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Chapter 21 - Gavin: Closure
What the hell was she doing here? I tried to communicate with Callum, but he was looking everywhere but me. He knew what he had done. He had fucked up by bringing her, knowing I had Danny with me.
Tatiana tore her gaze from Danny and then looked at me. “Can we speak in private please?”
I was about to decline, but Danny answered for me.
“You guys go ahead. I need to check on Axel and make sure that he is okay. I will be in our room.” She kissed my cheek and then detached her hand from mine. I didn’t know if her gesture was meant to make me feel more at ease or more on edge.
She was too calm about this. I didn’t like it, but I also knew that allowing me to have this conversation with Tatiana meant that she didn’t want to be talked to right now.
Callum also got up. “I will leave you two alone to chat.”
Once they had both left, and it was just me and Tati in the room, the tension thickened. It was suffocating. She was staring at me with so much pain and sorrow in her eyes. But unlike in the past, I didn’t feel the urge to hold her in my arms until her pain subsided. I didn’t know if that made me cold or just made me practical.
“How are you?”
“Really, Tati? That is what you lead with? You come to Callum’s house, knowing my girlfriend and son are here, and to ask how are you?”
Her eyes went wide. “You have a son with her?”
I nodded. “Not biologically, but in every way that matters, he is my son.”
She nodded slowly in understanding. “How old is he?“
“Two, almost three.”
She gave me a knowing smile. “Your eyes light up when you talk about him.”
“Axel has a way of warming your heart if you let him,” I said. “Now, what are you doing here, Tatiana? I thought we said what we needed to on the phone. Look, I get that it was your body and you get to decide how you want it to be, but that baby was also mine. I should have been informed. But what is done is done now. We can’t turn back time, and we can’t make it all better. We can only move on and live our own separate lives. You can date whoev—”
“I didn’t say yes because I loved you,” she blurted out successfully cutting me off.
“What?”
“I turned down your marriage proposal because I loved you, Gavin. You deserved someone who could be all in with you. Someone who wanted to give you a baby and give you that domestic lifestyle. You deserved that, and I knew that I couldn’t be that for you, no matter how badly I wanted to be. It’s just not in me.
“I couldn’t compromise my career. It’s only now beginning to take off, and I can’t lose these opportunities I have because of a baby or even a husband. I love you, and I don’t want you to think for a second that I don’t because I do. I truly and deeply do. The problem is that my love and what I want for myself wouldn’t have been sufficient enough for you. And deep down, you know you felt it, too.”
I remained silent.
“You are a family man, and I always knew LA was not where you wanted to place your roots. It wasn’t home because your heart wasn’t in it. I wasn’t your home. Now, from what Callum has told me and the way you looked at Danny right now, I know she is your home, and now I know that I made the right decision. I had to break your heart in order for you to find exactly what you needed.”
I was dumbfounded. I was never someone who was left speechless but, in that moment, I was speechless. For almost a year now, this was the explanation I had searched for. I had been devastated when Tatiana left me, but now I realized that it was one of the best things she could have done for me. She set me free because she knew someone could love me better than she ever could.
“I will forever cherish you, Gavin. You brought so much light into my world, but our chapter is over. You have a whole new book you are writing now, and I have a feeling it will be the best one yet.”
She stepped forward and placed a gentle kiss on my cheek. She stepped back and offered me a small smile.
“She’s a good one, I can tell.” That was the last thing she said before she walked out of the living room and out the front door.
I stayed rooted in place, trying to grapple with what the hell had just happened. Tonight had been flipped on its head. I didn’t know how to feel about my conversation with Tati. I had always known she wasn’t a bad woman. It wasn’t in her nature to be cruel.
My chest did feel a little lighter though, and maybe this was the closure that I had thought I never needed. It had been exactly what I needed. I walked over to the pristine white couch and sat down. I placed my elbows on my knees and ran my hands through my hair.
“You okay, man?”
I heard Callum walk into the room. I lifted my head from my hands.
