Living With Regret

by Lisa De Jong

  I immediately wish I’d stayed back. Cory is wearing the light blue polo shirt I bought him for his birthday, but it’s pulled up along his waist. His shorts and boxers are down at his ankles. I can’t see his face, but I know it’s him. Thin bare legs are wrapped around his waist.

  Whoever she is, I hate her. I want to rip all the hair from her scalp and shove it down her throat. Tears well in my eyes, and I take a couple more quiet steps. Then, he moves his lips to her neck, giving me a perfect view of her face. I’m shocked. Sick. Stunned. Of all the people on this world, I never thought it would be her. Never.

  Under the little bit of moonlight that shines through the trees, I see her eyes are closed. I want her to open them and see me. I want her to see what she’s done to me.

  His betrayal hurts.

  Her betrayal kills.

  I never in a million years thought this could happen.

  She wraps her arms around his shoulders and opens her eyes. I’m waiting, and it doesn’t take her long to find me. I bet my face looks a lot like the one she wears right now. Shocked. Sad. The only difference is mine has a thick layer of disgust over top.

  Her lips part. She’s either going to fall into euphoria or call me out from the shadows. Neither one is something I want to hang around for, so I run. Not toward the parked cars or the party itself, but in the opposite direction. Far, far away from everything. Far from the life I’d been living.

  The last hole has been filled. The sequence of events all lined up, even if they don’t necessarily make sense. She said it started around Christmas. That’s always a busy time, but this last year, I took a short ski trip with my mom’s side of the family. Three days … that was all.

  I thought I knew him. I thought I knew her. I’ve never been more wrong. Never. The depth of betrayal runs through my skin into my veins. I don’t think I’ll ever get over this. Our relationships are built on trust, and almost every relationship I had has been broken. How am I supposed to come back from that?

  “What are you doing out here? It’s freezing.” I don’t answer. I don’t open my eyes. I’m trying too hard not to feel, and if I look at Sam, that’s exactly what will happen. Sam didn’t come out to the field that night with malicious intent. He didn’t come out there to ruin my relationship with Cory. He was there with Madison, and ultimately, he was there to save me.

  Sam protected me for months … from this. Maybe I should be grateful, because this would’ve been impossible to handle on top of Cory’s death.

  It doesn’t mean I’m going to forgive him for keeping things from me for so long … I can’t.

  His strong arms reach me, lifting me up against his warm body. My eyes remain closed, too tired and swollen from crying to even look where we're going. His shoes crunch at a rapid pace against the fresh snow.

  “What happened?” he asks, never breaking his quick pace.

  Something tells me if I just say her name, he’ll understand. He’ll get it. Maybe he doesn’t know about the baby, but he knew about them. I wonder if he was ever going to tell me? Does he get how stupid this makes me feel? I should have seen it. Maybe I did, and I just didn’t want to admit it.

  “Madison,” I whisper, burying my face in his black leather jacket.

  For the first time since he picked me up from the ground, his footsteps slow. If it’s even possible, his arms tighten around me. I was right. He knows, and not only that, he feels. His heart beats the rhythm of mine. He knew how much this would hurt me. He caged me to protect me. He tried to protect my ideals about love, and by doing so, he may have actually strengthened them. Cory could have broken every ideal I’ve ever had, but Sam saved them by sacrificing himself for me.

  The relationship we had, the one we built on, was important to him. He finally had me, or at least most of me. He had to have known that by holding the truth from me, he was putting all of that at risk. Don’t get me wrong … I’m pissed at him. I almost wish I’d heard the truth from him, not Madison, but it’s easy to say that now. After the initial shock wears off.

  My anger shifted from Sam to Cory to Madison … to myself. How could I not see what was going on? I was basically on my way to becoming like my mom. To becoming the type of woman I didn’t want to be.

  We move quickly through the snow again. The cold no longer bothers me; I’m too numb, too exposed.

  I must have drifted off for a little bit. My mind gets a temporary reprieve, and when I wake up, he’s walking up a flight of stairs. Heavy boots hitting against the metal staircase. The smell of cedar. I should’ve known he wasn’t taking me to my house.

  He kneels, turning the knob and pushing the door open. “We need to get these clothes off you. You’re soaked.”

  A shiver runs through my whole body. My feet and hands are numb. My energy drained. I’m not in a place where I can argue. If I were, I’d ask him to put me down. I’d tell him that just because I understand what he did, doesn’t mean I forgive him. Trust is delicate. Once broken, it’s hard to put back together.

  He sets me down on the edge of his bed. I’m so weak, but he uses his torso to hold me up. First to go is my soaked coat, followed by my sweater. I think my bra joins them, but I’m not sure. I’m so tired. So weak.

  “Okay, I’m going to lay you back. We have to get these wet jeans off you.” He gently guides me back, removing both shoes, and peeling back my soaked jeans. His soft comforter lulls me … I just want to sleep. And sometimes, like now, I never want to wake up.

  “Stay with me, baby. We need to get you under the blankets.” I hear him moving around the room, but all I want to do is curl up into a ball and let the day drift away.

  The bed shifts beside me, then I’m back in his arms again. This time, he doesn’t take me far, lying me down on the center of the mattress. I expect him to throw the comforter over me and let me go to sleep, but the mattress dips behind me. His chest feels like fire against my back. His legs feel the same as they tangle with mine. The only thing separating the two of us when he wraps the comforter around us is his mesh shorts.

  “Go to sleep,” he whispers against my hair.

  And I do. I drift to sleep just as quickly as I fell apart earlier.

  I WAKE UP IN the same position I was in when I fell asleep. Sam’s warm body is still locked tightly with mine. His lips are pressed to the back of my neck. They’re just there, lingering, providing an extra form of comfort—not really kissing me. But he’s letting me know he’s here, in case I have any doubts.

  I run my feet along the cotton sheets, feeling the sensation of the smooth threads against my skin. My fingers tingle as they brush against Sam’s forearms.

  “You awake?” he asks, lips still against my skin.

  “Hmm, kind of,” I murmur, trying to pull away from him. I won’t deny that I still feel things when Sam touches me, but I can’t act on them. Too much has happened.

  His grip on me tightens, clamping me to his chest. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “I’m going home.” I wiggle with no luck.

  “You’re not going anywhere until we talk.”

  Frustrated, I quit fighting him. I don’t have the energy anyway. I’ll listen like he asked, but then I’m leaving. “Talk,” I say, rolling his sheets between my fingers.

  “I couldn’t tell you,” he blurts. “Think about it, Rachel. If I would have said, ‘Oh, by the way, I was there the night of the accident and the reason you were upset that night was because you found out your boyfriend and best friend were sneaking around behind your back,’ what would you have said?”

  I shrug. Honestly, I would’ve had a hard time believing him without seeing it myself. It would have been a difficult one to swallow.

  “I’ve given you your space, but now, you’re going to listen to me.” He inhales a deep breath. “What we had, what we have, means everything to me. I hate that you even thought for a minute that it doesn’t. I would never do what Cory did. Just the thought of it makes me sick. I was going to tell you
… that morning when you remembered I’d been there that night. There was just no easy way to say it.” His voice is laced with tremendous sadness and regret. I don’t feel bad for the way I reacted that morning, but he should have told me a long time ago, no matter what the outcome might have been.

  “How long had you known … before that night?” Holding my breath, I count the seconds it takes him to answer. This is going to be the deciding factor between us moving forward together or moving on apart. If he knew long before that night and didn’t tell me…

  “I didn’t,” he replies, gripping me tighter. “I swear to God, I didn’t. Madison called me, and I could barely make out a word she said except your name. Then, she said something about you catching her with Cory, and I was so pissed. Not for myself but for you.”

  Closing my eyes, I let out a pent up breath. “You were never with Lidia, were you?”

  He laughs nervously. “I talked to her that night, but that was it. I didn’t want to explain the whole Madison thing without explaining everything else first.”

  I hate that he was ever with Madison in any way. Did he care for her like he’s caring for me right now? Did he tell her about his mom and dad, his struggles? Did he have feelings for her?

  His hand slides up over my hip, his warm fingers caressing my side. “I know what you’re thinking … Madison and I hung out a few times. We were sort of friends with minimum benefits. It was about fun … nothing else. I never slept with her.”

  “I don’t need to hear anymore.”

  “Yes, you do.” He scoots back just enough that he can press me on to my back. For the first time this morning, I’m seeing his face. His gorgeous, yet very tired, eyes look down at me. “The way I’m laying here with you right now, I never did that with her. No one has ever been in this bed. No one has been in here.” He grabs my hand, resting it on his chest. “The way my heart is beating … that only happens when I’m with you. I love you, Rachel. I’m in love with only you.”

  He’s so sure, and I think I am, too … sure that I love him. When someone’s seen the worst of you, but looks at you the way he’s looking at me right now … that’s love in its purest form. I love him because of the way he loves me. The way he’s brought me from where I was to where I am. I love him because of the way he is—kind, protective, always there. I just love to love him.

  “I love you, too.”

  His head lifts from the pillow, his warm lips touching my shoulder. He draws a line to the base of my neck. It tickles just enough to make me squirm in his arms. “You really scared me last night,” he says, kissing below my ear. I let him.

  “I didn’t realize how long I’d been out there. I was so freaking mad, I thought I was going to totally lose it.”

  He splays his hand against my bare stomach, fingertips tracing my belly button. “You should have called me. I would have come for you.”

  My heart aches in the worst way after I spoke with Madison yesterday. With all the voices screaming in my head, it was impossible to hear reason. I don’t even know if it exists anymore. “I wasn’t thinking clearly. I couldn’t.”

  He leans in, gently brushing his lips across mine. He pulls away slowly, his eyes never leaving my face. I never thought I’d be with him like this again. “I really thought you were gone for good. I thought we were done.”

  “I don’t think that’s possible. I always come back to you in some way or another, but Sam, I have to be able to trust you. If there’s anything else—”

  His large hands cup my face. “There’s nothing else … not that pertains to you or us. I only kept things from you to protect you. I knew the reason you were running, and I didn’t want to be the one to tell you. As much as I wanted you, I didn’t want to tarnish how you felt about Cory. Not when he wasn’t here to defend himself.”

  What he’s saying makes sense. I think if the tables were turned, and I knew the same thing about someone Sam loved, I would have a hard time coming clean. What would be the point if the person who’d done wrong was no longer here? It just becomes another layer of pain to deal with, and no one wants to see someone they love going through that.

  There’s one thing I haven’t remembered about that night. I can’t think of a reason why I would’ve let Cory into my car. I’m a different person now than I was back then, but I think I would’ve told him to find his own way home. In fact, I’m pretty sure of it.

  “How did Cory end up in my car? Were you still there then?”

  “After he found us, he tried to fight me until you blurted that you knew about him and Madison. Everything stopped then. He became really quiet, and you asked me to walk you to your car. God, Rachel, I tried to talk you into letting me take you home, but I didn’t try hard enough. You’ve always been so stubborn,” he says hurriedly, brushing his thumbs along my neck. “I made sure you were in the car, and you slowly started to pull away. I thought everything was good and I’d just call the next morning to check up on you. I watched as you stopped at the end of the dirt road, and he jumped in the passenger seat. I didn’t expect you to pull away with him, but there was nothing I could do.”

  Closing my eyes, I nod into his hands. My whole world revolved around Cory. From everything I remember, I was completely broken that night because of what he did, but I loved him. There wouldn’t have been any second chances, not after I saw him with Madison, but I would have wanted an explanation. I would’ve wanted to know why.

  “There are so many things I wish had happened differently, or not at all, but I think the ending would have been the same. I think the ending would have always been me and you.”

  He kisses my forehead. Each cheek. The cleft of my chin. The tip of my nose. “I hope you always feel that way.”

  I truly believe we all have one person we’re meant for. There’s a reason I always come back to Sam. Knowing what I know now, I wonder how long it would have taken Cory and I to break up. Would I have found my way back to Sam? Would he have come after me?

  I remember when Madison was in my car, and she was telling me how she’d been hanging out with Sam. I couldn’t stop thinking about the baby she was carrying, and how I hated that it was Sam’s. Honestly, it hurt more thinking about Sam making a baby with her than it did thinking about Cory and Madison together. Maybe it’s just because of where I am now in life … the relationships I’ve rekindled.

  “Can I tell you something?” I ask, combing my fingers through his long bangs.

  “You can tell me anything.”

  “When Madison started telling me that she’d been seeing you, I thought the baby was yours. That thought pretty much crushed me.”

  He climbs on top of me, our bodies perfectly aligned. “Oh, baby, I couldn’t even think about that with her. Besides, I think to her, I was nothing but a distraction.”

  “From Cory?”

  “Yeah,” he says, kissing the tip of my nose. “We distracted each other.”

  I still haven’t gotten over the fact that Sam liked me all these years. I wonder how long he would have waited. It doesn’t matter now, I guess, because we’re here. “Thank you, Sam.”

  “For what?”

  “For getting me through all of this.”

  He kisses me deeply, pushing his tongue between the seam of my lips. His movements are urgent, but we’re in sync, our tongues dancing to the sweet song in our hearts.

  The second he backs away, I miss his touch. “I’m going to say this again and hope you take it differently this time.” He pauses, allowing our eyes to connect. “I’ll always keep you safe.”

  He will. I know he will.

  The key to a happy, fulfilling life is to be able to forgive when the devil makes himself known through others. I’ve had a couple weeks to work through what I learned about Cory and Madison. My anger faded, and an overwhelming sadness took its place. A baby, who will never know his father, is going to be born. And as much as I want to hate Madison, I can’t. She’s going to be someone’s mother—a young mother without anyone t
o help her.

  For some reason, I need her to know that I don’t wish anything bad on her. What’s done can’t be undone … I realize that, and I’m pretty sure she does, too.

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” Sam asks, covering my hand with his.

  I smile, albeit a little forced because of the crazy butterflies in my stomach. “I think I have to.”

  As Madison’s house comes into view, my heart rate picks up. Like me, she’s lived in the same house since she was born. A one story, baby blue colonial with black shutters. I’ve always thought it was cute, like one of those perfect homes from a half-hour sitcom, but real life things happen here.

  Sam parks along the street but sits quietly at my side. He knows how I work, thinking everything through. I’ve rehearsed what I want to say over and over the last couple days, but I know the minute I see her, that will all go out the window.

  “Just wait here,” I say, grabbing the manila envelope from the back seat. “I should only be a few minutes.”

  “Take your time.”

  I step onto the curb and slowly make my way up to the white door. I have to tell myself to keep walking, to do what I came here to do.

  Before I think too much, I knock against the wood door, praying she’s here so I don’t have to go through this whole process again. When I’m about to hit my knuckles against the wood again, it opens.

  It’s Janet, Madison’s mother. Her mouth falls open when she sees it’s me, but she quickly recovers. She knows. “Hi, Rachel, it’s been a while since I’ve seen you.”

  “Hi, Janet. Is Madison home?”

  She hesitates, her chest moving up and down at a visible pace. “Let me check. I’ll be right back.”

  Instead of inviting me in, she closes the door. Janet knows Madison is home and, right now, they’re probably talking about whether or not it’s a good idea for her to come out here with me. I don’t know if I’d come out in this situation.

  A couple minutes later, the door opens again. It’s not Janet this time … it’s Madison. She looks terrified, and if I had to bet, I’d say she’s been crying.