“Really?”
He nodded, then moved forward with what he’d come to tell me.
“Things were said on both sides that probably weren’t meant. But Blake went for the jugular first, and she also hit him.”
My eyes widened, surprised that Matthew wasn’t the only one that had gotten physical. I could totally see Blake as being feisty, but to imagine her striking her brother was nearly impossible.
“She copped to that, even though she wouldn’t tell me anything else. She said some really nasty things about you, Lauren, and she ended up blaming Matthew for losing our baby.”
“She didn’t,” I breathed, but the look on his face confirmed he was dead serious. “Let me guess, something about being a piece of ass?”
Chris winced, and I kind of felt sorry for him. Sworn enemies or not, the terminology was brutal. Combine that with Blake blaming her brother for their miscarriage, and I could practically feel his pain right along with him.
“Matthew said something to that effect last night,” I explained, though I didn’t expand on when it occurred. “Now I get where that came from.”
“To be honest, I don’t blame him for the wall. I can’t say I wouldn’t have done the same thing.”
“I’m so sorry about that,” I said quickly, heat rising to my cheeks at the reminder. “I’ll pay for it to be fixed. Just tell me how much, and I’ll write you a check.”
“It’s not a big deal. It’s just some drywall and paint. And I didn’t come all the way over here to beg you for restitution. Knowing Blake, she’s probably already working on getting it patched up. Gracie sent her home today. She’s a mess.”
Which led to the question of why Chris was here, hashing things out with me, instead of at home consoling his wife. I didn’t have the nerve to voice that, though.
“Matthew said some stuff about me, too,” he continued. I was almost afraid to hear it. If Blake could throw me under the bus so easily, what had my husband said? “Most of it was true.”
“Like what?”
He shrugged, a futile attempt to make this look like a normal conversation. “I’ve thought for years that Blake should try to mend fences with her parents. Both her and her brother, really, but especially her. The Snyders don’t have a beef with Blake other than she stood behind Matthew when they wouldn’t. But every time I’ve brought it up, the thought has been shot down just as quickly.”
“Why?”
Chris chuckled, and this time the laughter was genuine. “If you haven’t noticed, Blake holds a mean grudge.”
I chewed a bite of my steak and considered. This was true; the long storied “rot in hell” moment a brilliant example. And clearly the one he expected me to think of. But she picked and chose her selections randomly, or so it seemed.
“I’ll give you that,” I began, “but she holds some offenses higher than others.”
I received a raised eyebrow in response.
“Think about it. We’ve got the obvious ones: her parents and you. But what about what I did to her?”
“I’m pretty certain you’re on her shit list, too.”
“No. Not for what I just did. But for what happened way back when I moved out of her house without telling anyone and disappeared for months on end. She acted like it was nothing and welcomed me back with open arms, like I’d just been gone on vacation or something.”
“Consider that a gift.”
“Trust me, I did. Maybe I’m reading way too much into it, but you were and are still far more pissed off at me for that. Sure, I didn’t wrong her - until now - but I put Matthew through living hell and she just brushed it off like it was no matter.”
I paused, waiting for the words to sink in. They eventually did, but not the way I wanted them to.
“I get what you’re saying, Lauren, but this is not that simple. She is not going to forgive and forget, even if we wait five months.”
“So what do we do here? Why did you show up today if the situation is pointless?”
He ran his hand through his hair, considering. “I don’t know.”
He looked so absolutely distraught that my heart went out to him. As precarious of a position that I was in, his role in the mess was even more distorted. While my relationship with Blake had cooled to a point that I had no problem putting my full weight behind whatever Matthew ended up wanting to do, he was stuck between his wife and his best friend. And clearly, he saw both sides.
“Are you going to talk to her about it?” I asked. It was a question posed out of curiosity, not of demand.
Instead of answering, he rocked back in his chair, balancing himself on the back two legs and staring up at the ceiling as if it held the meaning of life. I humored him, pretending I was more interested in my lunch than in whatever battle was waging in his brain. Eventually, the reality of what we collectively faced came crashing down on him, and he lowered the chair to its correct position.
“I can’t lose her again, Lauren,” he insisted. “The last time I did, it took me ten years to get her back. If she walks away now, she won’t be returning.”
Chapter Thirteen
Blake
It was late when Chris came home. Then again, maybe it wasn’t, since I’d gone to the bedroom and stayed there soon after Gracie had kicked me out of the studio. I doubted I’d slept any at all, but being curled up in my bed seemed preferable to staring at the hole that graced my living room wall.
The few moments that Will had stopped by to check on my well-being had been brutal. I’d put on a brave face for him because I knew if I didn’t that Chris would hightail it home. And as much as I wanted to seek refuge in my husband’s arms and shut the rest of the world away, the best thing for all involved was to just forge forward with life as we knew it.
Except there was an emptiness that I felt in my chest that reminded me that things weren’t the same as they had been even twenty-four hours earlier. And I knew in my heart of hearts that they would never be the same again. One by one, I’d pushed each of my family members away. But this last break had been the hardest by far, and I doubted I’d ever fully recover from it.
Even though I heard Chris’s movement in the house, I still jumped when the door to the master opened, turning the thin ribbon of light that had spread inside from the hallway into a blinding beacon. I reached my hand across the mattress to my nightstand, searching for my glasses. I slid them on, preparing for whatever was coming.
“You awake?” he asked softly, just in case I wasn’t.
“Yep,” I answered quickly.
Instead of turning on the lights like I expected him to, he left them off and shut the door behind him, folding us back into darkness. Within seconds, his weight lowered down on the bed beside me, his arm reaching out and pulling me into his warmth. I snuggled against him, craving his touch more than I could express. He seemed to catch on, the knuckle of his index finger trailing down my jawline, then repeating the motion on an endless loop.
“Hungry?” he asked finally.
“Not really.”
His finger stilled, and I knew I’d given the wrong answer. My own body betrayed me at the mention of food, my stomach growling in protest. I’d not had anything to speak of to eat all day, save the three cups of coffee it had taken to get me up and into the studio in the first place. I had the raging headache to prove that, though that could also have been a side effect of my mental state.
“You have to take care of yourself, Blake,” he said gently. “Especially if you’re serious about this.”
His hand trailed down to my abdomen, where it rested meaningfully. Message received. I nodded, knowing he could feel the action, and slotted my fingers through his.
“Life will go on, angel. You’ll see. The sun will still rise tomorrow and we’ll get through this.”
“I know,” I whispered, even though I hadn’t yet convinced myself.
“I’m not going anywhere.”
“I know.” That was something more certain. The convict
ion that accompanied my agreement was stronger, but there was still a hint of lingering doubt. “Am I being stupid?”
A sigh, which was not the most encouraging response. Though I couldn’t see Chris walking away from me at this point, I was painfully aware of the predicament that I’d put him into. Asking him to choose between me and my brother was selfish at best, and brutal at worst.
The easiest thing to do would be to give in. To call Matthew, my tail between my legs, and agree to meet with our mother and hear her out. An hour of discomfort for a lifetime of peace on the sibling front. As simple as it sounded, the thought turned my stomach and left me nauseous.
“I can’t tell you what to do,” he hedged.
But how I wanted him to. I had a feeling that my defense mechanisms were shitty, but I didn’t have the strength to counteract them. My overwhelming instinct was to run and hide, burying my head firmly in the sand. Hence today’s half-assed attempt.
“What if I want you to?” I asked aloud.
“You wouldn’t listen to me anyway.”
I snorted, finding a minimal amount of humor in that statement. He was probably right.
“If he wants to talk to her, that’s his right. But for him to decide for me; I can’t let him do that.”
“You’ve decided plenty of things for him,” Chris reminded. “And for us.” Those words came much more quietly, but they hit home the hardest. I winced.
“I had to.”
Chris said nothing, only resumed stroking my cheek. I tried not to imagine the distance between us growing exponentially, but it was difficult. As much as this man loved me, could he stand by me if and when he didn’t agree wholeheartedly with my stance on things? Matthew had planted that seed in my mind, and I was left to wonder how much Chris could swallow down his own opinions before he choked on them.
I reached up and circled his wrist with my fingers, bringing his hand to my lips where I kissed his knuckles one after the other. I nuzzled my cheek into his palm, a silent plea for him to pour on the affection. Right now, I needed a physical declaration of love more than I needed dinner.
He rolled over so we were no longer spooning, so that he hovered over me. I stared up at him, allowing him to remove my glasses. The frames were deposited back where they’d come from moments ago. He lingered above me, a shadow whose features I could complete in my memory.
“I’ve always loved you,” he declared, a statement that sent shivers down my spine even though I knew the truth of those words like the back of my hand.
“And me, you,” I vowed, because that was our reality.
My hand reached up to touch his face, to trace the lips that had supplied my first kiss and many more since. As much as things had changed throughout our history, one thing remained a constant: I was his, and he was mine. Even those horrible years that I’d kept him seemingly out of my life, the feeling hadn’t disappeared, only lain dormant. When we’d finally both recognized that we couldn’t stop hiding from one another, it had reemerged full strength, perhaps even more powerful than before.
A fleeting thought passed through my mind. Maybe Matthew and I had the same connection, though admittedly in a different sense of the word.
Chris leaned over to flip on the lamp beside the bed, illuminating the room with a soft glow. He preferred to make love while he could at least partially see me, and I enjoyed watching him do it. Tonight especially, I needed to see his eyes as they took me in, almost as if witnessing my naked body for the first time.
Though our love had now spanned decades, I was no longer the fresh faced fourteen year old he’d lost his virginity to. Or even the eighteen year old version that had accidentally gotten pregnant the night of my brother’s arrest. The modifications had come after the miscarriage, a good kind of pain self-inflicted to numb the bad. He’d accepted the blue hair and the nose ring easily enough, but unveiling that which wasn’t easily seen had given me pause the first time we’d slept together after our reunion.
Now each time that he undressed me, his reaction was priceless. Those chocolate brown eyes of his would take me in from head to toe, sweeping from my face, across my breasts, and abruptly stopping at the ring of sunflowers that circled my pierced navel. Sometimes he’d trace the tattoo with his finger, sometimes with his tongue, others with tiny kisses. But they always garnered his undivided attention. And he always, always, hardened noticeably at the sight.
Tonight, I received kisses, his fingers idly sliding the barbell back and forth through my navel. Initially, he’d been hesitant to touch, but I’d insisted it didn’t hurt, because it didn’t. It was a strange, not unpleasant sensation that passed over me when someone else handled the jewelry since it had long ago healed.
My breath caught in my lungs as he executed a particularly glorious motion. He responded by withdrawing from that area of my body and continuing further down. His gaze focused on my legs, long and still as shapely as during my cheerleader days. And, as we’d come to realize, still as limber as before. So I didn’t even flinch when he extended both of them heavenward, my ankles coming to rest on his shoulders.
If I didn’t know better, I’d say that the sex he instigated was more of an outlet for himself than for me. While my position on things was clear - at least for now - he was noticeably conflicted. The one thing that couldn’t be argued was our chemistry, as thick as ever. And he seemed to take solace in that, his eyes closing in relief with the passion that he felt, the comfort that came from burying himself inside me and forgetting everything else.
And I wasn’t about to deny him the opportunity to shut everything else out. I turned off my brain as well, focusing no further than this bed, on these two bodies searching for release. The sound of our respective heavy breathing drowned out my internal monologue. Everything else became inconsequential for as long as we were in this moment, moving as one.
Right here, right now, I could believe that it was us against the world. And that we could somehow come out victorious.
I didn’t stop to think how unlikely that was until I’d ridden out a couple of intense orgasms - one his, the other my own - and he’d left me alone to whip up something for us to eat. I remained on the king sized mattress, small and insignificant. Under the guise of trying to hasten conception, even though it was probably way too early for that, he’d allowed me to remain here instead of forcing me up and out to the kitchen to assist. He was humoring me, and we both knew it.
A hot tear slid down my cheek, dampening the pillowcase that my head rested against. I bit my lip to stop any more, squeezing my eyes shut to keep from breaking down entirely. Crying didn’t fix anything, only made me question my own convictions.
Chris hadn’t given me a straight answer in regards to the state of my own stupidity. He’d turned to the ultimate distraction, the language he knew I’d be too eager to reciprocate. The balm that I used to heal any and all wounds, the one thing that I ran to in order to make everything else tolerable. He’d rightly ascertained that I used sex as a weapon, and I’d fallen into my own habits yet again.
But this time, I’d not picked a random, nameless man up in a bar. This time, I’d dragged my husband down into my destructive behavior.
And this time, the demon that I was battling was myself.
Chapter Fourteen
Lauren
Three weeks had passed since the meeting with Patricia and the subsequent fallout. Three weeks of silence from Blake. A handful of of calls from Chris to Matthew, but nothing like it used to be. They came at strange hours, likely when Blake wasn’t around to hear. I wasn’t sure what was said, and didn’t want to press. Talking to Chris didn’t seem to upset Matthew, so I figured there was no need to pry.
Therefore I happily continued on firmly ensconced in oblivion. Distances were kept, lines drawn in the sand. And I watched it all unfold around me, unable to do anything to stop it. Matthew was my lighthouse in the fog, the beacon that I sailed towards. If we ended up becoming our own island, then so be it. I’d chosen
my side when I’d taken his hand in marriage, vowing to stand behind him even when his opinion wasn’t supported by the popular vote.
Matthew wanted to open the lines of communication that I had set about establishing, and that was what we were going with. A nagging voice in the back of my head wondered had the directive come from anyone else if he would have been so receptive, but I tried to ignore that. From what Chris had said during the steak bribery lunch, Blake had just about posed the same question. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know the true answer. I held fast to the belief that his desire to allow his mother back into his life had come out of pure intentions, and not just a willingness to please his piece of ass.
Hadn’t the two of us been through enough already? Lord knows that if he was just looking to get laid, he wouldn’t have waited for me all those months while I got my act together. He wouldn’t have obsessed over losing me like he did; he wouldn’t have eventually come after me upon getting the heads up from Will. The two of us had established much more than a relationship based only in the bedroom.
Ah, the bedroom. But some habits were easy to slip back into, and I silently wondered if his magnified need for me was the result of his manwhore past. Our sex life had been more active than ever lately. And while I wasn’t complaining, I was sort of haunted by the fact that this was how he dealt with obstacles in his life.
At any rate, Matthew had decided to move forward with letting Patricia back into his life, baby steps at a time. I was glad that he was forging ahead even if his sister didn’t give her blessing. While I would always love Blake, and was more than a little concerned what her absence in Matthew’s life would do to him, it was reassuring to see that her opinion did not matter more than his own. She didn’t control him, even though she undoubtedly held a remarkable amount of power over him.
And so it led to me being where I was, in our kitchen, stressing over the perfect lunch.
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