Love the Way You Lie

She stood there waiting for him to come home. She knew exactly what she was setting herself up for too as soon as he walked through that door. She knew what kind of mess she put herself in and that this wasn’t healthy.

She knew he had another life outside of her, but she was okay with that. She knew that he always wanted to peruse his music career before he would peruse her. He always told her that his first love was music and he second love was her. It was never the other way around.

She knew that he had other women hitting on him every single day and that he would come home with about four or five phone numbers in his pocket. But she’d take them out of his pockets and put them on top of the washing machine when she did his laundry.

She knew he’d probably drive home intoxicated and pass out on the couch, not even making it upstairs where she waited for him. She could care less if he got in a car wreck. As morbid and sadistic as that sounded, it was true. He loved his alcohol more than he loved her.

She knew a lot.
And she did nothing to stop it.

Standing intheir her room, which she used to share with him, she looked around at the walls. Photographs of happier times reminded her of the people they both used to be.

Before she met the guys.
Before his band got famous.
Before they had a huge fan base.
Before he started sleeping around.

Before he asked her to marry him.
Before she said yes.

Her body ached and begged of her to get up, but she couldn’t. She had become too weak to even bear her own weight. All her strength had gone away from fighting him. She had no will left to argue.

There was so much she wanted to tell him, but knew he’d never listen to her.

The faint sounds of keys being turned in the lock downstairs reminded her that he was home from work. She didn’t even have to turn to look at the clock to know that it was late from him to come home. She knew work ended around seven-thirty, but he wouldn’t come home until at least eleven, sometimes midnight.

With what energy she had left, she stood up and dusted herself off. His footsteps could be heard throughout the whole house. Why they had bought this huge place was anyone’s guess.

She heard him throw his keys on the counter and the fridge open. She knew what was coming next. Usually it was “Babe, where’s the booze? or “Did you forget to buy it again?

But it never came.

She stood there in the middle oftheir her room, trying to compose herself and make it look like she had not just stained the carpeting with her tears. She figured he would go sit down on the couch and turn on the TV before he passed out, but she never heard the television kick on.

She barely even noticed the noise of the steps squeaking as he climbed up them. Her breath got caught in her throat when the door totheir her room creaked open and he poked his head in.

“Babe?”

She turned her head around, her body following. Her cold, blue eyes caught his attention. He never noticed that they changed shades of blue over the years. They were much darker from when they met.

Her body was stiff and he knew something was up. What it was exactly, he had no idea.

He furrowed his brows together, trying to piece together the view in front of his eyes. Her bags that she regularly took on tour or on vacation with the girls were out and on the bed, looking like they had been packed already. He also noticed that all her belongings on the dresser were gone, except her wedding ring. It clearly stood out on the dark wooden surface.

His eyes raced over from the ring back to her. “Brandy, what’s going on?” He asked uneasily.

She opened her mouth to speak, but quickly shut it, biting her bottom lip. He cocked his head to the side and was even more confused than he was before.

“I’m leaving you Johnny.”

“Wh-Wha-What?”

He mentally hit himself in the head for saying something stupid like that.

She rolled her eyes. “How did I not see that one coming?” She said out loud, taking one of the bags and throwing it over her shoulder.

“Brandy!” He cried. “You can’t just fucking walk out on us!”

She stopped moving and stared down at the bed sheets with angry eyes. “Oh and you can?”

“I never walked out on us!”

She drew in a breath and closed her eyes, shaking her head. “Yeah, you just keep telling yourself that.”

She picked up the other bag and walked over to where he stood in the doorway, trying to push past him, but he wouldn’t have any of it.

“Johnny, just move.”

“No.”

“Jonathan,” She said more sternly.

He grabbed her upper arms with his hands and looked straight in to her blue eyes. “Brandy, I love you.”

Part of her wanted to say it back, but the other half, the stronger half, didn’t let her do it.

“It’s too late for that.”

“But what am I going to do without you?” Was the only thing he could come up with.

“You can find someone else to fetch your beers.” She glanced back over at the ring sitting on top of the dresser. “Someone who deserves to wear that.”

“Baby, you deserve this!”

“No,” She said quietly. He could see the tears already falling down her cheeks. “I don’t deserve any of this. I deserve more than just lies Johnny.”

She freed herself from his grip and made a run for the door, though she didn’t actually run. She walked, rather slowly to be honest. She wanted to make her exit dramatic so that he would remember what he had just thrown away.

He heard the door shut and ran to the bedroom at the front of the house on the second floor, rather than going out the door to chase after her. He peered out the window and watched her throw her bags in to the back of her car before climbing in the front seat and starting it up.

He watched as she pulled out of the drive and her taillights to her BMW fade out in to the distance.

He walked back in totheir his bedroom and picked up the silver, sparkling band from the dresser, cradling it in the palm of his hand.

----

She pulled off to the side of the road, knowing that she couldn’t drive anymore right now. She needed a break.

She turned on the radio and leaned her forehead up against the top of the steering wheel, letting her salty, depressed tears fall on to it.

“This one’s a brand new one from Eminem and Rhianna!” The radio DJ announced. “Call it in if you love it or hate it,” He said before repeating the digits to the radio stations hotline.

“Just gonna stand there and watch me burn. Well that's all right because I like the way it hurts. Just gonna stand there and hear me cry. Well that's all right because I love the way you lie. I love the way you lie.”