The Reason for Me

by Prescott Lane

  I motion to the drawer again, and she reaches inside without taking her eyes off of me. She turns a little bottle around in her hands, searching her memory for an explanation as to why I’d have a bottle of pink nail polish.

  “Her toes,” she says, barely a whisper. “You painted her toes when she couldn’t reach. My God, that’s all you have left of her—one bottle of nail polish.”

  She engulfs me in her arms, weeping, her hands going through my hair. “No one knew about us. Her parents packed up her apartment. All I had left was that one little bottle she forgot to pack the night she left.”

  “I can’t imagine. I’ve held on to Logan’s things for so long. I can’t imagine if I hadn’t had his clothes to smell, our place together, his bike. It’s taken me years to let go of some of that stuff, and this is all you have left of her?”

  I take the bottle from her, twirling it in my hand like I have so many nights. I never set out to have the drawer, to open it every damn night, but found I couldn’t go to sleep unless I did. The memories of someone in that drawer would always call out to me. And in the beginning, right after it all happened, thinking about them for just a few minutes was all I could take. Then over time, it just became part of who I am.

  I still have one more place I need to go, one more thing to face. “Remember I told you I’m leaving town for a few days? I’m going to see Lulu. I haven’t seen her since she was a baby. I promised Celeste once that I’d be there for Lulu, and I haven’t been. She’s five now.”

  “Who has custody of her?”

  “Brent’s parents. They still live in North Carolina,” I say, but she doesn’t respond. Something is still off with her. I know I just dumped a lot on her, but it’s more than that. “It’s important to me to . . .”

  “I understand,” she says, her voice a mere whisper. “She was almost your daughter.”

  She knows everything now. Well, she knows everything about my past. I need to tell her about my present, my future. “At the time, I was ready for that. But it didn’t happen,” I say, taking her hand. “But now I’m ready again.”

  “Holt,” she cries in a soft whisper, her eyes filling with tears.

  “I want it all, the whole thing. And I want it with you.”

  In typical Annalyse form, she doesn’t do what I expect. She doesn’t collapse into my arms, kiss me. We don’t fall into bed, and have the best makeup sex of our lives. Instead, she releases my hand and steps away from me. What’s happening? This is exactly what Celeste did to me. “I know I hurt you. And I know you didn’t want to, but you fixed me and . . .”

  “Maybe my job was to fix you so that someone else gets to love you.”

  What the hell is she talking about? I just opened up to her, and this is what I get? She starts to walk away from me again, towards the back door. I let one woman do that before, I won’t make that mistake again. I can’t. I don’t think I’d survive. I slip my arms around her waist from behind, resting my head down on top of hers. “I only want you to love me.”

  “I do,” she cries, lowering her head. “But I may never be able to . . .”

  She completely falls apart, and I start to understand. It should’ve dawned on me before, but as usual, I’m a little slow with these things. It was stupid to think I could give her a prescription for birth control, make a little speech about hope, and things would magically be better. There are no magic pills, just like there are no magic dicks and vaginas. And then I just went on and on about Lulu.

  I turn her around in my arms. “Do you remember what you told me when I returned your costume shoe?” She looks up into my eyes, her blue ones with the slightest glimmer. I can tell she remembers. “You told me you weren’t Cinderella, and I told you I’m not a prince. So who the fuck needs a fairy tale?”

  She’s fighting it, but a tight-lipped smile starts to appear. “You want kids, and I can’t . . .”

  “You want to give me the fairy tale, white picket fence?” I ask, and she nods. “Then the day I ask you to marry me, you better say yes!” She starts to giggle a little. “And what better ending than adopting a passel full of kids and giving them a home.”

  She covers her mouth, trying to hold in her sobs. “Do you really mean that?”

  “Biology wasn’t important to me with Lulu, and it’s not important to me now. I mean, how many fairy tales contain a biological mom, dad, and 2.2 kids, anyway?”

  This time she laughs out loud. “I really do lov . . .”

  I put my finger over her mouth. “No way am I going to let you say it first again. And I know you like it quick and dirty, so this is long overdue.” I tilt her chin up, giving her a little grin. “In case I haven’t made myself clear. I love you.” Her entire body softens in my arms. “I don’t want to take another breath without you,” I say, leaning in close, my mouth hovering over hers, our breath, our lives, becoming one.

  This is my reward, and I’m ready for this, for happiness, for hope, but mostly for her. As I wrap my arms around her, I feel the chains of control that have imprisoned me fall aside, and sense a warmth overcome my entire body. It’s not that I think all this crap is over. I know it’s not. Nothing is going to erase that night, not even Annalyse’s love, but this is a start—an ember.

  I kiss her like I’m never going to kiss her again. I kiss her like she’s my reason for living. I kiss her until I forget where she starts and I begin. I kiss her like it’s our first kiss, like I’m still trying to make her mine. I kiss her like I own her and like she owns me. I kiss her until she knows I’ll never kiss another woman, but her. This kiss is the kiss that means forever and finally. The kiss that ends all others.

  EPILOGUE

  FIVE MONTHS LATER

  ANNALYSE

  Holding my carry-on bag, I glance around Holt’s house. Well, my house, too. I officially moved into his house when Meg and Patrick returned home in December. It’s a little strange to live next door to my sister, but she loves it. And Holt and I have learned to lock our door and draw the curtains, and we confiscated Meg’s key.

  Double-checking to make sure I’d put the mail on hold, my eyes land on the refrigerator door, now covered in pictures and drawings from Lulu. She really is a precious little girl. Holt says she looks exactly like Celeste, same blonde hair, only Lulu’s is curly.

  Last December, I made the trip to North Carolina with him so he could officially meet her. I worried it might break his heart to see her, but it seemed to begin to heal something inside him. He was finally fulfilling his promise to Celeste to help take care of Lulu. The girl sure is a hugger, just like her mom. I know Holt loves that about her.

  Dark days still come every so often, when the guilt starts weighing on him, but I’m pretty good at reading his moods. And just being there with him—no fixing, no saving—just good, old fashioned loving, seems to help him out. And it’s been good for him to keep in touch with Lulu, to see her so happy.

  The day I moved in, he cleared out that dresser drawer. He made some excuse that the drawer was for my stuff, but he was finally ready to do it. All the items are now displayed on a shelf in his den. I’m so proud of him. We should all do that, wear our pain, our sadness. Show it to the world. Someone should make a t-shirt line that says just that.

  That would let us all put our true selves out there without hiding behind polite smiles and small talk, fake “I’m fines,” and social media posts that make us all look like we are living the high life. Maybe that will be the next venture for my blog. I can see it now. The line of shirts would be called: “I’ve got issues! You?”

  “Ready to go?” Holt asks, slipping his hands around my waist.

  “I don’t know,” I tease. “It might help if I knew where we were going.” I’ve traveled all over the world, but never have I gone to the airport without knowing where I was headed. Until today.

  “You’re the one that didn’t want any of the traditional wedding stuff,” Holt says.

  He’s got me there. I’d done all that with Lo
gan, and it felt weird to do it again. Maybe it was just because of how that ended? When I suspected Holt was getting ready to ask me to marry him, I told him I didn’t want an engagement ring or big wedding ceremony. I was too busy trying to turn my blog posts into a book, anyway. Yep, they offered me a deal, and I’ve been agonizing over it for months. Thankfully, Holt didn’t seem to mind the idea of a non-traditional ceremony.

  He popped the question in the most unusual way I’ve ever heard of—with cash. Well, that’s not entirely true. It was a random Tuesday. Seriously, who proposes on a Tuesday? He comes home from delivering a baby. I’d waited up for him, and it was close to one in the morning. He doesn’t get down on one knee; instead, he pulls me to my feet and hands me an envelope.

  Inside is a bank deposit slip for ten thousand dollars, and to say I was confused would be a fucking understatement. When I saw the account was titled “Our baby fund,” I melted on the spot, and I’ll never forget what he told me.

  “An engagement ring is a symbol of forever. What’s more forever than family?”

  I didn’t want a diamond. Holt gave me what I really wanted—a family. So whether or not it happens naturally, through fertility or adoptions, we’ve got a little head start. It was the best proposal, and of course, my answer was “yes.”

  Still, he might be taking my declaration that I didn’t want a traditional wedding a little too far. What bride doesn’t even know where her wedding is taking place? I’ve heard of surprise honeymoons, but this is getting ridiculous.

  The Dirty Truth Blog

  May 11

  Everything is a choice

  So guess what? I’m officially Mrs. Pussy Mechanic, MD. Yep, that’s right. We got married!

  Tradition would say he shouldn’t have seen me on the wedding day, but we bucked tradition. It didn’t work out well for me last time, so we did things our way. Well, his way.

  I had absolutely no idea he was bringing us out to California to be married among the “fire follower” flowers. He understands the symbolism of the flowers for me, but I know he would’ve happily married me in our backyard or at a Justice of the Peace. He really didn’t care as long as I was his wife in the end.

  I also had no idea that he flew out our closest friends and family, even little Lulu, to share the day with us. He got simple titanium bands for us both, and a red wedding dress for me. Yep, that’s right—red. He could’ve lied and said he picked that color because of some fire symbolism, but it’s really because he thinks I look “sexy as fuck” in red. He’s such a man.

  My man. The man I love.

  Life is full of choices. Sometimes we make the right ones. Sometimes we make the wrong ones. Sometimes a choice that seems so trivial ends up changing the direction of our life forever. And sometimes a choice that seems monumental doesn’t mean shit.

  So then what do we do? We make another choice, and another. I’ve made some bad choices in my life, but the worst one I ever made was not making one at all, spending years just going through the motions of life, paralyzed by pain, sadness, grief, and loss. Basically, I wasn’t living at all—just stuck in the mud.

  Looking back, it all makes me smile now. I chose to walk in the mud in plastic stilettos, and well, my life changed that Halloween night—just as it had before. That seemingly irrelevant decision—to walk, to move, to go forward—became more important than what car to buy, what college I went to, and all the other bullshit choices I seem to agonize over.

  So go left, go right. It really doesn’t matter. What matters is that you do something, choose something.

  And if you have to choose something, why not choose something great?

  Like hope, like love. Like happy.

  The past few months have taught me so much about myself, love, my heart. Let’s recap what we’ve learned . . .

  The heart is flexible.

  It has a memory.

  It is a cruel liar.

  And perhaps most importantly, it has needs.

  It needs a friend, a lover, and more than any other organ, it needs time—to heal, to hurt, to make peace with the senseless, and make room to accept, to beat loudly enough for us to listen. The body has needs—fire, food, water—but the heart needs so much more. And my heart needs him.

  *

  HOLT

  Placing breakfast down on the nightstand, I slip in next to her, watching her sleep like I have so many nights before. This morning is different, though. This morning, she’s my wife.

  Will I still make crazy orders where her safety is concerned? Damn right, I will. In fact, I think I’ve got a legal responsibility to do it now.

  Will I still drive her crazy with my small talk? Yep, it’s a husband’s duty to drive his wife nuts. I think I read that somewhere.

  Will I still smack her ass every chance I get? Hell, yeah. Isn’t that one of the best parts of being married—sex comes included?

  Does she still have the power to destroy me? Absolutely. But I know she won’t use it.

  People always ask couples, “How did you two meet?” It’s funny to think I met her while I was sleepwalking, because that’s what I’d been doing with my life before Annalyse. She kicked me and woke me up that night, literally and figuratively. And I never knew it could be like this, at least not for me. My parents had this kind of love—the kind that surpasses even death.

  Glancing at her red wedding dress draped on the chair, the image of her standing among the flowers of the California wildfires is burned into my brain. She put all the petals to shame. Perhaps that’s because she’s the most beautiful thing to grow out of destruction. She certainly shone a light for me, helped show me the way. And she looked like a goddess standing there in a sea of vibrant colors, with both beauty and ruin surrounding her.

  To think I’m the lucky son of bitch she chose to stand with her.

  She slowly opens her blue eyes, igniting something within me—a fire, but not the flames of hell. No, this time it’s the sweetest burn, like a welcome warmth from a fireplace on a cold winter night. For the longest time, I couldn’t figure out what it was about her that drew me in. But now I know it wasn’t me being drawn in. It was all her. It was her stepping into the fire with me and not being afraid of the burn, the heat.

  I can’t give you a reason why Logan died, or Celeste or Jason or Brent. Maybe there’s not one. But thinking back to the flowers, I know the reason for the fire is so that they could grow and bloom. The destruction might look like complete and utter shit, but underneath a seed grows, fighting to push through, fighting for life. I guess that’s what Annalyse and I have both been doing for a long time.

  Sure, I’m a doctor, but I’m also a man—which means I’m not very deep. I don’t have things all figured out. I can’t always talk about my feelings. And I definitely don’t post them on a blog, but this much I know. Annalyse is the reason I’m the man I am. I was less than half a man without her. She’s the reason I don’t want to be alone anymore. She’s the reason I can sleep and dream. The reason I smile. She’s the reason for all of it. She’s the reason for me.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  This part of a book is always hard to write. It’s like when the winner of an Oscar tries to thank everyone in two minutes—and I’ve only got a few paragraphs. I just hope I’m not that person who randomly forgets to thank their spouse. So let me get that one out of the way first. Thank you to my husband. The one who calms me down when I threaten to stop before I’ve even started, and then not to publish once I’m finally done. (Yes, that happens with each book.) Thanks, babe, for loving me in my craziest moments.

  I also have to thank the wonderful team of women who hold my hand through each publication—Nikki Rushbrook, Neda Amini, Robin Bateman, Rachel Lockwood, Tania Marinaro, my big sis, all my girlfriends. You ladies are always there with a word of encouragement, the occasional F-bomb, or just an ear to listen. Love you. And a huge thank you to Hang Le for bringing my story to life with her beautiful cover.

  Most importantly,
my readers—how can I ever say thanks enough? Even though I see the number of pages read, the downloads, it’s still hard to believe you are out there. It floors me. Thanks for reading my stories, spreading the word, reaching out to me. I wish I could give each one of you guys a big hug. But until then, I hope you can just settle for another Happily Ever After!

  Love,

  Prescott Lane

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  PRESCOTT LANE is originally from Little Rock, Arkansas, and graduated from Centenary College in 1997 with a degree in sociology. She went on to Tulane University to receive her MSW in 1998, after which she worked with developmentally delayed and disabled children. She currently lives in New Orleans with her husband, two children, and two dogs. She is the bestselling author of Stripped Raw. Other works include Layers of Her, First Position, Perfectly Broken, Quiet Angel, and Wrapped in Lace.

  Contact her at any of the following:

  www.authorprescottlane.com

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