Take This Regret

  Exhaling heavy and deep, I brought her against my chest, and she locked herself to my neck. I squeezed her with one arm around her waist and a palm on the back of her head, looking up at Elizabeth over Lizzie’s shoulder.

  I was almost shocked to see she looked like death, as if she’d been to Hel and taken me with her. The fatigue, worry, and hurt marring her face, the perfect partner to mine. Her jaw quivered and shook from where she stood, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. She swal owed and looked away as tears streamed down her face.

  I stood and pul ed my daughter up with me. Lizzie latched her legs around my waist just as tightly as she wound her arms around my neck and whimpered as if she were terrified I might let her go. I shushed her, ran my hand through her hair, and promised she wasn’t going anywhere

  —that I wasn’t going anywhere. I did not intend to let her out of my sight anytime soon.

  I turned and left the door wide open. Elizabeth could stay, or she could go. At this point, I couldn’t bring myself to care. The only thing that mattered right then was the shaking little girl in my arms.

  I carried Lizzie across the room to the adjoining kitchen and rested her on the counter, the distance of the large room and my back to Elizabeth our only privacy. I didn’t go far, just inched back enough so I could drink in her eyes, read her expression, and understand what she felt.

  With her hands in mine, I asked her, “Are you okay, sweetheart?”

  Were any of us okay?

  Would we ever be?

  Lizzie shed a new round of tears, trembled under my hands, and said, “You left me, Daddy . . . I was so scared you might never come back.” I had no idea how we would ever be al right or if I could ever forgive Elizabeth for what she’d done.

  I pressed my lips to her head, smoothed away the matted locks of hair sticking to her cheeks. “I’d never let that happen, princess.”

  She captured the solitary tear sliding down my cheek, rubbed it between two fingers, and whispered intuitively as her eyes burned into mine, “Mommy is so sad, Daddy.” It was my child’s plea for me to somehow make this right.

  This time I had no clue what to say, had no answers, and could make no more promises. I only whispered,

  “Daddy is sad too.”

  I held her there for the longest time, and while she cried a week’s worth of tears out against my shirt, I murmured every reassurance I could find. I told her that I had been thinking of her every second, promised her that no matter what, her mother and I would make sure this never happened again.

  I felt Elizabeth’s movement from behind, the sound of the door close, and the soft shuffle of her steps over the hardwood floor. When her weight settled on my leather couch, I knew she had chosen to stay.

  Honestly, I had no idea what to do with her as she sat silently in my living room, had no idea whether I wanted to scream at her or thank her, whether I should tel her to leave or her beg her to stay.

  When Lizzie final y settled down, I pul ed away and smiled at her, touched her nose in a playful way, desperate for some sort of normalcy with my daughter. “Are you hungry, baby girl?”

  She nodded and smiled a real smile of tiny gapped teeth and dimples.

  “Come here.” I helped her from the counter and led her to the refrigerator. There was little there, mostly delivery leftovers I’d ordered and hadn’t been able to stomach over the last week. In the microwave, we heated up orange chicken and rice from the Chinese place down the street while we shared smal smiles and tender embraces that stil bore the sadness of our separation. I fixed her a plate and set it in front of her. Kissing her on top of her head, I whispered, “Here you go, sweetheart.”

  She grinned up at me. “Thanks, Daddy.”

  We ate together side-by-side with my arm wrapped possessively over her shoulder. We sat with our backs to Elizabeth because I wasn’t ready to face her any more than she was ready to face me. Between bites, Lizzie and I murmured words of love and encouragement to each other and little things I hoped would restore her confidence.

  She’d smile up at me while she chewed, though I could stil sense her wariness in the way she clung to the hem of my shirt and watched me as if I might suddenly disappear.

  I swal owed down the anger it provoked, reminding myself that I had to accept the fact that part of this had been my fault too.

  Lizzie ate her entire plate plus a bowl of vanil a ice cream that had been left over from the last dinner we’d shared here when we’d laughed and made sundaes. She fed me little bites with her spoon and giggled, and for the first time, I smiled, unrestrained and uninhibited as I leaned in to tickle her tummy.

  “I love you so much, Lizzie.”

  She climbed onto my lap, kissed my cheek, sat back, and grinned. “I love you even more, Daddy.” I laughed with the game she wanted to play, knowing I had already won because there were no bounds to how much I loved my child, but teased and poked her bel y anyway. “Nu-uh, I love you more.”

  “Wel , I love you this much, Daddy.” She spread her tiny arms wide, and I wrapped her in mine.

  I flipped off the light switch in the smal second bedroom.

  When I had bought this place, I could never have imagined it would eventual y become Lizzie’s room. There was a warm glow resonating through my body, a peace that she final y was here. I’d lain beside her until I was sure she was in a deep sleep, sure that she felt safe and loved and secure. When the fists curled in my shirt final y loosened, and her soft breaths spread out in an even rhythm over my face, I’d slowly risen from the tiny twin bed, pul ed the covers up to her chin, and kissed her for what seemed the mil ionth time that day. I would have been content to watch her sleep al night, but it was time to confront what was waiting for me in the other room.

  At the end of the hal , I stopped and looked out to where Elizabeth sat at one end of the couch in the muted light of my living room. Her back was to me, though I saw her face reflected in the darkened panes of the windows—

  so sad and forever beautiful.

  I swal owed, and she looked up and caught me staring at her in the glass—so incredibly sad. I wanted to wipe her sadness away, but I now doubted that I ever could.

  I moved to the opposite end of the couch, sat on the edge of the cushion, and slouched over my thighs with my hands dangling between my knees. There was so much to say, but I had no idea where we’d ever begin, and I feared that this may very wel be the end. Minutes passed by while nothing was said, the room quiet except for the sound of our breathing in the sadness and apprehension that hung stagnant in the air.

  “I’m sorry, Christian,” Elizabeth suddenly said, her raspy voice cutting through the strained silence. She looked down at her fists clenched in her lap and whispered lower,

  “I’m so, so sorry.”

  From the side, I appraised her curled up in a tight bal on my couch, appearing so smal and defeated, and I wished desperately to believe what she said.

  “Are you?” I lashed out, my tongue unexpectedly sharp and severe.

  She winced with the words, pressed the pads of her fingertips deep into the hol ows beneath her eyes, and wiped at the tears that seemed to have fal en endlessly since she’d walked through my door hours before. “Yes.” I searched her face for honesty and found no deceit, just a broken girl who was hurting just as badly as I was.

  “What did I do wrong, Elizabeth? I . . . I thought we . . . ,” I begged.

  She pinched her eyes shut, her beautiful face wasted and worn, my offense aged and old. “You left me.” I leaned against the back of the couch and dragged both hands through my hair, as I blew the air from my lungs toward the ceiling. I looked back at her and gave my surrender through a whispered apology. “I know I did, Elizabeth, but I can’t take it back. God knows, I wish I could, but I abandoned you, and there’s nothing I can ever do to change that now.”

  As painful as it was, I ignored the part of me that wanted nothing more than to reach out and comfort her, to take away her sadness, th
e part that loved her and wanted to beg her to give us a chance. It was time to give up that piece of my heart and accept that I’d done too much damage, it would never be erased, and I’d never be forgiven.

  “I can’t do this anymore, Elizabeth . . . you run every time we get close. I . . . can we just . . . just forget about what happened last weekend? Go back to being friends for the sake of Lizzie? Because I won’t live without her, and I refuse to al ow what happened this last week to ever happen again.”

  What appeared as grief rocked her body, and she wheezed over broken, strangled words. “Is that real y what you want?”

  “God, Elizabeth . . . I . . . of course not . . .” I looked at her and touched my chest in sincerity. “I’m in love with you.

  Do you stil refuse to believe that?” I shook my head, pushed forward through the anguish of my concession, the devastation that blazed as I let go of the only woman I had ever loved—the only woman I would ever love. “But Lizzie’s happiness comes first . . . before you . . . before me.” For a few painful moments, we sat in silence, Elizabeth’s mouth twisted in shame before she final y swal owed, licked her lips, and labored through halting words. “I love you, Christian . . . so much . . . and . . . and I don’t want to give that up . . . I don’t want to give us up.” Her eyes were closed eyes as if shielding herself from my reaction or maybe from her own admission.

  My heart stuttered with her confession, both heartbroken and overjoyed. For so long, I’d wanted to hear those words fal from her lips. I’d just had no idea that in those words there would be so much sadness, that they those words there would be so much sadness, that they would be tainted by years of her sorrow, and that my own thril in final y hearing her say them aloud would be tarnished by the immense amount of resentment over what she had done.

  She opened her eyes stil heavy with tears, and she angled toward me. Her expression was altogether intense and scared but, for the first time, was completely laid bare.

  There was nothing left for either of us to hide. Her mouth and hands shook as she continued. “What happened on my birthday . . . I wanted it . . . I wanted you. But when I woke up next to you, I panicked. Everything I’d gone through after you left me the first time came rushing back. The way it happened . . . the fact that we’d been drinking. It made me feel cheap . . . dirty, and al I could think was that you’d leave me again. Even when I knew that morning you weren’t lying when you said you loved me.” Her voice cracked and she paused.

  “I knew I was wrong the entire week, Christian . . . the whole week. I watched our little girl fade away while I clung to my fears and insecurities and tried to convince myself I was doing it for her. What I put Lizzie through this week . .

  .”—Elizabeth closed her eyes as if she were protecting herself from the memory—“. . . I pushed my own child away when she needed me most, and I don’t know if I’l ever be able to forgive myself for it, but I can promise that it wil never happen again. She’s my life, and I’l never again let my issues get in the way of my responsibility to her . . . my love for her. But I’m tired of running, Christian . . . tired of running from the only man I’ve ever wanted. If you can somehow forgive me . . .”—she wet her rose-colored lips

  —“. . . I want to find a way to forgive you . . . I want to let you love me and not be afraid when you do.”

  Maybe now I real y understood why Elizabeth had run from me al of these months, why she would never al ow herself to believe. A love as intense as the one we shared, one that had not dimmed through years of betrayal but had only grown, was terrifying. We had the power to destroy, to devastate and ruin, to lay the other to waste.

  But I wasn’t running.

  I reached for her hand and pul ed her to my chest. With the connection, the silent tears she’d cried al evening erupted. She clung to me just as tightly as Lizzie had and wept just as hard. She whispered muddled pleas into my shirt while I ran my hands through her hair. “Don’t leave me, Christian . . . please don’t ever leave me.” I shushed her, kissed her on top of her head. “I’m not going anywhere, Elizabeth.”

  I laid us down on the couch on our sides, held her close, and let her cry. Her body quaked as she sucked in shuddering breaths and buried her face in my chest. I cradled the girl I had broken, ran my hand up and down her back, and through her hair. She curled up closer, molded herself to me, and I held her tighter. On the cusp of sleep, she whispered, “Don’t ever let me go.”

  I tugged the throw from the back of the couch, draped it over our bodies, and drew her closer stil . “Never.”

  I’d known when I’d woken up the next morning with Elizabeth stil wrapped in my arms that things were different. She didn’t push me away when I hugged her and murmured good morning against her forehead. Instead, she had pressed her lips to my chest and looked up at me with a smal , timid smile.

  It was then I knew we were going to make it.

  That was the last night I’d slept at my condo. I’d spent the rest sleeping on Elizabeth’s couch.

  Over the last five weeks, Elizabeth and I had spent every second we could together. I met her every day for lunch, and we actual y talked. There was no skirting or softening, just honesty—even when it hurt. In the beginning, there were constant tears and a lot of anger. But she final y opened up and told me how devastated she had been when I’d abandoned her, everything she’d gone through, and how badly she had needed me. While it crushed me to hear it, I welcomed it because I knew we could never truly move on until we actual y faced our past. As the weeks went on, those tears began to dry as a firm future came into view—our future.

  We spent our evenings together as a family, mom and dad and daughter. As much as we laughed and played, we devoted a lot of time talking with Lizzie, giving her reassurances and straight answers for what we had done, for the ordeal we had put her through. Even then, we had started taking her to a counselor once a week to help us weed out the seed of abandonment that had been planted, just as Elizabeth and I had started to see a counselor as a couple.

  We were doing everything we could to make this work.

  The nights—the nights were perfect and entirely tortuous. We spent hours on Elizabeth’s couch making out like teenagers with tangled tongues and wandering hands.

  When she’d final y groan and rol off me, I’d chase her upstairs and kiss her senseless against the wal outside her bedroom door. Weak-kneed, she’d careen into her bedroom, giggling and mumbling under her breath something about me being dangerous.

  When I’d curl up each night on her worn couch with my senses overwhelmed by Elizabeth, my body throbbing and craving more, I couldn’t imagine feeling more satisfied.

  Movement from upstairs caught my attention, and I looked up. “Okay, we’re out of here.” Natalie held Lizzie’s hand as they descended the stairs, Matthew fol owing close behind. Lizzie had her backpack on her shoulders, her dol tucked under her arm, and the sweetest grin on her face. I went to her, knelt in front of her, and touched her sweet cheek. “Mommy and Daddy wil be at Aunt Natalie’s and Uncle Matthew’s first thing in the morning to pick you up, okay?”

  She nodded, and wrapped her arms around my neck.

  “I know, Daddy. I’m so excited! I can’t wait!” I smiled down at her. “I can’t wait, either. I love you, princess” I brushed my lips across her forehead and stood.

  Natalie popped up on her tiptoes, wrapped her arms around my neck, and whispered against my ear, “I’m so happy for you guys . . . I love you al . . . you know?” She stepped back, looked up at me as if to see if I understood.

  I squeezed her hand. “I love you too, Nat.” Lizzie grinned and swayed from where she waited at our sides.

  Matthew shook my hand, his words a touch pensive.

  “Take care of my girl.”

  I nodded. Always.

  Matthew drew Lizzie into his arms and ushered Natalie outside. I watched them until the door closed behind them. I looked up when I felt her. She stood at the top of the stairs wearing a fitted b
lue button-up dress that tied around the waist, flowed over her hips, and flared at her knees. Her hair was curled in soft waves, and her face seemed to glow. She looked both modest and sexy, and she absolutely took my breath away.

  I waited at the bottom of the staircase and smiled softly as I watched her every step as she came to meet me downstairs.

  She stopped a foot away.

  I swal owed deeply and reached for her hand. “You look amazing, Elizabeth.”

  She blushed. “Thank-you.” Her attention wandered down over my maroon button up, black slacks, and back up to my face. “You look amazing, too.”

  I helped her into her coat and led her out to my car. I kissed her softly before I opened her door and settled her into the front seat.

  The ride was quiet, fil ed with anticipation and thrumming hearts. I held her hand the entire way, kept stealing glances at the most beautiful woman I had ever seen.

  I parked and went around and helped her out, popped the trunk to grab the blanket and the picnic basket Lizzie and Natalie had helped me prepare earlier in the day.

  With clasped hands, we made our way up the pathway and over the embankment. Elizabeth stopped to pul her heels from her feet when we hit the sand. Maybe it had been sil y for us to dress for a nighttime trip to the beach, but we’d dressed for a celebration—tonight we would celebrate us.

  The moon was high and lit up the beach, the waves gentle in their swel and rol , a peaceful calm. The tepid San Diego air of December chil ed our skin as it rushed over the water and against our faces, and Elizabeth hugged her coat to her body. She shivered and curled up closer to my side as she walked barefoot over the cool sand.