“You’ve done it, lady, now come inside so we can finish talking this shit out where it’s warm.”
“That isn’t going to happen,” I declared and his head jerked.
“What?”
“I am who I am and I can’t be something else for you. For over a week, I’ve called, texted and sat in the Compound while your brothers knew I was waiting for you, humiliating myself by sitting there, hoping I’d get the chance to make things right with you. They did their best to be nice, it’s their way. But you didn’t give me that shot, they all knew it and I knew it too. You didn’t return a call. You didn’t send back a text. You walked away from me, twice, and just now you saw me and walked into your house without looking at me. You don’t need my drama in your life, Hop? Well, I don’t need a man who can so easily cut me out of his.”
“You didn’t know about Cody, babe, I didn’t know about your dad.”
“You didn’t ask.”
“I’ll remind you, you didn’t either.”
“Oh, you don’t have to remind me, Hopper. I remember. God, I remember,” I told him, the words sounding choked in the end so I swallowed as Hop shifted toward me but I took a step away so he stopped.
“This doesn’t work,” I declared.
“Yes, it does,” he contradicted.
“No,” I shook my head. “It doesn’t. We fight all the time.”
“We also fuck all the time.”
He had a point there, just not a good enough one.
“We don’t work,” I stated.
“Baby, the good we got, how can you say that?” he asked.
“I have a week and a half of knowing it, Hop,” I answered. “You cut me out.”
“You fucked up then I fucked up, babe. We’re gettin’ to know each other. That’ll happen and, just a head’s up, even when we got time and experience in, it’ll still happen.”
“You cut me out.”
“I fucked up.”
I leaned in and hissed, “You cut me out,” and he blinked at the sudden harshness of my tone. “Do you have any clue, any fucking clue how much pain I’ve been in? A week and a half, knowing I hurt you like that, knowing I forced you to relive that, knowing I did wrong, calling you, texting you, begging you to let me talk to you, apologizing and you not giving me anything?”
He stepped out on the stoop and I took another step away.
“Lanie, come here,” he urged.
“No.” I moved back another step.
“Goddamn it, Lanie, you’re gonna fall off the fuckin’ stoop,” he growled so I stepped down the two steps and stood on his front walk. “Jesus, lady, just come inside the fuckin’ house.”
“I wanted one night,” I reminded him.
“Lanie, baby—”
“That’s it. One night. But you pushed in, I let you in and now I remember, Hop. I remember what, for seven years, I’ve been guarding against.”
He stepped down. I stepped back.
“You have something, you have something to lose,” I went on, slowly backing up. “You don’t have anything, you have nothing to lose. I didn’t want any part of it but you made me want it then you gave me something and you took it away and reminded me how bad it hurts, how it kills to have something to lose.”
“Please, honey, fuckin’ come inside.”
“We’re done.”
“Take a deep breath, calm the drama, think a second then come the fuck inside.”
I stopped dead, he stopped dead and I pinned him with my eyes.
“This isn’t a drama, Hop. Pay attention. I’m not ranting. I’m not in a tizzy. I’ve given this a lot of thought. Thanks to you, I’ve had a good amount of time to think about it. And we’re done. I don’t need this pain. I’ve had twenty-eight years of living with this kind of pain, watching my mother endure it, and I’m done.”
His face went hard.
“I’m not doin’ to you what your motherfucker of a father is doin’ to your mother,” he growled.
“It’s not the same but it’s still heartbreak,” I returned and, just as quickly as it came, the hardness washed out of his features.
“Do not do this, Lanie.”
“It’s already done. It was done when you got off your bike, walked into your house and broke my heart. Just like my father. You didn’t even have it in you to do it up close and personal.”
He grabbed my arm but, with a savage twist, I pulled away and took two steps back.
“It was good you shielded your kids from what we might have been, Hop. I’ll miss them but they won’t miss me.”
“Jesus, fuck, babe, I’m beggin’ you, come inside.”
“Good-bye, Hop.”
“Baby—”
I turned and ran.
He turned and ran into his house.
He didn’t have his keys.
This was good.
This meant I got a head start and when I hit a motel parking lot, Hop had no idea where I was.
It was only when I was sitting cross-legged on the ratty bedspread did I allow myself to burst into tears.
Two days later…
I sat on my couch, twisted toward Tyra to my left, lifting a bent leg just like hers to rest it on the couch and I sucked back some wine.
Since I gave her the wineglass before I sat down, she’d already had her sip, so when I took my glass from my lips, she was prepared to launch in.
“I don’t blame you.”
I closed my eyes.
“Lanie, honey, look at me.”
I opened my eyes.
She leaned toward me and wrapped her fingers around my thigh. “I don’t blame you for me getting stabbed.”
“I know,” I whispered something I did know but had been denying for insane reasons until that moment I wouldn’t allow myself to get. Understandable fear after what happened that led to irrational guilt that no one gave me any indication I should feel. I just fed off it, or more to the point, let my monster feed on it in a vain and crazy attempt to keep myself safe from ever being hurt again.
“I hope so,” she told me. “Since I told you way back when that I didn’t.”
I drew in breath then confided, “I hear it over and over again in my head.”
Her head tipped to the side and she scooted closer. “You hear what in your head?”
“Our conversation. You telling me to end it with Elliott. You advising me that his getting us kidnapped was a concrete wall you can’t scale when it comes to love. Me telling you—”
“Stop it,” she interrupted, squeezing my thigh.
“I think that’s it, sweetie. I think that was why I couldn’t forgive myself even though you and Tack never blamed me. I think it’s because I play that conversation over and over in my head and it reminds me there was something that needed to be forgiven,” I admitted.
“Honey, you didn’t kidnap and stab me and you have to find some way to get that straight. I don’t know how to stop you playing that conversation in your head,” she stated. “I just know, together, Lanie, we have to find a way to do that.”
I took a sip of wine, my way of being noncommittal. I couldn’t tell her we could do that, since I hadn’t been able to do it for seven years. With this, I’d taken a big step. Who knew how long it would take me to get to the next one.
The day after the break with Hop, I’d called her and told her I was ready to do this. Not surprisingly, she’d told me to tell her when and where and she’d be there.
I gave her the when and where and last night, sleeping at home again, I waited for Hop to show or call.
He didn’t.
It was over.
That killed but I’d survived worse (I told myself) so now it was time to move on with my life. Do this. Fight the monster myself without Hop at my back.
And hope I won.