Chapter 2 - Restless Lovers Pay The Price

When she got in her car, she looked back in her rear view to see if he had followed her out, and he did.  She wanted to pull away, she wanted to drive away and never see him again, but her heart wouldn't let her. 

The car was in drive, her foot on the break – but she couldn't go.  He gets to the driver side of her car; she pushes the button to put her window down.  He can’t see her eyes; she’s already put on her Dolce sunglasses to hide the tears.  “What could you possibly have to say?” she asks, with no tone.

“I’m sorry.” Was all he had to say, he stood there and let her make the next move.  He wishes he could see her eyes, because her eyes say so much more than her mouth ever could. 

She looks away, facing away from him and she mumbles, “Sorry doesn't fix it anymore Jon.  Do you know how many times we both have said and heard I’m sorry?”

“That’s all I had left to say.” His hand goes through his hair, stopping to pull on some of the tension in his neck.  He’s here with the woman that he has loved more than anyone in the world and for some reason, for some unexplained reason – they can’t be together and be happy.  “Why do we have to say anything at all?  Can’t we push the broken pieces under the rug and start over?  Start back where we were friends.”

“Really Jon?” she mimics, “Starting over and what, pretend like nothing ever happened?”

“I’m not saying that, but do we have to talk it all to death?” realizing what he just said, he pauses and waits for Beth to come uncorked, but she doesn't. 

“All we had is dead already Jon.” The tears are rolling down her cheeks.  She leans over and reaches for a tissue out of her glove box, “What more is there to lose?”

“How can you just turn it off?”

“I didn’t turn it off, Jon.  I ran out.” She tells him as she wipes the tears from her cheeks. “I wish you had just seen me walking down the street and let me be.”

He leans in on the edge of her door, “You don’t mean that.”

“Yes, I do.  Now we have gone and hurt everyone all over again, this is ridiculous.” 

Reaching in with his right hand, he gently brushes her cheek and she can’t help but to melt into it.  She loves this man with everything that she has and everything that she had.  She’s strong until he touches her.

“Tell me you want to go and I’ll let you leave and you’ll never hear from me again.”

“I need you to let me go.” She says, with the tears still streaming down her face.  “You need to let me go.”

“Tell me you want me to, Beth.” Her face is in his hand.  He takes off her sunglasses and it’s then that he can see it; he can see that she still loves him.  Her eyes have never lied to him.  “You can’t do it, can you?”

She looks at him and cries.  She sees the man that she fell in love with all those years ago, at the end – that Jon was gone.  She never thought that she would see him again.  She can see that he’s beaten and broken too. 

“I can’t go through it again, Jon.  I have had enough heartache for the rest of my life.”

He smiles at her, his warm loving smile that reached his eyes, “Do you think I want to go through anymore?  I have had enough as well.” 

She drops her head and lets out a sigh, she has to leave.  She has to save them, she has to save herself.  “I have to go.”

“No you don’t.”

“Yes I do, Jon.  I can’t let it all back in, you have no idea what I have had to do to get to this point in life.  When I lost you, I lost everything.  I gave everything that mattered to me up and had to start all over.  And I had to do it ALONE.  You had the kids and Dorothea.  I had no one.”

“I suffered a great loss too, Beth.  You’re not the only one that hurt over it.  Even though I broke it off, I missed you, had dreams about you, tried to find you….I went through the 5 stages too.  Stop thinking that I was immune to it.”

“I’m not thinking you’re immune to it, I think you were able to skate through it easier than me because you had kids and family.”

“I still hurt and wished it all would be different." he admits, with tears filling his eyes.  Looking at her warms his heart, but knowing that she wants to leave is killing him.  "You know that Dorothea and I are only married on paper."

"That's right, you're married Jon."

"It didn't bother you before."

"Yes it did."  She puts the car back on drive and takes her foot of the brake, "I can't do this Jon, please let me go."  She looks at him, he's still leaning in her window.  "We can't do this again."

"What's it gonna take?"

"For what?" she blurts at him, irritated that he just can't let her go.  "You know what you did to me, you know that you let me down when I needed you more than ever, more than I ever needed anyone."

"Beth."  She pushes his hands off the door and accelerates.  She gets to the end of the driveway and then it hit her.   Placing her car in park, she get out and walks back to him, using the physical Italian that she learned from him over the years.

"Do you want to know something Jon, do you want to know what you did that destroyed me, what you did to kill any spirit and any hope that I had, for anything in life.....you questioned whether I did something to our daughter.  You wondered if I was responsible for her death when in all reality YOU fucked some strange crazy woman and she formed an attachment to you.  SHE came into our house and murdered, murdered our daughter, you son of a bitch."  She's in his face now, still feeling strong, "She didn't just kill McKenna, she killed me to."  She slapped him across the face and his reflex was to grab her and hold her until she got it all out.  "I blame you first and then I blame myself."

"I know."

"No you don't.  You have no idea what I've gone through since the  day you called me, you fucking called me like a coward and told me it was over.  That's chicken shit, you egotistical Italian asshole."

All he can do is look at her at this point and show her that he loves her.  Anything he says seems to provoke a feeling in her and then she let's him have it.  He needs her to believe that he is sincere about the divorce and that he is no longer living with Dorothea.  Beth does know that, Dot had confirmed it earlier but it didn't matter to Beth.  Jon broke it off for many reasons that she didn't agree with at first, but she does now.  She knows that their love was cursed and that any happiness that they COULD find WOULD be tarnished by some tragic event that will test them again.  They have been through too many tests, Beth is opting out for anymore testing.  Her heart and her sanity cannot and will not handle it again.

"You can't win, if you're not afraid to lose." was all he could say as she walked back to her car.  She turns left out of the driveway and gets to 35, instead of going north on 35, she decided to head south.  She was going to the beach to put her feet in the sand and to be alone.