Even though my brain and my heart are screaming at me to look away, I can’t do it. I keep walking in a daze through the bar until I’m only a few feet away from Fisher, who now has his hands wrapped around Melanie’s ass.
I watch her run her tongue over his lips. The same lips I’ve kissed for fourteen years, the same lips that have kissed every inch of my body and spoken words of love and desire. My heart feels like it’s breaking in half. I bend over at the waist and wrap my arms around myself, trying to hold it all together. I feel like any second, my insides will spill all over the floor at my feet. A strangled cry escapes my mouth as Melanie shifts her hips in Fisher’s lap and I hear him groan.
Both of their heads turn in my direction at my guttural sound and I want a hole to appear in the floor so I can fall through it and disappear forever.
Melanie smirks and Fisher stares right through me with cold, dead eyes.
“Sorry, sweetheart, it looks like you just didn’t have what it takes anymore,” Melanie sneers as she keeps her eyes on me while she leans forward and runs her tongue over Fisher’s lips again.
I feel someone’s arms wrap around me from behind. I don’t even struggle as they pull me backwards, away from the nightmare I’m living through right now.
“Come on, Lucy, let’s go home,” Ellie says softly next to my ear.
“Yeah, get out of here, I’m a little busy,” Fisher finally speaks as he wraps his arms around Melanie’s waist and turns his head to look at her instead of me.
“You’re a fucking asshole, you know that?” Ellie shouts as she continues to pull me through the bar.
“Been trying to get everyone to realize that for a while now,” Fisher yells in response, still gazing at Melanie.
I try to look away from the two of them, but I can’t do it. It’s like driving by a car accident and not being able to tear your eyes away from the devastation because you just have to see, you have to know that it’s real and that it actually happened.
“What the hell are all of you looking at? Mind your own fucking business!” I hear Bobby shout as his arms wrap around me, as well, and he helps Ellie usher me out of here.
I suddenly notice that the bar is silent. Someone turned off the music and everyone is looking between Ellie, Bobby and I over to what Fisher is doing at his table. It’s mortifying and I want to die. I feel like a bug under a microscope, like everyone is examining every detail of my life just for the fun of it. I don’t want to be the source of entertainment for this town. I’ve kept what’s been going on with Fisher a secret for years, never admitting to anyone but Ellie about how I felt like he was slipping further and further away from me. Too many people wanted our relationship to fail. Too many people tried to tell us that high school romances never work, especially when one of those people is a Marine who spends more time deployed than he does at home. I don’t want them to be right. I don’t want them to talk about me behind my back, satisfied that their predictions came true and that they were right along.
I can’t pretend like the things he said to me earlier were all lies, a way for him to push me away so I wouldn’t have to continue watching him fall down that deep, dark well. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. I’ve seen the betrayal and the hard truth of the words he spoke to me in living color.
My legs give out as we make it through the door of Barney’s and out onto the sidewalk. I don’t know who is holding me up or who is helping me walk at this point. Ellie and Bobby have a tight hold on me, both of them giving me words of apology and reassurance that I don’t even bother listening to as they take me away from the bar and my shattered hopes.
I’ve lost him. Everything he ever promised me was a lie. He was never going to find his way back to me.
Chapter 8
Fisher
Present Day
Lucy turns around and glares at me when I say her name. I might have added a little song to my voice when I said it, just like old times. I want to get a rise out of her. I want some sort of proof that she still feels something for me. I hate the fact that she’s clinging to this asshole’s arm so tightly that she’s probably cutting off circulation, practically begging him to keep her safe from the big bad wolf.
I want to say something cocky. I want to smirk at her and make some sort of joke about how I’m back and she can kick this jerk to the curb, but I can’t find my fucking voice. Jesus, how in the hell did I stay away from this woman for over a year? I didn’t want to, that’s for damn sure, but I had to. I was headed down a path that neither of us would have recovered from, and I couldn’t take her with me. I’d already done more damage to her than I cared to admit when I pushed her away, more harm than I ever wanted to think about, but that’s why I’m here. I have to relive all of that shit and I have to find a way to erase all of the pain I inflicted on her. It’s part of my recovery and it’s the only way I stand a chance in hell of proving to her that I never meant the things I said to her a year ago. I never meant to do what I did to her in that kitchen the last time I came home. It was a mistake. Every word I spoke and everything I did was a mistake, and I want to take it all back and make it right again. She just has to give me a chance to make it right.
“Jefferson.”
My first name on her lips sounds like a curse. I’ve never gone by that name since I share it with my father and my grandfather; it’s too confusing. I hate that damn name, but it’s still the most beautiful fucking sound in the world coming from her mouth, so I don’t complain.