Chapter 21 - You Wanna Want Me

 

 

"Why do I get the feeling that you're over me?" he asks, looking over in her direction.  "I feel like you don't love me anymore."

"What gives you that feeling?" she replies, a little confused how he would feel that way.  "I love you as much as I did the day I met you."

 

"Really?"

 

"No, probably more now, I guess.  My love for you has matured, that's for sure."

 

"What do you mean?" He looks her in the eye, "Your love for me has always been mature."

 

"My love for you started out with me needing to be with you every second, I don't love you like that anymore."

 

"Was that love or lack of trust?"

 

Tony brings them their food and they have a great conversation over dinner.  They laughed, they joked, they picked on one another but most importantly, they were themselves.  "I have always trusted you, and I think that when you did break that trust - I was devastated.  You were the one person that I knew would never hurt me, but you did."

 

"I never meant to hurt you, you have to know that." he states, hearing her say those words stung but he needed to hear them.

 

"Now I know that, but when you first did it, it sure felt intentional.  It took me weeks to even think about it." she reaches over and rubs his leg, "I could hear your words on the phone over and over in my mind and it felt like I was never going to forgive you."

 

"Have you?"

 

"Absolutely, but I'll never forget it." she reminds him, she was one to always to forgive, but she never forgets.  "I love you Jon and I hate that we aren't together, but we're better when we're not together."

 

"I disagree."

 

She drinks her water, rinsing down her delicious brownie covered in ice cream, knowing that she'll pay for it later.  The twins were very active after she ate sweets, but she was dying for one of the house brownies.  "Together we lose what's important to ourselves.  We put all of our passion into one another and lose sight of what we're really passionate about."  She gives him a little chuckle and goes on with, "Last month I had a fundraiser for our foundation and raised over 5 million dollars, and I was able to do that because that was all I had to do, was plan and prepare.  I put 100 percent of myself into it.  There were no distractions and no crisis that I was thrown into.  It was nice."

 

"I know what you're saying, but are you happy?" he turns on the barstool to face her, giving her his undivided attention, "Are you complete?"

 

"I will never be complete, Jon.  I have lost and buried too much of myself over this lifetime.  I will never be whole and I will never ever be complete."  She turns to face him, they are now face to face and he grabs her hands, "I accept that I will be this way for the rest of my life, so when I think of what I have, I am as happy as I can be."

 

"Bullshit.  You're not even close to happy."

 

"How can you say that?  You don't know how I feel."

 

Smiling, he responds, "I can see how you feel and feel how you feel.  Do you forget who you're talking to?"

 

She's getting a little irritated with the conversation now, he has no idea how she feels.  " I love you, God I love you so much it kills me most days.  But when I wake up in the morning, I don't question what tragedy is going to happen next.  I get up, walk the vineyard, have breakfast and enjoy my day."

 

"That's not living Beth, that's just going through the motions." he finishes his glass of wine and Tony pour him another.  "Thanks Tony."

 

"No problem Mr. Bon Jovi.  Miss Adams, can I get you guys anything else?"

 

Beth shakes her head no, "That will be all, thank you Tony."  The bartender leaves them alone again. 

 

She takes a deep breath and exhales slowly, "In the very near future, I'm going to have a set of twins.  I won't have and don't want to make the time for very much else.  I have decided that life from this point forward is going to be all about them."  Her eyes meet his again and she follows with, "Listening to the testimony in that crazy bitches hearing made me realize that I missed out on so much with McKenna, I was so immersed in opening that firm and it's success that I was gone all the time."

 

"We couldn't have known that was going to happen."

 

"Do you see that if you had to leave and go on tour back then, McKenna would have been with Lupetta and Maria.  I was obsessed with that, it was my every thought in every waking moment."

 

"That's called passion."

 

"Bullshit, that was obsession and because of that, WE are not good together."

 

"How can you say that?"

 

"Do you remember how you felt when you learned about what Dalton did to me.  Do you remember that rage that you felt and the obsession that followed making sure that he paid for what he did to me?"

 

"Yeah."

 

"Do you remember how crazy you went when Dorothea tried to kill herself?  It was your mission to keep the kids from her until she was well.  You obsess, just like I do and that isn't good for a family."

 

"Beth, we're driven.  That's a great trait to have, who wouldn't want to pass that on to children."

 

"It's WHAT we obsess about.  We obsess the wrong way and we leave people, mostly children in the wake."

 

"The kids are fine."

 

"Now.  And from what I've seen, they have healed and progressed immensely in the last 6 months.  Dad is home, mom is home and Beth is on the other side of the country."  She sips her water and stands up, she needs to stand up.  The babies are putting pressure on her lower back, cutting off circulation to her feet.

 

Jon scoots his stool back, giving her room to stand.  He reaches over and rubs her butt, "Are you okay?"

 

"Yeah.  My feet are sleeping."

 

"Want to go?" he asks her, having no idea how the rest of the night will play out.  He has no plans on going San Jose tonight, he just needed to be there for the show the day after tomorrow.  "Let's get you out of here so you can put your feet up."

 

"Did you get enough to eat?"

 

"Yes."  he wipes his mouth with the linen napkin and places it on the counter.  He stands up and as soon as he does, he wraps his arms around her neck and holds her.  "I need you to know something."  He kisses her forehead, "When I called you from the road and ended our relationship, I felt like you say you do right now."

 

She looks up at him and gives him a quizzical look, "What are you talking about?"

 

"I was so crazed by what had happened that I wanted the easier life, I needed the easier life."  he releases his hold on her and they start to leave.  As they walk out the door, they are blinded by the lights of camera flashes going off like fireworks. 

 

"I told you this would happen."  She walks through the crowd and quickly gets to the house and in the door. 

 

He stops and orders everyone off the property and warns them, "If you don't leave now, I will call the local police department and they will help you off the property."  He too works his way through the small crowd and goes into the house. 

 

"BETH......" he calls out for her.

 

"I'm up here." he can faintly hear.  He walks through the main floor of the house and makes sure that all of the windows are covered, leaving the outside world outside.  He knows that she's pissed that there were photographers on the property.  He knows he's going to get an earful regarding that matter. 

 

"Do you want anything before I come up?" he yells up to her.  He wasn't ready for her response.

 

"No, I'm good.  Don't you think you should get going, it's getting late."  She says as she walks to the top of the stairs.  She stands there looking down at him, not understanding the look on his face.  He feels like she had just punched him in the gut, "What's that look for?"

 

He runs his hand through his hair, he can't look at up her, "Do you really want me to go?"

 

She starts to walk down the stairs, "Do you think you should stay?'

 

"Why should I leave?" he barks at up her.  She stops half way down the stairs.  "Do you really want me to go?"

 

"Is it a good idea for you to stay?" she asks him, frustrated that he thinks he can do what ever he wants.  She won't admit to him or herself that she wants him to stay, she knows it will kill her to watch him leave - but she can't shake the feeling that he already has one foot out the door.  Reaching him at the bottom of the stairs, she stops on the first step and says, "Will you tell me what's going on with you?  I can see that there is something eating at you, something bothering you - talk."

 

He shakes his head and leans into her.  His head lays on her breast and his hands are drawn to her big belly, he rubs it and starts to tell her, "I hate that I'm here like this."

 

"Like this?" she asks him, as she rubs his back and kisses his head. 

 

Without lifting his head he says, "Why do I have to come to you when I learn something about you, that affects both of us."

 

"You didn't have to come here." she states, "You could have called?"

 

"And miss this?" he refers to her belly, "I never would have seen this if I called."  He now lifts his head and looks at her, "Why didn't you tell me about the in vitro when we were together?  Why didn't you tell me you were trying to have a baby?"  She can see that he has tears in his eyes, and that really tears at her heart strings.

 

"Well, how do you tell the man that you love with all that you have that you might be pregnant with another mans baby?  How would you have felt about it, if I said, 'Hey, I might be pregnant with Brian's baby?"

 

He laughs and admits, "I would have thought you were crazy, claiming to be pregnant by a dead man."

 

"See, there was no good time or good way to tell you.  Plus, I didn't want to jinx myself by talking about it."

 

"You really want to do this alone?"

 

"No, but I don't have a choice.  I made the decision to do the in vitro, making any outcome my responsibility."

 

"What if they're mine?"

 

"Then they are yours.  We can deal with that when we get to that point.  But until then, I need to life my life the way that I think is best for me and for them."

 

"Is that really without me?  Do you want me to go?"

 

She cups his face with her hands and leans down and kisses his lips, she smiles from the inside out because she has always loved his lips, his kiss.  "I think it's best if you do."

 

"How can you say that?"

 

"Because if you don't leave today, you will eventually have to leave.  You're on tour, I can't invest even a day in the heartache that I know is going to come."

 

"Heartache?"

 

"When you leave."