by Alisa Mullen
Lizzie did it for the both of us as I heard not two but three doors slam by the time the elevator hit her floor. Nick stepped out and started to grin.
“You are a God damn millionaire. Take a week off and pay attention to your wife,” I demanded.
He slowly turned, looking just as shocked as Lizzie had, to look at me while I sat back on the elevator rail and waited for the doors to close.
Great. Two women gone in one night. Great. I just fucking loved being Sean Ford. I continued to hear Lizzie’s annoying last words.
“Thanks for nothing!” Door Slam. “Thanks for nothing!” Door Slam. Over and over. Truer words had never been spoken.
That was my life. Thanks for nothing with Lizzie. Thanks for nothing with Aoife. Thanks for nothing with my mom. Thanks for nothing with my father. Thanks for nothing, Sean.
I didn’t want to drive home. I didn’t want to go anywhere but back to Aoife. Lizzie was right. I couldn’t make her change but damn it, I knew she wanted me just as much as I wanted her right now. I drove around downtown for a while, listening to some Deep Purple. I remembered listening to them the first morning that Aoife and I drove up to my house. It felt so right that morning. It has always felt right. Natural. Like I have known Aoife all of my life and if I believed in reincarnation, she and I would have been two branches on the same tree – side by side – swaying in unison. I loved her and it fucking hurt to think of never seeing her again.
My chest started to ache and I couldn’t breathe. Little white spots appeared in my vision and I felt like I wasn’t driving the truck anymore. Who was I? What was the meaning of life? What does it feel like when we die? Oh my God, I was going to die. I was going to kill someone because I was having a heart attack and driving a vehicle. I pulled over, double parking on Center Street – right smack dab in the middle of traffic.
I took of my seat belt and put my hand on my heart as I tried to take deep breaths. I was definitely dying. I reached for my cell phone with shaking fingers and dialed the only number I needed.
“Sean?” She was breathing hard. I heard the other guys in the background. Shit, I was dying and she was at karate class. We wouldn’t ever see each other again. It was over.
“Baby, I think I am having a heart attack,” I squeezed my eyes shut and rubbed the same painful spot on my chest.
“A heart attack? What is going on?” She didn’t sound panicked but more confused.
“I, uh – I can’t breathe. I have a pain in my chest, like,” I took a deep breath and let it out slowly, “like in the middle in this one spot. I keep rubbing it so it isn’t a muscle – it’s underneath, you know. Oh and I am seeing spots, I feel really light headed.”
“Sean, where are you, baby?” Aoife asked in a calm and sweet tone. She called me baby. I only ever called her baby. I smiled a little that she called me that a few moments before I died.
“I am in downtown. I – uh, had a really bad fight with Lizzie and I didn’t want to go home and you don’t want me anymore so I don’t know. I guess I should have driven to the hospital. Mass General is right around the corner.”
I felt like a fucking idiot. I should have just gone to the emergency room and now I sounded like a dumbass on the phone with the one woman I wanted more than anything in the world.
“Sean, love. Listen to me, okay?” Aoife’s breathing had calmed down. She wasn’t in the classroom anymore. She was walking. Where was she going? Was she coming to be with me at the hospital? My heartbeat picked up – hoping that she would come be with me. “Are you there?” She asked, sounding concerned.
“Yes, Aoife. I am here,” I said. “I am listening to you, babe.”
“You are not having a heart attack. Take nice little breaths. You are having a panic attack. It has happened to me before and it feels really bad. You are going to start feeling better in a few minutes. Just listen to my voice and how much I love you. I am so sorry I told you not to come back. I love you, Sean Ford. Once you can breathe and see okay, I want you to come home to me. I want you to make love to me in the shower. I want you to kiss me everywhere. You need to start feeling better because I need you soon. I am horny and I want you on top of me all night,” she rambled and it was beautiful.
My breathing calmed down and my heart returned to beating regular and strong – just like my cock was. Strong and hard. Damn, the girl wanted me to kiss her everywhere in the shower? I didn’t even realize I was pulling back into traffic until she asked me how I was feeling. “I love you.” I said over the phone. “I will be there to pick you up soon.”
“I am already home, Sean. Come home and love me.” Aoife taunted me with a suggestive voice. “I need you now.”
I don’t remember driving the entire way back to her place. As soon as I got through the door, she let me lick every part of her naked body with my tongue in the shower and afterward she took all of me. It was another sleepless night and I was so fucking glad that I had her. It felt so right and she was all I needed.
Lizzie was right. I fell a little bit more in love with Aoife that night. She had talked me down from an anxiety attack and made me feel like a man while doing it. That was all I wanted to feel. I wanted to feel her and I wanted to feel like her man.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Aoife
It was wrong of me to make Sean choose between Lizzie and me. Kenpo had been our time together and I cherished every moment I had with Sean because I knew we were running out of them.
It was a test and I was a bloody fool for drawing a line in the sand. He didn’t deserve that from me but I was scared. What was going to happen after I left to go back to Wicklow? Would he and Lizzie make up from their fight? Would he find another “Lizzie” to obsess about?
I didn’t have any right to be jealous or angry. I knew Sean wanted me and God, I wanted him, too. I tried to figure out every scenario in my head so that I could stay and still take care of what needed to be tended to back home. Every scenario ended up with me getting on that plane.
I had to go home but I was already lost without Sean by my side. I thought about him coming with me but again, it wouldn’t be ideal for anyone. I had to stop being so bloody selfish and let him go.
What made me the saddest was that Boston was starting to feel like my home, too. I wanted to live here – a place where day to day life wasn’t so monotonous and Sean wouldn’t be disappointed in me. We could have a beautiful life together and I knew it. I was giving up everything I had ever dreamed of in a man to return to Ireland, my home, and my blood.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Sean
People always started counting the days until Christmas sometime in July. We were walking down River Street in Newburyport one July Saturday afternoon, with Aoife under my arm, and overheard two women talking about their lists already being completed.
Aoife read my mind and kissed my cheek. I hadn’t thought about how many days we had left. I thought about how many weeks. After taking her to a Red Sox and Yankees game, I took her to the beach in Maine. We only made it to Kittery and York but she was so happy to spend the day in the sun. We found a secluded place where she could take off her shirt and truly enjoy the sun. I made sure she was always comfortable, rubbing sunscreen over every scar and looked around on her behalf in case she would want to cover up.
She never showed her scars to anyone. I knew that some of the guys that had fought her in Kenpo saw her, but like the professionals they were, they didn’t even do a double take. I was positive they assisted many people that had been abused in some way find their strength and courage. Everywhere else, it was second nature to make sure she was always covered up. Only her face, arms, and hands were unmarked. I thought about what kind of tattoos would cover some of them up but I never broached the subject since she wouldn’t be in America long enough to finish that big of a job.
“Nine days,” she had whispered to me that day that the women were talking about Christmas.
“Nine?” I choked and gasped at the s
ame time. I started coughing and got sick to my stomach. I felt another panic attack coming on and had to stop to breathe.
That had been eight days ago and other than when we worked, we were always together. Tomorrow was Aoife’s last day in Boston. She was packing her bags. I was taking the furniture out and putting it in the truck. I was a fucking wreck. She was on auto-pilot, obviously trying not to feel a damn thing. It was in this moment that I wished Lizzie and I had never fought. I would be able to ask her what she did the day before Teagan left. She would say she was with me. At least, I think I was with her during the last days he was still in Boston.
But we weren’t talking. Radio silent was my friendship with Lizzie and up until now, I hadn’t felt or thought a thing about it. I needed her. I needed someone to take this really awful feeling out of my stomach. The pit was continuously tight.
I felt Aoife come up behind me and I turned to give her a smile. I wasn’t going to lose it in front of her. This was life. She had to go home and I had to let her.
“What time do you leave?” I asked, cocking my head to one side. I hadn’t ever thought about the logistics of her flight and how she would get there.
“Ten o’clock tomorrow,” she said. She twisted her lips and looked away from my eyes. I grabbed her into a tight hug.
“Then we have all day today and all day tomorrow. I can take you to the airport,” I said into her hair.
“No, it’s okay. I am meeting the rest of our group at South Station. We will all travel back together.”
“So, then I will see you off at South Station,” I conceded and wished I was one of the other assholes that was traveling back with her.
I felt her nod in agreement. I held her on that sidewalk for what felt like forever. I wanted nothing else than to kidnap her and make her stay.
Lizzie was right again. I could scream and beg until I was crying – blubbering – but I couldn’t change the outcome of Aoife’s life. She was choosing her life in Ireland. I had to stay in mine. I didn’t know what that meant for us but it did feel like it was over.
Breaking up with someone had always been so meaningless. The woman got clingy. I was an asshole for not calling the next day. She cheated. I got bored. The break up with Aoife wasn’t a breakup. It was a “rip up.” Neither wanted to break our bond, but the facts of life were ripping straight through us. It made all other break ups look like child’s play. I would never take a relationship with a woman so lightly ever again. I would move on from Aoife and I could find a love right now woman. I would settle and that would be okay. Or it wouldn’t. It would be the way it was supposed to be.
We left the mattress in her room and stayed in for the rest of the afternoon and evening. There wasn’t much for either one of us to say. Sometimes we asked if the other was hungry. Once I got up to take a piss. I came back to find her looking off into space. She would forever tug at me and I had to be right next to her - until the very last second. I held her with my eyes for so long that they started to hurt. My lips kissed her for so long that they grew raw. My dick plunged into her so frequently that I was beyond sore. It took everything to stay awake but by one o’clock in the morning, I felt the gravity of sleep take over.
My eyes popped open and I felt it. It was over. I turned my head to her side of the bed and she was gone. I looked over to where her suitcases were. Gone. Poof. I was a guy lying in an empty bed in an empty apartment in the middle of a city I didn’t live in. I was nobody. I could lie here for days and wither away to my death and no one would ever know. Certainly not Aoife.
A note was placed on her pillow. I tossed the note to the side and brought the pillow to my nose. She had been here. She was on the pillow and I squeezed it so hard until the fire building in my heart began to spark into explosion. I fucking lost it. Yelling every possible swear word I knew into the pillow did nothing to alleviate the burn. I threw it across the room and picked up the note with shaking and angry fingers.
Sean,
My love.
You were so unexpected and I am such a lucky girl. You are a wonderful man, never forget that. I feel blessed to have known you in every way.
You will always be in my heart. Please know one day won’t go by without thinking of you. I am sorry this was my goodbye. I just couldn’t do it to your face. I didn’t think I would have been able to go if you were there watching me.
Love forever,
Aoife
I read the letter over and over. It was beautiful and it was just like her to hide this secret. I thought back to when I asked what time her flight left. I assumed it was at night and she hadn’t corrected me.
How do I move from this bed? If I leave it, then it is really over. This was our last place together. I suddenly felt panicked. What if she was still at the airport? What if I could get one last look at her? I picked up my phone and immediately dialed her cell.
The ring tone that spiraled throughout the apartment killed all those thoughts. She had even left the only way I would ever get in touch with her behind.
I sat up and looked at my phone like it had all the answers. I pushed call.
“Sean?” she asked.
“She is gone,” I choked out.
“Where are you? What are you doing?” Lizzie asked.
“I - I don't know,” I answered numbly.
“Do you have to work tonight?”
Did I? What was the day? It's Tuesday. It's Kenpo night.
“Oh God, Lizzie,” I sobbed. “I knew from the moment I met her she was going to go. But I didn't know that it would feel like this. I just thought that it would be painful I didn't know that it would just wrecked me and rip everything out of my stomach.”
Lizzie stayed silent.
“Can you hold on a minute, honey?” Lizzie asked. I nodded my head even though she couldn't see me but I didn't care. She was gone from the phone for a little while and I just sat there and just held my stomach trying to make it stop feeling like it was dying.
Lizzie came back on the phone. “Okay, so you don't have to work tonight. I'm going to meet you up in Newburyport and you and I are going to hang out like old times okay?”
“Are you sure?” I asked.
“Yes, I'm absolutely sure. I know exactly what you're going through right now, honey. Nick is going to take the kids. Everyone is good. We're all good. I don't know what you did that night to kick him in the ass but thank you. I've wanted to call you forever.”
I let out it left a little chuckle I had forgotten about that night. “Okay, so when are you going to drive. Are you okay to drive?”
“I think I'm okay to drive. I don't know I mean I just feel really sick you know,” I said.
“Yes, I absolutely know Sean,” Lizzie responded with banality.
I drove in a daze back to Newburyport. I was happy that Lizzie was on her way, too. It didn't make me feel like I was so alone. But she would leave, too and then I would be alone.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Sean
For the next few days, Lizzie made sure I had movies and food when I wasn’t at work. She cuddled with me in bed at night and talked my ear off about how she and Nick were planning a trip to the South of France and wouldn’t it be cool if I did something fun like that soon. She wanted me to forget Aoife. Impossible.
Someone must have notified the crew at The Ink Shop because when I went to work on Wednesday night, the entire place went silent as I walked in. With a nod, I basically told people to eat shit and die. Lizzie came in a few hours later and she somehow cut through the tension with the five pizzas she brought in.
Her favorite guy was Menthol so she sat with him most of the night but I didn’t miss the worried looks that she threw my way every so often. I kept my nose in my work and every time Aoife’s face or laugh hit my mind, I shoved it back so I could focus on the here and now. She wouldn’t want me to stop living.
Many times I did fail and blank out. I worried about her and her father. I hoped that the fast moves we had lear
ned and practiced so many times were coming in handy. Many times I wanted to ask Lizzie to call Freddie. Didn’t he work with her in some way? I kept that to myself, however, and with every day that passed, I felt the same old routine pre-Aoife take its place back in my life.
Lizzie took off on late Thursday night because Nick had to leave town the next morning and the kids were home alone. She begged me to stay with them over the weekend but I couldn’t go. I didn’t want to think about the living room where I had met Aoife or the sidewalk I hugged her on. I wasn’t ready to look at the places that made us who we were. Boston was part of our love affair and I was just as pissed at the city as I was with the situation.
Bold locked up The Ink Shop with me on Thursday night.
“So, Laura is still asking about you,” he prompted. It wasn’t with the same excitement he had had a few months ago but I knew he was throwing it out there to be helpful. He wanted to remind me that I still had a dick and I still had fan girls.
I thought about Laura. She was so hot. I never disagreed with that. Maybe if she had been waiting around all this time I should give her a shot.
“Oh yeah?” I asked as I lit up a cigarette.
Bold nodded his head slowly. “Yep, she is pretty into you, Sean. Asks about you every time she is at the house. I told her you were… ya know…involved. But seeing as Irish had to go back, it wouldn’t hurt to go out for a few drinks.”
“Yeah,” I answered absentmindedly.
“So we should do it. Let’s take the girls to a place in Portsmouth this weekend. They will get all fancied up and whatever.”
I was so fucking relieved that he hadn’t said Boston that I found myself nodding in agreement.
“You have any appointments tomorrow night?”
I gave him the “are you fucking kidding me” look and he laughed. Bold never laughed which made me genuinely grin at him. I immediately stopped when I felt it. It was like I was cheating on Aoife to smile and laugh with my buddy about going out. I felt sick. It was going to take some time to get used to getting back to the asshole I was before any Irish girls entered my life. Laura was probably just what I needed to make that happen.
