Page 53 of Here Comes Trouble
After a couple more days of staring into space, he tried calling her, first on her mobile, only to be sent straight to voicemail, then at her magazine, only to be told she wasn’t available and could they take a message?
He sent numerous texts asking her to get in touch with him, becoming more and more irate when his phone remained steadfastly silent.
She’d cut him away like the bloodsucking leech he was.
It wasn’t the first time a woman had walked out on him, but he’d never liked any of the others enough to care that much before. He liked Jess though, an awful lot.
She’d twisted herself into his thoughts and he found himself on edge and preoccupied by the emptiness she’d left by her desertion. He barely knew her, but she’d done something to his psyche by forcing him to think about someone other than himself for once – as if she’d opened up a gaping hole in him which he was having trouble healing.
He should have been honest with her about how he really felt, instead of treating her like something fun to do. He cringed at the memory of telling her that.
But he’d been scared. It was his standard defence mechanism, to keep his lovers at an emotional distance so he’d never have to deal with more of the painful feelings of rejection he’d been living with since he could remember.
His whole life had revolved around needing people to buy into the image of the bad boy loner hewantedthem to see, rather than the real him and he seemed unable to drag himself out of its death-like grip.
Without meaning to he’d let Jess glimpse the real him, but when she’d pushed for more he’d thrown up his barriers, keeping their relationship purely physical, keeping her out.
Using her for his own ends.
He’d unequivocally demonstrated that his career was the most important thing in the world to him and that she’d meant nothing. He’d used her to fix himself, drained their relationship of everything good, then spat her out. Because he was a selfish fucker. His father had been right after all; he didn’t deserve to be loved, not when he acted the way he did. He took everything he wanted and gave nothing back.
He was pure, unadulterated greed.
If he was ever going to be good enough for Jess, he needed to learn how to let go of his anger and jealousy and fear and give her back what she’d given to him.
Humility and kindness and altruism. To learn how to give for the sake of giving, instead of looking for what he could get out of it.
He’d drawn himself into such a hard shell nothing had been able to penetrate it. Until Jess came along and started tapping at the cracks.
She’d been absolutely right about how distanced he’d allowed himself to be from everyone else, how hyper-focused he was about how things affected him. He’d completely overlooked how he’d messed up everyone else who came into contact with him, just so he could get what he wanted.
He’d been alone for so long he had no idea how to let someone else into his life. How to care about them and let them care for him. Deep down he accepted now that he’d thought of himself as unlovable, after having it rammed home over the years through his dad’s total lack of interest in him. He’d never admitted to his father how that had made him feel, he’d just shrugged it off as how things were, but he should have been braver. He should have stood up for himself instead of shutting himself away.
And now Jess had given up on him too.
He wanted her back so much it made him ache, but how could he ever make her believe he meant it?
It was time to face up to what kept him so distanced from everyone else in his life.
He needed to let go of this feeling that he still had something to prove to a father who had never cared about him. The old man was dead and he needed to move on with his life now.
Then he needed to find Jess and convince her that he was sorry and that he was worth taking a risk on. That he could be trusted.
After days of not being able to face going in to his studio and hiding away from the world in his flat, he finally made the journey back there. Picking up a scalpel from in amongst the mess of paints and modelling equipment on his art table, he walked over to the painting of Jess. It was the piece of work that could prove he wasn’t the flash in the pan that he, and pretty much everyone else in the world it seemed, had feared he was.
Raising the scalpel, he brought it down hard across the canvas, cutting a large gash from corner to corner, then another, and another, until all that was left was a frame with colourful strips hanging from it like ragged paper garlands.
It was time to start again.
10
After a few weeks of going through the motions of getting up and going to work in a stultified daze, Jess finally began to come out of the emotional coma she’d put herself in in an attempt to block the pain and humiliation of how Xander had used her.
At least she’d been able to give Pamela what she’d wanted and included a bit about Xander exploring the theme of ‘Sexual Awakening’ in his new exhibition in order for the article to be published.
He’d tried calling her a couple of days after she’d first stormed out, a phone call which she’d ignored in her anger at him. Then he’d sent a few texts which she’d deleted without reading. She hadn’t heard from him since. He’d obviously given up on her now and she didn’t expect ever to hear from him again. But then, why the hell would she be any different to the tens of women he’d already cast aside? He’d probably moved on to a new love affair already.
She wouldn’t know. She hardly looked at social media any more for fear of seeing something about him and a new lover that would bring back the flood of heartache she was only just starting to break through.
