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Davis
Shoving open the apartment door, it bangs heavily against the wall with a loud thud.
I immediately shut and lock it behind me, closing out the memories…the expectations….the best that I can. Being here in this small space, and with all the stress of my so-called life weighing me down, it feels like the walls are slowly closing in around me. I can barely breathe.
Hooking my finger into the tie, I pull it loose and drop it to the floor. The buttons at the neck of my dress shirt feel like fingers strangling me. I can’t get it off quickly enough, and by the time I do my entire body is clammy with sweat.
Today was fucked in so many ways. I dressed up in my clown suit as was expected; as I’ve done a few times recently, indulging in Chantal’s need for us to be seen at various work functions and once at church. Today, as with all the others days where I’ve been expected to dress the part, I played the role of the devoted husband. Today, I nodded and smiled and agreed with every ridiculous word that came out of my in-laws’ mouths. I sat there around the table, on a day when I was supposed to be feeling thankful for the blessings in my life, and the only thing I wanted to do was run.
I’m a goddamn sham. A fake and a phony. Sitting there amongst the china and crystal, the starched cloth napkins, and the food that was cooked by the hired help, I knew I no longer belonged anywhere near that house or those people. The years I spent by Chantal’s side feeling so incredibly out of place, have nothing on the four hours I just spent trying to please everyone at the Thanksgiving gathering.
Her parents treated me like a stranger they are forced to tolerate a few times a year, much as they always have. Her sister blatantly ignored me, her asshole husband did too. There were the usual questions her regal, stuck-up father lashed at me…..are you still working atthatplace? When are you ever going to get arealjob? The man is and always has been a complete snob.
Chantal did little or nothing to defend me, much as she always has. I don’t know how I used to handle holiday events prior to this and I wish could remember. Was I always such a fucking coward, seething in silence yet being the dutiful husband right by her side?
Yes. Apparently I was.
Sitting around the table today I had the clearest realization that I’ve ever had or have felt in all my thirty-five years: I don’t belong in that life, with those people, or with the woman I once believed I’d be with for all eternity. My life was never my own when I was with Chantal. It was all about what she wanted, what would make her happy, and how the two of us would be perceived to the outside world. Much like the Sunday church services she’s made me go to time and again, family dinners were nothing more than a chance for her to pay her dues to her parents.
Fuck them. And fuck her too. This is no life for me. I really wonder why it took me so damn long to realize it. Looking back on it all, it’s apparent that I was content just settling for what my life had become. I might have even wallowed a few times in my own pain, doing nothing to rise above it or move on from it.
Until I met Merrick.
Merrick changed the way I look at my life and the people in it. He made me realize the value in having close friends, people whom I can rely on for pretty much anything. He made me see the beauty in being close with my family, when I’d only ever been closed off to them.
Shedding the rest of my formal wear, I pull on a faded pair of jeans and equally tattered t-shirt, beginning to feel like myself again. Flopping down onto the couch, my gaze immediately drifts to the picture on the wall. My memory takes me immediately to the night he stood in this space next to me grieving for me as only he could, with his whole heart.
Since I’m being real with myself about Chantal and her family, I need to do the same with Merrick. Is he someone I merely want in my lonely life or someone I really, really need? Was it just attraction that brought us together, even as forbidden as it once seemed to be?
The truth I’m finally willing to admit to myself is that in the weeks since I walked away from him and said a final goodbye, one question has remained, nagging at me again and again: Was it real?
The questions about my relationship with Merrick feel endless at times. Did we really grow from awkward friends to intimate partners in the course of only a few months? Was it all as simple and easy as my heart still believes it was? Did we melt into each other, become one in body and soul, because we were destined to? I need to know if it was real. I need to know if the love he said he felt for me was true, and if the future he imagined for the two of us was the forever kind.
My heart picks up speed as I consider what to do next. As much as I despise change, I have to dosomething.This painful limbo that I’ve been living in for the past few months—maybe for all the years since losing Charlotte—needs to come to an end. If I’m meant to be with Merrick, if he is really the one for me, I need to know if what we had was real, or something I only imagined because I’d spent so many years being miserable and lonely. I need to believe that the emotion and the love I feel for him, is beyond question; and that I can proudly call him my own and walk side by side with him for all the years to come.
This urgent need to seek the truth washes over me and in an instant I know what I have to do. Searching the floor for my sneakers, I find them next to the bed and quickly sit down to pull them on, no socks required. On the side table sits the envelope that’s been haunting me, taunting me for weeks now; the final version of the divorce papers. I have to give Chantal credit….even though we’ve both been trying to make this second chance work, she has honored her promise to me—finally, I might add—and had the papers drawn up, awaiting only my signature. I’ve looked them over many times, the simplicity of our divided belongings highlighting how little between us there really is.
How little there ever really has been.
First things first… I need to figure out what part Merrick will play in my life, if any. I need to know if the intense, soul-deep love we confessed to one another still remains. And I need to know if he’s even willing to have a simple conversation with me, given how terribly hurtful I’ve been. There’s every chance he could slam the door in my face. God knows he has every right to hate me.
I move as quietly as possible down the stairs, through the dark house and out the front door. It’s late now, almost midnight; our early evening holiday meal and the two hour drive each way, taking up the majority of the day. I’m tired but invigorated; the idea of seeing him after all this time sending a jolt of happiness spiraling through my chest.
Christ…I have missed him so damn much.
The light on his porch burns bright, but the house itself is dark, making me wonder if he left town to spend the holiday with his parents. I’m such an ass; I never considered that hewouldn’tbe home when I showed up unexpectedly at his door, much as I had in the past.
“I need to know,” I mutter to myself, dragging in air and rapping twice on the door. Staring down at my feet, I silently count to one hundred, then knock three more times. The relief I feel when I see a light go on inside the house makes my head swim. When the door is pulled open, it’s all I can do to refrain from lunging for him.
Merrick stands in front of me, sleepy-eyed and adorably tousled, clad only in his favorite pair of sweats. He immediately frowns, eyes skimming my face as he hurriedly asks, “Are you alright?”
No. Fuck no. I haven’t been alright since the morning I left him weeks ago. Nothing about my life has beenalrightsince then. Every conversation, every movement, feels forced. Every breath I take feels like I’m taking it for someone else. I’ve been so uncomfortable in the skin I’ve been wearing as the obedient husband that I’ve managed to almost disappear completely.
“I need to know.”
The wrinkles between his brows deepen in confusion. “What?”
Taking a step forward, I whisper again, “I need to know.”
