Spelivia Diaries: Shots of Love

Don't Let Go 2.0

Give it up for my good sis, @EvieEveWrites for part two of this prompt!  Enjoy! 

The ride up to his room was silent, outside of the old school funk music softly playing in the background. Olivia's eyes stayed on the chrome doors while Spencer's occasionally drifted over to her. Sleep hadn't come easy to either one of them. The bags under their eyes made that obvious. How did they get here? Would they stay here?

The elevator dinged as they reached Spencer's floor. He let Olivia walk out first before leading her down the short hall before they reached his suite. It was definitely lived in. Spencer had made it as much of a temporary home as he could.

"You hungry," he asked his wife as her eyes wandered around the room. 

"I can order us something."

"Yeah, sure," she muttered, pulling her jacket closer to her skin. She sat at the small table in the kitchenette area of the suite, suddenly not knowing why her words left her. She had practiced what she wanted to say on the ride over but being in Spencer's presence made it hard to think. Not knowing what was on Spencer's mind made her nervous. Would this conversation end like their last one? The one that had put them in this position in the first place.

"Here's the menu," Spencer broke the awkward silence. "I wouldn't suggest the waffles. My stomach didn't take well to it the other day."

"There's homecooked meals at home," Olivia offered, holding back a laugh when Spencer arched a brow. 

"Okay, I order out and then put it on a plate. Still tastes like home though," Her eyes fell back to her lap when Spencer didn't respond the way she thought he would. He usually dogged her cooking or made fun of her plated food prepared by a restaurant. It was their thing. Not taking life too seriously and it made things easy. Until marriage. For some reason after their vows, they lost their way. Maybe it was the way they viewed marriage and it put extra pressure on them. Or did relationships truly change after legalities were involved?

"Just let me know what you want and I'll order it," Spencer replied, sitting on the edge of the bed. His sheets were in a twisted mess from all the tossing and turning he had done. Olivia went with French toast and a bowl of fruit. It was still early and she didn't want to overeat before the sun even came up.

Sitting in silence until she finished her plate of food, Spencer began to think about what he wanted to say first. He kept a lot of things to himself to save her feelings but since they had gotten to this point, he wanted to lay all cards on the table. 

"Do you think it's worth the fight?"

Keeping her back to him, Olivia hummed, "Of course. Do you think so?"

"Won't lie and say there aren't some days I've thought about just walking away. I don't know why these last few months have been hard. It's like someone flipped a switch and everything went left," he admitted.

"Things won't always be like this," Olivia added, not sure she believed her own statement. 

"They say the first year is always the hardest."

"We usually don't fit into the cliche, Liv. Communication has been strong up until this point," he pressed, joining his wife on the bed, following her gaze out the window.

"I never said I didn't want kids or that I changed my mind, Spencer. I never said that but for some reason you weren't hearing me." 

Their eyes stayed locked on the bright lights and heavy traffic that littered the Los Angeles roads below them.

"It's not about kids. Our problems run way deeper than that and I've realized that since I haven't been at home. I think when we got to college, our communication changed and honestly hasn't gotten better since. You still like to run-"

"Oh, I get it. This is all on me," Olivia groaned, throwing her hands up in frustration. "You act like your communication is top notch when you're the first to leave home when things get rough."

"You didn't even let me finish what I was saying, Olivia. Damn," Spencer replied, exasperated already and they had only been talking short of five minutes. 

"It's on me too. It's on both of us. We've been skating by all this time and shit finally blew up."

She pushed herself to her feet. 

"Never thought I'd see the day you walked out. Do you even want to come back home?"

"I had to walk out to save our marriage. If I stayed, I don't know if things would have gotten better. I needed a break," Spencer answered. 

"That wasn't me walking out on you."

Olivia scoffed, "Oh, it wasn't?"

"Me walking out would be walking away without the intention of coming back," he reiterated. 

"I think we're both allowed to have our space when necessary."

"Didn't feel that way when you did it," she replied softly but loud enough for him to hear. She distracted herself with the fresh flowers sitting in his window. 

"Felt very final but maybe that is just my sensitivity speaking. I know if I did the same thing, you'd feel like I was giving up too. Sorry I made you feel like we couldn't handle this together."

Spencer's tone softened, "I never said we couldn't handle it together. It's just hard when we can't talk without arguing, that gets us nowhere. How much yelling did we do before I decided to give us space?"

"Every other day," Olivia smiled slightly. 

"Just the image of you packing your bags and leaving scared me. Not something I ever wanted to see. I want to make this work, Spencer. We've come way too far to just throw it all away because we can't talk to each other."

Facing her husband, the frown on Olivia's face had turned to one of worry to match Spencer's expression. They were worried they couldn't fix it. No matter how simple it seemed.

"I know you started this new job and having a kid right now would be difficult. But what I've been trying to tell you is that I'm here to carry that load too, Liv. Seems like you just shut me out completely and assumed you would be in this alone," Spencer continued, going down the list in his head of things he had been holding inside to spare them both.

"And I'm sorry for that. I just know how much responsibility a kid brings and I want to be fully present for that. I don't want to be like my parents were. At least if I know what I'm getting into with this job, I can plan accordingly," she explained, taking her spot back on the bed next to Spencer. 

"You took that as me changing my mind completely and I wasn't."

Had they had a sit down conversation months ago, this argument could have been settled. Their stubbornness and fear of what would have come from the other person's mouth, kept them in a struggle. 

"I know I'm not always the easiest person to talk to and I'm sorry about that. I just want to put a baby in you," Spencer grinned, reaching over to rub Olivia's stomach.

"Boy," the journalist laughed, smacking away her husband's hand that finally landed on her thigh. 

"And I want that too, when things calm down at the office. You've had time to adjust, I'm just asking for the same. For a couple more months at least?"

"That sounds fair," he admitted. "And again, you're not going to be in this by yourself. Remember that." Spencer placed his finger under Olivia's chin and forced her to look at him.

"Good. As long as you agree to bring your ass back home and we handle this from there. We can't communicate with you on the other side of town in an ugly suite," she looked around the room in disgust. 

"Seriously, how did you stay here?"

"It's not that bad, but home is sounding a lot better," Spencer said, pulling Olivia into his lap. 

"I'm sorry," he said softly against her lips.

"I'm sorry, too."