The Essence of Fate

by Alison E. Steuart

  I snap my eyes up to his, the truth of his words ringing in my ears. “My God…you’re right. What was I thinking?” I rest my head in my hands and close my eyes. “I’m so selfish, he probably wants nothing to do with me now.”

  “I doubt it. However, if that’s the case at least it will be his decision and not yours.”

  As scary as that may be, he’s right. I made a mistake, and it was up to Ian to forgive me or not. I should have never tried to decide what was best for him.

  Uncle James continues. “I understand that your intentions were good. You thought you were doing what was right for him, but everything that brought you to that decision was misplaced. You used a tragic story that had nothing to do with you and Ian as a couple and used it as the catalyst for why the two of you were better off apart. Think about it, Charlotte… How does that make any sense?”

  The floodgates open as I answer, all of the emotion this conversation stirred up spilling over the surface. “I was afraid… I’ve always been afraid. I let my fear of ending up like my mother take the driver’s seat. It completely overwhelmed me.”

  Taking my hand again, James quietly reassures me with, “Now it’s time to let love take the driver’s seat. Fear may have overwhelmed you, and fear is very powerful…” He pauses, causing me to look up at him. “But nothing is more powerful than love.”

  As the sobs break free, James stands and comes over to me, holding me tightly as I let it all out…let it all go. This time for good. It hurts. The pain is intense as it leaves my heart, knowing that I am closer to reliving my father’s mistakes than I ever realized, that my manipulation and lies, regardless of how good I thought it was for Ian, are ultimately no different than my father’s reasoning behind his betrayal. I did it for love…so that makes it okay. How could I have been so selfish? The sobbing continues as I think about the pain I caused Ian. The man I love with all my heart and soul, the man that made me feel alive again, to feel whole again, to experience passion that I didn’t know was possible.

  Uncle James keeps holding me until I’ve cried the last tear. I’m exhausted from the outpouring of emotions, but at the same time, when I think about my parents, I feel so much better. As twisted as my father’s justification was for what he did, knowing his intention was to protect my mother because he loved her actually makes more sense than what I’ve lived with for the past decade, and it soothes an ache deep in my heart.

  For the first time since my mother passed away, I can picture their souls together, united in love and not lost in darkness, searching for something that will never be found. A smile spreads across my face as they come to me in a vision…the way they used to be, truly happy and deeply in love.

  “Well that smile is a sight for sore eyes,” I hear James say in a compassionate voice.

  Sitting up straight as he moves back to his chair, I say, “I just had the most amazing image of Mom and Dad come into my mind.”

  “Oh?” James questions as I pause to enjoy it a little longer.

  “Yes. They were together, surrounded by the pure light of love. It was the most extraordinary thing. It was so vivid, their happiness tangible.” I look at him as I wipe away a tear, this time of joy. “I have never been able to do that. I’ve only seen them as lost souls in a dark place that’s lonely and sad. I would force myself not to think about it because it was too painful. But just now…they were together, and they were happy.” A huge smile spreads wide across my face as my soul wraps around the image of my parents as they were, as they were meant to be. “Thank you so much for sharing that with me.”

  “I’m so sorry, Charlotte. I should have told you sooner. I just, I thought you were doing so well.” He’s visibly upset now, and I feel badly. “I didn’t know you were struggling like that. It breaks my heart to know that is how you saw your parents.”

  “James…please don’t feel badly. I thought I was doing well, too. And maybe I was until Ian came along and started shooting cannonballs at my smooth sailing ship.” I try to lighten his mood with a little sarcasm. He laughs and gestures in acknowledgment that I could be right. Continuing, I point out, “Also, I’m only twenty-eight. If you had told me all that when I was even a few years younger, I’m not so sure how I would have taken it.”

  “That’s exactly why I didn’t tell you. That, and I genuinely thought you were okay. I knew if the time came that I needed to, I would.” He gives me a look that shows his love for me. “And so I did.”

  “Thank you. I needed to know.” It’s at that point I notice his phone keeps pinging with incoming text messages. I know he has a tremendous amount of responsibility, and I don’t want to keep him from something important. “James, please take care of whatever that is. It could be important.”

  Grabbing his phone, he scrolls through the texts, smiles, and asks to be excused to make an important call. I was glad to have the time alone, looking out over the Mediterranean and beyond to the horizon, where dark blue meets the bright blue of a cloudless sky. What James told me was a lot to take in, yet I can’t help but think about the way Ian expresses his passion. It’s intense and sometimes even a little painful, but never in a bad way. Everything he does only accentuates the pleasure and reaches inside, attaching itself to my soul so that when I finally reach the pinnacle, it’s so much more than merely a physical release. It’s a magical combination of emotion, energy, sensation, and pleasure that is so powerful, so perfectly fused together it can only be described as pure ecstasy. When it’s delivered by someone you love in the truest sense of the word, it’s more meaningful than words could ever do justice.

  I feel a sense of sadness that my parents never shared that kind of passion, that kind of trust. Perhaps it would have scared her, but I doubt it. Yet more than anything, I have a deep sense of longing for Ian. I was fooling myself before, thinking I could walk away giving him his freedom. Now that the dark veil has lifted, I can see clearly again. I know I have to make it right. I have to be honest with him and let fate do the rest.

  James walks back out onto the veranda with a smile that says his conversation went very well. Sitting back across from me, he says, “I have something important I need you to do for me.”

  Thirty

  Ian

  I ran an extra mile this morning to push myself past the exhaustion of not sleeping well again last night. It’s been four days since I ran into Charlotte and that pretty boy she was with. Ever since then my sleep has been disrupted with images of her being pleasured by someone other than me…and it’s eating away at my sanity. Today, however, I have meetings set up from 10:00 a.m. on, so I’ll have limited time to be stuck inside my head.

  At 9:15, Jackson enters my office looking a little sleepy-eyed himself. “Looks like you were up helping Becca with the baby again. I bet the last thing you want to do is sit through a two-hour meeting with the city.” I laugh at the grimace that transforms his face into a clear expression of how he really feels about that.

  “Man…I really don’t want to deal with that circus. I’m exhausted. Forgot how much maintenance newborn babies are. She’s kind of getting into a routine, but all she wants to do is eat…which means we’re on a round-the-clock cycle of changing diapers. It’s literally in one end and out the other with babies.” Now it’s his turn to laugh at the grimace on my face. “It’s not as bad as it sounds. It’s just time-consuming. Newborns only drink breastmilk. It’s when they start eating baby food that things get a little gross.”

  “Ah…good information. I’ll keep that in mind,” I say, instead of what’s actually going through my head.

  “So what’s your excuse? You look like hell.” He points out the obvious then grabs us each a bottled water.

  “You know exactly what my problem is, which makes that a stupid question.” I may have snapped at him unnecessarily with that response. But I’m not rehashing everything with him again. As always, Jackson has been a great friend, talking me through this fucking nightmare Charlotte created, but I’m done talking. I w
ant enough time to go by so that I start to feel like myself again and not some hopeless drug addict looking for his next fix, yet knowing it’s never going to come.

  “Yeah, I suppose it is a stupid question. But it’s also stupid for you to assume that guy Charlotte was with is more than just a friend. You and I both know how unlikely that is.” His impatient tone is pissing me off.

  “That’s where you’re wrong, Jackson! I don’t know shit! Other than the fact that the woman I loved couldn’t find it in herself to trust me after I gave her a part of me that I didn’t even know bloody existed! And now she knows I didn’t cheat on her… She knows she was wrong, and instead of doing something—anything—to make it right, she walked away.” My fist comes down hard on my desk, making everything on it jump. Kicking my garbage can over and putting a huge dent in it, I turn back to him and finish, still yelling even though I know he doesn’t deserve it. “So…no, Jackson. I don’t know how unlikely that is, considering I don’t even know who the hell she is. As far as I’m concerned, she’s capable of anything!”

  I’m waiting for him to rip me a new one for taking it out on him like that, but instead, he says, “Love.”

  My back is to him, so I turn around and cross my arms over my chest, recognizing my own defensive posture. “What?”

  “I said love. During your little rant, you said the woman I loved…as in, past tense. I was just correcting you.”

  He’s dead fucking serious, too.

  “Wow, Jackson. Don’t pretend to know what’s going on inside my head. Got it? Whatever my feelings are for Charlotte don’t really fucking matter, because I have no intention of ever being with a woman that can’t trust me. It’s too important to who I am, and I’ll be goddamned if I ever stay in a relationship where my woman doesn’t have enough faith in me to know I won’t cheat on her!” The truth in my own words lands heavily in my heart as I remember finding out why she left me. I have never had such a twisted wreck of emotions take over my mind.

  “At some point you’re going to have to listen to what I’m saying to you. That’s not how it works! This shit doesn’t just turn off and on according to who’s pissed off or who’s been betrayed or where the real problem lies with trust. The fact of the matter is that the two of you need to sit down and hash it out like adults! Then you can decide which way is the right way to go.”

  “Not happening,” I respond as an image comes into my head of us hashing it out like adults, making my blood heat and my fists clench. “This conversation is over. If we don’t leave now, we’re going to be late and I hate being late.” Back at my desk, I gather a few folders, my laptop, and my keys.

  “I’ll drive,” Jackson says. I give him a questioning look, and he clarifies. “I’m not driving in your car with you in this mood. So you can either drive by yourself or enjoy the ride in my passenger’s seat and chill the fuck out.”

  He’s got a fair point. I really don’t need to go into a meeting with the city ready to pounce on the first asshole that says something I don’t want to hear.

  “Fine. You drive.”

  Three—not two—hours later, our meeting is over, and we are on our way back to the office. I had let Jackson control most of the discussion while I sat back as the intimidating observer. Overall, everything went well, except for the new guy that apparently likes to make himself feel important by focusing on details that are irrelevant at best or blatantly nonexistent at worst. I slid a note to Jason, the head of land development, and told him to shut the little prick down or I was going to. That guy’s nonsense wasted forty-five minutes of that extra hour.

  Regardless, we got what we wanted and without surprise. We knew the city was going to do everything it could to pave the way for this project.

  After eating a banana and half a protein bar for lunch, I was off to the next meeting with a group we are considering for the irrigation. It’s a huge part of this project and has to be state-of-the-art. According to Jackson’s research, these guys are one of the best in the country, and from the presentation they put on today, his research appears to be one hundred percent accurate. It is likely they will be the group we choose.

  By late afternoon, I’ve wrapped up my last meeting with the architects and interior designers. It was a great way to end what had started out as a rather unpleasant day. The design aspect of the buildings we develop is why I love my job so much. It’s a creative outlet that allows me to play with color and texture, to visualize the lines and curves, the different materials and how they all come together in a perfect balance, and to think outside the box of what is expected. My team is second to none, and our brainstorming sessions literally give me a high that no other facet of my job ever could. I do what needs to be done and I do it well, but the interior and exterior design is why I do it.

  A tap on my door announces Jackson. He walks in and takes a seat in front of my desk. His expression says he’s curious about something, and I really hope it has nothing to do with Charlotte. “So, rumor has it that Novas Alturas has officially named the project Skye…with an e. Rumor also has it that Adriana is insisting you get full credit for it.”

  Adriana is good at what she does and professional, when it comes to business, but it is becoming abundantly clear she isn’t taking no for an answer.

  “That’s good news. That they decided on Skye, anyway. It fits quite well. As far as the rest, I really don’t give a shit.” I don’t want to open up the conversation of Adriana again with Jackson, either. He knows she’s trying to set the hook, and he’s not too keen on the idea. He doesn’t trust her, and frankly, neither do I.

  He laughs in agreement. “Well…I’ll tell you this. It’s good. Damn good, man. How’d you think of that?” He leaves the question hanging while I debate on whether I should tell him the truth.

  “Adriana put me on the spot last week when we were having dinner, told me to come up with something since I didn’t like her ideas. Something reminded me of my trip to the Isle of Skye a few years ago, and it clicked.” I don’t tell him what reminded me. I’ll keep that for myself.

  He gives a slow nod that suggests he knows I left something out, but he also knows me well enough to leave it be. Changing the subject, we discuss today’s meetings and any loose ends we need to tie up. All in all, today was a complete success for all things Skye.

  Now, if I could get the rush I used to get after a day like today I’d be set. Instead, everything falls flat, and I hate it.

  Jackson notices, saying, “You good, man? Why don’t we go get a drink somewhere?”

  “Thanks, but a drink is probably the last thing I need. I’ve been doing a bit too much of that lately, and besides, you need to be at home with your family. I promised Nana I’d stop by tonight for dinner.” Which I’m only doing because I love her. What I’d rather do is go home, pour a scotch, feel sorry for myself, and go to bed. My new routine is beginning to get too comfortable.

  We say goodbye as we exit the building, automatically going in for the familiar fist bump that says everything we need to say. Getting in my car, I sit there for a minute, trapped in another random daze that I constantly find myself in. Looking up, I see Jackson pull out of the parking lot in his white suburban.

  I’ve seen his car a thousand times, drove in the damn thing today, yet at that particular moment, I see it for what it is. A family car. He bought it so he could drive his wife, his son, his newborn daughter, and any future children anywhere they want to go, and the thought of it slams into my chest like a battering ram. I continue sitting there, watching him wait at the stop sign before turning right, trying to decipher what the hell just happened. If I’m being honest with myself, I know exactly what happened; I’m just having a hard time accepting it.

  For the first time in my life I have a deep longing to have a family of my own. “Excellent fucking timing, Ian,” I say as the dark cloud returns. The same one that’s been following me around for over a month. The same one that I hate with a passion.

  Not want
ing to wallow in my own pity, I start the car and head to Nana’s.

  As always, being in her home makes me happy. It’s warm and inviting, and it’s exactly what I need right now. There’s a heavy weight on me that isn’t getting any lighter. You’d think over time I would become resilient, yet nothing could be further from the truth. Spending time with Nana, though, gives my soul the boost it needs.

  “Hello, dear.” Warm hands grasp my face as she pulls me down to kiss my forehead.

  “Hello, Nana. How’s my favorite person?” My voice sounds flat, even to my own ears.

  “I’d be doing better if my grandson was doing better.” She holds up her finger and shakes her head as she turns to walk into the living room, saying in a reprimanding tone, “And don’t try to feed me that line from the other day. That’s another sorry attempt at bullshitting yourself, and I’m not interested in hearing it.” She walks over to her chair by the window and sits down. “Why don’t you try being honest with me and yourself for a change and maybe we can get somewhere.”

  She’s been trying to get me to open up about Charlotte, but all I’ve done is tell her everything I think I’m supposed to say, not what I really feel. “Because the truth feels like hell, Nana. That shouldn’t be too hard to understand,” I say, pouring a heavy scotch that I’ve decided I do need after all, before taking my seat across from her.

  “Why don’t you try it anyway, Ian. Your way clearly isn’t working.” She tips her head and gives an expression that says, you know I’m right.

  “All right…the truth is…” I pause to look down at my drink and rub the back of my neck, knowing it won’t relieve the pain that actually resides in my chest, but go through the motions anyway to buy some time. “I miss her. I miss her so much it’s tearing me up inside.” I leave it there because I need to quit talking.