When Love Bites

21 Big Trouble in Paradise IV

Chapter 21 Big Trouble in Paradise IV

He came back through looking just as angry as he was when he left. "Nope." I wasn't. I really wanted to know why it seemed like all we did was fight. I was tired of it, but I also wasn't willing to give in.

"Okay." I made myself a grilled cheese sandwich and sat down at the table. There was a notepad still there so I picked up the pen and started writing. I had no idea what. I was just writing.

He stayed in the kitchen, I stayed in the living room. We weren't getting anywhere fast. Valentine's day was 4 days away and it seemed like we were as far apart as we had ever been.

I picked at my sandwich wrote and then got up and got two bottles of water and put the kettle on. "Tea?"

"Yes please."

"Okay, which?"

"Honey vanilla chamomile."

I made her tea and brought it and the water to her. I sat down next to her on the couch and looked at the empty fireplace.

I took my tea and the water and thanked him. He sat down next to me but still didn't say a word. I cleared my throat and followed his eyes. A few days ago we were happy and making love in front of that fireplace. Today, well that was another story. I swallowed hard.

"I love you."

"I love you too."

"Now what?"

"I don't honestly know. We break it down, apologize for what we need to and set some ground rules?"

"Are you open to ground rules being set?"

"Mostly. As long as they are fair."

"And what exactly is fair?" I fought to keep the anger out of my voice. It wasn't going well.

"They should be equal for both of us and I don't want anything forbidden and I want to be able to leave the house."

"Huh?" I looked over at her sharply.

"You asked. I don't think any of those things will come up, but I am being honest."

"What do you want?"

"I want some freedom, but I don't want to upset you, and I hate when we fight. What do you want?"

"For you to have an honest conversation with them. Not that I think they would be honest with you. Make it a hypothetical then. Ask them, separately how they really feel about you. Otherwise, do whatever you want. With exception of announcing that we are dating. I don't like it. It makes me extremely uncomfortable and very unhappy. I am not going anywhere with my ex or any woman friend that you don't already know and aren't comfortable with. Marisa is the only one I would ever want to hang out with and I would like for us all to do that more, but it is what it is. Do what you want." I was frustrated and exhausted and completely done. I'd have gotten up and walked away if she didn't mean so much to me.

He was defeated. I still felt he was judging some of those pictures unfairly, and letting Aleen completely off the hook. "I can talk to them, and if their answers are okay with you, would it be okay if I hung out with them if Lisa is around?"

"Whatever you want."

"That is obviously not what you want. Don't shut down. I'm not going to run."

"I can't do this anymore. I haven't been this drained in at least a year. No, it's not what I want, but I'm your boyfriend not your husband or your father and I get the feeling that it wouldn't matter anyhow. You're gonna do what you want to do regardless of the way I feel or the consequences, so you may as well just go on and do it. I'm done fighting with you about this. About them, and the other night and all the other things that I tried to point out and you got your head wrapped around this idea that because Aleen took the pictures that it's not so bad and that I'm so blind that I am seeing something that isn't there. I have two accounts, not just hers of their actions with you, not to mention encouraging or allowing your best girlfriend to become so inebriated that she's damn near close to blacking out. No. I am not seeing something that isn't there. It's there. You ask. Then you decide what you want to do with your friendship with them and your relationship with me. Where we go from here is up to you. Take the wheel. I'll buckle up and I'll see you when we come back into the light together. Just ask. I'm too tired for this. I can't even hear you right, right now. I can't think, I can't process and I'm not even sure of what the hell I'm saying. I'm going to bed. I just can't do this." I got up, wiped the tears from my eyes, touched her shoulder as I passed her. "The only thing that I know is that I love you. That is a part of who I am now." I went to the room and laid down to cry.

I was numb. Absolutely numb. He was essentially asking me to choose between him and my friends. He was also leaving it all up to me. I did the thing he told me to do. I called Liam first. He confirmed Avi's suspicions. He wanted me to be single. I told him that if he was expecting my status to change, then we couldn't hang out anymore. The conversation went similarly with Derek. Well, that resolved that problem. I was the blind one. I sat and cried over the loss of my friends and for making my boyfriend feel defeated. Why didn't I see it? It had been about an hour since he went back to the bedroom. He needed the sleep, I needed to be close. I quietly slipped into bed with him and hoped he wouldn't get mad to find me there. I drifted off to sleep myself.

At some point, I felt her crawl into bed with me. I wrapped myself around her and pulled to me and whispered her name and my love for her. I promptly fell asleep with the love of my life tucked safely in my arms.