Then my worst fear jumps to the surface. “The baby? Oh, my God, is the baby okay?”
“Shhh … it’s okay, sweetheart. Just lie back and relax.”
I refuse and do the opposite. I sit straight up and boldly ask, “Drake, is our baby okay?” The look in his eyes is scaring me, but I have to know if I lost our child.
“Yes, the baby is okay. Now please lie back down. You’ve been out for half a day. I was freaking out here.” Drake leans down and kisses my eyes. The pressure of his lips to my skin hurts, but I don’t care, because my baby is fine and so am I.
Worry is masked all over Drake’s face. He wants to tell me something, but I immediately know he is struggling to find the words. The feeling in my stomach transforms from pain to terror as I study his face and attempt to decipher his expression.
“Look, baby, I know how you’re feeling. Delilah and I had a pretty heart-to-heart conversation, and she told me about what you’re planning to do.”
Yep, my intuition has been right. Drake now knows I am not going to stick around here and will be moving to Eden Heights to be with our friends and his family. I don’t want to leave him, though. I want Drake to come with me.
The pain is too much to hold in, and I start to cry. I know what his answer is going to be, and I’m not sure my heart will be able to take the blow.
“Please,” I beg. I need him to understand that it will be okay. Together, we will be okay, and Presley is always with him. “I can’t do this without you.”
The tears are freefalling from my eyes, and I allow myself to be weak. I never used to let people in, because I wanted to keep my strong front; however, all of that is long gone. I know I’m flawed on the inside, and I’m aware Drake knows that I am. I just need him to see he can be happy no matter where he is.
“Baby, please don’t cry.” While he cradles me in his arms, it feels like I’m holding onto him for the last time.
I take a moment to log everything I love about Drake to memory: I love his smile, his heart, the way he is with Mia, his compassion, his eyes, his body, his soul. I press my face into the crook of his neck and take in his smell. It’s a captivating smell only he can create—the clean smell of soap married with the masculine scent of his skin. It’s unmistakably Drake.
Drake pulls my face away from his neck and palms my cheeks between his hands. He simply smiles and whispers, “I’ve been doing some thinking, well a lot of thinking, and I came to a long awaited conclusion. Delilah and I had a pretty intense conversation when we were waiting for you to wake up. I know what you want. However, I also know what you’re asking me to do. It seems nearly impossible to break myself away from this place. I have one very important piece that will always keep me tied here. But I may know what I can do to put you at ease. Zoe, will you marry me?”
My gut falls to the floor as I am overwhelmed with all the emotions of this very moment. I am happy, extraordinarily happy. I want to marry Drake more than I want to breathe, but I will not marry him only to stay in Sulfur Heights. If that is what he’s asking me to do then I will have to break his heart, and mine for that matter.
Before I can give him an answer, I need to know why he really wants to marry me.
“Drake …” I take a deep breath, preparing once again for his exit from my life. “I love you. I love you so much I feel like I’m drowning in you. But I will not marry you only to stay in Sulfur Heights. If you talked to Delilah, you know what I’m going to say next. I want more than anything to raise this baby with you, but I will not do it living here. I’m sorry. I know you have your reasons for staying, but I will not let my child grow up here.”
“Me, either,” he replies, trying to choke back a laugh.
My eyes widen and the smile, as painful as it is to give, illuminates my face. I sit up in bed and wrap my arms around his neck. The tears are flowing again, but they are tears of happiness.
“Baby, I’m sorry. I loved her, I know you understand that, and it’s hard to shed the guilt over her death. But, Delilah reminded me there are three very important reasons I need to separate myself from the guilt. She reminded me I have people in this life whom I love and deserve my love in return. It won’t be easy, but I’m ready to get rid of the guilt. I’m ready to fully move on. But I do have one more question.
“What?” I whisper back.
”You’ll marry me, then?”
I nod my head and squeak out at the same time, “Yes. Yes, I will marry you.”
I pull the garage doors down on the repair bays and lock up the shop for the night. The day has gone by really slow, and I have been looking forward to closing this place down for the last three hours.
My replacement for Jeremy is okay. He knows his shit yet is way too serious. Randy only works on the cars and goes home. That’s it. And when there is some down time, he just sits there and looks at his phone. I’m not used to that. I have always had someone I enjoyed working with, even before Jeremy. However, no one is a replacement for my brother.
Things around here have not been the same. I am trying to make myself understand why he had to leave, knowing that, if I were in his situation, I probably would have done the same thing. Like I said, it’s just not the same.
Although I started out on my own, this shop has been our idea since we were teenagers. We spent hours hanging out in the garage, talking about our shop, the cars we would service, and thinking how rich we would be once it was open. Man, we were so certain we would make a million fucking dollars in the first week.
We were such fucking idiots, but that’s what was so great about the dream we had. It was something we did together, and for five years, we made that dream come true. However, now it doesn’t have the same glory it used to. Now that he’s gone, I feel like I’m only here because I have to be. I used to love this place, but like everything else happening in my life, I simply can’t find the desire to love it anymore.
I walk to the office and pull out the blanket and pillow from under the desk. This has been my home for quite some time now. Delilah and I are in the very opposite place from where we started. I used to be completely enraptured in everything she did. She captivated me with every word spoken, blink of her sapphire eyes, and the slightest touch of her body. But now that’s all gone. I can’t stand to be at the house when she’s there, because it will lead me to getting cussed at, her crying, or me getting extremely pissed off.
We really don’t have anything good anymore. I’m not sure how we lost it along the way, either. It was never like that before. We couldn’t look at each other without sharing a kiss or stripping naked. We were head-over-heels for one another. It’s just not that way anymore. She’s unhappy. I’m unhappy. And I have determined that maybe it’s not worth the trouble any longer. Maybe none of this is worth the trouble anymore.
I open up the cabinet and pull the only comfort I have had lately from its depths. The glass bottle of liquor has not let me down in my time of need, and it’s been needed a lot lately.
Everyone is up and leaving or pissed off at me. Shit, the only people I make smile nowadays are my kids. It doesn’t matter what I say or do, they are always willing to give me a smile. The very sight of their faces or the sound of their laughter reassures me as to why I’m still working as hard as I do. I may be a fuck up with my other relationships, but I will never let my kids down. I will always do right by them. Yet, when Delilah and I got really bad she thought it was best for the kids to have me live at the shop. I hated it at first. I felt like I was being kicked out of my family. However, I realized it wasn’t fair for them to hear the hateful words we say to one another or see us fighting any longer. It was the hardest thing I have ever done, but I couldn’t watch their sad eyes take in the anger anymore.
I unscrew the cap and guzzle down the whiskey. Almost every single night I close up shop and drink myself to sleep. My life is incredibly boring and miserable. Now that my brothers are gone, I feel like I have no one. I can’t stand anyone who lives in this town, and
going down to The Slab only pisses me off. It reminds me of the times I would pick up a chick and fuck her in the backroom. Women upon women, night after night, I fucked them hard and moved on. I can’t go back down that road. Even though Delilah and I are not living together anymore, it feels wrong to be with someone else.
We haven’t exactly had a conversation about splitting up. We stay at separate places, but nothing has been made official. In all honesty, I don’t know why. Maybe it’s because I still love her, but I’m not sure love is enough to fix us. Perhaps we were together to create our children, because they are impossibly cute, and now it’s time we move on.
I know I’m not perfect, and I will agree with people saying I am hard to get along with. But she’s not perfect, either. My entire family looks at Delilah like she’s a saint, all because she managed to fall in love with me. I should be offended by that. Am I that impossible to love? According to them, my dead parents, and any other encounter I have had in my life, I must be. Now, I’m not sure even she loves me. My kids are all I have now—no family, no friends, no Delilah.
As the pain rips its way up through my body and settles on my chest, I do what I do every night. I take a long pull from the cold, glass bottle and allow the whiskey to extinguish the pain before it’s all I can feel. Relief will soon come.
I take one more long drink, begging with every swallow for my mind to fall into a whiskey- soaked oblivion.
I managed to cook a meal and entertain my guest with limited interruption tonight. My children were surprisingly distracted by something else, which allowed me to make spaghetti and garlic bread and chat with Zoe. I was surprised to see her at my door, considering the only person who knocks is the father of my children. Jake and I may have our differences, but one thing I will never deny him is spending time with his children.
Usually on the weekends, he will come over to play with them. I always leave so they can have his undivided attention and to escape the pain that’s been living in my heart for months now. However, moments like this, when he’s standing drunk in my kitchen, remind me why his moving out was needed. It’s been a while since he came over wasted, and shooing Zoe out was probably the best course of action.
The air is pungent. Whiskey is wafting off his body as he stands in the doorway of the kitchen. Moments like this make me loathe him. Do I love Jake? I ask that question all the time. I think I really love him, but nights like this along with the vile words he says when he’s in this state of mind are enough to make me despise him.
He has always had a drink or two when he got home from work, and it never really bothered me, because he controlled himself. However, slowly he started to consume a little more and then the real asshole started to come out more frequently. He claims that he’s the same man he was when we met, but that’s not true. Maybe at first he drank a lot, but after Presley died, Jake barely drank around me. It was never in this manner, and it certainly wasn’t around our children. Yet now, this is the only version of Daddy they remember living with—the drunk, obnoxious ass who can barely speak back to them.
He says nothing to Zoe as she leaves the house. Drake still wants nothing to do with him after the horrible things he said to him and Darcie. And I don’t blame him. He called people he loves a stray, not recognizing them as the family they are. I know he didn’t mean it, and I think Darcie and Drake do, too; however, they’re not going to tolerate his crude behavior. Jake is fantastic at lashing out on those he loves when he’s hurting or pissed, but he’s used to them sweeping it under the rug. I should know; I’ve been doing it with them for years.
Jake stumbles on his feet and grabs the corner of the counter to prevent himself from toppling over.
“What are you doing here?” I ask.
While Jake lets go of the counter and inches his way deeper into the room, I straighten my spine and stand my ground. I refuse to give in to anything he wants, and with that look on his face, there can only be one reason he has showed up here tonight.
“Cupcake, you miss me?” His words are slurred, and his beautiful brown eyes are glossed and bloodshot.
“Jake, you’re drunk. If you want to talk, come over in the morning. Otherwise …”
Just as I’m trying to kick him out, Jake stumbles forward and trips over his own feet. He falls to the floor with a loud thud, knocking kitchen chairs over in the process.
I release a sigh and kneel down next to him on the floor. Remnants of our spaghetti dinner still lie under Quinn’s chair. Jake takes notice by picking up a noodle from the floor and examining it like it’s the strangest thing he has ever seen. I take the food from his fingers and throw it in the trash.
This is probably the drunkest I have seen him in a long time. Normally, he can keep his feet planted on the floor, but Jake is so wasted he can’t even do that.
When I turn around, he has rolled over to his back and begun to fall asleep. Knowing he can’t drive home, I move from the kitchen and pull blankets from the linen closet. I make a pallet on the couch then walk back to the kitchen. He’s snoring and making gargling noises deep in this throat. God, I hope he doesn’t puke. There’s something about cleaning up a grown man’s vomit that sends me over the toilet bowl, too.
I stand over him, putting my feet on either side of his hips, and tap on his cheek. “Jake!” The snoring momentarily stops yet resumes as soon as he swallows. “Jake!” I shout as I tap his face harder. Nothing. Then I decide to try something else.
I move to the cupboard and pull a cup from the shelf. I turn on the faucet and fill the glass with cold water. Then I move back to Jake’s passed out body and stand over him again. I don’t want to dump the water on him, because that might really piss him off, so much so he will attempt to drive. As a result, I dip my fingers in the cool water and sprinkle it onto his face.
Jake jerks slightly, cracks his eyes open, and then quickly resumes his sleeping. Damn it! I decide to risk it and tip the cup completely over. The water splashes onto his face and startles him awake. When he jerks his body up, knocking me on top of him, my heart collapses. I haven’t lain with Jake like this in so long. I miss it more than anything. If we have anything positive, it’s the physical part of our relationship. I only need to touch him to be weak in the knees. And now, I’m straddling him, my body aching for the contact.
“Why the fuck am I all wet? And why the hell are you lying on top of me?” Jake whispers, the smell of booze on his hot breath.
“You passed out on the kitchen floor, and I was trying to wake you enough to move you to the couch. I don’t think you should drive in your condition. When you woke up, you knocked me over. That’s why I’m lying on you.”
Our faces are so close together, every feature I love about him looking back at me. His soft, full lips tilt to the side as he gives me his trademark smirk, once again making me ache with need.
“As much as I love your body on mine, you’ve got to get up. I’m not feeling so hot.” As quickly as possible, I stand up and extend my hand to help him off the floor. Jake puts his palms in mine, and my little five-foot-two-inch frame leans back slightly and pulls his six-foot body from the floor.
His legs wobble a bit; however, I manage to successfully get Jake to his feet. As he comes to my side, placing his forearm over my shoulder, I grab onto his hand and wrap my arm around his waist. My body tingles when I grasp his side, knowing how firm and perfect his body is underneath his clothes.
We move through the kitchen, making our way into the living room where Jake flops down on the couch and tips his head back, resting it on the back of the couch. I bend down and pull off his shoes.
“Do you want some Advil or water?” I ask, knowing he will be feeling like crap in the morning.
“Yes, please,” he moans more than he says.
I head down the hall to get him the pills. When I come back, Jake has managed to remove his shirt. Again, I get distracted when I look at him. The ink covering his chest dances with every breath he takes, the pin-up girl wit
h my face perpetually staring back at me. My fingers itch to trace every line drawn onto his body, but my heart breaks knowing this may not be something I can have in the future. If he doesn’t get himself together and treat me with a little respect soon, I will leave him for good. I will not put my kids through this, and I sure as hell won’t put myself through it.
I reach down and tap his shoulder, “Jake, here’s your medicine.”
His eyes crack open, and he smiles sadly. “Thanks, cupcake.” He swallows the pills and guzzles down the water before settling down on the couch, passing back out.
I take a minute to study him again out of memory, not desire. I don’t want to lose him, yet I can’t tolerate his antics any longer. Regardless, my gut is telling me he won’t come to the realization easily. He won’t know what he truly has until it’s gone. Even then, I’m not sure he will.
I lean down and kiss his temple. “Come back to us, Jake. Come back, please.” I pull the blanket over his body and kiss him one more time.
As I walk from the living room, I can feel the emptiness of loss coating my insides, fueling the hurt. I know in this moment I love him unconditionally because, if I didn’t, I wouldn’t feel my heart obliterating inside my chest.
***
I feel warm, too warm. It’s a necessity to get the blankets off my body immediately. I attempt to kick my leg out from the comforter, but my body is practically weighted down. I stir awake and look down at the colored arm holding onto me. Just like he did when we first met, Jake has made his way to my bed and is holding my back to his chest.
I rub the sleep out of my eyes and savor this feeling. It’s been forever since I felt his arms holding me, and all the pain I have borne over the past few months pricks from my eyes. I miss him. I miss us. I miss his smile, his laugh, his love, and the way he would look at me like no other woman could compare.
He is a wonderful man underneath all his brooding and antics, but Jake is stubborn enough to hang onto his pride over anything. Case in point, the night I came back to him when I left Emerson at the altar. He admitted later that he had wanted to drive to Memphis that night yet had decided against it. And I know that, when the time comes for me to leave, Jake won’t follow. He will stand his ground because he is always too proud to admit when he’s wrong, and he really needs all of us in his life.
Everlasting Love Page 15