Elizabeth removes her hand and gets up to pace back and forth in front of me. “What if I made a mistake, Ryder? It’s something I think about all the time. It’s something I thought about tonight. God, this is all so crazy. So insane. My thoughts are all jumbled and I’m angry. I’m confused.”
“Elizabeth, you’re not making any sense. And I really do need to talk with you.”
She stops pacing. “What if it was you that came through my window that night?” she says at the same time I say, “need to talk to you.”
“What?” we say at the same time again.
She’s the first to continue. “That’s what I think about sometimes. I think about you. What if it was you that night? There’s always a part of me that wonders what if.”
My brain is malfunctioning at her words, what they mean. I need to stop this. I need to tell her about Jayson, how he was drugged and is in the hospital, how he needs her there with him. But I just can’t because my mouth won’t cooperate with what my brain is telling it to do. So I sit back and listen.
“There’s a part of me that knows that no matter what, no matter how much I lovehim,I will always love you, too,” she confesses. “He ripped my heart out tonight, Ryder. He destroyed me. I gave him everything. I chose him over you, and he destroyed me. It hurts so much, so, so, much,” she cries, huge silent tears tracing down her face. “Part of me wishes that I never said yes to him that night. That I said yes to you instead. You would never hurt me like that, would you Ryder?” Elizabeth’s liquid verdant eyes bore into me, begging me to ease her pain, make it go away, give her promises that I know I won’t be able to give and still live with myself without a heavy burden of guilt weighing me down.
I decide to once again be the better man. I lift myself up and go to her, taking her in my arms. “Sweetheart, I know you’re upset and angry and confused. I know you’re feeling hurt and want that hurt to go away. I wish I could be the one to give that to you. I wish things were not what they are between us, between you and Jay. But they are. I have loved you for years. I have loved you enough to let you go and find your happiness. I told you I’m not going anywhere, regardless of if we’re together or not. Perhaps, one day, we’ll get our chance. Fuck, I wish that with everything in me. But today,” I kiss her temple, “today, you need to be with Jayson.”
“I’m so sorry,” she cries into my chest, shoulders shaking, her hands gripping the front of my shirt wet with her tears. “You must hate me for saying these things to you. I’m so sorry. How could you love someone like me? I’m screwed up. I’m selfish.”
“Not selfish, Elizabeth,” I tell her. “Just wishing for something right now that’s not possible. And after you truly understand what happened, you would hate yourself if we allowed things to happen between us tonight.” I lift her chin, cup her face, needing that small contact before I say the words that will cement my future by letting her go once again to be with him. “Jayson is in the hospital. He needs you Elizabeth. I came here to bring you to him.”
Her voice cracks with grief. “Oh my God. What? How? Why?”
“I think we need to sit down for this.” I pull her to sit on the side of her bed. We don’t let go of each other yet, our souls craving that physical bond holding the threads of our disjointed hearts from flying away into night. She and I will forever be tied together, just like she is with Jayson and Julien. I meant what I said, believing the words my dad told me the day my world fell apart and I lost her to Jayson. She needs to experience life and love, the good parts and the bad. And I will continue to hope that one day she will be mine to love, be free to love. Hope that all of this, the things we feel and do and say right now, will be worth it in the end.
“He didn’t do it, Elizabeth. He told you the truth.”
Her eyes go wide, then she frowns. “How do you know for sure? We saw the same thing. He and,..” she swallows hard. “They were half naked, wrapped around each other. I know what I saw!”
“He was drugged, Elizabeth. He didn’t know what he was doing.”
“Drugged?” she almost shouts before lowering her voice. “What the hell do you mean? How do you know?”
I fill her in on everything. How he was acting, the dizziness, vomiting, memory loss. As I explain it all to her, she goes from worried to furious to murderous. “The bloodwork confirmed it. He had GHB in his system. I looked it up and everything he did, the over the top way he went after Marshall, the dizziness, vomiting, not remembering stuff, even winding up with Jacinda, it was because of it.”
Elizabeth grabs her tablet and looks GHB up on the CDC website to confirm what I’m telling her. “How can we be sure that he didn’t take it willingly?”
“I talked to Maria on my way over here. He was never out of her sight even when she went to grab the bottles of water. She saw Jacinda and Samantha give him the red cups. That’s the only thing he drank before they came outside.” Elizabeth growls when I say Jacinda’s name. “It’s not his fault, Elizabeth.”
I cup her head between my hands and force her to look at me. “You also didn’t see him after. He’s torn up and kicking himself knowing that he hurt you. He’s broken inside, blaming himself, wanting you to forgive him. He needs you, Elizabeth. Will you let me take you to see him in the morning?”
She bites her lip and nods slowly.
“I’ll pick you up at seven. If everything's good overnight, they’ll discharge him in the morning.” I stand up and wipe my hands on my jeans. “Is it alright with you if I exit through your front door and not the tree?”
Her hand on my arm stops me from leaving. “Will you stay with me? Or just hold me until I fall asleep?”
“My beautiful Elizabeth. I would do anything for you.” She looks so lost at that moment, like a butterfly whose wings have been damaged and it struggles to keep flying, to keep going. She reaches out and takes my larger hand in her smaller, more delicate one, and leads me back to her bed. I remove my shoes and climb on top of her comforter, leaning back against her headboard with my legs outstretched. She joins me and snuggles into my side laying her head in the crook of my shoulder and closes her eyes. The smell of her jasmine body lotion envelops us.
“Would you rather,” she begins in a soft cadence as her voice turns husky with sleep. “Would you rather be rich and feel somewhat content, or poor and be extremely happy?”
“That’s easy,” I say. “I’d rather be poor and happy.”
“Me too,” she replies, eyes fluttering down in exhaustion. She’s had a very long, hard night. “You make me happy, Ryder.”
“As do you, sweet Elizabeth,” I murmur back but she’s already asleep.
Jayson
Mom, dad, and Julien just left to go home and eat and take showers. They stayed in the waiting room all night until visiting hours started up again this morning. The doctor on rotation came in not long ago and said I should be discharged later today after they do one more blood draw to make sure things look good. The hospital staff have been nice, but the food is god-awful. I check my phone again. Still no word from Ryder or Liz. I text Julien.
