14 COLE
Watching her drive away is just as painful as waking up to find her gone—maybe more because this is fresh in my mind.
I’m standing in the middle of the road, watching her drive away from me until her car is no longer in view.
My hand comes up and covers my lips, wanting to feel her kiss there forever.
I turn and walk back into the house. I close the door behind me and kick off my boots.
I toss another log into the fire, and I go into the kitchen and pour a stiff drink.
I take the glass back to my lounge chair, but I don’t bother with the TV.
Instead, I watch the fire as the flames dance and move.
I’ve lived alone in this house for the past ten years.
After only a week with her, it’s too quiet now, too lonely.
I wonder how I could’ve changed so much in only a week, but I can’t figure it out.
All I know is that she’s gone, and now things are too quiet, and that really makes me feel like I’m the last person on earth.
There is one positive in this whole situation, though.
She says she wants to work on staying together.
Maybe if we can maintain a long-distance relationship, we’ll eventually get to move into a regular relationship again.
Will she move here, or will I move there?
That’s the same question we’ve always fought about.
Now that I’m the owner of the logging company and the sawmill, living somewhere else is no longer an option.
I have to be here day in and day out to run the place.
Sure, I can take some time off for a vacation if I want, but just moving across the country and never stepping foot in the place won’t work.
I have no idea how her business works, so I don’t know if she could move things around on her end, but I know one thing, I don’t want to ask her to change her life for me.
I did that before, and things didn’t work out well for us.
If I want her, I have to be willing to rearrange my life to make her fit into it, and that’s exactly what I’ll do.
I’ll rearrange some things when the time is right.
Whatever it takes. I love her with all my heart, and these past ten years of living without her have been my own personal hell.
If I have to, I’ll hire a manager who can oversee the day-to-day operations, and my role will go down to simply being the owner.
That would free up a lot of time, so I could fly out there to see her, or I could take some time off when she’s here visiting me.
Whatever it takes, I’ll do. Plain and simple.
I finish off my drink, and I stand and go to the kitchen to pour another.
As I sip at the drink, I look out the kitchen window and into the yard.
The snow is still thick and fluffy in the yard, but the roads are clear now that they’ve been plowed and had salt added.
I bet it will be weeks before this snow has melted away.
I wish it could’ve kept her here a little longer.
We were living in our own little world. I couldn’t have asked for a better snowstorm partner.
I walk back into the living room, and I look around, taking the place in like I haven’t lived here all this time.
Seeing it now feels different. All of her books are on the shelves, all but one.
It’s sitting on the end table, and I pick it up and put it back into place.
I walk back to the bedroom, and I take a deep breath when my eyes land on the bed.
The room smells like her and her favorite perfume.
Memories fill my head of all the things we’ve done on that bed over the past week.
Even though my body should be more than satisfied, I still get hard imagining it.
Annoyed with myself, I go to the bathroom to take a shower.
I need to clear my head and figure out how to be alone again.
I take a long, hot shower, and I don’t get out until the water runs cold.
I turn off the water and wrap a towel around myself.
I step out of the tub, and I stand in front of the mirror, brushing out my hair.
After drying my hair and beard, I pull my hair back into a ponytail before going for some clothes in the bedroom.
I pull on a pair of boxers and some sweatpants.
Taking a deep breath, I head back to the living room, where I sit and watch TV.
I spend hours watching TV simply because I need to keep my mind off one thing and one thing only.
After wasting hours of my life doing nothing, I get up and go to the kitchen to make some dinner.
I decide to grill a steak and toss a potato into the microwave.
I’d like to have a salad, some freshly baked bread, maybe even some baked beans, but it’s pointless to make all of that for myself.
Dinner is getting done around six, and I take my plate to the lounge chair to eat instead of sitting at the table like I have been with Alice.
She’s officially been gone for several hours now, and I wonder how much longer it will be before she’s calling to tell me she made it home safely.
I check my phone just to make sure I haven’t missed her call.
The ringer is turned on, and the volume is up as loud as it can go.
Yet, I have no missed calls. I’m anxious about her getting home safely, and I’m also a little worried that now that she’s gone, things will go back to how they were before.
Maybe she was just telling me what she thought I wanted to hear.
With those thoughts, I can’t even finish eating, and I take my plate to the kitchen and start cleaning up.
The sun is just starting to go down, and I need to gear up for a long night ahead of me.
A long, cold night where I’ll spend it sleeping in my chair and trying to avoid my bed just like I did before she appeared back into my life.
It’s at this moment that I know I’ll do anything to keep her.
If she wants us to live in California, I’ll move there in a heartbeat, and I’ll travel back and forth to check on the logging company and sawmill.
I love her more than life itself, and after ten years, I’ve smartened up enough to know that I can’t go another day without her by my side.