Choices (6 page)

SEVEN

Paxton sat in her living room staring at her Christmas tree. This would be the first Christmas at the cabin that she would spend alone. Her mother went on a cruise with her sorority sisters. Jenny tried to get her to go along, but Paxton refused to go. They hadn’t talked too much since their session with Dr. Keeler. They both knew that it didn’t go well and they were slowly retracting to their own corners again. Paxton had an individual session with Dr. Keeler in about an hour, the last one before the holidays.

She didn’t know what she was going to do for the next few days. Ryan and Duke said they were stopping by to make sure she wasn’t alone for the holidays but she still felt empty. Paxton still felt like she was missing something, someone. She sighed and played with her left ring finger. She missed her ring. She still had a faint tan line that hadn’t quite disappeared yet. She missed Jack ev
en though she hated to admit it, she did. It was over between them, he was with Kenleigh and she was alone. Sure she had Duke but she couldn’t love him like he deserved to be loved. Paxton knew she couldn’t love someone a much as she loved Jack, as he was her once in a lifetime love.

Her phone buzzed signaling she had thirty minutes to get to her appointment. She got up and stretched. She was already ready to go to her appointment, so she just grabbed her purse and shoved her phone inside of it. She was just letting herself have a self-indulging moment of depression. That’s how she looked at it. She needed a moment to dwell in self-pity but now it was over, time to focus on her day and moving forward. She couldn’t have Jack anymore and she needed to find something else. She couldn’t be consumed by him any longer. He wasn’t hers to keep.

***

Paxton sat in Dr. Keeler’s office. She curled up on her normal side of the couch. She leaned into the arm rest and waited for Dr. Keeler to signal that she was ready. Paxton was an open book and she often looked forward to her visits with Dr. Keeler, with the exception of her joint appointments with her mother now. She thought of Dr. Keeler as her friend, someone she could unload on, even though she was paid for it. Paxton saw Dr. Keeler take a sip of her coffee and set it back down. Even though it was middle of the afternoon, Dr. Keeler always had coffee. Once she set it down, Paxton knew Dr. Keeler was ready to begin.

“How are we doing today Paxton?” Dr. Keeler always started by asking her that. Paxton smiled at the routine.

“I’ve been better,” she said looking over at Dr. Keeler. Paxton pulled her knees up to her chest and rested her chin on them. She wrapped her arms around waiting for Dr. Keeler to ask her to elaborate.

“What’s going on? What has you down?” Dr. Keeler tilted her head to the side as she waited for an answer.

Right on cue
, Paxton thought.

Keeping her chin resting on her knees, Paxton opened up, “It’s the holidays and it’s the first one I will be spending without anyone around. Duke and Ryan said they would stop by but I will be alone most of the time.” She saw Dr. Keeler write something down but Paxton never worried about it. She never cared what Dr. Keeler wrote. She waited until the pen stopped moving. Paxton looked down at the floor before continuing. “Duke said the Jack has finally moved on. He is with someone else.”

“Do you believe him?”

“I’m not sure. He was just in New York for a conference and he went to go see him. Jack told him that he was with Kenleigh now. That he was moving on, not wasting any more time.” Paxton didn’t want to delve into her stalking habits. She still couldn’t find any pictures of them together but maybe that’s because he didn’t want to start the rumor mill back in Bridge Heights.

“How are you taking the news?”

“I don’t know. I am bummed because I know that I can’t love anyone else the way I love him. I feel like I messed up big time and I won’t be able to get him back. I mean I am in my mid-thirties, who am I going love again that it will totally consume me? That’s a one-time thing. That is a young love thing.”

“So you think that you can love no one like that or that no one can love you?”

Paxton stared at her. She wasn’t sure how to answer that. “I don’t know. I just know that I miss him so much right now. Maybe it’s the holidays. It’s just like I am missing something in my life. I noticed after Jack left and nothing has filled this void since. So I don’t know how I feel about him loving someone else right now. I don’t know how to move on. I don’t know how to make myself happy right now. I don’t know!” Paxton rocked herself. She didn’t know where her little rant came from. She wasn’t this worked up before she left the house.

“Okay. So let’s talk about that,” Dr. Keeler paused, taking a sip of her coffee. “What do you miss about him?”

Paxton couldn’t believe she would even pose such a question. Her mouth gaped open as she stared at Dr. Keeler. Apparently Dr. Keeler didn’t think it was a ridiculous question. She still sat there waiting for an answer.

“I miss him. I miss the way he made me smile, took care of me. I miss his smell when I lay in our…my bed. I miss waking up in the morning with him right there beside me. I miss just everything about him. All I want is him, is that selfish? Maybe, but I don’t know what to do now that it’s not a possibility to be with him.”

“So you miss the comfort of having someone around the house or warming your bed?”

“I miss Jack, just Jack. The little things he did. He used to just stare at me, like I was the most beautiful thing in the world. His smile just made me melt. He always gave me his crooked little half-smirk.” Paxton paused remembering that smile. “He would wink then just continue staring. His eyes just consumed me. I would forget what I was doing whenever he looked at me. That effect never wore off.”

“You still love him deeply then.”

“Certain days I still love him so much it hurts. I can’t get out of bed, the memories haunt me.”

Paxton watched Dr. Keeler scribble something down. Memories of her and Jack waking up in the sunlight filled her mind. Jack would chuckle in her ear as he trailed kisses that started behind her ear down to her shoulder. They would lay there not saying a word to each other. His scent surrounded her as he pulled her closer to him. She rubbed the edge of the couch as she remembered Jack’s love for her.

“What about those other days?”

Paxton jumped at the sound of Dr. Keeler’s voice. Paxton didn’t know how long she was silent but it was long enough for a prompt from Dr. Keeler.

“Other days, I remember being alone. After Ella passed,” Paxton paused, “you know that I went to a dark place. Jack, he was there for me in the beginning. He was there whenever I needed him. I cried myself to sleep most nights and he would lay there next to me. He would run his hands through my hair because he knew that it comforted me. Then suddenly he was gone. He stayed at the school longer. He would shut himself in his office apparently working on new lesson plans. I was stuck in my grief. I couldn’t move beyond Ella’s death. We grew apart.” Paxton remembered those nights she was alone. She remembered the loneliness she felt. She silently wished that Jack would walk into the rooms those nights. The days when he was at work, she couldn’t even get out of bed. She stopped eating on her own.

“One day he came in and stared at me. It was about a month after Ella’s funeral. I could see in his eyes that he was annoyed with me. He didn’t approach me, he didn’t say a word. He walked to the closet when no words were spoken between us, changed out of his slacks and put on sweats. He opened the door and looked back at me. He said something under his breath. When I asked him about it, he said ‘nothing’, then he walked out the door, walked away from me.”

“I remember running down the stairs. I was so angry with him. I don’t know where it came from. We got into an argument. It was a breaking point for us. He accused me of wasting my life, taking everything for granted when I know first hand how life can be cut short. It was that night that I changed, I remembered it. I went into my closet and found every Ella-esque outfit I could. I would be carefree and do whatever I wanted in the moment. I would be a risk-taker, an adventurer, someone who wasn’t consumed by their career.”

“And is that when you started sleeping with men? You were being the carefree Paxton?”

Paxton stared at Dr. Keeler. She was trying to figure out how to answer that question. She bit her lower lip. Paxton was embarrassed by her behavior looking back on it now.

“It never was about going out trying to get laid. I guess most of that was bad judgment due to how much I had consumed.”

“What was it about? Why did you feel the need to go out, seek out men?”

“I don’t know. I guess I wanted to show Jack that I didn’t just lay around the house crying. He accused me of isolating myself. I was, but I wanted to prove that I could get out of bed,” she waited a moment letting the scenes play out in her head. “At first, it was just going having a drink and driving around. After a few weeks, it was a couple drinks. I would take the long way home. Jack didn’t even question when I was out late. Then one night, a guy came over and bought me drinks. We were both intoxicated and I didn’t make the best choices that night. That was the first night that someone made me forget why I was even out. When we left the bar, he was just walking me to my car. I had no intention of sleeping with him, but it just happened. I did it over and over because I wanted that one moment to feel normal, the one moment when my life wasn’t shitty. That’s what those men did for me.”

“How did you feel about it the next day if it wasn’t planned? You cheated on Jack numerous times.”

“I felt horribly guilty. I was going to tell him as soon as I got up after the first guy. It was a Saturday and we both normally slept in but when I woke up, he wasn’t there in bed with me. I thought that maybe he was down in the office but he wasn’t. He was nowhere to be found, so I got angry and just kept it to myself. If Jack wasn’t filling my needs, I would have to fill them on my own.” Paxton paused as she remembered the array of emotions from that morning. The guilt, the loneliness, the anger, it all surged in her again. Tears formed in her eyes.

“So you are still upset that he wasn’t there?”

“Yes, he never came home, never called. By about eight-thirty I gave up on him. I got dressed and went out again. I didn’t sleep with anyone on the second night, I just got hammered and took a cab home. He was there waiting up for me, angry himself. He had a beer beside him and I saw a couple empty cans as well.”

“Was he drunk?”

“No, probably buzzed if anything. The look of hatred in his eyes was evident though. It was the first time he waited up. He tried to pick a fight but I just walked upstairs and went to sleep.”

“How did the next morning go?”

“It didn’t. I woke up and left this time. I went to see Jonathan that morning to see if I could come back to work. He said give it a few more weeks. Jack had told him I had been going out, I wasn’t dealing with Ella’s loss very well. I mean looking back now I wasn’t but I became even more furious with Jack. He was now interfering with my career.” Paxton clenched her fists. Her career back then was everything to her. Jack was blocking her from keeping promises to her father, to her mother.

“I went out every chance I could. If a man took notice, I was thankful that someone did. Jack was barely there, we barely spoke. I don’t know why he flipped on me, what changed, but I was lonely. I was thankful someone was just acknowledging my existence. I wanted that feeling again, the one I got when those men made me forget. I felt wanted. Jack just wanted nothing to do with me, he gave up on me.” She remembered Drake’s words at the gallery yesterday. According to Drake, Jack hasn’t given up but it counters what Duke said about him being with Kenleigh.

A buzzer went off. Paxton knew it was the timer signaling the session has once again ended. Dr. Keeler scribbled one last note but Paxton couldn’t get up. She saw Dr. Keeler glance up at her. She stopped whatever she was writing down.

“Paxton? You okay?”

“Uh, yeah, fine.” Paxton stood quickly. She didn’t know what was going on why she suddenly felt the need to get out of there.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m fine,” she gave another fake smile. The second one she gave in less than 24-hours. Paxton shrugged on her coat and grabbed her purse.