Chapter 26
Ava
Max 4:07 PM: I'll be home soon. I'll bring boxes.
I didn't know why I hoped he'd beg me to stay. I stood there with tears streaming down my face, staring at the message for a few minutes before sending Kelsey one that said I'd be back to work tomorrow. Then I dropped my phone on the bedside table and kept putting my clothes into the small duffel I brought with me.
Over the past few months I'd acquired more things, so Max's offer to bring a few boxes was a kind gesture. He'd been the one to insist I needed the things--a few more outfits, a stack of books which I read while recovering, the teddy bears he and Kelsey got me while I was in the hospital, a few fuzzy blankets he gave me to keep warm, and a framed photo of the two of us on surgery day before I went in. The nurses took it to commemorate the day I got new life in the form of the lungs of a teenager who died.
I felt hollow as I sank onto the mattress where Max and I had sex so many times. If I could've made this easier by slipping out and not even saying goodbye I would have. I knew it would've been kinder for me to do it that way. Max was going to be hurting; hell, I was hurting. But I'd made my peace with it.
This ritzy glamorous lifestyle wasn't for me. I was a simple girl with simple tastes. All I needed was a comfortable bed, food to eat, a roof over my head, and good friends. Which I had. At home. Where I belonged.
Kelsey sent a text back reminding me I was an idiot, but telling me how excited she'd be to have me back home. All I could think about was how to say goodbye to someone I loved. I got the very grave feeling that mourning the loss of someone who was alive would be so much more difficult than grieving someone who died.
I'd be tempted to reach for my phone and see if he left me good morning texts. I'd crave the interaction and have to fight myself not to send them myself. I'd look for him every fucking time the bell above the door at Perk Up rang and I'd have a hollow spot in my heart for a very long time.
But I had to do it. It wasn't fair to Max that I made him stay an arm's length away emotionally while indulging in the benefits of being here, and I wasn't just talking about sex. I let him dote on me, and I let his staff serve me. None of this was ever mine to truly enjoy and my heart had to give it up. And that was outside the fact that every time I thought about coming back to work I thought about paying my fucking bills and eating canned meat again, instead of Max's chef's gourmet cooking.
I knew every time those thoughts came up that I'd allowed myself to fall too far too fast. They were all damning evidence that I'd let Max have power over me that I shouldn't have. I liked the lifestyle. I liked the luxury. I liked the comfort of things, not working, not stressing about money, not having to sleep alone. And while sex with him had been my choice, and I had initiated it, I knew it was only a matter of time before I was too far gone.
I couldn't risk the thought of Max using those luxuries and comforts--even his own body--to control me or keep me powerless.
"That's how it starts," Mom would say. "They get you comfortable and make you feel safe, then they start controlling you. First you can't work anymore. Then you can't eat what you want. Then you have to do whatever they want, and if you don't they smack ya."
"Ava?"
I stiffened when I heard his voice. I didn't realize I'd sat there for that long crying. Max was home now and it was time to say goodbye and leave.
"I'm here," I said, calling out to him, but he was in the doorway. I glanced over my shoulder and saw his sad smile.
"I brought boxes. Do you want some help?"
Looking back down at my phone, I let my shoulders droop. There was no way in hell I could stand here and pack my shit into those boxes while trying to look him in the eye at the same time.
"Uh, that's okay..." I want him to go now, back to work, or to his room. To let me do this alone how it should be. I can't take anything else from him.
"I brought you something else," he said, and I saw his shoes in front of me, along with a stack of papers. It had a legal firm's letterhead and I knew what it was before he said, "It's the annulment paperwork we had drawn up when we signed the marriage contract. You just have to sign and you're free then."
I detected a hint of sadness in his tone but when I looked up at him and accepted the documents I saw his expression was calm. "Thank you," I managed, and I put them on the mattress beside me. I didn't want him to see that I'd been crying so I quickly stood and turned my back to him as I continued putting things in my suitcase. Then I focused on emptying the nightstand and filling the two boxes he set on the bed behind me when I was still seated.
"So you'll be the beautiful barista again?" Max walked around the end of the bed and stood with his hands in his pockets watching me. All I could think was how close we'd become and how now we were going back to being complete strangers.
"Yeah," I said sadly, and I tried not to feel the crushing weight of the financial burden I was under. I was barely making ends meet as it was. This hospital bill was going to cost a fortune. But I was alive, and I had to remind myself that Max did me a huge favor. "Don't worry. I can pay you back for the few months of rent when I get my first couple paychecks." I was already tallying up how I'd be able to catch up things with him and still make my current bills. I'd need a lot of tips and extra hours.
"Don't worry about it. Just whenever you have the money." Anyone else would have been offended by those words, but I knew Max was saying them because of me. Because of how I treated him and how I demanded to pay my own way and be my own person. Part of me wanted to beg him to just forgive that debt and make it easier for me, and I knew he would. I knew he loved me even though he promised not to fall for me.
But I couldn't do it. I couldn't take advantage of him now. I had to follow through and stick to my original plan.
"So you're still going to come in and get coffee and pester me?" I wanted there to be humor in my tone but I couldn't muster it. I was so heartbroken.
"Of course... And you're going to refuse to go to lunch with me." Max's voice was tight and rigid. It wasn't anger though. I knew the sound of heartbreak.
"You never know. I might say yes one of these times." I forced a smile and said, "I'll sign the papers before I leave. Kelsey is going to pick me up."
Our eyes locked and I saw sadness in his. He blinked a few times and nodded. Then he took a step backward, and just like that, I knew we were officially done. "I'll let you pack then."
Max walked out and I burst into tears again and this time I didn't even try to stop them. I curled up on the bed and sobbed myself to sleep knowing Kelsey's call saying she was here would wake me. I'd make sure to slip out when Max wasn't home to avoid an awkward goodbye.
If he wanted a hug or a kiss I'd lose my resolve.
Chapter 27
Max
Week one was difficult. I buried myself in work and Foreman and I put out all the fires. We appeased angry clients and made concessions with other projects. We salvaged most of our projects and only lost one.
Week two was worse. Without any work to keep myself too busy, I had a lot more free time. I was sad to admit how bad it hurt. I hadn't even had time to stop in at Perk Up and get a coffee except one day. Kelsey was working the shift and said it was Ava's day off. She was only doing a few days a week and I just hadn't chosen the right day. It hit my gut like a sucker punch and I got my coffee black, like the way my heart felt.
At the beginning of week three I finally had the nerve to walk into the room Ava slept in. It still smelled like her. I picked up her pillow and breathed her in sadly and noticed the stack of annulment paperwork on the nightstand. With so much going on and so much on my mind, I hadn't even signed them myself. I just had to scribble my name and return it to the lawyer and Ava was officially in my past.
I dropped her pillow and picked up the papers to thumb through them. Even seeing her signature would've been comforting to me, but when I got to the signature portion I noticed the lines were blank. Ava hadn't signed the papers at all. She left them lying here and took her things and went.
For a moment my heart sank at the idea of seeing her again. Not because I didn't want to see her, but because this meant I had to look her in the eye when she did sign these documents and feel the sting of rejection over again. I doubted I'd ever find anyone I even clicked with again, let alone someone I loved the way I loved her. And it was hard enough hearing her slip out of my home in the late evening as I was lying down for bed. She never said goodbye, which I resented at first, but later realized it was a gift from her. She knew it would tear us both apart.
So why this? Why no signature?
It took me four days to gather the courage to go to the coffee shop to get that signature. When I got there on Friday morning, Ava wasn't on shift. Kelsey offered to give her the papers, but I couldn't just leave that sort of thing to chance. I told her I'd come back when Ava was working, which consequently was Saturday morning.
So when I woke up anxious and a little too flustered for my own good, I forced myself to think of how Ava might be feeling instead of getting wrapped up in my own emotions. Chances were that she just forgot. She was dealing with the burden of returning to her life that had challenged her financially and emotionally before I came along, but it was now even worse with the added medical bills. That couldn't be easy, and I knew she'd never let me help.
When the bell rang above the door at just after seven a.m., the place was dead. The sign still ready "closed" but the door was unlocked. The baristas looked up in my direction as I walked in and a few of them smiled with recognition, then quickly scurried away from the counter. When Ava walked out of the back, I watched her tense. Her eyes swept across the dining room toward me and she looked at me and forced a smile. Her hair was tied back in a rubber band and she wore the Perk Up apron.
My throat felt like a python was wrapped around it, but I approached the counter knowing this was what I had to do. I couldn't leave things open ended or assume she had left the contract unsigned on purpose. And while it pained me greatly to find out the reason behind this, it was the right thing.
"Hey," she said, smiling softly. Her hands rested on the coffee counter and she looked at the forms in my hands. I swear there was a bit of sadness in her eyes as she took in the sight, but she said, "What can I get for you, Max?"
Three weeks of no contact had made my heart--and my body--crave her so badly. Seeing her now was like throwing gas on the fire of hunger and drowning me in a blanket of grief all at the same time.
"I'll take a chai triple latte with vanilla and cinnamon." I set the papers down and she turned and walked away to make the drink. There was no one in here with us now. The place was silent, though I heard shuffling in the back room. Three baristas, a manager, and a cashier, and it was like all of them knew I was coming. Kelsey probably told them all yesterday.
I watched in silence as she moved about the narrow space to make my drink. Her hands shook slightly, nerves probably. She didn't want to have this conversation any more than I did. I knew it because if she was ready, she'd have called me over the past few weeks. She'd have texted me to ask why I hadn't been in to see her. I'd have been forced to tell her it was too difficult for me emotionally.
