by Mj Fields
I did look a bit pale but this next couple days would fix that. I tanned fast. My eyes weren’t as white but I was tired. I leaned in to take a closer look and Tessa walked in the bathroom.
“Oh I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. I’m all set here.” I glanced at myself quickly again and she giggled. “What?”
“You.”
“Your brother told me I looked like shit. I was just checking.”
“You don’t look like shit.”
“No, I kind of do. I’m pale; the whites of my eyes aren’t that bright. He’s right.” I laughed it out.
“Are you feeling alright?” She felt my head.
“Yeah. I feel great.” I smiled and walked around her. “See ya out there.”
I walked outside and pulled my sunglasses out of my pocket hoping to hide my eyes. I was glad the setting sun was in front of us so I didn’t look like a seventeen year old kid trying to hide the fact that I was fucked up.
~
Alex and I steamed clams and crab legs and grilled chicken and steak. My kids were hanging with Tessa, Jade, and Alex’s kids.
“You made it!” Tessa laughed and I looked up to see her sister Kendall and her family.
Ben, fucking Ben, he married Tessa’s sister but was real into her when we were kids. He was annoying as fuck and I still wanted to slap the shit out of him every time I saw him.
He picked Tessa up and spun her in a circle and let me tell you, I wanted to floor him. I looked at Alex and he smiled. “Ben’s here.”
“Yeah. Kendall looks great.”
Alex laughed and walked up to his younger sister and hugged her.
So what do I do? I follow him.
“Hey Kendall you look amazing,” I smiled.
“Lucas!” She hugged me and I picked her up and yes, I swung her in a circle.
Ben stretched his hand out and shook mine pretty firmly. “Hey there Lucas. I see the kids. Where’s Ash, she finally smarten up and leave your ass?”
The whole group went silent and I was a little embarrassed, but I kept it together.
“Actually she did.” I laughed.
Ben laughed, thinking I was joking, and then he looked around and saw the faces.
“Oh Lucas,” Kendall reached out and grabbed my hand.
“No big deal Kendall.”
And as if that wasn’t enough shit for one day karma threw me one more fuck off, the Red Coats toting British boy band invaded. That drummer that had his hand nearly on Ava’s ass and the fuck seemed a little too fond of Tessa.
I looked and saw Logan standing within ear shot. He looked angry.
“Excuse me.” I smiled and even patted Ben’s back when I walked away.
~
Logan had heard what Ben said and was pissed. I talked him down and sat with him in front of the fire during dinner away from everyone else. Maddox came over and sat with us. His buddy T came over too. Logan seemed to loosen up and actually enjoy himself.
I, however, did not enjoy watching Zach Taylor and Tessa standing away from the entire group lost in their conversation. But there was fuckin nothing I could do about it. So I walked out to the lighthouse. The place I had come all those years ago trying to stop Tessa from saying ‘I Do’ to the man whose life we were to celebrate tomorrow.
I stood on the rocks as the waves slowly connected with them. The sunset was a beautiful pink color and the light blanket of clouds covered very little of it. I sat on the rocks taking it in. What a day it had been. Ashley, Ben, Zach, all of who I would love to release every ounce of anger that had built inside out on, but couldn’t.
“Beautiful isn’t it?”
I looked back and saw Tessa’s father John behind me. I stood up and smiled. “Sure is.”
“How are you holding up?”
“I’m good. How are you?”
“Great. It’s actually good to see everyone here supporting Tessa and the kids.”
“Yes it is.”
“Lucas, I am sorry about you and Ashley.”
“It’s fine.”
“Hurts though don’t it?”
“Yeah it does. But what do you do? Stay strong for your kids.”
“Yes you do.” He stood looking out over the water. “Even your adult kids. My girl worries about you.”
“I don’t want her to.”
“I know you don’t, but she does. She was scolding Ben…”
I laughed. “I thought I had played that well.”
“Regardless, he was wrong.” We stood for a few minutes more, silently. “You ready to head back?”
“Sure.”
Chapter 19
Tessa
Once everyone was settled and those who had left for their hotel rooms for the night were gone. I walked into the master bedroom. I grabbed the folder from my bag and set it on the bed. I then grabbed Collin’s favorite Boston Red Soxs sweatshirt and set it next to it. I went into the bathroom and brushed my teeth and washed my face.
When I came out I made sure the door was locked and I removed my clothes and pulled Collin’s sweatshirt over my head. I crawled into bed and pulled the covers up over me and grabbed the folder.
Collin was a writer. Not in the typical sense either. He wrote letters to me. Letters to be mailed or given to me at specified dates and events in my life. Tomas held them and each time he gave me one I asked for them all and he lied, ‘That’s the last one.’
Each seemed to come at the time I needed it most. Each urged me to move on, to live, to enjoy life. In one he told me that he knew I was his one and only true love. He hadn’t expected or even dreamed of having what we had together. He didn’t know he could until me. It didn’t matter that he had been with hundreds of women, and yes that was the first time a number was ever disclosed. Yet it wouldn’t have matter if it were thousands. I knew what I meant to him and he knew what he meant to me.
No matter the amount of love I had for him, I was angry that he left me. I was even angrier at him for telling me in a letter that he always knew his time here would be short. He had cheated death thousands of times by the grace of God and a lot of luck. He never saw himself old. Not in dreams, or in future plans. Which Collin planned for everything. He even wrote his eulogy. He wrote his life was better than he ever expected or felt he deserved, and he said it was because of my love.
I was still so angry when I read that. Angry at him for becoming part of my life when he knew he would leave me too early. Then I was upset with myself because I was angry at him. You see I can hold it together for all the people around me, my family, my friends, everyone. I would fake my way through this life if that’s what it took. Because down deep I wanted to go to sleep and not wake up.
One minute I was happy, the next sad, then angry, and other times suicidal. I felt like that same girl from high school. The one whose heart was shattered by Lucas over and over again. Damn him for fucking up so many times and damn him for not because if he didn’t I would have never been Collins wife.
Lucas. I don’t even know where to start with whatever it was that was going on with us. But honestly I don’t know what I am going to do about the situation I keep creating with him. That first night I had no intention of coming on to him but I was drunk and lonely. Yes lonely. I was married for a long time. I was used to being held, kissed, loved, and touched, all the time. And then it was gone.
I told Jade, apparently I needed to talk. Jade said it was because Lucas was safe. But he wasn’t safe. He never had been. I thought for a fleeting moment that he could just have sex with me, like he had so many others. Then, he had to tell me he loved me, that we were gonna happen, and that I was drunk and he couldn’t.
That’s brought back so many memories from long ago. And what do I do? Obsess over it. If that’s not bad enough I do it knowing I am. And what does that do? Make me feel. Numbness, loneliness, sadness fleeting. Competitiveness and longing to be needed, desired, wanted, touched by a man who shattered me, so I could feel.
I
talked to Jade about it and she said we had already been on a few dates. I laughed. But let myself do it even though it was wrong. A few times.
And feel I did. I lost myself in him and then immediately regretted it. So what do I do? Do it again and again. When I finally let it sink in, I hated myself. Then I let myself see what I was doing to him. Jade pointed it out. He was hurting too. He had just been cheated on, his wife left. Jade told me she didn’t contact Logan that he had to contact her. And she told me that I needed to be considerate of his feelings.
That caused me to fall into another bout of self-hatred. Then we went to South America. There I learned that Collin had kept a secret from me. Now I know why he did it. He was protecting his right hand man Tomas or whatever his real name was but then I started to doubt Collin.
I stayed away from Jade and Lucas, instead went on tour with Maddox and Harper. I could lose myself in there love and not be angry at Collin because how could I when he saved Harper’s life and never treated me with anything but love.
I made friends with Zach Taylor. He was still front man for Maddox’s old band, Burning Souls, but decided to support Maddox for a while. He wasn’t touring and he was trying to stay out of his sister’s hair. He told me she said he was smothering her.
He and I had a lot of discussions about music, love, loss, and friendship. Jade later pointed out to me that he was attracted to me and I told her he was not. He was twelve years younger than I was and that she was absurd. She told me I was an idiot for not seeing it.
It allowed me not to think about Lucas and the fact that Collin had betrayed my trust for the very first time and that I did the same by sleeping with Lucas.
I looked down at the folder and tried to read the letters. I wanted to feel him here. Let him know I was sorry before I let him go forever by shattering his ashes where I knew her would want them to be, because he said so.
There was a knock at the door and I got up and unlocked it. I peeked out and saw it was Jade. I opened it and she came in and sat on the bed.
She held up a letter. “This is for you. It came from Tomas. I was supposed to give it to you before tomorrow’s celebration.”
“Celebration,” I huffed and I sat down.
She looked at the open folder and then up at me. “How are you doing?”
“Great.” I held the letter in my hands and saw his writing.
“Want me to stay?”
“If you want.”
“I want.” She pulled her legs up and sat waiting for me to read the letter.
I opened it and pulled out the ivory stationary paper and looked up at Jade.
“I wish Tommy had done this you know.” He voice was so soft, so unlike Jade. “I know it’s hard to read. It’s still hard to read the letters and poems Tommy wrote me but Tessa, I would have done anything for him to have given this to me. I wished he knew about Luke, so that he may have written him a letter to him on his wedding day like Collin did for Harper. I wished he would have told me to live and love again like Collin does you.”
“He would have had he known,” I reached out and held her hand.
“I know it’s not the same. We were young and kids, for crying out loud, and it wasn’t easy for me to move forward.”
“But you loved Ryan.”
“Of course I did. I grew up with him. I didn’t know he loved me that way. I didn’t feel like I was not betraying Tommy. Remember when I was in the hospital giving birth to Luke? How rotten I was to Ryan?”
“You wanted Tommy to be there. I’m sure Ryan understood.”
“I saw his eyes Tessa. I knew I hurt him. I knew how I made him feel. I still think about it.”
“Are you trying to say it’s the same thing,” I leaned in and whispered. “That I’m doing to Lucas?”
“No of course not.” She stopped giving me a moment to think. “It just would have been so much easier had he told me he wanted me to be happy. That he wanted me to move forward and love again.”
“Of course he would want that for you Jade. Why wouldn’t he? He loved you.”
Jade smiled and nodded. “It’s been five months Tessa. Collin has been gone five months. He wants that for you too. For God’s sake girl, it’s in every one of these letters. Speaking of, open the damn thing; I could use a little romance in my life.”
“From the grave?” I tried to joke and she saw right through it. “Do I have to read it out loud?”
“You have to try. You also have to try to listen to the man who loved you enough to leave these letters.”
I lifted the paper up to my lips and kissed it. I did that with all of them. I don’t know why but it made me feel closer to him.
Hello Beautiful,
I know if you’re reading this it means it’s time to say goodbye. I ask that you spread my ashes in a place that brought you peace and a place that brought me an angel.
It is here in this town I first met you. It was here in this town I was given kindness from the first time by a stranger, a little girl with a blue ribbon in her hair. It was here I held you and it is here I saw you, truly saw you, and then allowed myself to see all the beautiful things in the world.
You opened my heart up so wide it dropped me to my knees and I would have crawled behind you for my entire life if you had just asked me too. Instead you lifted me up. You trusted me even knowing everything in my past. You walked beside me and taught me and allowed me to feel. I could never have imagined that.
Love is not all that you gave me. You gave me life. Tessa I love you so much that I am giving that to you. I hope you understand the meaning behind this. If not I want to explain. I want you to live again. I want you to live a life that allows all that love brings to it. I want you to smile. I want you to trust. I want you to look forward and not in the past. I want you to know love again.
I was given one love. I am eternally gratefully for that. You, my beautiful girl, are still here. Do not grow old Tessa, just continue to grow.
Let my ashes float away in your place of peace and the place I found true love. Nothing can take that away from either of us, not ever. Smile knowing that we had a wonderful life. And then, smile again knowing that I love you enough to want you to love and be loved again.
I will be smiling down on you for eternity. Please Beautiful, truly smile up for me.
Love Forever,
Collin
I wiped the tears away as Jade took the letter from my hand. She placed it in the folder and then set it on the nightstand. She climbed up in the bed laid down and patted her shoulder. I laid down and she hugged me as I cried.
“You will be okay.”
“I watched him die Jade. I begged him not to die. I remember him saying, ‘Can’t have you yet’. He didn’t want to go Jade. He didn’t want to go.” I couldn’t stop crying and the louder I got the tighter she hugged me. “He must be so disappointed in me. I am so disappointed in me.”
“You have no reason to be Tessa. He has told you he wants you to love again…”
“He didn’t tell me to fuck Lucas,” I whispered a hiss.
She laughed. “Well not exactly.”
“It’s not funny.”
“No it’s not but I bet he would be happy that you smiled for a few minutes.”
“Jade, please don’t. Not now.”
She reached over and turned off the light.
~
I slept all night and woke to Jade snoring quietly. I sat up and grabbed a pair of leggings and threw them on. I brushed my teeth and threw my hair up on a sloppy bun. I walked out into the kitchen and looked outside.
My father, Ryan, Alex, Ben, Zach, Brody, Jake, and Lucas were all there and so was Luke Lane.
“Jade!” I yelled as I ran in the bedroom. “Jade! Luke’s here!”
She jumped up and laughed. “My boy’s home safe?”
“He is.”
She smiled and tears of joy filled her eyes. “My boy’s home.”
She started walking out of the room. “Hey Jade!”
“Yeah?”
“Pants,” I laughed and threw her pants at her.
~
I followed Jade out as she ran to her son. As soon as he saw her he hugged her tight and she cried.
“Mom I’m home,” he laughed. “You can stop crying now.”
“Happy tears, joyful tears,” Jade laughed as the tears fell down her face. “It’s all over now right? You’re done.”
“A couple more months but its state side.” Luke let go of Jade and laughed. “I’m almost done Mom.”
“Eight years,” Jade grabbed his face, “Of hell. No more. Understand?”
“Yeah I do.” The sadness in his voice did not go unnoticed.
I looked over at Lucas and his face showed concern. He looked at me and smiled.
I smiled back and looked over at Ann’s house. Ava was coming out and she stopped a looked at Luke. She was trying to stop the smile that was forming. If she only knew that it didn’t matter. Even from a distance I could see it in her eyes.
“Welcome home soldier,” she laughed as she walked quickly over to us.
“Hey Ava,” he tried to look unaffected but I could see the way he looked at her.
I looked at Jade and then at Lucas, trying to see if they noticed. They didn’t. But Lucas looked at me suspiciously and unable to stop myself, I laughed. Ava looked at me and her face turned red. She walked over and nudged me with her shoulder.
“Back off, Tessa,” she growled teasingly.
“Ava!” Lucas scolded her.
“Daddy!” Ava scolded back.
I put my arm around her and laughed and she buried her head into my shoulder and I did the same thing.
~
I was in the kitchen starting breakfast when Lucas came in.
“I’m sorry Ava was rude. I don’t understand…”
“She’s not rude Lucas, she’s adorable.”
He just looked at me.
“Lucas…”
“Need some help?” He asked and finally looked away. He grabbed the eggs and started cracking them in a bowl.
“I was going to fry them.”