I urged myself to move past that failure and hold on to this new future with all my might. I didn’t know how I could just leave it all behind tonight, nor could I bear for him to walk away. My decision wouldn’t come; words stuck in my mouth, lodging in my throat. I swallowed them down, along with a hard, painful lump.
David’s eyes darted between mine, and hope drained from his features. “It’s him?” he asked finally, dropping his hands and stepping back.
My knees gave, and I fell to the floor in a broken, bawling heap. How could I have done this to everyone? How was I the source of so much despair?
David hesitated only a second before he strode away. He pulled open the front door, and without looking at me, turned his head over his shoulder. “You can have the house.”
I choked back my tears. “No,” I screamed, but it was muted by the slam of the door.
The first time I’d seen David had been electric. Our eyes had met across that shimmering lobby, and it was as if the heavens had smiled right on me. What had that feeling been? Lust? Love? Had it been nothing? Or everything?
Relief didn’t come. As I expected my fear to fade away with my decision to stay safely on the cliff and not jump, it only deepened instead, taking root. And new fears took place. That I might wake up one day trapped by all the things I hadn’t wanted because I’d been too scared to change my life. That Bill would never feel like home. That I’d fall out of love with Bill. That I already had.
As I broke apart on the kitchen floor, I wondered if picking safety over passion was still the right thing. Except, it wasn’t safety I’d chosen. It was fear. At some point, I’d lost myself to it, and David had tried to bring me back. Now, I’d stay lost even though fear would exist no matter what path I pursued. I’d just said good-bye to a man who’d tried to show me that a life without love was no life at all.
That was, I realized, even worse than the unknown.
A life withouthim. I’d lived that life in the anguished months following the morning I’d fled his apartment. And I’d been spiraling downward until he’d returned. Until he’d danced with me at Lucy’s wedding, walked with me through the streets of Chicago, and brought to life a house that could’ve been ours.
And then it hit me. I knew exactly what that feeling in the theater lobby had been when our eyes had first met.
I scrambled to my feet and flung open the door. I ran into the rain after him, and with everything I had, I screamed, “It’s you!”
David stopped. His shoulders tensed, but he remained frozen as the sky fell around us.
My voice cut clearly through the downpour when I said, “Of course it’s you. You are my home.”
After what felt like an eternity, he turned slowly. Pain etched his face. For a heartbreaking moment, I thought I was too late. But then he stepped forward, and suddenly I was running. He opened his arms, and I jumped.
And I was home.
