Needed to get this out before I can continue on A Game of Chase. Hope you enjoy!
If what happens in the series inspires more, then I'll be sure to deliver!
All I can claim here is an active imagination.
Will sat in his office, late at night, once again nursing a warm drink in his hand. He wasn't sure how long he'd been staring out that stupid window, allowing the drink to warm to room temperature. To him, time had little meaning tonight. He could have been there for two minutes or two hours. It was as if he were in a trance, disconnected from the real world.
"We should avoid being alone together," he'd told her. "It was a weak moment," he had said. Stupid. Why can't you just tell her the truth, dumbass? he thought to himself. But he knew the answer. He knew why he'd said that instead of what was screaming inside his heart.
It was for his own protection.
If they started things up again, and Alicia decided to go back to her family again, he didn't know how they would recover from that. Their relationship hung in such a delicate balance that any more such encounters could cause it to fall to pieces.
He knew that was shit. It was. It was a pretty excuse, but it was shit. He would give up everything for her. He'd lay his firm, his career, everything he had at her feet if there was a chance she would be happy with him.
But he had no reason to believe that chance existed. She'd chosen her family over him. She'd left him.
But she doesn't know the truth, Will, a tiny voice inside said to him. He lifted his drink to his lips, as if to flush that tiny voice away. She didn't know the truth. She didn't need to know it. She'd made her choice. And he'd have to live with it. But he didn't have to live with more pain, more rejection, more sorrow.
No, his silence was for his own protection. To protect him from the pain.
And maybe to protect her from a choice she didn't want to make.
***
Alicia sat on her couch in her empty apartment, sipping from her glass of wine. The kids were with Peter tonight and she was alone. She preferred that tonight. Tonight was a good night to wallow.
Oh, the things she'd said to him! How had she let herself get so out of control?
"Oh my God! Listen to yourself, Will. You are not the injured party here," she had screamed in his face.
"And what, you are?" he had screamed back to her.
"I am, yes!" she returned, in the loudest voice her body could produce.
The words echoed in her ears, painfully reminding her of her inappropriate actions.
And then he'd kissed her. But he'd pulled away before she did.
And why had her heart sunk when he had said they should try to avoid being alone together?
She took a big gulp from her glass, blankly staring straight ahead. She wasn't sure what that meant.
Peter. She was committed to Peter. She had to stay focused on that. She had to stay focused on her family. Her children were all that mattered.
She took another gulp from her wine glass, trying to convince herself that she was right.