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Gage felt a warmth course through his body, his heart began to race, his arm flew out, putting a hand to the wall to balance the wave of dizziness that suddenly racked his body. “Come again?” He questioned lowly.
Watching his reaction had her tears rolling down her cheeks. The words on her tongue grated, like they were being dragged across sandpaper. “I can’t leave Luke.”
Gage’s hard eyes roamed Tilly’s face. A face he loved looking at. A face that over the months of being together, he learned all the expressions of, and what he saw in her features punched him in the gut. “You aren’t fucking with me, are you?” He kept his hand to the cool concrete wall and raised the other to run through his hair as realization rushed through his body.
“I was prepared to walk out of my life, was prepared for the pain I’d cause, the anger and resentment from my kids for breaking up their home. But what I wasn’t prepared for, couldn’t even ponder without it breaking me, was losing my kids. If I leave him, he will fight for full custody.”
Gage’s arm dropped as he closed the distance between them, he pulling her into his arms. Holding her close, he told her, “We can get the best lawyers, Till. We can fight this.” The words sounded wrong as he said them. His arms grew tightly around her, but she didn’t reciprocate the comfort.
She wanted to sink into his embrace, wanted to soak up every second because she knew, after this, she wouldn’t know it again. She knew she was ending them, and it was killing her. But they were the ones who cheated, and they could fight, but Luke was right; he would most likely to win. Even the smallest chance that she could lose her kids, she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t start a new life with Gage when she lost part of her heart. It wasn’t fair to him, to either of them.
“We cheated. We knew the consequences. He didn’t threaten to take them, he’s trying to get me to stay, to fight for my marriage, to fight for him.” Tears filled her eyes, the pain in Gage’s breaking her. “He isn’t the one I want to fight for. Even knowing the damage we caused, you’re the one I love. The one I can’t stand the thought of living without, but then I look at the damage around us. All the pain, all the regret. Starting over, leaving all of that destruction in our wake…” She looked down, unable to stand seeing how she was feeling looking back at her. “From the beginning, we clicked. Like the last part of a puzzle, we fit. Together, I felt whole. Complete. But I always thought being with you felt like a dream, a part of me always feared waking up. That car accident, that was when I woke up. That was when I realized just how much our actions hurt those we love. Can you really start a new life built on that much pain?”
Gage stepped back as if the words she was saying were burning from her body. He felt a tightness enclose around his chest. Without a doubt, he understood what she was saying, the mess they left behind if they’d walk away hand in hand. The memory of his wife sobbing on the floor only hours ago came rushing back. That pain snaked through his body, twisting every organ in it. He tried to take a deep breath but failed. “You don’t even wanna try...” He paused, because the question he was asking her, he was having a hard time answering himself. Gage looked to the ground because, looking into her eyes, he knew what they were saying, and that was goodbye. “Do you?” he finished, raising his head, eyes leveled on her.
The woman in her wanted to fight, wanted to hold on to what she had found with him because she knew she’d never feel it again. But the mother in her, she wanted to make her children happy, she wanted their childhoods to not be tainted by pain and heartache. There was enough of that in life. “What I want I can’t have. Either way, I lose...we both do.” She saw him rear back, but she pushed. “I saw Heather. I saw the devastation. I understand how she feels because I’m feeling it right now. She loves you.”
Gage’s head fell, his chin almost hitting his chest. He had nothing to say in return because seeing what he did to his wife, to his own daughter. The past, the history that he and his wife held. He couldn’t just walk away from the life he knew, leaving everything in a heap of broken hearts. And more… he didn’t want to.
“We do this, we lose our pasts. On Christmas, I saw my family, maybe for the first time in a long time. There’s a lot there to fight for.” She glanced down, needing to be completely honest with him. Looking up into his eyes, she said, “Luke and I, it was like we found each other again on Christmas. We talked, really talked for the first time in a long time.” She held Gage’s gaze, her heart breaking when she added, “We made love. I thought at the time it was goodbye, but it hurts too much to be a goodbye. Can you honestly say that you can walk away from your own family, that there isn’t anything there to hang on to, to fight for? Are you sure you’re ready to cross that bridge, to burn it down behind you? I want to say I am because I love you, I really truly love you, but I’d be lying if I said I could walk away and not wonder if I didn’t try hard enough. If I let it go too soon.”
His reaction wasn’t what she was expecting, it surprised him, too. Relief moved through him so strongly he reached out for the wall. He looked into Tilly’s beautiful face, the pain etched in her expression, and he understood it because he couldn’t say goodbye to his past either. It was why seeing Heather’s pain destroyed him; it was why Christmas had been so bittersweet, because what he thought he lost, what he thought he’d found with Tilly, he was finding again with Heather.
He wasn’t ready to write a new story, not even a new chapter, but if he hadn’t met Tilly, if she hadn’t come into his life when she had, they would both still be incomplete because it wasn’t just their own eyes they opened. Their marriages weren’t over; they were just off track.
Tears clung to her lashes, her pain matched his own because he couldn’t say goodbye to his past, but he didn’t want to say goodbye to her either. He touched her, needed to feel her one last time. He brushed his knuckles across her cheeks, her tears dampening his skin. “I can’t walk away from my family either.”
Tilly couldn’t hold back a sob, even wanting to hear him admit it, it broke her in a way she knew she’d never fully recover. Days ago, she had been so sure of where her life was heading, eager to get there, and now, she was saying goodbye to someone who not only claimed her heart, but someone she liked, a friend she knew she was going to miss every day for the rest of her life. Regret lay ahead for her too because she knew she would look back on this, and always wonder what would have happened had they held on...a part of her wishing that they had.
“I don’t regret it. Not a second.” She bit back another sob, her voice cracking. “I’m going to miss you.”
Gage sucked in a deep breath through his nose, his shoulders slumped when he let it out. His eyes moved to Tilly. “Fuck, I’m gonna miss you,” he admitted, and his own sob broke from his throat. “You’ll always hold a part, Till, always,” he said through a broken voice.
“You’ll always have a part of me, a piece of my heart that is only yours.” Her voice thick with tears. “I’ll always wonder,” she whispered, “but I’ll never forget.”
Gage laid a hand over hers, holding it to his heart, looking into her eyes. Tears fell down his cheeks, he had no words. He took in the woman who entered his life so unexpectedly and knew he had to let her go. Not only did he know, but inside, he needed to give his all to the one woman he truly loved. His wife. And even though it would take him a while, maybe even a lifetime to clean up the mess he made, he would. He wanted to. Because the grass on his side had always been green. “I love you,” he whispered huskily through the pain. Dropping her hand, he started walking backward toward the door. “Remember, Tilly, you are perfect the way you are, don’t forget,” he said, his back hitting the door, his hand moving to the handle, the other rubbing the tears on his cheek.
She wanted to hold him, but she knew if she did, she’d never let go. She wanted that, to hold onto him and face whatever came. A part of her knew she should. That she should fight, but she didn’t. She’d told him once that if he was hers, she’d hold on with both hands. The sob ripped from her throat because she was letting him go. He was leaving, walking out of her life. Her voice loud when she spoke her last words to him. “The grass truly was greener.” Her voice broke when she vowed, “I’ll never love anyone like I love you.”
Gage forced a smile, leaving it there as he turned the knob on the door, opening it, his eyes to hers, as he slipped through. When he did, he left a piece of his heart with the woman in the stairwell. With tears streaming down his face, he tried his best not to look back. He succeeded.
EPILOGUE
Luke had been better thanhe’d vowed. There was love and laughter in their home. Pictures covering the walls of all the new adventures they’d shared as a family, Candice in many of them. The newest picture was of Justin, a big smile on his face, class of 2025...a Boston University graduate. Tilly hadn’t just found happy, she had found love, true love with Luke. It had been there all along, but taken for granted, and not just by him. She had been so ready to throw in the towel that she hadn’t allowed herself to see Luke. Like he had said, the distance that had grown between them had tainted her vision too. She hadn’t allowed herself to acknowledge that what she thought she found with Gage, she’d had all along with Luke.
They were going away, a second honeymoon. She’d been packed for three weeks. He wouldn’t share where they were going, but every night, when he came home from work, he surprised her with another clue. Wherever they were going, it was tropical and required little in the way of clothing, though she suspected that had more to do with his plan of keeping her naked for the duration of their trip. A plan she could fully get behind.
She looked over at Luke, his breathing even and deep. Climbing from bed, she walked downstairs, stopping at the pictures on the wall. A lifetime through snapshots, a life worth fighting for, a life worth sacrificing for.
Every once and a while, she’d see something, smell something, and he would be there. Those four months rolling through her head like a movie. All the things they talked about doing, the life they planned on having. She believed things happened for a reason. She believed Gage and she had found each other when they had because they had both been at a crossroads. Eager to see if the grass was greener, even believing at the time that it was, but what they shared, as beautiful as it had been, it wasn’t built on the foundation that she had with Luke. They didn’t have the history, the memories, or even the story...one that could be hard and painful at times. She knew he had that with Heather, seeing her at the hospital, the pain and devastation, he too had something to fight for. They both had just needed the reminder.
She walked to her office and settled behind her desk, taking a moment to look at the handblown vase covered in violet and fuchsia flowers, one she always kept filled. She no longer worked for Kenny. She needed to let go of that last link to Gage. She now did freelance graphic design work for businesses—logos, marketing materials. Sometimes, she dabbled in landscape design, but that was just for her.
She pulled open the drawer and retrieved the long slim box. Opening the lid, a smile touched her lips. She never wore it. Had only worn it on the day he’d given it to her. What she thought would be the first of countless gifts from Gage turned out to be the only one she’d ever receive. She traced the etching, the words she knew by heart. For as fleeting as their time together had been, they had given each other what they had needed, and part of that was learning that nothing in life comes easy. It was more than that lesson though for Tilly. She had truly loved him, a part of her still did.
She turned on her computer, selected the folder Friendly Words, the drawing she made appeared on the screen. Reading the words, remembering how she’d felt when she drew it. She knew she needed to say the words she hadn’t been able to say. She needed to say goodbye. Her finger hovered over the delete key, memories of Gage moving through her mind. He hadn’t just given her love, he had made her see herself, made her want more for herself. Without him, she wouldn’t have found her husband again. She wouldn’t have found her happy ending. She knew from his Open Space page that he had found his with Heather. Their time together wasn’t a story, it wasn’t even a chapter. It was a footnote, but one that had profoundly impacted them both, one she’d remember always, another beautiful and poignant snapshot in her life.
She dropped her hand; like all the other times she’d tried to say goodbye, she couldn’t. She had found her husband again, but Gage owned a piece of her heart. He always would. She closed the folder and gently tucked her bracelet back into the drawer. She left her memories in that room and went back to bed, curling up next to the one who owned the rest of it.
