Miss Me; When I'm Gone (editing)

CHAPTER 45 (Travis)

Travis

Swinging the axe, I split the piece of wood I needed to mend the fence. But I couldn't stop. Lifting the axe, I swung again, ruining the perfect piece I'd created. Then I swung again. And again. And again. I wasn't sure when the yelling started, but when I looked up to see my mother standing across from me with her hands on her hips, frowning at me disapprovingly, I knew I must have gotten loud.

Shit.

She had been waiting for me to snap. I had been careful to work through my day without emotion as long as her attention was on me. Getting Armelle Miliani off your back when she thought you needed to talk was near impossible. I dropped the axe and stared down at the small chunks of wood that were now only good for firewood. I'd annihilated it. I would have to get another piece now so I could fix the goddamn fence.

"Don't recon that wood did anything to you," Momma said, cocking one of her eyebrows.

I didn't respond. I just dropped to my haunches and started picking up the mess I'd made.

"I've had all I can take, Travis Miliani. You've been a shell of my boy for months, and now you lose your mind and begin yelling and beating the shit outta that log with an axe? You have to talk to me. You're giving me anxiety attacks. I'm worried about you."

For nine weeks, I had managed to live without my heart. This wasn't life. My life was a woman who didn't want me. This was an existence. An empty, shallow, existence. I hadn't told my mother about Blair, but Karleah had. Momma had asked me about her the week after Blair sent me away from her. I had been so overcome with pain from just the sound of her name that I had jumped up and fled from the table. Momma hadn't mentioned her again. But now I needed her to. I needed to talk about Blair. I wanted to tell someone about her. To fill. Y emptiness with the memory of her.

"I love her," I said simply.

She raised both of her eyebrows now. "I kind of got that already, sweetie. When you ran like the fires of hell were after you the day I asked you about her, you have that away."

"She's my life, Momma. Blair. She's it. My one. But she doesn't want me." Just saying it sent a bolt of agony through me. I winced, unable to hide it from my mother.

"Then she's a fool," Momma said, with all the conviction of a mother who loved her son.

"No. She's brilliant. She's beautiful. She's like a bright ray of sunlight. She's...ne'er life growing up...." I stopped and swelled the bile that rose up in my throat just from thinking about what she'd been through. How my girl had suffered.

"It was bad, Momma. Dark. As dark and twisted as a girls life can be. But she's not a fool."

My mothers face fell. I could see her fighting back the tears in her eyes.

"Oh, baby. I Should have figured when my big hearted, beautiful boy fell in love, he'd fall in love so completely. You never did anything half way. You didn't take your first steps, you took off running. You didn't say your first words, you sang an entire line of a song. And you didn't take up for the underdogs at school, you got expelled for tying a bully to a flag pole. My baby has never done anything half way. You do it with so much determination it blasts everyone else's attempts out if the water."

She walked around my mess and dropped down beside me. I felt the tears burn my eyes as she took my face in her hands and looked at me with so much love and heartache, because that was who she was. My mom hurt with me. She always had.

"You are a good man. The best. I Love your stepfather, but even his doesn't compare to the heart you have. You were the best thing I'll ever do in this life. I can't top creating you. Being a mother is a gift that brings me joy every day of my life. I'll die knowing I left a man on this earth who will leave a trail of good everywhere he goes." She stopped, and I knew there was a 'but' coming.

"But for the first time in your life, I am watching you let someone destroy you. I miss your smile and your laugh. I want those back. You've never let an obstacle in your life go unconquered. Why are you doing it now? If you love her, then go get her. No woman in their right mind can turn this face down."

I reached over and wiped the tears from my mother's determined face.

"I need her to come to me. If we have a chance at a future, I need her to come to me. I've always taken what's I wanted and conquered my trials, but nothing and no one had ever meant what she does. I can't conquer her, Momma. I love her.  I never want to make her do anything. Even love me. She has to love me all on her own."

Momma let out a son and wrapped her arms around me and held me to her. I closed my eyes and fought back the emotion threatening to let go. The last time my mother had seen me cry was when I was three and broke my arm falling off a trampoline. Even when Karleah had laid in a coma, I had cried in private.

I would never get over losing Blair. If she never came back to me, I'd be broken the rest of my life.