"You did what?!" Petra yelled as she stormed the remaining steps in the Marbella restaurant, closing in on Jane.
The small brunette stood her ground, "I am sorry Petra, but it was the truth and someone had to do it! You're miserable."
"I am not-" Petra instinctively rebutted, before Jane cut in,
"You never go anywhere anymore. In fact, I don't think I have seen you leave your apartment this month, except when you've come downstairs to work."
"I've just-" Petra tried weakily.
"Speaking of your apartment, it's a mess; which is pretty hard to fathom, considering you're a pain-in-the-butt neurotic clean freak. I mean, when was the last time you washed your sheets?" Jane began, longwindedly.
"Not to mention the row of empty pickle jars on your counter, the half-melted candles with wax dripping down the furniture, and was that a paddle ball set on your bed...?" Jane asked confused.
Petra hung her head, hell bent on hiding the tears welling up.
"Also, I 100% support finding a hobby, especially to get your mind off a break up, and I hear pottery can be quite cathartic...but one living room can only hold so many dried misshapen clay bowls!"
The brunette scrunched up her nose slightly in concern, and paused, reaching to place a comforting hand on the blonde attempting to inconspicuously wipe tears from her eyes. At the contact, petra stiffened and tried to pull herself together by retaliating.
"Who let you into my apartment!? You had no right! Just like you had no right to talk to-"
Jane interrupted, defending herself before Petra could get any more heated.
"Petra, we are family. You, Raf, the kids and I. We have been through so much, but we're family and we love you. We were both concerned. We've never seen you like this before; Whenever you do appear from your apartment, the only time you don't look like the walking dead is when the girls are around."
"It is hard seeing you like this; so yeah, we did what we had to do. And don't blame Raf, it was my idea", Jane continued emotionally, getting worked up herself.
She waited for Petra to calm down before continuing, "Look, I don't know what happened between you and JR, but it is obvious she still cares for you."
At that mention, she saw a glimmer of light in Petra's eye that she hadn't seen in weeks, eventhough Petra wouldn't acknowledge it herself,
"She couldn't possibly." The blonde stumbled hesitantly, but Jane nodded assuringly,
"When I told her you weren't doing well, she wanted to come over immediately and check on you. I'm the one that had to tell her that it might be best to give you a few days, to prepare emotionally, before you met."
Jane closed the distance between them, to give the tall sniffling blonde a hug.
"So you've got three days to pull yourself together girl, before it's time to win back your woman!"
Jane cheered a little over enthusiastically, trying her best to uplift her friend's spiritis. Petra squeezed the brunette as she allowed the tears to flow for the first time in public,
"Thank you, Jane. Truly, Thank you."
Six weeks. It had been six weeks since they broke up-41 days to be exact- and a day hadn't passed where Petra didn't relive every moment of that night. Not because she wanted to, but because every second of the incident tormented her in her sleep. Always ending the same way, no matter how hard she tried to change it, her jerking awake with a yell, in a cold sweat, as JR exits and the door slams.
She wanted, needed, to reach out to JR immediately, but nothing seemed right, no apology worthy. There were over a eighty deleted and unsent text messages that felt contemptibly insincere to Petra; two dozen drafted emails that felt disgracefully unromantic; several stamped and addressed hand written letters that suddenly felt hopelessly incomplete just as they were picked up to be mailed.
Petra had even booked and rented out the entire restuarant that they celebrated their 6 month anniversary at, but as time neared to send JR the invitation, the romantic gesture seemed more and more false; a charade or stunt that would not ring as true to JR nor merit the weight or significance of Petra's remorse properly.
Then there were the visits; ones that started intermittently, but had increased in frequency lately as the desperation for contact had driven Petra frenzied with despair. She had been in JR's halls, at her door, a simple breath and knock away from the brunette, but she always froze.
All of this was so completely unlike Petra, which only added to her frustrations. She was not someone to wallow in pity, she went after what she wanted Always, no matter the cost; but for once, for the first time in her life, Petra was finding that she couldn't.
The fear of unpreparedness would suddenly overwhelm her as her fist hovered over the door; the trepidation of final rejection would sink in; and the guilt, remorse, and heartbreak would resurface paralyzing her to the point where most trips recently just ended with the blonde crying on the street, inside her car, internally berating herself for not having the courage.
Petra wasn't doing well, she knew it; and judging from her conversation with Jane, everybody else knew it also, even though she tried her best to hide it. What they didn't know though, was the actual extent of her pain.
At first, Petra was haunted by JR. Everything in her apartment reminded her of the brunette: her lipstick on a coffee mug when Petra ate breakfast; a strand of her hair in the drain as she showered; or an earring on the nightstand as she got ready for bed.
The bed.
The sheets were the most agonizing. Every inch of linen, from the pillow cases to the duvet, was imbued with JR's scent; her perfume, her shampoo, her everything. Viscerally, Petra would ensconce herself in them, curling in fetal position to inhale every last memory. Each night hurt more than the previous, cutting an ever increasing hollow hole in her.
But as the days past and everything else around Petra numbed in the brunette's absence, the pain of her memory became one of Petra's sole sources of comfort-because it connected her to JR. The pain kept their memories, their time together fresh; it kept JR there for Petra.
However, no matter how hard Petra tried, no matter how much she substituted by surrounding herself with relics, the temporary satisfaction that came with a particular memory was always fleeting, and usually replaced quickly with gut gripping anguish.
Petra had hit rock bottom.
It had been 6 weeks since she'd seen her love, and her hope that something salvageable remained dwindled a little bit more with every painstaking day that passed.
Until today.
The thought of JR concerned about her, possibly worried about her, and wanting to stop what she was doing to come see her, renewed a hope in Petra to imagine a chance where she recently couldn't.
She did not know what this meeting in 3 days would mean to JR, but Petra did know that if this was going to be the last opportunity she had with JR, she didn't want to waste it.
"Hi"
"Hi"
Petra and JR both halted akwardly in the doorway, shuffling; unsure and insecure, and both determined to rein in their emotions this evening.
They searched each other's eyes intently for several seconds at the door, seeing the same thing reflected back: fear, longing, and pain.
Petra finally blinked, stepping aside to watch JR enter hesistantly.
The two of them hadn't been together in Petra's penthouse since the incident, and passing by the bedroom door sent chills down both of their spines as each were flooded with vivid flashbacks of what happened in that room, against that wall.
JR immediately attempted to shake off the jarring memories and refocus on what brought her here.
"How are you?" she probed earnestly, moving forward to hold Petra's hand.
"Fine" Petra responded quickly out of habit, having trouble peeling her gaze from the bedroom door as well.
JR froze, withdrawing her hand before she reached the blonde, crossing her arms and furrowing her brow worriedly at Petra's casual answer.
Petra took a slow step back, realizing her absentmindedness, and clarified,
"Okay, I am not doing fine. In fact, I'm doing the exact opposite of fine." Petra laughed akwardly, trying to keep her emotions at bay.
"Look, I don't know the exact reason you're here. Maybe you just wanted to check in on me, maybe this is closure for you, maybe Jane forced you..." she continued, a mile a minute, nervously.
"Jane didn't force me" JR interrupted calmly, slightly hurt that Petra would even consider it a possibility.
"What I meant is...whatever the reason, I am happy you are here." Petra smiled briefly before taking several long deep meditative breaths to slow her heart rate and her emotions racing.
"I know I don't deserve it" Petra started shakily, "but I just wanted to ask for 5 minutes of your time."
Petra met JR's eyes searching for assurance before continuing,
"It doesn't require you saying anything. In fact, I don't want you to-I couldn't take it if it was out of pity. All you have to do is just sit and listen for 5 minutes...and you'll never have to hear from me again, I promise".
Petra closed her eyes as her voiced cracked the final words, knowing she'd be unable to bear the sight of JR leaving...again.
When she heard the couch cushions restle as the brunette sat down, her heart jumped in her chest as she sighed in relief.
Petra then opened her eyes, urging herself on confidently through her nerves, and decided to provide JR with the only thing Petra found worthy in this moment: honesty.
"Lying to you was the biggest mistake of my life" she tried to begin straight-fowardly, but quickly lost her battle, choking back the pain rising in her throat,
"Because you are the best thing that has ever happened to me."
JR immediately jumped up to make her way over to the blonde, but Petra motioned her to sit.
"No. I need to finish this. I have to finish this, because I don't know if I will be able to again."
Petra paused as JR hesitantly sat back down, swallowed loudly, and attempted to forge ahead.
"No one has ever made me happier than you. No one could ever make me happier, and that scared me."
"You said you love when I'm vulnerable, but it petrifies me! I'm not use to it; I've never done it with anyone but you." Petra hesitated as her breath hitched in fear; before she decided to completely let go.
"I've never been vunerable with another person, and I didn't know how to do it healthily. I'm use to putting up walls, not voluntarily putting my heart in someone else's hands and giving them full ownership of it. Doing that with you, so quickly; having it beating raw, without protection, and tethered so delicately to someone else's emotions, simultaneously frightened and exhilarated me."
"And it still does. One smile from you and my heart flutters, a single laugh from you and it skips a beat. The depth of those feelings were new and foreign to me, and I floundered. At the time, I would have done anything to keep them"
The blonde inhaled deeply, blushing a bright shade of red in embarrassment of her own gushiness.
"What I'm trying to say is that I love you! I love you so much that I panicked; and to keep from losing you, I did the one thing that caused me to: I lied."
"There hasn't been a second these past 44 days that I haven't regretted it immensely. I know now that what I did was irreparable, and that is a cross I will bear for the rest of my life."
Petra wiped her tears and headed to the corner of the room.
"I am not asking you to forgive me, I couldn't hope for that. But I will ask if you could let me do one thing".
Petra set the case down gentily on the counter and unlocked it, before turning back to JR.
"No one has made me want to pick this up again in over 10 years...until you." she shakily picked up the wooden instrument and bow before glancing at the floor.
"I wrote this to play you at our anniversary, to tell you I love you, but I chickened out...just liked I chickened out of saying it that night too, when we made love."
"If...when you leave tonight, there will undoubtedly be an incredible burden for me to bear, but the thought of not being able to show you how much I love you one last time, is not one I'm willing to carry."
With that, she closed her eyes, placed her head on the chin rest and started.
The first few notes echoed off the suite walls stunningly causing JR to audibly gasp. For all of Petra's mounting nerves and expected rust, she took back to the the beautifully crafted tool like her fingers were made for it.
Her hand glided effortlessly over the neck as she moved through a beautifully full and flowery warm chase of a first section, her bow flitting over the strings lightly and joyfully.
She traversed through multiple scales and pitches harmoniously; transferring from stacatto to pizzicato back to long smooth strokes, culminating in a startling romantic timbre; until Petra's emotions began to rise several bars in and the tone abruptly cascaded into a low, undulating, and fervent vibrato.
The slow and languid heartbeat of the melody resonated ardently in the air for several beats before Petra opened her eyes to switch positions.
The sight that met her of JR swollen-eyed, tear-streaked, silently crying astounded Petra, bowling over her own thinly contained resolve. She attempted to keep playing but the tremoring of her hands and heaving of her chest made it next to impossible.
JR lept from the couch instantly when she saw Petra break down, struggling desperately to finish the piece. She drew the blonde in forcefully, knocking the wind out of both unintentionally.
"It's okay, it's okay, it's okay." JR murmured soothingly as the blonde began to cry in her arms. This was the first time JR had touched her in 6 weeks, and the electricity that seared through Petra at the contact caused her knees to buckle harshly as she fell to the floor sobbing.
JR followed her.
"If you go down, I go down" JR smiled slightly, after they hit the ground in an ungraceful clump.
She stroked the blonde's hair gently before planting a kiss on her forhead,
"We're in this together."