You Left Me to Remain With All Your Excuses for Everything

Christine dropped the pair of lace and cotton panties onto the ground in the laundry room and backed herself against the wall before sinking down onto the ground. So many things were running through her head as she stared at the small undergarment. There were emotions and memories and so many things that ran over and over in her mind, but mostly she had questions. Questions about who the panties belonged to, and why hadn’t Tyler just left her rather than hurt her so much more? There were questions about how long it had been going on, and if the girl was pretty, young, tall, why was she so much better?

She let her tears run down her face as violent sobs of rage and hurt quaked through her body. She cried until she didn’t think there could be any tears left in her. She finally got herself up off the ground and went into the living room and picked her purse up off the sofa and dug her cell phone out. She checked the time quickly, noticing that it was after 2 a.m. She had been crying for hours.

She dialed Tyler’s cell phone, not caring if she woke him and his precious girlfriend up. Another wave of pain shot through her as the call went directly to his voice mail box. It took her a long time to get the strength to even begin to speak, and as the beep beeped her mind froze. “Tyler…I just wanted to…I needed to…I hope….we need to talk,” she said and hung up. She looked at the entertainment stand and tears started to fill her eyes as they landed on the wedding picture in its engraved frame. She picked the picture up and lay down on the sofa with it pressed to her chest and she cried hysterically until falling asleep on the sofa rolled in a ball with her wedding picture to her chest and her cats surrounding her.

Jackie woke up in the morning to Tyler kissing her neck and her shoulders. She smiled and groaned just a little bit as she stretched her body out. “Morning,” she smiled.

“Morning babe, how did you sleep?” he asked in between kisses. He ran his hand over her hip gently and sucked slightly on the soft skin where her neck and shoulder connected. She hummed a little bit and smiled.

“Amazingly with you here,” she said. She could feel him smile against her skin. It was so easy for him to get caught up in his own lie. When she was sending out so much love, and she was so genuine about the way he made her feel, he couldn’t help but let it be contagious. “And you?”

“The same,” he said and kissed her neck again. She smiled to herself and put her hand on his and pulled his arm around her waist and pressed her back against him.

“I’m glad,” she said and closed her eyes contently. This was perfection for her. “Do you have to leave?” she whined a little bit. He sighed harshly and kissed her hair a little bit.

“You know I do honey, but I promise you’re all I think about when I’m not with you,” he said. “You are everything.” He reached over her then and picked up his cell phone from where it was lying on her night table and turned it on.

“Tyler, please don’t take away the little time I have with you by turning that thing on,” she begged. He sighed again and set the BlackBerry down on the headboard of her bed and put his arm around her waist again.

“Are you happy?” he asked. She pouted a little bit. He always had a way of making her feel bad for wanting to just have alone time with him. She didn’t know why he did it to her so often. It made her feel bad.

“I shouldn’t have said anything,” she sniffed and rolled her body into a ball. He sighed with his own guilt. He knew it wasn’t fair to her that he put her through so much shit and then when he was with her he didn’t give her the attention she deserved. He tried to pull her closer to his body but she pulled away and sniffed again. He could tell he’d hurt her feelings more than he’d thought.

“No, you were right to honey. I don’t stay with you very often, when I do I shouldn’t start looking through my phone the minute you wake up. I’m sorry,” he said and successfully pulled her against himself. She sniffed again and he could feel her body shake with a slight sob.

“It’s been a year, Tyler,” she started to speak. “When are you going to stop stringing Christine along?” she finished. He sighed harshly and rolled onto his back and looked up at her ceiling with frustration. He knew that question was going to come at some point. It seemed like lately, every time he saw her she asked him that question.

“Soon,” he said. He could hear her long shaky breath, and he prepared himself for her to start crying. It seemed like she’d been doing a lot of that lately, too. It made him wonder how much longer he could keep both relationships going. He knew that eventually she wouldn’t stay there waiting anymore. She was smarter than that, and he was afraid she was starting to realize the truth in the matter.

But he was surprised when she didn’t cry. Instead she got out of bed and went into her bathroom and locked the door behind herself and opened her medicine cabinet. She pulled out the thin box and looked it over for a few minutes, reading the labels, before pulling the E.P.T. pregnancy test out of the box and sitting on her toilet. She took a deep breath and held the little wand under her urine stream and finished on the toilet before setting the test on her counter and turning on her shower.

She stepped into the shower and let herself relax for a minute. She was worried about how Tyler would react to her being pregnant. A part of her hoped the test was negative, because so much of her feared he would be angry, and part of her hoped it was positive, because she saw it as a way to have the little family she’d wanted for so long with him. But so much of her worried that she was the one he was stringing along.

Tyler had called Christine’s phone three times with no answer. He was wondering why she had sounded so upset in the message she’d left him. He wanted to talk to her, but he couldn’t get in touch with her. He was worried that something had happened to her.

Jackie came out of the bathroom then and crawled onto the bed and lay on top of him. “Tyler,” she sniffed.

“Yea?” he said.

“Do me a favor, please, I need this from you,” she said gently.

“What is that, honey?” he asked, trying not to focus on Christine’s message. She kissed him on his lips and down his neck a little bit.

“Make love to me, please Tyler, I need you too,” she begged. He put his hands on her back and looked into her eyes. He could tell that something about her wasn’t as it usually was; he just couldn’t tell what was wrong.

He didn’t protest, and he rolled her onto her back and kissed her lips. She moaned a little bit as he kissed her neck and her chest and she let out a harsh breath as he slipped into her. She tried to keep her tears down as he moved against her, and she put her hands on his back.

“I love you,” she whispered against his neck and she felt his breath warm the skin on her shoulder.

“I love you,” he said and kissed behind her ear. So much of her hoped more than ever before that what he’d said was true. She tried not to be too loud as the physical feeling started to take over the emotional; as she knew Madison was awake by now and wouldn’t want to hear them.

She lay with him for a long time after he finished. She wanted to tell him about the pregnancy test and its results, but she didn’t know when the right time would be. Suddenly then he got up and started to get dressed. She sighed and also got out of bed and pulled on her satin robe.

“Are you going now?” she sniffed with tears starting to fill her eyes.

“I have to Jackie, it’s getting late,” he said and buckled his belt quickly. “I’ll call you, okay?”

“I don’t want you to leave, Tyler,” she said as the tears started to slip down her cheeks. She knew he had to go now; it was almost 3 o’clock in the afternoon. But she hated that he was leaving her again. “Please stay with me, just this time.”

“Jackie, you know I can’t, baby,” he said and pulled his keys out of his pocket. He picked up his cell phone off her head board and kissed her mouth. “I’ll be back soon though, I never leave you waiting on me too long,” he said. She sniffed and wiped her eyes with her finger tips.

“Please Tyler, I’m begging you,” she cried. He sighed and put his arms around her tightly.

“I can’t, but I’ll be here soon I promise. I love you,” he said and let her go. He opened the door to her bedroom and she took a deep breath.

“Tyler…I’m pregnant,” she said. He stopped and thought about what she’d said for a minute. He could hear Madison and Josh in the living room, and he wondered if Madison knew. That would be another good reason for her to hate him.

“What?” he asked gently without looking at her.

“I’m pregnant…” she repeated. “And I think it’s time you tell Christine what’s going on, and stop hurting her like that,” she said. He turned around to face her and she could see the anger in his features.

“I thought you were protected!” he snapped. “How the fuck did this happen?!”

“How do you think it happened?! You came over here and fucked me and I got pregnant! That’s how it happened!” She said with shock and anger. She was prepared for him to be angry, but how could he blame the whole thing on her?

“You were supposed to make sure that didn’t happen!” He snapped.

“Tyler, those things don’t always work! I’ve been on the pill; I never miss a fucking day. But sometimes shit happens! Why are you being so mean about it?! This is a good thing, now you can just be with me and our baby, and it will make it easier to just let Chrissy go,” she said.

Madison stood up from where she was on the sofa and Josh looked up at her. “Madison, stay out of it,” he said.

“Hell if I’m going to let him scream at my friend like that Josh. Besides, she didn’t tell me anything about this…” Madison said and started to walk towards Jackie’s bedroom. Josh sighed and sunk down into the sofa. He had a feeling this wouldn’t be good.

“I don’t see why you’re so angry,” Jackie said and sniffed.

“Look, take care of the kid,” he snapped.

“What do you mean ‘take care of it’?” she asked with horror.

“Get rid of it,” He snapped. She looked at him with pain spreading across her face as her tears started to run further down her face.

“But, we can be happy…me and you…and the baby…” she started.

“God damn it, don’t you understand that you were never anything more than a piece of ass?!” he yelled. Suddenly she felt like all the air had been taken from her lungs and she’d been punched in the stomach. “You mean nothing to me! So I don’t give a shit what you do with that fucking kid, but don’t expect anything from me!”

“Are you fucking kidding me!? You did not just fucking say that to her!” Madison shouted as she walked up to them. He turned to face her and she slapped him across the face. “What’s wrong with you, you selfish mother fucker!?” She screamed and slapped him several times.

“Stay out of this, this doesn’t concern you, bitch,” he snapped and pushed her away from him.

“Don’t you ever put your fucking hands on me again, asshole!” she shouted and punched him in the jaw. “It is my concern, because she is my best friend and you just fucking told her she was nothing. The only person here that is nothing, is you dick head!” she snapped. She felt Josh’s arms go around her waist then and she struggled to get away.

“Come on, you’ve had enough in this,” he said and started to pull her away.

“Let me go!” she snapped, but he didn’t loosen his grip until he had her in her bedroom.

“I think….it’s best…if you leave now…and don’t come back…” Jackie said and looked at the ground. “Since I’m nothing to you anyways…there is no reason for you to come back is there?”

“Keep your little friend on a leash, she’s obviously a danger to herself and others,” he snapped and left.