“Whatever It Takes” Excerpt

Gavin

 

Present day

 

I was sitting on our living room sofa once again, choosing to stay out there rather than sleep in our bed without Emma. I hadn’t bothered to change from my shorts and t-shirt from the party and after Emma had gone to bed I just sat on the couch, thinking about what I had done and what was going to happen to us. I had been dozing on and off, not really sleeping but not quite fully awake either as my thoughts churned. I had my head thrown back, resting on the top of the cushion, my face turned up towards the ceiling when I heard the sound of bare feet hit the wooden floor of the living room.

 

“Em?” I said, squinting in the dark. The only light on was the one glowing from above the stove in the kitchen behind me.

 

“Yeah,” she whispered. “I need a drink.”

 

She poured herself a glass of orange juice from the kitchen and then joined me back in the living room, sitting at the other end of the dark, leather sectional.

 

“What are you doing on the couch?” she asked me before taking three greedy gulps from the glass.

 

I shrugged. “I didn’t want to sleep in our bed without you.”

 

She snorted. “But a month ago you wanted to sleep in a hotel bed with another woman. You’re funny, Gavin, you know that?”  She let out a half-assed laugh that turned into a giggle. Before I knew it she was full out belly laughing and then, just as quickly, she was hanging her head and crying into her juice.

 

I moved to take the glass out of her hand and set it on the coffee table before kneeling at her feet. I grabbed both of her hands in mine.

 

“Emma, please. Don’t cry,” I begged.  God, it killed me when she cried, even more so when I was the cause. “I am so sorry, so fucking sorry for what I did. I don’t deserve your forgiveness but I swear, if you can try to forgive me I will spend the rest of my life making this up to you, I swear it.”

 

She leaned forward and rested her chin on my shoulder and I wrapped her in my arms. “Why?” she cried in my ear.  “Why, Gavin? I don’t understand. I thought we were happy. Wasn’t I enough for you?” Her whole body shook with sobs.

 

“Of course you are, baby.  You’re everything to me,” I said, and I wasn’t lying. Emma was my world. Since the day I met her, I had been crazy about her. I loved how strong she was, something she didn’t give herself nearly enough credit for. She had always thought her OCD and need for control were things that I just put up with. They weren’t. I loved her even for that.  I thought it was adorable how she kept things so neat and organized in our home. It made life easier that way, anyhow.  I also loved that when she was anxious I was able to calm her. It made me feel like her hero in some way.

That even though she was a tough woman there was a vulnerable side to her and she needed me to protect her from that.

 

And so I pulled back and took her face in both of my hands. “This had nothing to do with you, you have to believe that. This wasn’t about anything you’ve done or didn’t do. It was only about me and my fucked up need to… to… I don’t know. I just know that it meant nothing and it will never happen again.”

 

The words I used to try to soothe her seemed to have the opposite effect. She grew angry and pushed me away, standing from the couch.

 

“You were the one I could brag to all my friends about!”  she screamed at me. She screamed so loud she winced as it burned her throat. Still, she continued, “about how wonderful you are! How you’re kind, and handsome, and helpful, and smart, and successful! How you were sweet and loving and made me feel like I was luckiest girl in the world! And you destroyed all that! All of it!  In one fucking night you threw everything you were and everything we had out the fucking window and now you’re telling me it was over something that didn’t mean anything?” She was in my face now, somehow towering over me though I was several inches taller than her.  “How could you do this to us? How?” Suddenly, her hand flew out in front of her and she slapped me across my face. The noise of it echoed throughout the room. As hard as she’d hit me,  it didn’t seem to abate her anger.

 

“How?” she screamed and slapped me again. “How?!”  Her hand connected with my face one more time and I felt like my skin had split, the sting was so bad. I didn’t care though. Let her beat me to a pulp if it would make her feel better. I knew though that no matter how angry she was, she’d only feel guilty about it in the morning. When she made one more feeble attempt to raise her hand to me again, I caught her by her wrist this time and pulled her into my arms and crushed her to my chest.

 

“No,” she cried and made a weak attempt to push me away but my arms were too strong. “No, let me go. Let me go.”

 

I bent my head and whispered in her ear.  “No, Emma. I’m not letting you go. I’ll never let you go.”