Never Stop Falling

by Ashley Drew

  She shakes her head from side to side. “I don’t want to leave things like this between us.”

  “Like what?” I ask, shrugging my shoulders.

  “Bitter. Angry. Resentful. This isn’t who we are. This isn’t who you are, Nick.”

  “You’ve been gone a long time. How would you know? Perhaps we don’t really know each other at all anymore. Maybe we never did.”

  I can tell my words sting when her jaw drops slightly, but she’s too smart to believe it.

  “You’re lying. I know you don’t believe that,” she asserts as she walks in my direction and stops in the middle of the kitchen, standing directly under the gleam of the dim lights as the shadows contour her heart-shaped face and hide her eyes. Darkness or not, I can see the fear in them, a thin layer of it glossing over each one.

  “I don’t know, Cori. I mean, the reason why you turned to Cooper all those years ago was because he understood what you were going through, right? Because I didn’t?”

  The only other words worse than Cori possibly telling me she doesn’t love me, are the ones she’d said that night at the lodge—that Cooper understood her. That someone she hadn’t known for more than a few months understood her better than the person who had known her all her life.

  “That’s not fair,” she argues, running a frustrated hand through her tousled hair. “And that’s not what I meant.”

  “Oh, really?” I question as I cross my arms over my chest, turning my frown into a smug grin. “Because it sure as hell sounded that way.”

  “Jesus, Nick! This isn’t you. You’re upset and have every right to be, but please, this isn’t how I want to leave things between us. This isn’t how I want to say goodbye.”

  I scoff. “So, that’s what this is? Goodbye? I always assumed goodbyes came in depressing letters and white envelopes. I guess I should thank you for not leaving one on the front seat of my car this time.”

  “That was low.”

  “No, it really isn’t,” I protest, pointing my index finger at her. “I can give you low, but then I won’t be able to take it back.”

  She runs both of her hands over the sides of her head and tugs her hair at the roots. “Be mad at me, Nick. Be angry. I can live with that. But I can’t live with you hating me. Just please don’t hate me.”

  She catches her breath like she just completed a marathon. She’s worn and wasted. Her eyes, heavy and spent and shaded a pale red, begin to pool with water in the outer corners of her eyes. Ten seconds ago, that would have done it for me. My weak ass would have strode over to her, thrown my arms around her body, and cradled her tightly. But I’m paralyzed. Speechless. Incapacitated by her belief that I could hate her.

  God forbid that after death, the universe decides to be cruel, and brings us back in another life as enemies—even then, I would never hate Cori. My mind would force me to, but my soul? No matter what life I’m in, my soul stays with me, and it could never hate her. It’s not remotely possible, and it kills me that the idea would even cross her mind.

  I push myself off the counter and take slow steps toward her. “Is that what you think, Cori? That I hate you?”

  Her anxiety grows in the way she fidgets as the space separating us closes in.

  “Why wouldn’t you? I hate myself. I figured you do, too.”

  When I reach her and our bodies can’t be any closer, I cradle her face in both my hands, taking a second to breathe in the sight of her; this may be the last time I do. Her cheeks are pink, matching the color of her trembling lips. Mascara is smudged across her eyelids, and if the dark patches beneath her eyes are any indication that she’s lost sleep over the past few days, it doesn’t make her any less stunning.

  “How can you say that?” I ask. With my hands still cradling her cheeks, I bend at my knees, lowering myself so that our eyes are leveled, my lips lined perfectly with hers, and her body tenses when I do. “I love you, Corinne Bennett. I am so desperately in love with you. I’ve always known it. In every photo we took, every embrace, every laugh, every smile—I loved you. In all your stubborn ways and crazy stunts, I loved you. I loved you long before I knew what it felt like to feel your lips on mine, and I loved you even more after I did. I’ve loved you every day you’ve been gone. Even as my heart breaks for you this very second, I love you. I will never stop loving you. So tell me, Cori, how can I hate you when I’ve done nothing but love you?”

  I’ve emptied my heart, pouring every ounce of love out of it, the effects of my admission leaving it hollow, cold. Not only is it an empty heart now, but one covered in endless cracks. A cracked and empty heart. I pity the person who’d even want an attempt at fixing it.

  Cori’s eyelids flutter in sync with her quivering lips, but she remains silent. Her eyes squint, using every effort like a dam of a river bed to hold back her tears, ready to spill out any moment.

  “I know you feel it, too, Cori. You felt it back then, and you feel it now. Your father and I—we’re the reasons why you left in the first place. The two of us are the only ones who could ever break through that hard shell you wear, and that scares the shit out of you. Your dad broke through it that night. And after what happened between us, you knew I’d eventually break through it, too.

  “And I get it. What you and I share, it’s scary. It’s really fucking scary because we could have everything together and lose it all. It’s risky and it terrifies me but I know it’ll be worth it. Because I want you. I want us. It’s been you and me since day one, Cori, and I want it to be you and me for the rest of our lives. Whatever fears you have going into this, we’ll face them together. So please, stop running, and stay with me. Just...be with me.”

  Her mouth pushes into a frown and her lips tremble wildly, and when a single tear finds a way to permeate her reluctance to simply let go, I’m handed a small piece of hope, and clutch it in my fist with all my might. Maybe, just maybe, I’ve gotten through to her.

  “I can’t.”

  And just like that, I open up my hands to find them empty. The hope—gone. Obliterated. Evaporated into nothingness. I back away from her, scolding my stupidities for getting in the way of my integrity, or what I’ve managed to salvage of it.

  She brushes her fingers against her cheek, wiping away the wet remnants of the lone tear, the only one that managed to escape the dam. When I look in her eyes again, they’re empty and dry, like a lake ridden with drought, any sign that water even existed, gone. It’s disturbing.

  My eyes gloss over, and I pinch the bridge of my nose and squeeze my eyes shut. “So, this is it then? This is how we’re going to leave it? You’re going to leave and marry Cooper, and I’m going to end things with Riley and—” I hesitate, “live without you. Again.”

  “Do you have to?”

  I look at her, confused, because of course I have to live without her. She has given me no choice. But then I realize I’ve misconstrued her question. Stupid, pathetic me.

  “You don’t have to, Nick. You don’t have to end things with her. You deserve every happiness. And I know she can give that to you. Please don’t do it for me because I would never ask you to end things with her.”

  She still doesn’t get it. If she thinks my feelings for Riley have only been temporarily compromised because of her, she can’t be more wrong.

  It’s sort of like a recovering alcoholic going without a drink for so many years, only to have his sobriety jeopardized when he comes face-to-face with booze. All it takes is one taste to trigger the memories, to help him remember what he’s been missing, and to make him forget the years he survived without it. If he can simply get past the temptation, he’ll realize that life without it is possible, as the previous years have proved.

  The truth is, I will never be sober; relapses are inevitable. Whether Cori is sitting in the next room or she’s on the other side of the world, my feelings will always be compromised, and I can’t continue to string Riley along knowing my heart is somewhere else.

  “You’ve asked me to do a
lot of things, Cori, but this one is all me. Riley deserves every happiness. More than I can say for myself. And I can’t give her that.”

  “I’m sorry, Nick,” she apologizes as she looks down at her feet. She can’t even make eye contact when she says it.

  I turn away, rest my hands against the edge of the counter, and hang my head low between my shoulders. It’s the photo of a man defeated. Crushed. A loser in the greatest game of his life. And it’s one I want to rip up and never see again for as long as I live.

  My head slumped, I breathe out a tired sigh, the last of my energy exerted through my final, achy breath. “I waited six years for you, Cori. I don’t know if I can do it again. If this is it, don’t expect me to wait for you.”

  Silence ensues, squeezing every last bit of tension out of the room. Cori’s feet shuffle against the silence, the sound of them growing further away, moving toward the threshold of the kitchen.

  “I’m sorry.”

  The quick taps of her shoes echo down the hall, silenced by the loud thud of the door.

  Here it is. The start of tomorrow.

  This is what I wanted—tomorrow. So why do I still wish it was yesterday?

  It’s been over two weeks, and this piece of paper is still as blank as it was when Mateo shoved it in front of me.

  He’s certainly taking his job as my best person very seriously. Perhaps too seriously.

  Because he’s staring down at me in the same way Mr. Blackman would whenever he’d catch us passing notes in sixth grade science. With the glare of his grey eyes, eyebrow cocked, and one arm planted on his hips while the other holds his coffee mug, Mateo doesn’t look pleased, and I’m certain he’s ready to pull out a yellow detention slip from his back pocket.

  “Seriously, Corinne? Two weeks and you still don’t have anything?” he questions, the irritation evident in the slight drop of his scruff-free jaw.

  If anyone has the right to be irritated, it’s me. Mateo rolled out of bed ten minutes ago, and he looks like he’s ready to walk the runway at New York Fashion Week. I’m lucky if I wake up without my hair looking like a freaking bird’s nest.

  But if I’m being honest, my irritation has nothing to do with Mateo and his perfectly dark, side-swept hair, or the glow of his skin, or the oleander tint of his cheeks.

  Okay, maybe it does a tiny bit.

  I bring my eyes back to the pristine white page. “It’s more difficult than you’d think.”

  “Since when has it been difficult for you to put words to paper?” he asks as he takes a seat in the chair next to mine at the dining table. “These are your wedding vows, love. It should be the easiest thing you write in your life.”

  I snap my eyes toward him. “Is it, Mateo?” Papers scatter in all directions when I reach across the table and yank the wedding to-do checklist from the bottom of the stack. “As easy as it is for you to make little check marks on your damn list?” My voice flares as the thud of the page against the hard surface reverberates beneath my hand.

  I quickly regret my catty behavior when I catch a hard swallow move down Mateo’s throat. He’s only trying to help. If it weren’t for him, in fact, half of the checkboxes on this list would probably be check-less.

  “I’m sorry,” I apologize, leaning my elbow on the table and resting my head in my hand. With the other, I pick up the pen and twirl it with my fingers. “You didn’t deserve that. There is just so much to do and so little time. I mean, where the hell does time go? August has come and gone, and it’s like ‘poof!’ I’m getting married next week. I’m overwhelmed and exhausted.”

  The six o’clock involuntary wake-up call catches up to me in the form of a long, breathy yawn. My eyes travel to the stacks of papers and wedding magazines scattered across the table, to the clutter of empty boxes in the middle of our living room. Surprisingly, Mateo hasn’t said anything about the boxes or why I’ve failed to start packing them. His OCD should have kicked in by now, and I sort of wish it had because he’d be saving me the burden of having to pack them myself.

  The warmth of his hand on my forearm pulls my focus back to him. “Okay, doll. Spill it,” he says as he takes a sip of his coffee.

  I stop twirling my pen and shoot Mateo a sidelong glance. “Spill what?” I ask, my voice low and nonchalant.

  “Come on, doll. Don’t you dare shut me out now. Ever since you got back, you haven’t said much about your trip home. You and Daddy Dearest are good now, but you’ve been mopey all week. I get depressed simply looking at you. For the love of God, you’re getting married! You should look like a blushing bride, not Uncle-Fucking-Fester! Those dark circles aren’t very flattering, and I’m only telling you this because I love you to pieces.”

  “Not all of us are as blessed as you are,” I say, placing a kiss on his cheek as I stand from my chair, walk to the living room, and plop myself on the couch.

  Mateo follows with his cup in hand and takes a seat on the opposite end. “Stop avoiding the conversation, love. Plus, you owe me for covering your shifts at the bar for the extra days you were away.”

  I roll my eyes at him for using that as a bargaining chip. “I said thank you. And don’t forget the offer I made, which you stupidly denied.”

  “One week of you doing my laundry, and I’ll need a new wardrobe by the end of it. I’m good.”

  I stick my tongue out at Mateo, allowing a few seconds of New York City silence to stir the air. He slurps his coffee, eyeing me intently, and when the floorboards of our pre-war building begin to creak above us in uneven and erratic beats, he and I both glance upwards. It must mean Mrs. Marchetti opted for Richard Simmons this morning, rather than Sit and Be Fit, and I giggle at the image. Mateo catches me, his smile mirroring my own, but it isn’t long before my funk returns and tugs the upward curl of my lips back down.

  “It’s that friend of yours, isn’t it?” he utters.

  That friend. I hate the sound of those two words as they roll out of Mateo’s mouth because God, he can’t be more wrong. Those two words hardly come close to explaining what Nick means to me. Take every language in the world, and there wouldn’t be enough words to explain this man’s importance in my life.

  To refer to Nick as that friend is the biggest insult I could ever dishonor him with.

  Well, aside from the insult of leaving him after I teased him with my heart, wrapped it up, and dangled it in front of him, only to take it back before he had the chance to open it. If you looked up the definition of Indian Giver, you would find my picture beside it.

  And here I am. With my heart—still wrapped, barely beating, and completely broken.

  Moisture pricks at my eyes, but I fight the urge, breathing steadily until the sting subsides. My legs leave the floor, and I lie across the couch and place my feet on Mateo’s lap. “Foot massage for my thoughts?” I propose, wiggling my toes.

  He places his cup on the coffee table and takes my left foot in his hands. “Girl, you are lucky you have pretty feet,” he teases. “Because I would not be touching these things otherwise.”

  And I do what he has asked; I spill it. All of it. Nicholas Kelley and every last drop of the past couple weeks—our reunion, Riley, the lodge, the almost-sex, the unresolved feelings—leaving it to soak in Mateo’s thoughts, and hoping by some miracle he can help me figure out a way to clean it all up.

  “Good lord! Shall we cue the hourglass credits and the Days of Our Lives theme song now?” he mocks with wide eyes. “I have to say, I am a little envious you have two men vying for your affections. You know, I’m more than happy to take one of them off your hands if you need me to.”

  Ignoring Mateo’s attempt at humor, I groan and press my fingers to my temples. “May I remind you that one of those men is hardly aware he’s vying for anything? I hate myself. I’m a terrible person.”

  “No, love. You are far from terrible. You’re merely in love and confused.” He sets my left foot on his lap and picks up my right. “Do you remember when we met?”

&nbs
p; “How can I forget? I couldn’t stand you,” I remind him with a playful wink.

  “Well, the feeling was mutual. You walked into that bar like you owned the place, strutting around that perky ass of yours, and it was your first day on the job,” Mateo recounts, pausing my foot massage to flip his long, imaginary hair over his shoulder in his best Corinne impression. “You had enough confidence to make your head explode.”

  I nudge his shoulder with my foot, before sitting up on the sofa and curling my legs into my chest. “If we’re going to point out flaws here, you have a bad habit of digressing off topic.”

  “Who said confidence is a flaw? And I haven’t digressed because there is a point to all of this,” Mateo says as he faces me and sits Indian-style. “Look, doll, you are the most confident bitch I know. In everything you do, you own it. I adore that about you. But you’re only human, and it’s okay to be vulnerable. I don’t see that side of you often, but I see it every time you speak of Nicholas. He makes you vulnerable. And that scares you, doesn’t it?”

  With my head hung low, I look at him from beneath my lashes. “I don’t get scared, Mateo,” I murmur, but my response is so pathetic, I’m not so sure I convince myself.

  Now, it’s his turn to roll his eyes. “God, you are a stubborn, stubborn woman,” he groans, shaking his head from side to side. “You are living in denial, and you will never truly be happy if you continue to live that way. The only thing denial does is feed the fear you’ve struggled to starve. So, stop feeding it. It’s not too late to find your happiness. You’re in love with Nicholas, doll. You can’t deny that.”

  I couldn’t even if I tried. I can’t deny my love for Nick any more than I can deny my need to breathe.

  “You don’t need me to figure this out for you. That blank sheet of paper and those empty boxes say it all.”

  I hug my knees and rest the side of my head against them. My eyes follow the streak of morning sun as it trickles through the window and shines like a halo around the empty boxes. It’s strange, considering this side of the apartment faces a courtyard and never gets much light. Perhaps it’s some sort of a heavenly sign? A nudge from the man Himself up there, telling me that I need to hurry up, pack my shit, and move out of here and in with Cooper. Cue the harps and choir because I hear a hallelujah coming.