Page 38 of A Love So Hard

“What is this place?” Lucy asked.

“Maybe we should get the little guy inside first, and then have this discussion.” She nodded her head, clearly a bit overwhelmed and from the looks of things the drive had done her no favors. Sitting still in basically the same position for so long had stiffened all of her muscles and sore spaces. I jumped out of the truck and ran around to her side to help her out. Then I moved to go pull Toby out of the car seat he was drooling all over in the back.

Once I got most everything unpacked from the truck I came back inside to find Lucy tucking Toby’s blanket around him where he was lying on the couch. The boy could sleep through anything. “Will you tell me now?”

I closed the front door behind me, threw the deadbolt lock to be sure that Toby wouldn’t be able to open the door if he woke up, and then turned back to her. “Come on, let me show you around and I’ll tell you everything.”

I gave her the tour of the home including the upstairs bedrooms and office area, the workout space in the garage, the new modern kitchen with all brand new appliances. “This is the house I bought four years ago,” I finally admitted.

“Aside from being really clean, it doesn’t look like anyone actually lives here though,” she stated quietly as she took another glance around with fresh eyes.

“I never moved in. I tried to once, for all of about two weeks, and then I just fucking couldn’t do it anymore so I went back to the clubhouse.”

“If you weren’t going to live in it, why did you keep it?”

I shrugged my shoulders and turned away. How could I tell her what this house meant to me? “It was the last thing I had of the dream we shared together.” The night your father told me you moved on I threw the engagement ring I’d gotten for you into the damned ocean. I was drunk, and I regretted the shit out of it the next day, but I stupidly thought at the time that it would magically help me let go and heal. I wanted the action to make me stop missing you.” I turned back to see that tears were spilling over onto Lucy’s cheeks then.

“When I really gave up after your dad closed down his shop, and I knew you were never coming back, I burned the kutte I’d had made for you.”

“Did it make you feel any better?” She asked, sniffing.

I shook my head. “Worse. It made me feel so much worse, Lucy because I couldn’t get it back. So, instead of having it just in case I ever found you again the damn thing was just as lost to me as you were from that point on.” I glanced around seeing the house from her point of view. “I couldn’t let go of the house because it was the last thing I’d done for us before everything went wrong. I bought this house to build our family in. It was everything you kept saying you wanted, and I needed to give you that. I knew the day I let the house go would be the moment you would never be able to come back to me.”

“CJ,” she whispered. “If I had known,” her words were choked off by emotion.

“I know, baby,” I managed to get out as I reached for her and pulled her into my body, holding her close in our house for the first time. “Things will be different from here on out, I promise you that.”

“CJ, I need to know…” She hiccupped and then slowly her eyes traveled up my chest until she was staring into my own. “Was there ever anyone else?”

I shook my head again. “What you saw that night,” I started to explain again.

“No. Not that. I know what that was now, and I can’t tell you how sorry I am that I didn’t realize sooner. I wasn’t there for you and I can never take that back.”

“There was never anyone else. I won’t lie to you. One night, when I had vowed to start moving on, I got deliriously drunk and I had sex with a woman. Fuck, I still feel bad that I wasn’t aware enough to question who the hell she was.” I saw Lucy flinch, but I needed her to know the story. If she planned on sticking this time, we both needed to be completely honest with one another so there would never be a need to doubt again.

“It’s just that the woman ended up being someone’s wife. PeeWee – from the club – has an older brother by about 17 years, I think. His wife came to the clubhouse and like I said I was drunk, looking to get over my hurt, and move on. We talked, drank some more, and I remember the moment she climbed into my lap, but then I was pretty much out of it until I was being punched in the face by her husband the next day.”

“Oh my God! I can’t believe she did that!” Then Lucy scrunched up her nose. “Wait, if PeeWee’s brother was older, then how old was the woman?” It was my turn to cringe.

“In her forties according to PeeWee.”

“Oh, CJ, you had sex with an old lady? And not the kind of old lady you guys treasure, but like… really, an old lady?” She surprised the shit out of me then when she started laughing. “Poor guy!” She managed to hiss the two words out between her laughter before she grabbed hold of her ribs and groaned in pain the movement had caused.

“Damn, I already hear enough shit from the guys at the clubhouse. Not you too, sweetheart!”

“I’m sorry,” she huffed out while trying to quell her laughter. “It’s just… that was honestly the only time you were with someone the whole time I’ve been gone?”

I tipped my head up and down quickly. Her face sobered and then her lips drew down in a bit of frown that I disliked immensely. “I’m sorry, CJ. That must have been pretty lonely for you. Even when I was angry, thinking you did the unthinkable, I still only wanted you to be happy in the end. Even if it wasn’t with me.”

“That was the problem. I couldn’t be happy because you weren’t there.” I looked her in the eyes then. “There is no happiness without you, babe. I know that for a fact now.”

She clutched her stomach, and then turned worried eyes my way once again. “CJ, there was always something missing with him, but I had to try.”

“Shh,” I cooed to her. “You didn’t do anything wrong, Luce. Am I happy to know you were with someone else? Fuck no. Does it make me happy that the asshole you were with fucked you up and put you in the hospital? It makes me murderous. I don’t think any of it was your fault or something I you need to feel bad about. You believed the illusion Stiff left you with. You believed your dad, and you had good reason to. He’s been your go-to person all your life.”

“He wasn’t even my real dad.” The devastation in those words rang out in each one.

“He may not have been the one who created you, but he was the one who stood by your side, kissed your hurts away, watched you graduate, and got you to that point in your life.”

---