Stay With Me

I would love to say that things magically got easier when I cut Gerard out of my life. In some ways, it did. I didn’t have to feel guilty when I came home after my sessions with Nina. My Saturdays were no longer two extremes of maddening exhilaration when I was with Gerard and regret when I came home to Frank and prayed that I didn’t smell like another man had his hands all over me only hours before. I didn’t feel like I had to juggle two people’s expectations and emotions on top of my own ups and downs. I had changed my day with Nina, so that I no longer saw Gerard every Monday evening. Now, my Monday evenings consisted of going home, cooking dinner for Frank and a stubborn refusal to wonder what I would be doing if I hadn’t let go of Gerard that day. I spent my Wednesday evenings on Nina’s couch, trying not to flinch under her stare as she dissected everything I told her to the ninth degree.

My relationship with Frank had improved vastly in the meantime. He was a little curious as to why I suddenly changed my schedule and avoided Gerard on Saturdays. I couldn’t tell him the truth, but the lie was convincing enough that he didn’t question it. He had no reason to question whether we had had a falling out over something Gerard said. I think he was just happy to think that my time was no longer taken up by another person anymore. Gerard was nothing but a distant memory to Frank after a couple of weeks without his presence.

The thing was, Gerard wouldn’t let me forget him. At first, it had been missed calls and voicemails. At first, they were reasonable.

“Can we just talk, please? Do you really think it’s fair that you get to walk away and leave me to pick up all the pieces? All I’m asking is for one conversation, I don’t think that’s an awful lot, considering everything.”

Then, after two weeks of refusing to give into his pleading voice that haunted me whenever I listened to this message again, they turned. It wasn’t just the anger that startled me; his slurred speech and drunken ramblings struck a nerve.

“You really are just like the rest of them, aren’t you? Why wasn’t I good enough, Grace? I tried so hard to be good enough, but fuck it, I may as well just give in. What’s the point of fighting for something you never really had, anyway? I just don’t feel like fighting anymore. You remember that feeling, don’t you? The one where it’s just emptiness and hopelessness, and nothing is worth it anymore…”

I had to stop listening to the voicemails after three very similar ones had been left on my phone, tormenting me even further. I didn’t delete them- I couldn’t. I wanted the reminder there. I needed the pain. The pain felt good, in its own way. It was a different kind of pain to the one I had carried around with me for so long. This one was of my own making; it was deserved, and the suffering that came with it was one I could just about bear. There was something therapeutic about it, as strange as it was. I could handle the fact that it was my mistake that had caused it. It was almost akin to when I had used a razor to hurt myself. Self-harming, but the definition of being self, made it a kind of pain that was manageable. There was an expectation of how high on the threshold the pain would be, you prepared for it and sometimes even craved it. It was far more desirable to be the master of my own torment than have it at the hands of another person.

Of course, then there was Nina. She knew what had happened. She let me cry in her office, as I struggled to put how I felt into words. It was surprisingly difficult to explain how I was filled with relief and pain in equal measure. I knew I had done the right thing, but that didn’t mean it didn’t hurt to know that I had hurt the person I loved. His voicemails and subsequent texts made it hard to distract myself from the thought of him. Part of me knew it was deliberate on his part, that it was his way of making sure that I couldn’t hide from the mess I had made. He wanted me to hurt over it, and he was definitely succeeding in his quest.

The texts were hard not to read, and even harder not to respond to. I wanted to end his pain. I wanted to be able to find the words that would just cure his anguish and rage, but I just couldn’t find the right way to tell him that I was sorry, that I wasn’t worth the misery he was putting himself through. I just had to believe that one day, the pain would be gone along with his feelings for me.

***

I was in the shower when it happened. It was Friday, the end of a long working week, and I was in desperate need of a long shower to ease my tense muscles. My weeks had gone according to plan. Everything felt like it was going okay, for once. I hadn’t heard from Gerard that day, which felt like a blow, as much as it was a release.

I should have realised how quiet Frank was when I stepped into the bedroom to put on my pyjamas. I was too wrapped up in my head, though. I was thinking about work, and how thankful I was that a big case was finally over, so that the office could get back to normal. I was wondering about whether I should suggest that Frank and I should go away for the weekend. I didn’t hear Frank stepping into the bedroom, as I slipped on my shorts.

I jumped when I turned around and saw him, standing in the doorframe and staring at me with a look I had never seen on his face before. It terrified me to see the expression. It was hard, cold,his eyes a little dulled and his face was pale. Not as pale as the night he found me in the bathroom, but it was close enough that I was concerned.

“Frank, what’s-“

“How long?” he cut me off viciously.

I was stumped. I had no idea what he was talking about. The anger coming from his body infiltrated the room, suffocating me in its potency.

“Frank, I don’t know what-“

“Gerard. How long have you been fucking him for?”

That was when I saw it. My phone, clutched so tightly in his fist that I believed he could break it. I knew then that he had seen the texts, or maybe he had heard the voicemails. Either way, he knew. I couldn’t deny it. I couldn’t lie my way out of it. I was too startled, too frightened and too ashamed to come up with a coherent excuse that would plausibly get me out of the situation.

“Frank, just let me-“

“HOW LONG?” he shouted, stepping forward and entering the room.

I jumped, the volume of his voice hurting my ears and reverberating off the walls.

“It’s over now, Frank. I ended it.” I rushed out, before he could cut me off again.

“Well, isn’t that mighty great of you. How long, Grace? How long were you laughing at me, while you screwed another guy?”

“It wasn’t like that, Frank-“

“What was it like, then? Hhhmm? Because I’m just dying to fucking know. Was he good, huh? Is that it?”

“Will you let me explain? Please?”

He glared at me with eyes that were vacant of everything but anger. There was a brief pause, a stillness in the air. He took in a sharp, deep breath.

“When did it start?”

I knew that the only thing I could do was be honest. I cringed internally, wishing that I could find a way to turn back time and avoid what was happening. The moment was my worst nightmare coming into existence. My life as I knew it was destroyed. It was imploding, and I could do nothing to affect the outcome.

“About eight months ago.”

“When did it stop?”

“Six weeks ago,” I whispered.

He didn’t give a reaction, at first. He remained still, eerily calm, considering how much anger was emanating from him.

“Why did you end it?”

The question caught me off guard. I expected him to ask why I had done it, what we had done, and where.

“Because I love you. I want to be with you, not him.”

He nodded. It was hell in its purest, heinous form, waiting for him to say or do something. I was too afraid to open my mouth; there was nothing I could say that was going to make things any better.

“Why did you do it?” he breathed out after a tense five minute silence.

“I don’t know.”

“Don’t fucking lie.” He hissed.

“I…I didn’t plan it, Frank. I was upset when it happened the first time, and it just spiralled from there.”

“How many times?”

“I didn’t exactly count,” I muttered shamefully.

“Ball park figure. How often?”

I was going to refuse him the answer. I knew that anything I said would be twisted. If I lied and said it was only once, then I had thrown away our relationship for a one night stand. If I told the truth, not only was I admitting that I was regularly sleeping with the two men, I was also rubbing in just how deep the affair ran.

“Couple of times a week, mostly.”

I wanted to hide from him when he flexed his fingers, clenching them even tighter than before.

“I can’t even fucking look at you right now. After everything we’ve been through. All the nights I couldn’t sleep, because I was worried you were going to hurt yourself again. All the times I wondered what I was doing wrong, and what I had done to make you so distant. All that time, you were off fucking him. You lied to me all that time. Were you even telling me the truth about Nick? Was that just a lie to manipulate me into giving you enough space so you could have your dirty little secret? God, you must have fucking laughed at me.”

“I didn’t lie about Nick,” I recoiled from him even further, physically sick that he no longer believed me. I should have seen that coming. I really should have, but it came as a punch to the stomach; winding me and leaving me almost incapable of speech. The affects of his words didn’t recede with passing time. Every second I stood there, the sting increased tenfold.

There was another pause. I didn’t know what was worse-his questions, or the silence between, as he thought out another question that only increased the gap between us now.

“Do you love him?”

His voice shook as he spat the words out. My fingers twitched nervously. I couldn’t stand the intensity of his stare, and the venom behind his eyes, and just how rigid his stance was. He was still as a statue, and almost as cold. His jaw was tense, as was his fist, like he was ready to throw a punch any second.

“I love you,” my voice was soft, breaking pitifully, as I uttered the last syllable.

My words didn’t affect him; not at first, at least. I could tell that he had noted that I hadn’t answered the question. He leaned against the doorframe, running his two hands over his face.

“I don’t know what to do. I don’t…I can’t wrap my head around this. Fuck!”

“I’m so, so sorry, Frank. I never meant for it to happen.”

“No, you just never meant to get caught!”

“That’s not true! You think it didn’t kill me, lying to you? You think it made me feel good about myself?”

“Oh, poor you. It must have been so fucking hard, going back to him every time! What did you get out of it? Was he a good lay? Oh, let me guess, he was a good listener, wasn’t he?”

“I went to him because he made me feel good about myself!” I yelled.

I wanted to take the words back, the second they left my mouth. Frank’s face fell, stunned, before a giggle escaped him.

“Wow. He made you feel good about yourself? That’s where I went wrong, huh? So what, me telling you that I love you every day wasn’t enough? Doing fucking everything for you wasn’t enough? Standing by you, when you could barely function, wasn’t fucking good enough?”

“Not when you wouldn’t look at me. Not when you didn’t know the truth about me.”

In a flash, the phone he held in his hand was thrown across the room, hitting the wall, and ricocheting to the ground with a dull thump. I flinched in surprise.

“Oh, go fuck yourself, Grace. How was I supposed to react, when you wouldn’t talk to me? Don’t you dare put this on me. I did fucking everything-“

“I know you do everything for me! You did what a good boyfriend should do. But you couldn’t understand, not like he could. He understood what I went through in a way you never will.”

“Well, excuse me for not having a fucked up childhood. I’m sorry I never had to deal with anything more serious than parental divorce.”

“I’m just trying to explain, Frank.”

“How about you just stop explaining then, because you’re really not doing yourself any favours. Fuck, does it even matter? Regardless of why, you still fucked him.”

The tears were streaming down my cheeks silently. I sat down on the bed, my knees too weak to continue supporting me. The stalemate was tense, even when Frank eventually sat on the floor, his back and head leaning against the wall, as he focused on the ceiling. I didn’t know where to look. My eyes went from the bed sheets, to the floor, the ceiling, to Frank, before going back to the bed sheets, and beginning the cycle again.

“Tell me what I’m supposed to do?”Frank eventually broke the silence, not looking at me, but instead focusing on the ceiling. “I wanna fucking hate you, and walk away, so badly, but I still love you. I really wish I didn’t, right now. My head is saying that I should leave. I know I fucking should.”

“I don’t want you to go,” I choked out.

He looked at me then. His eyes were glassy, but he didn’t let the tears fall, unlike me, who was a silent blubbering mess on the bed.

“How can I ever trust you again? Why should I even try?”

“I’ll do whatever it takes to make this right, Frank. Just…just let me try, okay? Let me try and fix this. I can fix this.”

My voice wavered.

“Maybe it shouldn’t be fixed,” he replied tonelessly.

“I don’t believe that. You said it yourself, after everything we’ve been through together. We’ve been through too much.”

“And yet it wasn’t enough for you to keep your panties on.”

I flushed with the harshness of his words. I saw a flash of regret in his eyes, when he saw how his words stung.

“Come with me to see Nina. We can work through this, Frank. I know we can.”

He sighed. His hazel eyes shined in the florescent light of the room.

“I’ll sleep on the couch,” he muttered, standing up, and calmly leaving me in the bedroom with my thoughts and bitter regret.

Notes

As I've stated on my other stories, I am humbly sorry for the pause on updates. Life was hectic. New job, new house, all that jazz.

So, who saw this coming? What should Frank do? How do you guys feel?

Lyra xxx

PS, I'm on twitter. Follow me @MCR_Lyra to chat, ask questions and/or remind me to update. Hope to see you guys there!