Michelle Mankin: Irresistible Refrain

I shook my head.

“Good.” He gave a curt nod. “Cause it’s not prom night anymore, Lace. Let me lay it all out this time just so there’s no chance for misunderstanding. I love you. I want you with me all the time. Don’t make it more complicated than that.”

“I’m not trying to.” I put my hand on his arm, but he shook it off. My throat tightened as I watched him go for his pants, yanking them back on. I pulled the lapels of the robe closer together, suddenly feeling cold. “Bry, please try to understand.”

He turned back around, his eyes flashing defensively.

“I love you, too,” I powered on. “But you’d have to be blind not to see what a wretched mess my life is right now. I need to get things straight first…before I get into a relationship with anyone.”

“I’m not just some random guy you hooked up with, Lace.”

Shit . I started to panic. That wasn’t how I meant it at all. He was taking everything I said and turning it inside out. “I know that…God, I know that.” I was finding it difficult to breathe. This was going even worse than I’d feared.

He must’ve noticed how freaked out I was. He moved back to the bed and knelt in front of me, his expression softening. “I know this is scary, Lace.” His voice was gentler and his eyes searched my face before he covered the two of my clutched hands with his own. “All the more reason for us to be together, so I can help you.”

I shook my head. “No, Bryan. I can’t let you do that.” If only I could explain it so he’d understand. “I can’t keep jumping from relationship to relationship every time I need a rescue. I’ve got to learn how to take care of myself for a change. It’s going to take work to become a better person, and that’s work that only I can do.” I glanced up at him hoping that I’d finally gotten through, but my heart stuttered when I saw how completely closed off to me he was.

“So you’re telling me you want me to put my life on hold again. To be on standby. To wait.”

Yes. “Yes.” I held my breath as I waited for his reply.

“How long do you estimate this process of yours is gonna take?” His voice was a really low rumble.

“I don’t know. Just until I prove to myself that I can do it, I guess.”

His jaw was rigid. An oppressive silence filled the room. I heard the air conditioner kick on, felt the cold air against the back of my neck, icy trepidation trickling down my spine. “I’ve waited through two guys for you. Look where that got you. Bad shit happens when we’re apart. We’ve both lost out on precious time that we should have spent together. And now that there’s nothing else in our way, you want to put up this wall between us? No, Lace,” he said firmly. “I’ve done all the waiting I’m gonna do.” I could see the anger and pain in his piercing gaze. “You decide. It’s got to be yes or no, right now.”

My heart froze completely solid. My chin dropped to my chest. A cold fist tightened around my throat. “No, then,” I whispered.

He didn’t say anything and that said it all. When I looked up, he was scooping his shirt off the floor.

Stop, my heart cried.

Please don’t go , my eyes pleaded.

But his face was an impenetrable fortress now. “Goodbye, Lace.” His words detonated inside of me like a bomb blast.

For a long time I didn’t move at all. So long that my rigid muscles went from tense to burning pins and needles to completely numb. But eventually I had to feel the pain. After all, Bryan had just blown my world to bits. And suddenly the realization of it all crashed down on me.

Totally obliterated, my heart lay scattered like shrapnel all around me. Big sobbing shudders shook my body as I looked at the tangled sheets, as I breathed in the lingering scent of his cologne, as I tasted him in my mouth along with the salt from my tears, as I heard the sound of his goodbye ringing in my ears, as I opened and closed my fingers remembering when I’d held him in my hands.

I jerked up out of the bed and turned my back on it. I sank to the floor, pulled my knees up to my chest, and wrapped my arms around my knees. I rocked back and forth, staring straight ahead, tears blurring my vision.

But there was nothing to ease the pain.

For a fleeting moment, I seriously considered getting up, getting dressed, and going out for some drugs. But if I went down that path again I knew there’d be no coming back from it a second time. I’d end up in the ground just like my mother.

My arms tightened around my knees. No fucking way. I steeled myself and stuck a fork in that chapter of my life. It was done. Over.

I was never descending into that pit again.

I’d have my cry. I was fucking entitled to that. It’d been a long time since I had so I was going to make it a good one. I felt sorry for myself and all that shit.

When the sun came up, my throat was raw, my eyes burned, and my Kleenex box was empty. I got up off the floor. I had to use the bed as a crutch because my legs had cramped up so bad. But I wasn’t going to allow myself to linger in that sad place. I was time to be tough. Resilient. I went into the bathroom and got myself cleaned up. I washed and conditioned my hair. I scrubbed twice with the fragrant hotel soap and scoured the traces of his scent from my skin.

I stepped out onto the bathmat and wrapped a towel around me. Pulling the hand towel out of the ring, I wiped away the condensation from the mirror. I stared at the pink faced woman who looked back at me. Her eyes were red rimmed but determined.

I liked her.

She was a keeper.

She was sick and tired of life knocking her the fuck down.

Things were going to be different from here on out.

This woman was going to start fighting the fuck back.

I pounded on my brother’s door with my fist.

“Hold up. I’m coming.” I heard his muffled reply through the door before he opened it. “What the hell!” he exclaimed when he saw me. “What’d you do to your hair?”

“Cut it, obviously,” I threw back as I brushed past him to enter the room.

“What’s going on, Lace?” he asked when I turned around. “Where’s Bryan?”

“I don’t know.” I blinked back the burn and avoided looking at him. I sank on the mattress and smoothed out the wrinkles in the comforter. “I asked him to wait for me. To give me some time to get my head sorted out. He didn’t like that plan.”

“Damn. I’m sorry.” Dizzy dropped down on the bed and glanced at me, eyes filled with questions I didn’t really have the answers for. Not yet at least. I was working on that.

The haircut was symbolic. The long feminine locks were gone, lopped off. Out with the old, in with the new was my motto going forward. From now on it was just me and my retro 1960’s Twiggy hairdo that practically screamed, “This chick can make it on her own!”

There is one thing I know , I thought as I ran my hand over the ear length strands it was going to take some time to get used to. “I’m not going back to Seattle.” There were just too many memories there.

“Kinda late to be deciding that.” Dizzy looked at his watch. “Our plane leaves in a couple of hours.”

“I already paid the change fee.”

“Where you gonna go then?”

“Vancouver. I have some unfinished business at Black Cat. Things I need to make right. I think it’s probably as good a place as any to start over.”