Page 111 of Confessions of a Smutty Romance Author

I drank deeply, finishing the rest of my wine, and for the first time, I wondered if having only friends, if missing out on lasting, lifetime love, was enough.

51

Jonas

I spent the day at the office, throwing myself into the only thing that I could think of to distract me, because when I’d gone home, all I saw was Mara. Everything there reminded me of her after months of her practically living with me.

It still had most of her touches, like how she put her cups away with the tops down instead of up. All the towels were folded a certain way because of her time as a maid. Even the pantry had her favorite snacks, carefully clipped at the top for maximum freshness. Her favorite fleece blanket was over the reading chair, and her bobby pins were on the vanity.

Unlike the last time she’d left me, this time had been unplanned and completely my fault. There wasn’t time for her to pack her things or erase every last trace of herself from my life, and there would be no replacing her from my heart.

So, I stayed busy. When my eyes began crossing from staring at balance sheets for too long, I got out my phone and called Tess.

“Hey!” she chirped into the phone, her happiness a stark contrast to my misery. “How was the premiere? Mom and Dad said the movie was amazing.”

“The movie was really good,” I said, not ready to lie to my sister, but also not ready to tell her the truth. “Hey, I was wondering if you could be there for Mom’s dialysis on Monday?”

“Mara already texted me...” She paused for a moment. “Didn’t she tell you?”

“Oh, I’m at the office. I haven’t checked my texts in a while.” Lie. Half a lie, at least.

“Work?” I could hear the frown in Tess’s voice. “It’s a Sunday! You should be spending time with your girl! She’s about to go out of town for months!”

I couldn’t even find it in me to smile at her teasing tone. I should have been spending time with Mara, but I’d ruined it. There was no going back. “So it’s taken care of?”

“Tracey’s going to start doing Mom’s dialysis with her, at least until Mara comes back.”

My eyes felt hot as I blinked. Mara had made sure my mom was taken care of, before she even left. “I’ll talk to you soon,” I said over the lump in my throat. “Love you.” Before she could ask any more questions, I hung up. My family loved Mara too, and I wasn’t anywhere near ready to tell them how colossally I’d messed up with the best woman I’d ever met.

I refocused on work for the next few hours until Birdie’s name came across my screen. I answered, desperate to have her tell me that Mara had come around, that she would forgive me and give me another chance. Instead, I heard sadness in her voice. “Hey, Jonas. Is it okay if I swing by your house to get some of Mara’s things? Her agent called and said that the job starts in Atlanta on Tuesday, so she has a flight tomorrow that she needs to pack for.”

It was like one punch after another, directly in the gut. Mara’s stuff was leaving my house. She was leaving Emerson tomorrow. “When are you getting her things?” I asked.

She was quiet for a moment. “Tonight if that’s okay.”

It wasn’t. “There’s a key under the planter by the door. Be sure to grab her bag of Cheetos from the pantry. I don't need those.”

“I will,” she promised. After a quiet moment, she asked, “How are you holding up?”

“Hanging in there.”

She sounded skeptical. “Are you hanging in there?”

“By a thread,” I replied. “How is she?”

“Exactly the same.”

We hung up, and I stayed at the office well past midnight so I could be sure Birdie had taken everything of Mara’s from my house. And when I walked in, I was prepared this time. Every trace with her things had been removed except for the cups. And the towels.

I tore through the cupboards, flipping them over as fast as I could, as if I could rid myself of the guilt, of her memory. I mussed up the towels, leaving them in haphazard piles that she never would have approved of.

And then I changed into my pajamas, wanting nothing more than to fall into an oblivious, heavy sleep without dreams of the woman I’d loved and lost.

But as soon as I lay in my bed, I could smell her on the sheets. I couldn’t fucking handle it. Couldn’t face theconstantreminder of how badly I messed up. So I worked the sheets off the bed, threw them in the washer, and then went to the guest room, lying in that bed with sheets that still smelled like detergent.

But that only reminded me of the first night when I'd set it all up because I was so turned on by her I couldn't control myself. And then I thought about sleeping on the couch, but I couldn't do that either because we all knew that was Mara’s place.

I wished I hadn't sold the first couch. It may have been uncomfortable, but not as uncomfortable as this visual reminder of all the ways Mara had changed my life. Or the way I was wrecked by her absence.

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