Compass (Siren Songs Book 2)

by Stephie Walls

  Dinner is sheer agony. The food is amazing, but I can’t bother to eat it watching my wife simply play with hers to keep up appearances. Each course is taking longer than the previous. People in attendance are enjoying themselves, except Piper and me. But no matter how hard I try to get her to engage, she resists, feigning interest in another conversation taking place simultaneously. She gets along swimmingly with Sutton’s plus one, who I’ve never seen before. I refuse to let it irritate me or derive even the slightest bit of jealousy. He’s some one-time asshat I’ll likely never see again.

  I don’t want to make her feel awkward by begging her to eat, and I don’t want to cause a scene by forcing her to talk to me, but hell, we haven’t been in the same room in over a month. She could at least throw me a bone.

  After the cake cutting, my brother and Cam take the floor, then the obligatory mother–son, father–daughter horseshit. I wonder how many more of these I’ll have to endure before they call it a night, and let the rest of us go home.

  When the bandleader calls the rest of the population to the floor, I see Piper hugging Cam and Dax as if she’s saying goodbye. She clings to Cam a little longer than I would’ve expected but I can’t hear the exchange from across the room. By the time I make it to my brother’s wife, Piper’s nowhere to be found.

  “Where’d she go?” I ask frantically. Frustrated at my inability to keep tabs on her this evening.

  “Home, didn’t she tell you? She said she wasn’t feeling well.”

  “No, Cam. She hasn’t spoken to me all night.” Dragging my hands through my hair, I let out an exasperated sigh.

  “She said she was going to get her stuff from the dressing room we were in. Her car’s out back where the limo dropped us off. I’m sure you can catch her.”

  I kiss Cam on the cheek as my brother wishes me luck, and then I take off in a full sprint to find my wife.

  Knocking on the door to the dressing room to keep from startling her, she calls out to come in.

  Looking up from her hands, I find she already changed clothes and is back in her hoodie and jeans. It must be eighty degrees outside but I imagine with as little body fat as she’s currently carrying around she likely stays cold. When she sees me, she stuffs her hands in the pocket of her sweatshirt in an attempt to hide whatever she was focused on before I interrupted.

  “Are you ready to go home?”

  “Yeah, I’m just getting my stuff. Do you want to meet me there?”

  “No, my car’s already at the house. Dax picked me up there this afternoon.”

  She’s confused and doesn’t understand this has been my plan since she walked out of the hospital. Well, right after Dax and I got into a screaming match, and he punched me in the face. After that, this became my plan.

  She doesn’t resist or argue just rises to her feet, grabs her purse and garment bag. I take the dress from her, holding the door open for her to walk through. I feel like I’m walking to my own funeral as I follow her to the car. Nothing’s going as planned. This is not how I saw tonight playing out.

  When we both go to the driver’s side of the car, I simply hold my hand out for the key. When she hands it to me, I unlock the doors, put her dress in the back and walk her around to the passenger side to let her in. She takes her seat without a word spoken between us.

  There’s so much I want to say to her—things I need her to understand about the last month, but the ride home just doesn’t seem to be the place to do it. I don’t want to get into a deep discussion, and either have to continue it sitting in our driveway or interrupt it by going inside. I opt for silence during the ten-minute drive home. I steal glimpses of her when I turn corners, but her stare never waivers from the passenger window. What I wouldn’t give to step into her thoughts for just a moment to know what I’m facing.

  Once in the house, our house, the one I haven’t been inside for over a month, the sadness is overwhelming. I can’t put my finger on where it’s coming from, but it’s breeding here. Turning the lights on doesn’t make the aura dissipate, but it will make it easier to stay awake. It’s nearly midnight and I don’t care how long it takes. If we have to stay up for days straight, I will not go to sleep one more night without my wife in my arms. She can play this however she wants, but the longer she resists the worse it will get.

  I don’t have the energy for this. Between last night and today, I’m out of fuel to pretend like I give a shit anymore. I refuse to perpetuate a sham of happiness in my own home. I have no idea why Moby came back here, but if it’s to rub my nose in how content he is, I wish he would’ve saved it for another day.

  Collapsing on the couch, I stuff my hands in my hoodie pockets, finding the little memento someone so graciously sent me. I haven’t had time to really study it, but from the quick peeks I’ve taken, it’s stunning. I rub my thumb over the inscription using it to soothe my weary soul.

  I watch in awe as Moby strolls across the room, not a single sign of the stroke visible. Whatever he’s been doing for the last five weeks worked. He looks fantastic, and his confidence is soaring once again. I fight the attraction I feel seeing the man I married emerge again. It will only end in heartache. When he takes a seat across from me, I know this conversation is going to be more than I can stand. His larger than life personality is back, and I’ve seen the look on his face before. I watched this with multiple women from his past. I’ve seen him let them down easy at the end of a night. His posture, the look in his eyes, it’s coming, and I need to brace myself for the inevitable.

  Leaning forward, he rests his elbows on his knees, his hands cupping his face before he wipes the stress away leaving his fingers dangling by his legs.

  “What happened to you while I was gone, baby?” Why he’s feigning interest is beyond me. He hasn’t cared enough to call, but somehow now he seems concerned. Hearing him say, “baby,” the way it rolls from his mouth in affection shreds me. He’s buttering me up to tear me down.

  “I’m not sure what you mean.” I lie my head back on the couch, staring up at the ceiling instead of his beautiful face. The blankness pacifies my loud thoughts.

  “You’re frail. You’ve lost so much weight. Do you not feel it? Surely you can see it.” I want to believe his voice is lined in pain, but it’s likely more pity for me than sorrow within him.

  I refuse to fall into this trap where this becomes my fault. My weight is not the reason our marriage fell apart. I shrug unable to verbalize my feelings or thoughts—unable to articulate my inner turmoil. I refuse to be cold and callous to him, but I can’t offer him my vulnerability either. He can spit out all the hate he wants; I won’t be a part of it. I will walk away with my head held high knowing I did everything I could. I fought with everything I had to save him. To save us.

  “Why aren’t you talking? Are we going to non-verbal communication at this point?”

  His frustration is evident two minutes into the conversation. It’s a small taste of what I’ve felt for the last year.

  “What do you want from me, Moby?” I try to keep the emotion out of the question but fail miserably. The snap in my tone sends him into fight mode.

  “What do I want?” His voice changes from a caring husband to almost yelling. “I want my fucking wife back, that’s what I want! I want you to tell me why you’re starving yourself!” Almost yelling has become full blown screaming.

  I cringe as he continues his tirade, knowing they’re just words, I will survive them no matter how harsh they become. My body flinches with each enunciated word.

  “I want to tell you about all the work I’ve done for the last month while I was away so you can know how desperately I wanted you back, and how much I needed to be whole for you.” He drags his hands through his hair, pulling at the roots. His nostrils flare as his cheeks and neck take on a firey-red hue. “I want to apologize to you. I want you to forgive me. I want to hug you, to kiss you. I want to make love to my wife!” He pauses for a moment, breathing deeply before hollering, “That’s
what I want.”

  Never taking my eyes from the ceiling, I rage in return without having really heard anything he said or the sentiment behind it. “If you wanted all those things, why haven’t you picked up the phone one single time, sent a single text message, a card, a carrier pigeon with a message, fucking Morse Code for all I care, Moby. Why?” My chest heaves as I try to catch my breath, unable to say everything on my mind fast enough. “I got nothing from you! My friends and family all fucking bailed on me after they encouraged me to pull the trigger. Every one of them told me I was doing the right thing and then…Radio. Fucking. Silence. That’s what I got from every damn one of you.”

  My anger boils over, the release of the pent up emotions, needs a volatile exit. Moby wants to know how I feel, so he’s finding out, loud and clear. I stand to roam around the room as I yell, throwing my hands in the air, using my arms to express my words. Flashes of heat flush my face with each word I hurl at him and adrenaline pumps through my veins.

  “You accused me of sleeping with my best friend’s fiancé. In front of him! You encouraged me to seek out one of your other brothers to fuck since you weren’t getting any. You ran me through the ringer in a goddamn temper tantrum. I was mortified, Moby! Mortified! You talked to me like I was trash and you treated me like a common whore.”

  I stare at the wall, my back facing my husband, it’s easier to get out what I have to say if it’s to an inanimate object, something without feelings, something that won’t break under the weight of my fury.

  “And at the end of the day, do you know who was still standing beside me? Not one fucking person, Moby! So, you want to know what’s wrong—I lost every person I’ve ever loved the moment I walked out of that hospital room.”

  Needing to move to expel the energy causing me to shake, I pace in large circles around our living room. I can feel his stare following me, but he doesn’t stop me. He doesn’t interrupt me. He just lets me say vent.

  “I can’t eat because it makes me sick. I can’t keep anything down. All I do is work and sleep, day in and day out. The stress level is unbearable.”

  Stopping in the middle of the living room, I turn to him and make eye contact for the first time, I hope he can see what I can’t find the words to say. His eyes are my undoing. I lose all my will to fight.

  I drop the rage, my shoulders slump, and I exhale loudly before starting my final stretch.

  “But you know what? It’s okay. At the end of the day, I loved you enough to let you go. I loved you enough to put your needs over my own to give you what you had to have. If that was my friends, then so be it. All I ever wanted was for you to be happy and healthy again. Even if it’s not with me.”

  He tries to interrupt me, but I halt him with my hand.

  “I’m filing for separation on Monday. I’ll save you the trouble of telling me you’re leaving me. After the events this weekend I had already planned to start looking for a new job next week so I won’t be around your family anymore. I have to find a way to move on, even if it means I lose everything.”

  “What? No! Piper, what are you talking about? You’re not filing for separation or quitting your job.” His brow furrows and his face fills with obvious signs of confusion.

  “So you just want me to continue living like this?” I wave my hands from my shoulders to my hips, presenting my body as evidence something has to change. The strangled cries tear at my words. I choke on the air I try to inhale, the hiccupping sobs rack my body.

  He’s on me in seconds, pulling me to him as he sits on the couch, cuddling me in his lap. I find my head in the crook of his neck, his arms wrapped firmly around my slender frame. For the first time in a year, I feel safe; the fortress he offers an impenetrable shield. The security of his arms is foreign, but familiar; a long lost friend I haven’t seen in years welcoming me back into the fold. My eyes sting and my throat closes as I’m strangled by the emotion escaping the tighter he hugs me. I haven’t felt my husband’s embrace in so long I had forgotten what it felt like. I had accepted I would never experience it again. The tears streaming down my face are now a mixture of anger, frustration, sadness, and joy.

  I cry for so long, I almost forget what I’m crying over. With one hand around my back, the other cradles my head, I finally begin to still in his embrace.

  “I’m so sorry, Piper.”

  I try to move my head to look at him, but he holds me where I am.

  “I know I let you down. I haven’t been the man I promised you I’d be, and I’m truly sorry. You need to understand, your friends haven’t abandoned you, they rallied around me in support of you.”

  Forcefully moving his hand so I can see his face, I find there’s truth in his words. “Huh?” I wipe the wetness from my cheeks with the back of my hand.

  “They’ve all been taking turns working out with me. I’ve been going to my regular physical therapy sessions, but I’ve been back in the gym. The guys I worked with have been training me, Dax, Brooks, Landis, Joey, your friends. Every one of them, every day, have pushed me and pushed me.”

  “But why?”

  “After you left the hospital, Dax and I had a bit of a falling out. Actually, he punched me in the face.”

  Dax’s behavior appalls me regardless of how warranted it was.

  “I deserved it.” He shrugs a bit before continuing. “Anyway, don’t get mad, but he told me, or I should say manipulated me with you.”

  “How so?”

  “He told me you didn’t want to leave but felt you had no other option to show me how grave the situation was, and if I wanted you back I would have to prove I was serious about keeping you. Piper, I have literally spent eight hours a day in the gym since I was released and it’s been ugly. There have been lots of victories, but there were several brutal days along the way. There was no way in hell I wasn’t getting you back.”

  “But why haven’t I heard from you?”

  “I was hoping you were working on you, taking some downtime. You deserved some time off from my medical issues and me. I didn’t want you to give in and let me come home. I mean I did, but I knew that wouldn’t be good for either of us. If I had heard your voice or read your words, I would’ve cracked and begged you to relent. It never dawned on me that if your friends were with me, they weren’t with you.”

  Processing his words is more difficult than having lived with the notion my friends had abandoned me and my husband was happy without my presence.

  “When I laid eyes on you tonight, it gutted me seeing you whole and happy without me. It confirmed I was your downfall, I kept you from recovering.” I scrub my hands over my face trying to rid myself of the tension in my brow. “I’ve been completely isolated, Moby. Totally alone.”

  “If I had known, Piper, I would’ve done something. I thought I was by helping myself, in turn helping us, but instead, I seem to have failed you again.”

  “You haven’t failed me.” I shake my head in protest. He isn’t responsible for me.

  “Baby, you’re sick. I’m not trying to upset you, but Piper, you’re easily twenty-five pounds underweight. That’s a lot for you. If I’d been here and been worth a shit as your husband you never would’ve gotten like this. It pains me to see you so broken, and even more so to know I’m the cause.” He touches my cheek with his hand, staring into my eyes emphasizing his words.

  “I don’t know what to say other than I don’t believe you’re the cause. It’s not like you starved me to death. I just couldn’t keep anything down, so I quit trying to eat. I’d make food and end up throwing it away. I started working so many hours to fill the lonely void, it was easy to skip lunch and dinner and no one noticed, much less cared. I’d munch on some fruit, or occasionally a protein bar throughout the day. Don’t feel bad Moby. Cam saw me every day and didn’t say a word until today.” I shrug. “So no one else noticed either, and they were around.”

  “You need to see a doctor, babe, and maybe a counselor, yeah?” His urging is from love. I see the shift
in his eyes. I know the way they look at me, and this is my husband speaking to me as he strokes my cheekbone with his thumb. This is the man I fell in love with, the one I never imagined seeing again after the stroke. The one I’ve been grieving over losing.

  Chewing on my bottom lip, I nod almost undetectably.

  “And no more crazy chatter about filing for separation? Or leaving your job?” He tilts my chin forcing me to make eye contact. “I don’t care what lengths we have to go to in order to fix us—we’ll do whatever it takes.

  “Okay,” I concede. I need Moby in my life—the healthy version of him, anyway. I want to heal our relationship and our bodies. Maybe now knowing he wants the same things we can start to move forward, even if it’s at a snail’s pace.

  “I don’t know about you, but I’m exhausted and really want to go to bed. Are you going to let me stay here?”

  Still chewing on my lip, I nod a little more eagerly, giving him the slightest of grins in the process. I feel like a teenager with butterflies in my stomach at the thought of my boyfriend spending the night. I don’t know how any of this will play out, but if there’s even a remote possibility we can save our marriage, I’ll jump in headfirst.

  Helping me up from his lap, he takes my hand, leading me to the bedroom. When he flips the light switch, I see he had no intention of leaving. His clothes are all over the place in bags and suitcases. He turns to me over his shoulder. “I promise, I’ll clean this up in the morning.”

  “You had this planned all along?” I should’ve known. I can’t stop the edges of my mouth from turning up in a subtle grin.

  He turns to face me and cups my face in his hands. “You can run all you want, but in the end, you’re going to be walking with me. No matter where you go, or how far you get, you’re never going to be alone.” Prior to the stroke, I never could’ve envisioned Moby not standing by my side. Then I couldn’t see him ever coming back. Now, hearing his words confirms his commitment to me never waivered—my mind was just cloudy, and I couldn’t see it through the fog.