Page 29 of Promise To Marry You
Suddenly the room is too hot. I am too hot. Grabbing my empty water bottle out of my bag, I bypass the still messy kitchen and head to the bathroom to fill it up.
“Fine.” I make my way back into my dark bedroom and slip back into bed, putting the phone on speaker and setting it on the pillow beside me. “It’s weird being here, though,” I confess under the cover of darkness.
I hear sounds on the other end of the phone that tell me Beck is most likely also in bed. Something about that stirs up butterflies inside of me.
“Weird how?”
I shrug, even though I know he can’t see me. “Just, I don’t know, strange. Nothing’s changed, you know? Like, nothing in the house. It’s all exactly the same as the day he died, except for the stuff I used the day of the funeral.”
Beckett’s silent for a second, the sound of his breathing all I can hear. “I wish I was there.”
His raw honesty hits me, forcing the same from me. “I do, too.” I sniff, feeling my eyes burn. There can’t be any tears left inside of me by now, can there? “I miss you.”
I hear his sharp intake of breath. “Oh Cam.”
“I broke all of his mugs and glasses against the wall,” I blurt out, desperate not to dwell on my confession.
“What?” Beck sounds surprised and more than a little worried. My phone starts to vibrate, and I see he’s wanting to switch to a video call.
Sitting up, I turn on the bedside light before I answer. The small screen fills with his concerned face.
“Why did you do that?” he asks, pushing his glasses up his nose, studying me through the screen.
I shake my head. “Honestly, I don’t know. Something came over me, and I just couldn’t contain the feelings anymore.”
“Fuck, Cam, I should’ve come with you.”
“No, it was good for me, in a way.” I chew on my lip, trying to figure out how to explain it. “I think I needed to release some anger and sadness, and as much as I wish you were here with me, I don’t know that I would have let go like that unless I was alone.”
“Why not?” he asks, but there’s no judgment in his tone, just curiosity.
“I don’t really know. Maybe because I was a fucking mess.” I hesitate, but something about this conversation makes me not hold back. “You’ve done so much to help me. But I still have a lot of fucked-up shit in my head. So much emotion, I don’t know what to do with it. And when I’m around you, you make me feel so safe that it’s easier for me to forget. Tonight, I let a lot of it go.”
Beckett doesn’t answer right away, and I worry that my honesty went too far. The last thing I want is for him to feel badly for everything he’s done.
“Cam,” he starts, then stops, running his hand through his short hair. “Jesus. I want to be relieved that you said I make you feel safe. But I’m also mad at myself that I missed the fact you still need to process so much stuff.”
“Beck, no —” I try to interject, but he interrupts me.
“You’re my wife, Cam. Like it or not, whether it’s a real marriage or not, in my mind, you aremy wife. And that means I want to take care of you. I want to make you feel safe and cared for, yet free to figure yourself out, however you need to. Somewhere along the way these last couple of weeks, I think I forgot that last part.”
“Beckett,” I say softly, our eyes connecting through the phone screen. I don’t know what to say. Except to ask him once more to be here for me. “Will you stay on the phone until I fall asleep?”
His tired yet relieved smile tells me more than any words could that we’re going to be okay.
“As you wish.”
With that, I finally let my eyes flutter closed, and somehow, I manage to fall asleep.
When I wake the next morning, my phone screen is dark, but there’s a text message waiting for me.
BECK: You can do this, Cam. You can do absolutely anything. And when you’re done, come home, I’ll be here.
Home.
One word with endless meanings. But right now, home is with Beckett, in Dogwood Cove.
And that doesn’t scare me nearly as much as it did before.
