Love Connection (A Feel Good Romantic Comedy) Page 14

  The thought of that woman knowing things about me stings. It feels like such a violation of my privacy and tells me how little Jake holds dear our relationship—or the memory of our relationship, more accurately. It’s a betrayal. He doesn’t care anymore; I’ve become an anecdote to amuse his friends and wife over dinner. What did she say I was? Yeah, his significant ex. She should’ve said insignificant ex. Why does he still have the power to hurt me so badly? Why can’t I just stop loving him? Why can’t I love Richard the way I love Jake? And what am I doing marrying Richard, anyway? This is too much for one person to bear alone. I need to talk to Amelia.

  Twenty-one

  Is It Too Late to Say Sorry?

  ♥♥♥

  Monday, March 5—London

  I enter the meeting room holding the files of my next settlement case in my arms. I can’t help but walk on air around the office surrounded by a halo of happiness. As I move toward my chair, I go over my notes on the terms our client’s willing to offer. I glance at the opposing lawyers, who are already seated at the glass table opposite to me, and resume my quick shuffling of documents. That’s until my brain registers one of the faces I just glanced at. My halo of happiness shatters as my head jerks back up. I look at the only woman sitting on the other side of the room. Oh gosh, it’s her! And she’s looking at me with a face that says, “Yes, it’s me. You wedding-crashing bitch!”

  Crap. What do I do now? This is Sharon. The woman I stole Jake from. The woman whose life I ruined. What’s she doing in my office? Is she a lawyer? She has to be. Panic floods my body, and as I try to sit, I crash against the chair, sending all my papers flying in the air. This is like one of those forever-embarrassing high school moments. Like walking across the cafeteria, tripping, and splashing the lunch tray on yourself in front of the entire school.

  I collect my papers in a dignified way and sit at the grown-ups table, trying to appear respectable. I so wish my face wasn’t so hot right now. I must be redder than a chili pepper. And my boss is in the room. Sweat starts pooling under my armpits. At least I’m wearing a white blouse. I hope it doesn’t show.

  Thank goodness I asked my junior associate to present our proposal today as a learning experience. I wouldn’t be able to talk right now. I keep my gaze low and look at my watch under the table. The meeting shouldn’t last more than an hour; everything’s straightforward and all the parties should be able to get what they’re after easily. So no big deal.

  “That is when the opposing counselor doesn’t hold the biggest grudge against you,” says a nasty little voice in my head. All right, Gemma, let’s get ready for the longest sixty minutes of your life.

  I stay silent for the entire negotiation and only nod here and there at Logan, my junior associate, who’s doing a wonderful job with his presentation. I keep my gaze lowered, but I can feel her blue eyes on me most of the time. It’s as if she’s drilling guilt messages into my skull:

  “You stole my husband.”

  “You ruined my wedding day.”

  “How does it feel to be this happy at the expense of other people?”

  I could die of shame. The way she looked at me. Withering. It was as if I was clubbing a baby seal or something.

  “No, you just clubbed her chances at happily ever after. No worries.”

  I mentally scowl at my sarcastic inner self. I can’t believe there’s a person in the world who could hate me that much. If ever there was a death stare, Sharon has mastered it.

  “Well, when you steal the groom from the glowing bride on her special day, death wishes could easily present themselves as side effects.”

  “Oh, shut up.”

  The buzzing noise of people talking in the background suddenly dies away. Did I just say it aloud? I dare to lift my head.

  Sharon’s staring at me. Apparently, she was speaking at that moment.

  “I’m sorry, did you say something?” she asks.

  I wish the ground would open and swallow me up.

  “No, no.” If you put together all Ally McBeal’s most embarrassing moments they wouldn’t add up to this. “Please go on.”

  “Glad we have your blessing to move forward.” Sharon gives me a shrewd, evil smile and resumes her speech.

  Well, I deserve this. I deserve to be humiliated and shamed. I ruined her life; I took Jake away from her. All her hopes, her dreams for a future with him now are mine. I stole her life. I deserve all the bad shit she wants to give me. What I did to her is bad karma. I need to suck it up and apologize to her. Yes, when the meeting’s over I’ll own my mistakes and say I’m sorry. Then maybe I won’t come back in the next life as a cockroach.

  Twenty unbearably long minutes later, the meeting’s over. As everyone gets up to leave the room, I linger behind. So does Sharon. It’s as if we’re both aware we can’t just leave without talking to each other. I don’t even know if we reached an agreement for our clients, I was too busy rehearsing my apology speech in my head. The last of her remaining colleagues murmurs something in her ear, they exchange a nod, and he’s gone. We’re alone.

  “Err, Sharon. Would you mind having a word with me?” It’s the best opening line I can come up with.

  “You usually don’t ask my permission to talk.”

  She delivers a jab-cross combo and sends me back to my corner.

  “Right, mmm… I really need to talk to you.”

  “Am I allowed to scream?”

  “Please, it’s only going to take a minute. You don’t know how many times I’ve thought of picking up the phone to call you.”

  “Why? Did you leave something out of your last speech?”

  She’s sharp. Everything she says is a blow to my face. Jab, cross, hook, uppercut, repeat. And since I don’t intend to punch back—figuratively speaking—I’m just going to hold my arms in front of my face and parry her verbal assault. She deserves her retribution, and if being mean to me helps her, I’m letting her do it.

  “About that. What I did to you was horrible. I never meant for it to happen the way it did. I never meant for it to happen at all. And if there was a way to take it all away, I would…”

  “You mean you’d rather not have stolen Jake from me? It seems to have worked out pretty well for you.” She jerks her chin at my hand. “Is that from him?”

  I follow her gaze to my engagement ring. Oh crap, this is getting worse by the minute.

  I blush. “It is. And that’s not what I meant. What I wanted to say is that if I could turn back time, I wouldn’t wait so long to sort myself out. What I did, the way I did it… it was wrong. But I can’t turn back time and I can’t take it back. All I can do is to say how sorry I am. I am deeply sorry. I never meant for anyone to get hurt and I know I did hurt you. And I’m sorry for that.”

  Sharon sighs, shakes her head down, and looks back up at me. “I’ve never hated someone the way I hated you. That day you took my life in the palm of your hand, crushed it into a ball, and threw it in the trash.”

  Should I say again how sorry I am? I decide to keep silent and look contrite.

  “And you can stop with the beaten-up-dog act.”

  “It’s not an act. I really feel terrible for what I did.”

  “And what do you expect? What do you want from me? My forgiveness, so you can keep living your life with no remorse?”

  “I don’t expect anything from you. I owed you an apology, and I wanted to give it to you. That’s all. I’m not going to steal anymore of your time. Thank you for listening.”

  I make to exit the room, but she calls me back.

  “Wait.”

  I turn again.

  “There’s something I want you to hear as well.”

  “Okay.”

  “As I said, you’re probably the person I hated the most in my entire life. Being left at the altar was the worst experience I ever had. I was lost, heartbroken, humiliated… but,” she pauses, “it probably wasn’t nearly as bad as going throu
gh a divorce would’ve been, which was probably where Jake and I would’ve ended up some years down the line. I was in love with him, and being dumped on my wedding day was painful, but not as painful as slowly realizing I’d married someone who could never love me the way I deserve to be loved. I never understood that until I fell for my husband.”

  I stare at her, stupefied. My eyes travel to her left hand where a tiny gold band is wrapped around her ring finger. Never has a little piece of metal given me more joy than the one sitting on her finger.

  “You-you’re married?” I stutter.

  “Yeah, I eloped to Vegas last month. I couldn’t stand to go through the whole ceremony-with-family-and-friends thing again. No crazy-ex-girlfriends-barging-in-to-yell-stop hazards this time.”

  She’s married, and she’s making jokes about me ruining her life, which I really didn’t do. Right?

  “You’re married,” I repeat, more to convince myself that it’s actually true.

  “I am, so no matter what happened, I ended up in a good place. As did you, as did Jake, as did my husband. He’s your biggest fan!”

  “He is?”

  “Yeah, he’s over there. You can check for yourself.”

  I stare through the glass wall of the meeting room where a tall, handsome man’s smiling at me. He’s the counselor who left the room last. His lips part in a warm smile and he bends forward in an obliged bow. I beam at him.

  “He came to work for my firm when I was already engaged. He says he fell in love with me during our first joint trial. The day I didn’t get married was the happiest day of his life, so you’re his hero. Seriously. He was there to pick up the pieces when I broke apart, and a fine job he did. Now I know what real love feels like, and I can understand why you had to do what you did. So all’s well that ends well.”

  I nod as I’m a little too choked up to speak.

  “I’d better go now.”

  “Sure,” I say. “And thank you.”

  She smiles and exits the room. Outside, her husband puts an arm around her waist and pulls her in for a kiss. I watch Sharon literally beam with happiness as the sunrays bounce on her blonde hair, and a huge weight lifts from my chest. My closet’s empty; no more skeletons lurking in the dark.

  Twenty-two

  Doubts

  ♦♦♦

  Monday, March 5—London

  “At least you’ve warmed up to the engagement idea,” Amelia teases me.

  I wave to the barman to bring us another round. We’re having drinks in a bar halfway between our offices and I don’t care if it is only lunchtime. I’m getting wasted.

  “I don’t think feeling glad you had a diamond ring to show to your ex’s wife qualifies as warming up to the engagement, do you?”

  “But you said it was the first time you were happy Richard proposed.”

  “Just as a social shield. If anything, this is telling me I shouldn’t marry Richard even more.”

  “Why? Because you’re in love with a married man you can never have?”

  “It’s not fair to Richard. I don’t love him enough to marry him.”

  “But you do love him?”

  “I do, but it’s not consuming, it’s not breathtaking. It’s just, well, lovely.”

  “Gemma, what are you going to do if you don’t marry Richard? Spend the rest of your life waiting for Jake to suddenly realize he can’t live without you? Be single forever? Become a crazy cat lady and die alone?”

  “No, no and no.”

  “What then?”

  “I could meet someone else…”

  “Someone better than Richard?”

  She has a good point there. I’m never going to meet someone better than Richard. He’s good-looking, kind, charming, fun, and full of life. His only problem is he’s not Jake. I so don’t deserve him.

  “No, you’re right. I’m never going to meet someone better than Richard.”

  “So?”

  “So, I’m screwed.” I shake my head. “Richard doesn’t deserve this; he deserves a woman who loves him with all her heart and soul. I’d be doing him a favor if I broke up with him now before we’re too invested.”

  “But he loves you, not some hypothetical perfect other woman. You make him happy. You’re just freaked out because he proposed.”

  “But doesn’t that say enough about where we stand? Every other woman in my position would be ecstatic—worse even, she would’ve probably been pressuring her boyfriend to propose. Isn’t the fact that the thought never even crossed my mind enough of a telltale?”

  “You’ve never been particularly girly about weddings. When I was telling you the details of my wedding with William, you kept rolling your eyes at everything I said.”

  “You were a tad overbearing.”

  “I was a bride,” Amelia says with pride. “You’d probably rather elope to Vegas so you don’t have to organize anything.”

  “I would,” I admit.

  “So, see, you’re not your typical girl when it comes to weddings.”

  “Listen, I’m not scared of the ceremony; I’m scared of making a life-commitment to a man when I don’t really mean it.”

  “Let’s try this way: were you thinking of breaking up with Richard before he proposed?”

  “No.”

  “And since I told you I was moving out, did you think about Richard potentially becoming your new roommate?”

  “I might have,” I mumble.

  “I’m sorry, what was that?”

  “Okay, okay. I thought about it. But more like something that would happen in the distant, indefinite future.”

  “So you were basically planning a long-term future with Richard anyway, except for the married label, right?”

  “I’ve never given it much of a thought, to be honest. I was going with the flow.”

  “But you still saw yourself with Richard in the future?”

  “Near future, yes. I never went past the next couple of months. Isn’t that weird? Shouldn’t I have been doodling Mrs. Gemma Stratton way before Richard proposed?”

  “Let’s try out some scenarios. Let’s say you were to give Richard his ring back—the thought of never seeing him again wouldn’t trouble you in the least?”

  “I never said I don’t want to see Richard again. I said I’m not sure if I want to marry him.”

  “Well, darling, you don’t have many options left since it’s clear he wants to marry you. From where things stand, you can either move forward with Richard or part ways. You can’t give him his ring back without breaking up. Is that what you want?”

  “No. No! I want things to go back to the way they were last week: easy, uncomplicated. I want to never have met Jake’s wife. I want to love Richard the way I still love Jake. You should’ve seen the way I cried today. I completely lost it. It’s not normal to be that desperate about your ex.”

  “Listen, Gemma, if I saw the flight attendant in person, I’d cry. Even if it’s been ages and I haven’t been in love with William for the longest time. It’s still a wound. Healed, but the scar’s there and it’s staying with me for the rest of my life. Please don’t throw away a perfectly good man who adores you to chase after the idea of a teenage love. You need to stop trying to replicate what you had with Jake. He was your first love. But it doesn’t mean you can’t build something even better with Richard. Something real, not a dream.”

  “Maybe you’re right. It’s just been a crazy day.”

  “Imagine if the redhead walked into my office and I didn’t know who she was. I’m surprised you didn’t pass out when she told you.”

  “That’s the adrenaline for you, prevents you from passing out. It was scary, Ames. She was standing there, telling me how curious she was to meet me after all the stories Jake had told her about me. I wanted to rip her head off.”

  “I’m sure Jake didn’t tell her anything bad. When a person has been so important in your past, it’s natural to talk abo
ut them.”

  “I didn’t tell Richard stories about Jake.”

  Amelia raises an eyebrow at me.

  “Richard might’ve asked questions, and I might’ve answered them,” I admit. “But I didn’t entertain him with funny anecdotes about my significant ex. That’s what they call me: the significant ex.”

  “It could be worse.” Amelia smirks.

  “You’re making fun of my misery.”

  “I wouldn’t dare.” She hugs me, still smirking, though.

  “Despite the fact that you’re such an insensitive best friend, I’m glad you’re still living with me, even if it’s just for a few more nights. I need you there tonight.”

  “I’m not going anywhere. Even when I move out, you can count on me whenever you need me.”

  “You’re my rock.”

  “And you mine.”

  “Do you think I should tell Richard?”

  “That you met Jake’s wife?”

  “Mmm-hmm.”

  “If you do, he’s going to ask questions, and unless you’re ready to answer them, you should keep quiet.”

  “Questions like what?”

  “Like how it made you feel to meet your ex’s wife.”

  “Yeah, you’re right. I should keep quiet.” I stay silent for a while. “Jake’s really gone, isn’t he?”

  Amelia looks at me with sympathy and nods.

  “What am I going to do?”

  “Move on and stop looking back.”

  I give her a confident nod back. But inside my chest, my heart’s screaming all its dissent.

  ***

  Want to come over tonight?

  When I read Richard's text my heart shrinks.

  Sorry, I had a really bad week start

  Rain check?

  I give amazing feet massages

  Perfect to turn around a bad week start