Us: A If I Break (Her) Story

by Portia Moore

  It was her alone against the world. No one to lean on, no one to protect her. It would have made me sad if I wasn’t super hormonal and pregnant, but being so it makes me damn near cry to think of it. So after badgering Cal to find out if it was true, and not letting up until he reached out to her, I was relieved once it was a fact.

  They were related; my husband had a sister, another woman who I hoped he could one day love and she could love in return. What I didn’t imagine—what I never guessed would ever happen in a million years—is that she’d have the same condition that my husband, the love of my life, lives with every day. When I found that out my heart shattered for her and when it came out that Ian was in love with her—well, the other version of herself—my heart broke even more for him.

  I first met Ian almost three years ago. It was a week before my art gallery was due to open. I had been more than familiar with his work. I was in awe of his photographs and knew I’d do whatever it took to have his work featured. His pictures spoke to me in a way that no other artist’s work did. Even though the pictures weren’t of sad things, they were gorgeous black and white portraits. Some of them landscapes, others of people, or objects. But there was an underlying sadness that was so deep, a pain that was almost tangible behind the lenses, that poured out into the work.

  It was a feeling that I recognized immediately and though the work was impeccable it was the emotion that drew me to them that made them stand out. I thought it was just me at the center of an emotional hurricane that made me imagine something that wasn’t there. Maybe I was projecting. But after finding out that Ian had gone through—and would go through—everything I had, I knew what I saw wasn’t imagined. It was a painful, emotional turmoil so deep that it’s indescribable to someone who hasn’t gone through it. That’s what was in his work, what spoke to me so deeply.

  It’s why when Hillary called me and told me what a fucking jerk Cal was still being to Ian that I had to run a warm bath and drink a glass of grape juice, wishing it was wine, to try to calm my nerves. I know they technically got into a fight when they first met but Cal understood why that happened, and it was over two years ago. I thought he’d be over it by now, but maybe that resentment is still in play. It’s the only reason that I can think of as to why he’s so mean to him.

  When I see him crack the door open, wearing a grin as his eyes slide down my body, I scowl at him and sit up in the water.

  “How’s my girls?” he asks, ignoring my scowl. I turn and my body is so big now it almost splashes water as I move to face him.

  “What happened at the hospital?” I glare at him and he sighs dismissively, coming behind me to rub my shoulders, but I shrug away from him demanding he give me an answer.

  “Hillary can’t keep her fucking mouth shut I see,” he grumbles.

  “What is your problem Cal? I don’t understand. Why are you so shitty to him?” I hiss, tired of holding it in. I’ve tried to look past it, but knowing that he let Ian sit in fear for hours and not let him see his wife is beyond me.

  “Ian doesn’t have anything to do with us. I don’t want you getting stressed out over shit that you shouldn’t be worried about,” he says firmly. I splash water in his face and he laughs at me, which makes me even angrier.

  “How could you do that to him? You can be an ass sometimes but that was really fucking cruel.” To my absolute horror I’m crying now. His condescending grin melts away and he sighs, pulling me back to him. I don’t bother to push him away this time because I’m an emotional mess and want his arms around me. I just don’t want him to be a jerk.

  “Babe, don’t cry. He’s okay, he knows she’s okay, and I can’t make her see him if she doesn’t want to,” he says, and I wipe my tears away.

  “Why doesn’t she want to?” I ask, confused.

  “That’s not my business babe. It’s neither one of ours,” he says, quietly rubbing my shoulders. I look over my shoulder and pin him down with a stare.

  “You really don’t know?” I ask, and he gazes at me blankly.

  “I really don’t know. I swear,” he says with an innocent grin. I roll my eyes at him but allow my body to relax into his hands.

  “I’m really not gonna like the guy if you start making me fucking jealous,” he says huskily with a playful look, but gives me a possessive squeeze. I can’t help but smile.

  “He reminds me of me, Cal…” I say, quietly going back in time to the days when I was the woman abandoned, the one who was in love with a man who had someone else, when he loved her and I was merely an inconvenience, a memory locked away inside a mind fragmented and refusing to meld together. I want to add that Ian reminds me of Cal, the two men I’ve met that Megan’s shared with us. Ian and Cal remind me so much of each other, I would have thought Kam would be the one he’d clashed with, that he would have made fun of, that he would have been annoyed with. Yet it’s Ian.

  He’s quiet, and I expect a smart-ass retort, but I only hear a soft breath pushed from his mouth.

  “It’s not the same thing,” he says, his voice quiet but firm.

  “How isn’t it?” I challenge him.

  “We were different. We were married.”

  “They’re married!” I tell him.

  “You had Caylen,” he counters.

  “I would have loved you the same without her. I hurt the same before I knew she existed.” I turn towards him, my body making waves in the tub. He takes my hand and helps me push my body up so I’m resting on my knees. I take his face in mine and rest my forehead on his.

  “He’s hurting Cal, like I was hurting,” I tell him. His hands rest on my stomach and I feel one of the babies kick it, and the smile he reveals makes my heart melt. One I didn’t get to see while I was pregnant with our daughter Caylen. I remember how badly I wanted this, him holding me and feeling love in his touch, his prideful smile while touching a part of himself growing within me. I put my hand over his, and he leans back and kisses me softly on the lips.

  “I can’t make her do what she doesn’t want, but I’ll be better,” he promises me.

  “That’s all I’m asking.”

  Ian

  I don’t remember how I got home. I sure as hell don’t remember calling Blue, but somehow it must have all happened because he’s on the couch opposite me. The room smells like stale whiskey and nightmares. My head is killing me. I push off the couch and shuffle over to the fridge, pulling out a gallon of water and downing about half of it before I move it from my lips, finishing off half the gallon. I search through my thoughts while remembering yesterday, looking at the table that I had pushed Megan up against. How she was on the verge of giving in, how she let my tongue into her mouth, how her hands roved up my body. The kiss she said would show me that she couldn’t love me back, not the way she loves him…yet it only did the opposite. It showed me she could if she just gave in.

  It was supposed to sever the tie between us. In her mind it would be goodbye, but I knew it wasn’t goodbye. It was an introduction to what we had, what I knew was there, what she’s tried to push to the back of her mind and forget. It was almost unfair; the rules were in my favor because regardless of how much she denied I was in her heart, I sure as hell knew her body—what it liked, what made it melt, every spot that would drive her crazy. I could convince her body even if I had to work more for her heart.

  “I thought you’d be sleeping for days.” Blue’s up on the couch, yawning now. I

  walk over and hand him the water jug. He takes it and finishes it off but frowns, pushing it back to me.

  “Your breath tastes like shit man,” he says.

  “Makes sense. I feel like shit,” I reply, sinking down into the couch.

  “You were so fucking wasted by the time I got to you.”

  I recall starting off with a double shot of whiskey and then another…and that’s about as much as I remember.

  “Thanks for coming,” I mutter.

  “You were messed up about Megan?” he asks cautiously.
>
  “You heard?”

  Of course he heard, they’re practically best friends now, I think, annoyed.

  “I saw her,” he says, and it makes me sit straight up.

  “Right before I came to get you.”

  I try to swallow my envy down.

  “I can’t believe she got hit by a fucking car man,” he says, shaking his head.

  “Did she tell you what happened?” I ask, already knowing she has.

  “We didn’t get to really talk. I got there right before visiting hours.”

  “I saw it happen. She was here,” I tell him, trying to unload some of the guilt I’ve been carrying on my back, making some room for despair and anger. He glares at me.

  “What?!”

  “It was kind of my fault,” I admit. He looks at me in disbelief and I just lay it all out for him. How she came here and told me about Alana coming back, and if she did again to refuse her. How she was getting married. And even how we almost had sex right in the kitchen, and then she ran out of here and directly in front of a car. Blue looks at me as if trying to wrap his mind around what he’s just heard. His expression goes from shocked to amused to disbelieving throughout the span of the story. He shakes his head slightly.

  “She wanted me to tell you.” He’s jiggling his foot, and fidgeting.

  I look at him, confused.

  “She wanted me to tell you that if Alana resurfaced that you tell her you didn’t want to be with her anymore and you’d moved on,” he continues. “I knew how you’d react if I told you but I should have just done it.” He groans, rubbing his face.

  “If you’d told me that shit you’d have ended up in the hospital, and not because of a car,” I tell him, trying to ease his guilt.

  “This is so fucking messed up,” he whines. It looks like my attempt to ease his guilt didn’t do shit.

  “So Cal said Alana came back?” he asks tensely.

  “Yeah. But he’s a jerk-off so he could have been lying.” I look at Blue and notice how stressed my little cousin looks. I feel bad that he’s been dragged into all of this.

  “I don’t blame her for being upset with me. It’s sort of my fault. I pushed her to…I just didn’t want to lose her,” I say quietly.

  “Which one?” he asks, and I frown.

  “It doesn’t matter to me, they’re one and the same,” I tell him. He looks away from me and focuses his eyes on something across the room.

  “What do you think Alana would feel about that?” he asks. I think this is the first time he’s even talked about Alana as a person separate from Megan.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I just mean, you know her really well. Do you think she’d want you to be with Megan?”

  “What the fuck are you talking about? She’s Megan. Megan is Alana,” I tell him, feeling myself become defensive. I think of my girl, the one who’s all fire, sass, and takes no bullshit. Who was possessive and liked me the same way.

  Shit…would she?

  “It was a stupid question. You’re right,” he says, exasperated. He stands and heads to the bathroom, leaving me with my thoughts…which are now full of Alana, not Megan. I look to the kitchen where I had her. The table I had Alana on, that I almost had Megan on. The apartment is full of memories of me and her—me and Alana—but our last memory is me alone with just a letter, saying to forget about her. To move on and be happy.

  She wanted me to hate her. She had to, because if I hated her I couldn’t love her. But she was wrong. I could do both simultaneously, almost effortlessly. When I first found out about DID I tried to think of them as two different people, two different women sharing the same body. As much as I try to wrap my head around that, it’s almost impossible. I see the woman I love, and there’s two different versions of her. I’ve thought of it as convincing her other side that I can love her and that she can love me, but for the first time I realize I’ve never stopped to think about how Alana feels about it, if she’s there somewhere behind Megan’s thoughts. Her memories I haven’t thought about. How Alana would take this.

  Blue is out of the bathroom.

  “Let’s go and get something to eat man. We need air and water that doesn’t have backwash from last night’s whiskey in it,” he says, and I nod.

  I stand up and head to the shower, get dressed, but I’m just going through the motions. With my thoughts on the conundrum he’s dropped in my lap, I’m even quiet on the drive to the restaurant. It’s a Greek place that gives you so much food three people could share it. The food is good and just what I need to suck up the remaining alcohol inside of me. Blue gets a Gyro platter and I get Bakaliaros. Blue’s attention before the food comes is on his phone, and I start to wonder if he’s texting Megan.

  Are they talking about me? I realize I’m being paranoid, and the blood coursing through me is still tinged with whiskey. I’m in a bad fucking mood even after the shower, and the fresh air Blue said would make me feel better. I keep hearing Megan’s words that she’s going to marry this douchebag, that she’s going to be with him. I think of Alana saying she’d be my wife, making vows she knew she couldn’t or wouldn’t keep, and I’m getting so fucking pissed. I signal the waitress over and ask her for a shot of tequila. Blue glares at me.

  “Don’t you think you had enough to drink yesterday?” he asks. I give him the finger. He sets his phone down and gives me his full attention.

  “You’re not going to do this are you?” he asks, his voice dripping with disdain.

  “Do what?” I scoff.

  “Turn into an angry bitter drunk, like our uncles, like…” He trails off and I realize he’s talking about his dad.

  “You’re being a little dramatic aren’t you Joshie?” I say, teasing him and trying to kill the sad tension that cropped up at my last statement. Josh’s dad was messed up all while we were kids. I heard he finally pulled himself together a few years ago but I haven’t seen him and I didn’t bother to ask Blue about it in case it wasn’t true.

  “Nobody starts out as a drunk. I know you’re dealing with a lot of shit man, but you can’t let this be you answer,” he urges. I can see the worry behind his eyes.

  “Besides, I wanted to talk to you about some stuff and I need you to be sober, okay?” I wave over the waitress again, who’s eyeing our table with a flirtatious smile, and I’m not sure if it’s for me or for Blue.

  “What’s up fellas?” she asks. Her eyes linger on Blue and that makes me grin.

  “You can cancel the tequila.”

  “Sure thing. Anything else I can get you while you wait?” she says, her brown eyes darting to Blue. He’s either uninterested or too stupid to notice.

  “Two Ginger Ales,” he tells her. She nods since Blue hasn’t given her the slightest glance before leaving our table.

  “She’s cute, and she likes you. God knows why,” I joke, and he shrugs.

  “I think you have enough women problems for both of us,” he quips back. I can’t argue with that.

  Our food arrives and we tear through it like we haven’t eaten in days. Once my plate is three quarters of the way finished I push it away. I grab my bottle of Ginger Ale, down most of it, and cross my arms across my chest.

  “Okay. Shoot,” I tell him.

  He looks at me as if he’s trying to figure out what I’m talking about, but he knows.

  Blue was my best friend before I realized we were related by blood. Our mothers were close and for most of my life I considered him more like a brother than a cousin or friend. We had our first fight together, had our first kiss with two sisters we double dated with, stole candy out of stores together. I was the first person Blue told that his dad was hitting his mom after he got drunk. We’ve always been closer than close, until we had a falling out. One of Blue’s fucktard friends brought him in on a robbery job that he was supposed to drive for, and Blue hid some of the shit at my house.

  Blue was young and stupid and I was slightly older and a little less stupid, but smart enough to k
now that what he did could have landed us both in prison. We fought, verbally and physically, and I told him he was dead to me. It was nasty, ugly, and we distanced ourselves from each other for way too long. It wasn’t until my mom told him about Alana leaving me and how messed up I was that we reconnected. That being said though, I know Blue and I’ve been so distracted with my own shit that I haven’t seen that my cousin has been carrying a heavy load of shit himself. Megan told me about what a slut his girlfriend turned out to be, and I guess I was so busy being heartbroken myself I haven’t realized that maybe Blue is too.

  “Is this about the Katie girl?” I ask him. He looks at me, almost surprised, and immediately frowns.

  “I think seeing how much you love Alana made me realize that what me and Katie had wasn’t even close, but it’s better to find out now than later right?” he says. I nod, but the way I’m feeling now, I almost want to tell him he doesn’t want the kind of love me and Alana had. That the loss of it isn’t worth it. But that’d be a lie. I’d live through this the rest of my life if I could get a do-over with her again.

  “What’s your plan from here?” he asks me. I feel annoyance and irritation crawl up my neck.

  “If I knew that I wouldn’t have asked for tequila,” I utter, trying to laugh it off.

  “What…what if she marries Kam?” My blood goes cold at the thought. It’s something I’ve been trying my hardest not to think about. I try not to think that she’s with another man every single day, that someone else makes her happy every single day. And here he is putting the shit right in my face…but he’s right. So I’ll tell him the truth.

  “I don’t have a fucking clue.”

  He starts playing with that stupid lip ring. “But she told you she’s going to say yes?” he reiterates.

  “I know what she told me but I also know what I felt!” My voice is loud but it’s after the lunch rush, and it’s Tuesday, so it’s mainly only the staff around.

  “You know what Blue? I don’t know why I even keep talking to you about this. You’ve made it clear you’re on her side, not your fucking cousin’s, so why don’t we drop it completely,” I tell him angrily. His face is full of indignation now, but there’s something else behind it. I’m surprised when he doesn’t tell me to calm down or pull it together or that I’m overreacting. Instead he lets out a long sigh, drops his face in his hands, and stares at the table.