by Nina Levine
BIRDIE
“So what’s the next step for you guys?” Cleo asked over the phone the morning after I slept with Winter. He’d left the hotel room five minutes ago in search of good coffee and I’d promptly called my bestie, desperately in need of her counselling. Sleeping with Winter hadn’t been my plan when I’d come on this trip with him, and while it felt like exactly the right thing to have done, on the inside, I was losing my shit. Because I still haven’t told him why I broke up with him all those years ago.
“I don’t know!” I rummaged through my make-up, looking for the pink lipstick I loved the most. It didn’t help that I’d brought five pinks with me, amongst a million other make-up necessities. When Winter had told me to pack light, I did. With my clothes. But not with my beauty products; I needed options with that stuff. “Oh God, where the fuck is it?” I muttered, my efforts growing more frantic as I failed to locate it.
“Birdie,” Cleo said, “Breathe. It’s going to be all right. You guys are going to figure this out.” She didn’t even need to know what I was doing to know I was panicking; Cleo had years of my meltdowns under her belt.
I stared at my phone sitting on the vanity and channelled her calmness. Cleo had a way of handling stress I could only dream of. Sometimes just being around her or talking to her could help ease mine, but not this morning. Today, I was floundering, and I probably had less than ten minutes before Winter would return and I’d have to be in control of my emotions. And just thinking about that stressed me out more.
“Okay,” I finally said, exhaling, not actually feeling less wound up, but faking confidence, “You’re right. We’re going to work this out. I don’t know what the next step is for us, but I’m sure it will have something to do with Winter bossing me around. He’ll probably try to tell me we’re moving back into together.”
“Is that what you’re thinking, too?”
I stared at myself in the mirror for a long moment, taking in the tiredness lining my eyes. Thank goodness I’d already showered and done my hair. Winter wanted to leave the hotel soon to head over to his dad’s place, which wouldn’t leave me much time to fix my face. And it needed a lot of fixing. “I think we need some time to figure this all out first. Like, I’m committed, but it’s been five years and a lot has changed for each of us. We need to talk about all this and make plans slowly rather than rush into things.”
Cleo sounded like she was choking on something when she said, “Ah, babe, I’ve got news for you and it’s all bad. Your man doesn’t know the meaning of slow.”
The sound of the hotel door opening alerted me to the fact Winter was back. “Shit,” I said softly, “I’ve gotta go. I’ll call you later to chat more about how work is going. Love you.”
“Don’t worry about work. We’ve got everything under control. But I wanna know how today goes with Winter, so either call or text. Love you, too,” she said.
I met Winter’s eyes in the mirror as I tapped my phone to end the call. “Was that Cleo, or your mum?” he asked. “Or Carey?”
He knew me as well as Cleo did, so of course he knew I was overthinking everything. “Cleo.”
Handing me a coffee, he rested against the vanity and drank some of his before saying, “Talk to me, Angel. What’s running through that beautiful mind of yours?”
I drank some coffee, mostly to stall this conversation, but also because I craved the caffeine and hoped it gave me a jolt of energy. Winter had worn me out last night, keeping me awake until the very early hours of the morning. After only four hours of sleep, he’d woken me looking for more sex. I’d told him no, my vagina was closed to him for the day. I was too damn sore to have him anywhere near me. “You can sort your own dick out today,” I’d grumbled. “I’d forgotten how big it is and how much you like to use it.” He’d pulled me close and growled against my ear, “Clearly if you’d forgotten, I need to up my game so you never forget again.”
He did not need to do any such thing. I would never forget last night.
Finally, after stalling for as long as I could, I answered his question. My words tumbled out in a hot freaking mess. “We need to start dating.”
His brows raised as he shifted his ass against the vanity and crossed one foot over the other. “Not at all what I expected you to say, but I’m listening.”
The intense way he watched me threw me off more than I already was. Diverting my gaze to avoid his intensity, I spied the pink lipstick I’d been searching for. Grabbing it, I said, “Well, don’t you think that’s the best next step? It’s been five years. We need to get to know each other again.”
As I set the lipstick aside for later use and picked up my foundation, he curled his hand around my wrist and drew my attention back to him. “Stop what you’re doing and talk to me.”
“I can put make-up on and talk at the same time.”
“Yeah, I know you can, but not for this conversation. I want your full attention for this.”
“Winter—”
“Birdie.”
I placed the foundation down and turned to face him. “This will delay our departure. Just so you’re aware.”
His brows arched again at my attitude, but he didn’t call me out on it. “I am aware. But so you’re aware, you don’t need that stuff on your face.”
And just like that, Winter managed to send a thousand butterflies to my tummy and turn my anxious mood on its head. This had always been his superpower. It was one reason why we worked so well as a couple. He had a way of helping me find the calm I desperately sought.
Now that he had my attention, he answered my question about what he felt was our next step. “I agree that things have changed in the last five years, but I don’t think it’s necessary for us to go all the way back to dating.”
“Well, I don’t mean dating as in seeing each other a few times a week for dinner and movies. I’m thinking something a little more than that.”
“I should fucking hope so, Angel, because I’m thinking a whole lot more than that.”
“Like what?”
“Like, we move in together and start making plans for the future.”
My mind raced almost as fast as my heart did at that statement. I wanted all of that with Winter, but I needed a moment to catch my breath here. I needed a moment—the perfect moment—to tell him that we could never have what he wanted in life. That maybe he shouldn’t choose me at all.
A knock on the door interrupted us.
Winter pushed off from the vanity. “Hold that thought.”
I watched him exit the bathroom, and when I could no longer see him, I gripped the edge of the vanity, bent my head, and sucked in some long breaths.
I’m just going to tell him.
Now.
He needs to know and then he can stop this before it goes any further.
Before his heart gets too broken again.
Can a heart get too broken? Isn’t broken, broken? Won’t finding out what I did break it completely so that it can’t get any more broken?
God, Birdie, focus.
I lifted my head and came eye to eye with Winter in the mirror again. “Max is here. He wants to talk, so we’re going to head out and find a café. You do your face and text me when you’re done.”
“Okay,” I said, my voice breaking as I gulped back all the thoughts I’d just had.
He frowned. “You okay?”
I nodded, forcing a smile. “Yeah, I’m good.” I moved to him and lifted up onto my toes so I could kiss him. “You go and sort stuff out.”
His hand landed on my ass as he kissed me again. When our kiss ended, he eyed me silently for a beat. “Love you, baby.”
My emotions crashed into me like a tidal wave. I loved this man with all my heart, and the thought of losing him again was unbearable. But so was the thought of hurting him again.
This was a no-win situation.
Both of us were going to drown in this.
The hurt and anger and pain were going to engulf us.
&
nbsp; The past was going to catch up with me and destroy him.
And although his father had just died, leaving him at his most vulnerable, I had to tell him.
I couldn’t allow him to go another second making more plans for us that would never come to pass.
I couldn’t allow his heart to be even more broken than it was already going to be.
I couldn’t allow him to tell me he loved me without knowing he shouldn’t.
As he removed his hand from my body, I reached for it and gripped it tightly. With my heart beating wildly, almost exploding out of my chest, I said, “We can’t do this, Winter.”
His frown returned. “Do what?”
“We can’t be together.” My voice was barely more than a whisper. But the anguish in it roared so loudly that it almost deafened both of us. “I lied to you while you were in Afghanistan. I did something I swore to you I’d never do, and all the things you think we can have, we can’t.” I let go of his hand and took a step away from him. Swallowing hard, I added on a broken whisper, “I can never make you a daddy. I’m so sorry.”
19
WINTER
There were four moments in my life that stood out to me. Moments that had signalled a big life change ahead. The day my mother died. The day I returned from Afghanistan that last time. The day Birdie left me. The day Dad died. This right here, this moment I was in with Birdie, screamed huge fucking life change. And I didn’t want one fucking thing to do with it. Not when we’d finally cleared what I thought was the last hurdle to be together again. I wasn’t deluded to think our journey would be easy, but I sure as fuck never expected something like this.
She was yet to tell me exactly what she’d done, but I didn’t need to know the details to know I wasn’t going to like it. I only had to take one look at Birdie to know that.
The way she looked like she was about to vomit.
The way she looked like she wanted to be anywhere but where she was.
The way she looked like regret was her own personal brand.
She’d uttered seven words that pierced my heart, but it was the words she hadn’t uttered yet that I knew would crack it wide open.
As she moved away from me, I snapped my hand around her wrist and held her in place. “What did you do?”
Her gaze cut to my hand and she tried to pull out of my hold. Tightening my grasp, I said, “Don’t back out of this now, Angel. And don’t think for one second that I’m letting you go. We need to sort this out, and that can’t be done if you walk away.”
She blinked and I took in the heavy rise and fall of her chest. “This can’t be sorted out, Winter. What’s done is done. I can’t take any of it back.”
My chest was tightening with every second that ticked by. “No, you can’t, but you can start by telling me what you lied about.”
Staring at me like she wanted nothing more than to flee this bathroom, she swallowed hard again. The silence became almost unbearable, but patience was a strength of mine, so I waited for her to fill it.
Finally, she gave me what I wanted. “Before I tell you, you need to think back to what we’d been going through in those last few years before we broke up. The stress, the arguments over your work, the fact you were away so much, and that when you were home, you weren’t really there.”
I remembered those years clearly, like they were just yesterday. The fights we’d had, the nights we’d slept apart, the pleas for me to leave the military, the tears, and the crushing heartbreak of it all. Birdie had supported my career choice from day one, but the SAS had been demanding in ways she’d never seen coming. Physically and mentally taxing, each tour hardened me in new ways. While I was over there taking target after target, seizing drugs from the Taliban, and destroying weapon caches, my relationship was falling apart. Each time I returned home, we struggled to reconnect because I struggled to leave behind the horrors of war.
“I remember,” I said, wishing like fuck I didn’t. Wishing I could take all that shit back and make better choices for me and Birdie.
She nodded before glancing down. The roar of silence threatened to consume me, to swallow me whole while we were suspended in that moment of before. The moment before she finally told me what had blown us apart all those years ago.
Looking back up at me, she said, “I didn’t want to lose you to that war.” Her voice cracked and she tried to swallow her emotions, but it was impossible. The floodgates were wide open now; our emotions were hurtling full force at us. “I told you over and over that I didn’t want you to go back. Every single time you came home, I told you.” She abruptly stopped and exhaled a shaky breath. “You have to understand how desperate I felt, Winter. To save you. To save us.” Her eyes madly searched mine, looking for understanding. But how could I give her that when I didn’t know what for yet?
“Birdie,” I forced out, wanting anything but to ask my next question, “What did you do?”
“I made a choice for us without giving you the opportunity to have a say. Even though we always swore to be completely honest with each other, and even though I knew how you felt about women who went down the path of getting pregnant intentionally to keep a man”—she paused one last time, again begging me silently to understand—“and even though we’d discussed the timing for future attempts at having a child, so that you could be around to support me through it if there were complications again, I went off the pill with the intention of falling pregnant. I wanted to force your hand. I wanted you to choose us over the military.”
Her confession was a bullet to my heart. It forced its way in, crushing and burning and destroying. I was unprepared for it. I had no bulletproof vest when it came to Birdie.
I let go of her hand as my brain connected dots. “You had another ectopic pregnancy?”
“Yes.” It was barely a whisper and yet it reverberated with ear-splitting noise.
“And you lost your other tube.”
She nodded, but gave me no more words as she watched me with tears tracking down her cheeks.
A year into our relationship, she’d fallen pregnant accidentally. Both of us wanted children, so it had been a blessing. However, it had been an ectopic pregnancy and she’d lost a fallopian tube. The doctor had warned us there was a chance she could have another ectopic pregnancy after that one, with the possibility of losing her other fallopian tube, so we’d agreed to put off having children until I could take time off and be home with her in case of any complications.
The main reason I wanted us to wait, though, was so I didn’t miss out on one minute of her pregnancy. As far as I was concerned, those nine months were far too precious to not be home for. I wanted to be there every step of the way for my woman and my child. My father had ingrained that sense of responsibility in me.
“Fuck.” The word tore from my soul. The sense of loss wasn’t just about the loss of her ability to have children; it was about so much more than that. Some wouldn’t even comprehend what this was about, but Birdie did. It was why she now looked at me like she feared my reaction.
I lived by a code, honesty its pinnacle. I walked away from people who didn’t return the honesty I gave them. Birdie knew this, and so she knew that right now my gut and heart were in free fall.
I didn’t know what to do with this information. Not a place I was used to being. Between my upbringing and military training, decisiveness had been drilled into me as a standard response to any situation. I took information in and quickly processed it before making a clear and firm choice. But not this time. Fuck, this time my heart was getting in the way of my brain.
I loved Birdie. With everything in me, I fucking loved her. I had done so almost from the day I met her, and all the way through to now. Even during my darkest days in the five years she hadn’t been mine, I had loved her. I hadn’t thought there was anything she could do that would change that. But fuck, life had a way of knocking you clear to your knees when you least expected it.
“Say something, Winter,” Birdie pleaded,
her eyes filled with the same level of anxiousness as her voice. “Tell me you’re done, tell me you want me to go, tell me you hate me. Just say something!”
As I stood there staring at her with thoughts wrapping their way around my heart, choking the fuck out of me, I wondered if we’d finally found something that would kill us. We’d already been through so much together; when did it all become too much? I was a fighter. That was me—heart, body, and soul. I didn’t fucking give up on things or people that were important to me. And Birdie was the most important person in my life, so I wasn’t about to give up on her. But would my love and my fight be enough? Because right now, I felt pretty fucking annihilated. I felt like an exhausted soldier crawling through the mud, riddled with bullets, desperately seeking shelter from the enemy, not sure if I was about to take my last breath.
“Winter.” Max’s voice cut through my thoughts. “You good to go? I’ve gotta get back home to take Jesse to a party, so I don’t have a lot of time.”
With my eyes firmly on Birdie, I answered him, “Yeah, gimme a minute.”
“You go,” Birdie said. “I’ll book a flight home and get out of here while you’re gone.” Resignation blasted from her voice. She’d already given up, but fuck if I’d allow that.
“No,” I said, the force in my tone causing her eyes to widen. “You’re staying right the fuck here so we can discuss this more when I get back.”
When she didn’t respond to that, I said, “I’m not done, Birdie.”
She wiped the tears from her cheeks. “Why? You should be. What I did was unforgivable.”
“Are you fucking kidding me right now?” My anger roared to life. “That you even have to ask me why I’m not done… that fucking kills me.” I jabbed my finger at her. “Don’t fucking go anywhere while I’m gone. I swear to fucking God I’ll come for you if you do, and it won’t be pretty if I have to.”
I stalked out of the room without waiting for her response. Far too fucking many emotions crowded me. I felt like I couldn’t breathe. Like I needed to rip my skin off and let these emotions the fuck out. But more than anything, for the first time in my life, I needed to be as far from Birdie as I could get.