I unlocked the door to my flat, stepping inside and dropping my luggage. The tour was finally over. I had made it five months without talking to Paul other than when it was strictly necessary, and I was impressed in spite of myself. It hadn't been easy, but I was more than willing to put in extra effort to avoid him. And now I had three months until our next tour, with nothing to do since there was no Bea to be dating. I was alone.
With a sigh, I walked through my apartment, not exactly sure what I was looking for. It felt emptier than usual. There would be no one coming over and spending the night, there would be no one eating takeout disguised as homemade meals, there wouldn't be anyone here but me. Sure, I could find another girl. There were plenty of fish in the sea, after all. But it wouldn't be the same.
Paul knew me well, we had been friends for years. He had been able to tailor Bea into the perfect girl for me, and to his credit, he had done a good job. She had been perfect for me. I had loved her completely, more than I had ever loved anyone. Our dates had been a new and exciting adventure every time, even if all we were doing was getting dinner at a restaurant.
He knew how to act, what to say, how to dress, where to go out with me, he knew everything to be a perfect woman for me. But it had all been a lie. Everything had been a lie.
I let out a groan, sitting down on the sofa and burying my face in my hands. I had been so stupid, to have missed all the signs. So many things he said, so many of his mannerisms, they all should've been obvious signs to me. He had even told me what his favorite rose was and then repeated the same information to me as Bea. But the thought had never crossed my mind. Why would it? I hadn't even thought it was possible, or that he'd be willing to go that far.
Shaking my head, I rose to my feet again, beginning to wander restlessly around my apartment. It felt so much emptier than it ever had before, my footsteps practically echoing through the rooms, bouncing off the walls.
Was this how he felt at the end of each tour?
He always tried to laugh it off. That he didn't mind going home to an empty house, since he always ended up so busy with women on tour. But I knew he hated it. He always pushed for longer tours, for more time on the road. Peter and Ace hated that. They just wanted to go home to their wives, and have a chance to relax and mess around more than they did on tour. I didn't really mind either way. Home was nice, tour was nice, so long as I had a girl to bang.
But it felt miserable now. I couldn't think of being with another girl. No one could be as perfect as Bea was. I mean she was made to be my other half, of course no one could compare to her. It was always going to be so empty, as if all the warmth in my home had vanished at the same time the pill tumbled down the drain.
I kept wandering through my apartment, winding up in my bedroom and beginning to absentmindedly rummage through the drawers of my dresser. I didn't know what I was looking for, but I was searching for something.
It was strange, grieving someone who didn't exist. There was no one I could share the pain with, really. There was no one else who knew her, no one else who missed her. I couldn't lean on anyone. I guess Paul could grieve her too. But I didn't want to turn to him.
My fingers closed around a polaroid and I lifted it up, looking at the photo of Bea in lingerie. A wave of anger began to bubble up inside of me, hands beginning to tremble, before I ripped it into a million tiny pieces, making certain there was no hope of ever being able to piece the photo together again and have to see her.
I grabbed a dustpan, sweeping up the confetti I had made from the polaroid, dumping it down the sink and turning on the water, washing all the pieces down the drain, dissolving them into paper mush. All the notes from here were next, joining the photo in vanishing down the drain. I found the boutonniere from the night we had gone to the symphony, crushing the dried petals into a powder, just wanting to destroy everything, and forget everything, to erase any and all evidence of the happiest few months of my life.
After tearing through my apartment, I had gathered up everything and shoved it down the drain, not caring if it would mess up the plumbing, until all that was left was the portrait I had drawn of her. I grabbed it, about to tear it to pieces too, before hesitating, looking a little closer, hands beginning to tremble. Swallowing the lump in my throat, I very slowly set the portrait down on the countertop, staring intently at it, my eyes tracing over every inch of it. The pen and ink I had used hadn't quite been able to capture the face perfectly, it wasn't a photo after all, but it was still clearly Beatrice.
The features were all there. The way the eyes drooped down, the slight hook to the nose, they were all familiar. Of course they were familiar, I had looked at the face almost every day for years. The jawline was softer, sure, but still nearly the same, with a square chin and defined cheekbones. Even the ever so slightly crooked smile, with the slightly askew front teeth and the plump lips, it was all there. It was all him.
In the end, it had always been him.
