But I Love Him Page 2

  But I don’t have it in me anymore. I’m losing him to it.

  The long silence stretches between us and I wait for it. Wait to discover which way he is tipping.

  “I love you too,” he says, and kisses my neck.

  I sigh in relief. For tonight we have won.

  I turn back toward him and kiss him, and he rolls into me, kissing my cheeks and lips and chin and neck, and in seconds we are lost to it.

  These are the only moments we have left. These precious seconds where the passion blots out everything else, and it is just us. The rest is a war neither of us can ever win.

  But I have already waved my white flag.

  I have already surrendered.

  August 15

  Eleven Months, sixteen Days

  I’ve made a mistake. A huge, monumental mistake.

  I forgot Connor’s truck broke down. I forgot he was going to be waiting for me when I walked out of Subway. I’ve only been back on the job for two weeks, and it’s already putting a strain on my relationship with Connor.

  And now he’s seen me. He’s seen me laugh and push Mark, the new guy.

  And I know what he’s thinking, and I know where his mind is going, and I know without asking that he’s steaming, waiting for me. I know the fear he has of losing me overpowers everything else, even his common sense. I know deep inside he trusts me, but I know his raging insecurities will always prevail.

  He’s so afraid of losing me that he can’t see I’d never leave him.

  And I know he had to have seen the way Mark hugged me with one arm, just a loose sideways hug, but still a hug. He won’t believe me when I say Mark means nothing. He’ll just replay that hug over and over in his mind and he’ll spin a story that’s so far from the truth.

  I’ve been so careful for so long. It was bound to happen eventually. I was bound to slip and do something like this. Why do I even wonder why I have no friends anymore? Why do I even wonder why no one talks to me? It’s my own doing. It’s my own fears that something will happen and I’ll say the wrong thing to the wrong person, and they’ll interfere somehow. And this is what will happen.

  Even Abby knows it. It’s why she stays away without me telling her to. It’s why she smiles that sad smile when she sees me.

  It’s why she’s stopped trying to be my friend. She was the last to give up. The last to surrender me to Connor.

  I hate this. I hate it so much, this waiting as we walk toward my car, Mark having no idea what’s about to happen and me knowing it too well.

  I’m afraid. I hate that I’m actually afraid of him right now. I hate that I know what this silence means, and all I can do is wait for it to explode.

  I feel claustrophobic and I’m not even in the car yet. I consider running. Away from him, away from everything. I could go five, ten miles before I had to stop. I’d be halfway to Aberdeen by then. Our tiny ocean town of Westport, Washington, is a town of nothing. I’d be gone in ten minutes.

  But that won’t solve it, and maybe this time he’ll talk to me. He’s been getting a little better, now that he’s away from his dad so much. He’s been cooling. Adjusting. Maybe this time he’ll understand, and he’ll see that Mark is just some random guy who means nothing at all, and we can use this to grow from.

  I know that’s going to happen, if I stick with him long enough. He just needs some guidance, some love, some understanding. He wants so badly to become that person.

  But of course that’s not the case. When he clicks his door shut, and before I start the car, he grabs my wrist and squeezes, too hard. It’s always too much, too intense, too everything.

  “Forget the store. Take me to the apartment. Now.”

  And for some reason, the whole ride there, the whole deathly silent ride, I keep hoping that my car will break down too and I’ll have to get out, that we’ll never make it to his apartment.

  But we do. I pull up at his fourplex, parking so carefully, perfectly between the white lines. I stare at the other three doors, hoping no one is home in those apartments. It’s a tiny building, two apartments downstairs, two up. Connor’s is on the upper left, with a big crooked number three nailed to the door.

  I follow him up the old wooden stairs, my heart pounding. I can hardly feel the thin railing as it slides underneath my hand, guiding me toward the front door with the peeling red paint.

  We’re barely through the entry before he shoves me, hard, and I’m sent sprawling all over the floor. I bang my elbow and a jolt of electricity shoots up my arm. I hear the door slam behind me, and the pictures on the wall rattle with the force.

  I lie there longer than I should, trying to keep my breathing down, trying to suppress the instinct to curl in a ball. I know his moods can turn with the right words. I know if I think clearly, I can steer him back toward being himself again.

  If I do this right, Connor will be back.

  “You’re such a slut,” he says, spitting the words at me. “Do you spread your legs for him, too?”

  I’m stunned into silence. He’s been cruel before … but this … this is coming from somewhere deeper.

  “No, God, no. I love you. Only you.”

  I hardly cry anymore when he’s like this. I’ve become numb to it, and the tears don’t come like they used to. I just take it and wait, and when it’s over I hold him until he is through hating himself for this, and we pretend it never happened.

  But today the tears are brimming at his words. They bruise so much deeper than his fist.

  “You’re so fucking stupid, you know that? How could you think he would look twice at you once he has you? I’m the one who’ll stick with you. Who keeps you around. You’re nothing to him.”

  That can’t be all I am to him. He can’t be just “keeping me around.” He needs me. Just as I need him. But hearing the words buckles everything inside of me. I fold in on myself and bury my face in my knees and wrap my arms around my legs and try to disappear. I could drown in my own tears.

  He hauls me up off the ground, sending waves of pain up my shoulder at the way he jerks me. Then he backs me into a wall, so he has me cornered.

  He always does it like this. It’s like he wants me to be trapped. It ensures I never leave until his anger is gone. It ensures he can always fix the things he’s ruined instead of letting me walk out the door with an ugly feeling swirling in my stomach.

  I can never walk away with this image in my mind. It is always the aftermath, the tears in his eyes, the begging for forgiveness. But it’s getting messier and more complicated every day. It’s getting harder to remember the apologies before the hits.

  Not when they’re coming more often. Not when the sweet spots are shrinking and the anger is boiling and nothing is going the way I thought it would.

  Why? Why does he have to let his anger explode like this?

  How does he look at me like this, trembling, crying, and continue to yell? How can he look me in the eyes and be so cruel?

  I could never do this to him. Never.

  “You have no idea how fucking stupid you are.”

  And then he reels back, his hand fisted, and punches.

  The wall.

  It caves in around me, bits of drywall showering down around my shoulders.

  And that is that.

  The first hit, the first good, hard hit, usually wakes him up. I can actually see it in his face, this abrupt before and after.

  I always know when it shifts. I think maybe the pain, so raw and real, pulls him out of his rage. Today I am lucky. Today it is the wall, and not me.

  He blinks, twice, and looks at me. At the way I tremble in front of him.

  “Oh. I …” He steps away from me. There is always a moment like this. A moment where I think he is seeing himself, where he’s reeling everything back inside him, forcing it back down and bottling it back up, and then he turns to me. For that split second before he gains his senses again, I see that same shock and fear on his face as must be mirrored on mine. I see that he has no
idea what he’s done. That he had no control of himself.

  But it’s not fair. It’s not fair that he lets his rage take over, that he lets it rule him. I don’t know why he has to be two people.

  I don’t know why he gets to be two different people, and I only get to be me, the one who is here to take what he has to give, and who is here to pick up the pieces afterward.

  Me. It’s always me. I don’t want it to be like this anymore. I can’t handle more of this. I’m barely holding it together.

  I’m barely holding him together.

  It’s just not fair.

  He steps forward to hug me, but I stiffen and he has to force his arms around me to get the hug to work.

  And I let out a sob of relief, because it’s over. The episode is over. Today he didn’t touch me. And I think this may be a good thing, it may mean he’s not going to. Ever again. If he can see me with another guy and get this angry and not touch me, it has to mean something. I let myself hope that it means something, because otherwise I’m not sure how much longer I can last.

  He holds me and I melt into a mess of sobs, which shocks me. I thought I was done doing this. I thought I could steel myself from this. But I can’t handle the roller coaster anymore. I can’t handle this up and down.

  He lets me slide to the floor and then he pulls me into his lap and he rocks me, back and forth, as I sob so hard I can’t breathe and start hiccupping.

  “I’m sorry, Ann. I’m so sorry.”

  I sniffle, my breath coming out in funny little rasps. “I don’t want you to be sorry. I want you to stop doing this. I want it to be like it was when we met.”

  “I know. It will be, I promise. I’ll treat you like I used to. I swear.”

  I nod my head, wanting to believe it.

  But even when I stop crying, even when we fall asleep and I’m nestled in his arms, this will leave another scar. No one will see it. No one will know. But it will be there. And eventually all the scars will have scars and that is all I will be, one big scar of a love gone wrong.

  July 30

  Eleven Months

  I’m oddly nervous. Today, I’m unveiling my sculpture, and I desperately want him to see it and finally understand how much I love him. I want him to feel it, to the depth of his soul, like I do.

  He is late getting home, and I pace the floors near the window, waiting to see the headlights smear across the wall. When they finally do, I practically jump out of my skin.

  I wait near the front door, a soft smile on my lips, as he ascends the stairs, his steel-toed boots pounding on each step. With each footfall, my nerves intensify, until they are nearly buzzing up and down my arms and legs.

  “Hey sweetheart,” I say, and reach out to kiss him.

  “Hi.” His voice is gruff and he’s barely touched his lips to mine before he’s moving past me, like he hasn’t even seen me at all.

  “I made you something,” I say.

  “I’m not hungry.” He passes down the hall and disappears into the bathroom before I can respond. I stare after him for a moment, the front door still ajar behind me.

  I follow him. “It’s not food, it’s—”

  “I got fired, Ann. I’m not in the mood for chit-chat, okay?”

  It’s hard not to step back at the sound in his voice. There’s a dangerous edge to it. An edge that tells me to stay away. Far, far away. If I were smart, I would leave. Right now, before it grows, before it simmers and stews and explodes.

  It was bound to happen, of course. He was often so tired he probably didn’t work at all. Not on the nights he was up late, helping his mom. Not on the nights he tossed and turned, so tortured by his past he didn’t care about the future.

  He missed some days. He was late. And yet somehow I didn’t see it coming.

  Now what? Do I hide the heart? Save it for a better day? It’s sitting on the dining room table in all its shimmering glory, under the glow of the chandelier. I don’t know where I’d put it even if I wanted to move it. I could toss a sheet over it, maybe. Hope he doesn’t notice it.

  When I hand that beautiful piece of art to him, I want him to smile. I want to see the impact it has on him as he stares at it, knowing how much I love him.

  And none of that will happen if he’s in this kind of mood. All those hours and hours of work will be for nothing. I can’t let that happen. It has to be for a reason. I have to see the payoff, or the disappointment will just be too much to bear.

  I nod to myself and head toward the hallway closet. We must have some spare sheets or something. Or maybe the whole closet is big enough. I could make a little area on a shelf, put it up there where it is safe. It’s not much bigger than a basketball, though oddly shaped and far more fragile.

  I dig around in the closet, trying to move some towels and boxes, desperate to find enough room for it before Connor leaves the bathroom. He’s not in the mood for a gift. He might react strangely to it. I need to save it for a better day. A better opportunity. A better—

  “What is this?”

  His voice carries down the hall. He’s not in the bathroom at all. He’s in the dining room. My heart throws itself around in my chest. It’s too late to hide it.

  I walk toward him, praying he’s happy, praying all those months were for something. When I round the corner and see his face, the nervous rigidity in my limbs melts away.

  His face has softened, and his eyes are expressing a gratitude I’ve never seen before. They shine with it. He walks over to me, wraps his arms around me, and rests his chin on the top of my head. “Thank you. I needed this today. Really needed it.”

  I nod and rest my cheek against his chest. I can hear his heart beat, calm and rhythmic, and it soothes me until we are both so relaxed we just sort of melt to the floor and keep hugging.

  “I love you,” he says. “I’ll always love you.”

  “So you like it?” I ask, pulling back to see his eyes.

  “Yes. I love it. It’s beautiful.”

  I grin. “I’m glad. I’ve been working on it for months. I collected all the glass myself, from the beach.”

  “It means so much to me. You have no idea. I’ll treasure it always. Just like you.”

  I smile and hug him again. I’ve done well.

  Finally, I’ve done well.

  August 30

  One Year

  Every piece of my body throbs. It pulses up and down my legs and arms and radiates outward from my chest. I sit up and try to shift my weight, hoping to find a part of me that doesn’t feel bruised and sore, but the glass scattered around me crunches under my weight, and I stop.

  It’s shattered. The whole beautiful sculpture. It’s in a thousand pieces around me, littering the floor, each tiny piece symbolizing another hour I spent searching out the sea glass, painstakingly assembling it with all of its mates.

  And now it’s nothing. Just like me.

  I reach up toward the bed and pull the ratty orange quilt off the mattress, covering myself completely. Now and then, the lightning strikes and my cocoon takes on a russet glow. The room buzzes with the sounds of the pouring rain, but I welcome it. It fills the room and drives away the silence.

  A burst of light comes from the window, and the flash glints off a piece of tumbled amber glass poking into my cocoon. I kick it swiftly away. I can’t ignore the ache in my chest as I watch it disappear. He knew how much that sculpture meant. He knew the nights I stayed up late putting it together.

  He told me he would treasure it always.

  Instead, he threw it in an explosion of rage.

  The air inside the blanket warms, and I rock back and forth, back and forth, inside this bubble where nothing exists but me.

  I don’t know what to do anymore.

  I am alone.

  Just as he intended.

  July 16

  Ten months, sixteen days

  Why can’t you just hate me?” He’s not looking at me. He’s sitting in a chair, staring at his hands. I know he’s studyin
g the white lines that criss-cross his skin. They line his knuckles like a road map, evidence of where he’s come from. “Why can’t you just see you’re too good for me?”

  “I’m—”

  “Yes, you are! And you know you are!”

  I hate these times. I hate when he tries to convince me to leave him. He doesn’t want me to. I know he doesn’t. But I also know he feels guilty for what he does. It eats him alive.

  I know there are days he wishes he would wake up without me and I would be gone forever, and he could imagine me happy. Some days I think that would do more for him than I can do when I’m with him.

  But it’s too late for that, because I could never leave. I know the truth. I know he would never make it without me here, picking up the pieces, pushing him in the right direction. I have to fix everything. I have to tape it all together and cover up the cracks and hope no one notices that nothing is ever as good as new.

  “Please,” I say. “Don’t do this today, okay? Just come here. Just hold me.”

  Sitting on the bed, I hold my hands up, toward him, like a mother would to a child. But he doesn’t move toward me, and I just end up sitting there, my arms achingly empty.

  “No. You need to listen to me this time. You need to just go and forget about me and never look back.” He looks down at me, his eyes shining with tears he won’t shed. “There are a thousand reasons we will never work and you know it. It’s time to face it.”

  I stare back at him, at those thick lashes framing his intense blue eyes. His blond hair is matted with yesterday’s gel.

  He can’t take my staring and turns away, rubbing his neck as he sighs.

  “But I love you,” I say, the first tears brimming. One finally rolls down my cheek.

  “You can do so much better than this.” His voice is nearly a whisper, but it’s still full of conviction. He believes what he is saying, and he wants me to believe it too.

  “Please,” I say.

  “No,” he says, louder. He looks down at me again, stares straight into my eyes. “I’m going. I’ll just get in my car and drive and I’ll end up wherever I end up, and I’ll start over. I won’t miss you. I won’t think of you. And you’ll be so much better without me.”