Page 120 of The Truth About Love

By eleven, I’ve opened the bottle of merlot and am sipping from my second glass.

When midnight strikes, I change out of the black dress I’d put on just for him and into baggy sweats and an old t-shirt.

He’s not coming.

I should have taken notice of that stirring in my gut, that twinge in my spine that said something wasn’t quite right. I shouldn’t have let myself get swept up in the fantasy of a happily ever after, because that’s all it is. A fantasy.

It’s a lesson I thought I’d learnt when I found out about his marriage. But apparently, I didn’t. Because I’ve spent the last several hours barely able to function with all the excited energy coursing through my body like caffeine at the thought of being with Auden forever.

It’s the middle of the night when there’s finally a knock at the door.

I don’t hear it at first. At some point I must have fallen asleep, because I wake up on the blanket I’d laid out on the floor with backache from the hard surface. I guess it was the rhythmic thudding that rose me.

Disorientated, I drag myself to the front door and open it.

Auden stands before me, his hair wet from the rain and sticking to the sides of his face. The darkness in his expression, the downturn of his plush lips and dullness to his eyes confirms that my instincts were right all along.

Whatever I thought would happen tonight, the spaghetti kisses and lovemaking, isn’t going to.

“Good of you to show up.”

I rest my hip on the side of the doorframe and look up at him with seething eyes. He scrubs a trembling hand down his face, before pushing past me and into my apartment.

I watch as he takes in the setup, the candles and the cushions and the wine. And then, with no warning, he picks up one of the glasses and hurls it at the wall. The resulting smash is ear-splitting.

But I don’t flinch.

I’m used to it anyway. The sound of a breaking heart is remarkably similar and I’ve heard it enough that I’m desensitized.

I’m frozen in place by the door as Auden claws at his hair and roars as he falls to his knees.

“She’s pregnant.”

And just like that, the world around me collapses. If I thought I knew pain before, it was nothing compared to this. This blinding agony, it flows like venom in my veins. I can feel it poisoning me, shutting down my organs and stealing the very essence of my soul.

By the time the words have settled, all that’s left of me is a broken shell.

Because not only has he built my hopes up just to shatter them again, he’s lied.

“You said you hadn’t slept with her.” My voice is barely a whisper, but he hears it all the same.

“I hadn’t.”

“Then how is she pregnant?”

When he looks at me, his eyes tired and devoid of colour, I see it. The guilt. The shame.

“The night of the dinner party, I saw you kiss Max,” he says, gritting his teeth as if he can’t bear to say that name. “I was so jealous, so fucking possessive of you in that moment that I swear I could’ve killed him. But I didn’t. I got drunk instead. And when I woke up in the morning, Cara was naked beside me.”

I can’t stop the horrified gasp that leaves me.

I stagger backwards, my legs collapsing underneath me. With my head in my hands, I slide down the wall and hug my knees to my chest.

He didn’t see me push Max away.

Auden stays rooted in the centre of the apartment, keeping me locked within his unrelenting stare.

“I don’t have any memory of it at all. Everything after you left that night is a black void. I have no recollection. Nothing.”

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