I'm going to miss you. I'm going to miss you so fucking much. I know that doesn't make any sense since once I'm gone, I won't be feeling anything, but when I think of the two of us not being together, it just rips me in half. I don't want to leave you. I want us to have everything we talked about. I want to travel the world with you by my side, waking up to your smile every morning. I want to buy that house with the perfect kitchen and the big back garden and watch our kids grow up in it. And I want to see you open the restaurant of your dreams and take the food world by storm. I want all of that more than anything. But I've ruined it for us now. This is the only way I can salvage even a little of that dream.
I need you to understand that this isn't your fault. There was nothing you could have done. I've made mistakes, and now I have to own them. I still love you with everything I've got. I love you so much it hurts.
I've got the pills in front of me. God, I'm frightened, but I'm happy that I won't be living under this cloud anymore. I know this is going to hurt like hell, but please, don't let this break you. Go and live the life that we wanted. Go and cook and travel and find someone else who isn't as weak and stupid as I am. You deserve the world, and the only solace I can take from this is that I'm still leaving you with a chance to have it.
I'm so, so sorry. Please forgive me.
-T
Tears stung my eyes, running hot down my cheeks. I wanted to rip that note into a thousand pieces. I wanted to burn it until it was nothing but ash. Anything to erase those words that condemned me so completely. He said there was nothing I could have done, but how could that possibly be true? I was his fiancé, the person closest to him in the world, and yet somehow I let the love of my life fall apart before my eyes without even realizing.
I'd known he was in a rut. I'd seen it in his eyes, in the tightness of his smile, but I didn't look any closer. He'd been down before. Poker players' lives are a rapid-fire series of highs and lows, and at the time I just assumed it was part of that rhythm. Now, it was so incredibly obvious that wasn't true. Since he died, I'd spent every spare moment agonizing over his behavior. No fancy dinners, no stupid spontaneous purchases, spending sixteen hours a day at the tables — how the fuck hadn't I realized something was deeply wrong? He was there for me through so much, but when he needed me, I was nowhere in sight, too stupid or blind to even understand that he was in trouble.
The worst part was, he did it for me. That hurt so much I didn't even know how I was still walking around. It was like a knife to the chest, jagged and ice cold. I would have done anything for him. I'd have lived in a shoebox for the rest of my life if it meant we were together. But instead, he took matters into his own hands without even giving me a choice.
I couldn't destroy the note. I deserved to be reminded, deserved to feel this for the rest of my life. I owed it to Tom. I'd deluded myself into thinking that Charlie's was a new start, but there were no new starts from this, no moving on. This was forever.
Careful not to crinkle or crease it any further, I folded the note and placed it back in the box. After stashing it back in its place, I moved out into the lounge and turned on the television. I used to love trashy reality TV as a means to escape, but at that moment it was just so much unintelligible noise in the background. It did nothing to cover the abyss that was opening up inside me, beckoning.
Was this really going to be my life now? Alone, afraid, working a meaningless job and pining after a ghost? I used to have so much to look forward to. I loved my work, I loved coming home to Tom and I loved all the plans we made. We had a whole future mapped out together, but now all that waited for me when I woke up was darkness. I had nothing.
It was only fifteen minutes before I was in the bathroom, calmly opening the cupboard under the sink and fishing out the bottle I'd stashed there. When I got the job at Charlie's, I poured every drop of alcohol in the house straight down the drain. Every drop that is, except for a single bottle of Smirnoff.
I cracked the top and took a long slug.
Chapter Four
Logan
I landed a long series of punches on the bag in front of me, letting it feel the full weight of my frustration. The leather cracked, a rapid-fire percussion, and my coach, Tony, who was bracing it, rocked backward with the force.
"Jesus, what's gotten into you?"
I shrugged. "Dunno. Just one of those days, I guess."
He nodded. "Well, keep it up. You punch like that next time you're in the ring, there ain't nobody gonna stand in your way."
"Ain't nobody gonna stand in my way anyway," I replied, mimicking his southern drawl.
"That's the spirit," he said. It was the sort of comment that should have been accompanied by a smile, but not from this man. Tony didn't smile.