The Memory (2)

She stood by her kitchen window, staring out at the night sky. It had been three years since that night that she had left, but it still felt like it was only yesterday.

The pain in her heart was still just as strong as it was then. She clutched her chest and bit her lip, doing her best to hold back the tears that were building up in the corner of her eyes.

'My pain? What about his pain? His heartache? The betrayal?' These were all valid questions that ran through her mind as she recalled seeing that expression on his face. The angry face, but the pain and hurt in his eyes.

She thought that it would be easy to leave once she got caught. That she would smile coldly at him and shrug, acting like what they had was meaningless to her. But when she those eyes, the quivering arms, his face that seemed to age right before her, her heart broke.

She realised how badly she had hurt him. And for what? A quick release of pleasure? He could give that to her! He gave her all she wanted - love, affection, a home for the two of them. Yet, knowing all this, she still did what she did.

Just thinking about it made her heart tremble and ache.

Seeing his broken heart made her realise she loved him, but had just destroyed that love, and that thought cast her into deep shame.

'Maybe he'll take me back', she once thought. All she had to do was wait a bit, and he would call to talk. They would smooth things over, and it would all continue like before!

He never called.

'I'll just go over there! If he sees how sincere and apologetic I am, he'll surely take me back!'

But life is never so easy. Instead of going over, she called her brothers and told them to pick up her stuff from his house.

That had been an error on her part.

Her family ended up finding out what happened, and they forced her to confirm if it had been the truth. All she had to do was say no, and they would have believed her, but just thinking of how it would hurt him more made her admit to everything.

She lost her family that day. Her mother and two brothers distanced themselves from her. And her father... well, he was less than pleased, to say the least.

To try and forget him, she started seeing other men, but none could fill the hole that she had created. They dulled the pain for a while, but at the end of the day, he was who she wanted and needed.

Their mutual friends would tell her that he wasn't seeing anyone whenever she asked, but she knew they were lying. Why wouldn't they lie to her? They knew what had happened, after all her family knew!

She would get angry when thinking of him with another woman and curse him. But then cry and become depressed because she was the reason he was with someone else.

It had been three years, but the hole was still there. She wanted to hear his voice once more, smell his scent on her clothes, feel his srrong embrace around her. Maybe he would even take her back!

Yes, as long as he took her back, she could endure this heartache and chest pain.

With a resolute nod to her reflection, she turned around and looked toward her phone sitting on the dining room table. Next to it was the couch, where there currently slept another man. She stopped as she gazed at this person.

This man was her neighbor, their apartments were right across from each other. She had invited him over for dinner and dessert, among some other more... adult acts. She had been seeing him for a few weeks and was actually enjoying herself. She hadn't thought about the other one for those few weeks, so why was that now looking st this sleeping man she felt shame and disgust? Like she had once again cheared on her love? Her heart ached and throbbed in pain.

She could no longer suppress these emotions, and began to silently cry as she slumped to the ground.

For a long while she sat there, crying into her knees. She had pulled herself back into the kitchen and his behind the counter, leaning against it while she sobbed uncontrollably.

At some point, her neighbor awoke and left without so much as a goodbye. This both angered and saddened her.

Eventually, her tears dried up, but she had become exhausted so she had no energy to move. She just sit there, curled up.

The phone rang.

She perked up. Maybe it him! Maybe he was calling to try and work things out, finally. She smiled. She would act a little cold towards him at first, but she would ultimately say yes to gritting back together.

Hurriedly, she scrambled over to the phone and grabbed it, answering before checking to see who had called.

"Hello?" she said as calmly as her voice would allow her. She didn't want him to think she had been waiting or was excited to hear from him, even if she were.

"... Hello... ", a woman's voice said, rather coldly. Her mother's voice. Though she sounded distant, there had been a bit of a tremor in her voice. Odd.

"Oh... Hello mother..." she replied dejectedly, "what do you want?"

"There's been an accident..."