“It was a last minute decision yesterday evening. Stanford and I decided to do a picnic on the beach, so we’re just picking up a few things,” I explain to her.
She finally notices Stanford standing beside me and her head jerks back and forth between us like she’s at a tennis match.
“Oh! You’re still…I thought…I mean, I heard…last night. I didn’t realize you two were still together,” she stammers awkwardly.
Oh, for the love of God. Now my mother is joining the gossip mill?
Moving closer to Stanford, I slide my hand through his arm and lean into him, resting my head on his shoulder.
“Yes, we’re together and we’re very happy,” I inform her, giving her my biggest smile.
“It’s nice to see you again, Evelyn,” Stanford tells her with a warm smile. He’s met my parents a few times over the last month and my parents have been nice to him, but a little standoffish. It’s annoying and we’re definitely going to be sitting down and having a talk about it soon.
Lifting my head, I push up on my toes and kiss Stanford right on the lips. Laying it on a little thick, I know, but give me a break. My mother, of all people, needs to cut me some slack. She knows what I went through with Fisher and she knows that dating someone else for the first time in my life scares me to death. Unfortunately, she and my father adore Fisher and all they talk about when I see them is whether I’ve heard from him and how worried they are about him. I know it’s going to be much worse now that he’s back home.
“Yes, well it’s…very nice to see you again, too,” my mother says with a tight smile as she adds up our total and Stanford pulls out his wallet to pay her.
I grab the bag from the counter and try not to give her the stink eye when I tell her I’ll talk to her later. We say our goodbyes and Stanford and I walk away, heading across the street to the beach.
“I’m sorry about that. My mother is…”
“Protective of her one and only daughter?” Stanford asks with a laugh. “It’s okay, I’m a big boy. I can handle it. As long as you’re okay, I’m okay.”
I tighten my hold on his arm and rest my head on his shoulder, just for myself this time instead of for show. This man really is charming and kind and I should be thrilled that he wants to be with me. I need to stop comparing him to someone else and enjoy learning about him and, like he said, see where this thing takes us. As we walk down the stairs to the boardwalk on the sand, I decide that is exactly what I’m going to do. I don’t care what anyone in this town thinks, I’m going to do what makes me happy.
Chapter 13
Fisher’s Therapy Journal
Memory Date: April 8, 2014 – 1:45 PM
“Maybe we should look into counseling again.”
Lucy’s words over breakfast run on a loop in my head. Tossing back another shot of whiskey, I hurl the empty glass across the kitchen. It shatters against the cupboards and the pieces scatter across the floor.
I’m broken, just like those fucking pieces of glass. I know it, and now Lucy knows it. Counseling isn’t going to work, nothing is going to work. She looked at me this morning with pity and I couldn’t stand it anymore. I don’t want her fucking pity.
I hear a loud bang outside and drop to the floor, covering my head with my arms. My breath comes out in gasps as I lie there waiting to hear the sound of gunfire and the sting of a bullet piercing my skin. When no sound and no pain come, I open my eyes and realize I’m lying on the kitchen floor.
“What the fuck is wrong with you, you stupid asshole?” I mutter to myself as I push up from the floor and stalk over to the counter to grab another glass and the half-full bottle of whiskey. I pour the amber liquid halfway up the glass and down the entire thing in one swallow.
She can’t be here anymore, she can’t see me like this. She’s just kidding herself if she thinks me sitting in an office with some quack in a suit judging me and what I’ve been through is going to help me. I’m beyond help. The faster she realizes that, the faster she can get the hell out of here and away from me.
My hands shake as I forego the glass and just bring the bottle of whiskey right up to my mouth. A creaking from somewhere upstairs makes me jerk the bottle away from my lips. I smack it down on the counter, get into a crouch and quietly move through the house, darting in between doorways and silently racing up the stairs, just like I was taught. The only thing missing is the heavy weight of my rifle in my hand.
“WHO THE FUCK IS UP THERE?” I shout, as I get halfway up the stairs. “I WILL END YOUR SORRY LIFE, MOTHERFUCKER!”
Kicking in the bedroom door, I charge into the room, seeing desert sand and Humvees in front of me instead of a bed and a dresser. I drop to the sand and army crawl, knowing I’ll be safe if I can just get to the convoy. Reaching down to my side to grab my gun, I feel nothing. I don’t have my weapon. Why in the fuck am I without a weapon? A Marine should never be without his weapon. I hear gunfire and explosions in the distance and I crawl faster, keeping my body low and my head down.
“COVER ME! SOMEBODY FUCKING COVER ME!” I scream as I claw at the sand and move as fast as I can.
My head smacks into a desert rock and I close my eyes and shake the pain away. When I open them again, I see cream carpet under my body and a king-sized bed covered in pale blue blankets right in front of my face. Not sand, not a rock, not a Humvee and not a convoy. Nothing but the bedroom I share with my wife.
“Oh, Jesus, oh, my God, what the fuck is happening to me?” I mutter as I push myself up from the floor and take in my surroundings, blinking to make sure what I’m seeing is real.
“I have to get her out of here. She can’t be here anymore,” I mumble as I race to the closet and pull two suitcases from the top shelf. Running over to the bed, I toss them on top and quickly unzip them, flipping them open.
I go to the dresser, pulling open the top drawer and grabbing socks, bras, underwear, whatever I can fit into my arms, before I race back to the bed and dump everything in to the first suitcase.
“Fisher, what the hell are you doing?”
The voice from the doorway startles me and I jump, automatically reaching down to my side for my gun. When I see Lucy standing there staring at me in confusion, I almost drop to my knees with the force of my shame. I reached for my gun. I reached for my fucking gun! If it had been there instead of locked up in a gun case in the living room, I could’ve shot her. I could’ve pulled it on her and put a bullet right through her chest.
“You’re leaving. Right now. I can’t do this anymore,” I tell her, the vision before me flashing between her standing in the doorway and an insurgent standing there with a gun aimed at me.
The insurgent disappears as quickly as he came and all I see is Lucy, my beautiful Lucy, standing in the doorway with tears filling her eyes.
“Fisher, please, don’t do this!” she begs as the first tear spills down her cheek.
I ignore her voice, even though it cuts right through me and makes me want to change my mind. I turn and run to the closet, ripping everything she owns off of hangers and piling the skirts and dresses, jeans and shirts in my arms. I come back out and stop again at the dresser, pulling open the bottom drawer and grabbing whatever else I can hold.
I toss all of that stuff into the second suitcase and watch as it morphs into an IED lying in the sand. I shake the image from my mind and try not to throw up all over the place.
“We’re done, this is over. I’m packing your shit and you’re leaving.”
I’m sorry, I love you, please forgive me.
She grabs onto my arm and I yank it out of her grip. I can’t let her touch me right now. Everything will come crashing down if I let her touch me. I need her touch, I want her touch, I don’t know how I will live without her touch…
But I need to protect her more.
She begs and pleads with me, asking me to talk to her, just talk to her. She has no idea that I can’t. I can’t tell her all of the things that are so monumentally fucked up with me
right now.
“There’s nothing to talk about. It’s perfectly clear what’s going on here. Everything is fucked up, don’t you get that? It’s ruined, all of it is ruined and you need to fucking leave!”
I’m so sorry, I love you, please forgive me.
Her voice fills the room as she tries to get me to stop and listen to her. I can’t take it. I can’t take the sound of her voice, it hurts too much hearing all the loving words she gives me. They rip right through me and gut me like a fucking fish. I know she’ll never leave. She’ll never walk away from me like she needs to, like she HAS to. She needs to be safe, and I need her to understand that this is the only way I can protect her from what I’ve become.
Hurtful things, so many hurtful things I spit at her.
“You need to get a life.”
I’m sorry, I love you, please forgive me.
“All those sad, pathetic letters…”
I’m lying, don’t believe me, please don’t believe me. I loved your letters, I kept them all and I cherish every one of them.
She presses her soft, sweet hands to my face and I rest my forehead against hers. I’m weak, I can’t help it. I need to breathe her in one last time. I need to feel her close to me and remember why I’m doing this, why I’m doing all of these awful things to her. I need her to walk away. I need her to hate me enough to leave so she can be safe. I’ll do anything to keep her safe. Every word I speak kills more and more of me, until I’m sure there’s nothing left but an empty shell. She slides her hands under my shirt and I’m immediately hard for her. Her mouth makes its way down to my neck and I want to growl with my need for her when her lips and her teeth press into my skin. I need her. I love her.
But I can’t have her or I will wind up killing her.
“I prefer women with a little more experience…”
I don’t mean it. I don’t mean any of it. Knowing I’m the only man who has ever been inside of you makes me feel like a fucking king and the luckiest man alive. I’m sorry, I love you, please forgive me.
She tells me she hates me and that empty shell crumbles to pieces and I know there’s nothing left.
“It doesn’t get better when I come home to you…I hate this life…”
I’m lying! Every word is a lie. I love our life and I wouldn’t change it for anything in the world. I love you, I love you, I love you.
I grab her suitcases from the bed and toss them to the floor before I change my mind. I walk right past her, not saying a single word, even though I want to pull her into my arms and beg her not to leave me. It’s too late for that now. Looking at the devastation on her face, I’m certain that all the lies I told, all the things I said to her to play on her insecurities and make her hate me…it worked. It worked just like I wanted it to. It worked so well that I know there’s no hope of ever getting her to forgive me.
I don’t deserve her forgiveness. I never deserved her to begin with, so now she’ll be free to find security and happiness without having to worry about the broken man she married who can never be fixed.
Chapter 14
Fisher
Present Day
“How does it feel to be the talk of the town? Again? Jesus, you’re mister popularity,” Bobby says with a laugh as I help him wash his gear down by the water.
Bobby runs his parents’ snorkeling and scuba hut during the summer season as well as a golf cart and bike rental business, doing so well for himself that he doesn’t need to work during the winter months. One of the perks of being friends with him is that I can dive anytime I want as long as I help him wash down all the gear when I’m finished. Bobby and I went for an early-morning dive before all the tourists woke up and it was a good way for me to clear my head. There’s nothing like being all alone, down on the ocean floor, surrounded by fish and coral with nothing but the sound of your breathing apparatus filling your ears to think about things.
“It’s not my fault this town has nothing better to do,” I complain as we move all the cleaned gear to buckets to take back to the hut for the next diving tour.
“It’s true, this place was pretty boring while you were gone,” Bobby admits.
His phone beeps with an incoming text message and he takes it out of the pocket of his cargo shorts, smiling and chuckling at what’s on the screen.
“Who’s that?” I ask, nodding towards the phone.
He looks up guiltily, wipes the smile off of his face and quickly shoves the phone back in his pocket.
“No one, nothing, it’s nothing,” he replies quickly.
“Really? It didn’t look like nothing. You giggled like a little girl,” I joke as we make our way up the beach.
“I do not giggle. I never giggle. Fuck off,” he grumbles, shoving one of the buckets up on the counter of the hut.
I put my own bucket up next to his, turn and face him with my eyebrow raised, waiting for him to spill the beans. It only takes a few seconds for him to crack.
“Fine! It was Ellie. It’s no big deal.”
I stare at him in shock and then toss my head back and laugh. “Ellie? Are you serious? I thought you couldn’t stand her. Why in the hell is she sending you text messages that make you giggle. And don’t try to deny it, you totally fucking giggled.”
He starts unloading the equipment from the buckets and lining it up on the counter so it’s easy for the people in the tour to grab after they’ve received their instruction.
“Look, don’t make a big thing about this. I like her, okay? She’s not as big a bitch as I thought she was. She’s actually kind of sweet,” he says with a shrug.
“You are such a shitty liar,” I laugh again. “You never thought she was a bitch. You’ve been trying to screw her since the first day you met her, and you got pissed when she blew you off.”
“Of course I have. Have you seen that chick? Long, thick black hair, big blue eyes, tits that are more than a handful and an ass I want to sink my teeth into. Who wouldn’t want to screw her?” he asks.
I raise my hand.
“Well, no shit. She’s your ex-wife’s best friend. And she hates you. She’d probably cut off your dick if you got within five feet of her.”
We take the empty buckets inside the hut and stack them against the back wall.
“Let’s get back to the more important matter at hand. What in the fuck are you going to do about Lucy? You know your window of opportunity is about ready to slam shut, right? As we speak, she is on another date with Sphincter. Sorry, I mean Stanford. I heard from Ellie that it’s a romantic picnic on the beach,” he informs me.
I close my eyes and take a deep breath, trying not to picture Lucy and Stanfuck snuggled together on a blanket in the sand.
“I’m trying to do this the right way. I don’t want to invade her space or piss her off. Right now, I just want her to know that I’m back and I’m not going anywhere.”
“I think it’s high time you ‘invade her space’,” Bobby tells me, complete with air quotes. “Stan the Man is not about to back down. There’s talk that he wants to buy Butler House from her and she’s not really in a position to say no to him. He wants to partner with her and turn it into a resort, complete with a waterpark and spa. If they go into business together, you’ll never be able to get close to her.”
“What the hell do you mean she’s not in a position to say no to him? Why in the fuck would she ever sell the inn? It’s been in her family for three generations and she loves that place,” I tell him, my anger on her behalf starting to grow.
The nerve of that ass fuck thinking he can come in here and buy Lucy’s business right out from under her.
“Dude, the inn hardly makes any money. She’s barely scraping by as it is, and with a place as old as that, there’s always shit going wrong that she needs to fix. She’s not going to be able to afford that place for too many more seasons before the bank takes it over. It’s a fucking money pit,” Bobby explains.
The inn has never turned much of a profit for as long as
I’ve known Lucy, but it was always more than enough to cover her expenses and give her something to live on. Aside from that, she got half of everything I owned in the divorce. I would have given her every single penny I had, but the courts wouldn’t let me. She should have plenty of money to do whatever she wants to the inn. What did she do with the money I sent her? Does she hate me so much that she refused to use it, even to make repairs to the place she loves? I’m angry and irritated, assuming that she never used the money just because it came from me. It was hers, all of it was hers to do with as she wanted. Why the hell didn’t she use it? She could keep the inn in her family and avoid having to sell it to ANYONE, but especially that fucker who clearly has another agenda aside from getting in her pants.
“Well, would you look at that? A pretty lady all alone on the beach,” Bobby tells me, nodding his head over my shoulder.
Turning around, I see Lucy off in the distance, sitting on a blanket, staring out at the ocean.
Telling Bobby I’ll talk to him later, I head in her direction. I watch as she leans back on her hands and turns her face up to the sun, her long hair cascading down behind her and brushing the blanket she’s sitting on. She’s so fucking beautiful it takes my breath away. I don’t know where fuck face went and why she’s sitting here all alone and I don’t care. All I care about is getting close to her again.
I walk up in front of her, stopping when I’m blocking the sun from her face. Her eyes blink open and she looks up at me, a scowl taking over her face.
“Nice to see you again, too,” I say with a laugh. “Mind if I sit down?”
I point to the blanket and she hesitates. I decide to plop down next to her anyway and deal with the consequences later. I sit close enough that her thigh presses against mine and her shoulder rubs against my arm. She scoots away with a huff and I keep my laughter to myself.