Chapter 14

I gasped and stumbled out of the chair in shock, flinching away from whoever was here with me and tripped over the edge of the coffee table, sprawling out on the floor. I rolled over, gasping and still crying as grief warred with shock at not being alone in the suite. I looked up into those piercing blue eyes and was shattered all over again, my face contorting as the sight of those eyes sent me into a new round of grief. I bawled, wondering if I was asleep or awake or if I’d finally gone mad and was seeing her here, haunting me in my mind.

“Oh my God!” the ghost whispered. “I had no idea you’d taken it this badly!”

She reached for the towel full of ice and picked it up before coming for me. Her fingers felt solid enough as she touched my face.

“Oh, Baby!” she murmured in sympathy to this pain. “I’m so sorry I put you through this!”

She was patting my face and neck with the cold towel as she gently smoothed my hair. I reached out to see if she was real at first and then I snaked my arms around her, crying on her shoulder, my thoughts a jumble. I was truly shattered in that hotel suite. I couldn’t have made sense, if my life depended on it.

She just held on and quietly assured me that she was there and wasn’t going anywhere, that she was back and mine and was indeed real. I must have babbled something about going crazy or ghosts or something. She got the message somehow that I wasn’t sure she was really here with me. It took a while, but I finally calmed down some and she was able to steer me into a chair. She plopped down in my lap and wrapped her arms around my neck, pulling my head down onto her shoulder.

She was still whispering apologies to me when there was a knock at the door. She told me to stay there and she got up to answer the door. They wheeled the room service cart into the room and set the place setting and food on the dining table before retreating, leaving the cart in the room with us to put out into the hall when we were finished.

She came and got me, urging me to eat something. I sat at the table and looked at the steak in front of me and started to pick at it. I’d been staggered by weeks of being frantic with worry and pain, pummeled by hosting the party, brutalized by the constant stream of questions about her and Beth, stunned by her appearance and was more than a little drunk as the booze sloshed in my empty stomach.

“What happened?” I whispered to her after a few bites.

I was finally concluding that she wasn’t a ghost or a hallucination since room service had spoken to her when they set the table. She looked pained.

“I got scared,” she said. “That night that we went back to the house, I wanted you so much, it scared me. I dropped you off and I called my best friend from high school. She told me ... well, she gave me a lot of advice and some of it was good, but this was clearly the worst thing I could have done. She told me that we got too hot, too fast. She said we needed to cool off and that I needed to make sure that you felt as deeply about me as I did about you. She suggested we spend some time apart and told me to come out to see her for a while, since she was on the other side of the country at UCLA. So, I went, and hung around and moped. She laughed that I had it so bad. I told Theresa that I was leaving, and I think I might have been out of my mind at that point, because I did a really bad job of explaining why. Anyway, all I could think about was you. Tanya tried to get me to go to parties and date guys while I was out there.”

She made a soothing noise and touched my arm comfortingly when I raised my head at that.

“She was trying to get me to go on double-dates with her. I think she wanted to get a sense of how deeply in love I was with you. Well, it must have worked because last week, she told me that, since I was so in love with you that there was no hope for other men. Then she told me to go home and take you to bed. That’s when I called and got the message to you that I wanted you to attend the party tonight. I set up the fitting for the suits and had all the bonuses waiting for you. I wanted to surprise you by being here in the suite when you came up after the party.”

“You surprised me alright,” I murmured, looking at my plate.

I picked at it some more and found my appetite had recovered a little.

“Have you talked to anyone?” I asked, carefully.

I wasn’t sure how much anger there was toward her among the rest of our support group for how she’d left. She shook her head.

“I was off the grid. I knew that the group would have your back and I didn’t want to put them in the middle. I just asked Theresa to help you with the bedroom and deliver the letter. How did you like the changes?” she asked delicately.

I looked at her and she was obviously on pins and needles about my reaction.

“I haven’t seen it,” I told her flatly.

That took her by surprise.

“Why not?” she blurted in shock.

“I promised I wouldn’t look at it until you revealed it,” I said and busied myself in separating a piece of fat from the piece of meat I was cutting. “I wouldn’t go in there without you. If I did, I’d be admitting that you weren’t coming back.”

She gasped at that, connecting the dots between what she’d done and how it had spilled over into my life.

“So, you’re still sleeping in the guest-room?”

I nodded and took a bite of the steak. I wasn’t thrilled with it. It was overcooked and was getting cold, but it gave me something to focus on.

“That bed is the only one we ever shared. When I laid down to sleep, that was the place I felt closest to you.”

She leaned against me, hugging my arm.

“I’m so sorry I left, and sorrier that I was too stupid to explain why. Like I said in the letter, I was a grieving widow half the time and a scared girl the rest. My life has been full of bad decisions and I was scared out of my mind that you were another bad decision and terrified you were a good one and I was gonna screw it up. My sister stole the first boy I had a crush on. I let Stan sweep me off my feet - and then you came along. I was scared that I was making another mistake.”

“You were so good, and I was such a fuck-up that I couldn’t figure out whether I’d finally lucked-out or paid my dues or whatever. I was scared that you were gonna end up being another chapter in my life that ended with me miserable. I know, that’s awful to say, but we’d only known each other for a week, and I was seriously going to jump into bed with you. If that’s not bad decision-making, I don’t know what is.”

“When Tanya told me to go home, she said she’d never seen anyone this deep in love with anyone. She never saw me this in love with Drake, or with Stan, not ever. I had no idea how crushed you were. I instructed Mr. Lawton not to pass any personal messages either way. I think he wanted to, but I told him that if he mentioned anything, I’d hang up and call Angela to keep in touch. I figured she might be capable of resisting temptation.”

I nodded.

“I almost hired an investigator to try to find you,” I said. “She convinced me not to.”

“I probably wouldn’t have been hard to find,” she admitted. “I hadn’t stopped using my bank accounts or credit cards.” She was silent for a minute. “So, when you came into the suite ... does it ... I mean, did you get overwhelmed by it, a lot?”

I shook my head.

“Most of the time, I shed a few tears and just hoped you’re doing okay. Today ... was awful. The party was a disaster. Nothing was right. I was run off my feet all night trying to keep the schedule working. Decorations weren’t put up until just before the party, the DJ had problems, the kitchen couldn’t have dinner on time and the list of problems went on forever.”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “Some of that was my fault. I asked the party planner if he could keep you from coming up to the suite before the party. I was hoping to surprise you. Instead, you surprised me.”

“I wish you’d surprised me before the party and been with me down there,” I said. “Part of what did me in was that everyone at the party knows that Stan and Beth were screwing around at last year’s party. Hell, for all I know, they might have snuck away for a quickie while I was there. Anyway, there were a lot of people that asked some very smug questions about where you were, why I was hosting and what happened with Beth. I couldn’t get away from it all night. Then I asked the desk to have the limo brought around and waited outside for a half-hour before they told me it was only supposed to drop me here.”

“You were trying to leave?” she asked, surprised. “Why? The suite was waiting here for you.”

“I was miserable. I still have a pounding headache. I just wanted to go home, hang up my suit, put on something comfortable, get drunk and bawl my eyes out.”

She looked pained.

“Oh God, I’m sorry. I wish I’d had you come up to the suite as soon as you arrived, now that I know. See what I mean?!!? I’m a total fuck-up!!! I wanted tonight to be perfect and I made you miserable all day! Fuck!!! What can I do?!!?” she asked. “Let me rub your shoulders.”

She started to get up and I reached out for her hand, stopping her.

“Just tell me you love me, and that we’ll make all our decisions together from now on,” I told her.

“I do love you!” she told me ardently, “and I swear I’ll let you keep me from making any more fuck-up decisions for the rest of my life! Just please, tell me you forgive me for screwing this all up!”

“Mel, I forgave you the second I looked into your eyes,” I said. “I’ve been lost without you. I couldn’t turn my back on you. I’ve been less than half alive without you here with me.”

She beamed at me and now she was crying, and I was holding her, the remains of my steak forgotten, but that was for the best. After a trip on the elevator for 23 floors and taking time for us to catch up between bites, it was ice cold now. I’d eaten most of it, but the rest was a lost cause. But that was irrelevant right now. All that mattered was that Melody was back. I held her and thanked all the Gods in all the Heavens that she was. I’d never known I was incomplete until I’d met her. Being separated from that feeling had been agony.

She wept for a long time, clinging to me desperately. She blubbered and tried to talk to me about her month apart in between breaking down, but it was all disjointed. In the end, I just held her and felt right for the first time since I’d read her letter. She’d become my life. Without her, there was nothing.

Eventually, she calmed down and just snuggled against my chest. She’d been feeling the strain too, and tonight was the release of all her anxieties. She’d been scared by her feelings, uncertain of mine, terrified she’d ruin things and insecure about her ability to hold onto me, having had her sister poach her first boyfriend from her. Once her sister mentioned that she’d shown interest in Stan, it led to Mel diving in head-first.

“Feel better?” I asked gently.

She didn’t speak, but nodded, holding me tighter. She was breathing deeply and when I looked down, I found that she’d fallen asleep on me. I supposed that made a certain degree of sense. I felt like I was ready for bed. I picked her up and slid my chair back from the table. I looked around the suite and took her into the bedroom. The bed was turned down, so I laid her on it gently and went to clean up. The ice in the towel went into the sink and the remains of the steak went onto the cart, which I pushed out into the hall. I looked in the bar fridge and pulled out a can of Coke. I wanted something to drink and more booze was the last thing I needed for tonight. I drained the can while I loosened my tie and undid the collar button.

I went to the window, looked out at the city and breathed deeply. Did I accept Melody’s explanation that she’d been running scared? Yeah, I suppose I did. She was young and naive and what experience she had was horrific and scarring. I thought that she was probably half-mad with fear by the time she’d gotten to LA.

I wished she’d talked to me. It would have calmed my anxiety a lot this past month and might have given me more certainty that she was coming back. I’d had the group, and both individually and as a unit, they’d been amazing, but I knew there was a certain amount of pity in their eyes when mention of Melody had come up. Terri, in particular, had gone above and beyond to be supportive, giving up most of her Saturdays to come hang out.

I returned to the bedroom and really looked at her. She’d been dressed in jeans and a t-shirt. I smiled at the realization that it was the shirt I’d left at her place, the last night that we’d been together. I tucked her into bed and then left the room. I needed to think. I started to go through my phone contacts, wondering who’d still be awake at 2AM. I sent Terri a text, asking if she was still awake.

“Sure. Just watching movies. Having a bad night?” was the immediate reply.

“I think I’d like to talk if you’re up for it...”

“Sure, tonight was that big thing you had to do for Melody, right? I was kind of expecting you to have a tough time tonight. Call.”

I smiled and tapped the phone icon to switch to call and she picked up right away.

“Hi,” I said quietly.

“Hey,” she said sympathetically. “Tell Aunt Terri where it hurts,” she prompted me. “Start from the beginning.”

I sighed and started to talk to her slowly about the whole thing. The party details, the problems, the changes, the bonuses, the dance, the half-drunk comments, all of it.

“Shit! No wonder you feel down tonight. You think she stuck it to you on purpose?” she asked.

I laughed a little at that.

“I know she did. She didn’t plan on me skipping dinner or the pounding headache, but she wanted me busy before and during the party.”

“Why?” she blurted, surprised that she’d do something like that.

“I’ll get to that,” I promised.

I told her about how miserable I was and about finally seeing the party to the end of the night and asking for the limousine to take me home only to wait outside for a half-hour before they could find me to tell me that it was only booked to deliver me to the hotel, and it was long gone.

“I wanted a cab, but the hotel staff was falling over themselves in their insistence that they make it right.”

“Why didn’t you call?” she scolded me lightly. “I would have picked you up.”

“You already do too much,” I told her. “Besides, it was midnight and I wasn’t thinking right. So, I came upstairs, poured myself as much booze as I thought I could stomach at once and then sat down to cry myself stupid ... and then she was here,” I said.

“What?!!? She’s there?!!? Now???”

“Yeah. She’d been waiting to surprise me and heard me fall apart. The first that I knew that I wasn’t alone in the suite was when she ran her fingers through my hair and spoke my name,” I said and got up to get another Coke from the bar. “I nearly had a stroke from the shock. I bolted up out of the chair and promptly fell on my face. I rolled over and looked up at her ... I thought I was going crazy. I’ve been holding onto hope this whole entire time. I ... I thought that I’d crossed from hope into delusion. I guess I even asked her if she was real, while I sat there on the floor babbling incoherently.”

“Sweet, merciful Jesus!” she breathed. “She just up and disappeared and then she ambushes you like that after making you entertain her employees? Please, tell me that she at least told you what was in her head that started this in the first place!”

“She did,” I said quietly. “But I think you need to hear that from her, though. She admitted that she did a really bad job of explaining it to you before she left. She’s a little clearer about it now. She’s been kind of a mess too, from what she said. However, her head seems to be on straight again.”

“Pffft!” was the heartfelt reply. “She could have ended it any time,” she pointed out. “So why now? Why tonight?”

“She worked through the issue,” I said carefully. “I don’t want you to think I’m dodging your question, but she needs to be the one to tell you. She and I talked, and she admitted she had no idea that I was taking it so hard. Tonight, when I got back to the suite, I hit the wall, to borrow a NASCAR expression. I was in complete despair when she first approached me. She didn’t realize that it had broken me this badly.”

“No kidding!” she said. “I mean, you look like a million bucks, but that’s only because you go to the gym when you’re stressed. I kind of hate you for that. I eat chocolate icing from the tub when I’m upset.”

“I told you,” I reminded her. “I visualize the weights as my problems and I just push them away until I get too tired to push anymore.”

“That works for you, Muscles, but the rest of us visualize our problems as chocolate frosting and we handle them one large spoonful at a time.”

That got us both laughing some.

“I’m glad you’re still able to laugh,” she said, sounding relieved. “Bella, Steph and I have been worried that you’d shatter when she returned.”

“I did,” I told her. “I didn’t stay shattered though. I got the worst of it out and then I started pulling the pieces together.”

“Okay,” she said, getting a handle on what I’d told her. “How do you feel about her being back? I know you love her, but she left you with a fat pack of hurt and not a lot of reason.”

“I’m ... I’m doing okay,” I said. “I’ll take some time to recuperate, but I was kind of soulless without her here. I’d walk around, do my work, hit the gym like a fiend and sleep. You and Bella and all the rest of the group have been amazing and gotten me through it and I know that if she hadn’t come back, you’d have continued to help me find myself again. Having her back has soothed a lot of the hurt. I think we both have a lot of talking to do, and a lot of recovery before we’re perfect, but we’ll get there.”