If I Break (38 page)

“I know this is hard for you. I can’t begin to imagine what you’re going through right now,” I say honestly, trying to comfort him in some form.

“I don’t know
anything
about you,” his tone is apologetic, but his eyes and expression are compassionate.
Still
his words hurt; they feel like a knife penetrating through my heart. That familiar face is looking back at me, but his eyes show no sign of recognition, nor do his words. “But when you look at me, it’s as if you know everything about me,” he says, his eyes on me, staring into mine as if he’s trying to see inside me, as though if he stared hard enough, he’d have the answers to all his questions.

“I have enough trouble with one life,” he says with a sardonic laugh. “How am I’m supposed to deal with one I don’t know anything about? One that… that isn’t really mine?” he says to himself.

I open my mouth to respond to him and then realize that he thinks this is easier for me. It almost seems as if he doesn’t realize what I’ve been through… what I’m going through.

I pause, trying to carefully choose my words so as not to agitate or overwhelm him.

“When your parents told me about you,” I begin warily. “It was the hardest thing I’ve ever experienced; the most difficult thing I’ve ever had to listen to. I was hurt and confused; I didn’t even believe them… I didn’t want to believe them,” I say, clenching my wrist as I continue. “I’m
still
hurt. I am
still
confused. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to say to… to
you
,” I hear my voice crack and he turns around to face me.

“I can’t compromise with someone I don’t know either.” I take a few breaths to try and steady my heartbeat, but it’s futile as my pulse continues to race. I can feel his eyes on me and I continue to stare at the floor.

“When you look at me… it’s as if I’m a burden… a problem, and you have no idea how much that hurts,” I swallow the lump in my throat, hot tears in my eyes as I finally look up at him. He looks as if he’s going to say something, then doesn’t. His eyes take my place and become glued to the floor.

“I don’t blame you for it,” I quickly add. “I can’t... But you have to understand that you have Cal’s…” I laugh as the tears are unavoidable, but I try and maintain a steady voice as I continue.

“You… You have his smile, his voice, his eyes…” I feel myself smile through my tears when I think back to when Cal would smile at me, without being condescending, manipulative or arrogant—those rare moments when he’d truly smile.

“When I look at you… I can’t help but see him. And it hurts knowing that you weren’t the one who stole my heart when you first smiled at me, who took me bungee jumping on our first date, that you weren’t the one who told me I’m the only woman you have ever loved. But you’re… you’re not him, and you’re in love with someone else,” I feel embarrassed as the tears stream down my cheeks, but he needs to see them, to know that I’m a person.

“So, I’m sort of having a hard time with this,” I chuckle, finally wiping away some of the fallen tears. “Even knowing all of it, I don’t how I’m supposed to get past it,” I explain.

“How I’m supposed to deal with this… if I even can, but I’m willing to try because of that little girl in that picture. I’d do anything for her, including giving up the only person I’ve ever been in love with…”

He looks at me, dumbfounded. I feel myself starting to break down and I take a deep breath, wiping away all of my tears once more, commanding my eyes to stop it. I walk over to him forcing myself to see someone new, to not see Cal, but to see …Chris.

“I-I’m sorry. Please don’t cry,” his voice is shaky his expression is one I’ve never seen before. I see him looking around nervously his hands search his pocket and he pulls out a napkin the rough kind that usually comes from a fast food restaurant. I take it and wipe my eyes.

“I know you didn’t ask for this,” I say.

“I know that this isn’t your fault. And I know that you want to believe none of this is your problem, but it is, and it’s mine too… But it’s not Caylen’s.”

“I’m willing to accept that you’re not Cal, that you aren’t my husband; I can learn to do that. But I can’t relieve you of being Caylen’s father. You’re part of her,” I say, sternly enough to get the point across, yet tender enough as to not frighten him, “and that’s all I’m really sure about. That’s all that I can think of to say to you.”

The silence returns.

I walk over to the sofa and sit down, resting my head in my hands. A few minutes later I feel him sit beside me. I look over at him; he’s in deep thought with his hands clasped together. I’ve never seen him… Cal… like this before. Cal never let me know when anything was wrong accept that one occasion; when he was upset about anything, he always tried to hide it. He was very good at doing it.

“My parents say that he’s… They describe him like…” he trails off as if he’s trying to find the right words, afraid of offending me.

“Oh I know,” I answer.

“Your father didn’t hesitate to tell me what he thought of Cal,” I say with a sigh.

“Is he…? Was he…?”

“The person your parents describe isn’t who Cal was to me,” I tell him, although busy looking at my hands.

“Don’t get me wrong, he could be arrogant, mean, and snide… a lot,” I say honestly. “But that isn’t all there was to him,” I add in defense, “He’s so much more than that. He could be kind… caring… protective,” I smile as I reminisce back on the earlier part of our relationship, how infatuated I was with him, like I was in high school with a crush on a teacher. He had me wrapped around his finger, for God’s sake. I laugh at the ridiculousness of it.

“He's extremely intelligent, confident, and persuasive; he could talk anyone into doing what he wanted. He was handsome, incredibly sexy…” I say with a laugh before I realize what I just said… Oh God I did not just say that out loud!

I glance over and see that his cheeks are bright red. He’s blushing! I realize that in my entire life I’ve never seen him blush. I’m staring; staring isn’t good, not good at all… Say something!

Thankfully his phone rings and breaks this embarrassing silence. He takes it out and looks at it.

“Excuse me,” he says. I nod, and he walks a few feet away and answers it. “Hello? Yeah, I know, something came up,” I can tell by his tone of voice it’s
her
. “I’m on my way right now… I’ll see you then… I love you too.”

I can’t help but feel a twinge of jealousy… well… more than a twinge, a lot more, more like someone just kicked me in the stomach and is standing on my chest. The man I love, well, this man who resembles the man I love, in the exact same voice is professing his love to another woman. Knowing that it’s her he holds in his arms, her lips he kisses… oh, God I have to stop thinking like this.

“About the other day..I-I’m not usually like that,” I rub the back of my neck.

“No, it’s forgotten,” he says sincerely.

“Does she know about all of this?” I ask as he hangs up, but my focus is on the ceiling fan.

“About some things,” he says letting out a deep sigh. I nod. I don’t know what kind of answer that is, but I decide not to push any further.

“… I, uh… I have to-” he begins to explain. I smile weakly, letting him know it isn’t needed.

I walk with him to the door.

“My mom says you’re from Chicago. How long are you going to stay here?” he asks hesitantly.

“Well. I’m from Saginaw, but I live in Chicago,” I correct him as we walk the small distance to the door. I scratch my head and I realize that I only have enough money with me to pay for another day at the Inn and I left my credit cards.

“I have to get back to Caylen, most likely tomorrow morning,” I say when we reach the door.

“Oh,” he frowns slightly, as if he thought I would be staying longer.

“I have some things to take care of back home. It’ll take me a couple of days, but I can come back, and… let you see her. We can start to work something out,” I say almost incoherently due this unwonted situation we are in.

“That would be good. I’d like that since we have a lot to work out,” he says. I’m not sure if he’s joking or not.

“Um, let me give you my cell phone number,” he says.

I turn to get my phone and hand it to him; after a few second he puts it in. He hands me his, and I do the same.

“You have my home number too,” he says after I’m done, and we exchange phones awkwardly, almost as if we’re trying to avoid touching one another.

He opens the door and steps outside. It’s an awkward moment, and we both laugh at our obvious discomfort.

“I just realized that we never got a chance to really… uh…” I look at him confused as he extends his hand.

“I’m Chris,” he says with a soft smile. I let out a small laugh, realizing we never really did get a chance to properly introduce ourselves.

“I’m Lauren,” I say, taking his hand.

March 10th 2013

It’s funny how one day can change the whole course of your life. Not even a day really, just a few seconds. The moment you find out you’re having a child or the day you receive a bad medical report. Those life altering moments when you know that your life will never again be how it was before those few seconds happened.

I’ve walked through the door to the penthouse over a thousand times. Each time secretly hoping he’d be there, sitting on the couch, his eyes giving away so much and so little. And then time would freeze and in that moment it wouldn’t matter where he’d been, or who he’d been with just that he was home, and that he loved me and couldn’t stay away. I hoped that, of course, there would be a reasonable explanation -circumstances that were beyond his control that kept him from me, from us, our family.

Each scenario I imagined played out differently and vaguely, deep down I never cared what the explanation was, just that he was home, and that my family would be complete again. That longing feeling of missing him so much that I felt a part of me was missing, gone. That part of me would be returned in pieces, but not quite broken.

I think back to the days in the house alone when I returned after finding out I was pregnant. Even then I was trying to run away from the memory of him, hating him with every fiber of my being. Yet each day my stomach grew larger as a part of him grew inside of me. Love and hate crashing together in a never ending battle that I fought within myself. I wanted to erase his existence from my mind but each and every day I walked through the door returning home from some mundane task, I still secretly hoped he’d be there.

I know how ridiculous an idea it was to try and keep my hope a secret - even from myself. The thought of wanting a man back who walked out on his pregnant wife was too pathetic for my own subconscious to comprehend. Well he didn't know but still, why I was trying to hold on to something quixotic
hope
, unwarranted almost incomprehensible? But I did; I still had hope for Cal and me. Now there is no hope. It’s the first time that I know for a fact he won’t be there. That the man I’ve loved and loathed all of these years is a mere figment of the imagination of a man named Chris…or not, my mind is too exhausted to cope with the logistics of this entire situation.

I had imagined this all going differently on my drive back from Madison. After all the convincing I did to myself that this is an opportunity for me to start anew and to leave the past where it was, making myself see this as a freeing experience. I pictured myself walking through the door taking a deep breath and a weight being lifted.

All of the days which went before, when I was left not knowing if he was alive or not, if he was hurt, who was he with, if he thought about me, if he knew about Caylen ... the burden of all that was gone – liberated from me.

But now as I
actually
walk through this door the feeling is overwhelming, almost as overwhelming as the day he left. I thought I had convinced myself on the long drive back home that I could exorcise him from my life, from my mind and my thoughts. I convinced myself that I could deal with this and that the reality I have now has given me the closure I needed to move on. But walking through this door now, in real time, I feel like I’ve been punched in the chest, the wind gone from my body and I can’t breathe.

The true reality of this situation hits me likes a ton of bricks, and I can’t help but make my way to the floor to prevent from falling. I’m trying to stop myself from crying but the more I try, the more I can’t breathe. I reach back to try to push the door closed behind me and rest my head on it. I promised myself that I would cry my last tear over him back in Madison and that I would walk through this door stronger not weaker and would be ready to close this chapter of my life ready to begin afresh.

Now I realize that I was an idiot thinking I could just will myself to be prepared for this; I’m not. I’m so tired of feeling like this; I don’t know what I did to deserve this. To fall in love and wrap my life around a man who doesn’t even exist, and now sharing a child with someone who doesn’t even know who I am. How do I explain this to anyone? I’m barely coming to terms with this myself. And now I’m supposed to pretend like this all didn’t happen, while staring at the face of the man I’ve felt bound to?

“Lauren, Lauren honey, what’s wrong?”

I see through my cloud of tears, a fuzzy vision of Raven and Angela. I try to get a hold of myself but their touch seems to make my emotions pour out even more. Raven kneels down and wraps her arms around me, rubbing my back. I know I have to pull myself together; her seeing me like this is going to cause her to think the worst. What could be worse than this though?

“Lauren, what happened? Did you find him? Lauren talk to me,” she says, her tone calm but growing more frantic.

I try to catch my breath, feeling that I might as well get it over with, when I see Hillary hurry to my other side near Angela. I make another attempt: this is not how I wanted things to go. Nothing is going how I wanted it to.

“Where’s Caylen,” I say bewildered, knowing that one of the only things that can calm me down is her in my arms.

“Caylen’s fine honey, she’s sleeping,” Raven assures me.