My Misery Muse (24 page)

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“Please don’t Seth.”

“I’m going to prove it to you Devi,” I said quietly.

She looked away rubbing the tears from her face “I don’t think you can, just go Seth.”

She turned around and walked towards her bedroom. I knew somehow I would have to prove it to her, and I knew words wouldn’t work this time.

I left her place making sure the door was locked and headed to my car thinking about what to I had to do.

“You’re sure you want to do this?” Drake asked me.

“Yea, I’m sure.”

“Alright, your funeral.”

With that we walked up to his parent’s front door and knocked.  His father opened the door, “Mr. Porter.”

“Drake, Seth what can I do for you?” he nearly spit out my name.

“Hey Dad, can we come in, Seth and I want to talk to you?”

He opened the door and let us through, but he didn’t look happy about it.  We went to the formal living room, and all sat down, both Drake and I were uncomfortable as hell; Mr. Porter just looked blank as usual.

“What do you boys need, bail money?”

We both shook our heads then Drake glanced at me.

“I want to marry Devi.”

He snorted. “Don’t you think it’s a little later for that?”

“No sir, I don’t.”

“Fine, she’s going to do what she wants anyway,” he said, “why come here?”

“Dad, Seth wants Grandma’s rings, the ring Dev is supposed to get when she gets married.” Drake said.

“Can’t afford to buy one?” he asked snidely.

I had to bite the inside of my mouth, “No sir, that’s not it, those rings mean a lot to her, she always envisioned using it as her wedding ring.”

“Dad, it’s hers.”

Devi’s dad looked at me, staring hard as if he was trying to get inside me, after a minute or so he nodded. “Fine, I’ll go get them, but Drake you don’t say a damn word about this to your mother.”

Drake nodded.

“Thank you, sir” I said.

He just gave me another hard stare and got up and walked out of the room.  I blew out my breath and looked over at Drake, “Well could’ve  gone worse.”

Drake snorted.

A few minutes later, he walked back into the living room carrying the velvet box that I knew held the rings that Devi had always loved.

“Thank you again,” I said when he handed the box to me.

He nodded, effectively dismissing us. Drake and I walked out the front door, and I still couldn’t understand how vibrant, artistic, Devi had grown up there.

Mags choked on her margarita so I leaned over to pound on her back but she waved me off. “He asked you to marry him, and you said no?”

I nodded.

“Isn’t that the second guy to propose to you in a year?” Cin asked incredulously.

I nodded again.

“Why the hell would you tell Seth no?” Mags asked.

I looked at her, “You know why, I told you last night.”

“Because he might leave,” she shook her head. “Honey, there are no guarantees in this life,
but the two of you, if you would just cut the bullshit would make it.”
[V6]
 

“You can’t know that,” I said.

“No, I do know that, but what’s it going to take for him to convince you of that?”

I looked away, “I don’t think he can,” I whispered.

“Then you are going to be alone for the rest of your life Devlin Shaye, that man loves you, and you keep throwing it back in his face. One day he’s going to stop trying, he’s going to move on with his life and what will you have then?” she asked not waiting for a reply. “You think you’ll have your heart in one piece but we both know you won’t, you’ll have old hurt that festers leaving you jaded and I hate to tell you but that will not keep you warm at night.”

“You don’t understand,” I said getting pissed, “he left, twice.”

“Like I told you last night, the first time
you
threw his ass out and told him it was over and go to LA. You cannot not hold that against him, he would’ve  stayed, hell, he was willing to do anything to make it work, but you got scared and you ended it. You kept his son from him, yea yea you tried, I remember I was there, but you know and I know that you still did it.  He forgave you for that, he tried to make it work again. Then he realized what it would do to your life, so he left trying to protect you, trying to protect Jaks.  You kept information from him that could have helped stop all the drama that’s going on now, but you wouldn’t call him, you let your damn pride get in the way.  He’s trying his best to fix the drama you could have prevented. He asked you to marry him, and you yet again threw it back at him.  So honey, I don’t want to hear it anymore about how he did this and how he did that because you yourself have done some shitty things to that man.”

With that Mags got up and grabbed her stuff and left, slamming the door behind her. “She’s right you know,” Cin said and left also.

I knew she was right in my head I had done awful things to Seth, and yet he still forgave me and came back over and over again.  So why couldn’t I let go of the past, was it my pride? Was it my heart trying to protect itself? I knew I was scared, I just didn’t know what to do about it.  Could I try and fail again, but on the other side, what if we tried and didn’t fail this time? What if it worked out and we were a family.  I knew I wouldn’t get answers to my questions tonight, but I couldn’t seem to stop my brain from asking them.  Could I risk having my heart broken again?  Or worse yet could I let Seth walk away, let him go? The thought of him not in my life was scarier than any of the rest.

¯¯¯

I left Jaks at Drake’s, he had stayed the night with me the night before, I wanted to spend as much time as possible with him, but Drake had offered his key to Devi’s so I could break in and corner her.  She’d been pretty much avoiding me since the night of Jaks’ birthday party, and I couldn’t come up with a better way to get her alone to talk to her and maybe for once get her to listen.  So I took off early from Drake’s came over with bagels from her favorite shop and lattes hoping to pin her down.  When she walked into the kitchen in her plaid flannel pajama bottoms and white thermal shirt hugging her curves I had to swallow hard.  Her hair was still mussed from sleep, her eyes not focusing yet, and she was barefoot her toes painted a deep purple.

“Hey,” I said quietly trying not to startle her, she jumped anyway.

“Uhm, hi,” she said confused. “Where’s Jaks?”

“Still at Drake’s, I wanted to talk to you alone.”

“Oh ok,” she said looking away, but I noticed her red rimmed eyes.

“You ok, baby?” I asked standing up and walking over to her. When I reached her, I ran the back of my hand across her cheek feeling her soft skin.

“Yea, fine,” she said quickly, “what did you want to talk about?”

I dropped my hand. “Some things have changed, and they’re going to affect you, thought we should talk about them.”

“Sure, but can I make coffee first?” I walked back over to the table where I had left the bagels and latte and handed the latte to her she blinked. “Uhm, thanks.”

“I know you; you don’t function without coffee in the morning.”

She nodded then took a drink of the latte, closing her eyes, relishing the first sip.

“Better?”

“Yea, thanks, so what did you want to talk to me about?”

“Here, sit, let’s eat breakfast and talk,” I said gesturing to the bagels.

She sat at the table taking one of the bagels, but tearing it apart instead of eating it. “Well the band is relocating to Dallas,” I started off with; she jerked her head up and stared at me. “We’re also are making some changes with our touring schedule. We’ve decided we’ve been going hard for 3 years, it’s time to slow down some, take time to have a life.”

“Oh,” she whispered.

“We’ll still tour of course, but we won’t be gone for more than six weeks at a time now, with a 2 week break, in between.  We’re also taking a hiatus after this tour, taking a year off, we’ll work on a new CD some, play some still, but our main focus isn’t going to be the band.”

She stared at the table. “Devi?”

She shook her head, I put a finger under her chin and made her look at me, tears were streaming down her face. “Baby?”

“I… I don’t know what to say.”

I nodded, “Marry me, Devlin Shaye,”  I then reached into my pocket and pulled out the velvet box her father had given to me and sat it on the table in front of her.

She stared at the box. “I… I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, Seth,” she whispered.

“About what, darling?”

“Us,” she said quietly looking down at the table. “I want us to try, I realized I don’t think I can really live my life without you in it.”

I stood up and walked around the table, and kneeled down in front of her so I could see her face. “Is that a yes?”

She nodded.

“No, Devi I need to hear it, is that a yes?”

“Yes,” she whispered. “Yes Seth, I will marry you.”

I pulled her out of her chair into my lap and hugged her to me tight, “God I love you Devi,” I murmured into her hair.

“I love you too.”

I reached up and grabbed the box off of the table and opened it, pulling the engagement ring out of the box but leaving the wedding band, I slipped it on to her finger and she stared at it.

“Is that my grandmother’s ring?” she asked quietly still staring.

“Yea.”

“How did you get it?”

“I asked your father for it.”

“Seth Taylor, I love you,” then she kissed me a slow, languid kiss.

“Will you zip me up already?”

“I’m trying, not my fault you gained weight since your last fitting Dev,” replied Mags.

“Shut up,” I snarked back.

“Well if you kept your legs together around Seth this wouldn’t keep happening to you,” she snarked back.

“Ha like your one to talk, when are you going to tell me who the father is Mags? I am worried about you.”

“Well,” she mused, “I should probably decide whether to tell the father or not first.”

“Oh you are telling him, you bitched at me for months about telling Seth about Jaks.”

“Yea but that was different you two were meant to be, me and this guy not so much,” she replied.

“He still deserves to know Mags,” I replied.

“I know, and I will tell him, I think, but I want to make sure you know, I don’t want to tell him then something happen.”

“I get it,” I replied.

“I still can’t believe you’ve made it this far without anyone knowing Seth knocked you up again,” she said trying to change the topic again.

“You know we don’t want anyone to know until after the wedding, we want this day to be about us not Seth and his super sperm.”

She snorted, “Super sperm.”

“Well, what do you call it when I get pregnant twice by the same man and both times on the pill?”

“True.”

We both glanced towards the door when there was a knock.

“Come in,” yelled Mags.

“Damn Devi you look beautiful,” said Drake when he walked in.

“Thank you.”

“Mags,” said Drake, “not too bad yourself.”