By the time we reach my front door, I’m so tired the hallway echoes with the sound of my feet dragging one behind the other. Xavier props me up against the door and rummages inside my purse until he finds the keys. Unlocking the door, he swings it open and then pulls my arm around my neck as he tucks one arm under my legs and carries me into the apartment.
It’s almost completely bare. All my belongings packed in boxes stacked in the hallway, ready for my new life.
A life I have no vision of right now. And a past that lies in ruins.
He lays me gently on the bed, and I only let go because I have to.
He slips my shoes off my feet.
“What were you doing there?”
“I was watching you.”
“How long have you been doing that?”
He just shrugs.
“It’s a hard habit to break.”
“Did you see Damien?”
“Yes.”
“And did you hear Cameron?”
“Yes.”
“I wouldn’t have let either of them hurt you. I didn’t step in until I thought you might actually be in danger.”
“I know.”
“But that’s not my job anymore, is it?”
“No.”
“You get some rest.” He leans over and kisses me gently on the forehead.
“Xavier?”
“Can you just stay for tonight? Please?”
“Malynda.”
“Please. I miss you. Just stay. For tonight.”
He sighs, and then I watch as he pulls off his jacket and throws it onto the foot of the bed, sliding off his shoes before sliding into bed next to me.
I roll over and I’m in his arms.
“Just for tonight,” he whispers, his lips in my hair.
My hand falls onto his chest, and I watch it rise and fall, rise and fall with his breath. My fingertips play with the buttons and I push one through the hole. And then another. And another until his shirt is completely undone. The two sides fall apart and I run my nails up his taut stomach, feeling the hot skin stretched over muscle.
I try to ignore the purple and yellowing marks, but I can’t. They’re there because of me. I roll over and press a kiss to the wounds on his chest. His heartbeat races under my lips and I move my body until I’m straddling over him, gently kissing up the bruises on his sternum, his neck until my lips are on his.
I feel his whole body close around me, his legs hooking around mine, his arms around my back as the kiss deepens.
I know what I want, what I need in this moment. Xavier, wholly and completely. I reach between us, fumbling with his zipper.
“Malynda,” he whispers and I shush him with another kiss.
“Just for tonight. Please.”
He sighs, and lies back, watching me as I shake my head, my hair falling over us.
He pushes my hands away and frees himself as I slide my panties down my legs.
He reaches up, his hands cupping my face like it’s a precious chalice in his hands.
“I love you, Malynda. Whatever happens to us, I want you to remember, I will always love you.”
My tears trickle down my face and onto his fingers.
If only I knew he would always be here to catch my tears.
I shift, positioning him under me, and then slide my body down, feeling him fill me up. Just as I wanted. Wholly. Completely.
He exhales and drops his hands down onto my hips, looking up at me, as we start to find a rhythm.
Our eyes lock and never leave each other’s.
Not even when he lifts my dress off my body. Not when I reach down, bracing my hands on his chest. Not when I feel myself fall over the cliff, or when his whole body clenches and then releases inside me.
Not even then.
Only when my exhausted body falls against him, do we finally look away.
“What are you going to do now?” I whisper to him, when our breath is quiet.
“Try to figure out what my life is meant to be without you,” he says, brushing my hair off my neck and dropping a kiss to the top of my head.
“You’ve done it for twelve years.”
“No. There wasn’t a day you weren’t with me.”
“And what am I supposed to do?” I ask him.
“Whatever it is you want. Without the weight of the past, without the fear of me finding out, without looking over your shoulder. Free from all that. Just to do whatever it is you were meant to do.”
I slide up until my ear is just over his heart. “What if what I want is to be with you?”
“Then you’ll figure out a way to do that too.”
***
I’m not sure what time it is when I wake up, but the room is completely dark. I turn over onto my back and nothing stops me. I reach out my hand to touch the sheet and it’s cold. He is gone but I still, strangely, feel safe as I slide out of bed pulling on the dressing gown I left on the chair next to my bed and walk through my empty apartment. There is no sign of him. There’s barely a sign of me left in this empty space and I’ll be glad to be gone from here tomorrow.
I hear a cough on the other side of the door and I freeze just for a moment before I realize what I’m hearing. I tiptoe to the door and peep through the eyehole, and there he is, sitting in the hallway outside of my apartment on the floor, his arms wrapped around his own body. His eyes staring straight ahead, waiting, watching, always protecting.
It takes everything I have not to throw the door open and run to him.
But I know, it’s not our time.
I know that now.
I know that for me, I know that for him, and I know in the morning when I step outside he won’t be waiting for me anymore. I push away from the door and slide to the floor, my back against the flat, cold wood, and cry over Xavier Kent one last time.