Page 22 of Good Intentions, Vol. 2

I miss you.

I miss us.

She didn’t give me a chance to hold her.

She didn’t give me a chance to tell her I’m here, that everything will be alright.

She said what she came to say and left me.

Just as she did every day.

Only now I knew I had to go to her.

I had to be there for my wife.

She needed me.

After the door behind Claire clicked softly, echoing around the still silence that was my company, visions of Heather came.

And I was met with an impossible choice.

*~*~*

“What are you doing here?” I whisper knowing she can’t hear me.

She’s fast asleep.

Watching her like this, her hands under the pillow, one leg thrown over the covers, her guard down. The disdain she shows every second of the day cast away. I can almost see the girl who I met and to whom I kept coming back over and over foolishly thinking I had it all in my control and I didn’t have any feelings for her. The woman I married. The mother of my son.

Carefully sitting down on the edge of my bed, I let the memories of who she was, who we were, roll in my head.

“I don’t know what to do anymore, Claire,” extending my hand, I watch the tip of my finger as it glides over her face, brushing her hair away from her face with belated breath.

God, this is the first time I touched my wife in over a year. She wouldn’t let me do it if she was awake, going so far as to flinch away from my touch. What hurts the most, I realize I missed it.

I miss her smell, I miss her skin, I miss her smile, her laugh, her enjoyment of everything I had to give her, her belief in me.

I just miss her.

Not the way she is now, but the woman I fell in love with.

And then just as rapidly that this realization came, comes the vision of Heather.

Heather in my shower in the office, the first time I’d seen her. All of her.

Heather on her knees under my desk.

Heather pressed against the wall of windows in my office, me moving in her.

Heather telling me she loves me for the first time.

Heather saying good morning to me with her eyes still closed and a small smile playing at her lips.

Heather smiling, dancing with me in her living room, laughing at me because of something I did or said, her soft look while she talked on the phone with her friend, her hopeful one while she did the same with her Dad.

And my heart starts beating faster.

“What do I do? How do I find a way to fix everything? How do I find a way out of this mess without hurting anyone?” Even before I finish my questions, I know the answers.