Therapy (14 page)

Imprinted on my heart

Footprints you left

Tears

Sadness

Emptiness

Full of regret

Eyes shut

Eyes wide open

I still see you there

I’m still hoping...

I drop my journal down on my nightstand and go for another glass of Bacardi 151, knowing full well that after my accident I shouldn’t ever drink again. But it’s been a really rough day for me. I need to relax and wind down.

I think about calling Donnie from the bar whom I’ve seen a handful of times, but he’s getting attached and, for once, I’m not. He’s great for a good time, but for some odd reason I’ve never clung to him like I do most guys. I’ve told many guys that I loved them over the past years knowing it wasn’t real, but I just wanted to feel loved, hear the words. Granted, no guy has ever affected me like Jace, not once over the past six years.

Not being a bullied teen anymore has caused me to be more forward, more outgoing, and less apt to shy away from things. I’ve met a lot of great guys, but usually scared them off in one way or another. One guy saw my scars and freaked out on me. That was the last I ever saw of him. Strange thing is, most guys haven’t really cared about them or even asked about them, which only reaffirms that they were only after one thing. Ryan was the only guy that came close to giving me the warm fuzzies, but I ruined that too. He said I called him too much, and that I was moving way too fast for him. He was a small business owner and had a really good head on his shoulders. I laugh thinking about how forward I’d been with him and some of the others. It wouldn’t be good for me to see Elizabeth Brant these days. I’m a grown woman who is no longer the scared little teenager I used to be. Sure, I have my shitty issues and still feel all sorts of fucked-up inside, but so many years of building walls has caused me to harden—not to mention the liquid courage that fuels my mouth so often.

I hear the doorbell and wonder who the hell that could be before padding across the cold floor to the door.

Donnie knows better than to come by without calling, and no one else comes here, ever. My brother has only been here once and my parents never visit me. A bit buzzed and unconcerned by the fact that I’m wearing only a little white pair of boy shorts and a cami tank top with no bra, I swing open the door, thinking that whoever’s there is about to get a nice show.

I gasp, dropping my drink to the floor, shattering glass everywhere. My eyes must be playing tricks on me. The alcohol has finally altered my sense of reality. That has to be it. This can’t be real. After six years, I stand face-to-face with Jace Collins.

My throat starts to close up instantly. It’s as if the oxygen in the room was sucked out with the opening of my front door. My eyes wide, I scan him up and down in pure shock and awe. He is Jace, but he isn’t Jace all at the same time. He’s still beautiful, but he’s so much more than that now. Jace is very much a man. Before breathing or speaking or acknowledging him in any way, other than dropping my glass, I just stand there in pure astonishment.

“Hi, Jess,” he says. His voice is deeper than I remember. Smooth, sexy, kind of husky. The deepest male voice I’ve ever heard in my life.

My mouth moves, but words don’t form. My heart’s crashing into my ribcage and my legs are weak.

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost. Aren’t you going to invite an old friend in?” The word friend rolls off his tongue with what sounds like a hint of anger.

Every damn syllable slaps me right in the face. But something’s wrong, very wrong. He has a dark, hardened look in his beautiful blue eyes. His face is stern and he seems tense.

I nod, still in a state of shock, before finally finding my voice.

“Ummm, Jace what are you... I mean, how did you? Why are you...here?” I manage to stammer out, my voice cracking as I fumble my words.

I look over at the clock—it’s after ten o’clock. I have so many questions rolling through my head right now; it’s a whirlwind up there.

Why is he here? And how did he find me?

Those are the two I want answered first.

He points to the shattered glass on the floor and says, “Are you going to clean that up? It could be dangerous.” His tone is stoic. I know things ended badly, but after six years I would think he’d be over it already.

“Umm, yeah... Come in. Just let me get the dustpan and a kitchen towel,” I say, nervously averting my eyes from his penetrating stare.

He steps over the mess and walks into my apartment.

Jace is in my apartment.

I want to pinch myself to make sure I’m not in some alcohol-induced daydream. He’s wearing the most intoxicating cologne, which follows me as I head to my kitchen in a daze. I inhale surreptitiously and sneak a peek at him as he’s looking around. He’s wearing snug-fitting jeans with an untucked black button down, sleeves rolled halfway up his arms—the same way he did in high school. I want to reach out and touch him just to be sure he’s real.

He’s holding a folder in his hands, and his grip is white-knuckled, fierce. My eyes dart back and forth between him and the mess I’m cleaning. With shaky hands, I finish up as fast as I can and return to the kitchen to wash up. He follows my every move with his eyes. I feel like that shy, bullied teenager all over again, but then I snap to reality and realize that, in fact, I’m not that timid girl anymore. Still all jacked-up in my mind, yes, but not as weak on the outside.

“What are you doing here, Jace? It’s ten o’clock at night and we haven’t seen each other—” He cuts me off mid-sentence.

“In six years. Yes, Jessica, I’m exceedingly aware of how long it’s been since you hung up on me and never returned a single call or text.” His jaw clenches and I’m one hundred percent sure that he hasn’t let go of what happened. “I distinctly remember coming home and knocking on your door, only to find out you were gone and had given your parents specific instructions not to give out your address.” He steps in closer to me and I freeze. “I’m also aware that you turned off your phone and deleted your Facebook account and anything else that I might’ve been able to use to get in contact with you. So, I certainly don’t need you to tell me how long it has been.” He inches closer and closer to me with every word until he’s nearly in my face. I look up into those bright blue eyes, which I’ve seen over and over again in my dreams, and even though it’s Jace, he looks like a stranger to me. My eyes move down to his lips, lips that I have imagined on my body many times. Now, those images replay through my mind, juxtaposed to the real man standing before me. His dirty-blond hair looks like he’s been running his hands through it all day. It’s shorter than what I remember.

I take one step back, putting some distance between us because I’m becoming increasingly aware that he’s not happy to see me. It hurts, but it pisses me off too. Caught in a mixture of emotions, we stand here in an uncomfortable silence. He’s much taller than me, so I have to angle my head to look up at him.

“I think you owe me an explanation, Jess. Why did you do it? Why did you end it when it was barely getting started?”

I start to sidestep him because he’s making me uneasy with the harsh tone he’s using. His hand comes down on the arm of my sofa like a barricade stopping me in my tracks.

“You’re not running away this time. I deserve a hell of a lot more than that from you. So, tell me.” Lowering his voice to an alarmingly quiet whisper, he says, “Tell me, Jess. Tell me why you ran.”

I flinch as chills spread over my body in reaction to his breath on my ear. Tears build in my eyes and I blink furiously trying to hold them back. He holds up the hand holding the folder and slaps it down on my coffee table causing papers to fan out across it.

“You know what, don’t bother. I just wanted to hear you say it, but you’re obviously going to continue your lies and secrecy. I guess some habits die hard,” he says with a sneer. I’ve never seen disgust on Jace’s face, but I do now.

My eyes move from his angry ones down to the folder, and the color slowly drains from my face. I can feel his stare boring a hole through me as my mind processes what I’m seeing—all of my paperwork from the therapy session. My name is on the tab of the folder and it has everything in it that I filled out earlier this morning.

How in the hell does he have my file?

“A past left without resolution is surely a past that will revisit you one day.”

—Kathryn Perez

“I DON'T KNOW how you have my file, but I'm pretty damn sure that's fucking illegal,” I say, my eyes never leaving the papers spread across my coffee table. All of my deepest, darkest truths and lies are on display, staring back at me, mocking me.

He knows...

Jace knows about the pregnancy and that’s why he’s here. I always hoped we would find each other again, but now I wish for the opposite. The disgust I saw moments ago has faded, only to be replaced with a pained expression that breaks my heart. The hurt circling in his eyes makes me want to reach out and hug him like he used to do for me when I was hurting.

“I don't think how I have the folder is the issue right now. The issue is what's inside it,” he growls, reaching down and pulling one of the forms out. “This,” he says, holding it up to me, “is the issue! This, Jess, is a really huge issue because if I'm reading this correctly you were pregnant six goddamn years ago!”

My face drops into my hands as the horrible reality of what I did resurfaces and crashes down around me. Right now, it feels like all I’ve been doing is living a rented life, never owning my choices, or the consequences of them.

“Jessica, please tell me that you didn’t lie to me about being pregnant with our baby. Tell me that you didn't abort our child,” he shouts with desperate eyes.

I drop down onto the sofa and look up at him. My face is streaked with tears and my chin is quivering as I try to form some semblance of words.

“Jace, I'm so sorry. So sorry. I never wanted to hurt you. You were never supposed to know,” I whisper, because I hate admitting any of this out loud.

A cloud of shame hangs over me and I can't even look at him another minute. He balls up the paper furiously and throws it across the room. My heart is breaking all over again as my past surges up, surrounding me, choking me.

“No. No. No. This can't be true.”

Tears form at the corners of his angry blue eyes. He runs his hand furiously through his hair and turns his back to me as he drops his head. He stares at the floor for a moment, and then places his hands on his hips. He starts pacing back and forth in my small living room while I just sit there in horror, watching him try to keep himself together. He stops and looks me dead in the eyes.

“I fucking loved you. When everything and everyone told me not to, I fell in love with you anyway,” he growls. “I did everything in my power to stop feeling anything more than friendship with you. I did that because I knew how fragile you were; I just wanted to be a friend. Someone you could lean on, count on, someone like Genevieve never had,” he says, shaking his head back and forth. “Relationships are messy; they can change people for the worse. I didn’t want that for you, for us. But I did it anyway. When I saw the pain in your eyes the day you caught me in the pool, I knew it was all wrong.” He looks right at me and the agony on his face is killing me. “I liked her, but she wasn’t you. She couldn’t make me laugh the way you could, she hated my music, and she didn’t have my secrets. You, Jess, you had my secrets. I gave them to you and I knew that day I should’ve given you everything else too.” He pauses, taking a deep breath, and I can see the soul-crushing torment of the loss in his eyes.

My heart’s racing and my stomach is in knots. I feel nauseated and the alcohol-induced bravery I was feeling has ebbed away. I did this to him, to us. One lie on the night that he finally gave all of himself to me led to another lie on the phone that fateful day, which led us here tonight. I’m a terrible, awful person and tonight I see it more clearly than I ever have before. Tears and regret can never fix what I’ve done to this beautiful, compassionate man that loved me when no one else did.

“I came to you, Jess. I came to you that night ready to give you more than my secrets. I sat at that damn party where everyone was telling me good luck and how I was starting my life for the first time. I sat there and all I could think about was you and how I wanted you there too. I wanted to start my new life with you. The more I drank, the more I fell into a shit storm of thoughts and possibilities, all involving you.” He continues to pace back and forth anxiously. “I told myself I couldn’t leave the next morning without coming to see you. I needed you to see that I wanted you as much as you wanted me. When we were together that night, yes, I had been drinking, but dammit all to hell if I didn’t sober up the minute I had you in my bedroom. I knew you had been with plenty of guys, but that night...that night you looked more innocent and untouched than any girl I’d ever known. I knew no one had ever made love to you. That was just for us: me and you.” His words drag me back to that night and the reality of what I had with him slaps me across the face. “You were beautifully flawed, but perfect to me. I’ve relived that night in my head a thousand times. I was so mad at you when I found out you lied about the birth control. I was furious because you lied to me during something so special, something that shouldn’t have been tainted. That night was everything that represented the good and the beauty of what we finally found with each other and you ruined it,” he says, dropping down onto my recliner directly across from me.

My mind can’t process all of his confessions fast enough. Every word he says crushes me inch by inch. He’s right, though—I ruined it. I ruined everything. Jace loved me and I threw it all away. Now he knows the worst of me, and he’ll probably hate me for the rest of his life. I don’t know what to say to him—no words can make this better. So, for once, I just say the truth.

“I’m sorry. I loved you too. I still do.” Tears spill down my cheeks and I stare into my lap. The pain on his face is too much to bear.

“I think your version and my version of love are two very different things, Jessica.”

I glance up at him and he has his elbows resting on his knees, his hands clasped together, and a lost look on his face. Regardless of the heavy moment we’re having, I still need to know how he got my file folder and found me. That has to be addressed.

“How did you get that file, Jace? I need to know,” I ask him point-blank.

“Where is he?” he asks, ignoring my question.

He? He who? Who the hell is he talking about?

“What are you talking about? He who?”

“Your husband. Is he out? Working? What?” I look at him, clearly dumbfounded.

Me, married? That’s a joke if I’ve ever heard one.

“I’m not, nor have I ever been married to anyone. I don’t even have a boyfriend. What the hell are you talking about?” He looks at me confused, stunned. He rubs the tops of his thighs with his big hands and rocks back and forth once before standing up.

“Yes, you were engaged. One month after looking for you myself, I had my mother hire a private investigator to find you.” His eyes search mine for answers. “The report she gave me said you were living somewhere in Dallas with a guy, that you were engaged to be married. There were even pictures of you in a bar smiling and drinking, having a good time with him, like we never even mattered.” He drags his hand through his hair like he always has. “After that day I never looked for you again. I lost myself in sports and classes. I didn’t date for a very long time after you.” The sigh that he releases shows just how exhausting this is for him to recall. “I was shut off emotionally and dove into learning everything I could about the human mind—what makes it work and what causes it to break. I kept telling myself if I could help other people that were broken inside like you, that maybe it would make up for everything. That’s when I met Victoria,” he says, placing both of his hands behind his head. He looks up at the ceiling like the words he’s searching for are written on it.

Victoria? Who the hell is Victoria?

Jealously instantly boils inside me, even though I have no right to it.

“Dr. Victoria Ward. She’s my fiancé,” he says, answering my unspoken question. And my world implodes all at once. My stomach rolls and I think I’m going to throw up. I shoot up off the sofa and run to the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind me and locking it with trembling hands. I drop down in front of the toilet, feeling bile rise in my throat. My eyes are so blurred from tears that everything around me looks hazy. The walls start to spin and my body starts to shake. I grip my arms, hugging myself and digging my fingernails in hard. I squeeze my eyes shut just as I hear a knock at the door.

“Go away. Please, just go. Leave me alone. You got what you came here for. I killed our baby and now you know what a mental case I really am, courtesy of your fiancé. So just leave me the hell alone!” I sob, screaming at him through the door.

“Just open the door, Jess.” Anger rises up in me like a raging fire.

“Don’t call me Jess. Don’t call me that ever again! I hate you, Jace Collins. Just go away and stay out of my life. Go marry your shrink doctor and have a happy, mentally stable life. You don’t need anything else from me; there are no more answers for you here,” I say, pulling my knees to my chest. He doesn’t reply and I can hear his footsteps walking away. I sit there, waiting to hear the front door shut, but I never do.

What’s he doing? Is he rummaging through my apartment? Digging for more ammunition against me?

I drop my head to my knees and squeeze my eyes shut. Thoughts and questions pillage my brain like a hurricane ripping through me.

He’s engaged. To her.

He’s engaged to a woman that knows every single one of my weaknesses. I try to push the thoughts away and squeeze my eyes tighter, as tight as I can. I grind my teeth and clench my jaw to keep the cries muffled, silent. I don’t want him to hear me cry anymore. I know he’s still here; I can feel his presence, but I’m not coming out of this bathroom, so he just needs to give up on the waiting game.

I can only focus on the pain shooting through my entire body, and the taste of blood in my mouth. Gentle hands roll me over, warm arms envelop me, and soft fingers brush the hair from my face. I breathe in intense warmth and the smell of peppermint. My eyes can’t focus, but even in this foggy state the immense pressure of his gaze upon me is undeniable. My body wants to, but fails to respond to the embrace.

“Hey, open your eyes. Look at me, Jessica. I’m going to help you, okay? It’s me, Jace,” I hear him whisper as my mind starts to resurface from the depths of darkness. He pulls me up, supporting me when my knees slightly buckle. “Come on, it’s okay. I can carry you.”

I feel his arms beneath my knees as he lifts me up into his strong hold. My head rests on his chest and I can’t help but moan in pain from the pressure on my ribs. I force my eyes to open and look up at him staring down at me.

My swollen eyes open as I come out of my dream only to realize that it’s only partly a dream. My ribs don’t hurt and I’m not bloody this time, though there’s more twisted blood and muck from years of depression and anxiety on the inside than there has ever been on the outside. Once again, I’m in Jace’s arms and he is mending my wounds, but this time I think he’s just as wounded as I am.

I tilt my head up just enough to take in his strong jawline and beautiful face. I can sense his reluctance to look down at me so I look away. He kicks open my bedroom door and leans down placing me on my bed. I notice the clock glaring at me from my nightstand, saying it’s midnight. I expect him to turn away and leave, but he doesn’t. Instead, he stands beside the bed close enough to make my heart skip a bit, but far enough to maintain the leagues between us. I have no idea how he got into my bathroom, but I guess I’m glad that he did.