BREATHE: A Billionaire Romance, Part 3 (7 page)

The truth was, I needed normalcy, if only for a moment. I went home when he gave me the option to do so. I really wanted to be there for him, but I also needed to take a step back for a moment. I wasn’t happy about it.

Hell, I felt miserable even doing so…

But if he had actually wanted me to stay, he would have told me to stay, right?

I growled in frustration and grabbed the remote off of Polly’s thigh and turned the channel. We hadn’t even spoken since I had been home. She didn’t notice that I was upset; and I hadn’t talked about her play.

We were both too enthralled with the TV to do anything for or with one another. But that was perfectly fine with me.

The less I had to talk about my feelings, the better.

I sighed and grumbled, all at the same time, hoping that the mindless contraption in front of me would warp my brain into a state of numbness that would inevitably lead to me forgetting the fact that I was in love with a dying man.

“Are you alright?” Polly asked, finally paying me some sort of attention, but I really didn’t want it. I just wanted to forget. I wanted to lose myself in the abyss of horrible television; I wanted to become Polly for a moment.

I grumbled a little more, more to myself than to her. Incoherent words dribbled from my lips as I watched some woman fleeing from a man-eating monster in the most ridiculous way imaginable. She was clad in hardly any clothing and kept stumbling with nearly every step she took. A turtle monster could have caught up with her.

I rolled my eyes, just before I felt movement.

“Tell me what’s wrong with you!” Polly snapped, jumping on me.

And I wasn’t sure what it was; if it was the horrific emotional state that I was in, or if it was just that I really just wanted her to ask me after all this time, but I spilled it. And when I say, I spilled it, I let it all pour out.

Everything.

Derek’s illness, my shittiness as a friend, my shittiness as an employee, and my shittiness as a girlfriend. Everything.

“You’re an idiot!” she said shoving me. “You should know better than to leave him like that!”

I wasn’t sure what she meant by that, but I had something to say regarding me ‘leaving him’.

“He’s going to leave me,” I muttered, bitterly.

“Not on purpose,” she said and sighed, clearly frustrated. “It isn’t his fault that he’s dying; don’t make him feel like it is.”

“I love how nonchalant everyone is about the fact that he’s dying!” I screamed, flicking my thumb over the power button on the remote. “He would have told me not to go if he needed me to be there when he woke up.”

“You really are an idiot.” Polly groaned. “You’re like a damn man.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“That’s supposed to mean that of course he isn’t going to ask you to stay; he wants you to want to stay!”

“I wanted to stay if he wanted me to stay!”

“He wanted you to stay because you wanted to be there, not because he asked you to.”

“That’s stupid.”

Polly groaned. “No! It’s not!”

“I’m just used to everyone being straight forward about everything.” I sighed.

“Well, hon, that’s not how it works off the farm!” Polly interjected. “People say shit they don't mean or shit they should not have said at the time. It’s an everyday thing in the world. It’s how normal society works.”

And I knew that she was right.

“Did you feel ok coming here? Did you feel guilty?” she asked.

I nodded in response. I had. I had felt horrible, but the entire time, I kept trying to reassure myself that it was fine because he told me to go home if I wanted to. He would be asleep anyway, I told myself. He would have told me to stay if he wanted me to, or so I thought…

But I was wrong.

“Then there’s your answer. You felt guilty. So get your ass up and go be with him.”

And that was all it took.

Advice from a friend…and my car…to get myself there.

At the front door of his penthouse.

When I knocked, though, there was no sound. And I hoped more than anything that he was still asleep. Because if he had awoken, I knew he would have been upset with me if not completely heartbroken by the fact that I had left him.

I sighed, the moment of truth was there. I slowly placed my key into the lock and, with great hesitancy, turned it.

I really didn’t want to go in. I really didn’t want to face him if he was awake. I didn’t want to fight. I just wanted him.

And as much as I didn’t want to face him if he was awake, he needed to know how much he meant to me. He meant enough that I was willing to put aside my pride, go back and admit that I was wrong for leaving in the first place.

I loved him so much that I was willing to beg for his forgiveness for showing even the slightest lapse…

I wanted him to know that I wasn’t going anywhere ever again.

And sure, it wasn’t necessarily a huge deal. I was only gone a couple hours; but still, it was the principle. I couldn't leave Derek; not in the state that he was in; not when I loved him.

I wanted to spend every waking moment with him. I wanted to kiss him and hold him and tell him that I didn’t blame him. And although it hurt my ego, and it definitely hurt my nerves, I knew that it had to be done. I knew that I had to open the door, and face whatever it was that was going to come from doing so.

I pushed the door open and called out to him. “Derek?” I called, sweetly, and in a tone low enough not to wake him if he wasn’t already.

But there was no movement in the distance; no scurrying about. There were no sounds, in fact. And just as I was about to call for him again, on my way to the bedroom, I saw something on the ground.

I squinted my eyes and continued walking towards the bedroom. And then I realized what it was. It was his hand poking out around the corner; he was on the ground.

“Derek!?” I shrieked, running over to him.

Only he didn’t move.

When I closed in on him and rounded the corner, I saw him completely.  His hand was outstretched over his head, and he was lying on his stomach, vomit all around… and as far as I could tell, he wasn’t breathing.

“Derek!?” I called again, falling to my knees.

But he wouldn’t wake up.

He wouldn’t move.

And by God, he wouldn’t breathe…and all I could think in that moment was that it was all my fault.

I left him.

~~~

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Jenn Marlow