31. Bridget
CHAPTER 31
Bridget
Once the car pulls up outside my apartment, I thank the driver and hurry inside like someone is chasing me. There’s no telling what happened after I left. If Ethan ran out behind me, he could be minutes from showing up. Or maybe he chose to stay behind and be with his family.
The thought of him choosing them over me causes a tightness in my chest as my breathing picks up. I wouldn’t be surprised if he stayed behind; it is Thanksgiving, after all. He should be with his family, and despite our recent confessions, I can never be family to him. He should choose them.
Besides, no one chooses me. His father didn’t, so why would Ethan?
I can’t fucking do this.
Tears start welling in my eyes as I enter my apartment, set my purse on the kitchen island, and stand there paralyzed, trying to calm my rising panic attack. There’s a faint vibration from my purse, and I reach in to fumble around for the power button, not even looking at the screen as I shut it off. I throw my head back and let out one guttural scream, then swipe the tears from my face and try to compose myself. This is all I’ll allow myself to feel as I shove these emotions into a neat little box in my heart. I can do this. I will do this.
How did I not see this? How did I not know they were related?
They have the same last name, but Black is a fairly common last name, like Jones or Smith. It didn’t even occur to me. I know several people with that last name, and I didn’t assume they were all related to Henry.
Hank.
Whatever the fuck he wants to be called now. Did Ethan ever call him by his first name to me, or just refer to him as ‘Dad’?
Now that I know they’re related, I guess I can see some small resemblances. But Ethan’s eyes are nothing like Henry’s, not in shape nor in the stunning green color. His perfect fucking mouth is uniquely his own, and Henry doesn’t have that delicious dimple.
Thinking back to high school, I have little to no recollection of that time in my life after I found out he cheated. My brain went into self-preservation mode, saving me from the emotional trauma I endured. Not a single image of Monica, the other woman, Ethan’s biological mother, comes to mind. He must share her features, but I have no clue. I can’t remember if we’d ever met in high school.
I look around the apartment, unsure of what to do next. I can’t stay here. There’s nothing to stop him from showing up. He has a key that I gave him when he helped after my surgery, and even if I used the chain on the door, I’m not sure I’d be strong enough to turn him away if I saw him.
I move to the window and stare down at the street. After several minutes, I decide it’s safe to take a shower. The need to rinse the day off me is too strong. There’s not a door between me and the shower that isn’t locked. I need to be sure that if he does come over, he can’t find me when I’m the most vulnerable and naked.
Once the water heats up, I slip in and let it wash everything off my body.
My anger.
My heartache.
My grief.
All my fucking emotions.
I collapse onto the shower floor, crying until the water is cool on my skin and a shiver wracks my body. Peeling myself off the tile, I shut off the water. The apartment is silent as I carefully slip out, wrap a towel around myself, and walk to the sink.
The mirror taunts me with my reflection as I reach for my cleanser to finish the half-assed job I started in the shower. But my hand freezes as a pang of sadness stabs my chest. I can’t even wash my face without thinking about him.
I hurry through my routine, giving thoroughness a big fuck you, before slipping into pajamas. According to the clock on my nightstand, it’s been two hours since I got home. His parents live an hour outside the city, and I worry that he could show up soon.
Emerging from the cocoon of my bedroom, I’m no fucking butterfly. I feel like shit, and I look it too. I grab my phone from my purse, turn it on, and set it face down until the notifications stop buzzing. My thumb swipes up to clear everything, so I don’t have to see what Ethan’s texts say.
Scrolling until I find Becka, I decide it’s time to fill her in on the shitshow that is my Thanksgiving.
Turns out Ethan and I have more in common than orgasms.
Becka
Didn’t we already establish this?
Ethan is my ex’s son. The one in high school who cheated on me.
And got someone pregnant?
Wait…
Holy shit!
Ethan is Henry’s child?
Yes, Ethan is Henry’s son.
He goes by Hank now.
I guess it makes him feel like more of an adult than being called Henry.
Idgaf what he likes being called.
WTF?!?!
How are you handling this?
Where are you?
I assume you left his parents’ house?
You assumed correctly.
Come over. I have wine. And leftovers.
I can’t.
Oh no, you don’t. If you aren’t coming here, I’m coming to you.
You’re not shutting me out. I know you.
I can’t do this, Becka.
Can’t do what?
Talk to me?
Be with Ethan?
All of it.
It’s too much.
I’m not fine.
Babe, I get it. I mean, I don’t, but I do.
I can’t imagine how you feel right now.
But you’re not alone.
I’m coming over.
With wine and ice cream.
Don’t.
He could show up any minute. I need to deal with him, and I need time to process. Raincheck?
Anything you need, babe.
I’m here for you.
I set my phone on the counter right as a knock sounds at the door. It’s soft and timid, nothing like Becka’s greetings, so it must be Ethan.
“Bridget, please, can we talk?” he speaks quietly through the door. I unfasten all the locks and open the door, his handsome face now holding a hollowed expression etched with despair. His green eyes are bloodshot and puffy, a stark contrast to their normally vibrant hue.
His features are drawn and slack, lacking the usual dimpled smile, and his once neatly styled hair now falls in disheveled tufts as though he’s been tugging on it. The weight of his emotional turmoil is evident in every tremor of his voice and the slumped posture that makes him seem smaller than before.
The heartbreak on his face is too much to bear so I turn to the kitchen determined to busy my hands with a meaningless task so I don’t have to face his hurt. I hear the door click behind him as he follows me.
“You’ve got to believe me, if I knew he was your ex, I wouldn’t have brought you there. I wouldn’t have put you through all of that.” I see his hand reach out in my peripheral, so I move quickly around the counter to put distance between us.
There is truth in his words, but a thought nags me, and I blurt it out before I can stop myself. “But you wouldn’t have kept dating me.” Even though my back is turned, I can feel the wound I inflict on him.
“Hell yes, I would have stayed with you. I know this is a fucked-up situation, but it doesn’t change how I feel about you,” he vows, grabbing my hand and forcing me to face him.
He takes a step toward me, so I step back to keep distance between us as I pull my hand from his grasp.
“For fuck’s sake, I lost my virginity to your dad. How is this our story? How do I explain that to people?” I shout, pulling at the strands of my damp hair, desperate to say anything that will create distance between us.
“Who says you have to? And who cares what other people think?”
“I do! I care!”
“I don’t. I don’t care who you lost your virginity to. I don’t care about all the other men you’ve been with before me. Those experiences shaped you into who you are, and I love who you are. If everything hadn’t happened the way it did, we might not be the people we are now. You might not have become the amazingly strong, independent woman I fell in love with, or maybe we’d never have crossed paths at all. I believe everything has to happen the way it did to make us who we are at this exact moment. And I don’t give a fuck what anyone else thinks about that. It’s just me and you.”
Despite the sincerity in his eyes, I flinch. How can he not understand?
“As a woman, I don’t have the luxury of not giving a fuck. I’ve tried, I really have, but I’m constantly reminded that everything I do is wrong or not enough. I have to put on a mask at work to be someone I’m not because if I show my true self, I’ll never be enough. Even Becka only gets pieces of the real me.
“I’m so tired of being a version of myself to please someone else. Be the perfect daughter, the perfect student, the perfect friend, the perfect employee. Be the perfect girlfriend so he’ll fall in love with you. I was so young when I lost my virginity, and it felt like I gave him every part of me, and he didn’t want it. So I made sure that every guy who came after him only got the pieces of me that I was willing to give. That’s why I don’t do relationships. Because this is how they end. I break, and I get hurt.” I will the welling tears to remain at bay. Crossing my arms over my chest, I stare him down, determination on my face. There’s no way I’ll give in.
“You don’t think it kills me to see you hurt?” His deep voice is soft and soothing as he takes a step closer to me, his hands balling into fists at his side.
“The only person who has ever seen the real me is you. You came barging into my life demanding pieces of me. You said you’d never hurt me. And you didn’t. But I am hurt. It feels like life has erected this unscalable wall between us, keeping us apart. This isn’t love. It can’t be. I can’t be in love with my ex’s son. I can’t.”
“But you are. And I’m in love with you. You don’t get to choose who you love, and believe me, I get that this situation sucks. But even if I knew about your past with my dad, I’d still choose you. That first night with you, I knew. I knew there was something special between us, that there was something special about you. I’m not saying it was love at first sight, but I did fall in love with you quickly.”
“But is it love? It can’t be if it hurts like this.” My arms squeeze tighter under my chest as I draw my body in on itself, trying to protect my heart from his declarations.
“I know it’s real because of that pain,” he says as he soothes a hand down my arm while crooking the other under my chin, forcing me to look up at him. Looking at him is too difficult. I’m not ready to face the truth in his words or the emotions he wears so openly.
My back hits the wall as I take another step out of his reach, throwing my hands out to ward him off. “It’s not real. We were forced to be around each other when you stayed here for six weeks. Anyone would develop feelings in that situation. I feel affection for you because you took care of me when no one else could. I didn’t fall in love with Henry’s son. I didn’t. That would be… messed up.”
“It’s so much fucking more than that for me. You need to know that.” He steps into me, his hand on my hip, grounding me and forcing me to connect with him.
“I don’t know that,” I say as I push his hand off me and walk to the living room. “You’re twenty-three. You don’t know what you want. You don’t know what love is. You’re too young.” The words feel hollow and wrong as they leave my mouth, but it’s the only thing I can say to push him away and put that wall back up around my heart.
“Ahhh.” He throws his head back and growls. “Enough with that shit. We both know that I have the emotional maturity of someone well beyond twenty-three. I had to learn to process my emotions in a healthier way because I had little sisters looking up to me who needed a parental figure since my dad was never around to do it his own goddamn self. But I’m a man with real emotions, and I’ve had enough of you throwing my age in my face as justification for what you think is your poor decision-making.”
“Fuck you.” I’m grasping at straws. I don’t know how to make him see that we can’t do this. I cannot allow Henry, Hank, whatever the fuck his name is back into my life.
“We both know I’m good for you. We are good for each other. If we were the same age, you’d have no argument, so cut that shit out right now and fight with me like an adult who owns their shit. You chose to be with me. We’ve had months together, and I fall harder and deeper every day.”
“Fuck—”
“You, yeah, you said that. You hide behind all these walls, but I know the real you, so stop yielding to the pressures of society. I don’t give a fuck what my dad thinks about us. I don’t give a fuck what other people think about us being together. I only care about how you feel, about us, about me. You’re my best friend, my home, the love of my fucking life, and I’m not throwing that away because you slept with my dad in high school. He’s not part of this relationship. I’ll fight for you every day to prove that this is real. That what I feel for you is real.”
With every word, he steps closer to me, closing the distance I put between us until he’s inches from me, his hand cupping my cheek as he rests his forehead against mine.
“I can’t do this with you,” I rasp.
“What are you saying?”
Something cracks in my chest as I push him away, taking another step back until I collide with one of the floor-to-ceiling windows. “I need time to process this. I need time to decide if this is what I want. I don’t know if I can handle being with you if he’s part of it.”
“He’s not part of this,” he insists as he closes the distance between us and cages me against the window. “Please don’t run. Don’t shut me out.” His pleas ghost against my skin as his face dips down, and his stubble grazes my cheek and neck. He kisses the spot where my neck meets my shoulder. “I love you.”
His mouth hovers over my skin for several heartbeats, waiting for me to return the words, but I can’t. I can’t say the words he needs, but I also can’t watch his heart shatter from my silence. My lips press together as I close my eyes and turn away from him. “I think you should go back to your place for a while.”
He tenses around me. “How long is a while?” His voice cracks with emotion.
“I don’t know,” I admit, still unable to look at him.
He places a gentle kiss on my exposed neck as he pushes back from the window and makes his way down the hall to my bedroom.
There’s no light in his eyes when he emerges a few minutes later, bag in hand. “This isn’t over,” he states, but even he doesn’t believe it. “I packed what I could, but I will be back when you’re ready to talk again.”
As he slips through the front door and the snick of it closing echoes through the space, I collapse onto the floor and release every emotion I’ve been holding in. My neat little box is broken, and not even I can fix it.