by Emma Vikes
“You know you should really stop staying here at the wee hours of the morning. It gets kind of creepy when I decide to drink a glass of water and see you standing here with a blank look on your face,” Jared said, stepping out of the house and joining me in the back porch. He was in sweat pants and a black tank top and his curls were in complete disarray. He wore his glasses and they were perched on the bridge of his nose.
I flashed him a weak smile and pulled my sweater tighter. “I couldn’t sleep so I thought that I thought tea would be a good idea.”
“Or you couldn’t sleep because you can’t stop thinking about him.”
It’d been exactly a week since the whole incident with Leo happened and he hadn’t contacted us since nor did he come here. To be honest, a part of me expected that he would demand to be a part of Max’s life but there hadn’t been any demands on his part. Then there was this part of me that thought that maybe he already went and left with Maddock for the documentary thing, choosing his career above all.
The last part pinched at my heart.
“Is Max still looking for him?” I asked quietly.
Max was upset that Leo didn’t make it to the game but Max wasn’t also the type to hold grudges. He was always such a good kid and so easy to take care of. It wasn’t a surprise to me that the following day, he asked Jared if Leo was coming over. Jared had told me that there hadn’t been any trace of disappointment in his voice when he asked about Leo. It was as if he forgot about the promise that Leo made and was simply looking for the guy that he looked up to and enjoyed the company of since he met him.
Foolish of me to think that Max would have the same fear-stricken heart as mine just because he came from my womb. He was his own person, entirely different from me. “Yes. I told him that Leo was just busy. Look, Elle, I was thinking...”
I turned my attention on him but Jared didn’t even seem fazed at my gaze. “I was thinking that maybe you should tell Max. Text Leo and meet up with him or maybe you can just talk to Max here and if he wants to meet with Leo, I could set it up and bring him to see his Dad. Leo already knows, Elle. There’s no point in keeping Max from him.”
I chewed on my bottom lip and let out a shaky breath. “I’m not even sure if Leo is still in Irving, Jared. When we had that confrontation, he let it slip that Maddock had this new offer for him. He would only be gone for a year...”
“But the moment he said it, all your defenses went up and you became this mother lion protecting her baby cub.”
I smiled at the analogy but my smile faltered. “Or I was merely protecting my heart.”
“I thought you said he was worth it?” Jared gently asked.
My eyes fluttered closed as I went back to our conversation, the first night that Jared was here in Irving when he found out that I was with Leo again. “He is.”
“What happened?”
“I thought I was protecting Max,” I whispered, the tears prickling my eyes, “but I was only protecting myself. I thought I was over it, Red. It turns out that the fear I had was just waiting for the right opportunity to strike and it did when rationality should’ve taken over. Everything just came back to me. How I woke up without him by my side. The pain that overtook my heart and paralyzed me. It all came back and I...”
Jared looked at me long and hard and then he sighed, reaching out to pull me in a tight hug. “Sometimes I really wish that you could just fall in love with me.”
I let out a small laugh and closed my eyes. “It would’ve been easier with us, wouldn’t it?”
He pulled away and placed a warm hand against my cheek. “I would never have broken your heart in any way.”
“But had you did, we wouldn’t have what we have now,” I said quietly, looking at him with a small smile, “and what we have now isn’t something I would trade with the world, Red. You’re my maid-of-honor.”
I winked at him when I said that and he grimaced, remembering the old deal that we had when we were young. “So what now, Elle?”
I turned to focus on the night sky again and shrugged. “I don’t know. Tell Max, I guess. But I really need to have Leo’s input on that matter because even if I could explain it to Max alone, I’m sure Max would want to see him after.”
Jared nudged me. “And does that mean you want Leo to be with you again and be the family that the three of you were meant to be?”
I let out a shaky breath and shrugged, completely uncertain. “I don’t know, Red. It’s all up to Leo now. He knows what I feel for him. He claims to feel the same way. And now he knows that Max is his son. If he wants to stay for us, then we get to be the family that I’ve always dreamed of having. If he goes, then I have to pick up the pieces of my broken heart again.”
Jared placed a gentle kiss on my forehead and smiled. “Then I hope that you get that dream one day, Elle. Even if it’s not with me.”
I squeezed his arm. “I think I’ll go inside and head to bed now. You coming in?”
Just as he was about to answer, his phone rang inside his pocket and he pulled it out, eyebrows furrowed and then turned to me. “I think I need to answer this. You go ahead.”
I wanted to stay and linger downstairs because I really wasn’t sleepy yet but I knew that Jared wouldn’t leave me alone if I did and the last thing I needed was to explain to him. What other explanation did I have other than my irrational fear that Leo would leave me again the same way he did before, the same fear that initially stopped me from being with him but I thought that I’d overcome it when I let my heart make the decision rather than all the rational reasons that my brain gave me.
There wasn’t anything else I could do but climb in bed and hope that the sandman would visit me and lure me to sleep. But there wasn’t much luck. All I could do was think about the confrontation I had with Leo and how I could’ve done it in a hundred different ways, a hundred ways that I wouldn’t break his heart with the truth.
I kept texting the blind date that my roommate, Natasha, had set me up with but he wasn’t replying. He told me that he’d be waiting for me outside the restaurant so that the two of us could come inside together but he hadn’t replied to any of my recent texts and the last text he sent me was the one during lunch which had been hours earlier.
Ultimately, I decided to call Natasha and ask her if he knew about his whereabouts but she didn’t answer my call either so I sent her a text to which she responded to a few minutes later.
He’s here at a frat party, Elle. I asked him about your date and he told me that he wasn’t really into you. I’m so sorry. I thought he was a good guy.
I let out a shaky breath. I’d been waiting outside the restaurant for nearly two hours in killer heels and a dress that I wasn’t even a big fan of but Natasha and the other girls had convinced me to wear. Above me, the clouds gathered, heavy with rain and thunder rumbled in the corner. When the first drop of rain hit my nose, I lost it.
I had such a long day and I was looking forward to this date all week only to end up disappointed. Forgetting the fact that I was in a dress or that I needed to find shelter because the rain was coming in strong, I plopped down on the sidewalk, folded my arms on my lap and let out a choked sob, the weight of the week finally overwhelming me.
And then something flashed across the street and for a moment, I thought it was lightning. Then I heard the patter of footsteps against the wet pavement. “Here.”
I looked up and met kind gray eyes and a small, sheepish smile. My eyes flickered on the wet green handkerchief in his outstretched hand. He chuckled and then sat beside me under the pouring rain. He still had the wet cloth in his hand, waiting for me to take it. “Who are you?”
“Hi. I’m Leo Hudson. Is it okay for me to stay here beside you for a while?” He was already drenched in the rain too but he had this really big smile on his face that warmed my insides despite the coldness of the rain.
“It’s raining.”
He stretched out his other arm, palm up as he seemingly caught the rain in his hand. He turned
back to me, a crooked smile on his face and shrugged. “Better to be soaked with someone beside you than to be drenched in the rain alone.”
Outside, the sky rumbled with thunder and lightning flashed, brightening the night sky for a split second and then I heard an unmistakeable cuss coming from outside. “Oh, for fuck’s sake!”
I shot upright from my bed, my eyebrows furrowed in confusion. Surely Jared would’ve gone in by now so who was outside? Slowly, I crept to the window since my room had a view of the backyard. Then my heart soared at the sight.
In my backyard, Leo Hudson stood soaking in the rain, huge framed canvases surrounding him as he kicked on the ground in irritation and he looked up, directly at my window and noticed me staring. Both our eyes widened but Leo recovered first and he stood there, his hands stuffed in his pockets and then nodded at me, mouthing ‘come down’.
Grabbing a jacket, I rushed downstairs, my heart racing. It was only when I reached the back door I stopped, thinking of how this will all go down. With eyes closed, I uttered a little prayer if there was a God listening to me now, praying that this will work out in the right way for the both of us, praying that this was our chance to really give it a shot, without secrets and all.
“Hi Ellie,” Leo shouted from the middle of the backyard the moment I opened the back door. He was soaking wet.
“I’m sorry about Max!” I blurted out the moment that I was close enough that I didn’t have to shout.
But Leo held up a hand, stopping me from saying anything else. He motioned at the frames surrounding us. “You were meant to wake up to this, photographs of you. I’ve got hundreds of them but I only chose the ones that made my heart race more every time I laid my eyes on it.”
My eyes flickered on each one and sure enough, he was right. But the one that caught my eye most was the blurred picture that I first saw in the gallery, a blown-up grainy picture of me in my orange dress, the very first picture that he took of me, and he was standing right in front of it. “What are these?”
Leo shrugged and then I took a cautious step closer. He reached out and then touched my face, a gentle smile on his. “I wanted to travel the entire world and take pictures of every beautiful sight that the world could offer and I had that chance, for a little while and now it’s dangled in front of me again.”
My heart crumbled a little at what he said but I nodded, flashing him an encouraging smile. If Leo wanted to travel the world again, I’ll let him, as long as he came back home to me. “It’s okay. It’s just for a year. Max and I will wait-,”
Again, he held up a hand and then placed a finger against my lips, chuckling. “Please let me finish, baby.”
Slowly, I nodded my head. The rain was lighter now, more like a drizzle kissing our skin. “Okay.”
He let out a deep breath and continued, “But getting you back made me realize that I’ve always had the most beautiful sight to take pictures of right in front of me and I took you for granted once. Never again, Ellie. No matter what the world could offer me, sights that are beautiful and vibrant, they’re all dull compared to you. All I want is you. A hundred, a thousand, millions of photos of you. You’re my only muse. You’re the only muse I ever want.”
“Leo...”I whispered as he cupped my face with both my hands, “I don’t want you to turn your back on your dreams. We’ll be here, Leo. We’ll wait for you.”
But Leo was shaking his head. “I had my shot at what I wanted before, Ellie, and it wasn’t what made me happy. I wasn’t complete. When I was with you and Max, it felt like nothing was lacking. Then I realized that you two were my missing pieces. I could travel the world over and over and it would be pointless if you weren’t by my side.”
The tears continued to fall as I pulled him in a hug. “But I don’t want to be the reason for you to give up on your dream.”
“On the contrary, you’re the reason why I have a brand new one,” he whispered to me and then pulled away. He wiped his own tears in his eyes as he knelt down on one knee and looked at me. He let out a small chuckle as he motioned at the frames surrounding us, “this wasn’t the idea I had in mind but it seems like the rain never really gives us a break.”
My eyebrows furrowed in confusion. “What are you doing, Leo?”
He reached for my left hand, holding it for a moment. “What I should’ve done a long time ago. I lost you once, Ellie, and I’d be stupid to let you get away again. I lost some time with Max but I promise you that I’ll make up for it-,”
“That wasn’t your fault.”
He tugged at my hand. “Please stop interrupting me.”
I let out a small giggle. “Go on.”
“Marry me, Eleanor Black,” he finally said, looking up at me with earnest gray eyes, “and we’ll travel the whole world together, like it should’ve been the first time around. I’ll take millions of photos of you until we’re gray and old, until my hand will shake so horribly that I’ll be physically unable to take a shot of you. Marry me, Ellie, and I’ll stay by your side for as long as the world allows me to.”
Whatever tears I had managed to contain broke out like a damn as I sobbed in front of him. “Yes, yes. Of course I will, Leo.”
He laughed and then slid the ring on my finger, stood up and pulled me in his arms, hugging me tight as the rain began to pour harder on the both of us. Leo pulled away slightly and his mouth was on mine, kissing me with as much love and passion as he could muster and while the world rained down on us.
He made me feel like sunlight.
Epilogue
Leo
Rain poured down outside, basking us in a coolness that lulled everyone to sleep. But I was creeping around the hotel we were staying at, my heart pounding in my chest as I quietly crept around the hallway, hoping that Megan, Eleanor’s sister or Imogen wouldn’t wake up or else I’ll be scolded because they knew exactly why I was awake and where I was headed.
“You do know that it’s not advisable to see the bride the night before the wedding right?”
I chuckled, knowing the voice too well. “Of course, you would know. You got married twice.”
When I turned around, my older brother stood in front of me, a familiar smirk on his face. His hair was dishevelled like hands had run through it a hundred times. I couldn’t help but roll my eyes, knowing whose hands it had been. His clothes seemed a little bit rumpled too. I nodded at his appearance.
“Kids asleep so you thought you two could sneak it a little private time?” I teased, smirking.
Milo rolled his eyes but a faint blush painted his cheeks. “Mom’s offered to take them for the night. I think she’s making up for grandmother duties since we live so far away.”
“So you thought it would be best to add another one? Golly, Miles, didn’t think that you would be in such a rush considering that Atlas hasn’t been a year old.”
He punched my shoulder, completely disregarding my comment. “What are you up to? Last I checked, Imogen didn’t take Max from Eleanor so you’re obviously not allowed to rendezvous the way I did.”
“Trust me, we’ll have an awful lot of time to jump on each other in Cabo,” I replied nonchalantly, smirking at him, completely unfazed by his teasing, “but the reason why I’m headed there is because of Max and not her.”
Milo’s eyebrows rose in surprise. To be honest, we’re all still adjusting at the fact that I had a son. Aside from Everett, we’re all still reeling from the news that Max was mine. Milo most out of everyone else. It had taken a lot of time explaining to him, why Eleanor kept it from me, why her decision wasn’t entirely a bad thing. Megan had taken most of the brunt of it all, having to listen to all his rants and annoyance at how much of a fool I had been before- as if I didn’t know that already- and how selfish it was for Eleanor to keep it from me when we met each other again and how Max had to grow up without a father even if he had Jared most of his life.
But Milo’s annoyance and disappointment were understandable. When Dad died, he made sure that we ha
d a father figure which was him. But then again, he also realized and ultimately understood why Eleanor had kept it from me. Sometimes heartbreak just kept us from thinking rationally. Also, Megan had to remind him that he was also emotionally absent for Violet for a year after his first wife died. I didn’t take his reaction as hypocritical though. I just knew that Milo would’ve wanted me to be the man that he always knew I could be like any brother would.
“Already missing your little boy?” Milo teased, smiling. I could see a hint of pride in his eyes. “I never really thought that you would be the next one of us to walk down the aisle. I always thought it’d be Ev.”
I rolled my eyes. “Ev only started dating again, Miles.”
But Milo stepped closer and placed a hand at the back of my neck and squeezed me tight for a moment. “I’m really happy for you, Leo. You finally found your match.”
I chuckled but nodded at him solemnly. “I know. Now I need to go see my boy and make a vow to him too. I wanted it to be private, just between the three of us. So if you don’t mind...”
Milo nodded and then stepped aside, letting me pass. I rushed to Eleanor’s room- which was literally on the opposite end of the hotel from where my room was located- hoping that I didn’t bump into anyone else. But I still held the warmth that I felt with my conversation with Milo. Out of my brothers, he was always the one who scolded me when it came to my rendezvous with women but he was also always the one who told me that one day I was going to find the woman that was going to turn my world around.
Little did he know, I had already met her once but I was foolish to let her go.
Never again.
Finally, I reached Eleanor’s door. Reaching for the blindfold that I stuffed in my back pocket, I blindfolded myself first before knocking. Three knocks later, the door finally opened. “What are you doing here?”
“I wanted to see Max,” I replied, smiling as I heard her voice.
I could just imagine her tilting her head. “You’re blindfolded.”
