One Day Soon (52 page)

He set out to ruin Yoss and me. He had no intentions of letting Yoss go. I had been too young and naïve to know that then.

Hindsight was a bitch.

“Manny told you where I was?” Yoss asked in surprise. He never knew.

“He told me you had come to see him. That he gave you one more job. Manny even told me where you were. He wanted me to see—” I couldn’t finish. Not even after all this time. The memory burned my mind. Branding it with things I wish I could forget.

“Yet you still waited for me,” Yoss whispered.

I pulled away from him, staring up into his face. “How do you know I waited for you?”

Yoss sighed. A deep exhalation that told me everything.

“You saw me there. In the rain. Waiting for hours.” My throat tightened.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured.

“Why did you do it? Why did you go to Manny?” I was so, so calm. I expected the anger. I expected the betrayal. But deep down I had expected his words. I had known in some small way the reasons behind his decision to leave.

So I listened to his words. I drank in the truth that had been denied for so long.

“Because I’m a guy who always makes mistakes. I can’t seem to help it. I can sit here and tell you my heart was in the right place. That I told myself it would be a one off to get some money to take care of you. That I just wanted to go into our new life with some sense of security. That I loved you so fucking much but I was terrified that I couldn’t keep you safe. Cared for. That I’d never be enough. I self-destructed. I lost you. And I felt as if I deserved that. That you were always a dream. One that I was lucky enough to hold onto for a little while.” His gaze moved to the window. “Then you became a memory. The kind that warms during dark nights and lonely days. You were my happy life. Even when you were living your own.”

“I’ve been full of a lot of regret, Yoss. It colored every part of the last fifteen years. But—” I shook my head. “I can’t hold onto it any longer. Not now.”

Yoss’s face crumpled. “I can’t expect your forgiveness.”

I took his hand, raising it to my mouth. Soft, sweet kisses on his palm. “You already have it.”

He was shaking. His breathing ragged. I wasn’t sure if it was from the emotion or his disease.

He was fading.

I could see that.

It terrified me. For tonight I would hold on and not let go.

“No more talk of the past, Yoss. We can’t keep looking to what should have been.” I framed his face with my hands. “We have to move forward. Towards what
can be.”

I reached for him.

He reached for me.

We met in a rush of tears and sighs.

Our lips crashed into each other.

We were on our feet. Moving back to the bedroom. The lights were off. It was dark. We fumbled and tripped. Laughing and smiling the whole time.

We had had enough misery.

I wasn’t sure how my clothes ended up on the floor. I was naked. Yoss’s bare skin flush against mine. We made our way to the bed. Kissing. Always kissing.

“We should take it easy, you were just in the hospital,” I murmured.

Yoss kissed my mouth. Hard and firm. “You and I have never been easy. We’re not starting now.”

His hand ran up my inner thigh until he found me wet and needy. “I have to know what you feel like. Inside. I will never know what it’s like to be just you—just me—without a barrier between us. I want to feel you. Like this. If that’s all I can ever have.”

He slipped his finger inside me. We groaned together as he worked his hand. Another finger. Then another. Stretching and filling me.

“Imi,” he moaned, his mouth smothering my cries and his moved his hand between my legs. Slipping in and out.

“I love you,” I gasped as I felt myself crumbling. Little by little then all at once in a flood.

“I love you,” he gave back to me.

“Please, Yoss. I need…” I couldn’t put into words exactly what I needed.

But I knew that he understood.

“I’m still not sure about this. The risk is too much,” Yoss argued, his fingers still inside me.

“We’ll be careful. I wouldn’t put my health at risk. No matter how much I want this,” I assured him. I reached down at pressed his fingers into me. Higher. Deeper.

Yoss slowly withdrew his fingers and found his jeans on the floor, pulling out his wallet. I watched him as he located a condom and tore the foil.

I had an intense sense of déjà vu. I remembered, with excruciating clarity, watching him before.

In a dirty motel room, weighted down with love and grief.

Scared but oh so sure.

Yoss came back to me a moment later, pulling me towards him.

“I want to see you,” he said, echoing words spoken long ago. I turned on my bedside light and stared up into his face.

His eyes were so green. Startlingly so against the yellow around them. I knew he was sick, but right then, he was more beautiful than I had ever seen him.

“Are you sure you’re okay? We don’t have to—”

Yoss cut me off with a brutal kiss. “There is nothing that I want more.”

He was there.

Then he was inside.

So deep.

So full.

We let out a breath together.

Our hearts pumping madly.

I felt his tears on my face. I didn’t wipe them away.

“I love you,” he whispered.

“I love you,” I whispered.

Time moved so slowly. Languid and easy we curled in on each other, finally finding a peace that had evaded us for too long.

We had been tiptoeing to this point. Scared and unsure. Hesitant and overanxious. But when we made the leap it was worth it.

All the misguided heartache. The roller coaster of emotions. The anger. The worry. The grief.

We were here. In our magical moment, living the story
we
had written.

“I want a family with you. I want a house full of children and holidays at the ocean,” Yoss said tiredly, his fingers tracing lazy circles on my naked back.

My eyes burned at his words. “I wish I could give that to you.”

We both knew it wasn’t possible.

We’d never have a child. It wasn’t in the cards for us. A dream that died before it could ever be realized.

“You can, Imi,” he said. “We can adopt. We can give a child with as shitty an upbringing as we had a real chance in life. A chance I never had.” I kissed his chin, loving his heart. His kind, perfect heart.

“I want that with you. But—” he paused.

Then in a flurry of movement he rolled me onto my back and leaned over me, his hair falling into his eyes. “But if I can’t have that dream with you, will you live it anyway?” he asked.

“What are you saying, Yoss?” Tears slid from the corners of my eyes, dripping into my hair.

He leaned down and kissed the salty trails. Drinking my tears. One at a time. “I’m saying that you deserve a family. I want you to have a full, happy life. Even if I’m not sharing it with you. It’s what I wanted for you that day under the bridge and it’s what I want for you now.” He kissed the side of my neck. “Only this time, no broken promises.” He laid his ear against my chest, listening for the beating that was only for him. “Can you give that to me? A promise to go on? Not just half living, but living to the fullest.”

The sweat had cooled. Yoss was weak. So weak. I heard it in the cadence of his tone. The heaviness of his limbs.

I was sleepy, but I wouldn’t close my eyes. I didn’t want to miss a single moment with him.

“I can promise to live the life we are supposed to have,” I fought. I argued.

Yoss lifted his head long enough to place a soft, sweet kiss over my heart. “Even if I’m not here,” he urged.

I wouldn’t cry. I couldn’t do that to him. I didn’t want to smother him in my tears when he needed my strength. I held him tight. So tight.

“Even if you’re not here,” I said.

I promised.

I hoped that it was one I’d never have to keep.

Fifteen Years Ago

I
went back to the bridge.

I wasn’t sure why I still waited for him.

After what I saw.

After the lie.

“I’d give you whatever you asked for. I want to remember what it feels like not to be ashamed. Not to feel sick inside. To be able to love without guilt and regret.”

I loved him.

I had told him it was without condition. So I wouldn’t leave. Even if my soul was in shambles. My trust in tatters.

Our love would have to sustain me.

So I waited.

In the rain.

In the cold.

For the boy who had promised me a future.

I learned that day that to love someone was to hurt.

And I was tired of the pain.

Present

I
woke up the next morning and I knew something was wrong. I rolled onto my side and put my hand on Yoss’s bare chest.

I waited for the rise and fall.

Up. Down. Up. Down.

I watched his face. He seemed to be asleep. His arm still wrapped around me. Holding me tight. Holding me close.

I couldn’t look away. Even though I had to get ready for work. I was scared to leave him.

Something isn’t right.

Once again a thin line of blood slowly dripped from his nose. It slid down his cheek and landed on the pillow beneath his head.

His color was worse this morning. The yellowish hue more pronounced.

“Yoss,” I said quietly, shaking his arm.

He was still. Too still.

But for the rise and fall of his chest.

Up. Down. Up. Down.

The blood didn’t have a chance to dry on his face. It continued to flow.

“Yoss,” I said a little louder.

I knew.

I
knew.

“Yoss!”

The scream tore from somewhere deep inside of me. From the part of me that had only just come out of the dark.

No.

He didn’t open his eyes.