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Consciousness comes with too much pain. I roll over to try and go back to sleep. Instead, I fall off the damned couch with a painful thud. Shit, the fall reminds me of Anne fainting and falling, then the whole fucking morning I want to forget.
Marshall is standing above me. “Jesus man, I was worried you were in a coma. Here, drink some water. You have to be feeling as bad as when you fell asleep, after that fall.”
Taking the bottle, I down it without stopping. I’m thirsty, and hungry. “What time is it? Did you go check on Anne? Is she okay?”
“It’s almost ten o’clock at night, you slept the whole fucking day away. Yeah, I went and checked on Anne. Is she okay? I don’t think so, man.”
“What do you mean you don’t think so?” Fear for her and the baby twists my chest into knots.
“What I mean, is for a woman who is two and a half months pregnant with a wedding dress in her closet, which she won’t be wearing, I got to tell you she isn’t, okay.
“I would say she’s about as far from okay as a woman can get. Don’t fucking forget all this hell you are putting her through is because she does love you but isn’t reading the lines from the script you made up.”
I can’t fucking breathe at the idea of Anne in pain. She’s hurting, I know because I’m hurting, and it’s all my fault. Sitting on the floor I let my head fall against the seat of the couch. “Okay, tell me how to fix this.”
“Thank fucking god. First go take a shower, you’re starting to stink. I’ll order something up for you. Listen for room service. I’m going to go get a change of clothes from your room. We’ll talk about how to fix this when I get back.”
I turn the shower on as hot as I can bear it and stand under the water to try and wake up. Marshall was right, asking Anne to marry me after only a week in Italy was too much, too fast. Even with the baby, I should have waited until we were in Paris, or maybe even back in Chicago. Yes, every time I told Anne I loved her and she didn’t say it back was painful, but it’s nothing compared to what I’m going through now.
Remembering Anne’s words about me buying her, along with her threat to walk out if I didn’t start talking because she was tired of being the only one to talk was a well-deserved punch. If I had put in the time and talked to her like Marshall told me, she’d have felt safer, more willing to believe in me. Anne would never have been able to give me what I wanted, and it was my fault because I wasn’t willing to tell her what it was I wanted and needed.
I grab a towel to dry off. I look but can’t find a robe. Wrapping the towel around my hips I hear knocking on the door. Damn, that was quick. Then I catch the clock, what the hell? I’d been in the shower for almost twenty minutes? It hadn’t felt like I’d been in there for that long. Where the hell is Marshall?
Opening the door, the guy is full of apologies for taking so long. I waive it off, telling him not to worry. I sign for the food and sit down to eat. It’s a good steak, but as the minutes tick by I’m growing more and more worried about where Marshall is and why he’s been gone so long. I’m done and pacing when the door finally opens. “Where have you been?”
Marshall tosses me jeans and a shirt. “Go get dressed.”
“Where have you been?” He’s not meeting my eyes, barely looking at me.
“Looking for Anne.”
I go cold. “Looking for Anne?”
“Yeah, she wasn’t in the room and her stuff is gone.”
“Her phone?”
“It was on the table beside her ring and her credit cards.”
Sonofabitch, if he’d knifed me it wouldn’t have had me bleeding out this bad. I shake my head no. I run to our room, my heart pounding in my ears until I can hear nothing. I search the suite, going up to the rooftop terrace but she’s not here. She’s gone, she’s really gone.
The roaring in my ears is taking me over. The smack Marshall delivers to my cheek is painful, shocking me back into the moment. I’m back in our suite, in the room we had made love in only a few days ago. As I remember that night I know she isn’t gone.
Marshall’s hand around my arm stops me. “Grant, wherever you think you’re going, you need to get dressed to get there.”
I look down. I’d lost my towel. “Thanks. Give me five then tell me what to say when I find her.”
“I’ll be raiding your mini-fridge you need more water.”
Dre
ssed, I take the water Marshall hands me. “Okay, what the hell can I possibly say to make this right?”
The taxi driver had driven like he was trying to qualify for the Indy 500. I had asked for it, but it was still over an hour since I’d found out Anne was gone. It’s a little after midnight when he screeches to a stop outside the airport. As I get out I hand him Euro.
I’m scanning the entrance when I see her. Anne is sitting on the floor looking miserable, with only her purse and a small carry on in front of her. She doesn’t see me until I’m a few feet away. For the first time since she fainted in Rome her eyes are silver pools as she looks up at me. Relief sends me to my knees in front of her.
“I’m so sorry. As crazy as it sounds I loved you too much to get this right. You told me your life wasn’t code I could just punch out and expect to happen, but I didn’t really listen. My life has been code, I’ve just punched out, and it happened the way I wanted—until you.
