Not over you

Chapter 23

5 months later

Ezra's POV

It's been 5 months. 5 long months of hard work. 5 long months of mood swings, appointments, countless pills. 5 long months of a hard battle against depression.

Aria is the strongest person I know. Not only did she do this once but twice and now she's almost back to her old self.

It's been hard. Some days were worse than the others. There were days she would refuse to leave the bed, days she would refuse to eat, saying that she wasn't hungry, days that she spent sleeping. There were a lot of mood swings, some anger and frustration. There were days she felt hopeless... days she believed she would never get better. But she did.

I've always been by her side. No matter how many times she pushed me away, how many times she told me to leave or that she didn't want me there. She had already gone through it alone, once and I wasn't going to let her do it again so I stayed.

In the meantime, we went on some dates, got to know each other again and spent more time as a family, with the girls. We are giving our relationship another chance and we don't want to rush it. We didn't tell anyone about it and were never affectionate in front of anyone, especially the girls. I know this is our last chance and I won't ruin it.

Aria is way better now. You wouldn't say she was depressed a few months ago if you didn't know. Indeed it wasn't a deep depression... for what she told me, 4 years ago was way worse, and of course, the fact that she started the treatment soon helped a lot but she recovered pretty fast.

Seeing her battle, her daily struggle to get better, only made me love her more if that's even possible, and I've been wondering, for the last few weeks, what we can do. As a couple, I mean. Even though we've gone on some dates I feel like we need to leave Rosewood and have some alone time.

I'd been wondering where we could go when it popped up. I immediately went to the travel agency and booked the flights and the hotel and I'm now going back to Aria's house to tell her about it. I can only hope she likes it and accepts to go with me.

(...)

"Hey!" Aria happily greets me as she sees me walking in. She looks around and gives me a peck on the lips and wraps her arms around my neck, as the kids aren't around. "Where have you been?"

"Hi. Had a few errands to run." I tell her, not wanting to tell her yet.

"Oh." She frowns and releases my neck. I grab her wrist, preventing her from turning away and leave.

"It's a surprise, ok? You'll find out soon enough."

"A surprise? Ezra, I hate surprises, you know that. Tell me!"

"If I told you it wouldn't be a surprise."

"Ok. Don't tell me then." She says, pouting.

"Aria..." I groan, frustrated.

"What..?" she asks innocently, with lost puppy eyes, knowing that I won't able to resist them.

"Ok, you win." I sigh, giving up. This woman really has me wrapped around her finger. She looks up at me, expectantly. "Well... I guess you should start packing." I start, but she interrupts me.

"Packing? Why do I have to start packing?"

"Will you let me finish, please?"

"Sorry." She says, ashamed.

"As I was saying, I guess you should start packing because we are going to Amsterdam!" I tell her.

"We WHAT?" she asks, in shock. Then I realize that I probably shouldn't have done this. Going on a trip must be the last thing she wants right now and I didn't even think about how she would feel.