California Dreamin'

It got so bad that I wanted to bring Dean back.

I wanted to call him and demand that he come back. Because my baby girl loved him. I wanted to demand that he love her back too.

But you can’t force love. You can’t wish it, will it or conjure it up. You can’t even earn love. If you could, there wouldn’t be any unrequited lovers in the world. Or broken love stories.

Love can only be given. It can only be given of free will and volition.

That was exactly why I never told Simon.

I never told him why his daughter was so upset. I never told him that she loved Dean. He would’ve flown over to California and forced Dean back. He would’ve done all the things that I wanted to do myself. He would’ve tortured himself with it, with helplessness.

I know him. My husband likes to fix things and it wasn’t something that could be fixed.

So I took care of my daughter as best as I could. I tried to be there for her and I tried to be there for my husband.

And tonight, I have to be there for them again, for both my daughter and this man I love. So I say the thing that I don’t really like to think about.

“You made me cry too,” I whisper.

He flinches like I’ve slapped him, and it cuts me so much to bring it up. But I have to. I have to do it. So he understands.

And to cushion the blow I maneuver my body on his lap.

I straddle him, putting my knees on either side of his and threading my fingers in his hair. His own grab my waist and press me into his torso.

“I cried for you, Simon,” I tell him, resting my forehead against his. “For days, for weeks. For the longest time I thought that you didn’t love me and I didn’t know how to accept that. I didn’t know how to live a life without you. I’m not saying this to make you feel bad because it’s all in the past and you’ve made up for everything a million times over. But I’m telling you this because I want you to understand. I want you to understand that the reason our daughter was so sad was because she loved him. And sometimes the people we love hurt us the most. It’s an unfortunate fact but it’s the truth. And you want to know another truth? When you finally admitted that you loved me, I’d never been happier. In fact, every day my happiness grows because you’re with me. I know happiness because of you. And on hard days, when my illness makes me think that I can never be happy and that I’ll always be sad, you make my sadness not so sad.”

His fingers are squeezing my flesh harshly. As harshly as he’s breathing, as harshly as anguish is rippling through his features. “Willow, I—”

“She’s happy, Simon,” I tell him in a broken, tear-filled voice. “Dean makes her happy. And I think the reason for it is because he’s like you. She loves him because she’s like me and he’s like you.”

“That’s the problem, Willow. That he’s like me,” he bursts out, like these words were sitting on the tip of his tongue all night and only now he got the courage to say them.

“What does that mean?”

“Some days I can’t…” His jaw moves back and forth as he tries to gather his thoughts. “I can’t bear how much I love you. Some days I get so afraid. I feel so weak. I feel like someone is squeezing my heart. Some days I feel like I need you, I need to see you and touch you, smell you or I won’t be able to breathe. I need you to breathe, Willow. I need you to make sense of the world. I need you… too much.”

He grabs my face, his thumbs digging into my cheeks. “He’s like me. He doesn’t love her. This is not love. This is… insanity and madness and addiction. This is a visceral need, you understand? He needs her. He needs her too much. Like me, he struggles with emotions. He’s weak. I can’t… My daughter can’t be with a man like that. I won’t let her be with a man like that, like me. She needs someone… better. She needs…”

When he runs out of words, I duck my face.

I clench my eyes shut to keep my tears at bay and press my forehead to his chest. I know his body inside and out and I know the very spot where he has a tattoo. The one he got for me: WW.

Warrior Willow.

Because he thinks I’m a warrior. And because I’ve got the same tattoo on my wrist.

Why does he always forget that he’s a warrior too?