Irreversible Damage (Irreparable) (17 page)

I slouch against the wall. Why would he offer her that just so they could share a beer?

“Come on, we’re celebrating.”

Celebrating? What are they celebrating?

I’m not going in there. I can’t face her. The stairs take an impossibly long time to climb. My body feels like it weighs a thousand pounds. I’ve lost him. Without bothering to turn on the light, I plop myself down on the chair by the window.

I don’t know how much time I spend staring into the deep abyss of the Pacific Ocean. I watch the waves break against the cliffs in the distance. The sun sets in a streak of light behind the horizon. Then the numbness sets in, and I stare at nothing. The room turns to black.

I’m startled when light fills the room. I blink several times as my eyes adjust.

“Are you coming down?” I hear fear in Brady’s voice.

I twist my head to look at him. He smiles. It doesn’t affect me. I feel too much resentment. “I can’t stay here, Brady.” The words taste as sour in my mouth as lemons.

He reaches me in an instant and falls to his knees in front of me. “What are you saying?” His hand buries deep in his mass of brown hair while the crease in his brow digs deeper than I’ve ever seen it. “You don’t want me anymore?”

I can’t lie. “I will always want you.” I reach out to stroke his cheek.

His hand finds my wrist. He pushes it away. He’s angry.

“We rushed into this for a baby we no longer have.”

I wait for his argument, but it doesn’t come. “Where are you going?”

“I’m going to Minnesota.” My voice catches. I choke back tears. “My parents bought me a ticket, and they’ll send a truck for my things in a few days.”

“No, don’t!” He’s obviously upset.

I can’t think about it. I know this is best for both of us.

“I don’t want you to go.”

“I have to.” I hate this. I hate that every time I watch him with Andrew, all I can see is what we lost. I hate that I feel like Andrew is a replacement for Mona. Most of all, I hate that I think Brady’s forgetting about our little girl.

“Don’t you fucking do this!” He reaches up and grips my arms. His eyes search mine pleadingly. “Do you hear me?” He shakes me gently.

I turn my head unable to look into his eyes.

“I know you’re hurting, and I know I’m to blame, but please don’t leave me.”

I finally cave and look at him.

“I know we’re messed up, okay? I go to bed every night with guilt and grief eating me alive. One minute you seem like you still love me, and the next you look like you’re going to tear my head off. I’m afraid to touch you because I know you’re going to reject me. That scares the shit out of me. I fucked up by shutting you out. I know that, but I didn’t know what else to do. I don’t want Andrew to feel any of the tension between us. I can’t stand the thought of fucking him up any more than he already is. I’m sorry. I’ll fix it. But please don’t go.”

As much as it breaks my heart to hear, Andrew should be his priority. He’s his son.

“Brady, I love you,” I admit. “I really do, but I need time. You have your music and Andrew. That’s where your focus should be. Mine should be on school and deciding what I want. I can’t do that here. My world has revolved around you. I have nothing else. It’s not healthy.”

“My life revolves around you, too, and I don’t give a fuck if it’s unhealthy, Sunshine.” He releases me, raking his hand through his hair once before letting out an annoyed a rush of air. I can practically hear the gears turning in his head.  “I love you.”

I hear him, but I don’t believe him. If only his life did revolve around me, I wouldn’t feel so completely alone. I watch him pace in front of me. No matter how much my heart begs me to stay, the irreversible damage between us will never allow it. It isn’t because I’m not utterly in love with him still. I am. But despair is stronger than love. Loving him doesn’t change the painful reality that exists each time I look into the depths of his soft green eyes. The warmth I once felt is gone. It’s cold, dark, and lonely. I don’t see love anymore. I see pity. I see our baby dying over and over. Worse than that, I see that Brady thinks I’m responsible. I am. I lost everything that night, including myself.  It’s too much. I have to go. I have to leave him in order to figure out who I am and what I want. It’s the only way to determine if our love can survive this and if we have a future together.

I stand up. He turns his head to the side. I watch his jaw work. My hand curls around his arm. I stare at the side of his head, silently begging him to look at me.

He doesn’t.

“If you love me, you’ll give me this. You’ll let me leave and give me some time to sort this out.”

“Oh, fuck!” His fist slams into the wall behind me with a loud thud. He doesn’t even flinch.

I do, taking a step to the side to escape his anger.

“Fuck! How can you ask me to live without you? My heart can’t beat without you.”

I throw my hands in the air totally exasperated. “You see, this is exactly what I’m talking about. That’s not healthy, Brady.”

“Enough with the fucking psychobabble,” he shouts, so loudly my ears hurt.

I’m stunned by his harsh words. My eyes well up with tears. He doesn’t understand. He never will.

“Jesus, Tori, if you don’t love me anymore, just say it.”

“You’re a fucking asshole, Brady Hunter!” I scream at him. He’s the one who looks stunned now. “Did you ever think that maybe I don’t love myself anymore?”

His arms are suddenly around me. He holds me against his chest. I’m fighting to move, but he keeps his grip tight. “I’m sorry. Don’t say that. Please, baby.”

I finally wiggle free and cross the room. I need space between us. He starts to speak, but stops. Instead, he growls in frustration. I stand tall and look directly in his eyes while I beg my voice not to crack. “I have to do this.”

He combs his face with his hand. His creased brow finally relaxes. “I know you do, but I can’t stand it.”

I walk to him. He leans into my touch when I cup his cheek. His hand covers mine. “I hate it, too,” I admit. “But I’ll always love you. I just need some time. I feel like I’m drowning.”

 “I won’t stop fighting for you.” His thumb brushes over my bottom lip. “Not ever.” His hand falls away.

“I know you won’t.” I offer him a weak smile. “Just give me some time before you lay on the pressure.”

He nods. “I’ll try.” There’s something in his voice that says he won’t, and maybe I don’t want him to. Maybe that’s why I’m running. I want to see if he’ll chase me. If that’s the reason, our relationship is unhealthier than I thought.

“Daddy!” Andrew storms into the room with a handful of shells. Brady scoops him up in his arms. “Look what I found.” He holds up a sand dollar, his smile full of awe. “They’re so cool.”

They’re the shells Brady and I found the day we bought this house. We spent hours on the beach. It was a happier time.

Brady also wears a smile full of awe, only it has nothing to do with the shells in Andrew’s hand. It’s the pure wonder of holding his son in his arms. A feeling I’ll never know.

The lump in my throat is trying to choke me. I swallow hard. Tears prick my eyes. I inhale a deep breath and beg them not to spill. I don’t want Andrew to ever feel how much his presence hurts me. It’s not his fault. He’s a good kid who’s been denied his father for far too long. “I’m going to finish packing. My plane leaves tonight.”

Brady scowls at me. He sets Andrew down. “I didn’t know you were going so soon.”

I push my hands into my pockets and twist my body. “I’m taking the red-eye.”

Andrew looks up at me with a smile. His daddy’s green eyes twinkle. “Where are you going?” he asks innocently.

I restrain my tears and smile back at him. “I’m going to Minnesota for a while.”

“When will you be back?”

Brady smirks. “Yes, when will you be back?”

I narrow my eyes at Brady before looking back at Andrew. “I’m not sure.”

“But I don’t want you to go. I like you.”

“Oh, I like you, too, kiddo.” Oh, God. It’s the one thing I’ve wanted to hear from this kid since the moment he arrived, but it’s too late.

Brady pats him on the head. “Andrew, can you please go downstairs and help your mom pick up the kitchen?”

“Okay, but don’t think I don’t know you’re trying to get rid of me.” Andrew turns on his heels. I hear his feet thunder down the stairs.

We both laugh. “Smart kid.”

Brady glows with pride. “Yeah.”

I lift my hands from my pockets. My arms feel heavy, like the rest of my body. “I have to go, Brady.”

He runs his hand over his face before locking eyes with me. “If you leave, my heart goes with you. It belongs to you, like yours belongs to me. Leaving doesn’t change that — it only rips us apart.”

Why is it so hard to believe him? I want to. It will never work out for us if I stay. The worthlessness I feel will swallow me whole.  I have to find my own worth, and I can’t do that here.

“I’m sorry, but I can’t listen to my heart this time, Brady.”

His lips press flat as he steps close to me. A violent tremor rolls through my body. He leans in next to my ear. I feel the anger radiating from him. “Well, you should, because your mind is misleading you.”

Oh, God. I run from him and race for the bathroom. I expect him to follow me. He doesn’t. I’m grateful because I’m out of strength to fight him. I’d stay. I lock the door and sag against it, sliding down the surface until I’m hugging my knees. Even after I hear Brady leave the room, I sit on the floor of the bathroom, sulking, for nearly an hour. I spend another hour pulling clothes from my drawers, deciding what to take with me while my heart battles with my brain, trying to convince me to stay.

I grab a suitcase from the top of our closet and set it on the bed. When I open it, a tissue sits in the bottom. It taunts me. I pull it out, smiling when I notice it’s the one Brady left for me when I first found out I was pregnant. He drew a heart on it. It says,
All yours
.

How can I possibly think I’ll ever be able to live without him? He’s absolutely right; my heart would never stop aching to be reunited with him. I’ve been wrong in my approach. I’ve been weak, withering away. I have to fight, for him and for us. The only thing actually standing between us for months has been me and my own pathetic insecurities.

How did this happen? Brady’s always been the one running from our relationship. He was never certain he could trust his feelings. I’ve always been the confident one. From our first kiss, I knew we could get through anything. The role reversal is almost comical.

It’s also a hundred percent my fault.

I fooled myself into believing if he didn’t act a certain way or say what I wanted to hear, then he must not love me, when in actuality, I’ve been the roadblock to our happiness. I’m the one who’s changed. I’m the one who’s avoided him. I could sit in on practices, make him dinner, and reciprocate his affections. I’ve been pushing him away since the day Mona died, hell bent on sabotaging what we have. All so I don’t have to feel the love I so desperately crave from him, because feeling his love means he can hurt me.

Stupid, when
I’m
hurting me.

I’m hurting us.

I call my mom and leave her a voicemail to let her know I’ve changed my mind.

Now that I’ve come to the conclusion that I never want to live without him, I can’t wait to tell him that I want to stay. I want us to forget the past and fight for our future, and, more importantly, that I love him and I always will.

Filled with happiness and hope, I flee the bedroom and sprint down the stairs. I take the corner to the studio door, letting the elation I feel pour out of me.

My hand flies to my mouth, and I suck back a gasp. The exuberance I felt instantly disintegrates as shock takes over every cell in my body. How could he? Through the half-open door, I see Annabelle’s naked body straddling Brady in the chair. She giggles into his neck. Why isn’t he pulling away? I feel sick. My knees quiver. I should run. I don’t want to see this. Brady lifts her from the chair and holds her naked form close to his chest as she starts kissing his neck. I quickly move away from the crack so as not to be seen.

“Come on, let’s get you to bed.” I hear Brady’s voice as I turn and run for the stairs. I stop short, deciding I have to see more. I tiptoe back, peeking around the corner just as they slip into the downstairs bedroom.

Oh, God. He’s taking her to bed. She’s naked, they’ve been drinking, and Brady’s alone with her. I go to the door, which he didn’t bother to close all the way, just in time to see her flat on her back with Brady’s body covering her. His head is buried in her neck. One of her hands is in his hair while the other squeezes his ass as she moans.

“Oh, God, Brady, yes!”

My life has just been reduced to nothing, completely obliterated by what I’ve witnessed in the last five minutes. I want to scream or cry or punch something. It’s not worth the effort. I want to shout at them to stop. I can’t. My vocal cords are tied in a knot. Nothing comes out. Feeling numb and empty, I slowly walk away and climb the stairs to call my mother and finish packing.

I should go back and confront them, but that would take effort. I’m tired of having to work for Brady’s attention, for his affection. Pining after someone who doesn’t want me here is pathetic. I refuse to be desperate. I can’t stay here clinging to what we used to have. Instead, I’m choosing to wither away in my unhappiness. I guess that’s just as pathetic, but at least I can do it in the comfort of my parents’ house, where I know I’m wanted and loved. I’m going to Minnesota to start a new life for myself. I’m letting Brady have what I can’t give him. The family he’s always wanted. He hasn’t admitted it to himself yet, but his actions are crystal clear. I’m a distraction from the important things in his life. I want more than that.

I want my Brady back, the sometimes moody – always complicated – man who used to adore me. The one who always put me on a pedestal. I’ll never get him back. I have to leave. I don’t want to feel hopeless any longer. Sometimes I want to die. I think about ending my life. I feel the urge more than I should. It’s not right, but it’s there, and it’s strong. It tells me Brady would be better off without me. There are times when I sit in the bathtub, starring at the thin purple veins under the skin on my wrists. I’ve felt tears overwhelming me while I’ve held the razor close. I’m tired of fighting it. I could never bring myself to go through with it, but the detailed fantasies suffocate me. I have to escape it. I have to go and leave my despair here.  It’s the only way.