The Returned

I’d tried telling her time and again. But she seemed to want it so much, and my protests and denials didn’t seem to work. She was convinced that her love would be enough. That she could heal me somehow.

But I knew better. I knew what it meant to love and be loved so completely that two became one. I knew that for the rest of my life, whether it is her or someone else that I’ll never have that again. Not with anyone else but my woman.

So now, here we are after months of pleading on her part, and my mother’s sad face every time I looked at her. That, coupled with the fact that it was beginning to look like my woman wasn’t ever coming back no matter how much I wished for it, had finally broken me down and caused me to make a mistake that I now have to fix.

I let my eyes travel over her one last time. The dress she wore was fitted across her chest seductively, the deep vee of the neckline showing off the creamy skin of her cleavage to perfection.

She was perfectly manicured and coiffed, not a hair out of place. Even the way she lifted the fork to her lips seemed cultured and refined and fit perfectly with her well-bred upbringing.

Still I felt nothing, nothing but distaste and repulsion, at myself. Even to sit and have a meal with her as man and woman leaves a nasty taste in my mouth. In fact, it’s only at times like this that I feel like I’m betraying ‘her’.

Maybe that’s why I hate it so much. Why it makes my skin crawl to even come up the driveway. Why I go home and sit in darkness for hours afterwards until the feelings pass.

It’s not like I don’t think of my woman every fucking second of the day. But it’s only when I’m forced to come here because I’ve ran out of excuses that I feel this sense of suffocation.

Always in her presence I feel like it’s a betrayal of the worst sort, and maybe it is. So why did I think that I could go through with this? Why had I even let myself be talked into it? And why was it only now that I felt this strongly when I hadn’t given a damn about anything in so long?

Why did I convince myself that this time would be different when I knew deep down that nothing would ever change? Even when my heart was dead inside me, when I didn’t care if I lived or died, I knew that no one could ever take my woman’s place.

But for whatever reason I’d let myself be talked into it this last time. Was it to prove something to myself, or to others? I knew it wasn’t because of any real interest on my part.

This was only the second or third time I’d let myself be talked into coming to her place, and I’m pretty sure it might be my last.

I felt stifled, like I couldn’t breathe. It wasn’t the first time I’d felt this way. But tonight the feelings were stronger than in the past and I knew I could no longer brush them aside, ignore them.

It was time I faced the truth and made her do the same. That no matter how much time had passed, I’m never going to feel whole again. Never going to want this with anyone else but the woman who owns my heart.

I know she feels it too, the lack of true interest on my part. So why is she so willing to subject herself to a life of this emptiness? A life with a man who’s never going to love her no matter what.

Could she really love me this much that she is willing to settle for the crumbs which were all I could ever offer her? For her sake I can’t let her do that. And I can’t spend another day feeling like the life was being sucked out of me just from being in the same room as her.

But how do I explain without hurting her feelings? How do I dash her dreams and break her heart after all that she’d done for me without her knowing that she’d never stood a chance?

That she’d wasted all her time and effort on a lost cause? There was no way to do that without lying and that I’m not very good at. There was no getting around this shit.

No matter what words I choose this evening is not going to end well for her. Just as I was about to speak she spoke up for the first time in minutes. “Why aren’t you eating Cade? I made your favorite meal specially….”

How could I tell her that this shit was only my favorite when made by other hands? That not even the most skilled chef could make the veal picata quite like my woman?