Page 41 of I Would Beg For You
I can’t stand it, much less that I upset her. In a flash, I’m on the couch and pulling her to me, cradling her in my lap as I gather her to my chest.
“I’m sorry,” I mutter in her hair. “I didn’t want you to know.”
“But I asked,” she mumbles, before the sobs take her.
Yes, she asked. The truth always tends to hurt.
It breaks my heart to see her hurting, but a part of me is also relieved this part of our history is out. For Naomi to know the truth, it means something. I want her eyes opened to the world. I want her to be an empowered woman who steps into her ownand can hold her ground. And for the two of us to have anything more than something superficial, she needs to open her eyes to what we are dealing with between our families.
Yet, she’s hurting, and more than anything, this breaks me.
It’s hard to watch her suffering this way.
What’s happening to me?
Chapter 15 Valentino
I end up brushingthe question away.Focus on her. Always on her.
I hold her and let her purge it out of her. At least, she’s not pulling away and is letting me console her. I knew we’d have to talk about difficult subjects at some point if our relationship was to go anywhere. Guess we are going somewhere now, because look at us in this moment.
“I don’t remember her, you know,” she says after a long time. Her words are muffled against my chest.
“You were five.”
“Still, I wish I had something.”
“Memories fade,” I say softly.
“What do you mean?”
I run a hand over her hair. “When you think of them, at first, it’s sharp and there, tearing you up. Then as time passes, everything dulls. You remember, but at the same time, it’s like a movie running in your mind. You’re seeing it, like it’s outside of you, instead of being in there.”
Silence thrums for a moment. I don’t know where the words came from, but they echo between us. I’ve never formulated this feeling out loud before, and to hear it being explained feels alien.
“How do you know this?” she asks. “I think I remember her, but then I find it wasn’t real.”
“Like you see this person in your mind, it’s like a moving snapshot. But when you really think about it, it’s not a memory. It’s an actual photo you saw, and that’s all you can conjure of them.”
Naomi pulls away from my arms to stare at me with wide eyes. “That’s exactly it. How…”
I shrug. “Happened to me, too.”
She blinks. “Your mom?”
I nod.
“But she’s been gone, what, a couple of years?”
“A little over four, actually.”
She blinks, then her small, dainty hand is cradling my cheek tenderly. She pulls herself up to drop a soft kiss on my lips. She’s gone before I can return her kiss.
“Grief,” I say. “Love that has no place to go.”
Naomi nods slowly. “It’s an apt description. It’s not a void in you. It’s a space too full, bursting with love to give…”
“…but the one who’s to receive it is no longer here,” I finish for her.
