Tell It Like It Is
Chapter 19
Will was stir-crazy. Over the next two weeks, thoughts of his upcoming wedding should have consumed his every thought. He should have dreamed of all the things that could go wrong and all the things that could go right. He should have been making plans for the honeymoon and setting up his apartment for what came next. But, to be perfectly honest, he couldn't. He tried to think about the benefits of short-stemmed roses or weather or not his tux was wrinkled, but he just couldn't. So his tux lay hidden in the very back of his closet and his face was shoved into file after file as he sought refuge from the confines of him glamorous office.
But it still wasn't enough. Something was not right. He'd freaked out Georgie when he came to her with a blank check and his permission to do anything she wanted to change the design of his office. But even with her homey touches it still felt cold. Just like his apartment, it was still missing something.
Even that wasn't the hardest part. It was the amount of energy it took for him to deny everyday that he knew exactly what it was missing. But he couldn't lie to himself. His apartment needed the inescapable presence of a free-spirited, hard-headed, fiery little blonde. His bed missed the lump in the covers where she should have slept. His office was missing framed photographs of her and little notes that she'd e-mail him everyday.
Instead the lump was Melanie. The photos were too. And the messages mostly said things like, "Too busy with the wedding to chat."
It didn't matter that she was cold, for he was just as cold back. He didn't care that she slapped him away; in fact he was relieved when she did. His heart was cold. His fiancé was cold. His apartment was cold. And with the sending of his invitations just over two weeks ago, his own sister became cold with disappointment.
But, you know how people can be. Denial is a powerful thing. Feelings can be repressed forever. Muscle memory eventually takes over for the shell a person can become. Misery is only noticed by those on the outside.
Ironic that while Lizzy remembered who she could be, Will forgot how to be anything.
But something always happens. People always snap. Unfortunately for Will it wasn't until two days before his wedding. Melanie had recently decided that she should stay at her own place for what remained of their time as singletons, and claimed it was improper for the world to know they shared a bed. Will felt like if they knew what happened within that bed, they wouldn't feel as though it were improper at all. It had been almost a week since he'd last seen his fiancé, and, to be perfectly honest, he'd barely even noticed.
That night he came home from work and pulled the mail out of its chute like he did everyday. He had his suit jacket in one arm so he fumbled with the bulky mess of letters and bills with his free arm and used his other to balance the jacket. He didn't want to get it wrinkly again and have to go through the whole thing again.
After he finally managed to press the elevator button using only his pinky, and threw the mail in the hall as he unlocked his apartment. He slipped inside and hooked his jacket on the back of the first door he could find. He took off his jacket from the day and tossed it across the apartment. He didn't even realize he'd done this, for Melanie had broken him of that habit months ago. He dropped his keys onto the little glass table by the door and winced at the horrible scraping noise the metal made against the glass. There was a little scratch in the glass. He rearranged the keys to cover it, just for a little while, just until he could find a better solution.
Eventually he tried not to think about the scratch, it would be weeks until Melanie would be back in the apartment; he had plenty of time to think about it. He stepped back into the hall, using the side of his foot to keep the door open so he didn't lock himself out and bending over to grab the mail where he'd dropped it. By the time he'd swung back around into the apartment and moved from the door allowing it to bang closed, he'd finally noticed it.
It was a lumpy little package in a manila envelope padded with bubble wrap, too small to be files, too lumpy to be Melanie Fed-exing back her ring. (Not that that thought ever crossed his mind.) He dropped the rest of the standard mail on the table and didn't even wince as the stack ground his keys into the glass once again. It was all lost on him, for Will had suddenly recognized the name scribbled across the front of that envelope.
He tore at the paper viciously, as if he were a starving man and the envelope held the only food he'd seen in days. The paper was tough and the bubble-wrap snapped as he tried to rip through it. Eventually he managed to peel up the tape on one side of the envelope and slide out the rectangle it held inside.
It was a video-tape. A square, plastic, black little tape with only a sticky-note reading, "I thought I'd sent it. Funny how things turn out."
It was unmistakably Lizzy, and as he popped the tape into his VCR he tried to prepare himself for what he was about to see but he still found it a little bit harder to breathe when he saw her image on the screen. She looked stressed, worn, resigned. She had her hair in a sloppy ponytail and was wearing her pajamas as if she were wallowing. She wasn't the image of perfection, but she was his Lizzy and if you'd tried to tell Will differently he'd have punched you in the face.
"Hi Will," she said softly and lifted her hand weakly as if she were waving. "It's been awhile hasn't it? I've missed you."
It was the tape from college. He tried to look away in shame, this was a Lizzy that was ignorant of how he'd break her heart, and still he couldn't take his eyes from the screen.
"It's been a rough couple weeks. I don't know if you've heard," she paused and shifted, taking great measures not to look into the camera. "Dad died," she sighed eventually, as if by saying such a simple fact she was confirming it to be true.
"It was two days ago. I couldn't even make it there to see him." She was crying now, but her pride caused her to cover her face to hide her tears. "Anyway," she wiped her eyes, "he had a heart attack. They said it was peaceful, but you know anything that has the word 'attack' in it can't be all that gentle.
"I don't really know why I'm telling you this, except that when something horrible happens you just want to tell the person you're closest to so you can cry on their shoulder, and even though I've never been much of a crying type of girl, I thought maybe that person was you.
"God Will, why does this hurt so badly? I mean I hardly ever saw the man. How can someone you barely know, leave you so, so heartbroken?
"You know what's crazy? When Mom called to tell me I literally couldn't breathe. It was like someone had thrown me on the floor and jumped on me until my lungs exploded. Then, when I stood up, it wasn't me anymore. It was like I was suddenly a shell, not able to think or breathe or feel.
"I wish you would just come out here and visit me. It's been so long since I've seen you and maybe if you were around again I'd feel better. You may be the world's biggest idiot, but you seem to be the only idiot that reminds me what it's like to be a human being. I love you, you know? I know you've said it before and I never responded because it really freaked me out, but I loved you even more for waiting for me to say it back, rather than just forcing me. I love that sometimes it's like I can feel you thinking about me. I love you, because I love you even when you're nine billion miles away. I love you because even when I'm hurt, you get me off the floor. I love you because you make me happy. I love you and to be perfectly honest that scares the shit out of me, because two days ago I lost the only man I've ever needed and realized that he wasn't the only man I needed."
She was smiling lightly now, but her eyes still mourned for her father and Will tried to pause the feeling in his stomach as her image quickly disappeared only to be replaced by blaring static and black and white squiggles. He wanted to feel that elation again. The way his stomach jumped when she spoke about him. He wanted to rewind his life, to just go back and be there, be there with her.
Even though it was seven years too late, Will's heart suddenly shattered into a million pieces.
You must hate me by now. I'm sorry it's been soooooo long. I was busy with finals, and my cousins wedding, then my father's birthday, then getting a new job, then quitting my old job, then going home. It's been busy.
Anyway it's summer now. Hopefull I'll have more time for updating. Hopefully...
Ok. We're getting close here people. Just be patient.