Arsen

by Mia Asher

  “No. I’m not happy. I fucking regret walking in that coffee shop this morning. I’ve regretted it ever since I laid my fucking eyes on you again.”

  I clutch my legs tighter in my arms as I wipe my tears on my knee.

  “Momma?” I hear Nadia’s groggy voice. The sweet melody snaps me out of the living hell I’m in. Untangling myself from my arms, I get up. My voice choked in tears, I leave without looking at him and go to Nadia’s room. “Please go. I need to put her back to sleep. I’m sorry, Ben. Have a good life,” I speak to the air.

  Inside Nadia’s room, I get in bed with her and wrap her in my arms as close as possible. I’m very cold, and I hope she can warm me with her tiny body.

  “Momma, why are you crying?” she asks sleepily.

  “Shhh, Nadia, shhh. Mommy loves you, shhh.” I can’t hide my tears from her, so I lose myself in sorrow. I cry in my baby’s arms. I cry until there are no more tears inside me. After some time, I hear her lightly snoring.

  When I realize I have to lock the door after Ben, I stall for time. I don’t want to leave her just yet. She’s my safe haven.

  As I hear an alien sound in the room, I glance at the door and see him watching us with tears rolling down his face.

  “Cathy...” he whispers roughly, “Damn it, Cathy.”

  I shake my head when I see him taking a step into Nadia’s room. I let go of her, get off the bed, and make my way to where he’s standing. Grabbing his forearm in my hand, I make him follow me to the living room.

  We stand in the middle of the room, surrounded by new memories I’ve created since our marriage ended. A life without him. Ben and I continue to stare at each other with tears streaming down our faces in total silence. With my heart ramming against the walls of my chest, I watch as Ben struggles to contain the trembling of his limbs.

  I remember Hayes words.

  Fight for him.

  I take the biggest gamble of my life because at this point there’s nothing else to lose and everything to gain. I wrap my arms around his large body, pushing myself closer to him until there is no space left between us. I hope my love can be enough when I utter the next words.

  “Ben…I know I don’t deserve you, but can we do it all again? I mean, try again?”

  “I don’t know, Cathy. I don’t fucking know.”

  “If you can forgive me, if you have it in you to give me a second chance, I will give you every part of me. Every kiss…every tear…every smile. I’m yours. Always have. Always will. I promise you that I won’t ever take you for granted. I promise you that not a day will go by when I won’t do my best to make you as happy as you deserve. I love you. Only you. Please, Ben. Forgive me.”

  I pause and swallow my tears. “I know we both have changed, a-and that sometimes love is not enough to make things work. Too much has happened between us…but I have hope. I’m not asking you to marry me, or to even date me. I’m just asking you for the chance to let me back in your life. With Nadia. Let us back, let me love you. Let me earn your trust again. Let me show you how much I love you, even after all this time.” I grab him by the back of his neck, pull him down, and kiss him with my whole soul, my whole heart, my everything. And I kiss for every year, month, week, day, hour, and second without him in my life.

  With the kiss coming to an end, I make him look at me and whisper fiercely against his lips, “Miracles are the consequences of daring to believe. And I dare you to believe in us again, Ben. I dare you to.”

  But when he doesn’t respond, I have my answer even before he lets go of my waist and pushes me away.

  “I’m sorry, Cathy. I can’t do it. I shouldn’t have come here, but I needed to know, and…fuck.” He rubs his hands on his face, wiping some of his tears away. “I forgave you a long time ago, I did, but I don’t think I can ever forget what you did to us. The pain is still fucking there. It’s too late.”

  I can’t move.

  I can’t breathe.

  All I can do is stand there and listen to him telling me what I’ve known all along. That I destroyed us beyond repair, even if I dared myself to hope briefly.

  Ben lifts a hand almost as if he wants to touch me again, but changes his mind because he puts his hands in his pockets instead.

  “I should go…”

  Not being able to answer him, all I can do is nod and watch him turn around and make his way through my living room to the front door, walking away from my life forever.

  Just like I knew it would be.

  Halfway through, he reaches down and picks up a Rapunzel stuffed doll that is lying on the floor next to some parenting and shoe magazines. “She’s as beautiful as you are,” he says, looking at the doll as he slowly caresses her golden hair.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  With a rueful smile, he turns to look at me. “She looks just how I dreamed our daughter would so many times before.”

  Ben is kneeling down, holding what could be our daughter’s doll in his hand, and telling me that she looks exactly how he imagined she would, yet I have never felt more lost or more heartbroken than now. When I left him in the house that day, I thought I’d lost part of myself, not knowing if there was a Cathy without Ben. And as I stare into my ex-husband’s eyes, I know that there’s no me without him.

  But I deserve this.

  I deserve to be alone.

  Ben is right.

  It’s too late for us.

  “If you ever need help financially, let me know.” Ben is standing outside my apartment now, looking calmer than before, but I see the sadness in his eyes.

  “No. I don’t deserve your help,” I say more forcefully than I intended. “I-I have a job. Amy was able to get me a position at a different hotel.”

  “It doesn’t matter. I’d like to hel—”

  “No. Please, Ben, don’t say anything else. J-just go. I’m so close to falling apart in front of you. I’m trying so hard to stand here and look at you and not want you,” I whimper as I clutch myself tighter. “I’m trying not to throw myself at your feet and beg you to stay. Please, just go. I’m so sorry for h-how much I hurt you but please, I’m begging you…”

  “I understand, Cathy. I’m sorry too.”

  And he’s gone.

  I know our love is broken past salvation and it is my fault, but watching him walk away from me once more still has the power to destroy me. As I stare at his hunched figure making his way slowly to the elevator, I realize that I’m not sure I’ll be able to heal from this.

  I don’t think I can.

  I don’t go back to bed.

  Instead, I sit on the floor on the same spot where Ben sat a couple hours ago, trying to see if I can still feel the warm imprint of his body, but I feel nothing. There isn’t anything left of him in my apartment.

  Nothing.

  It is empty.

  Just like me.

  But then I remember Nadia.

  Nadia.

  My beautiful Nadia.

  She is my will to live.

  The only one who matters.

  So I stand up, make my way to my bedroom, take a shower, and get ready for the day. I bury the pain deep within me once again, and prepare myself to pretend like nothing ever happened.

  There is no other choice.

  I have to.

  I have to be strong. I’m holding hands with Nadia as we walk to her school in the pouring rain. Like every autumn before, the weather has turned chilly while the leaves begin to fall and cover the asphalt in a sea of orange, brown, and bright red. Listening to the city come alive with the sounds of cars driving over wet pavement and puddles being splashed, I watch as my daughter walks protected in her bright pink raincoat and matching boots. She’s twirling her umbrella and humming, “Rain, rain, go away…”

  I’m so entranced by the way her blonde curls are bouncing off her shoulders that I don’t notice the man making his way towards us until I hear him saying my name. Startled, my hand goes to my chest as I peek from under my umbrella at a soa
ked Ben watching us with so much love.

  “Ben?” I ask incredulously.

  “Hi,” Ben smiles bashfully as I move forward to shelter him from the rain with my umbrella.

  “Um, Momma?”

  Upon hearing Nadia speak; Ben looks away from me, focusing on Nadia who is openly studying him with those big green eyes of hers.

  “Hi there, pretty girl,” he says huskily.

  “Hi. You’re the man Papa didn’t like. You made my momma sad,” she states.

  Ben grimaces. “I am, and I’m sorry for that, but I’m here to try to make it all better.”

  “Reaaaally? Will you buy her a cupcake? My momma says cupcakes always make a bad day better.”

  “If she’ll let me, I’ll buy her as many cupcakes as I possibly can,” Ben says, smiling into my daughter’s eyes.

  Nadia seems to be content with his answer because she nods and says, “Momma, don’t be sad anymore. He’s gonna buy you cupcakes now, okay?”

  I want to laugh and cry, but instead I tear my gaze away from my daughter and stare at Ben, who’s watching me intensely as rain keeps falling around us.

  “Cathy, I can’t make promises. I don’t know anything anymore…so much can happen, so much has. But what I do know is that I want you both in my life. Of that, I’m sure.”

  “I understand. Just give me one chance. Just one to make this right.”

  I watch Ben as hope is reborn within him. Fear and indecision disappear, clearing the path for our future together.

  “There was never a choice for us, was there?” he says as a smile grows on his beautiful face, accentuating the thickness of his lips and the sharp edge of his jaw.

  I shake my head and smile as happiness bursts inside me, bringing me to life once more.

  “No.”

  “Come here,” he says, flashing the same cocky smile I fell in love with the first time I saw him.

  About to reach for him with Nadia in my hand, I let myself think of that boy with the aqua-blue fire in his eyes one last time. Silently, I thank him because he’s the reason why I’m standing in front of Ben. He saved me from myself, and in a roundabout way he gave me Ben back. Without his help, and whatever it was we had, I don’t think I would be here. I would probably be dead. I love him and always will because his inner fire brought me back to life. Yes, he was the fire that burned my marriage down to ashes, but in those ashes, hope was reborn.

  He healed me.

  Arsen.

  Missing you is a sickness I can’t cure, and it’s fucking killing me.

  Fuck.

  It happened again.

  I’m looking at a lavender ceiling instead of the familiar grey of my bedroom.

  The pillow feels too fluffy to be mine, and it smells like fucking fruit.

  Why the hell would I want to fuck someone who smells like fruit? It reminds me of my nana.

  I feel nauseous, so I close my eyes and try to remember how I got here in the first place.

  What the fuck did I do last night?

  I open my eyes, and turn my head to look at who I did last night.

  Figures...

  Lying next to me is a naked blonde haired woman that looks exactly the same as Catherine. I guess if I can’t have the real thing, I might as well screw the next best thing, right?

  I’m sick.

  Disgusted with myself, I get up, get dressed, and leave the blonde chick’s apartment without saying goodbye. It’s not like I want to see her ever again. I never do. And it works for me.

  Once I step outside from the building, I look around and try to figure out where the hell I am. I glance at the street corner and read the green sign that lets me know I’m on Fifth Avenue. Well, isn’t this just fucking peachy? I’m in no fucking mood to ride a cab or the subway all the way to SoHo at this moment.

  With a pounding head, I decide to go in search of the closest deli. I need to take something to make my headache go away. As I start walking, I realize that I’ve been here before. The buildings look eerily familiar and the more I stare at them, the more a memory I’ve tried to erase many times before keeps popping in my head. But it’s not until I’m standing across the street from the same fucking coffee shop and see her that the images of those two days come crashing down on me.

  I had to let her go.

  When she told me that she was pregnant, I freaked out. It was fucking shitty of me, but I didn’t know what to think or how to react. I wasn’t even sure the kid was mine and it scared the hell out of me. How were we supposed to raise a child together when everything was so new? For all I knew, she could still dump my ass and go back to her husband once she got bored with me. The situation was so fucking messed up, but I didn’t care since Catherine was with me and not with that asshole. I just wanted to love her for as long as I had her because that was all that mattered to me. Our time together.

  I saw her, I wanted her, so I took her, even if in the process I destroyed a good marriage. I saw the sadness and vulnerability in her eyes the moment I got off the jet, but it wasn’t until much later that the complex of wanting to be her fucking savior was born.

  All I wanted to do was fix her, save her.

  Just before she told me she was pregnant, I was planning on taking her to Paris for a weekend. And maybe once we got there, go fucking romantic like in the movies and shit, and finally tell her how much I loved her.

  Somehow she became my reason to be, to exist.

  I loved her so damn much.

  But when she came back from seeing her gynecologist and told me she was pregnant, reality came knocking on my door.

  Just like Ben had.

  A couple hours before Cathy came back, Ben was at my apartment telling me that the only reason she was with me was because of her last miscarriage, which sent her spinning out of control. He told me that things were getting better between them before it happened, that they loved each other, that she was never mine to begin with. And yes, I thought he was being a pussy.

  Then Ben revealed something that she fucking failed to mention before. She was with me because he had left her. It had never been her. She wasn’t the one to end it. But like I told him before he left my apartment, I didn’t give a rat’s ass as long as she was with me.

  And she was.

  It wasn’t until after she told me she was pregnant, and I saw the way her eyes were glowing with such hope and tears, that I knew.

  I couldn’t do it.

  I couldn’t take it away from them, even if it didn’t work out. Ben and Cathy deserved that baby.

  I didn’t.

  So I did what I always do best.

  I broke her heart.

  I told her I didn’t love her.

  I told her there had been no promises.

  I was lying.

  When she came back to me…after Ben had left her…when she told me it was over between them…I became hers.

  That night, our first together, as I held her while she slept in my arms, I thought that life couldn’t get any more perfect. I finally had her and I was not going to share her anymore.

  She was finally mine.

  My own.

  I did not expect her to come back from the Doctor’s office with a dazed look.

  I did not expect to see hope and anguish warring in her eyes.

  I did not expect her to say, “I’m pregnant.”

  And when she didn’t even know for sure if I was the father, it fucking pissed me off. I wanted to go to that mother fucker and beat the shit out of him because it meant that I had shared her. It meant he had touched her.

  And, it fucking hurt.

  That wasn’t supposed to happen.

  And, then I remembered the way Ben looked when he came to my place. Fucking destroyed.

  I had to do it.

  I kicked her out.

  The moment I did, I realized what a big mistake I made. As I laid in my cold bed that night, not being able to taste her in the air I breathed, I decided I didn’t care about Ben. If there
was a chance that the baby could be mine, I was going to take it. I loved Catherine, my Dimples…I knew I was going to love the baby, whether it was mine or not. And in case the pregnancy came to nothing, I wanted to be there for her.

  The next day, I went to look for her at Amy’s apartment. I saw her walking out of the building, and instead of stopping her and begging her to forgive me right in the middle of the street, I decided to follow her. I needed to go over my speech one last time. As I was standing across the street from that coffee shop stalling for time, I saw him walk into the same shop as Catherine. I had just left her not even twenty-four hours ago, and she was already asking Ben back.

  I turned around and walked away from her, from any hope of ever seeing her again. She was back where she needed to be all along, even if it killed me for a second time in my life. The only difference was that this time, I didn’t think I would be able to survive because I was already dead.

  It’s been almost five years since that day.

  Fucking hell…

  It hurts.

  It still hurts.

  As I stand on the same corner, transfixed and feeling my fucking soul shatter all over again, I watch the familiar blonde hair and dimples on the face of a woman I haven’t been able to forget. Ben is giving a young girl a piggyback ride and has an arm thrown around my girl’s shoulder. They are laughing and looking like a perfect family.

  I feel pain.

  Mind-numbing pain.

  My body is shutting down.

  Catherine still has the power to take my fucking breath away after all this time.

  Please turn around and look at me.

  Please turn around.

  Please.

  Please.

  I beg, pray, chant, and wish for Catherine to do so. I need to see the eyes that have haunted me for so long, the ones that stole my soul and never let it go, but she doesn’t. Instead, she stares at Ben with all the love that should have been mine.

  I despise him.

  With her arm wrapped around his waist, I watch as he leans down and pauses for a moment before kissing her on the mouth. Closing her eyes, she stands on her tiptoes to receive his kiss. He’s watching her intensely. Shit, he fucking loves her. I don’t want to witness anymore of that bullshit, so I study the girl instead. She has blonde hair and looks just like her mother. So beautiful.