“Bullsh—” she starts, but I lift a hand to her mouth, covering it with two fingers and cutting her off mid-word so I can continue.
“Stop. I’m going to tell you everything. I swear it’s not what it looked like. But you have to know that I am mortified that you caught me in that moment. That I absolutely couldn’t hate myself more for making you feel like I wanted someone else, that you have been living with this for months, thinking I don’t want you.”
Pretty sure her eyes roll, but she doesn’t move to talk again, so I remove my fingers from her lips and grasp her hands again, turning to face her fully and release the last of what I haven’t shared with her yet, as I think she’s finally done with me.
“I remember that night. Do you?”
Her eyes narrow in suspicion, surprised I know exactly what she’s referring to.
Yes, Di, that’s right. I know exactly the night you’re thinking about. Because there was only one of them.
She nods her head, uncertainty diffusing her hardened features.
“It had been weeks since we’d been together. I missed you and—"
“So you went to look at porn instead of actually being with me?” she cuts in hotly.
“Fuck, no! Di! Listen to me. Dammit, just let me explain, will you?” She huffs a breath but doesn’t pull her hands back from mine, another good sign that she wants to hear what I have to say, wants to believe me.
“I fucking missed you. I know you missed me, too, and you’d been so frustrated for days that I thought you having some, ya know, alone time with one of your little friends would help until we could actually get some time together for once. But then the whole battery fiasco happened, with Preston and Topanga,” I make the sign of the cross before continuing, “and I wanted to make it better. It wasn’t selfless, I fucking wanted you as much as I wanted to help you.” I do something between a chuff and a snort. “Probably more. But by the time you got the boys to bed, and I came back from getting Lea to finally fall asleep, you were passed out.”
She sucks in a sharp breath, I know it’s to use that sharp tongue to tear me down again, so I cut her off with my hand over her mouth before she can even begin. Risk her biting off my fingers to make her listen.
“I’m not giving excuses, Christina. I’m telling you what happened, the whole story, start to finish. Then you can hate me, come at me, do whatever you want. But I’m not sitting on this one more fucking minute. This. Ends. Tonight.”
She settles back into her side of the couch, withdrawing her hands from mine to wrap them around her middle again. But I don’t think she’s doing it to be cruel, just to brace herself for what she’s afraid I’m about to say.
“You’d been working so much, you had been so upset and so tired, and you looked peaceful for once. I couldn’t bring myself to wake you up so I could get my rocks off. It seemed so selfish. You needed the sleep. And what kind of asshole wakes his exhausted wife up for sex? But I had gotten all hot at the thought of finally getting to be with you after so long, that by the time I saw you were already out, my dick had a mind of its own, and it wasn’t going to let me go to sleep yet.”
I take in a deep breath, knowing this is where I fucked up, and this will be the hardest part to share. “I’m guessing you woke up? And saw me after that?”
She nods, her eyes venomous.
“I know it’s that night you were talking about because that’s the only time I’ve ever done anything like that, Chrissy, I swear it. Not that I don’t have to jack off sometimes, of course I do. We went from fucking every day for years to seeing each other like once a week if we’re lucky, and this dry spell we’ve been in lately… Anyway.” I shake my head. She knows.
“I’ve definitely had to handle my own needs, that’s not the first or only time that’s happened. But it’s always to thoughts of you, memories of you, things I want to do to you, or, God, baby, some of the things you’ve done to me.”
My dick starts to harden as memories flood my mind’s eye, and I push them aside, focusing on her face that’s in front of menow, not as it looked all those other times. It only helps a little. I still fucking want her just as bad. But not until she understands that, and believes it’s true.
“What was different that night?” she asks quietly, like she’s willing to listen to my side.
“Fuck,” I start. “I don’t even know. I guess I kept thinking about how it used to be between us. That fire in your eyes, that…desire you always had when you looked at me. That passionate side of you has always gotten me so fucking hard, and I was craving that fire from you. I missed that the most. So fuck me for it, but I went looking for pictures that reminded me of that in you. I found one that looked so much like you when we first started dating, and that way you used to look at me, that it was so easy to convince myself itwasyou. That you were still looking at me the way you used to. Like you wanted me, needed me.”
The tears start rolling down my face again, mirroring her own, which is uncharacteristic for me, but I can’t help it. I feel like less than a pile of Sir Wags’ shit in the yard that she caught me inthatmoment. That the one time I have sought outside stimulation for my own needs, that’s what she saw. She fucking caughtthatmoment of all of the possible moments.
I can’t imagine what she thought, how devastated she was. It’s all clicking into place now. How cold she was the next morning. That was the first time she didn’t wake me up, if I remember correctly. How withdrawn she was from me after that. She stopped reacting when I’d flirt with her. And when she stopped reacting, I eventually stopped flirting like I used to. It was a vicious cycle that we both got trapped in, all over a shitty substitute for what I really wanted. My fucking wife.
“I wish you’d fucking called me out on it right then, baby. I swear. I wish you’d thrown the phone out of my hand, punched me in the nuts if you needed to. I would trade anything to take that moment back, and the last few months that followed it. Because you know what happened? I couldn’t do it. After all that build up, how ready you’d gotten me, I couldn’t get off to some other chick’s picture, no matter how much she reminded me of you. She wasn’t you. She wasn’t the real thing. So I went to bed, determined to get you alone the next day. And… and I think you know what happened after that.” I trail off at the end, my voice hardly above a whisper by now.
It’s my turn to stare and listen now, as she works her features into something less taken aback, and more compassionate, more understanding than I’ve seen from her in a long while.
“I wish I’d punched you in the dick that night, too,” she says, a wet laugh breaking through her tears and popping the tension of this moment, and I can’t help but laugh with her.
“I’ll give you a free shot if it will undo what I did,” I throw out, only half joking.
She laughs again, squeezing her eyes tight and shaking her head. “I don’t want to hurt your dick, Chance.” She places a hand on one of my knees, and something inside me starts to heal at her finally reaching out to me and bridging the chasm between us. “All I’ve ever wanted is to be enough for you. To be what you wanted. You’ve always been the one for me, but when I thought you didn’t want me anymore, that stung.”
I can’t keep away from her anymore. I need her in my arms. I need to know that she is still mine. That our love is still there, still strong, and that we will work through what’s been plaguing us both.
