Page 77 of A Good Girl's Guide to Dominance
“Don't do that,” Jaz says, placing a hand on my knee. “I should've been more supportive, because I understand what it’s like to fall for someone. I did the same thing with Michael when we first started dating, and you took it like a champ—like a true friend. It wasn't my place to tell you not to be all-in for your man.”
“But look where it got me. You were right, Jaz.”
“No I wasn't. You did exactly what you were supposed to do, Nia. You had finally met someone who checked off every box. When you find somebody like that, you're supposed to go for it. Don't let these Instagram and Twitter girls tell you any different. They don't know shit about being in a relationship or what it takes to make one work. You dived in head-first because that’s what you're supposed to do. The only problem was that Rome didn't dive in with you. He couldn't because he was still swimming in a pool of his grief, and until he’s able to pull himself out of that, he can never fully be with you, or anybody else for that matter. You didn't do anything wrong, and I'm sorry that I made you feel any different.”
“I'm sorry, too,” I reply, losing the battle to my tears once again. “Even if I did the right thing, I should have at least listened to you and proceeded with caution. If I would've, maybe I wouldn't have fallen for him so quickly. Maybe I would've done a better job of recognizing the signs. I would've known that there is no winning a competition with someone who has died, especially if they died while still in love. She took his heart to the grave with her. He may not ever get it back now.”
“Damn. I'm so sorry this happened, Nia. I truly am,” Jaz says.
“Me, too,” I reply, as both of us put our glasses down on the coffee table and hug.
“You deserve better,” Jaz says, squeezing me tight. “You deserve someone who is willing to love you with the entirety of their heart, not just the bits and pieces left over from a previous relationship. You've been through so much, Nia.”
“Toofucking much,” I reply, and my wall of anger is crumbled by a wrecking ball of misery that sends me right back to where I was when I first arrived on Jaz’s doorstep.
My broken heart aches with pain that feels brand new, and I have no choice but to feel it. I hug Jaz as tightly as I can, and I stop fighting. I let myself cry as hard as I need to.
“I'm so sick of this shit,” I mumble into her shoulder as memories of Rome storming out of my house replay in my mind.
I don't love you … and I never will.
“I know, boo” Jaz says as she begins to cry with me. “I know.”
Forty-Two - Rome
My bedroom is dark, just like my mood, as I lay in bed with all of the blinds closed and the curtains drawn. The TV plays a show on mute, but even the movement of the character’s mouths on screen annoys me to no end. I can't be happy right now. All I know is the pain I feel. All I know is the pain I've caused. All I know is the pain I deserve for being so lost—so turned upside down by my own grief that I would deny happiness to someone who loves me.
Nia loves me. She said it … and I believe her. I wish it wasn't true because it scares me so much. It’s why she called me a coward. She was right. Iama coward, but acknowledging it doesn't make it any easier to separate myself from it, because fear has its arms wrapped around me like a fucking bear hug. I feel it squeezing me every day, crushing my spirit as well as my lungs so that I can't breathe or feel anything. I tried to let go of it so that Nia and I could be happy together, but its grip is too strong. Now I've broken the heart of the woman I'm quite possibly meant to be with.
No one knows what it’s like to be torn like this. To have Nia on one side—gorgeous, perfect, funny, smart, strong-minded, and loving. She is everything I could ever want in a woman, and it makes no sense whatsoever to chooseanythingover her, but especially fear.
On the other hand, I have the memory of the only woman I've ever allowed myself to love. Natalia was perfect, too. She made me feel things I didn't know I could, and we were happy until the moment she left this life. We were in love the entire time, and that love did not die with her. I will always love her in one way or another, no matter how much time goes by. But holding onto her memory and allowing it to control my life now is … I don't even know what the fuck it is. Lunacy? Ridiculous? Pathetic? Illogical? All of the above? No matter the adjective used to describe the trap that is our happy memories, I can't let go of her. Five years later, I still feel unable to move on.
And then there is love. I loved both of my parents. They were my entire world, and I don't say that out of obligation. I loved them dearly. We were the kind of family that knew how to laugh together, and chose to do it on a daily basis over stressing out about the troubles of life. We genuinely enjoyed each other’s company, so when Mom died it broke my father and I. To say that we mentally struggled after her death would be an understatement, but we still had each other. We leaned on one another even more, still finding ways to laugh when crying felt much more reasonable, and we did everything together. We were inseparable … until death came for him, too.
My mother was taken from us by a car accident. My wife, stolen from me by a random brain aneurysm. My father, cut down by a heart attack that showed no signs that it was coming before bursting his most vital organ like a balloon in his chest. I loved them all more than could be explained by an encyclopedia of words, and they all died premature deaths and left me on thisgodforsaken planet to fend for myself. All of them—my world’s most important people—snatched away from me. Why would I ever allow myself to feel that pain again, when I'm still broken from all of the times before?
The ringing of my doorbell splits my head open. My soft pillow feels more like a cinder block after the drinks I had last night before bed, and now the tune that plays from the doorbell is a fucking foghorn. I try to wait it out, refusing to even lift my head up, let alone answer, but the foghorn blares again and again.
“Fuck,” I whisper as I slowly drag myself out of the bed and walk at a snail’s pace to the door. From down the hall, I can see that it is Nikola through the glass, and just seeing him makes me want to break down. He is the last family I have left, and I hate and love him for it, but I would never turn him away, even after an argument.
When I unlock the door, I don't bother conversing in the doorway. I turn the deadbolt and pop the door open, then walk away as he enters and closes it behind him.
“Well, you absolutely look like shit, Rome,” he says as he follows me into the living room.
I slowly lower myself onto the couch and lay my head on a pillow, agony filling my entire body like a cup running over.
“Haven't heard from you in a few days,” Nikola goes on, sitting across from me on the ottoman. “Isabella and I tried to reach out to you on the anniversary, remembering how hard the day always hits you, and when we didn't get a response or a call back we started worrying. Considering the way you look, I assume things haven't gone well since you stormed out of our house. Are you okay?”
“What does it look like?” I ask, keeping my eyes closed to avoid the light from the sun through the door and windows.
“Oh, it looks like you died and failed at coming back to life. You're like a zombie that couldn't quite make it. You're azom. Get it? Halfway there.”
“I get it,idiota,” I say, but I don't have the energy to make it sound insulting. “Did you come all this way to torture me?”
“I told you, Isabella and I were worried about the anniversary and the lack of communication from you. The wife practically demanded that I come over here and make sure you hadn't done anything stupid. She’ll be glad to know that you haven't ended it all, but from the looks of it, you still may have done something stupid.
“You've always struggled on the anniversary of Natalia’s death, but you’ve managed to piece yourself back together again by the end of the next day. Here you are three days later, still wearing pajamas that you clearly haven't changed in days, smelling like farts and cheap wine, with no lights on in the hall you just shuffled down, which leads me to believe that you're lying in your room in the dark like a fucking vampire. Sound about right?”
