Chapter 13 #3
Truck slipped his wedding ring on his finger and couldn’t believe how right it felt.
He fingered the smaller band wistfully. Reluctantly, he took his own ring off and put it back into the velvet bag with Mary’s.
He wanted to haul her back to his apartment and demand to know when she’d planned on telling him about their marriage, then make her wear the ring proclaiming her as his.
Just as he would wear his ring, making sure bitches like the chick from the bar knew he was taken.
But instead, he put the bag in his pocket.
He needed to figure out how to get Mary to confess that they were husband and wife, but in the meantime, he couldn’t bear to be separated from their rings. Somehow he felt, if he had them with him, it would somehow make their marriage more real.
Truck went back into his living area and detoured to the kitchen to get a glass of water. He drank it down, then went back to the couch.
His memory was definitely returning. With every word he read, and with every hour that passed, Truck was more and more certain he’d eventually remember everything. His head was throbbing, but nothing could keep him from reading his wife’s words.
I have to admit that I’m feeling better.
I finished the chemo treatments (which sucked) and have started on the radiation again.
Every weekday for fifteen minutes, I get zapped.
I can’t feel it, which is good, although I have a permanent tan mark on my back from the rays. That can’t be healthy, can it?
And my skin is slowly starting to burn. I remember this from before.
Truck has been super attentive the entire time, and I have to admit I love it (although I’d never tell him that. It would go to his head or something. Ha!).
There are times I just don’t understand how he can love me. I’m a pain in the ass. It can’t be fun to be around me right now with my health issues and the way I’m always so bitchy. He could do so much better than me.
But if he decided that he couldn’t deal with the cancer, or me, it would break me. More so than Brian did when I was a teenager. More so than all the other men who let me down. Truck means everything to me, even though I’ve never told him. I have no idea what I’d do without him.
Truck closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
Mary might only be able to admit to herself in her journal how much she cared about him, but seeing the words meant more to Truck than he’d ever be able to put into words himself.
He didn’t like knowing that he had the power to break Mary, but he wasn’t surprised…
simply because she could easily break him as well.
When he opened his eyes, he had to blink a few times to clear the tears from his vision so he could keep reading.
Oh, God. I forgot how bad radiation was.
I can’t stand for anything to touch my chest, which makes it awkward because I’m basically living full-time with Truck in his apartment.
He’s helped me goop up my chest with the lotion they’ve given me, but it burns so bad.
And it’s so humiliating having him see me.
Intellectually, I know boobs don’t make me who I am, but how will Truck ever see me as anything but the poor pathetic shell of a woman I am now?
Not that I have the slightest desire to have sex, but what about the future?
If Truck stays married to me, I’m gonna want to jump his bones, but even I wouldn’t want to bone someone if they had the kind of scars I do.
They simply aren’t attractive in any way, shape, or form.
Nights are the worst. I swear I can feel my skin peeling and cracking.
I lie in his bed on my back, without a shirt on because that shit hurts, and Truck sleeps next to me.
He scoots down until his feet are hanging over the edge of the bed and he throws his arm around my waist. He nuzzles against my hip and tells me how proud he is of me. How strong I am.
What he doesn’t know is that it’s all a lie.
I’m a fraud. I’m not strong at all. If I was, I’d tell him that I love him.
That I want him to be with me for me, not because I needed his fucking insurance.
But I don’t say a word. I lie awake most of the night memorizing the feel of him next to me because I know when this is all said and done, and I’m better (God, please let me get better!), I’m gonna lose him.
Truck remembered sleeping with her like that.
Remembered the helplessness he felt of not being able to do anything for her.
Hating how much pain she was in. Hating that sometimes even the breeze from the ceiling fan on her chest was too much for her to take.
Mary was so fucking strong. He couldn’t even fathom how she’d made it through.
But seeing the words “I love him” in black and white, again, made him more determined than ever to make her believe that she was beautiful inside and out.
She loved him.
Mary fucking loved him.
Truck smiled.
It’s been a while since I’ve written in here. Things are…weird.
The doctor told me my cancer is gone (yeah, like I’ll believe that. I’ve heard it before).
I’m still with Truck, have basically moved in.
But Truck’s friends found out we’re married. And they weren’t happy. They were pissed he kept it from them, because they don’t keep secrets from each other. I’m afraid Truck is gonna tell me to go home, that we should get a divorce, but so far he hasn’t.
But worse than that, Rayne hates me. I can’t blame her, really.
We promised to get married together, and I went behind her back and did the deed without her.
Of course, the promise was bullshit. We were both drunk when we made it, but still.
I know Rayne, and I know she had dreams of me marrying Truck and her marrying Ghost in a double wedding ceremony, and learning that I’m already married killed those dreams. I killed her fucking dreams.
Many times, I’ve thought about how everyone would be much happier if I wasn’t around.
If I hadn’t married Truck and gotten the treatment, they might’ve mourned me, but Rayne would be married, Truck might’ve found someone who was less annoying than me, and the others wouldn’t all be fighting.
God. This sucks.
Mary and Rayne had a pact to get married together?
The guys were fighting because he’d married Mary and hadn’t told them?
He couldn’t imagine why he didn’t tell his best friends about it…
unless he was protecting Mary. Yeah, he could see himself not wanting to make her feel awkward around the others.
But he didn’t believe for one second that any of the women, or his friends, would be happier without her around. That was bullshit. She’d better not still believe that.
Things still suck. At least Annie is still talking to me. We’re practicing our sign language together. She’s so fucking cute. Says she’s gonna marry Frankie, the deaf kid she met who lives out in California. They “talk” over the Internet all the time.
I miss my best friend.
Truck seems to have patched things up with his friends, thank God, but Rayne still hates me.
I don’t know how Harley feels, but since she’s super close to Rayne, she probably does too.
Kassie is about to give birth. Emily is not far behind her (and she’s having a boy!
One of the nurses I got to know in the hospital spilled the beans to me.
I promised not to tell, but it’s been hilarious telling Emily that I just “know” she’s having a boy because Annie wants a brother. She’s going to be so happy).
I don’t really even know Casey or Wendy that well, which sucks because they seem to be really nice. Rayne’s brother is now with a woman named Sadie. Truck’s talked about how hilarious Bryn is, Fish’s wife, but again, I wouldn’t know because I’m not in the inner circle anymore.
Truck is…Truck. He’s so nice to me and now that I’m not sick anymore, sleeping next to him is akin to torture. Right before he comes to bed, I steal his pillow so I can smell him on it all night. He doesn’t know though. He always smells so good.
Oh, and…I miss sex. It’s silly. I mean, I was sick for so long, I couldn’t imagine ever wanting it again. But one night when Truck was at work, I masturbated. I climaxed so hard, because I was thinking of Truck’s big hands on my body. How his tongue would feel eating me out.
I’m so pathetic. But, man…now that I’ve started thinking about it, I can’t stop.
Truck swallowed and felt his dick twitch in his pants. Reading about Mary wanting sex, and masturbating, was so damn sexy, he almost couldn’t stand it.
He had no idea how old the journal entries were though.
They might be years old, or they might have been written shortly before that last mission when he got hurt.
Truck had no idea since they weren’t dated.
He was glad he and his friends had patched things up, but it sucked that Mary had still felt ostracized.
Obviously they’d made up, because Rayne was in constant contact with Mary now, but he hated that they’d had a falling out in the first place, especially since it centered around their marriage.
Rayne and me are BACK!
I decided that enough was enough and I was going to apologize for everything. But then the bank got held up, and I had to hide in the vault with her.
I spilled my guts and she FORGAVE ME!
God. Nothing feels as good as having Rayne back.
I also kinda told Truck that I wanted him. That I wanted to be a real wife to him.
Things have been weird with us lately, but I’m hoping that I haven’t ruined our chances altogether. I’m working on being nicer, not only to him but to everyone. It’s been hard (especially when that skank paramedic hit on him), but I don’t want to always be the bitch.
He has to go on a mission this weekend, but when he gets back, I’m going to tell him that I like him. A lot. I want to tell him that I love him, but I have to work up to that.