Page 11 of Beyond our Forever

Who turned off the air conditioning? I’m dying here.

I’m drowning.

Out of the corner of my eye I see him throw a couple of bills on the table and run after me. I don’t care about the free show we’re giving the other diners, all I want is to go back home, to the solitude of my room. To the bed that we once shared, which is now cold, and has been for quite some time. It’s become the graveyard of our love, where I have to live daily surrounded by the mausoleum of our dreams.

I have the perfect house, but feel more incomplete than ever.

More imperfect than ever.

“Ilythia,” he calls, quick to follow, he’s behind me, his hand taking me by the arm.

“What do you want?” I ask him loudly, pulling out of his grasp.

“My family,” he insists. “I want my family back.”

“You can see the children whenever you want, Bruce. You know I would never deny you that.”

“But that’s not enough.”

As if I didn’t know.

There is much that separates us, we are both aware of that, but if he’s added to all our problems by finding consolation in another woman’s arms, then the distance becomes gigantic.

Impassable.

“Give me a chance,” he pleads. “Let’s start again, love.”

“It’s too late.”

“You don’t love me anymore?”

“No one is indispensable. People die, but life goes on.”

The pain from what I said is evident in his dark eyes and also in mine.

It is tangible.

“Do you live better without me?”

“I live,” I reply bitterly, wanting to acknowledge that I just exist, that’s it.

Everything blurs, the sounds around us muted by the beat of my broken heart. I’m about to fall apart here, in the middle of the street as my body trembles. Why does it have to be this way? This should be easier, like someone cutting out my appendix with a scalpel. Someone come and anesthetize me. I want to stop feeling. I want to stop hurting.

So why don’t I accept his proposal, it would be so easy, right? But nothing has really changed with him. So I know in a few short days we’d return to the same old ways, getting lost in the hustle and bustle of the children. I’d get lost between the time it takes me to make food and do the laundry. Between routine and comfort, between wanting and not having.

Between yearning and never getting.

I’d rather be alone and know where I stand, than to have someone by my side but remain submerged in that emptiness. There is no worse loneliness than that. Believe me, I am a firsthand witness.

“Taxi,” I yell, drawing the attention of a car just passing by.

I get in as fast as I can and I’m soon on my way, dissolving into pieces on the sticky vinyl of the back seat, under the pitiful eye of the driver.

At home, I sit for a long time on the wooden swing hanging on the porch, trying to pull myself together. I don’t want my children to see me like this, they are dealing with enough changes, it’s not been easy for any of them to see their father leave this house. Bruce has always been a caring, devoted, loving father, but although that was a very important part of our relationship, the shortfall in other areas was so great that in the end that outweighed all the good parts.

The kisses that we did not give each other.

The touches that were never offered.

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