Page 77 of The Beat of My Heart
“She has only been gone an hour. I’ll make up the time on the highway,” I tell my friends as I run to my car. Holy shit. It’s time my Angel heard what’s on my mind for a change.
Chapter 28
-Believer, Imagine Dragons
Julia
“I’m a master, oh oh oh,” I sing at the top of my lungs in Lanie’s car. I’m trying to drown out everything happening in my head. I just have to get to my parent's beach house, then I can lose my goddamn mind. And I will. Oh, I will. The chaos isn’t just coming, it's raging and swirling and threatening my sanity with every beat of the bass drum vibrating the car doors.
“How, how is Trevor my Charlie? Shit like that doesn’t just happen. Right? It doesn’t, I know it doesn’t. I ran. Jesus, I’ve been living with a broken heart for almost two years, and the one man who holds the glue just found me. And I ran.”
Pounding my head into the seat as I drive, I try to clear my thoughts, but it’s useless. My hands beat the steering wheel in time with the music while my thoughts scream out, trying to be heard first.
It’s too much. There’s just too much. I’m on the verge of a nervous breakdown as I pull into the driveway. My parents built this home as a sanctuary, but tonight there’s no peace. Shifting the car into park, I jump out and head to the back of the house. Following the path over the dunes illuminated only by the light of the moon, I run—a dead sprint to the water's edge.
Falling to my knees, I set my pain free.
I don’t hear him approach, but I feel him. My heart skips a beat in time with his whenever he is near. It’s the only reason I don’t end up face-down in the ocean from fright when he finally speaks.
“Angel,” he whispers on an ocean breeze.
Turning my head, I see him clearly for the first time in almost two years. My dreams don’t do him justice. His eyes glow with emotion, and I see all his insecurities in the tightness of his body.
I swallow, trying to speak, but no words come, just tears. Nodding to acknowledge him, Trevor steps forward. Wrapping his muscular arms around my body, he lifts me to his chest, cradling me like a child. That’s when I break. Sinking into the sand with me in his arms, Trevor holds me as I cry.
At some point, I realize my hair is wet. Looking around, I wonder if it rained. When I feel another drop hit my cheek, I realize Trevor has been crying too. “My dad cries sometimes too,” I whisper, wondering if he’ll know this Ed Sheeran song or if he’s forgotten my quirks.
A sad chuckle escapes him, “Let me wipe your tears so I know you’re real,” he says, kissing my cheek. “You know, one of these days you’re going to quote a song that I don’t know.”
“I hope not,” I tell him, unsure what to say next. “There’s no handbook for what to do when your one-night stand reappears and is so intertwined in your life it's hard to believe fate alone had a hand in it.”
“I’m not sure I believe in fate, Angel. Destiny, maybe, but I think this fate had a name, and it was Loki,” he sighs.
Pulling back in shock, I look into his eyes. “We have so much to talk about.” It’s the understatement of a lifetime, but it’s almost the most truthful thing I’ve said in a long time.
Glancing over my head, Trevor asks, “You left with nothing, Angel. You scared the shit out of me. Then, and now,” he says as his voice breaks. “Do you even have keys to the house? You’re covered in sand.”
Watching as he attempts to brush damp sand off my legs, I try to take everything in stride, but that’s just not my style.
“I wanted to tell you my name,” I blurt. “I wanted to exchange numbers. I was even going to ask you on a date… an actual date. I’ve never asked a man out on a date before. Did you get my voicemail? I-I wanted what we had to be real, I wanted to believe it was real.” Tears are making it impossible to see his face, and that’s probably for the best. “What if he wasn’t planning on showing up at dinner that night? What if he is only here because Lanie made him chase me down? Oh, my God, Trevor, you’re a dad, and you’ve never even got to meet him. He’s the most amaz—”
Trevor’s lips land on mine mid-sentence, his sand-covered hands rough as they hold me in place. He angles my face in a way that suits him, and he deepens the kiss. Oddly, the kiss isn’t sexual. This kiss is all about feeling and emotions. It’s the single most intimate moment of my life.
“You told me once that people are always trying to shut you up, I’ll never do that, Angel, unless I get to do it that way,” he smirks. “We have so much to discuss, but let me clear up something else for you, Angel. Lanie did not send me, I’m here because I want to be here, I want you. I have so much to tell you, though, and when I’m done, you’ll have to decide if I’m still what you want.”
“Cha… I mean, Trevor, there isn’t anything you could say that will make me walk away from you again,” I begin.
“Let’s not make any promises, yet, okay?” he stands, taking me with him.
* * *
Typingin the four digit-code to my parent’s electronic door lock, we enter the home as familiar scents of summer engulf me. Walking through the home my parents built years ago, I notice all the little touches my mom has added since they stopped renting it out to vacationers. I’m reaching into the hallway closet when I realize Charlie, fuck, Trevor! Trevor isn’t behind me.
Backtracking, I find him in the family room standing in front of the mantel that is covered in photographs, and the air catches in my lungs. I’m witnessing the very first time Trevor is laying eyes on our son. Even though it's a photograph, there is no mistaking whose son Charlie is. He is the spitting image of his father.
Watching as he runs his finger back and forth over the frame, I’m reminded of the very first time I ever got to hold our little miracle.
“Jules, he’s beautiful,” Lanie tells me.
