by Scott, Shae
When he shows up he's in good spirits. I listen as he tells me about his day. He wasn't in the office at all today and maybe that's part of why I miss him. I've grown so used to seeing him at work, even if only for a moment.
"So, I ran I into Annie and Kelsey today," Cole says easily, a slight smirk on his face as he watches me move around the kitchen. I slide a beer towards him and watch as he pops the top.
"At the coffee shop?" I ask. The girls are always there. I've gotten to where I like the random pow wow sessions there.
"Uh huh. They were full of questions. I'm sure you've been getting them too," he says. He's amused.
"What kinds of questions? About the other night?" I ask. I already know the answer. My own messages from them are enough to know exactly what questions they were asking. I feel the unease start to creep in.
"Yeah, they wanted to know how long we had been keeping it a secret. Annie claims that she's known the truth for a long time," he laughs. It's easy for him, to handle the teasing and the questions. I try to breathe through the anxiety that is taking hold.
It only takes him a moment to realize I'm not laughing with him.
"You okay?" he asks me.
I don't want to tell him I'm worried about what people are thinking. It shouldn't matter. I shouldn't be turning my back on things I want because of what other people think. Isn't that what I've been trying to learn this whole time? But I can't help it.
But just like usual, I don't have to tell him. He already knows the dark places that my mind goes.
"They weren't judging us, Em. They were happy to see you happy. To see us happy," he says quietly.
"I know. I mean, I know they are, but what about everyone else?"
"What about them? Em, no one else matters. Don't get caught up in that."
"I'm trying, but it's hard," I admit.
"You'll get there," he says.
Will I? Every time that I think he's right something happens to bring me back and make me question my sanity completely. There are moments when I think I'm simply faking the whole thing. Maybe all of the progress is in my head. Maybe I want it so bad that I'm just going through the motions. You know, fake it ‘til you make it?
And if I'm doing that...just faking it...well, it's not fair to Cole who is so clearly all in. What if I can't go all in?
I can feel the cloud descending and even though I'm fighting hard against it, it is enveloping me quickly. I suddenly wish Cole hadn't come over. I don't want to fight this with him here. He won't understand. I just need to deal with it on my own. Find my footing again.
I feel my emotions starting to tumble away from me. It's like I'm being pulled up and away from my body simply to watch the destruction that comes with irrational fears. I breathe in to try and ground myself, but the fear is starting to overtake me. It's the fear that reminds me that I still have more healing to do.
It's discouraging to feel yourself yanked back into the self-doubt that you've worked so hard to shed. It only takes one moment, one random errant thought to bring the baggage you'd so carefully packed away to come crashing down around you again.
How many times can I pick up the pieces and pack it away again. How long until I give up and sit among it all alone?
Cole gets out of his seat and rounds the island to stand next to me. He sees the panic in my eyes. He's talked me off this ledge too many times. It's not fair to him. He deserves someone who can hold themselves together. Who isn't afraid to laugh or live. He deserves someone who will hold his hand on the street and not worry that the old church biddies will gossip about her at the grocery tomorrow.
"Stop freaking out, James. No one says we have to have a coming out party. Let's just live our lives and let it all fall into place, okay?" he says taking my hand into his, smoothing his thumb across my skin to calm me.
"What if I never get there, Cole? What if I never feel comfortable with any of it. You keep forgetting that I'm broken. I'm not the same Emery and I never will be. I can't guarantee you that the new version will ever be enough. You deserve more than that. What if I never get there?"
"Where is this coming from? The girls? Em, we've been over this over and over again. Why do you keep trying to go backwards?" he asks. I keep asking myself that same question. He's trying to be patient but I know my setbacks are frustrating. I know he wishes I could just be better so we could ride off into the sunset. But it doesn't come that easy. It never will. Have I been leading him on, letting him think that that is our future?
Probably. Lately I've done nothing but try and live in that perfect bubble. All of the time we've spent alone, all the great sex and long talks. Hell, how could he think anything else? He saw my breakthrough and thought he was in the clear. Maybe I did too. But it's not that easy. It's not like a light switch that's been thrown. I'm still broken. I may always be broken.
I'm so tired of being broken. Of not feeling whole.
"No one expects you to be the old Emery. So stop putting that pressure on yourself," he says.
"Everybody wants me to be somebody else. Eventually you will too."
His eyes harden briefly, my words surprising him.
"What does that mean?" he asks carefully. He's still handling me with kid gloves and the fact that he is, suddenly makes me mad. I feel a wave of adrenaline rush through me and I suddenly want to push his buttons. Push him until he breaks and gives me complete honesty.
I don't want him to handle me carefully. I want him to give me everything, even if he thinks it will hurt me. Maybe that's what really scares me. At the heart of it I'm afraid he's not giving me the truth. How can he be so perfect and so good all the time? When does he break? When has he had enough? How can I believe him if he's holding back?
"It means that one day you'll get tired of having to put me back together," I say evenly.
I see his jaw clench and I wonder what words he's trying to hold back. I want him to say them.
"Stop it, Emery," he says simply.
"What? You don't like what I have to say? Maybe you'd like it better if I just stood in the shadows and played the part of perfect arm candy," I say. I know it's unfair, but I can't stop myself.
I see the change in him the instant the words leave my mouth. I brace myself knowing I've pushed his buttons and that he's done tip toeing around my feelings. Good. He's done giving me a pass. Just like I wanted. I need him to break, need him to be less perfect, but the fire in his eyes tells me I may not be ready for it.
"I'm not him, Emery. Stop comparing me to him. I don't like it. Nothing about us has anything to do with him. Quit making me pay for his mistakes. Don't push me away. Don't test me. Don't use me to do the things you should have done to him. Got it?" His voice is low and even. He's holding on to his control by a thread and it makes me want to push a little further.
"You're only here by default. You're here because he died. Otherwise you'd still be a stranger."
His eyes blaze from inches in front of me. His jaw tenses as his teeth grind together. I swallow hard and hope he can't see me cracking under the weight of his stare.
"Is that what you think? You think we're here because it's convenient? Because it's easy?" he fumes. I don't answer, but I straighten my shoulders against his words.
He lets out a harsh laugh, "That's bullshit," he says, stepping away from me. He runs his hand through his hair in frustration. It's sexy, but I try not to let that show on my face. "You are not easy. Not even a little. But I choose to fight for you every single day. I fight for you because I love you. He never fought for you. Not at all. Not once. So, you see, I'm not him. Not even a little. And we are not a default setting. We fit because we belong. We fight for what we need. What we crave. What we want. I didn't fall into this because it was easy. I fell into it because I never let go of you and I'm not willing to let you walk away again."
His confession leaves me fighting to remember how to breathe. It's raw and rough and completely transparent.
"You. . .love me?" I ask, my
voice quiet and unsure. It's the one thing that keeps echoing in my head.
His body freezes and I realize that he probably didn't mean to say that. Hell, he probably didn't mean it at all. It just came out in the rush of words and he was caught up in his frustration and anger.
"Oh. I mean. . .nevermind." Shit, I wish I could take back my words. What a stupid question to ask. Especially now. I look down at the floor to avoid the look of pity in his eyes.
I hear the sound of his boots on the floor as he moves back towards me. His fingers find my chin and he lifts my face so that I can see his. Gone is all of the anger from before. His features are softer, but his expression determined.
"Did you think I ever stopped?" he asks.
I shrug, unable to find words with the way his gaze holds mine hostage.
"I've loved you since I was sixteen. You taught my heart how to love. Every beat since has spoken your name. Even when we were apart you were there. Just because you left didn't mean I had to stop. I simply had to tuck you away in the corners until life brought you back to me. Now that it has, I'm not letting you hide in the corners anymore. I'm going to love you out loud from here on out. I'm going to love you the way that you deserve. I'm going to do it one moment and one memory at a time until you believe it with every cell in your body. Until I erase every shred of doubt that he gave you. I'm not him, Emery. This isn't about then, it's about now. So yeah, I love you and I don't have any intentions on stopping."
My breath comes out in a woosh. My heart is pounding so hard against my chest now that I only hear the roar of blood in my ears. It's as if the world has stopped spinning and I'm frozen in a single moment. One move and the walls around me will shatter into shards of glass at my feet. I feel it. I feel the weight of it all. I just have to give in. I have to make the decision to step away from the pain and let love back in.
The guilt tugs at me as I stare into his patient eyes, but I believe him. I believe that he will do exactly what he's just said. He really will love me through it all.
The tear slides down my cheek before I can stop it and his thumb wipes it clear just before he pulls me to him. I can feel the rise and fall of his hard chest and it lulls me into a feeling of safety.
"I know you're afraid to start over. I know that you worry about what people will think or that they will judge you. But you have to let that go. You have to choose to be happy. To move forward," he says.
"But I married him. I made promises," I argue weakly. His words, his confession has me wanting to ignore all of that.
"And he promised you a life that he couldn't deliver. He broke every promise he made to you. He broke your vows when he pushed you aside. When he gave himself to another woman. You don't owe him forever. You don't owe him anything, James. It's not about him. It's about you."
"You make it sound so easy," I mumble.
"Moving on doesn't make you a bad person, Emery. Neither does loving someone new."
My eyes snap to his as my heart slams against my chest. He's right. I know he is.
"Me, too,” I squeak out. He looks at me, confusion in his eyes. I swallow hard and try again, because he deserves to hear the words I feel. “I love you too.”
It only takes a second for his mouth for descend onto mine in a hungry kiss. It's different than any kiss before because it's filled with raw honesty. It's filled with confessions of love and honest fears. It's stripped away of everything but raw, honest emotion. It's only truth.
His hands fist in my hair and he pulls my head back, exposing my throat. He slides his tongue across my skin and leaves hot kisses across from my ear to my collarbone. His strength holds me captive in an embrace that promises me forever.
"I need you," I confess on a whisper. My hands reach for his shirt tugging it up until it's over his head so I can feel the warmth of his skin beneath my hands. He returns the favor and soon my breasts are in his mouth and he's flicking his tongue against my nipple and shooting hot molten desire straight to my core. I don't need foreplay, I only need to feel him inside me, completing me and filling this void that can only be filled by him.
Because now I see it. It's always been him. Even when I was living a life with someone else, my heart belonged to Cole. Maybe Gabe knew that all along. Maybe he never gave me all of him because he knew I never had everything to give back. I don't know, either way my heart has found its home. I was meant to be here.
We fumble with belt buckles and pants and then Cole is pulling me down to the floor with him. He pulls me into his lap, his hardness rubbing against me, teasing me. But through the heated fog he looks at me, his eyes locked on mine as his hands cradle my face.
"I love you, Emery James. I have always loved you. I will always love you." And with those words I lift to my knees, my mouth finding his in a deep and powerful kiss. And as I slide down around him, his length filling me, everything else disappears. It's only us. He grips my hips and we find a rhythm so slow and perfect that I fear I will break apart. He kisses me deeply and as I wrap my hands around his neck, tangling my fingers in his hair, he pulls me closer, cocooning me in his embrace and as we move I can no longer tell where I end and he begins.
I whimper as my body begins to shake around him. It builds from deep inside me, creeps higher and higher and it's so intense that I fear what will happen when I finally fall.
"Cole." I moan his name, a plea for him to take me higher, to hold me tighter.
"I've got you, baby. God, you feel so good." I hear the strain in his voice as we move our bodies sending the cabinets behind us into a drumline.
The pleasure is so intense and as we each near our climax our grunts and moans fill the air with complete abandon. This man has me completely spellbound. This is what it feels like to be loved completely and I don't hold back at all as the orgasm hits me like a freight train. It takes over every sense, every fiber of me and I fall. I fall like rain, like stars. Because somehow this moment feels so much bigger than every other moment. It feels like magic.
It feels like true love.
We lie together on the kitchen rug, staring up at the ceiling, wrapped up in each other's arms, breathing each other in, coming down from our high and reveling in the shift this night has had. I know he feels it just as I do. I don't apologize for my words or my meltdown from earlier because I know that he knows my heart and where it comes from. He knows because he’s been there feeling it with me for months. He takes my fears and holds them with his own and because of that I'm finally able to show him the insecurities I've been keeping to myself.
His hands draw lazy circles across my back, completely content.
"I get scared sometimes," I say quietly.
"I know you do," he says. I love that he doesn't try to dismiss it. Instead he accepts it as part of who I am.
"I'm afraid I'll never find my way back. What if I never heal enough to be whole again? What if I’m never the that girl again?"
"Then I'll love every piece that you give me. Every piece of her that you find and every new piece that you discover along the way. Because you are everything. Can't you see that you are already everything to me?" My vision blurs with unshed tears. "You're everything."
WE ARE HAPPY. IT'S crazy just how perfect everything feels right now. In fact, I can't remember when I've ever felt this kind of bliss. It's the kind that only comes after you know what it's like to go through darkness. To drown in it until the light is such a distant memory that you doubt if it ever existed in the first place. It's only when you see the other side of the coin so clearly, in all of it's jagged, twisted detail that you can appreciate the beauty of something like this. Something real. It sounds silly and cliché, but I don't care. Caring takes too much work and it hasn't gotten me anywhere except deeper into a sea of hurt.
So I choose to be happy. Every morning I choose happy. For the first time in a long time I simply choose to do the things that make my heart feel good instead of making it break. I choose to live. I choose to laugh. I choose to love.
Love can do that to you. It can change the way you see everything. It's certainly changed me. It has opened up a whole world. One I had shut out and closed off. I have friends again. Some old, some new, but people who genuinely care about getting to know me. Letting them in little by little only adds to the foundation I'm putting together. This time I want to build it strong so that it doesn't have to balance on one piece.
It finally feels like things are falling into place, so when the school board calls to ask me to come in about a possible last minute opening for the upcoming school year I can hardly contain the yelp of excitement. I was alone in the office and after hanging up the phone I did a full on happy dance. One more breath of life filling my soul.
When Dad comes in a few minutes later, looking exhausted I nearly tackle him with excitement. Seeing his face light up made me feel like I could save the world. And when he dances around the tiny office with me I freeze frame the memory to keep forever. It is as much his success as it is mine because he never gave up on me. Not once. Not even when I gave up on myself.
There is so much positivity happening so fast that it almost scares me. I'm almost afraid to believe in it. Almost. My happiness has a way of burying my doubt. Which I think is a good thing. It feels good to live in this moment.
I practically float home on my high. And by the time Cole shows up to the house I've become obnoxious with excitement. He demands that we celebrate and so we pull out the contents of the refrigerator in a very Top Chef effort to make a celebratory dinner.
We laugh as we cut up veggies to make kabobs for the grill and Cole quizzes me with how he thinks the interview will go. Basically it consists of me trying to tell him how I'd handle certain situations with the students.
