TANGLED HEARTS.
- YOU DIDN’T HAVE TO.
His head feels heavy and it’s pounding. These are the results of exceeding his drinking limit, the only thing he can be grateful for is that he drank in the comfort of his own house so he had a sense of security. He passed out on the couch and when he sits up, his neck and back are the first to chastise him for thinking he could spend an entire night sleeping in the position that he chose. In his defense, he had planned to go to bed but the alcohol in his system got the better of him, one drink led to another and now he’s here.
He finally manages to sit up and stretch his arms, then he looks around him. There’s bottles on the floor and the silence in the house is just too loud for him. His helper is on leave and he’s responsible for keeping his own house clean until she returns. That should keep him busy because Amerie is in the Vaal with her family and the company is closed, he needs to find something to keep him busy before he goes crazy or had another night of heavy drinking. He doesn’t want this to become a habit.
The first person to pop up in his brain now that he is awake is Amerie and the thought of her is what reminds him to check his phone and it takes a moment for him to finally find it under one of the cushions on the couch. When he checks, he finds that she left two missed calls and one text on WhatsApp. He doesn’t open his WhatsApp because he knows it’s flooded with forwarded Christmas messages, the same ones he always gets each festive season.
He decides to just call her instead, the sound of her voice is exactly what he needs right now and it doesn’t take long for her to answer “Finally,” her worried voice comes through and he feels guilty for that. She called over two hours ago and he has never left her hanging for that long so he can understand why she’s worried.
“I’m sorry, love. I was sleeping and didn’t hear the phone ringing,” He explains.
“You had me worried for a while there, how are you?”
“I’m good, baby. How are you?” he neglects to mention the fact that he has a massive headache and his body feels like it was run over by a truck.
“I’m okay, are you sure you’re good?” she asks. She’s far and she she knows he’s spending the day alone since he declined having to join Frank and Judith for lunch. They still haven’t mended whatever relationship that they have and Shane has no interest in being the one to extend an olive branch. He believes that him being overly friendly with Judith is what led to her thinking she could do what she did so he needs to fix that, and he’s just not in the mood for company that isn’t Amerie.
“Yes, I’m good. How is your Christmas morning going?”
“It’s going good. Isabelle and I are on kitchen duty. Some of my uncles, aunts and cousins will be joining us so you can imagine just how busy we are,” she says with a happy tone and he can just picture her moving around the kitchen with that bright smile on her face.
“Let me not take up your time-”
“No, no you’re not hanging up yet,” she sounds like she’s moving “Isabelle and our other cousins that are early can keep things going while I take a few minutes to talk to my man. I worry about you, Shane, you being all alone today,” she says and he chuckles.
“I love it when you call me your man,”
“I know you do, but don’t change the topic,”
“Things have been like this for the longest time for me, don’t stress yourself about me, love. I’m a grown man,”
“A grown man who is lonely on Christmas, the thought alone is just heartbreaking,”
“I’m not alone right now because I’m talking to you. I don’t want you to spend your day worrying about me, I want you to enjoy your time with your family. I’ll probably spend the day sleeping or I’ll find something to do, I’m good,” he assures her. The last thing he wants is to ruin her day.
“Okay, I hear you. Are you in your bedroom?”
“No, Why?”
“Because I left your Christmas present in there. Go to your closet and open the side that you offered me when I started sleeping over at your house,”
“Amerie, you didn’t have to-” He says feeling both emotional and guilty because he didn’t think to get her anything. He wasn’t lying when he said this is just another day to him and she went out of her way to leave him something.
“I know I didn’t have to but I wanted to, Shane. I’m allowed to spoil you too. Now go and check your gift, don’t hang up,”
He does as told, they are talking as he walks to his bedroom and goes exactly where she directed him to go. He finds a small black box in there with a red ribbon tied around it. He unties it and proceeds to open the small box and then he sees the brand new watch inside. He is at a loss for words. In his entire existence of forty-two years, he has never, ever received a gift for Christmas. He has also never expected to receive one. He worked hard to be able to get himself whatever he desires but this is just different. Knowing that his woman saw this and thought about him makes this watch mean so much more than the other ones that he bought himself.
“Shane, are you still there?”
“Yes, love. I’m here. Thank you, I love the gift,” he says wholeheartedly and this warms Amerie’s heart. Hearing how his tone is changing makes her so happy because her mission is a success. She wanted something to make his day in her absence and she managed to do it.
“I’m glad you love it. I wasn’t sure what to get you because you have everything but I remembered that you love your watches, now you get to add to your collection,”
“I would love anything coming from you, Amerie…and now I feel bad because I didn’t get you anything,”
“I don’t mind, I know this is just a day for you but I wanted to make it special without expecting anything in return,”
“Thank you, love. I appreciate it,” he resists the urge to tell her how much he loves her because he wants to do it in person and not over the phone. He feels ready to say it and can only hope that she’s ready to hear it, she doesn’t have to say it back, he just wants her to know that he is madly in love with her and he wants it to stay like that.
The both eventually get off the phone and while Amerie goes back to cooking for her big family gathering, Shane gets in the shower to clean himself up and wake his body up. He no longer feels like just sleeping, it’s like Amerie has gifted him with this new energy inside him and he’s ready to go about the day.
As soon as he’s done with showering and getting dressed in his casual wear he starts by cleaning the house, especially where he was drinking last night. He does it in no rush and when he’s done he moves to the kitchen to make himself breakfast and then he cleans up.
He decides to get in his car and see where the road takes him… Well, he already knows where it will take him so he tries to see if he can find an open florist today which might be impossible but after searching for a while he finally finds one and he is lucky to catch them before they close. He buys lillies and then he gets on the road again.
It’s a while until he comes to a stop at the cemetery. He finds a parking spot and then he takes the flowers and makes his way through the tombstones until he gets to the one that he came for. It looks like it was cleaned up just recently, maybe his aunt came to do it. He’s thankful that he didn’t come earlier or he would have risked bumping into her and that would just ruin her Christmas.
After so many years, he still finds it difficult to come here. It still hurts. Especially because of the guilt, he holds himself responsible for the fact that his mother and little brother are are here instead of living their lives. Things didn’t have to happen the way that they did and if he had the power or ability to go back in time and have things happen differently, he would do it in a heartbeat. He would give his own life for them.
He kneels and reads the names and message that’s on the headstone for the hundredth time and it still feels like the first time when he finally gathered the courage to come back after he left them here on the day of their burial. “Emma and Brandon Matthews, mother and son. Always together and never apart,” it reads, followed by a Bible verse.
“Forgive me for spending so much time without coming to see you, it’s just never easy to come here,” he takes a deep breath and then releases it “But I’ll try to come from time to time. With the hope that you both have forgiven me for how things happened. I know that nothing I say can or will bring you back, I can only hope that the both of you are resting in peace and that on the day I make it to the afterlife, you would have forgiven me for how things happened”
He has a lot to say but doesn’t know how to express himself, he wants to tell them about the new light in his life. The one that gets him to smile without even having to try. He wants to tell them that he has tasted happiness and contentment now but a part of him is scared to even say these words out loud because deep down, he still feels like he does not deserve to have anything good going for him…but if his mother and little brother are angry at him for what happened then surely he wouldn’t have anything good going for him, right? Or maybe he’s just trying to grasp at hope where there is none.
He finally gets up and prepares to leave. What he’s not expecting is to find when he turns is someone standing behind him, a face that he never thought he would ever see again and now she’s right here,in front of him, looking at him and it takes a moment for him to register what is happening and get over the shock of seeing her standing right in front of him after her disappearance “Gail?”