After Xander had called Elijah out about his preference for threesomes that night, Elijah had shared a different sort of conversation with Logan.
After they had left X-hale.
It had been quite interesting and truthfully, it had left Elijah anticipating their next chance encounter. He hadn’t expected to see Logan and Samantha so soon after that conversation, but his change of plans on Sunday had prompted him to contact Logan rather than put it off.
He had been given a chance at something he was certainly interested in and he had failed. Knowing Logan’s reputation, Elijah hadn’t actually expected a second chance after he had disappeared on them last night. When he woke up that morning, he had thought he had some time to think it through before he contacted Logan again.
Then he found out that his next trip had been cancelled.
The moment he learned about his change of plans, Elijah had manned up and placed the call. Unfortunately, he had been greeted by Logan’s voicemail. He wasn’t quite sure what to expect from Logan, or if the man would even call him back, but now that Elijah had apologized, he felt a measure of relief.
When he pulled into his driveway several minutes later, he didn’t bother glancing around at the exterior of his single story brick house. He knew what he would find if he did. The yard was immaculate, the shrubbery and the grass kept trimmed and neat. There were several trees and well-placed lights along the driveway and that was usually all he noticed, if even that. Elijah paid a company to maintain his yard weekly, mainly because he didn’t care enough to deal with it.
If life hadn’t been so incredibly cruel, Elijah would’ve been coming home to his wife. But that hadn’t been the case for the last four years because Beth was dead. His beautiful, vivacious wife had died after a long, brutal battle with cancer, leaving him with a heavy heart that still beat with her memory.
Had Beth still been alive, she would have insisted that they maintain the yard themselves. Then again, if Beth were still alive, the gardens around the house would’ve been brimming with bright flowers that she would’ve planted herself and Elijah would’ve been home long before dark, business be damned.
But, he was coming home to an empty house. Just like he had each and every night for the last four years.
Once he was parked alongside the garage, he shut off the engine and stared out into the night. He glanced over at the garage door as he sat there. He could have parked inside the garage, but that would have meant he needed to remove the multitude of boxes that still remained there. Rows of cardboard stacked on the cold concrete, collecting dust after all these years.
The boxes were full of Beth’s things. The things his mother and his sister had helped him to pack up just two years ago in an attempt to help him move forward. Not move on, because they all knew that would never happen.
He hadn’t thought it possible, but it had helped. A little.
Taking a deep breath, he opened the door, climbed out of his car and then made his way into the house.
Elijah yanked at his tie as he made his way through the dimly lit rooms, ignoring everything around him. The inside was much like the outside. It was maintained by someone he paid to keep it clean and dust free. Aside from the furniture, the only things to remind him of his beautiful wife were pictures that lined the mantle on the fireplace that was never used. Other than that, the place was cold. Sterile.
Nothing like the home he’d had when Beth had been alive.
Habit had him twisting his wedding band around and around on his finger as he made his way to the bathroom.
Although Beth had been gone for years, Elijah still missed her. Terribly. He thought about her all the time and yes, he even talked to her. Talking to her made him feel better. It was the fact that she couldn’t talk back that hurt so much.
Beth had pleaded with him for months before she died, begging him to go on with his life once she was gone, to find someone who would make him happy. Someone he could love.
“I need to know that you’ll take care of yourself,” Beth said through a watery smile. Elijah knew she held her tears at bay because of him. She was so damn brave, it broke his heart.
“I’ll keep moving along,” he told her, squeezing her hand gently. “I can promise you that.”
“Promise me that you’ll find a way to be happy,” Beth had rasped. “I don’t want to leave you all alone.”
“I won’t be alone,” he lied.
“I know that,” she told him. “You’ve got your family. They’ll take good care of you. But that’s not what I mean and you know it. You’re young, Eli. You deserve to be happy. You deserve to find someone who will love you as much as I do.”