Beautifully Unbroken (11 page)

Her words hit me like a slap in the face. “Did you know she did this?” I asked shakily.

“I didn’t want to feel any responsibility for your stupid actions, Sara; of course I wouldn’t have let you kill yourself,” he stated. “You need help serious help.”

“I need you,” she sobbed.

I could see Casey rouse from her drunken state on the couch. She stood up, slowly rubbing her head before heading into the kitchen. Her eyes caught mine, and I shook my head in warning to her, but she gave me a look of confusion before turning her eyes to Sara.

“What the fuck are you doing in my apartment? Get out now!”

“Casey,” Sara said desperately, “tell Jo; tell her what Blake and I were, please. You know; you know what was going on between us. Tell her, please.”

“You were a mistake,” she said firmly. “Now get out of my home before I kick your skanky ass out myself.”

“I’m not leaving without Blake.”

“Go, Sara, now,” Blake demanded. “There never was and there never will be anything between us. If I could go back and erase every single memory I have of you, believe me, I would do it right now. You were a mistake. Do you hear me? A mistake!”

“She has done this to you; I know she has!” she yelled. “I hate you! You have ruined my life, and I hate you! You will pay; you will fucking pay!” she shouted to me.

“Enough!” Blake yelled.

Sara sank to the floor, sobbing into her hands. She was a woman broken. She had believed that she and Blake could be something; she had believed that she meant more to him than she really did. I knew the signs; I had seen it all before. And as much as I was falling in love with Blake so quickly and so hard, I wasn’t sure I could go through this again. I wasn’t strong enough physically and mentally to deal with another woman who was in love with the same man as I was.

Tears started rolling down my cheeks as I saw her sobbing, desperate to be loved. I stepped around Blake, ignoring his hand that he held out for me. “She needs help,” I said shakily as I stared down at her. “Don’t just throw her out onto the street; she could do something stupid.” I sniffed. “She’s not well enough to be alone.”

I looked up at Blake. He was watching me carefully. “Are you okay?” he asked, but I couldn’t answer him. I couldn’t tell him that he, too, needed to go. In that moment I realized that I loved him so much, but that wouldn’t be enough to get through all of this. I had lived my life in fear in London for so long that New York had felt like my safe haven. I couldn’t go through it all again, no matter how much it was going to hurt to say goodbye to Blake, no matter how happy I had felt over the past few days and how much I knew Blake was right for me, I couldn’t go through it again; I needed to let him go.

I stepped around Sara and headed down the hall and into my bedroom.

After closing the door quietly behind me, I fell onto my bed and sobbed uncontrollably. I could hear voices in the hallway, and I was pretty sure that Sara was still in the kitchen.

My mind tried to process everything that had happened over the past few days. I had opened the door to Blake on Friday and had ended up spending the most wonderful weekend with him. I had seen my future with him. I had seen that I could be happy again. I had fallen in love with him. I had felt wanted. I felt through his kiss alone how much he felt for me. And then Sara had turned up and reminded me of the reality. While we had spent time in our bubble, everything was perfect. Things were never that simple in the outside world, and this episode had proved that.

I couldn’t have a relationship with Blake for fear of what could happen. As much as I loved him, it would be easier to say goodbye to him now than to face a future full of fear and dread.

My door opened, and after a few seconds, I felt the bed dip beside me. Blake’s gentle hand reached over and wrapped around me. I turned over to face him and buried my head into his chest. He held me so tightly, no words, no actions. We just lay together, and he held me until I had cried so much that I could cry no more. He never spoke; he never once told me everything would be okay. He just let me cry the tears that I needed to release.

Eventually I looked up at him. His eyes were full of sadness and regret.

“I’m so sorry,” he whispered, sweeping my hair away from my face, but his eyes remained on mine.

“Were you really there when she cut herself?” I asked.

He nodded slowly.

“When?”

“She called me Tuesday threatening to do it. I didn’t believe her at first, but I couldn’t risk that she wouldn’t. When I got to the apartment, there was blood everywhere.”

I nodded and placed my head back down on his chest.

“Where is she now?”

“Casey called her mom; she’s driving up from Washington to get her. She’s agreed that she needs help, and her mom has said she will help her too. They’ve taken her back to her apartment while they wait.”

I nodded before lifting my eyes to Blake’s. “Blake,” I said quietly just as a tear escaped.

He knew what I was about to say to him. “Don’t do this; please, Jo, don’t.”

I leaned in and placed my lips against him. I could taste the salt from my tears against his mouth.

Our lips stayed locked together. I felt Blake’s body shudder before I felt a tear from his eyes too against our lips. I pulled away slowly.

“This weekend has been—”

“Don’t.” He placed his finger to my lips and shook his head. “It’s over. She’s gonna get help. Don’t let her do this.”

“I have to,” I said unconvincingly.

“We can’t just throw everything away that we have found this weekend, Jo. You know yourself. What we have … it’s more … much more. You have my heart now. I gave you my heart; please don’t break it … please.”

The thought of breaking his heart was killing me. I wasn’t only breaking his heart, but I was shattering mine too. But I had to walk away now; I had no choice.

“Something happened to me four years ago; Sara just brought it all back tonight. I can’t do this. I shouldn’t have allowed myself to get close to you in the first place, Blake, but I did, and now I have to pay the price. We can’t be together; I will ruin us, I will ruin you. I can’t take that chance.”

Blake’s lips pressed against mine firmly, and then he was above me, kissing me deep, hard, and frantically. His hands held my face, his fingers gripping to my hair, not wanting to let me go.

He pulled his lips away and looked down at me, breathing hard. “I love you. I know you probably don’t believe me right now, but I do, Jo; I fucking love you with every bone in my body. And I am begging you; don’t do this to me, to us. Please, Jo, don’t.”

My breath caught as my heart slammed hard against my chest. I managed to push Blake from above me, and I climbed quickly off the bed. “I need you to go,” I sobbed.

Blake scrambled off the bed, and I backed away. “Don’t. Please, Blake, you don’t understand. I need you to go; we can’t carry on like this – not now.”

“I know you love me too, Jo; I can feel it. You were going to tell me only yesterday as we lay in that bed; I know you were, but you thought it was too soon, so you stopped yourself. I know that you love me, Jo, and you know that I love you too, so doing this makes no sense.”

“It makes sense to me!” I yelled.

“Then tell me!” he yelled back. “Tell me what it is that’s making you do this! You are breaking me, Jo; you are going to break me if you make me walk out of your life.
I love you!
”

“Stop! Stop. Just please stop!” I placed my head into my hands. “I’m no good for you; you will see that. You will be glad I stopped this before it got too far. You will see.”

“It’s already too far.” I looked up to see Blake pacing the room, running his hands frantically through his hair. “I’m crazy about you, Jo; I have never felt like this about anyone, and I know I never will again. This isn’t just about this weekend; I have loved you from the first moment I laid my eyes on you. I always knew that you were hiding your feelings, why? I don’t know, but I want to know, I want to know so as I can fix this.”

“I told you I feared happiness. Do you see why now?”

“I can make this better, Jo; I can fix this. Please, just tell me, tell me what made you feel this way.”

“I need you to go,” I said firmly.

“Tell me why. Tell me why I need to go, and I will walk out of here and not bother you again. Just tell me, please,” he begged.

“No” was my simple answer.

We stood silent for a few moments, both breathing hard, our eyes silently talking as he begged me not to do this and I told him I needed to even though I didn’t want to.

“Look,” Blake said, breaking the silence, “I’m sorry that you have been messed around in the past. I’m sorry that because of it, you feel the need to push me away. But I am not the past; I’m your here, your now, your future. I can fix it if you just tell me what happened. I promise you I will fix it; I will fix you.”

“You can’t fix it, Blake, no one can. That’s what happens when you get broken one too many times.”

Blake grabbed his jacket off the bottom of the bed. His heavy eyes stayed focused on the floor beneath him. “When you decide you want to talk, I’ll be there. This isn’t the end, Jo.” his eyes slowly lifted back to me “There is no end for us.” With that he walked out – out of my room and out of my life. I sank to the floor, and if it was possible, I cried more tears than I had ever cried before.

Stepping out of my audition onto the hot streets of New York, I should have felt elated. I should have been shouting from the rooftops that I had just nailed a two-episode part in one of America’s most popular sitcoms. But all I felt was empty and alone.

I had made the effort and finally got out of bed twenty-nine hours after I had told Blake to walk out of my life. Well, when I say I had made the effort, I had been practically dragged from my bed and forced out by Casey.

After offering me the job, Marcus had bombarded me with information about filming and a night out that was planned which would be a great way for me to break the ice with the rest of the crew. I had listened and nodded, but nothing that he had told me had imprinted into my memory.

My phone buzzed to inform me of an incoming message. I scrambled into my bag and dug it out to see Blake’s name on the screen.

I can’t stop thinking about you. I hope the audition went well. I miss you. Call me please. xx

Immediately I was overcome with the emotion that I had managed to mask during my morning with Marcus, but desperate not to cry in a crowded street, I dropped my phone back into my bag, took a deep breath, and began dragging my tired, restless legs in the direction home. I would wait until I was at least back in the comfort of my apartment before I could cry as much as I wanted into the pillow that smelt so much like Blake.

“Jo!” I heard the familiar voice calling me from across the busy street. I lifted my heavy eyes, and they connected immediately with Cooper, who was walking with meaning towards me.

His smile lilted as he approached me and saw my obvious state. “Don’t tell me you didn’t get the job,” he said, stopping just in front of me.

“I got the job.”

“Then what’s happened?” his voice was soothing and sympathetic.

Unable to hold them back any longer, I let my tears fall. Cooper placed his arms around me, and as my head touched his chest, every bit of emotion I was feeling came spilling out uncontrollably.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he said quietly against my hair. I nodded and pulled myself away from him, quickly wiping my eyes.

“I could really do with a friend right now,” I said.

“Have you eaten?” he asked.

“No.”

“Come on, I know the perfect place. Let’s see if I can bring back that gorgeous smile of yours.” He smiled slightly and took my hand in his. The warmth I felt was comforting; it seemed that Cooper had a habit of turning up at the right moment, and he always managed to make things look better than they actually were.

Cooper drove us to a quaint little restaurant near Little Italy that was owned by his aunt. We sat in a corner booth, away from any prying eyes on onlookers. Cooper ordered us a bottle of their finest champagne as a celebration and two of their specialty burgers with extra jalapeño, even though I had told Cooper I wasn’t hungry. He had insisted on making me eat. Cooper was doing his best to cheer me up, and it was exactly what I needed right now.

“I’ve been trying to call you since last week; have you been avoiding me?” I asked as Cooper poured us both a glass of champagne.

“No,” he said quickly. “No, I er … I’ve had a few personal issues to deal with.” His eyes scanned to me quickly before resting back on the bubbles in the glass that he was watching so intently.

“Nothing too serious, I hope?”

“Nothing I can’t handle.” Still his gaze remained fixed on the glass as he twiddled the stem between his fingers.

“I haven’t seen you out jogging either,” I said before taking a long sip of the champagne. The bubbles warmed my belly, and immediately I felt my body begin to relax.

“Sorry,” he said, finally looking at me. “It does look like I’ve been avoiding you, doesn’t it? But trust me, I haven’t.” He smiled. “Maybe we can start meeting up for a jog; what do you say?”

“Sounds good, I’m going to need the distraction,” I admitted.

“Anyway,” he sighed as he sat back into his chair, “why the sad face when you’ve just landed the role you had been dreaming of?”

I took another swig of champagne. “Blake,” I answered simply.

“Ah, Blake.” Cooper nodded. “What’s he done this time?”

I shrugged. “It’s not so much him.”

Cooper straightened in his seat, resting his chin in his hands. “I’m listening.”

“First of all, he slept with Sara,” I said.

“Well, you weren’t together.”

“No,” I answered, “but we had kind of made our feelings for each other clear. He had asked me out for dinner, I had said yes, and then I got the call from my mum.”

“So he slept with Sara knowing you were going to London?”

“No. He didn’t know about my dad. He saw me leave with you and thought that we were …” I nodded to Cooper, who smiled knowingly. “The thing is, Sara knew why I had left, but she didn’t tell him.”

Cooper’s mouth formed into an
O
.

“He slept with her because he thought that me and you …” I let out a heavy sigh. “Anyway, we got past that, and I have just spent the most amazing weekend with him.”

“And that’s made you cry?”

I polished off the champagne and reached for the bottle to refill my glass. “Sara turned up at my apartment on Sunday night. She was a mess, Cooper; I felt so sorry for her. She had tried to kill herself. Blake knew, and he hadn’t told me. If I’d known she had tried to take her own life over him, I would never have allowed myself to get close to him.”

“None of this is your fault, Jo,” Cooper said, reaching over and taking my hand.

“Then why do I feel so responsible?”

“Because you’re you,” he said simply. “You’re kind, you’re thoughtful, and you care way too much about other people. You didn’t make Sara do what she did. She did that all by herself.” Cooper released my hand just as our burgers arrived. “Now eat up; I know how much you like those jalapeños.”

“The hotter the better,” I said as I picked up the burger and took a small bite.

He winked. “Just like the lady sitting across from me.”

“
Cooper,
” I said as a small smile touched my lips.

“There you go,” he said, pleased with himself. “I knew I could get you to show me that gorgeous smile of yours.”

As I entered the apartment, the strong smell of flowers hit the back of my nose. As I stepped into the kitchen, my breath caught at the sight of the most beautiful flower arrangement I had ever seen.

“They came just after you left this morning,” Casey said as she stood against the counter drinking coffee, watching me carefully.

I walked over and took the card from the centre. “I don’t even need to open this, do I?” I said quietly as I rubbed my thumb over the envelope.

“He misses you, Jo; you should call him.”

“I can’t.” More tears filled my eyes. It seemed impossible to release the amount of tears that I had since Blake walked out, but they kept on coming.

Casey placed her mug down and walked over to me, wrapping her arms around me tightly.

“I’m so sorry that this has happened,” she said into my hair.

“I shouldn’t have let myself get close to him. I knew I could never be happy. I just thought it was going to be different with Blake, and now we’re both suffering because of me.” I stepped out of Casey’s hold and wiped my eyes dry of the tears.

“This isn’t your fault, Jo.”

I shook my head in disagreement. “It’s all my fault, and now Sara is in a clinic. That’s my fault too.” My eyes never left the flowers; they were truly beautiful.

“Did you get the job?”

I nodded. “Filming takes place next month.”

“Well, that’s good. Can I congratulate you?”

I gave her a weak smile. “Yes. Thank you.”

“And Blake? What happens between the two of you now?”

I sucked in a deep breath. “I need to get on with my life and try my hardest to forget him.”

“Do you think that’s even possible?” Casey said carefully.

“I need to try.” I took the huge box of flowers and headed to my room.

My body shuddered as I walked in and noticed that Blake’s scent still filled the room. I needed to forget him. I had to remember this; I would have to change the sheets first in order to void my memory of exactly how good he smelt. But for now, I placed my flowers down on my bedside table, buried my nose into the scent on the pillow, and opened the card.

To the only woman who will ever complete me. Tell me what to do to fix us, please. I love you. xx

The writing on the card was Blake’s. He had written it himself from the heart. The pain in my chest worsened. “I need to forget you, Blake,” I whispered, placing the card under my pillow.

I reached for my phone and reread his text over and over until my finger hit delete. I switched off my phone and placed in it a drawer next to the bed. The morning would mark the start of phase two in my “get over Blake and move on” plan, which I already knew was going to be impossible because now I knew exactly how good he really did feel. But for now, I allowed myself to inhale his scent until my eyes finally drifted into a deep sleep.

“Jo, your mom called again. She is worried about you. Please call her; she’s going out of her mind.”

Casey had been taking calls from my mum for the past six days now. I had heard Casey tell her during most of the calls that I had broken my phone and happened to be out while she was calling. She would then promise to tell me and assure her that I would call her back. I could tell that Casey was uncomfortable lying for me, but I also knew that she could sense the pain I was going through right now and knew that I wouldn’t want to burden my mum with my petty men troubles so soon after losing my dad.

I was desperately trying to move on, but it was proving so much harder than I had ever anticipated. The difference between getting over Blake and Michael was that Blake was the innocent one in all of this, not me. Blake loved me, Michael didn’t, and I loved Blake – uncontrollably. It proved to me that the feelings I had for Michael were more lust than love. It made getting over Blake impossible.

I had managed to get out of bed for the first three mornings, and I had met Cooper for a run each of those times. I figured that running until I struggled to breathe would make me focus more on trying to stay alive than think about Blake. But it didn’t. I felt myself almost forgetting to breathe because my mind was always otherwise occupied. Cooper had noticed, but he never brought it to attention. He would try his hardest to cheer me up, even flirting with me, which he knew annoyed the life out of me; but that was Cooper, and he just couldn’t help himself. I hadn’t eaten much since Cooper and I had gone for lunch on Tuesday; that too was taking its toll on my body. I had nothing left inside me to burn off. By day three I was running on empty, so I decided that as much as Cooper was trying his hardest to help me, I was better off in bed. I still hadn’t changed the sheets, and Blake’s scent was still very much present. As much as I had tried my hardest to stick to phase two of getting over Blake, it was proving totally impossible.

I felt the bed dip, and Casey’s hand brushed over my hair. “Are you going to get out of bed today?” she asked quietly.

“Probably not, no,” I whispered.

“Call him,” she said firmly. “It’s obvious that you can’t survive without him.”

I didn’t reply.

“He’s not doing well either, Jo; Alex is worried about him.”

I turned over to look at her. “He’s seen him?”

Casey nodded. “He’s a mess, Jo, just as you are.”

I sniffed and wiped my ever-dripping tears on my sleeve.

“I did that to him,” I sobbed. “He must hate me.”

“He definitely doesn’t hate you.”

“He should hate me. I hate myself.”

Casey twisted her body and lay next to me, looking at the ceiling.

“I know you want to forget him, Jo, but the more you lay here sniffing his pillow, re-reading that card, and looking at the flowers, the more you are going to drive yourself mad.” She tilted her head to look at me. “And you look like shit.” she observed.

“Thank you,” I replied dryly.

“Get up.” She sat up sharply and hopped off the bed. “Let’s go out, get our hair done, maybe a facial. What do you say?”

“No,” I whispered.

Casey flopped back down onto the bed. “I know you don’t want to, but you need to. I need to know that I’m doing everything I can to help you; it kind of makes lying to your mom that tiny bit easier too.” She gave me a lopsided grin.

“I’m sorry.”

She stood up, headed towards my wardrobe, and began pulling clothes out in quick succession. “Wow, you wear a lot of black,” she said with disgust.

“Matches my mood,” I managed to say.

“Well get your ass out of that bed and put these on. We’re going out, and I’m not taking no for an answer.” She tilted her hip to the side, resting her hand just above it as she stood tapping her foot impatiently.