I would have done everything differently.
I would have never given her an excuse to leave.
I have to pull over the car, motorists swerving past me, honking. I don’t care. I can’t even be right now. The thought of losing her so soon, without even a goodbye, is debilitating.
I stay like that, trying to breathe, my head resting on the steering wheel, parked illegally. I stay like that until I find the courage to keep on going and face my truth, whatever that truth may be.
I find parking around the corner from my flat and head on up. Outside the door I wait and listen, hoping to hear some kind of movement inside that will put an immediate end to my suffering, at least on one level. If she’s still here, I still have a chance to right things.
I quickly unlock the door and step on inside. Lionel comes running over, begging for me to scratch him behind the ear. I crouch down, absently petting him, trained for any sort of sound.
There. From the kitchen. The fridge door closing.
Hope sings from somewhere deep within me.
I head straight on over there and see her standing with a glass of juice in her hand. She’s staring at me like she’s been waiting, her hair stringy and hanging around her face. Her eyes are red and puffy and I can feel every ounce of pain that’s radiating from her like poisonous sunbeams.
“I thought you were gone,” I manage to say, dropping my bag to the floor.
She watches me for a moment, her face contorting momentarily. “I tried to.”
I lick my lips, unable to say the right thing. The only thing I can say is, “Kayla, I’m sorry,” and it comes out in a harsh whisper.
She raises her chin, trying to keep it from trembling and all I want to do is stride across the room and hold her in my arms and promise her that everything will be okay.
But I stay in my place. Because I know to hold her right now would be hopeless.
“What are you sorry for?” she asks flatly.
“For what happened?”
“And what happened? Do you remember?”
Guilt has one foot on my lungs, slowing pushing down. I shake my head. “No.”
Her face pinches together. “Then why are you sorry?”
“Because,” I cry out hoarsely. “Because I know I got drunk and I know I was in a mood and I know I did something very, very wrong. I don’t know what but…I can feel it. I can feel what you must have gone through. It’s sticking in me, like knives, and I can’t shake them loose.” I pause, trying to breathe. “I know I hurt you. And you can’t know how sorry I am for that. For everything wrong I’ve done.”
“But you don’t even know,” she says breathlessly, as if in disbelief. The look in her eyes is another kick to the gut. “You don’t even know what you’ve done, what you said. You don’t know the person that you become.”
“I have an idea.”
She gives me a bitter smile. “Oh no, I don’t think you have any fucking idea. You are nothing like this man here. You’re not you. You’re someone else, someone I hate.”
Hate.
“You’re the fucking devil, that’s all I know. Mean. Horrible. You stare at me like you don’t even recognize me, you talk to me like I’m someone else and no matter what I say, how I reason with you, nothing works. It’s like I cease to exist to you. How can I handle that you? How can you promise I won’t see that side of you ever again?”
I want to promise. In my desperation I want to promise her everything. But I know I can’t. Because if I promise it and it happens again, I won’t get another chance.
“Listen, love, please. I am going to do whatever I can to make sure that doesn’t happen again.”