Chapter 25: Hopes We Cherished Fade
A/N: I literally cannot get over the fact that after this there's only two more parts to be written. Thank you to everyone who reads and reviews. I can't believe the amounts of visitors I had in the month of December - 398. And close to 1,000 hits. Thank you, everyone. Enjoy the latest chapter. Happy New Year to you and yours. I also hope that you all had an enjoyable holiday season.
The ironic aspect of Ava's situation is that she couldn't bring herself to be mad at Jake. She felt sick to her stomach, betrayed and hurt, but she would be the biggest hypocrite on the planet to be mad at him. True, she wanted nothing more than to drive to Sig's house and push Tara into the lake in the back, but that would just look too obvious. Now not only was she missing her (ex?) lover as well as her husband of just a few months, but she had no one to turn to.
'Karma,' she thought to herself, 'really is a bitch.'
Part of her knew she had to confess everything to Jake. The other part just wanted to call him out on it and keep her and Sig's secret just that - a secret. She could pretend to be upset with Jake, throw him out. Or, she could call him out, be upset and then confess the past three years of her life. The latter would only hurt Jake, and, Lord help her, she could not bring herself to hurt him.
Telling him the truth would more than likely destroy him. Of course, he'd been cheating on her with Tara, but he had no clue about her and Sig. Why further damage Jake's perception of reality? He'd lost his sister, his dad was clinically depressed and addicted to pain killers and he was a borderline recovering alcoholic.
Tears formed in her eyes. This was all her fault. And Sig's, too. If he just would have gotten rid of Tara and never pushed her and Jake together! Her and Jake's wedding portrait hanging above the faux fireplace caught her eye. The tears spilled out and she openly sobbed. Her shoulders shook and she finally let everything out. She cried for her - her past, college life, parents, her feelings towards Sig. She cried for Jake - why couldn't she be strong enough to just tell Sig no and live her life with Jake? She cried for the fact that everything revolved around Sig.
'Maybe,' she thought bitterly, 'when you finally realize who your life revolves around you should also realize that you are totally and irreversibly in love with him.'
Outside, the fall rain and wind whipped through the city of Seattle. The weather matched her mood.
Hours later, when Ava finally emptied herself of tears, she sat on her sofa, numb to the world.
After her internal debate, she finally decided: No more lies. If she knew the truth of Tara and him, then he deserved to know the truth of Sig and her.
Naturally her plan was short-lived. Her cell phone interrupted her thoughts.
"Hello?" she tried her best to hide her shaking voice.
"Ava," it was Jake's mother, "Charlie is missing."
xXXxXXxXXxXXxXXxXXx
Booking a flight for Seattle to Dutch Harbor (via Anchorage, naturally), was easy. Actually getting your connecting flight from Anchorage to Dutch Harbor was another battle in and of itself. There were roughly a dozen flights scheduled to depart that Thursday that Ava flew up to meet her husband at Dutch Harbor, a total surprise. Of the dozen, only two made it out and landed in Dutch.
Ava was not one of those lucky people to successfully land. Instead, she spent roughly six hours in the airport before she was finally buckled in on her flight, heart hammering in her chest, waiting for the small turbo prop plane to take off.
Julie had called the ship to inform Jake of his father's mysterious disappearance. Ava opted to fly up to Dutch to be with him, and to try to start sorting out the mess that was her life. With the exception of Julie, nobody knew Ava was flying up to meet him.
If she thought taking off was terrifying, landing was a down right nightmare. From the sky, it looked like the runway was only a hundred feet long. She sucked in her breath, closed her eyes and silently professed her love to Jake. The plane slammed down to the ground, hard, and sputtered forward a few times before she heard the wind rush over the aircraft, and came to an abrupt stop. Alive, thankfully, she grabbed her purse and waited for her turn to stop off the plane. In the airport, she grabbed her small bag and hopped in one of ten taxies waiting for arriving flights.
"Where to, miss?"
"The docks," she replied shortly.
The mighty Northwestern was already docked and she smiled to herself. Everything would be out in the open soon and then she'd be able to sleep at night.
"Ava!" Josh Harris rounded a corner and nearly gave Ava a heart attack. "What are you doing here?" he laughed, giving her a hug.
"Surprising Jake," Ava explained. "Do you know if they're still on the boat?"
"Um, yeah, I think so," Josh said, running a hand through his hair.
"Great, thanks. I gotta get going, I'll see you around?"
Josh nodded. "Sounds good."
Just a few hundred feet, and she saw Jake. He waved wildly at her and she saw his smile. She smiled, too.
"What are you doing here!" he shouted, helping her over the rail.
"Surprise!" Ava grinned, throwing her arms around him and hugging him hard. She didn't care that he smelled of cigarettes, sweat and fish.
Before he could kiss her, the galley door swung open. "What's all this commotion about?"
Sig.
Ava kept her arms around Jake. Sig looked as if he saw a ghost. "Ava?"
"Captain."
Sig was a smart man. When he saw Ava on deck, her long blonde hair being whipped around by the fierce and chilly wind, he knew instantly that she was here to talk to the three of them, without the opportunity for the press and media to be present like they always were in Seattle. What she didn't know was the talks that he and Tara had had while at sea. The real reason of the hat. Ava was already trying to tear the young deckhand off the boat and back to the hotel.
He couldn't do anything to stop her from making the biggest mistake of her life.
"C'mon, Jakey," Ava smiled up at her husband, "Let's go. You can do the counts for Opies in a few months. I missed you!"
Jake shrugged his shoulders, turned to Sig and replied, "See you tomorrow, boss. I wouldn't mind having her meet me here after the end of each season!"
And before he could protest, they were gone.
When the pair finally reached the hotel, Jake jumped in the shower and proceeded to use all of the small toiletries that were provided. He emerged, dressed in sweats, his hair still dripping wet. Jake grinned sheepishly at her and crawled up the bed to lay by her side.
"I missed you."
Ava grabbed his hand. "I missed you, too. What the hell happened to your hand?" she shouted, sitting up. The panic swept over her face immediately.
"Cod knife," was his short answer.
xXXxXXxXXxXXxXXxXXx
Meanwhile, back on the docks, Sig jogged down to the Cornelia Maria, barged on in and raced up the steep stairs to corner its Captain.
"She thinks that he's been cheating on her with Tara!" Sig stage whispered.
Phil Harris blew a puff of smoke from his lips and put his head down. "This is still going on?" he ground out. "You know, the brief time Anderson was on my ship, all he could talk about was his wife. It was sickening, really. He loves her."
Sig let himself fall into a chair opposite of Phil. "Yeah, no shit."
Phil looked over at Sig. "Did you know she was coming up here?"
Sig shook his head. "She did that all on her own."
"Brave girl, dealing with those damn prop planes." Phil propped his feet up and reclined back in his chair, resting his hands behind his head. His cigarette was still smoking away in its ashtray.
Sig could only grunt in agreement. "Ava just showed up at the rail. I heard Jake shout and start laughing and I heard a girl's voice and I just knew... The look in her eyes, man. She's going to call him out on it and, knowing her, she won't be able to not tell Jake about her and I."
"Why's this bad? Don't you think after three years it should be out in the open?" Phil asked sincerely.
The captain of the Northwestern could feel his blood start to boil. "Jake never cheated! It was ligit, he was out with your boys. When Tara's car broke down she couldn't take the girls to get their dresses before their wedding, and since I was with Ava, Jake was the one who helped my family."
Phil looked at Sig like he wasn't buying the story. "And who told you this?"
"Tara."
"Ah."
The two captains were silent for quite a while. Finally, Sig figured it out. "You don't believe it?"
"Hell no," Phil laughed. He sat forward to light a new smoke and inhaled deeply. "She's lied to you before, why would now be any different? I think it's part of a greater plan."
Sig really did not want to believe this. But after years of Tara not giving a damn about him, lying to him - why shouldn't he expect this?
Of course, by telling Sig that there wasn't an affair between herself and Jake, Tara would ensure that Ava's mind would be put at ease by Sig. Then, when everyone is back home for the summer, the four of them could pick up just where they left off.
Or... Tara told him this in order to sabotage both Jake and Ava's relationship as well as Sig and Ava's relationship. By Tara telling Sig there was no affair, Sig would tell Ava. Ava wouldn't believe Sig, saying there was far too much evidence and confront Jake. They would fight and argue, and Ava would turn around and blame Sig.
"I take it you understand?" Phil asked quietly.
Resting his head in his hands, Sig let out a frustrated scream.
xXXxXXxXXxXXxXXxXXx
After Jake's recollection of the cod knife incident, he grinned and told Ava "And that was the least of my worries for this trip. Sig and Phil switched Jake Harris and me."
Ava cocked her head to the side. "But you came back on the Northwestern?"
"Yeah," Jake laughed, blue eyes lighting up. "After Edgar had to fish me out of the sea."
Ava sat straight up and started screaming. "Sig did WHAT to you? Why would he do that? You could have been killed, what the hell was he thinking?"
"Calm down, Ava," Jake tried to soothe her nerves. "I'm fine. It was the most valuable lesson I got. Phil and the guys on the Cornelia taught me new tricks. And I learned that the Bering Sea is nothing to be messed with after spending fifteen minutes in it."
This did nothing to calm Ava down. Was this some sick joke that Sig tried to pull on Ava? Was she even meant to hear this story?
And like he was reading her thoughts, "It'll look great on TV."
She playfully punched his arm. "Not funny."
"So, really, why are you here?" Jake asked, taking her into his arms.
Immediately her heart started to hammer in her chest.
"Well, it's two-fold, really," Ava started. She was absently playing with a few strings of the comforter on the bed.
"First, about your dad -"
Jake interrupted her. "My mom called and told me last night. When I get back home I'm going to start putting some serious ads in the paper, the news and try to use some of the fame or whatever to start a search for him. We'll find him, I'm sure of it."
Ava nodded. His father had been missing now for only two weeks. There was still hope, but Ava knew that each passing day it grew less and less. She didn't want to upset Jake. There wasn't even a lead on the missing man.
"What's the other reason?"
What better way than to go right into it?
"I know about you and Tara. The Penn State hat? Tara was home alone that night. Sig didn't get home until well after four-"
And then she stopped, her mouth snapping shut.
'You idiot!' she screamed. 'You just gave it all away, you total moron! Why didn't you think about how to tell him without bringing Sig into it and what time he got back home?'
"...Sig told me that he was out with Johnathan that night. And how do you know what time he got back home?"
Ava was quiet, and she looked down at her hands in her lap.
"Ava..." Jake's voice broke. "How do you know that?"
"Why was that hat at Sig and Tara's house?" she countered.
Jake laughed, rather sarcastically. "I was over at their house in the afternoon to take the girls out to get their dresses for our wedding. Tara's car wasn't working and Sig wasn't home. I forgot it on the coffee table, along with my flannel shirt. After I dropped them off, I went out for my bachelor party. Now," he continued, "how do you know about Sig not getting home until late?"
'Don't lie, tell the truth,' she chanted. 'He deserves to know the truth.'
"Because he was at my apartment that night."
Jake's arms fell away from her as if she were burning him. "Do I even want to know why? Can I put two and two together here, or is there some sort of elaborate story that I should know?"
She could only shake her head. "You guessed right."
He let out a heavy sigh, running his fingers through his hair. And then he jumped up and started pacing. "How long? When did it start? Why did it start? How..." he stopped, his sky blue eyes filled with tears, "How could you do this to me?"
And just like that, Ava's heart broke and she started sobbing. She hoped that he could understand her through her blubbering, she really didn't feel like explaining it multiple times.
"I met Sig right after I graduated college. Friends of mine went to UW and I flew out to Seattle for a long weekend. I met Sig at a bar. We hooked up," she started crying even harder. "I was supposed to go to law school, but he offered me my job. I moved out here and we started our affair. It's been going on ever since... Well, before you and I even met."
Jake flew to her and grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her. "Why?" he roared. "You lied to me from the very start! Do you even love me?"
"Yes!" she wailed. "You are everything that I should ever want in a man. You are so wonderful, Jake. I love you. So much. Please believe that."
Her answers still weren't good enough, and she knew it. Nothing would ever be good enough. "Why did you agree to marry me? You went through with it, too."
"I told you, I love you! You and I are so good together."
"But we're not perfect, right? You said that I'm everything you want. Am I everything you need?"
Her immediate reaction was to blurt out no, but was she ready to throw the ultimate betrayal at him? He'd divorce her, that she was sure of.
Ava looked at her husband, the tears flowing freely down both of their faces. He was beautiful. Jake Anderson was all man: Strong arms and a finely muscled back, strong jaw bone and thick hair. His voice made her smile. When he smiled, she smiled. His eyes were the most intense sky blue she'd ever seen. He was kind, gentle and loving. He'd do anything for her and for his family. Jake was fully prepared to take care of not only Ava, but his family as well. He should be everything she wanted - and needed. But if, by some miracle, he forgave her, she knew in her heart of hearts that Sig Hansen was already buried too deep in her heart to let it go. It would take years of practice, and more than likely stepping down from her job, but she would be willing to try to stop seeing Sig all together. Would Jake go for it?
Apparently, her internal thoughts were also vocalized. She never knew when to shut her mouth when she was upset.
"I will forgive you, Ava," he started.
Ava let out a small laugh - was it too good to be true?
"In time."
It was.
"I'll eventually forgive you - and Sig," he added, "but not for a long while. If you and I stay married, and I stay working on the ship, there's no way I'll be able to function. Our entire relationship, and my marriage, would be based off a lie. I can't forget that. Ever."
Ava shook her head. This wasn't happening.
"I believe you when you tell me you love me. But if you truly were in love with me, and wanted and needed me like I need you, you would have cut whatever was going on with you and Sig a long time ago. You may have been able to trick yourself into believing it, but I can't fool myself."
"Jake, please-" she started.
"No!" he shouted. "I loved you, unconditionally and with all of my heart. The love I have for you is obviously not the same love you have for me."
"That's not true-" he stopped her again.
"It is true! Don't you see? If you loved me the way I loved you, this never would have happened."
"And we never would have met!"
"Ava," Jake said softly, "that still doesn't erase the fact that our relationship started off with you lying to me. And my family. And the crew, our friends. Sig's family."
Ava hung her head in shame. "I am so sorry. I never meant to hurt you, ever. I love you, I hope you believe me when I tell you that. I fought with myself over even telling you this and just telling Sig that he and I were done. But... When Sig told me that he found that hat, he thought it was Andy's. And then Tara gave it to you before you left for Dutch. I thought... I thought you were having an affair with her!"
Jake laughed. "Not even close."
She didn't say anything.
"Your conscience just got the best of you," he explained.
She nodded. A heavy silence stretched between the two.
Jake sat next to her, but did not look at her. Ava stared at him as if he would vanish before her eyes.
Finally, she spoke. "What are we going to do from here?"
He let out another sigh. "You, Sig and myself are going to talk. When we get back to Seattle..."
Ava held her breath.
"...I'm going to get my stuff and move back in with my mom. Tell her that I want to be there while dad's away. You and I will try dates or whatever. But if I can't get over this, I'm not going to be in a loveless marriage. You know?"
Divorce. After being married for just short of four months. Thousands of dollars wasted. Two hearts, shattered. One life ruined because of her.
Ava nodded numbly. "Do you want to talk to Sig tomorrow?"
"Nope," Jake hopped up from the bed, grabbing his winter coat. "You and I are going over there before the two of you can chat behind my back. I want this sprung on him just like this was sprung on me."
Although he didn't yell at her, somehow those words hurt her more than their impending divorce. Why would Jake stay with her? She was an awful person. She never hated herself more than at this moment in time. When she looked at Jake, her sweet Jake, her heart broke all over again. Their eyes met and she started to cry silent tears.
"I know," he whispered.
"Know what?"
"It hurts me, too. To hurt you, I never wanted that. I know you didn't want to hurt me."
He held out his arms and she rushed into him, holding onto him for fear of him letting her go.
I can't remember when it was good
Moments of happiness elude
Maybe I just misunderstood
All of the love we left behind
Watching the flashbacks interwind
Memories I will never find
So I'll love whatever you become
And forget the reckless things we've done
I think our lives have just begun
I think our lives have just begun
"Falling Away With You" - Muse