Saved by the Doctor

by Ivy Wonders

  “Tara, we are not getting back together. How would that work anyway, once he’s old enough to move out? You know you and I wouldn’t have any excuse to stay together,” I told her. “What then?” The longer this conversation went on, the more I remembered just how manipulative Tara could be. I wouldn’t let her get the best of me. “No. It’s best if you just move in and put any notion of us and a future out of your mind.”

  “We could deal with those problems when the time comes.” She went quiet for a minute. “We need to do what will make our son happy, Harman. I’ll move in, but you have to give Rebel up. No dating. Give me a chance to show you that it’s best for us all to be a family together.”

  My jaw ached from holding it so tight. My head hurt from thinking so damn much. And my mouth opened but nothing came out of it. I didn’t want Tara back. I didn’t want to even see her every day in my home. I looked out the window, seeing Rebel’s house glowing in the distance. Would I give her up?

  Will I be able to?

  Her voice but a whisper, she said, “Harman, I can’t change what I’ve done. I can only try harder to make the future better.”

  I had to admit that Tara had matured a hell of a lot in the last month. But would that be enough on its own? “And what changes are you going to make?”

  She cleared her throat, and I realized that she’d been crying silently. “I’ll sell the shop and devote myself to our son and you.”

  Throughout the years, I’d known how much the pregnancy had affected her mentally, how it had made her feel like she had no choices. “I don’t want you to give up working if you like it.” I swallowed hard, knowing what I had to say next, but hating myself for it. “And I’ll break things off with Rebel on one condition, Tara. You’ve got to start seeing a therapist. One of my choosing.”

  She’d always rejected the idea, and I knew if she rejected it again, there was no hope for our family—whatever our family was. “If you’ll join me in couple’s therapy, I’ll see your therapist, Harman. I’m serious this time. I want to make things work. I want to do that for our son. He never asked for this. You and I made that mistake on our own.”

  “It wasn’t a mistake.” I hated when that even went through my mind. “Eli wasn’t a mistake. No matter what else happened before or since, he wasn’t a mistake.”

  “Then neither were we,” she said with a long sigh punctuating her remark. “I’m just now realizing that for the first time ever, Harman. We weren’t a mistake. Something brought us together that night. We might’ve only had that one night, but it gave us Eli.”

  You couldn’t even call it a night. It was ten minutes. But she was right. It had given us Eli. Both of us. Not just her. Not just me. Both of us. And he deserved to have us both.

  Even if that meant I had to give up Rebel.

  I sighed into the phone, and I imagined I could almost hear my heart breaking. “Okay. I will see a family counselor with you—but we will remain separated. And I’ll stop seeing Rebel for as long as we remain in counseling. That is the best I can do right now, Tara.”

  I could practically hear Tara’s smile through the phone; the woman always got what she wanted, and I imagine that’s what she thought was happening here. She may have matured, but a person can only change so much.

  “Deal,” she said. “I can move in tomorrow.”

  Chapter 24

  Rebel

  Waking up with a pounding headache, I opened my eyes to see Harman walking into my room. “Where’ve you been?” I didn’t recall a whole lot after he got the call from Eli.

  He stood there across the room, looking so sad and not coming any closer. “Home.” He put the keys on my dresser. “I took your keys. I didn’t want to leave the door unlocked, and knew I had to come back to check on you. By the way, I’ve poured out the rest of the bottle of Jack Daniel’s. It was a precautionary measure.”

  “I need something for this headache.” I climbed out of bed, then realized I had no clothes on. “Oh, hell.”

  Harman grabbed my robe off the hook, tossing it to me. “Here you go. Put that on.”

  My lack of clothing had never bothered him before. I instantly felt sick to my stomach—and I didn’t think it had anything to do with the hangover. “Do you mind filling me in on what happened with that phone call you got? I’ve kind of forgotten about it.”

  “Yeah, a whole glass of Jack and very little Coke will do that to a person.” He gave me a serious look. “Hey, promise me you won’t use that stuff to get over me.”

  My hands, which had been struggling with the belt on my robe, fell to my sides. “What?”

  “Promise me that you won’t take to drinking, Rebel,” he said, leaving out the most important part.

  “What’s going on, Harman?” I sat on the bed. My head felt so light that I thought I might faint. I had to sit down or risk falling. “You said something about me getting over you. What’s that about?”

  “She’s going to move in with me and get therapy.” He shifted his weight, looking nervous. “This is over.” I’d told myself a million times that this is how it would end, but it hadn’t helped me one bit.

  It felt like someone had reached into my chest and ripped my heart right out. Nothing had ever hurt this bad, and I prayed nothing ever would again.

  Harman just kept repeating the same words over and over again: “I’m sorry.” That’s all I heard for at least ten minutes as I cried like a baby.

  “I know you have to do this.” I stopped to wail. “I know it’s best for Eli.” I fell back on the bed, thinking I might be having a heart attack it hurt so badly.

  “Baby!” Harman was suddenly right there, holding me. I wished he hadn’t touched me.

  But I clung to him, holding him so tightly, as if I could hold my shattered world together if I just held him tight enough. “Don’t end this! Please!”

  His lips pressed against my forehead. “I’ve got to. I’ve been selfish, and I’ve got to stop.”

  And that one word hit me right where it should’ve. I was being selfish, too. “I’m sorry.” Now it was my turn to say those words over and over. “I never wanted to come between you guys.” But I had done just that.

  Harman left me alone and I tried to take a few minutes to compose myself. He came back with some pain reliever and a glass of water. “Here, take these.”

  Wiping the tears out of my eyes, I tried to make light of the situation. “Doctor’s orders?”

  Nodding, he said, “Doctor’s orders. And I want to make a few more while I’m at it. No more crying. I still love you. You’ll never lose that. There is no one else I’d rather be with—and I hope I never lose your love either. But things have to be this way. For now. Maybe forever. Because I’ve been selfish with you, too. So incredibly selfish, and I hope you can forgive me. But it’s not because I don’t love you. You just don’t deserve to be a part of this mess. And until I can get my family sorted out, I don’t deserve you either.”

  “I love you, too. I always will, I think.” I thought about Eli as I swallowed the pills, hoping they’d be able to take away my headache and my heartache for good. “And I love Eli. He’s going to have his family back. I’m happy for him.”

  “Yeah, me too.” Happiness was the last word I would have used to describe how Harman sounded. He looked at my open bedroom door. “I should go. Are you going to be okay?”

  Not even close.

  Nodding, I didn’t want to put any more guilt on him. He had more than his fair share already. “I’ve got a doctor’s order for you, too, Harman.”

  “And that is?” he asked as he moved slowly toward the door.

  “You make the best family you can for that boy.” I gulped back the knot that formed in my throat. “He deserves a great family. He’s a great kid. And please, let him know that I won’t need his help with the animals. It’ll make his mother upset if he keeps coming around, but I don’t think I’d be able to tell him that myself without breaking down.”

  “Yeah, I
know.” Harman backed out the door. “I’ll explain things to him. He wants his family back—he told me that. He’ll have to understand that it means he can’t come here anymore. He’ll have to understand that having his mother back means losing you.”

  “No one gets to have it all,” I whispered as I watched his eyes glaze over.

  A tear ran down his cheek. “Yeah, no one gets to have it all. I suppose love wasn’t in the cards for me. Not a love I’d get to keep, anyway.”

  “You’ll always have my love, Harman. My heart is yours.” I saw no reason to lie to the man. He held my heart in the palm of his hand; maybe it would be a comfort to him as he laid in his cold bed with Tara.

  Don’t think about it, I told myself, even as my heart shattered into even tinier pieces.

  More tears fell from his eyes. “You’ve got mine, too. I’ve got to go. Sorry.” He turned and left in a rush. I heard the door close.

  Burying my face in the pillow, I let myself cry. Doctor’s orders or not, I was going to have to cry. I knew I had to let it all out somehow.

  What I didn’t know was how long that would take. Sleep didn’t come that night, and I had to call in sick the next day. Another night passed without a wink of sleep, and I cried a hell of a lot, too.

  One more day of calling in sick, and I finally stopped crying. But I couldn’t make myself get out of my robe—the one Harman had tossed me when he’d come to break my heart. I hadn’t bathed, brushed my teeth, or my hair. I felt like the walking dead.

  That third day, I sat on my sofa, looking out the window. When I saw Tara’s car pass by, I felt it all come up again, and I fell apart once more. I promised myself that would be the last time.

  She had her family back. I’d lost what had become mine, but at least they were whole again. And I had to stop being so selfish. I had to pick myself up and dust myself off and get on with my life.

  When a knock came to my door, I just looked at it from my safe spot on the sofa. “Who is it?” I finally asked.

  “Tara.”

  Why is she here?

  To rub it in? I got up and went to the door, not caring that I looked like a truck had run me over. She needed to know what she’d done to me.

  And just as I was about to let her see what I’d become, I stopped myself. “I’m sick, Tara. Now’s not a good time. I think I’ve got the flu. I don’t want you to catch it.”

  It wasn’t her fault that I’d fallen in love with a man who’d told me straight up that he’d give his ex-wife another chance if she wanted to make their family whole. So I wasn’t going to try to make her feel guilty about what had happened to me.

  “Oh, that’s too bad,” she called out through the door, sounding much too cheerful. “I’ll have Rene bring you some chicken soup. She can leave it on your doorstep. I’ll stop by in a few days to see how you’re doing. I just wanted to let you know that I’m seeing a therapist. Harman found one for me. And we’re seeing a marriage counselor, too. I know you probably don’t want to hear about that, but I wanted to let you know that I’m trying, Rebel. I really am.”

  “That’s good to hear.” I leaned on the door, feeling terrible about everything. “I miss them both,” I mumbled, almost more to myself than anyone else. “Don’t tell them that,” I rushed to add, “but I do. And I’m glad you’re getting help. It does help to talk to someone who can help you with what you’ve gone through.” And then I knew I needed help, too. “I’m gonna go see someone, too.”

  “Good,” she said with a happy lilt to her voice. “I know this has to be hard on you.”

  It’s killing me.

  But Eli was who mattered the most. “Yeah, it is. But as long as Eli’s happy, that’s all I care about.”

  “Yeah, us too.” She made two knocks on the door. “I’ll let you get back to it then, Rebel. Listen for Rene’s knock to get your soup. And I’m sorry it has to be this way.”

  I was sort of sick of how many sorrys I’d said and heard lately.

  Stumbling back to the sofa, I looked at it but didn’t sit down. I needed a bath, and I needed to get off my pity pony. Sure, I’d lost the love of my life, but a little boy had his mommy and daddy back under the same roof.

  As I stripped off the robe—which I tossed into the trashcan as I walked past the kitchen—I found myself wondering if Tara was sleeping in the same bed Harman and I had.

  My stomach began to hurt even more, and I had to stop thinking about that. It didn’t matter where she slept. Harman wasn’t mine anymore. He was trying to be a good husband and father, and I needed to let him do that. Not that I could stop him if I’d wanted to.

  I wanted them to be happy. If they could be happy. Can they really be happy?

  Turning on the water, I got into the shower, washing the remnants of our last time together off my body. Some would’ve thought it disgusting to live that way for three damn days. And they’d be right. But until that moment, I couldn’t just wash away what was left of the man I loved.

  Running my soapy hands over my belly, I wondered what would’ve happened if I’d gotten pregnant. Would Harman have felt the same way about everything?

  It didn’t matter. I wasn’t pregnant. I’d been on the shot for years. No little miracle would come along to keep us connected for the rest of our lives, the way Eli had connected Harman and Tara. And I wouldn’t have wanted that to be the only thing keeping us together anyway.

  The truth was, I felt sorry for Tara. She would never know real, genuine love—not the kind Harman and I shared. I felt it there still, beating in my broken heart. We’d always love one another, even if we could never be together.

  There were worse things than sacrificing love, so a child could have the life he deserved. Did it nearly kill me? Yes. But no sacrifice ever comes easy.

  Chapter 25

  Harman

  The fourth day seemed to be the hardest day yet. I’d woken up with a hard-on after dreaming all night long about Rebel. To say I missed her didn’t come close to describing how I felt.

  I could stop picturing Rebel as she collapsed into tears. I’d tried to explain everything when the first onslaught had come, but I didn’t think she’d heard a thing I said. I’d told her that it didn’t have to mean the end, that I wasn’t actually getting back together with Tara, just cohabitating with her. But as I’d watched her body being overtaken by wracking sobs, I knew I hadn’t been fair to Rebel.

  I couldn’t keep stringing her along with promises that things would be better some day. It was selfish of me to hope that she’d wait around until I was able to help Tara become the mother she needed to be. Rebel deserved to be happy, too, and I knew she’d never move on if she didn’t get the closure she needed.

  So I hadn’t repeated the bit about staying separated from Tara and had just let Rebel assume the worst. And the days since had been some of the worst of my life.

  Tara had moved into the servant’s suite, putting her place up for sale. She was giving it her all just as she’d said she would. And she was about to have her first session with the therapist I’d set her up with. And we were set up with another counselor to start our family therapy on the first of the year. Things were in place to help us become a stronger family unit for Eli. But nothing we’d done so far had me feeling like we were any closer to becoming the family we all wanted to be.

  Something was missing. And I knew that something was the love Rebel had brought to Eli and I. Tara just didn’t have the natural knack for making people feel loved that Rebel had. Not that Tara tried too hard to make anyone feel great.

  In fact, I’d almost go so far as to say that Tara had the exact opposite effect on people. She’d come into our home and turned our world upside down. Eli had a new bedtime—eight 0’clock sharp. And Tara stayed firm with the no drinking after five each evening. She acted as if Eli hadn’t gotten over his bedwetting stage, no matter how many times he and I had told her. Even the maid who took care of his linens told Tara he hadn’t had an accident in two years.


  I thought it was kind of funny that Eli’s bedwetting had stopped almost immediately after Tara had moved out. I never pointed that out to her, though. And any time I tried to fight her on her new rules, she’d just start up with the dramatics, and I didn’t have the energy to put up with that. Not when I was spending so much energy trying to heal my broken heart.

  And with Tara back, all the reasons I’d never been able to give my heart to my wife came flying back to my mind.

  Tara didn’t try to get anyone to love her. She was who she was, take her or leave her—there was no room for compromise. And I preferred the latter. But Eli was happy that she was back.

  Catching him in the hallway as we were both going down to breakfast, I saw a smile on his lips. “You’re looking pretty happy today, Little Buddy.”

  Nodding, he skipped ahead of me. “It just makes me happy to know that Mom’s in the breakfast room, and I get to see her each morning before I go to school.”

  And that was the reason I was doing any of this. I knew if this was to work, I had to start communicating with Tara about how I wanted things done in my home. Not that I’d call it mine, because I wanted her to think of it as hers, too. But the fact was, she’d come in and taken over, and neither Eli nor I were happy about the changes she’d made.

  Patting Eli on the back, I let him in on my plan, “I’m glad you like having your mom here. But I think it’s time I dealt with these crazy new rules she’s come up with.”

  “Good.” He hopped down the stairs. “The no-drinking-after-five and the no-swimming-before-bed need to go, Dad. And I think the homework-done-as-soon-as-I-get-home should go, too.”

  “Now that one, I agree with.” It was a lot better having Eli get his homework done right away than it had been for me to get home and have to help him with it.

  “Aw, man,” he whined.

  Walking into the breakfast room, we saw Tara sitting at the table with her iPad. She tore her gaze away, looking up at us. “Good morning, boys.”