by K. Ryan
"Yeah," I nodded.
"Did you read them?"
In spite of everything, I didn't have it in me to lie to him, especially not to his face. So, I shook my head, unable to bring myself to say the words.
He nodded slowly, rubbing his mouth with one hand and stared at the floor for a few moments. Then his eyes snapped back up to mine with new determination. "That's okay. I'm glad you got them at least. That's all that really matters."
His fingertips grazed my arm and my eyes flitted shut at the contact. I inhaled suddenly and the words sputtered out in a desperate attempt to give myself a little more time.
"I got some internship offers."
His fingertips just kept their exploration of my forearm as he closed the distance between us and he beamed a proud smile my way. "That's great, Iz. I bet they were all just biding their time until you finally graduated, huh?"
"I guess," I laughed, breathing in that familiar scent of musk and gasoline and feeling a little light-headed. "So, um, I got offers from galleries in Raleigh, Boston, New York, and Washington, D.C."
His face was an open book of raw emotions and with each turning of the page, a new emotion—pride and happiness for my success, dejection and grief, and finally, acceptance.
I didn't tell him that I hadn't even bothered to apply to the galleries Dr. Jacobs had suggested in Chicago and Los Angeles simply because L.A. was too far away from my dad—and Caleb if I was being completely honest—and the lure of New York's art scene was just too great. My heart wanted to choose Raleigh just as much as it wanted to choose New York. I just wasn't ready to talk about that yet.
Still, despite the news I'd just dropped on him, his thumbs brushed my cheek. I leaned into him, inhaling one more time, and feeling my heart finally tear through the wall I'd carefully constructed around it. I couldn't hold out anymore. I'd missed him too much. I loved him too much.
My arms wrapped around his neck as tears pricked my eyes. This was what I needed—feeling his strong arms holding me tight, protecting me, loving me. I couldn't stop now even if I tried. Our foreheads found their way to each other and his fingers ran along the edges of my hair like he was reminding himself what it felt like. Both rough hands closed around my face as he pressed his lips into mine, moving his mouth slowly to savor this moment. My hands skimmed around his shoulders and grasped the labels of his leather cut to pull him in even closer, drunk on the taste of his lips and the feel of him underneath my fingertips.
He hummed against my lips and pressed himself even closer until I was flush against his chest. I wanted to be closer. I wanted to just wrap myself around him and forget the last two years ever happened. It just felt so good...it felt like home. Like everything might be okay again. Like I might actually be whole again.
And then the fog lifted as my thoughts caught up to me. I gently pulled away, but not before kissing him one more time.
"I have to leave for work," I murmured against his lips.
He nodded, his hands still cupping my cheeks and his forehead still connected to mine. "Can I see you tomorrow?"
I closed my eyes and nodded before I could stop myself, my emotions once again getting the better of me. "I have class at eleven and then I have to work at one."
"Okay," he told me with a firm nod. "Maybe I could walk you to class?"
My heart flip-flopped. He was willing to turn around and drive back here tomorrow just to walk me to class? Now I just wanted to kiss him again. So, it was really for the best that his calloused fingertips slipped away from my face and he took a small step back as his hands found their way to his front pockets again.
"So I'll see you tomorrow?"
"Right," I smiled through my hesitation. "Tomorrow."
Hope and happiness flared in his eyes and he leaned in to kiss me one more time before stepping back out into the hallway. I watched him leave, shutting the door behind him when he descended down the stairs with a wave, and I leaned heavily against my door, my hands wringing in front of me.
I didn't know how I'd ever recover from that.
As I shuffled back to my kitchen table to grab my purse, my eyes fell on the stack of letters again. My past and present, still rearing their ugly heads, and I scrubbed my hands over my face. New York and Boston needed an answer soon and I couldn't put off the inevitable forever.
The problem was that up until 10 minutes ago, I'd been absolutely firm in what I wanted and needed to do. And then Caleb showed up and everything flew off-kilter again. Just when I was finally ready to take the necessary steps in order to actually move on—the timing couldn't have been worse.
I never thought I'd ever be the girl who made all her decisions because of a guy. Even when I'd chosen Winston-Salem over Richmond, I'd talked myself into believing it really was the best thing for me. Maybe that had been the right choice at the time, but now I was in a different place. Now I needed to move in a different direction.
If I stayed in North Carolina, I'd be holding myself back for the sake of working on a relationship I wasn't sure could be saved. I'd be sacrificing yet again. Putting someone else above myself. Making decisions with a we mentality.
At some point, I needed to figure out what was really best for me and the course of my life. I wasn't so sure I could afford to make the same mistake twice.
. . .
I sat in my mom's Trans Am in the driveway with my hands clenched tightly around the steering wheel. What the hell was I doing here? This was just a bad, bad idea. Nothing good was going to come of this, and yet, here I was, parked in the driveway of the house I'd only lived in for a few months. It seemed like so long ago since I'd lived here I was beginning to wonder if I'd only dreamt it.
Calling would've been so much easier and way less painful, but instead, I was parked in the driveway, unable to stay, but unable to leave just yet.
I just needed to see him. That's what this was really about.
I didn't know how my brain was still somehow able to command my finger to press the doorbell when I finally got the nerve to get out of the car. Now all I could do was wait.
Nothing.
I waited a few moments longer, shifting anxiously from side to side and still, nothing. Maybe he wasn't even home in the first place. It was early and maybe—God, what was I doing? I was hovering out of my body, watching helplessly as I rang the doorbell again.
Before I even had a chance to back away in a panic, I heard Caleb's gruff, muffled voice from behind the door and I froze to the ground again. And then the door opened.
"Alright, alright, what the hell do you..." Caleb trailed off, his arm stretched out to hold the door open and his eyes wide with surprise. "Iz? Wha—is everything okay?"
"Everything's fine," I jumped in to appease his obvious worry. "Can I come in?"
Oh shit. Why did I say that? Why couldn't I have just said what I needed to say out here on the safety of the porch?
His eyes softened right before they landed on the box under my arm and he swallowed tightly before nodding, stepping to the side just enough to give me room to pass by him. My eyes roamed the house hungrily as my heart twisted with regret. Everything looked pretty much the same way I'd left it, minus the stale pizza box and empty beer cans that littered the coffee table in front of the couch. Other than that, everything was still eerily the same, which given the fact that my relationship with Caleb was anything but the same, just made this all the more painful.
"I'm sorry to bother you," I told him now in a voice I barely recognized. "I know you planned on coming to campus later today."
Caleb's eyes bore into me with the same kind of intensity he'd brought with him to my apartment yesterday, the kind that sent a flutter deep into my stomach. "You're not bothering me, Iz."
"I'm taking the internship in New York," I blurted out suddenly, surprising us both. That was what I'd come here to say and now that it was out there, I wished I could snatch it back and pretend it wasn't happening.
His face twisted in agony and all t
hat hope that had radiated in his eyes from the moment he'd opened the door withered and died. He nodded simply, like he'd already expected it, but that didn't make it hurt any less.
My arms somehow managed to hold the box out to him.
"I kept every letter you sent me," I told him shakily. "I couldn't throw them away, but I can't read them either. You should have them back. They're not really mine anyway."
It was too dangerous for those letters to end up in New York with me. Sooner or later, my willpower would give out and some random, drunken night in the not-so-distant future, I'd tear through them one by one until I found myself at his doorstep again so I could jump right back into his arms. From where I was standing, my world was a whole lot safer if those letters were in their rightful owner's possession.
Without a word, he gently slipped the box from my hands and promptly set it on the back of the couch.
I didn't owe him anything. I knew that. But despite all the shared history between us, despite the pain and the heartache and the devastation we'd left in our wake, I still needed to explain.
"I can't stay," I whispered hoarsely as one traitorous tear slipped down my cheek. "It just hurts too much. And I need to do what's right for me, not anyone else."
His eyes watered with unshed tears and he nodded dejectedly.
"I'm so sorry, Iz," he murmured. "I know there's nothing I'll ever be able to do or say that can make this right, but I understand. I really do."
"I wish I could stay. It's just that..." I willed myself to press forward and push through the speech I'd practiced in my head during the drive here. "I know that if I do, we'll fall back into something and it'll never be the way it used to be. I can't just forget everything that happened to us. It doesn't work that way."
I paused and found him focused on me intently, hanging on every word to brace himself for the inevitable blow he was about to receive.
"Caleb," my voice shook as I went on. "I understand why you didn't want me to wait for you. It took me awhile to really see it, but you were right about everything. It's not fair for you to just show up at my apartment after you told me not to wait for you. I'm just doing exactly what you told me to do and it took me awhile to get there, but I'm moving on."
Clear resignation reflected in Caleb's eyes now and I could almost feel the defeat just radiating off him. His shoulders slumped and his face crumpled in obvious anguish.
I blew out a deep breath, overcome with the weight of what I was about to say. I never thought we'd ever be standing here having this conversation, but there was no point in ruminating on the how and why. Our dreams had been crushed right before our eyes.
"I know you blame yourself, but I need you to know that I don't blame you. Well, I guess it was your fault for ending up in prison, but everything else...it wasn't your fault. You were the best thing that's ever happened to me and I know you don't see it that way, but I don't regret any of it. Not even for a second. It's just over now."
This internship in New York would open up a world of opportunities I might never get again. If I wanted to be a serious artist with a real career, I needed to reach for that future with open arms and nothing holding me back. I didn't know what my future had in store me, but I was finally beginning to accept that maybe Caleb just wasn't in it. That thought was devastating and freeing all at the same time.
Caleb shuffled backward, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand, and once his face was scrubbed free of his tears, he inhaled sharply. His eyes snapped up to me, but there was no bitterness. No disappointment. Just acceptance and grief.
"I need to leave, but, um, I was wondering if I could take a few of the baby's things," I called out to him, shifting anxiously from side to side as I watched his eyes widen and soften at the same time. "I didn't take anything with me when I moved out because I think I just wasn't ready to even touch it, but I can't go to New York without it. I just can't."
His Adam's apple bobbed up and down and then his head dipped into a tight nod.
"Of course, Iz," he murmured and motioned with his head toward the hallway.
I trailed after him, not wanting to get too close, but still craving that heady intoxication all the way into that third bedroom. This was the last thing I had to do here before I could finally leave and really start a new life, but it was just so much harder than I'd expected. I'd known stepping back into the nursery would throw me back into the dark abyss I'd somehow climbed out of, but the second my eyes fell on that half-finished mural, tears flowed freely down my cheeks.
Caleb reached up to get the memory box he'd pushed into the furthest depths of the closet the morning I came home from the hospital. I'd only opened the box one time and had barely survived it. The only way I'd survive it a second time was because Caleb was standing next to me.
He opened the box with a shaking hand as I leaned around his shoulder to see inside, shuffling through a few items so he could pass me the certificate of life.
"Take it, Iz," his voice was rough, but firm. "Please. You should have it."
As if they had a will of their own, my fingers reached out to slip it from his hand. From there, the rest happened naturally as we split the remainder of the box: a tiny pink blanket, a few pictures of her, the sympathy card signed by our doctor and nurses, a card with her footprints on it, a little pink onesie, and our hospital bracelets.
Caleb wiped his eyes and put the box with its cute pink bunny on it back deep into the closet. When he turned to face me, before I could even catch my breath, he was heading right for me. I closed my eyes as his lips brushed against my forehead and his fingertips gingerly trailed across my face. Every moment, every touch was equal parts pain and comfort and I hated every second of it. When I forced my eyes back open, tears spilt down my cheeks in waves and Caleb caught them with his thumbs.
My body was working against my mind now, but none of that mattered until I felt his strong arms wrap around my waist. Nothing else in the world would ever make me feel this safe, this protected, this loved.
Lifting my face out of his shoulder just enough to brush our cheeks together, I shivered when Caleb's lips caressed mine, gently moving and coaxing all the emotions out of me I'd fought to keep at bay.
"I love you," Caleb murmured hoarsely against my lips and it was only now that I was able to see the wetness shining in his own eyes. "I'll never stop."
These overwhelming sensations had just brought up everything I knew, deep down, was true: I didn't really want to leave because I loved him.
Please ask me to stay, I thought as tears streamed down my face. Ask me to stay and I'll do it. Fight for me. Please.
"I love you too," I whispered in between kisses, just letting him hold me tighter as my tears mingled with his.
He never asked.
And it was for the best. Love was never our problem and now, in spite of my moment of weakness, love just wasn't enough anymore.
So I let myself revel in his touch and his kiss one last time because now, this was goodbye.
. . .
Caleb
I turned my face into her hair and breathed in deeply, taking in everything about her while I still had the chance and burned this moment in my memory. Every soft rise and fall of her chest. How soft her skin was. Her warmth. Her beauty. Her everything.
I hadn't earned the right to keep her. I had to let her go instead.
Asking her to stay would be just like slapping shackles around her ankles.
But when she stepped into the hallway, panic leapt up into my throat.
"Iz! Wait!" I called out and desperately reached for her before she could make it to the door.
My hand closed around her elbow and gently turned her around, only to find her cheeks stained with freshly-shed tears and her shoulders trembling. Her head was buried in my shoulder before I had a chance to say anything else and I wrapped my arms around her, drawing her in closer, deeper while I still had the chance.
I took her face in my hands, brushing away her tear
s with my thumbs and gently pulled her chin up to look at me.
"I'll never love anyone else," I told her through my tears. "It'll always be you."
Her beautiful face crumbled as a new wave of tears tumbled down her cheeks and she covered her face with her hands. After I gently pried her fingers away from her face, I brushed these new tears away too.
"Please don't cry, Iz," I tried to smile through the wetness on my own cheeks but couldn't muster the strength. "You're gonna go to New York and you're gonna be famous. People are gonna be lining up just to get a glimpse of your work. I know it. They'll probably pay millions of dollars, too, just to be able to have a piece of it."
She laughed in spite of her tears and I swept my thumb across her cheek just so I could keep touching her for a little bit longer. She swallowed hard and with a tight nod, gingerly stepped backward, out of my grasp, and toward the door.
"I need to leave, Caleb."
"I know."
She backpedalled until our hands slipped away from each other and she was right at the front door. This was it and my heart thudded desperately in my chest just to prove it. She was really leaving now. And I had no one to blame for this but myself.
By the time the door opened, she turned back one last time with a devastated smile just barely touching her lips.
And as she sent me one last, soft smile, she stepped through the doorway and then she was gone.
I shuffled to the kitchen window to watch her rush to her car and tear out of the driveway. The blinds in the window slapped back down in place and I stumbled backward. My heart stuttered and then plummeted right into my stomach.
She was really gone. Just like that. Something that was never meant to last, but had irrevocably left its mark on me. I was forever altered. Forever scarred.
Things might've been different for us if I hadn't failed her so miserably. Because of my actions and my stupidity, the only woman I'd ever truly loved and would ever love, had just pulled out of my driveway for good.
