’m done trying. Now, I came here to support you, but you need to know that’s all it is. Do you understand?” I was crying and he knew he’d hurt my feelings. He grabbed my arm and pulled me into a hug. “Heather, I’m sorry. I’m not trying to be a dick. I just want you to know that I’m not here to work things out. I’m here to support you because you don’t have anyone else. Just because I don’t want to be with you, doesn’t mean I don’t care.”
I let him hug me, but it didn’t make me feel better. It wasn’t like I didn’t already know our fate. I just couldn’t rehash it while trying to cope with everything else. I knew I was being sup
er emotional, but how was I supposed to act? “I know. I just wish it could be different. I’m so glad you’re here. As complicated as we are, I don’t know what I would do if you hadn’t come.”
He grabbed my arms and pushed me away from his chest. “You’ll get through this week. You’re a lot stronger than you think you are. One of the things I always loved about you was how resilient you were.”
“That was before I lost the man I loved.”
He said something as he walked out of the room shaking his head.
Why couldn’t I just keep my mouth shut, for once?
Getting through this in one piece was going to be difficult.
Chapter 4
Jessie
Every damn time we were alone, this shit happened. You’d think I’d learn my lesson, but no, I was always putting myself right back where we were before. Our road to a nowhere relationship was exhausting. I was so sick of the back and forth. That’s why I wanted out.
Heather’s sobbing continued throughout the morning. I tried to avoid her, consuming myself in all things Jacob. It worked for the first two hours he was awake, but a kid can only stay occupied for so long before he wants to get into something else.
When he heard his mother crying, he went running toward the sound.
We found Heather sitting on her mother’s bed. She was holding a picture of herself at graduation. Her mother was kissing her on the cheek. Jacob climbed on the bed as I sat beside her, taking the picture and looking at it closely. “You still look the same.”
She did a fake air filled laugh. “Yeah right!”
“Tell Mommy she’s still beautiful.” I meant it. Heather was stunning. She had no flaws when it came to her looks. Her hair always flowed and shined. She has the sweetest little lips and prettiest eyes. I loved her ass and the size of her tits, especially when she got pregnant. If I could have drawn up my dream girl in high school, it would have looked just like her.
Losing Him (Mitchell Family Series Book 8) Page 2
