The Fading Trilogy: Fading, Freeing, Falling: Includes 2 BONUS short stories: Hoping and Finding Forever (139 page)

Leaning back in his seat, he tells me, “I dragged his ass out back and kicked the shit out of him before slamming him into the dumpster. He was fucked up. Bad.”

I don’t even know how to feel about all of this because it all just hurts. Every part of it. It all came crashing down so fast.

“How’s Candace?”

“I don’t know. She won’t talk to me.”

“Why? What happened?”

Dropping my head to the side, I rest it in my hand, telling him, “She found out about me being the one who found her that night. She bailed, and I haven’t heard from her since the day after the fight.”

He shakes his head, confused, and questions, “You told her?”

“No. I talked to Jase. He said she had spoken with the detective on the case, and he had told her who the witness was . . .
me
. She took the call while I was still asleep, and when I woke, she was gone.”

“Fuck,” he sighs out.

“I really fucked this up.”

Leaning his arms on the desk, he asks, “What are you gonna do?”

“I dunno, man. I keep calling and texting, but knowing her, she’s probably just deleting them.”

“Maybe she just needs time.”

“Yeah,” I say as I stand up. “Maybe. I’ll be in my office if you need me.”

I spend the rest of the day buried in work that Max should be doing, but I need to keep busy, so I take it off his hands and work late into the night.

I finally talked to my mom last night after avoiding her calls. She was upset, hating that Candace had to find out from someone other than me. But I can’t keep asking myself what if. It is what it is, and I can’t go back because if I could, I would have done it all differently.

It’s been two weeks—and nothing. I call her everyday—and nothing. I’m going crazy, practically living at the bar, hiding in my office, and doing what I can to keep busy. I wound up hanging out with Jase and Mark the other day when they came up for drinks.

They’re my only connection to her, but they are also genuine friends and I don’t want to let go of that. Aside from Max, they’re friends that I’ve connected with on a more authentic level than I have in the past. I don’t want to go back to what I had before I met them. Candace showed me what it was to connect, and I’m not going to trash that. I can’t.

When there’s a knock at my door, I open it to find Jase standing there.

“Hey, man. What’s up?” I say as he walks in.

“Nothing. What are you up to?”

“Not a damn thing,” I tell him. “Wanna beer?”

“Nah, I’m good,” he says as he takes a seat in my living room. “How have you been?”

“How do you think I’ve been?” I respond as I fall back on the couch, kicking my feet onto the coffee table.

“I can’t get her to talk to me,” he admits.

“Join the club.”

“I’m serious, man. She won’t leave her house. I’m worried.”

“Why are you telling me this?” I ask, because all his words do is hurt me.

“Maybe if she could hear you explain yourself . . .”

“You don’t think I’ve tried? Dude, I call her every single day. She won’t talk to me.”

“Go over there,” he says.

“If she’s not returning my calls or texts, she’s not gonna let me in.”

“She needs to talk to you. Take my key and just go. She needs to hear you ‘cause she’s shutting us all out,” he says. “You should see her. She looks awful.”

I watch as he slides her house key off his key ring and then sets it on the table.

“I don’t know, man. I don’t wanna hurt her.”

“She’s already hurting. You’re the only one who has ever really gotten through to her in the past. Just try?”

Staring at the bronze key lying there, I’d be an idiot to not take it. If only just to get a look at her. Anything. I’m desperate, so I take it.

“Thanks, man,” he says before heading out.

Pulling into her driveway, I already feel my anxiety welling up. I don’t know what I’m about to walk into, but I know she’s inside, and I’m desperate to see her. When I ring the doorbell, it takes a moment before I hear that voice I’ve been missing so much, but her words are nearly lifeless when she says,
“Go away.”

“You won’t return any of my calls, babe. Please, let me talk to you.”

She doesn’t respond, and when I use the key to unlock the door, she turns to me and yells, “What are you doing?!”

“Jase gave me a key.”

She mumbles something under her breath before saying, “Ryan, please go. I don’t want to talk.”

Jase wasn’t lying; she looks awful. She was small before, but I can tell she’s lost weight by the way her clothes are hanging on her. And I know she isn’t sleeping by the dark circles under her eyes. What the hell have I done to her? God, knowing she’s hurting so much that she isn’t taking care of herself is just another punch to my gut.

“I can’t
not
talk to you. It’s killing me.”

“It’s killing
you
?” she snaps. “What about me? Ryan, I can’t do this. I can’t even look at you. Please, just go.” Her words are strained as she speaks.

“I can’t stand to see you like this.”

“Then go! I will do almost anything to make you leave.”

“Just let me talk to you. Please, babe, just let me talk,” I beg.

“Fine, say whatever you need to say, then leave me alone.”

When she sits on the couch, I walk over and sit next to her as I watch the tears begin to fall from her tired eyes. I wanna touch her. I wanna pull her into my arms like I’ve done so many times before, but now I feel like I can’t. Like if I tried, she would just reject me. I’m so close to her right now, but I’ve never felt so distant. I hate it.

“I’m worried about you.”

“Don’t,” she says as she turns her head away from me.

“When was the last time you’ve eaten?”

“Ryan, don’t. Just say what you need to say.”

Reaching out to take her hand, she yanks it away from me. God, this is bad. Needing to get through to her, needing her to know, I just start talking—pleading. “I love you. I know you don’t believe me, but I do. No one has ever affected me the way you do, babe. I swear to you . . . I swear I didn’t know. I didn’t, Candace. Not at first,” I tell her when I start to choke up, and I just let it out. I let all the tears fall that I’ve been holding in because I feel like I’m losing everything I am at this point. She’s all I have ever wanted in this life, and I’m losing her.

“When I saw you at the coffee shop, I thought it was you. I thought you were
that
girl,” I tell her, nearly crying out the words because they hurt so much. “But then I kept thinking, ‘What are the chances?’ I didn’t know because you looked so different than from that night. And then I found out that you were friends with Mark. Every time I saw you, I felt myself being drawn to you in a way I’ve never felt before. I had myself convinced that my head was playing games with me, and I honestly did not think you were that girl. It wasn’t until I saw your tattoo when we were in bed. That’s when I knew. When I found that girl, I saw her tattoo—
your
tattoo.”

“Ryan, please,” she begs, but I can’t stop. She needs to hear this because I’m starting to wonder if I’ll ever get this chance again.

She’s trying to shut me out, so I continue, “When I saw it, I broke. I didn’t want you to be her. I had already fallen so hard in love with you, and realizing that it was you fuckin’ killed me,” I explain through my tears as she sits there crying with me. “Everything started making sense to me. How scared you always were with me when we first met, how afraid you were when I tried to touch you. Everything made sense. But, I didn’t know how to tell you. And then you told me you loved me, and I know how hard that was for you. I just couldn’t hurt you.”

“But you did,” she sobs out. “You lied to me. I let you see all the parts of me that weren’t pretty, but you knew all along. And when I finally opened up to you, you already knew.” She drops her head and begins to cry harder when she says, “You let me give everything to you. You had to have known that you couldn’t hold on to that secret forever. I would’ve eventually found out, and you still let me fall for you like I did. I feel so stupid and used, like you just felt sorry for me or pitied me.”

“I never pitied you, babe. I have only ever loved you. I just didn’t want to hurt you.”

When I try pulling her into my arms to hold her, she shoves me back and gets up from the couch, stepping away from me.

“I can’t do this. You can’t say those things to me,” she says.

Walking toward her, I stop right in front of her and confess, “I know I fucked up. I fucked everything up so bad. I know all you wanted was someone you could trust. I wanted to be that for you, and I fucked it all up. But I didn’t know what to say; I was scared. You’ll never know how fucking sorry I am.”

“I knew better. I knew I shouldn’t have let you in like I did. But I can’t see you anymore. You have to stop calling and texting,” she says. Her words tearing me apart as she continues, “I need you to just not exist for me because I can’t do this. It hurts more than I thought anything possibly could.”

“Candace, please,” I beg. I can’t fuckin’ do this. I can’t
not
have her in my life.

“Just go.”

I see it. She means what she’s saying, but I can’t move. I don’t how I’m gonna turn and walk away from her. So I stand here, a broken man, in front of the only girl I’ve ever given my heart to and I cry.

“Please, you have to go. I can’t do this,” she pleads.

“You have to know how much I love you.”

Closing her eyes, she whispers, “Please, Ryan.”

I wait for her to open her eyes, but she doesn’t.
I’m always gonna want her, but r
eality hits me like a brick.

It’s over.

I’ve never felt pain like this before. It’s one thing to get the shit beat out of you by a man you don’t even like, but it’s another thing entirely when the person you love the most in this world doesn’t even want to look at you. I’d go back and take a thousand more beatings just to have her open her eyes and look at me.

But she doesn’t, and I can’t bear the agony, so I take one last look and absorb everything I can before I turn away from everything I never wanted to. She gave it all to me, and now I leave it behind as I walk out of her house.

The finality of what just happened starts to sink in as I drive home. How is this over? Ending faster than it began. I’m not sure what else I could have said to save what we had. I would’ve kept her forever if she would’ve let me. But it’s done, and I’m not sure where I go from here. In my head I’ve been thinking that I was going to give it all up for her. Move to wherever she was going. Maybe I was just in too deep.

There’s a black van parked in front of my place when I get home, and as I’m getting out of my car, I see a guy opening the back doors and pulling out a large, wrapped item.

Walking toward him, he asks, “Mr. Campbell?”

“Yeah. What’s this?”

“I have a delivery from Thinkspace Art Gallery for you.”

Her photo.

“Would you like me to carry it up?”

“No,” I tell him as I reach out to take the piece, which is covered in a brown paper wrap.

“You sure?”

“Yeah. I’ve got it. Thanks.”

Before getting into his van, he turns and says, “It’s a beautiful piece, sir. Enjoy.”

I watch as he drives away, but I don’t think I could ever look at this photo—her photo. How could I enjoy something that has been torn to shreds because of me? Carrying the canvas upstairs, I lean it against the wall as I go to the kitchen to get a beer. Popping the cap, I turn and rest my back on the counter and look at it, just sitting there—masking away my happiness, knowing that she’s underneath the paper. But being the masochist that I am, I need to see her. I set the bottle down and rip the paper off, revealing the white line of her back.