Page 110 of If This is Love

I spent the third day fishing. On the fourth day, I holed myself up in a deer blind with a rifle, but I wasn’t hunting. I just sat up there, peering through the scope and watching the majestic bucks at a closer distance than I could get in person. On the fifth day, I slept inside the cabin on purpose so I couldreallyfucking sleep. And Ireallyfucking slept. A full twenty-four-plus hours straight.

And when I woke up from that epic sleep, I still missed Ruth more than I’d ever missed anything, but I still didn’t have the balls to face her, speak to her, or contact her in any way, shape, or form.

In all honesty, running off to the east Texas ranch was basically a knee-jerk reaction to my quickly impending death by humiliation.

Fortunately—or unfortunately depending on how you look at it—I had not died of this epic, nuclear-disaster-level humiliation.

I’d have to go home eventually, and when I did, I was going to have to face Ruth. I hadn’t spoken to her since that last disorienting moment when I woke up on top of her naked body with my spent, condom-clad cock still inside her without any idea how we’d wound up like that.

Luke explained it all that same night and assured me Ruth swore to him I hadn’t hurt her in one of the most deplorable ways imaginable. Learning that lifted the weight of the world off my scorching, burning, agitated shoulders, but the whole thing was too much even without that worst-case scenario.

Ruth and I had made love for the first time, and I not only ruined it by losing control of my mind, I also couldn’t even remember it.

I didn’t think anything could suck this much. The only way I could comprehend something suckingthis muchis the fact that I had no choice but to exist in this very specific suck because it was all my doing.

My damaged mind had already cost me my wife, and now it had driven an excruciating wedge between Ruth and me before we had a chance to actually be anything beyond close friends.

Anyway, in a nutshell, I spent the first week here coasting through the hours while I distracted myself from self-loathing with the Great Outdoors. When week two rolled around, I still wasn’t ready to go home yet, but I did need to catch up on work. So for the past seven days, I’ve been catching up on all the most mundane administrative tasks in existence.

Sitting at a splintery, old picnic table that was on the far-left side of the cabin’s large porch, I skimmed through my emails, mentally cataloguing them in order of importance. And these days, anything related to Destination Destiny ranked at the highest level of importance because I had to make up for the fact that I’d basically abandoned the job.

There was an email from Abdulrahman Farid, the head of another local construction company, and I’d worked with him on a number of projects over the years. Farid had immigrated from Jordan to New Orleans way back in the early nineties and ran his business in a humble, honest, steadfast way that I admired and respected. So, when I realized I needed to physically remove myself from anywhere in Ruth’s vicinity for a while, he was the first person who came to mind to take over for me during my sabbatical.

Hello Gabe,

I have attached photos of the progress of the temple. Please view them for any adjustments you feel are necessary at this time. I believe we are on track to accomplish the task to specification and in a manner that will bless the women and aid in their comfort.

All good regards,

A. Farid

I internally braced before double-clicking to open the attachment. I had such a love-hate relationship with this fucking temple. And now the hate was less about the temple reminding me of the awful shit I’ve been through, and more about how dealing with it for weeks left me depleted and as touchy as a harried alley cat, which of course resulted in me having sex with Ruth for the first time and not being able to remember it.

But never-fucking-mindthat.

The photos were above and beyond my expectations. Farid must’ve had some kind of Midas touch with my guys because this temple looked basically finished from where I was sitting, and I’d only been gone for two weeks.

And it wasstunning.

The interior of the temple was small, about the size of two and a half standard bedrooms. The color scheme was all subdued, earthy tones; sandy brown, muted goldenrod, and creamy white. The floor was covered by plush carpet that featured a rich, red damask-style design. The front of the room featured a mural of a leafless tree upon which two elegant, royal blue peacocks perched facing each other, their tail feathers draping below in a long, majestic sweep that formed the base of a circle. The ceiling was a series of recessed circles that stretched to the heavens and came together in a conical point. The exterior photos showed the gopura in all its white stone beauty. Not diminutive, but also not so tall that it was ostentatious. Humble, but proud. Delicate in aesthetic, but solid enough that it would withstand a hurricane, when another one inevitably slammed this city.

A wide arch formed the entrance to the temple, and just on the outside was a smaller stone replica of the gopura that sat in the center of a courtyard, which was paved with stone and filled with vibrant, green ivy and flowering plants.

It was lovely. A lovely place of serenity and peace. Just right for ladies who had gone through what these ladies had. It was something.

As I punched out a quick, grateful reply to Farid, that kept rolling around in my mind.

Something. It was something. It was something.

Sometimes it seemed impossible to let go of things no matter how much you wanted to. But this was something.

I clicked the send button and then stretched my arms way up high as I contemplated a mid-afternoon nap. It was Sunday. If I were at home, I’d be going over to Scott and Ophelia’s for Sunday lunch with the squad—or not given my total lack of balls to face Ruth yet.

Though, I missed her so much right now that if it weren’t a six-hour drive, I would go straight there to deal with this shit already. I knew I needed to just deal with it. It was basically an unsolved problem involving the thing I loved the most, and my gut had been screaming at me for two weeks to just fix it already by sucking it up and going to see her.

But itwasa six-hour drive home. In six hours, Sunday lunch would be long over with, so I’d have to go straight to Ruth’s house, which I would most certainly talk myself out of during the long-ass drive. Because I just wasn’t ready. So I was just going to stay here until I was.

Or until I missed her so much that it made me magically immune to humiliation somehow, and then I would just show up completely free of fucks to give but with a whole lot of groveling.

---