by Brock, V. L.
I stop abruptly on the sidewalk. As a result of my sudden halt, a person accidentally bumps into me from behind. He rounds me with a disapproving click of his tongue.
With my shoulders relieved of the weight of the world, a Cheshire cat grin imprinted on my face and my insides brimming with optimism, I step inside the store I have halted at, ready to procure the first jigsaw piece as a sentient of the future.
“Oh, Hayden, how are you?” Mom gushes down the handset as I lean against the back worktop of my kitchen.
“I have been better, but––”
“That sounds ominous, Hayden. What has happened?” she interjects, concern lay thick and heavy in her voice. The very last thing my mother needs is my impediments to bear.
“It’s okay. Please, don’t worry, Mom. I’m rectifying it.” Taking a step forward, I raise my shoulder and incline my head, effectively balancing the receiver, and delve into the white and gold bag on the kitchen island.
“Okay. How are Samantha and the baby?”
I free the flat, pink box from the bag and lift the lid. Unfolding the white tissue paper, I gaze adoringly at the tiny pink bodysuit that is nestled inside. ‘Daddy’s little’ and a full blossoming velvet red rose printed beneath the lettering.
“We have decided to call her, Rose. And yes, they are both fine.” I smile in awe as I imagine the vest on our tiny, red-haired daughter. I refold the paper, and place the lid back.
“Rose Wentworth, a beautiful name for a beautiful girl. You have no idea how overjoyed I am, Hayden. To meet my granddaughter before it’s my time to leave this world…” she sniffles and I know she’s considering how my dad has missed the opportunity.
“Mom, please. Don’t cry. Dad will be watching over us. He’ll see her grow.”
She inhales loudly and regains her composure, her voice fractionally suppressed. “Yes, you are right. I’m sorry, my son. I’m just very emotional today. Please, ignore me.”
And in a feeble attempt to lighten her mood, I tell her about the vest, and my contemplations of turning my home office into a nursery.
The cab driver pulls up against the sidewalk on the opposite side of Fillmore Point Center Apartments. The electric blue, florescent light at the summit of the high-rise building appears more vibrant than usual. But then again, maybe now I hold a clearer understanding of how significant things become when you never imagined you would set eyes upon them again.
I tip the driver considerably, since he remained quiet throughout the entire journey, allowing me much needed time to concentrate greatly on exactly what I want to say to Samantha. I only have one shot at this. I have messed things up enough, I can’t risk messing this up, too.
“Enjoy your evening, sir.”
“I’ll try, thank you,” I smile as the curly-haired driver glances back at me over his leather-clad shoulder. I slam the door behind me a little harsher than intended as I exit the cab.
Shifting anxiously, I direct my focus on the digital numbers overhead, watching each red line change and connect, as the elevator climbs steadily to the fifteenth floor. Beating my fingers erratically against my black denim-clad thighs, I endeavor to quell my nerves and recover my equilibrium. My heart is pounding, and even though my breathing is shallow, I am unable to gain a decent lungful of air.
The elevator bounces as it ends its scaling. The familiar ping soon follows and the door swiftly parts, revealing Samantha’s apartment directly in front of me. I idly remember the first time I came here. Samantha was out so I had to talk with Jessie. I snort in disbelief. Look how far we have come.
But yet you have managed to return back at the very first hurdle. It appears that this so-called, relationship is not destined to move forward. It is you, Hayden. You are the problem, remove yourself, be alone, you are better off that way, you cause no pain that way. He taunts me, his mouth thin, dark and smirking wickedly. I concentrate profusely on the scrawny entity, donning funeral attire; his back hunched, his inky hair long, and greasy and plastered to his oval, head.
I evoke his malicious, derisive ways, the scornful, belittling seeds that he sowed in my mind, the same ones that he helped develop into an involuntary negativity that I borne for so long, and find the strength to aim all of my anger, and hatred back at him. The things that I have lost, the things that I have needed reassurance to overcome and the things that I have let the voice of my paranoia transcend and triumph over…
No, I have let you win for far, too long. No more. It ends now.
Heaving a sigh, I mentally evict the fear that lay in wait from my mind. I smile in liberation as I move past, and come to defeat that which has held me back. I am no longer fearful of what has happened, and that which could happen. I am allowing myself to be happy, live in the moment. To offer Samantha the life that she deserves––a life we both deserve.
I step forward, and knock on the door.
After a few moments, the door is swung open, and I am ephemerally surprised by the tall, muscular blond that is Jessie’s boyfriend, as he glares at me with blazing, sapphire eyes.
“Matt.”
“Hayden, what are you doing here?” He steps out a fraction, drawing the door closed slightly behind him.
“I need to see, Samantha.”
Squaring his shoulders, he crosses his arms and parts his legs, holding a defensive stance. He snickers in haughty derision, “Sorry, but no.”
“Matt, no offence, but this is none of your business.” How dare he lay down the law with me? How dare he tell me that I can’t see Samantha, how long as he been on the scene for? Five minutes!?
He takes another step towards me, his face strained and menacing. “When my girlfriend has to sleep in the same bed as the woman who lay heartbroken because of you, just to comfort her, and to console her when she wakes up confused, thinking your ass never left, and that you are still together, then yeah, I think it is my fucking business.”
“I didn’t leave her; I wasn’t the one to walk away,” I hiss as my blood boils, adrenaline flooding my veins like a tidal wave.
“Who’s at the door?” the door is pulled open, and Jessie is stood stock-still, radiating hostility.
“Jess…” I murmur. She steps out of the apartment, walking past Matt so she is in front of me. “I need to––” I am halted when Jessie’s hand strikes hard, sharp and fast against the left side of my face, my head violently flailing to the right. I stand immobile and close my eyes, as my cheek tingles and heats under her assault.
“How fucking, dare you…”
“I deserve that.” I open my eyes and turn to gaze at the petite, belligerent brunet.
“Do you know what she has been through? Do you know what she said to me less than three hours ago?” I regard her patiently, as she continues. “‘If everything in life is merited on your past, then I have already signed my death certificate’. You may have gone to Harvard, you may have degrees and all manner of credentials coming out of your ears, but can you even comprehend how disturbing that was to hear? My best friend, someone who has taken some fucking knocks from all sorts of people in her twenty-four years, who has witnessed things that no child or no woman should have to witness––someone who has the strength and courage of a fucking lioness, to turn around and say something that…sombre?” She hisses, radiating contempt. Her voice breaks and tears find their way down her face.
Disgraced and guilt-ridden, I hang my head and shake it faintly. I had no idea.
“How dare you…” I peek up at her with hooded, dark eyes as she repeats herself once again.
“Please, Jess. I know what I have done. I know what I need to do; I just need to see her, to put this right. Please,” I plead.
“There’s no way I’m letting you in, mate,” Matt protests once again. He finds silence as I cast a scowl in his direction. Glancing down at the floor, he fluctuates from foot-to-foot.
“What’s going on?”
My heart beats faster, my adrenaline wanes as the sound of Samantha’s voice be
hind the door connects with my ears. I have missed that sound.
Matt pulls the door open and steps aside, permitting an unobstructed view of Samantha wrapped in her pink fluffy towel. Her eyes are swollen and bloodshot, and all I want to do is charge through the door, take her in my arms and never let her go; to bring her solace, to be her white knight and her prince all in one. To attempt to give her the Happily Ever After that she forsook dreaming about, the one that I promised her that I would give, but left her when she needed me most.
She licks her lips and holds my gaze.
“Am I dreaming?”
TWENTY-TWO
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SAMANTHA
I haven’t laid eyes on him in forty-eight hours, and seeing him now, standing on the opposite side of my threshold in his black jeans, navy dress-shirt with the top two buttons undone, revealing a white T-shirt underneath, has my stomach contorting with credulous anticipation. His shiny hair falls perfectly as a result of his parting, the dark shadowing of the stubble surrounding his mouth and jaw. He is staring at me with his intense, pleading, chocolate eyes. My breath catches whilst my lips offer tiny, skeptical, repetitive grins. It feels like months since I last saw him. I fight the impulse to run into his arms, to curl myself around his body like a vine and never let him go.
“Sammy, you don’t have to see him.” I am vaguely aware of Jessie’s voice, pierced with deep, weighted apprehension, yet I’m unable to divert my focus from Hayden.
His hands are nestled in his front pockets and he is observing me with his own hopeful yet guarded expression. There it is––the many distinctive tiers of my confusing, Hayden. He licks his lips quickly before muttering my name on an audible gasp.
I feel every set of eyes in the room bore into me with expectancy. Two sets silently conveying that I should maintain my guard––kick him away after the havoc he has caused my emotions to ride out the last forty-eight hours, while the other silently calls out to my heart to give the benefit of the doubt.
I fight the conflicting emotions raging through my body. I want to release the big, fat, happy tears that weigh cripplingly and pungently in my heart over the mere realization that he’s here. He came to me, even though I was the one that walked away.
He probably came to collect his things; my subconscious takes a sip of her cheap white wine and flicks through her glossy magazine.
“Sammy––”
Without drawing my gaze from the highly sexual man in the doorway, I shake my head effectively halting Jess’s following words. “Let him in,” I breathe then perceive his guard as he visibly relaxes.
“Sam, I don’t think that’s such a––” I glare at Matt, causing him to discontinue with his opinion.
“I said. Let. Him. In.”
Resigned, both Jess and Matt hang their heads and step aside.
Stepping over the threshold, Hayden strolls towards me. His Dior cologne tantalizes my senses in ways I almost forgotten that it could as he stands towering over my towel-wrapped body. I’m transfixed, watching vigilantly at the motion offered by his Adam’s apple as he forces a swallow. Just like King Arthur wielding Excalibur, this single particular action has Hayden wielding my excitement, my yearning, and the dark places of my body––places that he knows all of my secrets to––begin to reawakening.
“We’ll talk in my room,” I finally push past the constriction in my throat. His sexy, floppy lock at the front of his hairline bounces as he nods in agreement.
“We will be right here for you, sweetie.” I motion a nod and smile with gratitude at my roommate, who is already in her ivory satin pyjamas, before turning on my heel and retreating back to my room, with Hayden in tow.
I expect Hayden to perch himself next to me when I lower myself on the edge of my bed. He shocks me by pulling out the white dressing stool from under the table opposite. Lowering himself onto the lilac cushion that covers it, he rests with his legs spread, his forearms propped on his knees. His knotted fingers hang in the vacant space in-between.
I am loosely aware of the soft music playing over the speakers of my iPod dock, yet the awkward uncomfortable feeling that two people experience on a first date is stifling. Countless words which need to be voiced are replaced with the occasional, small shy glances.
Feeling awfully underdressed as my ex-fiancé gazes at me with conflicted yet sensuous eyes; I clear my throat and tighten the towel around my naked body, secretly grateful that I hadn’t already taken my bath before he paid a visit.
“How have you been?” I ask.
Bearing the weight through his arms, his shoulders hunched, he peers up at me with an unreadable expression. “You are kidding me, right?”
I shrug my shoulders shakily. “I’m sorry; I don’t know the protocol for what this”––I draw an invisible line between us––“situation is, Hayden.”
He hangs his head, releasing a heavy sigh. “No,” his head resumes hanging low, but I am pinned by his intense gaze. “I’m sorry. Sorrier than you will ever know,” he’s barely audible; still, his eyes are both glossy and rueful.
Irritated by the prolonged stint of the conversation, I mutter, “Why are you here, Hayden?”
“I have been a complete idiot,” he frowns. “I want to apologize, and hopefully, you’ll grant me time to try and explain myself.”
I cock my head to the right, my brow arched as he remains reticent. “Well?” I urge, wrapping my arms around my middle.
“Thursday morning, I found out that Addison has come back. I am not using that as an excuse for my behavior that night, but I want to be completely honest with you, because you deserve nothing less.” I see his pain and fretfulness in his expression. He unlocks his fingers and rubs his hands together. I notice he is still wearing the Claddagh ring I gave him at Christmas.
“She’s back? As in…”
“As in, she is back in San Francisco. Samantha, I was scared. The last thing I want is her tarnishing my future with you. I told you how vindictive she is, I don’t want you being dragged into it.”
“Hayden, I’m a big girl. Trust me when I say, Addison is no threat to me.”
I watch him carefully as he traces his tongue over his lips and hangs his head again.
“But I want there to be an ‘us’, Samantha,” his voice breaks and as he slowly rears his head up to face me, twin tears escape his eyes and trail down his cheeks, before dropping onto the knuckles of his left hand.
I close my eyes as though his words have wounded me. “Hayden…”
“Please. Sam,” when I open my lids, Hayden is already rising from the stool. He pulls it nearer to the side of the bed so he’s sat directly in front of me. “I was trying to save myself from any future hurt that there was a chance I could experience. I was living in the past––in your past, and that was wrong,” distracted, he shakes his head, “So very wrong. I will do anything; I will seek any form of help. I just want you back. God, the last forty-eight hours have been Hell.” He fists his hands through his hair while Snow Patrol duets with a soft voiced female about setting fire to the third bar.
“Do you remember Christmas Eve?”
I frown, “Of course I do, you proposed.” I smile at the memory of the Kodak moment. “It’s not something you forget.”
“I made a silent vow that night, that I would follow you into the nine circles of Hell if I had to. I meant it. But at the time when you felt most alone when that jackass demeaned, and oppressed you the other night,”––he closes his eyes and forces himself to swallow––“I broke that promise, I allowed it, and I allowed you to walk away.” He captures my hands in his, closing around them like an oyster shell, and searches my eyes that are now swimming with tears. “It was the worst mistake of my life. I will never, ever do that again. I will never leave you again, Samantha.”
“Hayden, I have already told you about the guilt and shame I hold from those years. I don’t want to have to be reminded of the fucked-up things that I did, especia
lly by you––the person who I changed for because I love you so Goddam much and would do anything for, to have you in my life. It’s not fair.”
I pull my hand free from his oyster-clutch and press it to the side of his face. Caressing the arch of his cheekbone, he leans into my touch.
“I gave you the chance right here in this room, to walk from me after you saw that sliver of the old me, after I told you the truth about myself. I opened that door for you, but you choose to stay, you choose to put that behind us and to move on. Yes, it’s been tiring, but we fought through it. You asked me to spend the rest of my life with you, for God sake. You cannot keep throwing this at me. It’s the actions after the feat that counts. And I haven’t given you any further reason to doubt me.”
He pulls my hand from his cheek and leads it down to his lips. They are so soft and warm on my palm. The devotion he feels is abundant as he presses a kiss in the center of it.
“Samantha, I’m going to be honest. I can’t accept it. I can’t accept that part of you, I wish I could explain why, and attempt to get you to understand, but it’s just something I’m unable to do, because it doesn’t even make complete sense to me. But I will change, I’m not giving up, I’m not letting that grating voice get the better of me anymore. From now on, it’s me, you, and the baby. Just, say you will take me back.” And it’s an impassioned plea that strains my heart.
Oh, Hayden, I don’t want you to change. It’s the way you cope. I have never once doubted his abilities to be a gentleman, but his mind can turn so dark, so suddenly. I observe him closely, absorbing every detail of his handsome face. Hayden Wentworth––the man with an angelic face but with a mind of a demon.