38. In The Doghouse
In The Doghouse
Vandal
The cleaners arrive just as I step out of my bedroom to the destruction and disorder left from last night’s event. These can be fixed with a few hours of work and a credit card.
Lola…the trauma last night caused to Lola can’t be corrected as easily.
She’s not just going to forgive me for lying to her.
Or understand why I didn’t invite her to my party.
The look in her eyes when she saw me dancing with those children…there was no way she could tell that far away in the low strobing lights how young they were, which might be a blessing. It’s one thing to be a lying, cheating creep and completely another to…
How am I going to get her to forgive me?
Start with the basics: coffee, flowers, and diamonds. Then grovel…until your knees bleed.
But none of that will matter if it happens again, which it will. We haven’t gotten The Ghost. Hopefully, one of the others got some real concrete answers because I’ve gotten nowhere at all, except in the doghouse with Lola.
Why now?
Why did she have to walk into my life now, when I don’t have the space to give her what she needs? What she deserves?
Walk away.
Fly said it.
The world just showed you that the two of you have no chance at working.
Not one single chance.
Then why am I heading out to get coffee, flowers, and diamonds?
Because it doesn’t matter.
None of it matters.
Lola and I were made for each other.
There’s nothing in this world that can stop us from being together.
***
Should I knock?
Maybe I should just stand out here and wait for her to come out.
That could be all day.
She has to eat, doesn’t she?
Maybe I should knock.
Or I should start groveling and then knock.
The door opens, and LynnLeigh stares at me in shock. “You’re not here. I’m seeing things because no man would be stupid enough to show up at the door of the woman he lied to and cheated on before they went on their first date. So I must be seeing things.”
“Is she in there?” Could I sound any more pathetic?
“For you, she no longer exists. You need to walk away and never even look in her direction again. If you see her walking on campus, turn the other way. If she’s in a restaurant, pick another one.
If she’s at a party you want to go to…well, that’s never going to happen ever again.
What were you thinking? Are you stupid or something?
Because one second, you’re into her. The next, you’re at a party dancing with other girls when you could have been dancing with her.
In what part of your feebly small brain does that make sense?
Or do you just enjoy trifling with women?
” LynnLeigh steps forward, shoving her pointy fingernail into my chest. “Was that it? Was my friend just a game to you?”
“Never.”
“Then why are you playing games with her?”
The truth is the one answer I can’t give.
“Answer me.”
“I can’t. There is no excuse. There is no reason good enough for hurting her. All I can do is say I’m sorry. It was not my intention to hurt her. I would do anything to protect her.”
Lola steps up to the door. At least a woman who at one point looked like my Lola. This creature…this completely decimated creature can’t be the woman I’m falling for.
I did this to her. I destroyed her, hoping to save some strangers that I might never even meet. It hardly seems worth it, regardless of how idealistic I was.
Except it wasn’t nameless, faceless people. My brother’s son died. I can’t stop now.
“Hi. These are for you.” I hold out the offerings without much hope that she’ll take them.
The woman in front of me is a zombie pretending to be part of the living and failing at it dismally.
Like I am any better. I might not have a tear-streaked face, my hair might be nice and neat, there’s no makeup on my face to turn me into a raccoon, but that doesn’t mean I’m any more alive than she is.
She takes them like a robot with unseeing eyes. “Why?”
There is no answer to that. “I’m sorry.”
“Why?”
“I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
“Why!”
“I know you can’t forgive me, but the last thing I would ever do is hurt you.”
“WHY?”
There is no answer to give, so I stand there silently begging for her to see past all of this and know to trust me even though every part of her screams that I’m no longer trustworthy.
As the silence echoes around us, the zombie turns around and shuts the door on me…on us.