by T. K. Leigh
It was as if every trace of his time on South Padre had been erased.
All but one…
Mackenzie
THE SOUND OF SEAGULLS and laughter surrounded me as I sat on the sandy beach, trying to make sense of everything. I raised my eyes and stared at a seemingly peaceful ocean, a few boats bobbing up and down in the distance. This island was supposed to feel like paradise, like an escape, but it didn’t. Not anymore. All I felt when I looked at the calm water, the sun shining and warming everything on that Memorial Day at the end of May, was a raging storm, a ship about to sink. My surroundings were mocking me, reminding me that my life would never be the same again. The truth was, it hadn’t been the same since I met Tyler.
I should have been crying, but tears refused to fall. I should have felt something. Anything. Anger. Hatred. Resentment. Fear. Confusion. But I felt nothing. Ever since the day I had gone over to what I thought to be Tyler’s house to see someone else living there, I shut down even more than I already had. I was a shell, a ghost of a woman going through the motions of living when I was really dead inside.
I closed my eyes, trying to remind myself of a happier time, hoping that would bring forward some sort of emotion. It was like trying to jump-start a battery that was long dead. Nothing worked. I was empty, my heart no longer able to feel.
I wanted to scream, but no noise ever came from my throat. I now knew why Catholics feared purgatory. I was there. I was a lifeless soul forced to walk among the land of the living. I wanted to make it all go away, to forget the beautiful, touching moments I shared with Tyler. The thrill of his kisses. The passion in his eyes. The fire in his touch. I was still tortured by all those things, sentenced to live the past two months in a constant nightmare because I was foolish enough to love him.
A small child, who couldn’t have been more than two years old, ran in front of me, his parents trying to catch up. The glee in his laughter struck me as I watched the happy family enjoying their vacation. The mother playfully grabbed the little boy, swinging him around and around, his squeals echoing and calling to a side of me I didn’t know existed. A tear escaped my eye and trickled down my cheek, cooling the fire that had been burning inside me. Then another tear fell. And another. And another.
The dam broke and, for the first time in months, I felt something. I lowered the iron fortress I had erected around my heart and stopped pretending I was okay, pretending what Tyler did hadn’t destroyed me. It wasn’t his deception that shattered me. It was my love for him, then and now. In my heart, I knew he was real, that we experienced a love so perfect, which made everything so much harder. My heart ached for him. My skin craved his touch. My body longed to be held in his arms. The arms that would always remind me of dancing, full metal jackets, and Truth or Dare.
He had tainted something so beautiful, so pure, so fucking perfect. His love was toxic and I needed to purge it from my system through my cleansing sobs. I had bottled it all up for months and it felt therapeutic to finally let it out. With each tear, I was letting go of another piece of him. His smile. His green eyes. His husky voice that swore he loved me. His words begging me to spend the rest of my life with him. They were all leaving me and, once my tears stopped, I vowed to never cry because of him again.
I had no idea how long I sat there with my head buried in my knees, my cries ravaging my short and slender body, but I didn’t care. It didn’t matter that people could have been laughing and pointing at the poor pathetic girl who gave everything to a man who used her, then tried to cover his tracks and make her think she imagined him. I needed this. Maybe then I could finally be over him.
I needed to be over him.
I wouldn’t let him ruin my life anymore.
A warm presence approached from behind and two arms enveloped me. I sighed, molding my body into Brayden’s. He was exactly what I needed right now. I needed his smile, his laugh, his compassion. I needed his reassurance that I was strong enough to get through this. That this wouldn’t break me. That I could rewind the clock and forget all about Tyler Burnham.
Pulling at the crisp gray shirt underneath his black suit, I drenched him with my tears, and he simply continued to comfort me, not saying a word. He knew me well enough to know I didn’t want to talk. Not yet. He was the only man in my life who always gave me exactly what I needed when I needed it. He had always been true and honest. He never had an ulterior motive. His love was pure and untainted.
“It’s about time you started acting like a human again,” he soothed, breaking the silence between us. He rocked me gently, running his fingers up and down my back. “You can’t keep pretending what’s been going on didn’t affect you, baby girl. It’s obvious it did. It’s okay to show your emotions once in a while. It’s okay to show you’re not impenetrable.”
I nodded slightly and clung to him as if holding him was the only way to keep my world together. He and Jenna had prodded me for an explanation about why I ran out on Tyler, but I didn’t know what to tell them. I couldn’t tell them the truth. Instead, I maintained that I wasn’t ready to talk about it, but that I found out he wasn’t the man I thought he was, which had a sliver of truth.
“How did you know I’d be here?” I pulled back and stared at his kind face, his blue eyes sparkling as he gazed at me with all the tenderness and understanding I needed from him at that moment.
“Call it my gut instinct. I went to the restaurant and Jenna said you had an appointment this morning, then never showed up afterwards. That doesn’t exactly sound like the Mackenzie we all know and love, so I had a feeling something must be wrong. I was on my way to the condo and noticed your car on the side of the road here.”
I wiped at my cheeks, taking a deep breath to settle my cries.
“Want to tell me what’s wrong?” he asked, almost guarded at how I would react.
“What isn’t wrong?” I scoffed. “I still go back and forth, boo,” I confessed, leaning my head on his shoulder. I picked up some shells in front of me and began tracing patterns in the warm sand. “Sometimes I feel like I’m losing my mind, that something in my brain snapped and I made it all up.” Lifting my gaze, I stared at the ocean waves, hoping they would calm me as they used to. “The only people who assured me I didn’t imagine any of it were you and Jenna. If I didn’t have you swearing it was real, that he was real, I probably would have checked myself into the loony bin at this point.” I glanced at him, seeing him studying my every move, almost as if he was ready for me to freak out at any second.
Returning my eyes to the sand in front of me, I softly asked, “Do you know I still go by his house every day?”
Biting his lip, he nodded. “I figured.”
“I don’t know why.” I shrugged, fighting back the new tears brimming in my eyes. “Part of me wants to think all of this has just been one giant nightmare, that I’ll wake up and everything will be like it used to be. What would you think if you were me? If, a week later, you decided to be the bigger person and try to talk things over, but you find someone completely different living in Tyler’s house, trying to convince you he’s lived there for years? It’s as if someone wants me to feel like I’m losing my mind. As if they want me to question whether any of it’s real. No matter how many times you and Jenna have told me it was real, I still had my doubts. My brain was yelling at me that it couldn’t be real. I had no physical proof it was. My heart didn’t want to believe it, though, and that’s been the only thing that’s kept me going. In my heart, I just knew it had to be real.” Meeting his gaze, I studied his gentle face, his eyes brimming with the same pain I felt.
Taking a deep breath, my voice quivered. “But there’s no doubt anymore.” I pulled the black-and-white image I had been staring at most of the day out of my purse and handed it to Brayden.
He glimpsed at the photo, then shot his wide eyes to me, questioning.
“You’re going to be an uncle, boo.” I covered my mouth, my breath catching at the words. Until that moment, it hadn’t sunk in.
Even after the doctor confirmed what over a dozen pregnancy tests already had, I didn’t think it was real. Finally speaking those words surrounded me with the truth amidst a lifetime of lies.
Brayden’s expression momentarily grew grim before he replaced it with a cheerful smile I was certain was for my benefit. “Uncle Boo… I like the sound of that.” He pulled me to him once more and planted a soft kiss on my temple.
A thousand thoughts ran through my mind, the most pressing of which being how the hell I was going to afford this. Since most of my money was tied up in the restaurant, I had allowed my health insurance to lapse. The doctor visit itself was going to cost me a small fortune. I knew Brayden would offer to help, as he always did; however, at some point, I was going to have to find the man who had become a ghost…Tyler.
“Mack, I know you probably don’t want to, but you need to talk about what you’re going to do.” He released his hold on me, forcing me to stare into his eyes.
“What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean,” he insisted, raising his eyebrows at me once more. “He has a right to know. I’m assuming it’s his…”
I nodded. “But how am I supposed to tell him? It’s like he’s dropped off the face of the earth! His cell is disconnected, and so is Eli’s! Every time I’ve called his company’s office, I get nowhere! Hell, maybe I am losing my mind. Maybe I did imagine him. Maybe it’s someone else’s kid! Right now, I just…” My chin wavering, I squeaked out, “I’m barely holding it together here, Brayden.”
Tears began to stream down my face again. There was a hollow feeling in my chest as I struggled to come to terms with the reality that would soon be my life, that I was carrying the baby of a man who wounded me, then disappeared. I would be forced to stare into my baby’s eyes every day and be reminded of how stupid and naïve I had been.
“Shhh, baby girl,” Brayden soothed, comforting me in his embrace. He kissed the top of my head, brushing my hair back just like my mother used to all those years ago.
“I’m stuck and it’s all my fault.”
“Mack, baby, it takes two to tango. He’s just as responsible as you so don’t you dare put all the blame on your shoulders. He could have easily slipped on a rubber and you wouldn’t be faced with this.”
I shook my head. “I told him it was okay. I was so stupid and caught up in the moment. I wasn’t thinking straight. Now I’m knocked up, carrying the baby of a man I can’t even think about without breaking down.” I turned to him and stared into his eyes, finally allowing myself to voice my true emotions instead of bottling them up. “How am I supposed to get through this?”
“Mackenzie,” Brayden started, “you are one of the toughest females I’ve ever had the privilege of knowing. You have so much life, so much strength. You’ll get through this just like you’ve gotten through everything else over the past few years. With Jenna and me by your side.” Enclosing my hand in his, he gave me a sincere look. “You know, you have options and I will fully support you, no matter your decision.”
Taking a deep breath, I briefly closed my eyes. “I love how you’ll back me, no matter what.”
“Why wouldn’t I? I don’t have a vagina or uterus. I’m certainly not going to try to tell you what to do with yours.”
I giggled at Brayden’s words, thankful he always had a way to lighten the tension. “I know. As much as I hate the idea of having his baby, it’s also part of me.” I held my hand over my stomach. “I can’t… I’m keeping it. I’m sure there’s going to be moments down the road where I may regret this decision, especially when I’m trying to do all of this on my own–”
“You won’t be on your own,” Brayden interrupted. “In the past eight years, when have you ever had to do anything alone? I’ll be there. Hell, if I need to, I’ll move back into your condo and help out.”
“You don’t need to,” I objected. “You have your own life you need to live.”
“I know, but you’re my soul mate,” he explained, caressing my hand. “I love you, Mack, and I will always do whatever you need.” He beamed, placing his hand over my stomach. “And this kid, well… He’ll be the most spoiled baby ever. Come on! Every kid needs a fantastic gay uncle who has no problem spending a ridiculous amount of money buying him Prada diapers!”
“I’m fairly certain there’s a law against shitting in anything with a designer label.”
He scrunched his nose at me. “Possibly, but it still doesn’t mean that the newest addition to our family deserves anything but the best. And that’s exactly what he’ll get.”
“What if it’s a girl?”
“Trust me. It’s a boy. I have a knack for knowing these things.” He winked and placed a tender kiss on my cheek. For the first time since leaving my doctor’s office earlier, I actually felt as if I could get through this, that I didn’t need Tyler to be a good mom to the baby growing inside me.
I relaxed into Brayden’s arms, wanting to live in that moment for as long as possible. I was calm, the demons that had been haunting me absent. Brayden gave me a sense of stability and comfort that had been lacking from my life.
“You loved him, didn’t you?” he commented softly.
“I did, but it wasn’t real.”
“What makes you say that? I saw the way he looked at you. I don’t care how good you are. You can’t fake that.”
“He lied to me, boo.”
Running his fingers up and down my back, he said, “I think he was truthful with you where it mattered. Nothing dishonest comes from love. We may hurt those we love, but we often think we’re doing right by them. We tend to lie to those we care about to protect them.”
“There’s no black and white, only varying shades of gray hiding a kernel of truth,” I murmured, remembering my father’s words when he asked me to pretend as if he were dead. I had done so to protect him, to keep him safe. Did Tyler keep the truth of who he was and what he was doing for the same reason? And what was his kernel of truth?
His words from that day back in Boston, begging me to believe his love for me was real, replayed in my head, his remorse-filled eyes flashing through my memory. A look of realization washed over me and I snapped my eyes toward Brayden’s.
A knowing smile on his face, he continued, “Like I said, you can fake a lot of things, Mackenzie, but you can’t fake being in love. There’s your kernel of truth.”
Tyler
THE AIR WAS DRY and dusty as I sat in the passenger seat of the all-terrain vehicle Eli expertly navigated through the barren desert of Sudan on a hot June day. The heat was unbearable, but at least I had all my limbs, which was more than could be said of many of the refugees seeking safety from South Sudan at the camp my brother’s company had been sponsoring for the past several years. The path that led me to this point in my life was an odd one, but I needed to be here.
It had been over three months since I watched Mackenzie walk out of my life, but the look on her face when she found out the truth continued to haunt me, finding me no matter where I went. Every woman I saw had that same exact expression in her eyes. Men glared at me with a look of disgust, as if knowing I had destroyed the most precious gift there was…love. My betrayal and deception tormented me, reminding me I would never be worthy of anyone’s love again, especially Mackenzie’s. Regardless, I wasn’t giving up. I simply needed to do something to prove I had a heart…that I was someone worth taking a risk for…that I was someone worth forgiving despite the heartache I caused. But I needed to learn to forgive myself first, and I hoped that by protecting some of the most vulnerable people I had ever met would put me on the right path.
However, that didn’t make me miss her any less. I missed her smile. Her voice. Her soul. Her heart. Her love. I was a coward. Even though I had limited access to a satellite phone and a computer here in the middle of nowhere, I hadn’t called or emailed her, following my brother’s orders to refrain from contacting her for security reasons. Even if I could contact her, nothing I said would ever tell h
er what she wanted to hear, what she deserved to hear. Instead, I kept a journal of all the things I wanted to say to her, hopeful she would be able to read it one day and see that she didn’t escape my thoughts once over the months of our separation.
Carrying the guilt of the failed mission that would always haunt me, I tried to find peace in my work, in my new mission, but that day continued to repeat in my mind like a horrible movie.
An excruciating lump formed in my throat as I watched a flash of dark hair scramble from the elevator of my brother’s building and bolt through the revolving doors, exiting onto the busy Boston street. I was foolish to think I could keep the truth from her. She was bound to find out, but I didn’t want it to be like this. I wasn’t cut out for betraying people, no matter the reason. Months ago, I thought this was the perfect assignment for me. I hadn’t cared about a woman since Melanie, but Mackenzie had spoken to my heart and I fell for her hard and fast.
I darted after her, knowing it was now or never. I needed to make my move. I needed to prove to her that it wasn’t an act, that it was so fucking real for me, that she truly was my lightning strike. Catching up to her with ease, I reached for her arm and spun her around. Her eyes grew wide, her mouth agape. Her chin quivered and I saw the hurt on her face, but I felt that spark and I knew she did, too.
Pinning her against the brick wall, I covered her mouth with mine. She pushed against me at first, her fists slamming into my chest.
“Go ahead!” I bellowed. “Fight me. I want you to!”
I earned everything she could do to me, but even when I was covered with bruises and scars, it still wouldn’t compare to the scar I had caused her heart. Mine would heal. I doubted hers would.