Mine to Lose
Authors: T. K. Rapp
Mine to
Lose
a
novel by
T.K. Rapp
Copyright Notice
This book is a work of fiction.
Names, characters, places and incidents are either product of the author’s
imagination or are used fictiously. Any resemblance to actual events, places or
persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. This book
contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and
Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No
part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any
information storage and retrieval system without express written permission
from the author, T.K. Rapp.
Cover Design by T.K. Rapp
Cover Image Courtesy ~
Forgiss/Bigstock.com
Copyright © 2013 T.K. Rapp
All rights reserved.
SBN-13:
978-0-9896432-3-8
ISBN-10:
0-9896432-3-9
For my Dixie, the best
friend a girl could ask for. I’ll miss you sweet pup.
“You don't
know who is important to you until you actually lose them.”
~Mahatma
Gandhi
“I have to go.” His voice spikes up in
frustration.
“No, Ryan.” I spin to face him. “You
don’t have to do anything, you
want
to go.”
“Is that what you really believe?” He
sounds shocked by my words, but continues, “I have no choice.”
“You have a choice.” I throw my hands in
the air in exasperation. “We
all
have a choice! You’ve been looking for any
reason to get the hell out of here.”
“Last I checked, Em, we have bills to
pay, and we aren’t exactly in a position for me to walk away from a decent
paying job. Besides, this will set me up to get a promotion sooner than if I
stayed around here.”
When I look at my fiancé, floored at the
words that come out of his mouth, the disappointment that I feel in this moment
is crushing. Of course, we rely on his income to make ends meet, but to say
that he
needs
to leave for work makes me feel as if I don’t matter. I
can’t believe we’re in the middle of planning a wedding, and we are already
having a huge crisis in our relationship. What does this mean for our marriage?
Maybe I’m being dramatic, but it feels like he’s bailing on me.
“Ryan, do you understand what this could
do to us? Look at us.” I wave my hands wildly between us. “This isn’t normal.
We’ve only been here nine months; I packed up and followed
you
to
Denver. You know how hard it was for me to find a job out here, but I found
one, and I love it. It ripped my heart out to leave my mom and my sister
behind, but I have finally started to make friends out here and now you want us
to pack up our lives and move, again?”
“
Want
? No, I don’t
want
to
leave.” He runs his hand through his hair and tugs before finishing. “But in
order to get ahead, I have to move. We have no kids, it’s the perfect time to
take these chances; I’m doing this for us.”
“You’re not doing this for us,” I scoff
in annoyance. “And what about me and my career? Am I supposed to follow you?
Are you trying to tell me that my career isn’t as important as yours?”
His body rears back, as though I
physically slapped him, his brow furrowing at my words. I know that I’ve hurt
him, but I am too upset to care. How did we get here? How did my fiancé, the
person I trust most in the world, become a virtual stranger? We’ve both been so
busy at our jobs that I guess we missed the signs. I figured we would have time
to sort things out, but the way this conversation is going, I’m not sure
there’s a way out.
“When they told me about this position I
knew you wouldn’t be happy with moving, so I looked for other jobs, but there’s
nothing out there. This economy is shit, and if I walk away now, it could be
months before I find something else. I’m not asking you to do anything but
understand what I have to do.” He walks toward me. “I can’t turn this down; it’s
just another stepping stone to prove to them that this is where I want to be.”
“Well, while you’re proving to them where
you want to be, you’re showing me where you
don’t
want to be. Here--with
me.”
“Damn it, Em, stop it!”
“Stop what? Questioning you? What you’re
doing to us? I’m sorry, I thought that this was
our
relationship!” I
can’t help the rise in my voice. “This is
our
life you are messing with;
do you get that?”
“God! Why are you making this about us?
This is for my career,” he counters, defeat evident in his voice.
“If you don’t realize that this is about
us, then this whole thing is far worse than I ever imagined.” My eyes sting
with unshed tears, but I refuse to let them escape.
Ryan reaches out for me, but I shake my
head and step away from him. “Stop. Just leave me alone. Believe it or not, I
understand where you’re coming from. But the fact that
I
don’t even
factor into your decision says more than you’ll ever know.” I choke out my
thoughts past the lump in my throat. He’s ripping out my heart, and I don’t
care to try to hide it. As much as I want to give him the benefit of the doubt,
doubt
is all I seem to have in me.
“You know you are the most important
thing to me.” He tries desperately to explain, reaching out for me again, but I
don’t want to hear it.
“There was a time that I wouldn’t have
ever questioned that, but that was before you started putting your career first.
You took the job without even talking to me. What am I supposed to think?” I
constantly move around the small living room to avoid looking at him.
“So what are you trying to say?”
“I’m not saying anything, Ryan. You have
said everything there is to say, haven’t you?” I let my eyes meet his and gaze upon
him with a blank stare. It’s a look I have mastered in the last couple of
months. “I think you need to go.”
He shakes his head in disbelief. “What?
Are you serious right now?” His annoyed glare lands on mine. “Where am I supposed
to go,
Emogen
? This is our home.”
“If you’re not leaving, then I will,” I
say flatly. I make a show of heading to our room with every intention of
grabbing my things. I don’t know where I’ll go, and I sound immature, but my
heart aches at what’s taking place right now. He heads to our room and blocks
my path, preventing me from leaving.
The silence is palpable as we stand,
staring each other down. I’m not sure which of us just won this argument, but
I’m pretty sure that it was neither. He waits for me to crack, like I always
do, but after a minute, he scoffs before stepping aside. “Fine, I’ll call
Dean.”
I walk to the couch and throw myself into
my usual spot in a huff before grabbing one of the throw pillows. He’s going to
Dean’s place, and as much as I like his friend, the guy’s a ladies man, always
partying and bringing home different women.
I rest my chin on my hand that hugs the
pillow and try to think of something to say.
Do I want to take back
everything I’ve said?
Not really, because it feels as if he’s putting me
last.
But do I want him to leave?
Of course not. This is Ryan, the man I
love, and the man I plan to marry. And as much as I don’t want him living the
bachelor life with Dean tonight, I don’t want him here either.
The lump in my throat grows larger when
he emerges from the room with a duffle bag in hand. Tears continue to form in
my eyes and my nose burns as I try to fight the emotions that want to be set
free. Seeing him, still so handsome but determined to win, almost destroys me.
It would be easy to give in to him, but if I give in now, I’ll be giving in for
the rest of my life. I’m too stubborn to stand and stop him or to even say
goodbye.
He walks over and stands near me, but I
stare at a small clump of lint on the wood floor under the entertainment center.
I hold my gaze to it, as if it alone can save me. If I look at him, I’ll cry; if
I speak, my voice will give me away. I hear him sigh heavily before he leans
down to kiss my cheek. Apparently that’s when my body decides to react. I pull
away, just as I feel his breath near. His sharp intake of air lets me know that
he’s hurt. I feel a silent delight knowing that I’ve hurt him, because he’s
just ripped my heart out.
“I’ll see you later, Em,” he says while
walking to the door. I hear him stop, and I can only assume he looks back at
me. “This isn’t what I want.”
When I turn my head to look at him, all I
see is the door closing behind him, and then the tears spill out. I stay glued
to the couch for at least an hour, trying to determine if I will ever get up.
* * *
I cried all night, so I doubt that I look
my normal, put-together self. I think I finally fell asleep sometime after
three in the morning, which means I only got two hours of sleep before my alarm
woke me up. When I look at my appearance in the mirror, all I can see are the
bags under my eyes. I shouldn’t have those at twenty-two, at least I assume I
shouldn’t. When I get to the office, I fill my mug with coffee before
retreating to my desk to hide away in my work for the day.
“Hey,” Cam exclaims from her desk nearby,
“we still on for lunch today?”
Crap!
I forgot we’re supposed to go out; I don’t feel like
putting on a happy face for anyone. “Cam, can we do it another day? I’m not
really up for it,” I say, moving papers around my desk to act swamped with
work.
I’ve only been working for six months,
but in the short time I’ve been here, I’ve come to consider Cam a good friend.
Good enough to read me better than most people who’ve known me my whole life.
She walks over to me and without skipping a beat replies, “No, we’re going
today. But I think you need to vent.” She looks at me with wide eyes, waiting
for a response. “M’Kay?”
I smile, thankful that she is willing to
put up with me, and even though I don’t want to go, it might be exactly what I
need. “Yeah Cam, sounds good.”
When eleven thirty rolls around, Cam’s
almost too eager to get me out, no doubt because she wants to know what’s going
on. She practically packs my office up for me to get me out quicker. “C’mon, we
only have forty-five minutes, and something tells me we’ll need every second of
that.”
“You have no idea,” I mutter under my
breath.
Lucky for me, Cam picks the deli down the
road and finds an empty table in the back. She heads to the counter to order
our usual and I sit, numb and disinterested in anything else around me. When
she takes her seat across from me, she stares at me in silence, and I
appreciate that she doesn’t push me to talk. At least not before I’m ready.
“Ryan left,” I finally admit, once the
silence has gone on too long. The moment the words come out, I bury my face in
my hands and start crying all over again. Saying the words out loud causes a
stabbing pain in my heart, which only makes me cry harder.
“He what?” I look up to see her face
stunned by my confession.
“Left,” I answer. “My fiancé left.”
“Hold on.” She puts her hands on top of
mine. “What happened?”
“Ryan was offered a position in
California for the next year, and he accepted without so much as a conversation
about it with me. So I told him he needed to leave.”
“But why? What’s going on?”
I start from the beginning and tell her
that he has a job opportunity that he says he needs to take for his career. I
explain that we had a huge fight because he accepted and expects me to follow.
When I finish talking, Cam leans back in her chair and looks as exhausted as I
feel. I don’t know why I unloaded everything on her, but since I moved from my
family in Utah, I don’t have anyone close by to talk to besides my best friend,
Joss.
Cam remains quiet for a while, picking at
her paper napkin on the table, and I’m not sure what she’s going to say. I do
know when someone stays silent for this long it’s usually because they don’t
know how you’re going to take what they say.
“I’ve never met Ryan.” She raises her
eyebrows, asking for some leeway before continuing. “And it doesn’t sound like
he really wanted to ‘leave,’” she says with air quotes. “But it seems to me
that you two are on different paths. You’re getting married in, what, a year?”
I nod before she finishes. “Did you two talk about what you wanted? Long-term?”
I try to think back, but I don’t know
that we did talk about these things. However, my embarrassment keeps me from
admitting that truth. “Of course we talked. But things change, I guess.”
“Does that happen often? Things
changing?” I know that she sees through my lie, and I look down at my hands
that are clasped between my knees.
I shake my head before making eye contact
with my friend. “No.” I’m barely able to whisper.
She leans over and reaches for my hand,
so I release it from my own before giving it to her. “What do you want, Em?” I
hear the sympathy in her voice and my heart swells.
“I want Ryan,” I answer simply.
“But why? Why do you want Ryan? Is it
him? Or the idea of him?”
“It’s all the same thing, isn’t it?”
She shakes her head. “No. It isn’t. So
maybe you need to figure out why you fell for him in the first place.”
We sit in silence for what seems an
eternity when the waitress brings our orders. She sets the plates on the table
and leaves me mulling over Cam’s question.
Why did I fall for Ryan?
Before I can answer, she hits me with
another question. “How did you and Ryan even meet?”
I don’t even try to contain the smile
that creeps onto my face. Three years ago, the first time I laid eyes on Ryan,
I fell in lust.