Healed (30 page)

“She hates me.” I said, watching my dad. “All because I listened to your advice.” I started to pace the length of the living room, trying to relieve the knot in my stomach. His arms were resting on his legs, his head in his hands.

Nick stepped in my path “You’re right, a part of her does.” My head snapped up to watch him. “I’m not gonna sugarcoat this for you. You hurt her, and it’s not going to be an easy fight to get her to trust you again. But there’s enough of her that still loves you that she might be willing to give you a chance, if you try.”

Dad turned to Nick. “Will she listen?”

“I think she will, but like I said, it’s not going to be easy.”

I spun around to face my dad. “How could you do this to me? I trusted you. I’ve always listened to your advice. Yet you told me to leave the only woman I’ve ever loved.”

Images of Emily began to flash in front of me, our first date, our first kiss, the day I asked her to be my wife. Then images from the bar chased them away. All I could see were pictures of Emily standing there, crying. Then there were Nick’s words in the car.

You broke her
.

I stopped my tirade when I realized that I couldn’t put all the blame on my dad. He did tell me to do all of it, but I made the decision. It was my choice.

“How could I have hurt her?” I closed my eyes in anguish.

“You can still fix it,” Nick said.

That’s when the idea hit me. I knew exactly what I was going to do to win Emily back.

Jumping to my feet, I started for the door. “We’ve got to go,” I called over my shoulder.

Nick and my dad hurried behind me. “Where are you going?” Nick asked.

Before I walked out the door, I turned to my dad. The pain etched on his face was overwhelming. While I understood why he’d done what he did, it didn’t make it hurt any less that I might have lost the love of my life because I listened to him.

“I need to deal with Emily first. You and I can talk later.”

He nodded once, and I turned and walked out the door.

As I got into the car I heard him call out, “I’m so sorry, Andrew.”

Nick wasted no time getting us on the road. Throughout the drive back, my mind raced with idea after idea. It was possible, but I was going to need my friends help. When I explained the idea to Nick he agreed, and promised to talk to everyone else.

The moment we reached my apartment, I was out of the car and headed for the door. I barely said good-bye to Nick. The laptop was sitting on the couch where I’d left it earlier, before I went the bar. So much had happened since then.

Opening my laptop I got to work on the apology of the century, my hands shaking, hoping it would be enough.

Emily

IT HAD BEEN A
few days since the whole episode with Andrew. Nick came home late that night and refused to talk about anything that happened after they’d left. Not that I could blame him. He was still Andrew’s friend, and I wouldn’t ever have asked him to turn his back on him.

Every day I thought about Andrew and the things he’d said to me. I was doing my best to keep it together. I felt like I’d finally crawled out of the hole I’d been buried in over the last seven months. Things were still pretty shitty, but I was doing my best to keep it together. I didn’t want to be the sad girl everyone felt bad for anymore. I needed to be strong and prove to everyone, and myself, that I didn’t need Andrew.

But my conviction was waning. It wasn’t like I could deny it. I still loved him. As the days passed, it got harder and harder not to push my feelings down, to keep them locked away. It didn’t help that every single one of my friends was avoiding the subject. Like it was this taboo topic. That, or they were afraid of which Emily might surface if they
did
say something.

One night when I got home from work, Nick was sitting on the couch watching TV. I’d stayed late to get a few reports done. Plus it had given me something to do, so that I had less time to sit in the apartment and dwell on what had happened.

“How about Chinese for dinner?” he asked. I wasn’t in the mood to cook so that worked out perfectly.

“Sounds good. Let me just change really quick.” Throwing on jeans and a long-sleeve shirt, I went back into the living room to join him.

“Did you already order?”

“Nah.” He shook his head. “I figure we can order in a bit. “I was just about to watch a movie, is that okay?”

“Sure, as long as you picked something good.”

“I think you’ll like it. Or at least I hope you will.” He winked at me.

Grabbing the remote, he pushed play. Immediately, I knew that something was off. Instead of the normal FBI warnings, there was music and a black screen. The music continued to play, while images began to float across the screen. Every few images were punctuated by words.

All of the pictures were of Andrew and me.

I stood up, ready to give it to Nick and walk away, but a hand wrapped around my arm. My head snapped around to glare at him.

“I know you want to run away from this, but after everything that happened a few days ago, I think you need to sit down and watch before you do anything.”

Indecision warred within me. A part of me wanted to run and hide in my room, while the rest of me wanted to stay and see what it was all about.

Not wanting to let Nick off the hook that easily, I yanked my arm out of his grasp but sat down next to him to watch the video. Each and every picture matched the ones I’d set out for him that day so long ago.

The pictures were one thing, but the words that rolled across the screen helped to put a few pieces of my shattered heart back together.

These are the memories I have of you.

Some of them good, some of them bad.

But it doesn’t matter what type of memories they are.

Because they are
ours
.

Ours to have for as long as we live.

I hope that these aren’t the extent of our memories.

Give me a chance and I’ll help to make many more.

Memories that I will hold near and dear to my heart, no matter what may happen.

The screen went blank and I turned to Nick, the feel of wetness on my cheek.

“Where is he?”

“Are you ready to forgive him?”

“I’m not sure, but I am ready to listen to what he has to say.”

Nick smiled. “That’s a start.” He took my hand in his. “You do know how much he loves you, right?”

“For a while there I didn’t think he did, but I’m starting to remember. Nick, where is he?”

“That’s something I’m not going to tell you. You know Andrew better than anyone. If you are truly ready to listen, then you need to figure out where he is on your own. Look inside and ask yourself, where would you go?”

Nick’s cryptic bullshit was pissing me off. I didn’t understand why he couldn’t just tell me. He usually sucked at secrets and I could easily weasel the answer out of him. But not this time. This time, I had a feeling he was going to keep the secret—no matter what.

Nick stood up. “I’ll be in my room if you need me,” he said with a smirk.

I didn’t even hear the door close as I stared off into space. Where could he have gone? I guessed he wasn’t at his new place, since I had no idea where it was, and after everything that happened I was pretty sure he wouldn’t be at his dad’s. Nick had asked me to think about where I would go.

That’s when it hit me.

I knew exactly where Andrew was.

I ran down the hall and knocked on Nick’s door. It took a few seconds, but he pulled it open.

“Can you take me to the park?” I asked without preamble. “I don’t trust myself enough to drive.”

He gave me a brief hug. “That I can do. I’m so glad you figured it out.”

“Let me grab my stuff.” I ran down to my room and threw on a pair of shoes, grabbing my phone and purse as well.

By the time I made it out to the living room, Nick was already waiting in the car for me. We made the drive quickly, my whole body trembling with nerves. When I stepped out of the car I noticed many cars in the lot, but Andrew’s wasn’t one of them.

Maybe I was wrong. Maybe he was somewhere else.

I shook off my doubts. He was at the park. I knew it. And my best guess was that he was at the swings. Without waiting for Nick, I ran through the park toward the swing set and just like I thought, there was Andrew, standing there, waiting for me, surrounded by our friends.

On legs that felt like jelly, I walked up to him. I stopped in front of him and he let out a deep breath. He took my hand in his and slowly sunk down on one knee.

“Emily, thank you for coming. There is so much I want to tell you, starting with how sorry I am you were made to suffer for my mistakes. You are, and always will be my true love, and I promise to never let anything come between us again. You are the most important person in the world to me and I love you with all of my heart. I’m sorry that I broke yours, but maybe together we could work on healing each other.”

His words were beautiful and they made me yearn for him to touch me. He squeezed my hand. “You are my everything . . . that’s why I was so scared to live without you.”

Lowering myself to my knees, I sat in front of him, looking at the face I’d missed every day for the last seven months.

“Oh, Andrew.” My eyes began to blur. “There are no guarantees in life. You just have to enjoy what you have, while you have it.”

And then I was engulfed in his warm embrace. “I love you so much, Emily. I wish I’d never listened to my dad. He was drinking and upset.”

“Shh.” I covered his lips with my finger.

“But I’ve caused you so much pain.”

“Then find a way to make up for it, ’cause I’m not letting you go again.”

He sealed his lips over mine, and a sense of joy and peace washed over me. The moment his tongue brushed over my lips, I let him in. It was his taste I’d craved every night I’d slept alone in our bed.

Slowly he pulled away, cupping my face with his hands. “Don’t worry, I’m never leaving again.”

There was sniffling in the background. Andrew stood and helped me up. Standing around us, I saw Angie and Lauren crying. Nick came over and clasped Andrew on the back. “I’m glad you finally came to your senses.”

“Thank you for taking care of her while I got my shit together.”

“I knew if you were thinking correctly, you wouldn’t expect any less.”

“I think it’s time for us to go,” Angie said, giving everyone pointed looks.

“Yeah, I think you’re right,” Josh agreed.

Angie stopped to give us each a hug. “I’m glad you didn’t disappoint me, Andrew. You better take care of her this time.”

“I will, if she’ll trusts me to.” A sad smile played across his lips.

Andrew held his hand out to me. “Can we go somewhere and talk?”

Taking his hand, I smiled. “How about we go back to the apartment?”

Nick threw his hands up in the air. “I’ll drive us back, but you won’t even know that I’m there.”

“That sounds good.” Andrew nodded. “I left my car at my place, so you wouldn’t see it.”

After all the excitement, I wanted to relax, and I knew the conversation we needed to have wouldn’t help me do that. The sooner we talked the better. “Let’s go.”

We followed Nick back to his car. Andrew sat next to me in the back, holding my hand the entire way. It seemed silly, but after our time apart, it was significant to me. When we arrived at the apartment, Nick hightailed it to his room once the front door shut. With the heat of the moment cooling, it was time for conversation because I wasn’t sure how much I trusted him with my heart.

“Are you staying here tonight?”

He looked down at the ground. “Only if you want me to.”

“I think it would be good if we talked. There’s a lot that hasn’t been said.”

He nodded. “Then I’ll stay.”

Taking his hand, I led him to the bedroom where we could sit on the bed. Once we’d gotten comfortable, I asked the most pressing question.

“Why tonight? Why did you come back?

He sighed. “No matter what you may think, I never stopped loving you. I let my fear control me. And while I hoped that with time things would get better they didn’t. You haunted my dreams. I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t function when I was awake all I could think about was you. When you threw your engagement ring and the tickets at me the other night, I wanted to blame my dad for everything that had happened and I made Nick take me there when we left.

I flinched away. The last time he’d talked to his dad, all hell had broken loose. “And what did he say?”

“He told me that he was sorry. That his mistakes caused me to make mistakes. He said that even knowing he would lose Mom, he wouldn’t change a thing. The memories he had of her were to be treasured, not feared.” A lot of it I could understand. Grieving is a painful process, and sometimes people did stupid things when they were emotional, although, that didn’t make it any easier to face. He’d always taken his dad’s advice so this time hadn’t been any different . . . except that the advice had been wrong. “But the one thing I realized was that, no mattered what my dad said, this was my decision. I was the one that chose to let my fear override everything else. Em, I can’t live without you.”