Always the Bride

36. The truth revealed

Hello! Sorry for the delay yet again. I would have written it sooner but I've been unwell again and concentration hasn't been my friend. Anyway, I hope you enjoy. :)

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When I’m back inside, I sit on the couch. Placing the bigger envelope to the side, I open Gregory’s letter first. Seeing him has unsettled me. Even though it made me realise what I need to do, it’s so hard to let go. I can’t get Jamie out of my mind. All I can think about is the ‘what ifs’. If this addiction became my life, this is how my life would always be. This is the state I would always be in. I don’t want that.

Are you sure? It wouldn’t have to always be like this, Teresa. If you planned it better, with Jamie’s help, it could go quite smoothly.

Oh god. No, I can’t think like that. I can’t!

Shaking my head, I force the thoughts away. I need to focus on one thing at a time. Right now it’s Gregory’s letter. I need to forget about Jamie for the time being.

I start reading.

Teresa,

I’m sorry to have to write this but I there are things you need to know about Carly and in an around about way, me.

You may or may not have heard that Carly and I were supposedly dating. I never told you because it was all a fabrication. She wanted us to be dating, even though I refused. It appears she made up a story to satisfy her own mind.

I’ll explain how it came about.

One day we met in a coffee shop. It’s one I visited to regularly and still do. We literally bumped into each other and she spilt her coffee over me. Even though I told her it was fine, she still insisted she buy me a replacement to make up for it. I agreed, simply because I was in a rush and had to get back to work. She introduced herself and I did the same, like you do when you meet someone for the first time but that was that. That was the one and only time I saw her.

I didn’t think of her at all, she was just a random stranger to me. Then one day, a few days later, I started receiving bouquets of flowers and gifts from a ‘secret admirer’. They were always waiting for me on my doorstep when I got home from work. I won’t lie, at first it was flattering so I didn’t think twice about it. Unfortunately it didn’t let up. This happened every week day for a month. Needless to say by that point I was getting worried.

Then I met you. The gifts continued even after we met but I didn’t think much about it anymore. My mind was always focused on you so when I got new gifts I just threw them away.

It was a couple of weeks later when I met your family and that was when I saw Carly again. I didn’t even recognise her at first, she had to remind me of the incident. That same night when I went home, I had a visitor around midnight and it was your sister. She admitted she had been stalking me and sent the gifts. Then she confessed she had fallen for me. She begged me to go out with her but I turned her down, reminding her I was going out with you. Sadly this didn’t stop her.

For the next month the gifts continued and she would turn up at my place begging me to give her a chance. I always said no and constantly reminded her I was with you. After that month, she went quiet and I thought I had finally got through to her. It was only a few days later though when I got home from work and found her naked on my bed. She had broken into my house and made herself at home. I called the police and they arrested her.

You might be wondering why I never told you about any of this, especially since it happened while we were going out. Well let’s just say I like to fight my own battles, you know that. That aside, I didn’t want to cause a rift in your family, you always appeared to get on so well. I wanted to try and sort it out without you or your mother ever finding out.