Page 70 of Aftermath
“How?” I asked, unsure of what exactly it was he wanted me to do.
“Take a deep breath,” he instructed. “And close your eyes.”
I inhaled and let it out slowly, letting my eyelids flutter shut. I focused on what I could sense around me. The low hum of music and the distant conversations that carried through the air. The smell of food being brought out from the kitchen. Beneath me, I could feel the way the leather of the seat felt against my thighs.
I didn’t need my eyes open to know exactly what the scene around me looked like.
“Where were you in the pub that night?” Stone asked.
Easy.
“I was over by the bar. It was Calvin‘s birthday.”
“Good, keep that same focus,” he instructed. “What do you remember about the atmosphere? Was it loud? Were there many others around you?”
We’d been singing happy birthday to Calvin, everyone holding their drinks in the air, giving a cheers to him. It was the first time I allowed myself happiness like that in a long time. Jake hovered close behind me, and I shuddered to remember the way he always had control. I recalled the way the bar was packed that night, a warm fall day with many out to enjoy it into the night.
“It was loud. I could barely hear Calvin and my friends over all the chatter,” I said.
It was almost like a my mind placed me right back in the moment. Reality slipping away.
“Did you notice anyone? Someone around you who didn’t fit or was taking notice of your group?”
I glanced around the room. I could see my friends, people I hadn’t spoken to in years now. Calvin with his arm around Eloise. It was one of the first times I truly got to know her. Jake’s hands were on the small of my back, but not in a comforting manner. It was in the type of way I knew, at any moment, he’d rip me from the joy.
I tried to look around, but I didn’t notice anyone else.
“No,” I said, feeling discouraged.
My heart raced, and I felt the sinking in my stomach.
“It’s alright,” Stone assured me. “You’re doing great.”
I knew it was the calm before the storm. I’d lived it out before. Any moment now, Jake would pick a fight and storm off, leaving me alone at the pub.
“What happens next, Lenny?” he pushed gently, and I ignored the flutter my stomach gave at the name.
My hands trembled in my lap the second I pushed forward in the timeline. I couldn’t tell if it was real or just part of the memory.
Jake spun me around to let me quietly know it was time to go, but I hadn’t wanted to leave. I wasn’t ready. My brother‘s birthday was the first time I’d been able to celebrate with him, and I wanted to share my own news. I’d been waiting for the right moment to pull him aside and tell him, but I hadn’t found my chance yet. All I wanted was to share one night with my friends and family, then go back to being the perfect fiancée Jake expected.
“He left,” I said quietly.
“Who left?”
The moment I protested leaving, he’d been pissed. He pulled me off to the side of the bar and started laying into me as quietly as he could, but I could hear the anger behind every word he spat in my face.
Ungrateful, disobedient, bitch.
Just a few the choice words used to shame me. I remembered holding my stomach, praying it would end.
“Fine. If you want to throw everything away for this, I’m leaving,” he hissed.
I watched him storm out before I had a chance to say anything. It was how all our arguments went. He was never willing to talk through or hear my side; he always stormed off, eventually forgiving me later when I begged for it.
This would be no different.
“Jake,” I said.
