38. Declan
Chapter thirty-eight
Declan
" H ey babe? Did you want to go to a Caps game this weekend? I think they're playing the North Carolina Titans," I call out as I walk into the house. I'm kicking off my shoes, thumbing through a stack of mail when I hear a throat clearing.
I look up to see my beautiful Serenity, but the atmosphere in the front entryway is off. She's nervous. Biting her lip and picking at her cuticle again. It's then that I notice the luggage at her feet.
My heart sinks into my chest at the same time that it trips over itself.
"No," I say, deathly serious as I lay the mail and keys down on the table. I step towards her, hands itching to hold her.
She holds up a hand to stop me.
"You're not leaving me," I growl.
"Hear me out, please?"
"You're not leaving me!" I shout this time, wincing at the sheer terror lacing my voice. My brave girl doesn't even flinch.
Her lower lip quivers. "I'm not breaking up with you. If you don't want. I just... I want to do this right, Dec. I never learned how to live on my own. I went straight from my parents' house to yours. We never dated. We never got to know each other before we jumped into bed together. And I don't know where you're at, but," she squares her shoulders before clearing her throat, "I want this to be forever. And I feel like you deserve that, if it's what you want, too."
I can't stop myself this time. I wrap my arms around her and bring her against my body, as if I can physically keep her from leaving me.
"Don't do this. Please. I'll do whatever you want. I'll take you on dates. We can take sex off the table. We can have long chats about anything you want. Just please, don't leave me."
She kisses my chest before she says, "You taught me about boundaries. This is one that I'm asking you for."
God, that guts me. But she's right. If we don't have boundaries, we have nothing.
She pulls back and places her hands on my cheeks, but the look I see in her eyes devastates me. She's leaving, and there's nothing I can do about it.
"I lo..." but she cuts me off with a hand over my mouth.
"If you love me, you'll give me six months. I want to keep seeing you, but if you can't wait for me, I understand." She swallows and I know this is hard for her too.
But I do love her. I love her with everything I have, and if tearing my heart out and letting her walk away is what she wants, it's what I'll do.
So, with a sad smile, I help her load her suitcases into an uber. She tells me how her and Ella got an apartment together closer to campus. And that she hopes I'll visit her there. But she sounds far away and I'm blinking back hot tears that threaten to fall.
She tips up on her toes and presses a kiss against my lips, but I'm numb. I swallow thickly as I watch her uber drive away. When I turn around to drag myself back into my house, I watch as the very last of the rose petals drifts to the ground on a cold breeze.
The finality of it shatters me. It's the end of the roses. Is it the end of our relationship?
Will she find someone her own age at college and realize how much better she could do? She should be off at frat parties, not hanging out with an old fucker like me and a sex club. Will she decide the lifestyle's not for her? Or will she find someone younger to dom her?
The uncertainty of it all eats away at me.
I pop open the most expensive bottle of bourbon I have and drink until I don't feel the pain anymore.
***
That's how Daniel and Harrison find me an hour later. Miserable, drunk, and firmly back in my anger.
"She sent us to check on you. Said you might not be handling her moving out well." Daniel says.
"I don't know what the fuck happened. Everything was perfect. She was perfect. We were perfect. Why the fuck does she think she needs to do it all over again?" I shout, throwing the now empty bourbon bottle against the wall and watching as it shatters. Light from the streetlamps catches on the thousands of splintered glass.
Harrison rubs the back of his neck, and I know he's guilty of something. I jump to my feet and am in front of him in a blink. I grab the front of his shirt in my fist. "What the fuck did you do!?" A droplet of spittle lands on his cheek but I don't fucking care.
He holds up his hands defensively. "Look, man, I just told her to be careful with you. I didn't want to see you get your heart broken."
"Look how well that fucking worked out!" I shout, shaking him by his shirt.
"What did she say when she left?" Daniel asks, pulling me off of Harrison.
"That she wanted a do-over. That she wanted to do things right. And if I loved her, I'd let her leave."
I slump down on the couch. The bourbon may have numbed the worst of the pain, but my head is swimming and I’m tired, well past the point of drunk.
"Well, that's good, then, right? She didn't break up with you. She wants a second chance to make your relationship right."
"It already was right! It was fucking perfect!" My drunk brain is repeating itself, but it's all I can think about. Before Serenity came into my life it was like I was going through the motions. I had work and running but not much else. She came into my life and before I really even knew what was going on, she'd given my life purpose. It started out as just protecting and providing for her, but the more she gave me of her trust and her body and her submission the more I came alive.
How am I going to survive without her? Six fucking months of what? Not holding her? Not touching her? Of freaking out wondering if she's safe or fed or not?
I won't fucking make it.