Chapter Sixteen
I opened my eyes and squinted against the low rays of early morning light streaming in through the slatted blinds in the otherwise darkened room. I squeezed my eyes shut and pressed the heel of my hand into my left one in defense of the sharp, stabbing pain that felt as if it were splitting my head in two.
I tried to sit up but the room spun and pinned me back down. Blinking, I tried to orient myself. Memories of last night flooded in and swept over me in waves of nausea and shame—the kitchen counter, the bedroom floor.
Oh my God came as a cry from deep within my soul.
Heat blistered my skin, his bare chest scorching my back where we touched, his arm slung over my waist. Deep, heavy breaths sounded against my ear and spread out over my face, his pulse a steady thrum.
Oh my God. I pressed my hand to my mouth to stifle a cry.
I tried to untangle myself from his grip without waking him. I froze when he tightened his hold. Unintelligible mutterings spilled from his mouth, and I held my breath as I slipped from his grasp and stood from the bed. I held my head in my hands to combat another rush of dizziness.
Christian groaned and mumbled, rolled to his stomach, and buried his head in my pillow. The sheet covered him to his waist, dipping to reveal the edge of his black boxer briefs and exposing the defined contours of his broad shoulders that tapered to his narrow back.
Oh my God.
With weak knees, I steadied myself with my arm against the wall. I looked down at myself in disgust, unable to remember how I’d ended up in a tank top and underwear, unable to remember how I’d made it into my bed.
How could I have allowed this happen, allowed him to treat me this way? I should have known he was just the same and that he would never change.
In my shame, I stumbled to the bathroom, shaking as I wrapped my trembling body in a black robe that covered my legs to my knees. I knotted the belt and then clung to the bathroom doorway as I stared back out at the beautiful man sleeping in my bed.
I felt my heart break again.
Why? Why did he have to ruin everything? I’d seen this coming like a storm churning out in the middle of the sea, only days until landfall. He’d turned us upside down, smiled with dishonest intentions, pushed until I’d fallen over the edge, waiting to strike until I trusted again.
I’d known all along where that trust would lead, that he’d laugh in my face as he threw it away.
Was it all just a game?
I looked over at the spot where he’d treated me like trash, where he’d fucked me on my bedroom floor. Like garbage to be tossed aside, he’d spilled into me without a second thought.
Just like years before. We’d been out at a college bar, drank until we’d staggered back to his apartment laughing, kissing, reckless. We hadn’t even thought about what we’d forgotten until it was over. Christian had shrugged it off as if it was nothing, and I’d pushed it to the back of mind until I could ignore it no longer.
He’d leave me, just like he had before.
And once again, I’d be alone.
I’d trusted him implicitly right up until the moment he’d driven me away, and I knew I could expect nothing different this time.
Forcing myself down the hall, I slid my palm across the wall for support. I closed Lizzie’s door with a soft click and felt something splintering inside as old wounds ripped wide open. I could barely stand under the deluge of memories, the burden I’d carried, every internal injury meted out at Christian’s will.
Everything spun as I clutched the railing and slowly took each step downstairs. My head throbbed with the pulsing and pounding of blood in my ears. It turned my stomach and soured my mouth.
I raced across the family room and purged my guilt and hangover into the downstairs toilet as I berated myself for being such a fool to have given in.
I shouldn’t have expected anything different or anything better.
On unsteady feet, I stood and held onto the basin as I splashed cold water on my face and rinsed my mouth. I tied my matted, tangled hair back with a band before I hunted through the medicine cabinet for a bottle of ibuprofen. Shaking, I placed four tablets in my mouth and cupped my hands under the running faucet to chase them down.
Tears stung my eyes as I looked back up into the mirror and wiped my mouth with a towel, unsure if I’d survive this time.
I lumbered out and was met with the remnants of the night before—two empty wine bottles, two glasses left half full, Christian’s shirt discarded on the floor.
Bending down, I picked the shirt up and closed my eyes as I pressed it to my mouth, to my nose, inhaling the sweet of the man who would never stop breaking my heart.
I stiffened when I felt his presence, and then heard the heavy release of air that sounded something like relief from across the room. His movements were subdued as he moved across the kitchen floor.
I flinched when he wrapped his arms around me from behind, buried his nose in my neck, and whispered, “Good morning.” It felt like a caress on my skin.
I whimpered, my mouth trembling as I made a decision before it was much, much too late, forcing out a barely audible, “Don’t touch me.” The old pain was fresh, tormenting my weakness, insulting the mistake I’d made in allowing him into my home and back into my life, mocking how easily I’d handed over my heart.
He stiffened but didn’t back away. I felt him shake, swallow, understand. “Please, Elizabeth, don’t do this.”
My hair brushed across his bare chest as I slowly shook my head. For the briefest moment, my desire confused my resolve, the continuous fire that roiled between us, a reminder of just how badly this was going to hurt.
But I would be strong enough to end this now before he completely destroyed Lizzie and me, while Lizzie still had a chance to recover. In time she would heal, though I knew I would not. No amount of time could undo the devastation I felt as I turned on him and wrenched myself from his grip, spitting the words as I inched back toward him and slammed his shirt against his chest. “I want you out of my house . . . out of our lives.”
He seemed to sway, to lose his balance. His face contorted in agony as he first looked at the wadded up shirt fisted in his hand and then back at me. Is that what I’d looked like when he’d cast me aside? Is that what the shock of heartbreak looked like? Could he ever feel the way he had made me feel? Could he ever understand?
His expression shifted and set in determination as he clenched his jaw. “No.” He shook his head. “I’m not going anywhere, Elizabeth.”
I closed my eyes, refusing to see the commitment on his face as I forced out the words. “Get out.”
I opened my eyes, dragging to the forefront the memories of what he had done. I remembered the callused expression on his face when he’d told me to choose him or my daughter. I remembered how it had felt to be alone, sick, and scared. Remembered what it felt like to fight for my child’s life.
I’d given up my goals, not because of my daughter, but because he had been too much of a coward to stand up for what was right, because he had refused to take responsibility for his family. I clung to long suppressed secrets of shame. I’d hidden from my family just how bad off Lizzie and I had gotten. When I’d already asked my family for far too much, I’d gone hungry because I couldn’t afford to feed both of us. The time Lizzie and I had been evicted from our small apartment and I’d driven through the night, feeling too ashamed to tell my mother and Matthew that I’d failed again, and I’d still ended up at Matthew’s house at four in the morning. It was then that Matthew and Natalie had taken us in to live with them. I held fast to the memories of their sacrifice—a sacrifice Christian hadn’t been man enough to make.
I stalked forward, backed him into the next room, and let everything boil over. “Get out!”
This time he pled, reached for me, and attempted to restrain me in his arms. “No, Elizabeth. I won’t leave you, not this time. I love you . . . oh my God, please don’t do this.”
I fought against him and twisted out of his grip, refusing to allow him to convince me of anything different than what he’d shown me the night before—remembered the five-minute exchange on my bedroom floor where he’d reminded me just how little I actually meant to him and let that anger bleed free.
“I hate you.”
He jumped back, releasing me as if he’d been stung.
I didn’t stop, but spewed my anger. “How dare you come in here and turn my life upside down . . . lead me on . . . make me believe you’d changed. I trusted you, and the second I was vulnerable, you took advantage of it!”
His eyes were wide with shock when they flew up to meet the tortured fury in my own. “What?” he demanded in a low voice as he took two steps forward. “Is that what you think last night was?” His eyes narrowed, and I cowered as he took another step that had me backed against the wall. “Don’t you dare stand there and act like you didn’t want it every bit as much as I wanted it, Elizabeth . . . pretend that this…”—he gestured wildly between us—“wasn’t already happening. Yeah, things got a little out of control last night, but it doesn’t change anything.”
He was right. Nothing had changed. He was just the same. He would promise his heart until it no longer suited him. He would take what he wanted and toss aside what he didn’t.
He will never stay.
Defeated, I slid down the wall and buried my head in my hands, unable to stop the rush of emotion. He will never stay. I felt myself breaking apart as tears poured unchecked down my face and the reality of my foolishness sank in and became real. I whispered again, “I hate you.”
Christian leaned down, his nose nearly touching mine, his voice fire. “You’re a liar.” He glared down at me with heartbroken rage and pointed up toward Lizzie’s room. “I love you, Elizabeth, but you need to know . . . I will fight for her.”
Squeezing my eyes shut, I put back up the walls he had torn down, wouldn’t listen to what he said. I lost myself in self-pity, in my mistakes, in his betrayal. In my mind, I saw him as the selfish boy who had ripped me apart.
He will never stay.
My tortured cries did nothing to drown out the echo of Christian’s feet as he walked away, taking with him the last piece of my heart. The front door grated on its hinges as it opened, taunted, He’s leaving you.
I couldn’t have imagined anything could have hurt worse than what had just transpired, that there could be anything more painful than cutting Christian from my life.
But I should have known better, known that it would only compound.
I fought for resolve, for a way to stay strong when Lizzie suddenly appeared on the stairs, panic in the clamor of her feet and in the flood of hysteria from her mouth.
“No! Daddy, don’t go!”
Christian turned in the doorway as if in slow motion. All color drained from his face as he dropped to his knees to catch Lizzie in his arms. She clung to his neck and cried again, barely coherent as she begged, “Don’t leave me, Daddy! Please don’t leave me!”
The nausea from before made a resurgence as I lay limply against the wall, disconnected, and watched my daughter fall apart while Christian tried to hold her together.
He rocked her, whispered against her head, and promised, “It’ll be okay. It’ll be okay.”
He pulled back, faked a smile. “I’ll come back, sweetheart. It might take a little while, but I promise I’ll come back.”
Lizzie held him tighter. “Please stay with me, Daddy.”
He choked over her plea and hugged her to his chest. Over her shoulder, he begged me with his eyes.
I looked away.
He will never stay.
I had to end it now for her sake—and mine.
“I can’t right now, princess. Mommy and Daddy just need a little time apart.” His eyes flitted over her face as he tucked a piece of hair behind her ear. “Try not to be sad and just remember that, no matter what, Daddy loves you.”
Then he stood and walked out the door.
With the click of the latch, a sob erupted from Lizzie, and she rushed to the window. She pressed her face against the glass, her voice small and broken. “Daddy.” It escalated with each breath as she repeatedly called for him, “Daddy . . . Daddy . . . Daddy!”
When he backed his car from the driveway and his tires squealed on the road, she slid to the floor where her cries became muddled and distorted, an echo of my own heartbreak sounding out from my baby girl who rocked herself in a ball on the floor.
For a fleeting moment, I thought I might die, that my heart would falter in my chest, seize as the ultimate punishment for what I had done.
I’d broken the two people I loved the most. I’d destroyed my daughter, destroyed Christian, had ruined what I knew Christian and I could have had—what I knew somewhere beneath the fear that we had already built—broke my own heart.
Christian was right. I didn’t hate him. I hated myself.
~
Lizzie stared at the untouched plate of food in front of her. She hadn’t said a word the entire day, but had lain on the floor for uncountable minutes or hours as I’d done the same, unresponsive from the impact. Some time during the day, she’d moved to her room and had shut the door and shut me out. I’d given her space because I’d needed it too. I had called her downstairs when I’d realized the sun had set more than an hour ago and she hadn’t eaten all day.
“Lizzie, baby, you need to eat,” I said, my voice cracking from the hoarseness of my voice, and pushed her plate closer to her. Please.
My request was met with silence, no reaction, as if I hadn’t spoken at all.
I turned away to hide the tears that gathered in my eyes. I blinked and they fell. I wiped them with the back of my hand.
My cell phone rang from inside my purse on the kitchen counter.
I closed my eyes, but not before they had instinctively sought out the clock on the wall.
Seven fifteen.
~
The night was long and lonely, filled with restlessness—too many thoughts and too much hurt. Christian chased me down in my dreams, haunted, hunted, woke me as he shook me and demanded to know why.
I’d left Lizzie’s door wide open, hoping she’d call out for me, need me. Instead, the same quiet distress as my own had seeped from her room. She’d tossed and turned, whimpering through her burdened sleep. In the early morning, I found her awake, sitting up in bed glassy-eyed and staring at nothing while she rocked the doll Christian had given her in her arms.
I called in to work, barely able to form a coherent sentence as I told Anita I wasn’t feeling well. She laughed and teased that I must have had too much fun on Saturday night to still be suffering the effects on Monday morning. I mumbled a weak, “Something like that,” before I hung up the phone and hung my head, having no idea how to deal with what I felt inside.
My gut twisted in guilt when I dropped my daughter at school, still mute, her face expressionless—numb.
But I left her anyway because I couldn’t stand to stay to face what I’d done.
Our beach was nearly deserted on a Monday morning in November. I sat at the edge of the water with my arms wrapped around my knees. The wind stung my face as it licked at my tears. I clutched my phone as it buzzed, the wind and waves drowning out the sounds erupting from my throat as I wept when his name lit up the screen again and again.
I pulled up in front of Matthew and Natalie’s house at five. The door opened a second later and Matthew stepped out. Pressure seemed to drain from him when he saw me, before it changed and the corners of his eyes creased in worry masked with anger. He met me halfway down the walkway, demanding to know what was wrong with Lizzie, why she wouldn’t speak, and why I hadn’t returned their calls all afternoon.
I stared at him and whispered, “Christian’s gone.” I felt another piece of myself wedge itself free when I admitted it aloud.
Christian is gone—because of me.
I closed my eyes. No, Christian did this, I thought, unconsciously clenching a fist as I tried to stand up under the guilt eating me from the inside out.
“What?” Matthew stepped forward and put his hands on my shoulders. He shook me lightly, forcing me to look at him. “What are you talking about, Elizabeth?”
“He’s gone,” I said again, felt myself sway. Matthew caught my waist, held me up, and helped me inside.
I sat silently on their couch all evening, huddled under a blanket. I couldn’t speak, couldn’t explain. Matthew left the house in a whirlwind of indignation and returned two hours later, weary. He took his ball cap from his head and ran his hand over his face and through his short hair as he looked down upon me in both compassion and disappointment.
I turned away, knew where he’d been.
Natalie took his hand and led him down the hall. From their bedroom came hushed voices as they whispered my secrets. I hid my head under the blanket and covered my ears like a four year old child. I didn’t want to hear, to know what he’d said, the excuses he’d made, to listen to the part that I knew was my fault.
Still Lizzie wouldn’t speak, wouldn’t eat. She sat at the opposite end of the couch, clinging to the neck of her doll, and cried in her sleep.
~
They say cowards run in the face of danger or pain.
I supposed that’s what I was, what I’d become, too fearful to love, too fearful to be loved, too afraid to live—so I ran.
The week passed in a blur of darkness worse than I had ever known. I’d tried to go back to work on Tuesday. Anita had sent me home. She said to come back when I’d resolved whatever it was I was dealing with.
I spent long days at the beach lost in guilt, anger, and remorse, and I spent the even longer nights torturing myself with his messages. Like a masochist, I pressed his broken voice to my ear and listened to him again and again.
Sometimes he begged me to call him and said he didn’t understand what he had done, but he was sorry for whatever it was. He told me too many times that he loved me.
As time went on, the messages became filled with anger and accusations, demanding to know how I could do this to him, do this to our daughter. He implored with me that if I wouldn’t allow him to speak to Lizzie, then to at least have the decency to tell her how much he loved and missed her, that he was thinking of her every second of every day. Other messages were filled with silence, though the pain of his presence was thick enough to speak for him.
Each day, I stood aside and watched my little girl suffer, the one person I was supposed to love the most, the one I was to protect and care for. I told myself that I was doing this to protect her, and then had to ask myself when I’d become such a selfish liar. She had withdrawn inside herself. She still wouldn’t speak and could barely eat—didn’t cry except in her restless sleep. Her eyes were sunken, their sweet intensity deadened, her vibrant spirit snuffed out and trampled under. Her teacher had called full of concern, saying Lizzie wasn’t acting like herself, and that she was worried.
I’d given her some pathetic excuse that we’d just had a hard week and promised that Lizzie would be fine.
Friday I pulled up to Matthew and Natalie’s house at five just as I had every day of the week. Sitting in the car at their curb, I tried to compose myself and pull myself together. I felt cold, chilled to the bone from the day spent with my feet submerged in the cold autumn water of the Pacific Ocean. I closed my eyes and held the steering wheel, willing away the sickness in my stomach, the ache in my heart, the fog clouding my mind, but there was nothing that could chase them away.
Sensing movement, I looked up to see Matthew had emerged from the house with Lizzie in his arms. Her face was buried in his neck, and he held her protectively while he glared over her shoulder at me. He’d attempted to talk to me all week, but each time I had shut him down. I told him I didn’t want to talk about it—I already knew what he would say.
I rose from the car to meet them, but Matthew pushed by me, gently placed Lizzie into the backseat of my car, and buckled her into her booster seat. He kissed her head and told her he loved her. She said nothing, stared ahead with vacant eyes. He paused for a moment and then placed his palm on her forehead as if he were checking for a fever. He mumbled something before he stood and shut her door. For a moment, he stared at me. His expression told me everything I needed to know. He was furious with me—blamed me.
I straightened my shoulders and lifted my chin defensively.
He shook his head at my reaction and started up his sidewalk without a parting word. Halfway to his door, he paused and shifted, before he turned around with his eyes narrowed.
“Don’t you think you’ve let this go on long enough, Elizabeth?”
I shook my head and scrunched my brow, pretending I didn’t know exactly what he was talking about.
Matthew scrubbed his face, agitated as he forced the air from his lungs. It was as if he had to regain control before he could even look at me.
“You have to put an end to this, Elizabeth.” He pointed at Lizzie sitting in the back of the car. “She’s miserable.” He punctuated both words with an angry jab of his finger, though they sounded sad and desperate.
“You don’t even know what happened . . . what he did to me!”
He laughed in an almost incredulous way. Coming from Matthew’s mouth, it still sounded a lot like sympathy. “What? You two slept together? Did you really not see it coming, Elizabeth? Because the rest of us sure as hell did.” His voice softened and he took a step forward. “I get it, Liz . . . why you’re upset. The timing was wrong and he should’ve waited . . . he knows he should have . . . but you know as well as I do it was going to happen, and it’s not right to make Lizzie pay for it.”
I flinched and stepped back against my car, both embarrassed that Christian had told him outright and confused that it hadn’t angered Matthew.
My throat constricted as I, once again, used my daughter as a way to justify my fear. “He’s just going to end up hurting Lizzie.”
Matthew snorted in disbelief and took another step forward, lowering his head to look me in the eye. “I think it’s about time you questioned just who you’re protecting, because it sure as hell isn’t that little girl.”
“I thought you were on my side.” Tears welled in my eyes, hurt because I’d believed Matthew would always stand by me, but more so because I knew he was right.
He glanced at the ground, then back at me, and took the last step to bring us face-to-face. His words were intense as if he wanted to shake me to make me understand. “I am on your side. All I’ve ever wanted was what’s best for you and Lizzie, and if you’d stop being so goddamned scared for once in your life, you’d see that it’s Christian!”
With that, I broke. The tears flowed and I fell into Matthew’s arms. He held me up just as he always had. He rocked me and shushed me as he told me, “It’ll be okay, sweetheart.” He ran his hand through my tangled hair and whispered again, “It’ll be okay.”
He stepped back, gripping my upper arms with both hands and squeezed me in reassurance as he pled, “It’s time to allow yourself some happiness, Elizabeth. You’ve loved that man since the day I met you, and running from him now isn’t going to change it.”
I gasped and tried to catch my breath as I admitted, “I don’t know how.”
He kissed me on my forehead and squeezed me again. “Yes, you do.”
Then he touched my cheek and left me standing there while he walked back into his house.
Reeling, I sank down into my seat. I wiped at my tears with the back of my hand and glanced at Lizzie through the rearview mirror. For the first time since her father had walked out our door almost a week before, her expression was something other than numb, and tears stained her precious round face.
In silence, I drove us home. As soon as I pulled into the garage, I hurried to Lizzie’s door and gathered her into my arms, desperate to erase the distance I’d placed between us over these last few horrible days.
I felt sick, finally accepting what I’d done, that I’d kept my daughter at arm’s length when she needed me most. And I’d done it to shield myself from the blame—and from her pain.
I stood in my garage, holding my child. I breathed her in, nuzzled her with my nose, and kissed her for the first time in a week. I ran my hands through her hair, her father’s hair, and apologized again and again, “I’m so sorry, baby girl. Mommy is so sorry.”
She dug her fingers into my skin and wept.
I swayed us in an attempt to console the inconsolable little girl in my arms.
She hiccupped, climbed up higher as she wrapped her arms around my neck, and spoke for the first time. “I miss my daddy.”
I released a heavy breath and drew her closer.
“I know, baby. I miss him too.”.