Eunice
His words left me stunned. She lied about the child because of her fucked up mother. The words echoed in my mind. Why would she do something like that, and why was her mother being dragged into it?
Why was he doing this to me now? I gave him the chance to save us, but I couldn’t now, not anymore, when he kept betraying me and my love for him. He didn’t leave any more chances. I was a fool in love, giving that last chance which he took for granted. I loved him more than myself and it felt like my biggest mistake. There was no use for him to come back to me. If Anne’s lies hadn’t been brought forward, then he would be in her arms right now. That insight made bile rise in my throat.
The intensity of his love right now would dull down to nothing for me in the unforeseen future. He loves me now but with the history of our unbalanced relationship, I didn’t see us having a future until he could see where his priorities lay. For now, I’m his priority, but what about in the future? The business he owns, a future child, or me? Would I ever be enough for him? How long would he stay faithful to me? The accusations he made, would they have washed away from his mind completely or did a trace of them still linger? How long would this new love stay, a week, a month, or a year? The guarantee of this love wasn’t forever anymore. There were no more vows binding us, no promises of a happy life forever, and no guarantees of having a life free of the guilt and past that would drag us down.
I stared in his eyes, finding a reflection of an infinite love that once existed in my eyes. His eyes glazed with tears, and I didn’t know how to break this to him. The fact that I couldn’t be in a relationship with him right now, or maybe ever in the future, would hurt him. Our lives had been pushed too far from the people we were when we married. We couldn’t go back to being those people, who we were. My wounds were still fresh. I couldn’t make a promise of loving him, of being the person I was before.
He was on his knees, begging me for another chance that I couldn’t give him. I didn’t think I would be able to look at him without remembering what all passed between us. We needed to break apart because we were like fire and gasoline, we would keep on burning in flames of guilt, sadness, hatred, or love. His hand tried to reach for mine, but I stepped back, hurting him emotionally in the process. Those teary green eyes brought tears to my eyes too. I was hurting for him, but I couldn’t take the chance of being in a destructive relationship again. Shaking my head, I put as much distance as I could between us. We were done—whatever traces of love we had left couldn’t give me the power to be with him. The strands of our love had weakened and vanished. There was nothing binding us together.
“I can’t do this, Joshua,” I whispered slowly, tears streaming down my cheeks. “I can’t be with you now, Joshua. What was left between us doesn’t exist anymore. It ended the day we divorced, our love vanished the day when you said, ‘I do,’ to her. I can’t be with you anymore. It hurts me too, but I can bear this pain for now. I have shed enough tears for a lifetime, burned in pain for months, and now I am all broken and scared. The thought of going back with you in that destructive relationship repulses me. We have come too far from each other. I can’t be that person anymore you’re looking for, not now.” I sobbed as the words left my lips, hurting each other equally. I needed space from him. My words tore him apart. I could see it in his eyes. I knew the pain he felt. It was an agonizing feeling of being torn from the inside, feeling like your whole life had been taken away from you and burned to ashes. It was a horrible misery that he had made me go through and it hurt to know that I was the one delivering this pain to him.
“No, no…” The word repeated like a prayer. He was instantly on his feet, crushed under the weight of rejection and unbearable pain.
“Please don’t do this, Eunice, I beg of you to not leave me like this. I ask for a chance to prove myself—just give me that. I know I have made mistakes more than anyone else, I don’t deserve your love, but I indeed know that we love each other so fucking much that we can’t stay apart. I love you more than myself—just tell me a way to prove it and I’ll do it in a heartbeat. I have my eyes only for you, and forever you. I really can’t stay without you, nor even breathe without you. Having you leave me will annihilate me. It will be like tearing away my soul, taking my life. Give me any punishment you like, beat me, push me, cut me, leave me bleeding, or burn me, just don’t walk away. I have been a fool. I let people manipulate me, and I let all these choices make me lose you. I would do anything for you, just name it, but I beg of you not to leave me and let me go. I wouldn’t survive without you—I can’t.” His pleading made my heart swell with pain. I wish I didn’t have to do this.
We were tearing each other apart. He wanted something that I couldn’t give him now, or maybe ever. My heart would have beat only for him once but now it had tarnished. I could never be his priority. He couldn’t be the man I wanted. We were broken. I needed time to heal and he needed time to gain himself back. There was no hope for us until we could find ourselves, and for that, we needed to leave each other behind and move on.
“Then just let me go, Joshua. I need to find myself, save myself from drowning in the pain of the past. I need to learn to love once again, and I can’t do it being with you. We are toxic to each other. Right now you think you need me—that you can’t live without me—but I would also be the constant reminder of what has passed between us. I would destroy you and myself more.” She turned partially away.
“I want you to make the right choice for yourself and me and going away for now is the best. We need to be apart from each other, need to move on, to learn to live without each other and still survive. We need to stabilize ourselves, forget the past, face what we have done to each other. It’s no more about us but about each other, Joshua. I need to be independent and learn to live without you—that’s what I need. Whereas for you, you need to survive in this world again, leaving behind the pain and guilt you feel deep down. You need to let go of the destructive life you lead, while holding so much burden of the past, shed it and walk away from it. There is a need for a time out between us. I can’t tell you for how long, but until we have found our happiness somewhere, maybe then we could fight for each other and find what we’ve lost. For now, though, we are over.” It hurt too damn much to utter this truth.
It was the stark pain of being ripped apart from each other, but it had to be done for each of our sakes. His eyes showed his pain, his tears telling the tale of how much he had lost, and the defeated look told how much I had ruined him. We were embraced by nothing but pain, the thick silence broken only by our constant sobs. Our eyes stared in each other’s soul.
“Does it mean we have a chance in the future? Do we hold a candle in the dark for our love, Eunice? Just tell me that and I’m willing to leave, because I love you so damn much I can’t bear to see you hurting anymore. I’m willing to walk out of here, a defeated, torn, and ruined man, knowing that I have no purpose to live for only if you could give me some hope. I will be lost without you—hell, I don’t want that. So just give me a hope to live for, something worth fighting for. Just let me know that can I have that one chance with you?” His words sliced my heart, knowing how much I was hurting him killed me from the inside.
“I don’t know, Joshua. I can’t give you false hope. I seriously don’t know where I stand right now. I’m so fucking confused. A chance has to be earned, and right now, whatever you do, I don’t think you could get that chance. I need to find myself, and you have to do the same for yourself. We are like lost souls, and together we’re destructive for now. I plead with you not to do something to yourself, because it would kill me. If you promise to stay intact for me, and find the person I lost, only then can I promise you that one day I will give you the time to earn another chance with me.” With a broken self, I lit a flame in his heart, a flame of hope that we could get a chance with each other.
I didn’t know when that time would come, when I would be able to give him that chance, but knowing that flame of hope will keep him surviving, will motivate him to be who he was, brought relief inside of me. His fingers reached for my cheeks, closing the gap between us, and I didn’t back away. I let him have this one last time. Wiping away my tears, his gaze made me burn under the wide intensity of his love. Tears streamed down from our eyes as we took in each other for the last time. His eyes hooded with pain and hurt still shined with the flame of hope.
“So this is the end of us, of you and me?” His question came from the worry that ate him away, the worry of losing each other forever. Biting my lip, I tried to stop the painful sob that willed to escape my lips. Looking away from him, I tried to control myself and the pain I felt. With deep breaths, I calmed myself and looked at him, only to have my heart crushed under the love in his eyes.
“No,” I breathed out a sigh, “Joshua, this is the beginning of you and me, of two people away from each other. We are parting our ways from here and beginning new lives. We can only hope that one day we will be strong enough to face each other again and start from where we lost it all.” My words mingled with the last ounce of love I felt for him. This was our end to have a new beginning. A painful sob escaped his lips and he embraced me in a hug. Crying our hearts out, we stood there in each other’s embrace. Breaking away, I looked at him for the last time, taking in the man I had loved for so long. I chewed on my bottom lip to stop myself from letting that painful cry out. His fingers freed my lip and hovered over it. I could see a longing in his eyes.
“Can I?” he asked, his fingers tracing my lips. I should have said no, but I gave myself over to the deep intensity of our love. For one last time, I let myself have his taste, the feeling of his touch, and feel the love we once shared. His lips descended upon mine as tears flowed freely. This was it—our end. I could taste our tears in our kiss. I let his tongue invade my lips, asking for the last taste of mine, his hands touching me for the last time, and our breath mingling with each other. No words were spoken while we took each other in completely. Soft trails of kisses were where it all ended. With our foreheads touching each other, we looked at each other for one last time. My hand caressed his cheek as I spoke the last word between us.
“Goodbye…Joshua.” As the words left my lips, our world was broken, we were finally apart. There ceased to exist the word us now. He looked into my eyes and stepped away from me. Slowly he took a few steps back and moved away from me. With tears in his eyes, he said his last words to me and walked away. I saw him going away with a broken, rejected heart, but those last words of his broke me more than anything.
“I will always love you, Eunice.” As he vanished from my sight, I walked into my room, where a painful cry escaped my lips. A cry for what I had done today, a cry for hurting him, and a cry for leaving it all behind. I cried for every last pain I felt, I let it all out. I didn’t know how long passed, but I was exhausted under the pressure of reality of what I had done.
A knock on my door made me move away from the small corner where I sat. Wiping away the remnants of my tears, I composed myself and walked towards the door. I hoped it wasn’t Joshua, because I didn’t have the guts to see him now. As I opened the door, I was met with blue eyes filled with sympathy.
“You shouldn’t have let him go, Eunice.” He paused. “That guy loves you more than himself. I could see it in his eyes and hear it in his voice. I don’t know why you did it, but I’m here for you, because you don’t deserve this pain I see in your eyes. Why did you let him go, Eunice? Give me a good reason for letting go of the love of your life. Tell me because I’m willing to listen,” Craig said sincerely. Right then I understood that he was the anchor the fates had sent to help me find myself again…