Irresistible Refrain

36

For a long time I didn’t move at all. So long that my rigid muscles went from tense to burning pins and needles to completely numb. But eventually I had to feel the pain. After all, Bryan had just blown my world to bits. And suddenly the realization of it all crashed down on me.

Totally obliterated, my heart lay scattered like shrapnel all around me. Big sobbing shudders shook my body as I looked at the tangled sheets, as I breathed in the lingering scent of his cologne, as I tasted him in my mouth along with the salt from my tears, as I heard the sound of his goodbye ringing in my ears, as I opened and closed my fingers remembering when I’d held him in my hands.

I jerked up out of the bed and turned my back on it. I sank to the floor, pulled my knees up to my chest, and wrapped my arms around my knees. I rocked back and forth, staring straight ahead, tears blurring my vision.

But there was nothing to ease the pain.

For a fleeting moment, I seriously considered getting up, getting dressed, and going out for some drugs. But if I went down that path again I knew there’d be no coming back from it a second time. I’d end up in the ground just like my mother.

My arms tightened around my knees. No fucking way. I steeled myself and stuck a fork in that chapter of my life. It was done. Over.

I was never descending into that pit again.

I’d have my cry. I was fucking entitled to that. It’d been a long time since I had so I was going to make it a good one. I felt sorry for myself and all that shit.

When the sun came up, my throat was raw, my eyes burned, and my Kleenex box was empty. I got up off the floor. I had to use the bed as a crutch because my legs had cramped up so bad. But I wasn’t going to allow myself to linger in that sad place. I was time to be tough. Resilient. I went into the bathroom and got myself cleaned up. I washed and conditioned my hair. I scrubbed twice with the fragrant hotel soap and scoured the traces of his scent from my skin.

I stepped out onto the bathmat and wrapped a towel around me. Pulling the hand towel out of the ring, I wiped away the condensation from the mirror. I stared at the pink faced woman who looked back at me. Her eyes were red rimmed but determined.

I liked her.

She was a keeper.

She was sick and tired of life knocking her the fuck down.

Things were going to be different from here on out.

This woman was going to start fighting the fuck back.