by Simply BWWM
Nick had talked with Chanel during one of their long conversations about how much he wanted a family. He had told her that when he was engaged he had wanted to marry her, wanted it to be forever, wanted a family with her, and then she had walked away and he had known that it wasn’t going to happen.
He had lost everything when she left. It was a big part of the reason why he had slowed down so much with Chanel; he hadn’t wanted to get hurt again and risk wanting everything and then losing it, and he was falling for her so fast that it felt to him as though it could happen again.
Chanel understood, but seeing Monica there with him, pregnant with his baby, wanting him back, kissing him and standing in his home, a home that was going to be hers at one time, all of it had destroyed Chanel. She had known that she was going to have to let him go. There was no place for her in his life any longer. He had known it as well, and their goodbye had been the most painful she had ever known.
The flight was so long that she mused over those thoughts again and again, replaying it all in her mind, thinking so deeply about it, feeling both grateful that it had happened and she had met and known the love of her life, and also feeling horrible about losing him, especially so soon into it. Their love affair had been like a comet, brilliant and blazing, shooting through the dark night sky, only to disappear within moments it seemed, fading away into nothing.
She had no doubt that, if given the opportunity, their love would have grown into a powerful bond that would have lasted a lifetime. She would have wanted to spend her life with him, she knew that, but it wasn’t for them to have; fate had dealt them a hard blow.
Their roads were to go in separate directions, his with his fiancé and his child as he started the family he had wanted so desperately, and hers to the other side of the country, where she would try to pick up the pieces of her shattered heart and rebuild it once more.
The plane landed and she walked off of it, feeling a rush of dry heat such as she had never known before. It warmed her skin after she had spent so many hours in the cold air of the plane. The sun shone brightly through every window, and a dim hope formed in the back of her mind that somehow that bright sun would begin to warm the coldness in her as well, thawing the pain away from her and helping her to grow strong once more.
She felt like a shell with almost nothing inside of her, moving mechanically through the throngs of other people as they picked up their bags and kissed their friends and family, being received by those who loved them and were glad to see them.
Chanel hadn’t gotten five feet from the baggage carousel when she heard her name called by the warm and friendly voice that she had gotten to know over the phone. She looked up and saw a slender, fit looking woman somewhere in her fifties with bright red hair and big blue eyes. There were soft lines carved by time around her mouth where she smiled and around her eyes where they crinkled at the corners.
Diana waved at her and came swiftly to her, her long, loose ankle length skirts billowing like dancing sails around the hem. A thick bracelet slid on her arm as she raised her hands and immediately wrapped them around Chanel’s shoulders and back, giving her a big hug.
“Welcome Chanel! Welcome!” She beamed brightly at her, and Chanel felt just a few rays of warmth and comfort shifting through the cracks in her heart.
“Thank you.” Chanel smiled at Diana as best she could.
“How was your flight? Did it go all right?” the other woman asked interestedly. Diana reached for Chanel’s bag and without a word, popped the handle up and began walking toward the door with it. Chanel felt a little relief at Diana’s instantaneous taking of control. It felt to Chanel as if she was being scooped up and cared for by someone who knew exactly what she was doing, exactly what was going on, and exactly what needed to happen. Diana had a sense of purpose and direction about her, but in an easygoing, kind, and generous way, as fluid as water and as warm as the sun.
“The flight was really long, but it was okay,” Chanel answered quietly, feeling numbness all through her and knowing somehow that she was blocking out all of her emotion so that she didn’t have to feel as much of the heartbreak as she had before. Feeling nothing was better than feeling pain.
Diana walked out of the airport, and Chanel followed her. The hot New Mexico air swallowed her up whole, and the sun radiated off of her dark skin. She narrowed her eyes and pulled her sunglasses from her bag, slipping them on and wishing that she had a hat. It seemed like it was so much brighter there than it had ever been in Boston, and she wondered if it was because there was less pollution in the air or because there weren’t really any other buildings stacked so close and so high to block out so much of the sun.
She didn’t know what it was, but she did know that she hadn’t been able to see so far around her in her whole life. It seemed to her that she could see for hundreds of miles in every direction, and that was both lonely and freeing for her, as if she was going to have all of the space in the world for herself to spread out and heal, even if it took a long, long time.
Diana put Chanel’s suitcase into the trunk of her old red car, and they climbed in. The open road was soon before them, racing underneath them as they drove away from the airport and headed to the ranch.
Diana talked about the ranch and the area, pointing out things that Chanel might like to know: trivia about where Pueblos were, the location of things in the town that she might want to know about or see or visit, and the history of the place. Chanel listened quietly and tried to soak at least some of it in, though she knew that some of it would be lost to the wayside of her troubled mind.
After a long drive out of the city along a narrow, lonely road through what seemed like the middle of nowhere, Diana turned off of the asphalt onto a dirt road, and they passed through sagebrush and occasional desert trees until they slipped into the crevice of a canyon in between two big hills before them. When they came out of the other side of the canyon, Chanel was stunned by the view.
Before her lay a valley, sectioned off by a split rail fence that spanned a massive area. Within the fence, there were landscaped grounds, and within the grounds, there were cabins set about at varying intervals. Two great buildings sat at one end of the row of cabins: one was a massive house, and the other, Diana told her, was a warehouse filled with studios for artists to create their work.
Trees of different kinds were growing all through the grounds, and there were areas where grassy meadows gave off a stark opposition to the dry desert around them. There were other areas where sand and gravel had been raked into peaceful gardens, and there were two ponds big enough for a row boat, one at each end of the ranch.
“This is incredible!” Chanel gasped with some trickle of happiness. “I never would have imagined that it might look like this here!”
Diana laughed. “The desert doesn’t look like it, but it has layers, lots and lots of layers, just like people do, and the longer you are here, the more you will get to know them, discover them, and probably love them.”
She parked the car in front of the big house and went around to the trunk, pulling Chanel’s bag out of it and carrying it with her as she headed for the door. “You’re in the big house with me, and the students will be staying in the cabins, unless we get any students under eighteen years old, which sometimes happens. I keep the kids close for many reasons.”
Diana gave her a smile, and they walked into the house. It was wide open with high ceilings and windows all around, bringing in the natural light which was so abundant in the desert. It offered a view of the valley, and the desert beyond that was truly breathtaking.
“This is amazing.” Chanel breathed out and felt as if she was exhaling some of her pain and devastation, as if she was letting go of just a few pieces of the broken parts of her soul and heart.
“It’s paradise. I’ve lived here for twenty years and I’m still blown away by how beautiful it is every single day. I never get used to it, and I hope that I never do. As Oscar Wilde said, complacency is the l
ast refuge of the unimaginative. This is where beauty is born and thrives, and it’s a hell of a great place to live.”
She walked down a wide hallway and into a big bedroom that had a large bed and an old desk with a lamp and a cushioned chair before it. There was a reclining chair in one corner of the room that looked out of the full wall of windows there, and in the wall of windows, there was a sliding glass door that led out to a private deck.
The décor was all desert-themed, with Native American artwork here and there. Feathers, leather, and stones were set in different places in the room, and above the bed hung a beautiful blue and green dream catcher.
Chanel stared at it and hoped within her heart of hearts that the dream catcher would work and that she would be allowed a peaceful sleep in the bed every night, without worry of dark and painful dreams.
“This is your space while you’re here, and you are welcome to be here for as long as you like, whether it’s for the next eight weeks while we prepare for your class and you teach it, or longer than that. There is no expiration date on your stay.” Diana grinned at her and set her hands on Chanel’s shoulders.
“I don’t know what made you change your mind about coming, but it doesn’t matter what it was, because life changes constantly, like a river, and moves in many directions; we go along with it, riding the current and taking whatever directions are ours to take. Whatever brought you here is already passed, and now you are here, so be here, be present, and focus on right now, every day. The past will stay in the past, and you will find this place to be so good for your soul. I’m really glad that you came. I think it will be a blessing for us both.” Diana hugged her again; a warm, comforting, genuine hug, and then she turned and headed for the door.
“The kitchen is always open. I’ll be there making lunch whenever you’re ready.” Then she turned and walked from the room, closing the door behind her. Chanel looked around in wonder at her new environment, her new home, and she felt herself thaw just a little, just around the edges, and hoped that Diana was right.
She unpacked her bags and put her clothes away in the dresser and closet that were in her room. Then she checked her cell phone and saw a message from Chris, asking her to call him when she arrived. She smiled and missed him terribly as she touched his phone number and the call went through.
He answered right away and she could hear the concern in his voice. “Did you make it all right? Are you okay? What’s going on there? Is it decent?”
The corners of her mouth turned upward, and she walked toward the sliding glass doors and opened them as she answered him, stepping outside to see the wide-open space of her new home.
“It’s beautiful, and Diana is really amazing. She feels like family already. I mean, I just met her and I feel like we’ve been old friends for a long time. It’s really… it’s really comforting. It’s going to be a good place for me. I think that even you would be surprised by this place. You would like it here; as difficult as that might be to believe, I think you would.” She let the sun soak into her, and she took as deep a breath as she could manage, hoping it might somehow bring new life into her.
“Well, I’m not sure how I’d feel about being in the desert, but I’m so relieved to hear that you’re okay and that she’s nice. That’s good. That’s great, actually, and I already miss you like crazy, so you’ll probably get your wish. I’ll come out and visit you when you have some free time.” He let out a long sigh filled with emotion, relief more than anything else. “So, when do you think that might be? What does your schedule look like at this point? Do you know yet?”
Chanel laughed softly at his barrage of questions, feeling as if he was mothering her to some extent, and appreciating the fact that she had a friend in her life who loved her so much that he was that worried about her.
“I’m good. Really, it’s definitely going to be a good place for me to be. So, there’s that, and I miss you too! As far as you coming out here, you could come anytime. I have two weeks to get settled in, and then I guess my classes start. Those last for six weeks, so I wouldn’t have as much time then, but Diana did say that I am welcome to stay as long as I want to, and I think I might.
It feels good here, and nothing feels good right now, so I might stay longer than the next eight weeks. Maybe you could come out after the classes are done and it could be a good time for the two of us to just be together.” She wished that he could be there the whole time, but he had a job that he had to do, and he was taking care of her house and her studio while she was gone, checking on it and making sure that things were fine.
He had a life in Boston, and while he could step away from it for a short period of time, he wouldn’t be able to go for long, and she wanted to be able to see him for a good chunk of time if he was to come to the ranch to be with her.
“So, eight weeks from now?” he asked thoughtfully. “That will work. It’ll be the longest eight weeks ever, but it will work. I’ll definitely come out and see you.”
“Thank you. You are the best friend in the whole world. Did you know that?” She felt her heart ache a bit for him.
“I do know that, but I think I have the best friend in the world, and it’s you,” he challenged her pleasantly, and they laughed softly together.
They talked a while longer about everything except her broken heart and Nick. There seemed to be some silent agreement not to mention his name or anything to do with him or the breakup. They both focused instead on everything positive.
When they had said goodbye, she touched the red button, ending the call, and as she looked down at her phone, her finger hovered over the text messages. Knowing that she shouldn’t, she touched the app icon anyway, and her messages opened up. Under Chris’ messages were Nick’s, and she knew that she should delete them, but she didn’t want to throw them away yet. She bit at her lower lip and tapped the screen once, opening them up.
“I can’t wait to see you for dinner tonight. I love you.”
It was the last text that he had sent to her, and it stabbed at her heart like a dagger. He did love her, and she loved him, and though they had said goodbye, their love hadn’t stopped suddenly. It was still there, just as strong as it had been the day before when everything had been beautiful and perfect for them. She wondered how he was and what he was doing. She wondered if she should send him a message just to check on him and see how things were going, but something in the back of her mind stopped her.
She knew that she couldn’t heal completely and let him go if she continued to hang on to him in any way. If she sent him messages, if she looked at his pictures, if she tied the strings of their memories around her fingers and held on, she would never be free of him, and she knew that more than anything, she must make herself free of him.
He would fade in time, she knew, though perhaps not completely. He would always be in her heart, but the nearness of him in her thoughts and in her heart would fade, and as it did, she would heal. She turned her phone off and set it on her bedside table, then left the room to go to the kitchen and have lunch with Diana.
***
Nick sat at the kitchen table with his coffee mug in his hands, his sky-blue eyes staring down into the blackness of the liquid which was growing colder as it sat there untouched. There was silence in the large room, and to him it felt like a tomb. The whole house felt like a tomb, one that he was trapped in and had no way out..
He couldn’t get the images out of his mind, the memories of that day. She had stood there in the doorway, staring at him as Monica had kissed him, as Monica had told him that she was carrying his baby, and he had seen her heart break right before him. It had been the single most painful moment of his life. He had never wanted to hurt her.
There in his pocket had been the ring that he had so carefully chosen, the ring that he had been about to give to her in his garden where the beautiful dinner had been set up, where he had been going to propose to her, and where their lives together would have begun.
Andrew had sil
ently gone into the garden, taken it all down, and put it all away. Since then, Nick had spent more time in that same garden among the Grecian pillars than he ever had before. It was the last place that he had been while they were still together, while they were still lovers and friends, while there was still the possibility of a future ahead of them. He couldn’t let go of it. He knew that he should, but he couldn’t. It was like a lifeline to the best time of his life, and he refused to let it go.
His mind was plagued with his troubles, and his heart had never hurt so much, not even when Monica had left him. At that point he had believed that he could not hurt more than he did then, but he had learned that he really had no idea what heartache was until he had said goodbye to the love of his life and watched her leave his home. It should have been their home, but it never would be.