To See You Again (16 page)

She pulled on my limp hand. "Let me try to help.
Please. You'd help me; I know you would. Let me do the same for you." I felt
the pressure from her hand gripping mine and all I could manage was a shrug.

Rachel

"How do you do it?" he asks, sounding more awed
than annoyed.

"Do what?"

"You have this way of getting me to talk about
things that I don't tell anyone. On that note,
very
few people know
about the depression diagnosis…so…"

I squeeze his hand tight. "Collin, I would never."

"Yeah, I know." He lets out a long breath and then
inhales deeply the way someone would right before they attempt to lift an
impossibly heavy object. Maybe that's what it's like for him to talk about
these things. Perhaps that's what it's like for
all
of us when we are
brave enough to unburden ourselves of the pain we carry deep inside. It's akin
to pushing something substantial up and off of your soul, just so you can
breathe. "I never tried to hurt myself, but there was this period when I
thought a lot about not wanting to be around anymore." He's quiet for a minute
and then he whispers, "And there were a few times when I thought about
different ways to do it."

"Collin." I feel desperate. The urge to try to
hold him is completely overwhelming. I settle for pulling his hand toward me
and onto my chest, as though I'm giving his arm a hug. He doesn't resist.

"Is that when you decided to get help?"

"Um…it was around that time. I sort of hit a rock
bottom and it made me think about my dad, and how he would just shut down for
days at a time. I had this week that was so bad I didn't know what day it was.
It occurred to me that I had enough money for that to just
be
my life. I
could live, cooped up in my house, having groceries and carryout delivered, watching
cable TV, and going in and out of sleep. I just thought—there has to be more to
life than this. There was for my dad, and he was too sick to see it. I didn't
want to be found hanging in the shed," he says flatly.

Oh, my God
. I wince, and then immediately feel sick thinking about Collin dead,
especially at his own hands. "When did it get better?" I ask, needing
desperately to hear him tell me that he
is
better, that all of this is
in his past.

"It took a while, and I have Reba to thank for
helping me. The first thing I did was get on meds, and it took a few weeks, but
I finally had some energy again. I started to give a shit, a little bit anyway,
about things I used to care about." He sighs again. "Everything else has been
about balance in my life; trying not to have too much or too little of
anything. I hardly drink anymore, and when I do, it's usually just one."

"Do you still have thoughts like you did before?"
I involuntarily squeeze his hand, thinking how I would give anything for him to
never feel that way again.

"Look, I don't want to freak you out. I really am
OK," he replies firmly.

I pray he's telling me the truth, and he isn't
just saying what he thinks I want to hear, or can handle. For the millionth
time today I wish that we weren't in total darkness. I want so much to see his
face right now. 

"I haven't had thoughts like those for a very long
time," he continues. "All of that happened before a lot of other things fell
into place for me. I keep pretty busy these days, and that helps, too."

"I'm sure you are busy running a large company.
How did that happen?"

"Victor left it to me," Collin says
matter-of-factly.

"He passed away?" I can't hide my surprise. Victor
was one of those people I just assumed would outlive everyone. I pictured him
as a crotchety old man, frowning in his easy chair, clinging to life just to
prove a point that he could do as he pleased.

"Yes, about a year ago now. He…um…wanted me to run
it because James is always in and out of rehab, so he couldn't depend on him. 
He was too sexist to give it to Reba, even if she had been more qualified,
which she wasn't. I'd been running my own company for several years by that
point and much to his amazement, I hadn't screwed it up yet. In fact, we were
profitable and doing well." He lets a little laugh escape, as though he's just
as surprised as Victor had been. "Don't get too warm and fuzzy over it, though.
Victor chose me because he felt I was the best shot of keeping his legacy
alive, not because there was any affection between us. He wanted his company to
remain in the family and I was as close to that as he could get."

"Wow," I reply, dumbly.

"Yup."

"Well, congratulations, Collin. That's great. I
mean, the company and everything…you at the helm. It's all pretty exciting." He
doesn't answer me, but he squeezes my hand.

I'm so impressed with him. I can't even imagine
the courage it must have taken to reach out and ask for help with his
depression, especially given how little family support he has…and then all his
success…running this big company...wow.

"Can I ask you something else?"

"Sure," he replies, sounding calm.

"Are you happy?"

He pauses a minute before answering and then says,
"Mostly."

"Does Leighton make you happy?"

There's an interminable pause and then he finally
says that she does, but I can tell he's holding something back.

"What about you and Beckett?" he asks, not
hesitating even a moment to ask me the same.

Collin

As the questions leave my lips I'm overcome with
the sensation of déjà vu. I know the cause of it immediately. It's induced by the
fear that surrounds asking her a question I don't know whether I want to hear
the answer to. A few minutes ago, I shifted to put my arm around her and she
instantly relaxed into me, her body folded up next to mine, her delicate hand still
in the grasp of my larger one, our legs touching on one side. I have held her
like this twice before.

The first time was the night she told me some dickhead
had tried to force himself on her. At first she tried to be all tough about it,
and downplay her own terror, and his actions, but I wouldn't let it go.
Finally, she broke down, sobbing into my chest until my shirt was soaked. I
stroked her hair and
begged
her to let me do something, anything. She
wouldn't. Eventually she fell asleep in my arms and I carried her to her bed,
tucked her in, and then retreated to the couch where I laid wide awake and
raging, unable to quiet the thoughts of ripping some faceless guy's head off.

The second time was the night when we made love. I
fell asleep with her locked in my arms, sure that I would wake up in the
morning to the start of something incredible, not the end of everything.

"I think I'm happy," she murmurs. I'd give
anything to see her face when she says this, to look in her eyes and see what
they would reveal to me. "Beckett is a really good guy."

When she says his name her hand begins to wriggle
free from my own, like she's just realized what we must look like, or what
Beckett would think if he could see us now. Acting on an unexpected impulse, I
tug on her hand seizing it back into my grasp, and then I squeeze her gently,
moving my head so it's nestled on top of her own. The scent of her—the
feel
of her—it's all almost too much, but I want
this
—whatever the hell
this
is—it's enough for me to take a shaky breath and repeat the words I said to her
before, years ago.  "Raven, I want to hold you. Please."

She makes a little sniffing noise, and I worry I may
have made her cry, but then she turns her body so she's nearly lying on top of
me and I tighten my grip on her. She runs her free hand along my chest down to
my abdomen, and I mimic her movements, running a hand down her arm, gliding
across her side, and then onto her leg coiled on top of my own.

"Say my name again," she whispers.

"Raven," I say, breathing into her hair. I plant a
kiss on the top of her head, so light that I doubt she's aware of it.

We are dangerously close to crossing a line, if we
haven't already. I don't want to care, but I know I have to, because I can't
make this moment last. We won't be suspended in our lives like this for much
longer. It occurs to me that this is when I should be concerned with déjà vu.
If I let something happen between us now, I'll repeat history that shouldn't be
repeated. I don't want her to cheat on someone to be with me, and as much as I
now know that what I feel for Leighton pales in comparison to what it feels
like to just be close to Raven, I don't want to hurt
her
either.

Ten years ago I was not the man that Raven
deserved. Today I might be, but pursuing what I'm feeling now could undo all of
that. I kiss her once more on the top of her head, inhaling the floral scent of
her hair, and this time she does notice, answering me with a mix between a moan
and a sigh. I think if I tried to kiss her now, she'd let me, but this time I
want to win the war, not just the battle. Shit.

"Raven," I say, and it takes everything I've got
to push the next words out, "we shouldn't do this." She doesn't respond, but
her previously circling hand stills, resting right over my pounding heart. "I'm
sorry," I whisper.

Rachel

His words waft over me like the distant smell of
something burning—a quiet warning of danger. Clearly what I need is for someone
to shout or shake me, to scream the words I need to hear in order to bring
around my sobriety, like a cold shower to wash away this heated intoxication. I
replay his words in my head. They're true and right and exactly what I need to
do, but clearly not enough to coax me into letting go of him. His rationality
is the opposite of what I want… But that's just it—
want.
That's what
this is and that is very different than a
need
.

I feel him solid and warm as my hands remain on
his chest, rising and falling in rhythm with each breath he takes. The desire
to stay in his arms absorbing all the intimacy and comfort that comes with it
is undeniable. This reconnection with Collin is as confusing as it is
wonderful. Years after he was gone, I coaxed my brain into trivializing the
connection he and I had had. I reasoned that we'd been young, living in the
artificial world of college, and as a result of that everything had been
intensified, magnified. I also told myself that the amazing sex we'd had that
night, was just an exaggerated memory caused by the intense emotions of the
night. Now, lying in his arms, inhaling his masculine scent, I'm reevaluating
that logic.

He whispers my name again and I know it's time to
wake from this dream.
This isn't real
my mind warns in response. What
I'm feeling now is artificial. A stress response, maybe? My life has been
non-stop and on the go for years. I'm forever inundated with calls and emails
from work, no matter what the day, or the time. Everything in my life is fast
paced, demanding, competitive, and about some arbitrary bottom line. None of
this would've happened if we hadn't gotten stuck in here. We wouldn't have
talked about any of these things, and I realize how much of that has to do with
life just being put on pause for a second. That's what this broken,
piece-of-crap elevator gave us—a pause button. The quiet though—the absolute
stillness all of this has generated—has made me realize just how crazed
everything has been. I don't know the last time I've slowed down enough to just
talk with anyone the way that Collin and I just have. So much of what I'm feeling
now is based on circumstance, the reaction to the relief of everything coming
to a halt. I need to let go.

I pull away from him, extracting my limbs from his
in slow motion, part of me wishing he would stop me, the other part thankful
for his prudence. 

"It's my fault," he says, just as my hand is
leaving his.

"What is?" My voice is shaky.

"Things getting like they did just now. I just
wanted to touch you. I've missed you." His voice is low and I can hear sadness,
or maybe even regret.

"It wasn't just you. I've missed you, too, but
you're right—when these doors finally open, we'll go back to our own lives." I
feel a twinge of fear grip me. It feels like something cold and hard is lodged
in the pit of my stomach.

"You'll go back to Beckett," he whispers, and it sounds
more like a question than a statement of fact.

I can't tell him now about the doubt I'm feeling
about Beckett, and my life, and the path that it's on, though part of me wants
to. I'm not ready for any of this to end. Right now, nothing seems scarier than
those doors opening the whole world back up again.

"And you'll go back to Leighton," I whisper.

"Raven?" I am ashamed at how I feel when he calls
me that. Chills run over me, reminding me of the effect he has on me even when
our physical contact has ceased. When I graduated, I banned the use of "Raven"
with everyone who called me it, reasoning that it didn't make sense to continue
with the moniker in the "real world". Employers concede to nicknames that make
sense—like shortening Katherine to Kathy or the use of a middle name versus the
first—but pet names are reserved for home life, not your corporate cubicle. I
never admitted out loud, that beyond all of that, without Collin there was no
Raven.  I told Collin once that I had never really liked my given, so switching
to the nickname he'd given me was a welcomed change. That was partially true,
the other part of all of that was how it made me feel. It was like it
represented this part of me I was never sure I could really be. Forever in
purgatory between two warring parents—and families for which my presence was
only intermittent—had made me feel as though I had to be independent, strong,
perfect all the time. That was Rachel. Raven was someone else. She was still
strong, but she could also be spontaneous, creative, and maybe even sexy.
Things I never trusted myself to be out in the world, things I only felt free
to be with Collin.