Chapter 18 #2
“I know you, Maren.”
“You knew me.”
I flinch with yet another reminder that she and I are in the past. “You wanted to break up with me,” I repeat, but this time it’s a statement. One I’ve always known to be agonizingly true, but she never confirmed it.
“But you broke up with me, instead.” Her lips tremble. “And you wasted zero time moving on.”
“I didn’t want to split in the first place, but you were pulling away for weeks, lying to me and ignoring my calls.
I wanted to see you, but you blew off any attempts to schedule a visit.
I suggested that we break up in the middle of an argument, but I sure as hell didn’t expect you to jump at the opportunity. ”
“You were on the other side of the country, Nate. You left.”
“And you let me leave, believing you’d be right behind me!” My face heats with pent-up frustration.
Maren squeezes her eyes closed again, as if it’s too painful to revisit that time in our lives. It’s no different for me. It was a difficult period, considering I was in a new city surrounded by strangers.
I was supposed to be there with the love of my life, but she bailed. She disappeared, and when I tried to talk with her about it, she still wouldn’t give me the truth.
When I told her we weren’t working, it was stupid. I regretted saying it the second it came out of my mouth.
But she agreed.
Instead of telling me I was wrong, or even allowing me the chance to take it back and apologize, she fucking agreed.
And my entire world dimmed.
I hold on to the wooden column for balance, the rough edges digging into my palm, but I barely feel the sting.
Maren deeply inhales, and the stuttering sound is so sharp between us, like she’s trying—and failing—to catch her breath.
“I admit—I thought about breaking up with you. I thought it would be the right thing to do so that you wouldn’t wait around for me before you started living your life, but in the end, I couldn’t do it.
I couldn’t say the words to you.” Her voice cracks.
“I couldn’t fathom a life where you and I weren’t together, but you could. You did.”
I push off the column and wrap my arms around her, my throat constricting. She buries her face in my chest, and I hold her close, my fingers tangled in the chestnut trusses of her hair.
Maren releases a sob, and my shirt absorbs it. The fabric dampens with each tear she sheds, and it soaks my skin underneath.
Each drop is like a knife to my fucking heart.
“I’m so sorry,” I whisper, my chin engulfed in her hair, and her lavender scent washes over me.
I hold her tightly for another beat before I pull back, holding her shoulders and meeting her eye level, the bill of my hat grazing her forehead.
“I never meant to hurt you. I didn’t realize how hurt you were.
I thought you—fuck, I thought you didn’t want me anymore. ”
“Of course, I did, but I’m sorry I made you feel like I didn’t. I’m sorry for so many things.” She swipes at her tears until the corners of her eyes redden. “The truth is that I missed you every day, Nate.”
The tearstained spots over my chest burn.
I fucking hate being the cause of these tears.
“I missed you so much that I thought about moving to LA. I started saving money and applying for financial aid again, but…” She hiccups on another sob. “But Mama got sick.”
Her gulp echoes between us like we’re standing in a dark, empty room, instead of outside.
“I had no idea,” I whisper.
It feels like someone pulls a rug out from under me, letting me fall down a terrifying abyss. In my head, I’m screaming, but no one hears me.
I’d heard of her mother’s diagnosis through my mom, but it was two years after I’d left. It was long after I’d gotten married.
With this news, my world tilts on its side, shifting my perspective. Suddenly, everything I thought I knew about us changes.
“She didn’t want everyone to know, not at first,” Maren says. “She needed me. Dixie needed me. I couldn’t leave.”
“I’m so sorry you had to carry this. I wish—” I turn toward the sky, each cloud a wish.
I wish for so many things. For starters, I wish I would’ve known about all this so that I could’ve been there for her. I wish she could’ve leaned on me during the worst time in her life.
“The point is…” Maren winces. “It was hard enough that we broke up. Then the news with my mom completely shattered me. And a year later, I had to hear from the gossiping old biddies in town that you were getting married and having a baby.” Her voice cracks harder this time.
With it, my heart absolutely splinters. “You married another woman, Nate. You became someone else’s husband, and you had a kid with her.
You became a family, while I became a distant memory.
” Tears fill to the brim of her eyes over what feels like several minutes, when in reality, it’s just a few seconds, until they finally fall.
Hard and heavy, as if she’s been holding them back for years.
“It’s over with Sabrina. It has been for a while.” I’m stating the obvious like a fucking idiot. But I have no idea how to take the hurt away from Maren.
I don’t know how to make this right.
“We were never right for each other to begin with.” I shift the hat on my head, hoping the breeze will cool me off, but it doesn’t help.
Nor does the rough exhale I release. “When Sabrina got pregnant, I wanted to be the best father I could be. At the time, I believed that meant we needed to get married to be a family. It’s what I thought was best for our baby, even if in the end, it wasn’t.
” I bite out a curse, scrambling to ease this ache for her—and myself—while my thoughts crash against one another in my mind.
How do I explain how irrational I was? I was a kid. Sabrina and I both were. We made choices that turned out to be the wrong ones, and screwing up was, unfortunately, something I was good at during that period of my life.
“It’s so complicated,” I manage over the frustration bubbling from my stomach and catching in my throat.
“Sounds like it,” she offers, but the shadow darkening her features doesn’t budge. “I can’t just forget that it happened, though.”
“I’m not asking you to forget.” I frown. “I’m just asking you to… to accept me as I am now. To let me show you how good we can be together. I’ll do whatever it takes to have the chance at the future we never got.”
She inches away from me and forces a smile, with so much sadness infused into it that I can’t fucking breathe. “It might be over with Sabrina now, but a piece of your heart will always belong to her. A piece you’ll never be able to give to me.”
“That’s not fair,” I rasp.
“You chose her, Nate,” she clips through her trembling lips, and her curt words slice me in half.
“You didn’t choose me. You didn’t fight for me.
Now you’re back after so long, and what?
How am I supposed to believe I’m not simply convenient for you?
It’s not like you came back here for me.
None of this is about me, and I can’t help but think I’m just an easy, comfortable option. ”
“You’re not. That’s not at all how I feel.
” My chest tightens with warring emotions.
Agony and defiance clash against my rib cage with every painful thump of my heart.
“I should’ve fought for you back then. You deserved that.
You deserved so much more than I gave you, and I’m sorry for letting you down.
I had everything so wrong and backward. If I could just—”
“It’s too late.” Maren shakes her head. “I can’t do this, Nate.”
I cling to her hands, refusing to let her go again.
But it’s not up to me.
I can’t force her to stay. To give me another chance. To give the us we never got to be a chance.
With a heavy, excruciating sigh, she wrenches herself away from me and slips down the porch steps, each thud of her boots along the walkway fading with every yard she puts between us.
I don’t hear the click of her door when she shuts it.
It’s hard to believe this day started with so much promise. So much hope.
In this moment, on a sunny, otherwise perfect Sunday, I only feel darkness. I don’t even hear the beat of my heart anymore.