I didn’t understand where she could be. I’d been sitting at Alexa’s kitchen table for at least two hours, waiting for her to come but she hadn’t arrived. She should have been home long before.

She probably wouldn’t have let me come by if I had called and asked, so I just dropped in, using the key she had given me to let myself into the apartment.

I needed to talk to her, and she was ignoring all of my calls and text messages. I hated doing things the way I was going about doing them, but it was the only way that would work.

I received a call earlier that afternoon from Curtis, telling me that Alexa had been at his house, and she was pissed.

She insisted that Kim and Curtis explain to her why they didn’t tell her about me. Fortunately, Kim wasn’t home at the time, and Curtis was able to talk to Alexa in private.

She was pissed off that Curtis didn’t tell her about me, but he explained that I was his best friend and needed his help. After much begging and pleading, Alexa agreed not to tell Kim about it. Whether or not she would keep true to that agreement remained to be seen.

During their conversation, Alexa told him exactly what she was feeling towards me. She said that she felt like I did nothing but manipulate her. Hearing him say that hurt my heart unbelievably bad.

I didn’t want her to think that way as it was never my intention. I never wanted to hurt her. She didn’t know what I was feeling towards her. She was wrong about my feelings and my intentions.

All along, my intentions were good. I just needed to find some way to get my point across to her. I needed her to see that I was sincere. I needed to be able to prove these things to her.

As it got dark outside, the inside of the apartment darkened as well. I didn’t bother turning on a light, so I sat in the darkness waiting for her. Besides, if she came home and saw a light on inside, she might not come in, and I really needed to be able to talk to her.

I don’t know how long I sat there in the dark before I finally heard her key unlocking her door. I tried to stay relaxed, but my nerves were getting the best of me. I’d practiced what I was going to say to her over and over again in my head for the previous few hours, but all those thoughts disappeared. All of those thoughts were replaced by a blank space.

My legs were shaking as I stood up from the chair and waited for her to turn on the lights. She always came in, turned on the lights and did something in the kitchen. That night was different than what I was used to. Instead of flipping the lights on, I heard her footsteps walk through the living room and into her bedroom. The first light she turned on was a small lamp that sat on one of her end tables.

Slowly, I started making my way into her bedroom. The whole conversation would have been much easier if she had walked in to see me sitting at her table. Now that she was in her room, the fact that I was there might scare. I didn’t want her to be afraid of me. I didn’t want her to look at me and see fear, hurt, and disgust in her eyes.

If I had it my way, I would have just remained in the shadows until she came around, but I knew that wasn’t going to happen unless I had a chance to talk to her. While I tried to figure out how to announce my presence, I stood in the hallway, watching as she sat down on her bed.

I’d never seen a woman look so broken before, and I felt horrible knowing that I was the reason.

I wanted so badly to be able to walk into her bedroom, tell her everything was going to be okay and have her actually believe me.

I wanted to hold her and make her feel safe. I wanted to do whatever I could do to make her forget all the things I screwed up. I wanted to somehow make her forget that everything had happened. I wanted to hear her telling me that she loved me again.

Unfortunately, none of that was going to happen, so I stayed in the hallway until I figured out a better plan.

Alexa was sitting on the edge of her bed with her face buried in her hands. She started to shake, which was when I realized she was crying. I hated seeing her like that.

My insides were torn up with guilt from putting her in that position. I hated seeing her like that, so I stepped into her room.

“Alexa?” I muttered, not wanting to alarm her.

She let out a yelp and jumped up off her bed, surprised that she wasn’t alone in the apartment. She stood there staring at me without saying a word for what felt like hours. I tried to get a read on her expression, but she had her poker face on.

“I want you to leave, Nick,” she finally said, her voice sounding frail and weak. She was no longer crying, but there was no hiding the fact that she had been. I felt uncomfortable standing in her doorway, but I really needed her to listen to me. I took a couple of steps towards her, but she backed off, her body tensing up.

“I mean it, Nick! I want you out of my apartment right now!” she demanded, this time with more bass in her voice.

“Alexa, please hear me out. Please give me a chance to explain everything to you,” I begged. My mouth was suddenly parched, causing my voice to crack.

“No. You had your chance to explain everything to me since the day you met me. Now it’s too late. I don’t want to hear any of your excuses. I can’t listen to any of it,” she said as she fought back the tears. She wouldn’t even look me in the eyes.

“Alexa, please, at least give me a chance. I love you. I’m not the person you think I am.”

“Yeah, I think I’ve already figured that out.”

“That’s not what I mean, Alexa. I talked to Curtis, and he told me that you were over to see him. I know you think that I’m a liar and that I took advantage of you, but that isn’t true at all. I mean, yeah, I wasn’t honest with you about my past. I didn’t want to tell you that I did time in prison. I knew there was no way in hell you would have ever given me the time of day if I would have told you that. I mean, look at you. You wouldn’t have ever given me a chance. Am I right?”

I waited for an answer of some sort, but she continued looking straight down at her floor.

“I needed to be someone else, somebody much better than the man I had become,” I continued. “I was already starting my life over, and I needed a clean slate. I knew I wanted you from the first night we met, and I knew that in order to have any chance at all with you, I’d have to show you that I was good enough. I had to show you that I was worth taking a chance on. The only way I could do that was to act like I had a healthy upbringing. I couldn’t let you know how fucking broken I really am so I acted like I had a normal past with a normal family. I was stupid to think it would work. It was really fucking stupid. You have no idea how many times I wanted to tell you the truth about who I was and the things I’d done but I couldn’t. By that time, it had all snowballed out of control, and I had no way out.”

For the first time, Alexa looked up and was actually making eye contact with me as I talked.

“I never wanted to lie to you, Alexa. I didn’t want to deceive you. If I could go back and fix it, I would, even if it meant you and I never would have been together. I wanted to tell you everything, and I think I would have whenever the time was right. It was dumb to believe that you’d never find out about any of my issues. I’m really sorry.

I mean, I fell in love with you the first night I met you. I hate the fact that you’re hurting because of me. I never wanted you to hurt. I never wanted any of this. The only thing I wanted from the beginning was you. That’s still all I want.”

I took a couple steps toward her and this time, she didn’t back away. I was standing directly in front of her, looking down at her tiny frame, which seemed even more fragile than it usually did.

She looked up at me but had a blank look in her eyes. She didn’t say anything. I reached out and touched her cheek, which prompted her to pull away, walking around to the other side of her bed.

“How dare you? After what you’ve put me through, how dare you come over here and try to touch me. Don’t you dare touch me,” she began to scream. “I want you to turn around and leave. I want you out of my apartment this instant. I want you out of here, and I want you to leave my key on the way out.”

“Alright, I can see that you’re not ready to talk about any of this just yet, and that’s fine. We don’t have to talk about anything right now. You’re going to need a little bit of time and space. I can respect that. I’ll give you a few days or so to think, and then I’ll come back by and see if you’re ready to talk then,” I said, being entirely sincere.

I flashed a slight smile at her before turning to walk out of her room and towards the front door.

“Nick!” she yelled right as I was about to leave. “I mean it. I want you to leave the key to the apartment before you go.

“No,” I told her after standing there complimenting her request.

“No? What do you mean no? You can’t say no.”

“I just mean no, Alexa,” I responded before walking out the door and going to my truck.