Chapter 20

It was like time had stopped still. Sami felt her tears dry as she gazed the beautiful man few steps away from her. She didn't see the subtle signs of insecurity on his face or posture. All she saw was the friend who had deserted her when she had needed him the most.

"Samantha?" EJ said her name again but she didn't hear the light plea in his voice. She only heard the cold words he had spoken moments earlier in the bar. Sami didn't understand why she felt so betrayed when he had done everything for a very compelling reason. EJ hadn't acted on a whim. He had been forced to a breaking poit by her.

"Samantha?" It was the third time he used her name.

"Please, don't call me that", she said shaking her head trying not to remember when EJ had used her name to caress her. It was too painful for her to remember what couldn't be.

"You'll always be Samantha to me." His honest answer was almost too much for her.

"What does Emilia say about that?" Sami asked wanting to hurt him. She didn't realize that by bringing up that name would only hurt herself. EJ looked thoughtful as he chose his words:

"Emilia knows about you Samantha. She knows and she accepts the things she can't change."

"She's the better person then, in every possible way", Sami couldn't hide the bitterness in her voice but she could hide her eyes filled with remorse.

"Why do you say that Samantha? Emilia is far from perfect. She is selfish, demanding, brutally honest at times and a manipulative liar at other times, but she is also sweet, caring person with a generous heart-"

"Why are you telling me this?" Sami begged him to stop.

"You brought up the subject. I thought you wanted to understand."

"You thought I wanted to understand why you fell in love with her? You thought I wanted to hear how someone else took my place in your heart?" Sami cried in shock. EJ sighed:

"Samantha, I saw you leave the bar. I thought you might have heard my conversation with John and Steve and misunderstood something."

"There was nothing to misunderstand. You didn't fly over the Atlantic to see me!" she shot back at him the words he had used to inadvertently cut her.

"Damn I knew I shouldn't have come after you", he groused to himself. The change in him as EJ prepared to turn and walk back to the bar woke Sami up. This was her first chance after EJ had left to try and change his mind. This might be her the only chance she would ever have.

"I'm sorry!" Sami shouted after him succeeding in stopping him, "I'm so sorry EJ. It's just that, I've missed you." Sami waited wanting desperately EJ to look into her eyes and see just how much she meant it. He didn't look at her but his voice gave her new hope:

"Samantha, don't."

"I've been through a lot this past year. I suffered through the marriage I chose in my ignorance and I survived the divorce. I'm coping with the children and I'm managing my own business now. I'm living a good life, a better life I've ever lived but it's not enough. Everything reminds me of you. The music I listen, the tea I make, the absence of friends who wont judge me and the place I live in. I'm still waiting for you to come back to live across the hall from me", Sami confessed, "EJ, nothing hurts like knowing what could have been and remembering how I alone chose something else."

"Samantha, this isn't why I came after you. Don't talk like that-" EJ tried to stop her again but Sami didn't listen. She couldn't let herself listen because she knew that she needed all her courage to speak the words in her mind to him.

"Do you remember Colleen and Santo, our ancestors and look-alikes and their tragic romance?" Sami saw EJ nod slightly, "EJ I think we are Colleen and Santo reincarnated. Fate gave us another chance to make things right but I ruined it all."

"That's ridiculous Samantha", EJ was outraged.

"No it isn't just listen to me please", Samantha pleaded with him and kept on speaking, "You once said that we have a connection we can't deny because it hurts to deny it and I think you are right. We've always had that connection EJ. We are soul friends, you are my anam cara. EJ, you are the only one for me and I don't want to wait for another lifetime to be with you. I love you. Wont you please forgive me so we can be together in this life as well as in all the lives to come?"

EJ laughed. He didn't know what to say so he laughed. But when he saw her wounded expression he made himself stop. He opened his mouth to express his disbelief:

"Samantha, you can not be serious. You can't really believe in this nonsense?"

"I do, I do believe in it."

"Samantha, when I spoke of our connection, I was trying to get you leave Lucas and be with me. I was trying to steal you away from him", EJ confessed, "I said those things because I loved you and they were true because I loved you. We are our own people Samantha and fate has nothing to do with where we are now. I would think you have enough to mend in your own life, Samantha. You really shouldn't even consider correcting the mistakes others have made."

"Well if it's not fate, then what is it EJ? All I know is that I can't stop thinking of you and hoping that things would be different. I want you in my life and I want you in my children's lives." Sami took a step closer to him staring at him and hoping he would make all her dreams come true.

"It's just a memory of a feeling Samantha. You'll find it again too, with someone new. Just give in and move on with your life. Your children will thank you for it", EJ closed his eyes for a second and met her eyes with a cold glare, "I'll make sure you wont have to witness any more of my meetings with John and Steve. I wouldn't want you to overhear anything that might upset you again. Goodbye Samantha."

EJ had just made the impossible possible. He had made Sami feel worse and more hopeless than she had ever felt. EJ wanted her to move on and find a happiness with someone else like he had found with Emilia. As she watched him walk away, slipping away from her, Sami wanted to scream. She wanted to turn back the time and go back to the moment she had turned on EJ. Sami wanted to go back in time with the knowledge that nothing could ever replace the hole in her soul if she would let him go away and that nothing EJ or his family had done would ever be reason enough for her to move on. Sami wanted to let her younger self know that EJ was her destiny and that by hurting him she would only end up hurting herself. Sami desperately wanted to believe that she would have another chance. She didn't want to face the fact that it was too late.