Revive Me: Part Three (New Haven #2)

by J.L. Seegars

whisper that I love him too, that I want this, I want us, because the only thing scarier than realizing that Dr. Banks was right about me feeling like the love of my family is attached directly to what I can do for them, is realizing that Chris’ love isn’t.

He just wants me. At my best, at my worst, and everything in between. When I’m angry and mean, when I’m soft and open. When I’m running from him and when I’m still. It doesn’t matter. He always looks at me just like this, like I’m his and he’s mine, and nothing else in the world matters except those two facts.

“That line, just like my heart, belongs to you and only you.”

“All night long, I’ve watched them watch you, watched people’s faces light up when they got the chance to talk to you or be on the receiving end of your smile.” Nothing he’s saying is suggestive or sexual, but for some reason, his already low tone has descended into the pits of hell, transforming into a growl I still associate with sweat-slick skin and lost inhibitions. Desire unfurls in the pit of my belly, and my pulse leaps as he continues.

“How do you do that, princess? Make everyone love you within moments of meeting you?”

“Yes, I was. I didn’t know what to call it, or how to even begin to act on it, but my soul recognized yours the first time we met. It was like I could see the light inside of you, even through all the pain and hidden secrets trying to obscure it from my view, I could see it, and I wanted it. I wanted you.”

When he gives me what I want, I give him what he needs: permission to be the version of himself he spends a lot of time hiding from the world.

“Leaving your mark on everything,” she whispers. “It’s already hard enough with your fingerprints all over me, every loop and ridge tattooed on my skin, a constant in my life even when you’re not, but now you’re just making it unbearable, Chris. The next time you leave, I won’t—”

“All I’ll have are the things you gave me and the ruined memories. A sad collection of reminders of you.”

“I’m so fucking sorry, princess,” I say, tipping her head back so she has to look me in the eyes. “I won’t ever stop being sorry. I need an entire lifetime to make this shit up to you, and I’m committed to giving you that.” The kiss I plant on her lips is born of desperation, and it dies a heartbroken death when she doesn’t kiss me back.

“There won’t be any reminders of me, Mallory, because I’ll be here. Where ever you want me, where ever you’ll have me, I’ll be right there with you.”

She’s all sunshine and radiant happiness that makes my heart twist in my chest. She was happy, and she came to me. She was happy, and she came home.

“Princess. You’re the best thing I’ve ever put in my fucking mouth.”

I’m pretty determined to build a life with you, and I need you alive for that.”

“You know it’s yours, baby.” “Say it.”

No, not just happiness. Joy. The kind of joy that’s hard-won, mined out of caves of darkness and caverns of pain. The kind of joy that comes paired with peace, settling in your bones and encouraging other bright, rainbow-colored emotions to come out and play.

In its simplest form, home for us has always been each other. The space we’ve held for one another, and the secrets we’ve kept. The miles we’ve driven and the tears we’ve shed. The days, months, and years spent yearning and dreaming, praying for the stillness of partnership when we were trapped in the motion of solitude.

Home, for me, has always been him. The circle of his arms. The heat of his skin. The leather and earth scent of him that normally grounds me, but today sends my already unstable world careening over the side of a cliff.

It’s a worshipful act full of reverence and love that makes my chest tight, a fresh surge of happiness riddled with panic washing over me while Chris continues his work, completely oblivious to what’s happening inside my head.

Because this morning, I woke up in the life I was supposed to have with the man I’ve always wanted. Because I’m happy, and I can’t trust it.

To choose joy instead of fear.

Giving them to the empty halls of the house we fell in love with when our love was new. Untried and untested.

He came back here to revive me, to breathe new life into our love, and I told him he couldn’t do it, but he did. He pulled me out of the grave his father dug for us and used the soil to plant a garden for our future. And now I’m standing here, reaping the benefits of the seeds he sowed, terrified of the harvest.

“And now you want to be the one leaving,” she says it like it’s a fact, and the truth of it resonates deep inside of me, speaking directly to the girl I was ten years ago, to the woman I was four years ago. To all the confused and conflicted versions of me that have spent the months since his return to New Haven running to him and from him all at the same time. To the parts of me that crave his presence and fear it. That love him and hate him. That worship and rebuke him. “Yeah, I guess I do.”

when you’re living with the severance of physical ties when the emotional ones are very much intact, it’s a bleak place. Absent of wonder or peace. Devoid of hope and warmth.

Because I am past dying—every moment I spend without her takes me further away from the verb, from the act of ceasing to live—I am dead, and only her love can revive me.

You’ve been running from me for weeks, which is fine because I’ll always chase you, princess, but I at least want to know why.”

“I didn’t fall in love with your daddy, Mallory. I sunk into it. Slipped it on like a pair of my favorite jeans, like a threadbare t-shirt that’s softer than anything has ever had a right to be.”

“The first time I hugged him, he smelt like home. And that’s what he became for

me, what our love became for us. A place we moved into with intention, that we sought out with purpose even though it surprised us.”

“You keep wanting certainty, baby,” Mama continues. “But certainty is a desire of the brain, not the heart. The only certainty we get in this life is death and the grief that comes with it. Everything else is ours to make, to hold in our hands and shape with our palms. To nurture or let die.”

The moment he reaches me, he sinks to his knees, both of his hands going to my waist, his tear soaked face buried in my stomach.

“I’ll beg, princess.” He murmurs, quivering lips pressed against black silk. “I’m not above it. My pride is one of the many things I’ll sacrifice to have you. And if I have to beg every day, I will. I'll spend my life on my knees with tears in my eyes and a million apologies on my tongue. Each one followed by a declaration of my unending love for you. The sun will rise and set a thousand times, and I'll still be kneeling before you, apologizing for being another man who disappointed you, another man who broke your trust." His hands are on the back of my thighs, pulling me closer to him. "I realize ten dates might have been too much to ask for, but don't ask me for less, princess. Don't tell me this is the end of the road for us. I'll do anything. Anything but let you go, so please don't ask me to do that because I can't."

The love I see there is a call to the parts of me that have only ever been alive for him, and for the first time in a long time, I allow myself to answer.

“And I want this. I want us. I want our forever.”

We breathe each other in, letting the promise of our future pass between our lips, making a home between the smiles we can’t let go of and the desire we’ve been trying to keep under wraps all night. Everything feels like it’s dialed up to the nth degree on the emotional side, but it’s the physical side that’s getting out of hand. And the longer we sit here, the stronger it gets. Sparks of electricity turning into volts of demanding energy that won’t be denied.

But she’d surprised me. Her sermon was one of life and not death, of futures dreamed of but unrealized, and if I hadn’t already been on my knees, I would have fallen to them.

“I love you,” I whisper, just because I can. “I love you, princess. Do you hear me? I love you with everything that I am, everything I could ever be.”

It’s so quiet. We’re barely moving, barely breathing, and still it’s enough. The connection, the desire, the love. Even in the confines of this room, in the unyielding walls of the silence we must maintain, in the moans of pleasure we must restrain, it’s enough. To send us over the edge. To catapult us into the stars, into a sky lit up by fireworks before we float down happily, landing on a pillow-soft cloud with more than enough space for our sated sighs and tangled limbs.

True happiness, and I have been estranged for years. We parted ways in a restaurant parking lot when the love of my life broke parts of me I didn’t think could ever be repaired, but now, after almost a decade of being strangers, we are back together. Thick as thieves. Picking up right where we left off: with bright, bubbly smiles and love-soaked days. With hope for a future informed by lessons from the past.

I’ve tasted goodbye on Chris’ lips. I’ve seen it on his face, and it’s never there. In the circle of his arms when he holds me once we’re done. In the soft, gentle kisses he plants on whatever part of me he can reach when both of our hearts are still racing from exertion, sweat-slicked skin sticking to each other.

It feels nice to finally be settling into this version of our forever, appreciating all the differences between what it is and what I once thought it would be.

“Move in with me. Be here with me, in our home. Every day. Every night. Every Christmas and Thanksgiving and every other holiday in between. I want this, what we had tonight, what we’ve had over the last two weeks. I want it all the time. I want it, and you, forever.”

“This is already your home, but I didn’t realize until tonight that you needed a formal ask, so here it is: Move. In. With. Me.”

it feels real like waking up inside of your wildest dream every single day and finding that it’s not a dream at all. It’s your reality.

She could have asked me to meet her on the moon, and I’d still be up out of my seat, grabbing my keys and heading out the door. I tell her as much, and she laughs, which makes me smile because it sounds like she’s having a great day.

This lunch. This life. This love. It’s all real, and all mine.

But I’m here to tell you, as the woman who loves you, who knows your flaws and your perfections better than anyone else, that even on your worst day you are a better man than he could ever be.”

It’s funny how being known works. How it comforts and distresses you at the same time. Mallory knows me inside and out. She sees my fear before I even register the sensation of being afraid, knows where

I’m going to stumble before I even take a step. I love her for that, but right now, it also scares the shit out of me because her idea is simply a reflection of...