Ch. 2

Now*

“Terry was the perfect storm, attractive, damaged, kind, mysterious, ruthless, strong, yet vulnerable. He was everything I should have stayed away from, but the second that I met him I was hooked, it was like he was a drug and I was addicted. The truth is, he had given his heart away to someone a long time before he met me, and he had never gotten it back.” 

“Mom, I don’t understand… you aren’t making much sense.”

“I know Charlee, it’s just so hard to explain, I’ve locked down these feelings for years, and I’m trying my best to explain to you our history.”

I looked at her, and for once she looked her age, her lips turned down in a frown, I could see the wrinkles, there were bags under her eyes that I had never noticed before and a sadness around her that had never been there before, I wanted to tell her to stop, that I didn’t need to know, but that would have been a lie and now I needed to know more than ever. 

She continued, “I was 18 when I met him, he was just 21, about to enter his last year of college, and he was in town for the Summer, he kept telling me that he could never be what I wanted him to be, and that he would one day leave in the middle of the night and I had to be okay with that. And I was, I figured anytime with him was better then none, he utterly captivated me. I figured if we spent enough time together, eventually he would feel the same way about me as I did about him, I was naive.”

“So, he lied to you Mom?”

“No Charlee, he never lied to me, he just couldn’t be what I wanted him to be." 

Then*

“I just don’t understand why you won’t kiss me Terry? Am I that unattractive to you? That you can’t even kiss me during a game at a stupid party?” Tears streamed down my face, I knew I looked as bad as I must feel.

“Damnit Cheryl, don’t cry, please, you know I can’t stand it when you cry.” He whispered as he used his thumb to wipe away the tears.

I signed on the impact, just having him this close to me was making my head fuzzy.

He inwardly cursed, “Why can’t you just be okay with being just friends?” He looked at me with pain brewing behind his stormy blue eyes.

“Because I think that i'm in love with you.”

“Damnit Cheryl, I should be the better person, I should walk away from you, but I’m a selfish man, you make it easier to live.”

I fell back into the passengers’ seat with a sigh, he always talked in riddles that I didn’t understand, whenever I pushed him on it, he shut down and I wouldn’t hear from him for a few days. It wreaked havoc on my soul, so I stopped pushing, and he stopped shutting down.

Tonight, at a party on the beach, when the bottle landed on me, he stormed away instead of just kissing me, it was embarrassing and tore me apart. I didn’t want to push it anymore tonight, He was leaving back to go back to school in Louisiana in 8 days, just 8 days I had left with him. 

Before I knew it, we were parked in front of my house, since the night was over I figured I didn’t have anything left to lose that night.

“Terry, is it me?”

“No Cheryl, it’s not you, but you’ll never be her.”

“Who was she? You could at least tell me that.” I looked over at him, his head hung low almost hitting the steering wheel.

“She was my soulmate.”

I sucked in a deep breath, the pain in my chest made it almost hard to breathe

“And? Where is she now?”

“She’s dead.” 

I gasped, just as he looked over to me, a single tear rolled down his cheek,

“You look like her you know, your hair, your laugh, you could be sisters.”

Shock rolled through me, and I had to get out of the car. I ran towards my front door, afraid to look back because if I did, I’d see the broken man in the driver’s side, and I’d run to him and try and take away his pain.

So I did what I thought was best, I ran inside.