The Hero + Vegas = No Regrets

Normally after a breakup, I curl up on the couch with Jules and lick my wounds for a weekend before getting up on Monday morning and moving on. Or I’d go back to Cincinnati and hang out for a few days, and find my heart had totally healed by the time I got back to New York.

But Jules is living with Leo, I’m not sure I ever want to go back to Cincinnati, and this isn’t any ordinary breakup.

This time the person I’ve broken up with doesn’t live a thousand miles away and isn’t emotionally unavailable. This time, I’m married and in love.

When Worth told me he loved me, I wanted to say it back, but I knew it would only make things worse.

The buzzer to the apartment makes me jump and I drop the pile of clothes I was carrying to the open suitcase in my living room. Leaving the clothes where they fall, I head to the door. When I open it and see Jules’ expression, I know she knows. The sadness and disappointment in her eyes is a final blow.

“What happened?” she asks. I cover my face with my hands and slump against the wall. “Leo told me last night that you guys split.”

I try and even out my breathing. I have so little energy, I’m not sure how I’ll get to the couch, let alone finish packing. I check my watch. I have to leave in an hour if I’m going to make my flight. “Yeah,” I say. “I wasn’t planning to end things. It just… happened.”

Jules puts her arm around me and leads me into the living room. “I thought you really liked him.”

“I did. I do.”noveldrama

“Then isn’t there a way to work through things?”

I sigh and collapse on the sofa. “It’s not a question of working through issues between us. There are no issues between us.” I feel horrible for leaving Worth the way I did, but it will be better for him in the long run.

Her brows knit together. “Then why?”

“Because I have stuff I need to work through.”

“And you had to end things with Worth to do that?”

“I kind of did, yeah.” I tell her about my trust issues and the way I feel like my past was a lie. How I’m not sure who I am when my foundations aren’t just rocked but smashed to smithereens. “I need to figure it out,” I say. “And I don’t want to lean on Worth because he would take the weight—that’s the man he is. I’d never really know if I was with Worth because I needed the support or because I wanted to be with him. I don’t want to spend my life with someone who I feel I owe a debt to. If I’m going to sink, I need to do that on my own. If I swim, I want to know I did that on my own, too. That’s the only way I can be the kind of woman who deserves a man like Worth. Does that make sense?”

“Okay,” she says, tilting her head to one side. “But say I got some devastating news about my past that rocks me to my core. I wouldn’t just walk away from my marriage to deal with it on my own.”

“Right,” I say. “But I married Worth because of what happened with my parents. The whole wedding was a reaction. I don’t want to stay married to him as a reaction, too. It would be like I was using him. I want to be with him because I love him. Because I want to build a future with him.”

“So that’s it?” she asks.

“I don’t know,” I say. I feel like I love the man, but I don’t trust anything anymore. “He says he’ll wait, but I can’t expect him to wait forever.”

Her eyes widen at the possibility that it’s not the end between us, but I can’t think too much about what might happen.

“I don’t know how long it will take to sort my shit out.”

She glances down at my suitcase. “So for now, you’re running away?”

I shake my head. “The exact opposite. If I was running away, I wouldn’t be going to Cincinnati. I’m facing shit straight-on. No more avoiding my problems or pretending they’re not happening. I’m going to speak to my mom, tell her I feel betrayed by her as well as Dad, and I’m… I’m going to consider seeing my father.”

I want to be the kind of wife Worth deserves. If I figure stuff out and he’s still there, I’ll be in a position to tell him I love him. And if he moves on? It will break my heart, but I will wish with everything I have that he’s happy. Because he deserves it.