A/N: Thanks for the reviews guys, and if you like my stories and want to read a story co-written by myself and the fantastic author Carolina, or jetderk1462, then go to my profile and find the story, "Playing with Fire." Enjoy this chapter. :)
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Trish found herself out on the same balcony that Christian had first come onto to see her. She was chilled even though it wasn't that cold. But when you're faced with perhaps the biggest conversation, the biggest moment of your life, things change, you change. She was changing as she sat down on the bench. Christian closed the doors behind them to give them a little privacy, but she could imagine the entire party with their ears up to the glass. She looked down at the cobblestone balcony in front of her.
"I know we have a lot to talk about."
Trish scoffed, "That's a laugh."
"What's a laugh?"
"The fact that you just said that so nonchalantly," Trish said. "I think I deserve a little more respect than I've been getting from you, which is nothing, there has been no respect on your part. None."
"I know that Trish, and I'm sorry for that."
"And do you think that sorry is going to make up for everything? Do you think that makes up for everything that you did? Do you think that even starts to make up for what you did?"
"No, I don't think it makes up for it at all," Christian said with a deep sigh, like it went down to his very soul. "Look, I know that sorry is not going to do a whole lot of good right now, or maybe ever, but I'm throwing it out there nonetheless."
"Well that's nice," she said sarcastically. "You're so special because it's out there."
"Trish, please, I just want to talk to you, after this is over, you can go back to hating me or whatever."
"I never hated you," she told him, and gave a sad laugh, one that was full of self-loathing. "I never, not once since you've left, hated you. That's just so sad isn't it? I'm so sad, and pathetic."
Christian sat down next to her. It wasn't even close to her, but it was close enough to feel her presence next to him. She wanted to shrink away from him, but kept her ground. She wasn't going to look weak, he would like that, or maybe he wouldn't. Her thoughts were so jumbled at the moment and she couldn't catch any of them.
"You're not pathetic," he told her, and she wanted to believe him, but why should she believe anything that he said? He had given her no reason to trust him. She had trusted him with her heart once, and he had in turn, crushed it until it was now, crumbled, pieced together haphazardly.
"I am pathetic," she said. "Look at me! Look at me really hard Christian! Here I am, with a great guy, a guy who probably loves me and is too goddamned afraid to tell me, who treats me like I'm everything. Do you know how good it should feel to be someone's everything? Do you? IT should feel like the most amazing feeling in the world, so why can't I feel it!"
"Trish…"
"No, shut up," she said, standing up, her eyes glossy with tears as she leaned on the balcony. She wanted to sob, no, more than that, she wanted to scream out into the sky. She wanted to be engulfed by the darkness of the sky until she was among the stars, burned and without feeling. She wanted to float lifelessly in the vast expanse of nothingness.
"You shut up," Trish told him again. "You don't even know Christian. You don't even know what I've been through. You can't even begin to know everything that I've been through since you've left. I've been in the fucking hospital, did you know that!"
Christian's eyes widened. "What?"
"I didn't eat for five days," she said, almost nostalgically. "Five days…I stayed in my room and cried, and didn't eat, and barely drank anything. I stayed curled up in a ball…Edge found me…took me to the hospital, I was suffering from exhaustion and dehydration…a double whammy."
"Trish, I had no--"
"Of course you had no idea, you left!" she yelled, her back still turned to him. "You wouldn't know because you weren't there, you left me, and I seriously felt like rotting away. Do you know how that feels, to just give up? I just gave up, and it weren't for my friends, and Johnny, I wouldn't be here!"
"I heard you were dating John," Christian said, "earlier, Stephanie told me."
"Thanks to her for that," Trish said to herself, "saves me a lot of trouble. Yeah, I'm with John, I'm with John and he tries to take everything away for me, and he still can't. He can't because heaven help me, I'm not over you Christian. I'm not even close to being over you."
"I'm not over you either."
"Don't say that!" she told him, her tears becoming dangerously closer to falling. "Don't say things like that, you're not allowed to say things like that."
"I'm sorry, but I'm not, I'm not going to lie to you, I'm done with lying to you," Christian said. "And I'm done with hurting you. That's what this is Trish, I'm trying to stop it all. I'm trying to end the cycle. If you want to move on after we have this discussion, then that's your choice. It's up to you."
"Why? So you can take the pressure off of yourself again?" she inquired bitterly. "So you can leave it up to me to feel the guilt? Is that what all this is Christian? Are you trying to clear your conscience?"
"Trish, listen to me, it was hard for me too. It was hard for me to leave you and it was hard for me to stay away. Do you know how many times I wanted to come back? Do you know?"
"But you never did!" she countered. "You had all the time in the world Christian, you had all the time in the world. You had every single day, you had twenty four hours in those days, and not once, not for one single second did you come back!"
"Do you really think that! Huh, is that what you really think that I just completely cut ties with you! I drove past your house at least fifty times, hoping that I'd gain enough courage to stop! I couldn't though, because I knew that you were hurt, I knew that seeing me would break you. I wanted you to be happy, I was willing to accept being miserable if you were happy."
"Did it ever occur to you that the only way I was going to be happy was with you!" she yelled. "Goddammit Christian, you were the reason I was happy, you made every, single fucking day better because you were there, do you not get that!"
"I didn't know," he said remorsefully. "I loved you so hard Trish. It scared me…"
"Oh, so loving me is scary now," she said, starting to laugh to cover up the tears.
She wanted to cry right now, but she didn't want to do that in front of him. She was already so weak in front of him, she just wanted to hold onto this one thing a little while longer. It was suddenly chilly, and she felt like her skin was damp and she was shivering. She was probably shivering because she knew that she was laying her entire heart out on the line and with this conversation, she could be a broken woman forever.
"It was scary. I loved you so much and so deeply," Christian sighed, wondering how he could possibly phrase this so she would understand. "I'm not used to loving a lot of people in my life Trish. I love my mom and my grandma. My dad was never around. I love Edge because he's my brother. Other than that though, there wasn't much else. That's it Trish, in my entire life, I'd only ever loved three people and they were all family. Then you come along, and…you were beautiful and sexy, and sweet, and everything that any guy could hope for…"
"Thanks," she said sarcastically, "glad to know that's not enough for a guy to stick around."
"No, that's not it at all, what it is, is a guy afraid of commitment. I was afraid of the disappointment of losing you. So I left first."
"How cliché of you using the 'it's not you, it's me,' excuse. I never thought you'd be the one for that," Trish told him.
"Okay, so it is a little cliché, but it's not. I still love you Trish, I'll always love you, but the fear of losing you, of you eventually finding someone better was so great that I just fled. The fear was too strong…and now you have found someone better."
"Yeah, I have," she said softly. "He's great, John's great."
"I'm glad that you think so, and despite everything I say or feel, I am happy that you have someone. I am Trish."
"Then why am I not happy?" she asked, finally turning to face him. "Why aren't I happy when everything seems to finally be going my way? And it wasn't just knowing you were going to be here tonight, it was before that, it's been that since you left. It's like happiness has disappeared from my life. I put on this front so my friends won't worry, but it's not working…they all know. Chris comes up to me and tells me John's a good guy, because he can see that I'm not happy. Lita tries to get me to see what a great catch I have, saying that she'd love to be with John, but she doesn't want to be, she just wants me to see how much I could love being with John. And it goes on and on and I'm starting to wonder why I don't see what's so great with him, and it's because of you."
"I don't want that for you Trish," Christian said, standing up and starting to go towards her.
"No," she said, holding her hand up. "Don't come any closer, you can't come any closer. You've broken me once Christian, I can't have you around to break me again so just keep your distance."
"Okay," he said, though he wanted more than anything to go over to her, but he owed her this much. "I won't come closer, but Trish, I'm sorry that I've done this to you. I never thought that it would end up this way."
"Well you should've," she said, and her voice held no malice or sarcasm, it was just a statement she knew to be true. He knew it was true as well, he should've known and he cursed himself for not knowing.
"I'm sure John is a good guy, and maybe if we let go, both of us, at the same time, then you can be happy with him. I'm here Trish, I'm here if you want to hit me, or tell me you hate me, or if you want to throw me off that balcony, I welcome you to do it."
"I don't want to do any of those things, I don't hate you, and I don't want to hit you. I just want this to be over. That's not too much to ask I think, I just want it to be over, for better or worse, just…over," she trailed off, her voice lowering to a whisper.
"Then it'll be over. Trish, I'll be out of your life forever, okay, and you be happy. I've put you through enough shit, and you deserve at least this. You deserve to be happy. Go be with John, be happy with him."
"You think it's that easy?"
"If you don't see me, if I tell you that it's over, we'll both let go Trish, I promise, we'll both let go."
"We're still hanging on aren't we?"
"Yeah, we are, and that's wrong on both our parts, I shouldn't lead you on, and you shouldn't be this way, pining or whatever you're doing," he told her. He just wanted her to be happy and have everything that she deserved, and if it wasn't him, then que sera sera, he'd just have to live with that. It would be hard, but hearing that he put her in the hospital, he could deal with anything so long as he never had to imagine that again.
"I don't know how…I don't…"
"What don't you know how to do?"
"I don't know how to let go," said she in a painful whisper. She closed her eyes as the tears threatened again to escape. And it was true, it was completely true. She had tried so many times to do the right thing, which was to let go, but she honestly didn't know how to do that. She didn't know how to let go of that thin shred of hope. She had clung to it for so long that to say goodbye to it now would seem so strange.
"You just try to get over me, like I'll try to get over you," he answered.
She opened her eyes and stared at him, her eyes linking with his. "I can't do it Christian."
"What can't you do?"
"I can't do it anymore," she told him, her tears spilling over now. She couldn't help it, and she couldn't stop them. They fell like waterfalls from her eyes to her cheeks until they slipped over her lips. The salty wetness almost shocked her, as she had become so numb she hadn't felt the tears. "I can't live without you. I can't pretend that I don't want you, I can't pretend like I can move on. I just can't."
"What are you saying Trish?"
"Christian, I can't do this anymore, I need you."
"You…need me."
She merely nodded as he stepped forward to envelope her in his arms. She knew there was so much to do, so much to talk out, but pretending just wasn't working for her any longer. She could go on and pretend that John made her happy and that she loved him, but she didn't. She loved Christian, and as she felt the familiar rush of adrenaline shooting through her veins that could only be described as love, she knew that she would never get over loving Christian, that it was all just going to come back to him anyhow.
She felt right for the first time in a long time.
