Chapter Two
It was a feeling I’d never wish on my worst enemy: heartache. It felt like being dangled over the edge of a cliff and knowing if the person let go, you’d fall to your death. The anticipation, though, the hanging and waiting for them to release you, that was the worst part. The unknown, the fear. That’s what heartache was like. There was never a thought that someone else could come along and make me forget about my love for Parker. I never so much as thought of another guy. I put my all into our marriage, with the hope that maybe the person I loved would realize what he had in front of him.
Reality was, I was alone.
Always.
Despite my anger with Parker for signing up for another deployment, we worked as a team tonight, packing up his duffle bags and footlocker, filling it with his life. Sad thing was, his life fit in those bags and footlockers. It was filled with clothes, army gear, and whatever other items meant something to him. As I folded another green T-shirt, I let the tears fall. Despite everything, I was sad to see him go, but for the first time, I realized I wasn’t his life. Maybe I never had been.
“Babe.” Parker wrapped his arms around me and rested his chin on my head. “It’s going to be all right.” I looked up at him as I often did, my eyes pleading with him to understand me. Every time I looked at Parker, I was transported back to the first day I saw him at the diner. I held on to that memory. It kept me going; it gave me hope. Looking up at him now, all I saw was loneliness, a lifetime of me hoping he would choose me, settle down and start a family. I would never ask him to give up what he loved for me, though. I couldn’t help but think if he loved me, he would have already chosen me and I wouldn’t even have to ask.
The doubt crept up like the sly bastard that it was, and I opened my mouth to disagree. His lips crashed down on mine before I could say anything. Sex with Parker was never slow or sensual; it was always filled with need. Hands grasping like it was the last time we’d ever touch, biting and clawing. It was the only time lately I was connected to him, and that’s what I needed now. To feel whatever there was left of him. Of us.
I grasped his shoulders, my fingers digging in to his hard muscles. Parker lived at the gym, so every inch of him that was once slender had been replaced with solid muscle. He wasn’t overly muscular, but extremely fit. I liked looking down at his massive chest as I rode him till he came. He had become a gorgeous man, matured from the young boy I fell in love with.
He threw me down on the bed; his bags fell to the ground, spilling out all our hard work. Neither of us cared, we were too worried about shedding all the clothes that separated us. There was so much more between us than clothes, but here, now, we were all that mattered. It was times like this I was thankful for having an IUD. No need to stop and worry about condoms or anything else.
With one gyration of his hips, he entered me, causing my head to roll back in pleasure. Parker stretched me out each time, his width and massive length filling me to the brim.
Each thrust brought me closer and closer to the edge that I’d been dangling over for months. I held on as long as I could, our slick bodies molding together until I couldn’t hang on anymore. Everything crashed around me, like waves I couldn’t control. I screamed in ecstasy before everything hit me.
I was tired of being strong and pushing back the frustration and fear that my marriage was over. Every day I smiled and tried damn hard to bring things back to where they were. But people changed. Getting married so young had shocked our families. To us, love was love; whether we were eighteen or thirty-five, we just knew that what we had was real. I hadn’t thought about time, though, that fickle little bitch that held everyone hostage and changed whatever she damn well pleased. Time ruined us. Time apart and at war. Distance had always been our enemy.
Parker slid out of me, and I bit my bottom lip in an effort to not cry out as each memory battered me.
“Hey. You okay?” With his arms on either side of me, he hovered over me.
“Please. Don’t go,” I choked out.
Stay with me. Choose me.
These were all common feelings I had before he left, wanting to get down on my knees and beg him to stay. Tonight, I saw red. Why was I begging a man who clearly had no concern for me, no thought for how I’d fare if he left again? I sat up, pushing him aside. I was still semidressed, but I didn’t give a flying fuck.
“Why, Parker? Why did you sign up again? We were supposed to start a family. Settle down and actually start our life together without having to say goodbye all the time.” The tears kept streaming as he stared at me, baffled by my honesty.
He knelt in front of me, his vulnerability taking me off guard. Now at my eye level, he looked at me, his eyes glistening with tears.
“Because I don’t deserve this life.” He reached out and caressed my cheek. “I don’t deserve you or this house.” He shook his head as he removed his hand. “I need the adrenaline. The pain of running off into the shit and trying to survive. That’s all I did my entire life before I met you, I survived.”
So much of his life was just surviving before we met. He was homeless at the age of seventeen, living with whatever family or friends would let him crash for a while. His sister, Emily, was pregnant, using drugs, and a dropout all by the age of sixteen. We were so different, but I thought love had to be enough. Because it always was, wasn’t it?
I grabbed his shoulders and brought him close to me, holding him tight against my chest. We stayed like that for what seemed like forever, listening to each other breathe, feeling the rise and fall of each other’s chest. I knew now why he left. I also knew that no matter what I did, I couldn’t be what he needed me to be. I didn’t have to just survive growing up. Our differences back then were what drew us together, that despite his shitty childhood he was able to show me such kindness and love. That was the type of man that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. War, though, changed a man. It took a kind soul and ripped him in two and brought him to his knees. It brought up his past, made it his present, and left behind those he loved and those who loved him in the process. Our life, our future, didn’t make sense anymore.
As Parker kneeled before me, cradled in my arms, I feared for the first time that we might not make it. That we were broken beyond repair.