More tears rolled down my cheeks and I wanted to both agree and disagree, but I had no idea what the right response was. Which one was worse? He seemed to understand my confusion. "Do you see now, how that doesn't work for me? I don't want to be someone's safety net. I don't want to be there, simply because the idea of me being gone is too...scary."
He placed his hand upon my chest, over my heart. "I want to be someone's everything. I want fire and passion, and love that's returned, equally. I want to be someone's heart." He removed his hand and stared at it. Holding back a sob at the immense loss I felt when his hand pulled away, I stared at it too. "Even if it means breaking my own," he whispered, his accent thick.
With a voice tight with ready to explode emotion, I managed to squeak out, "What are you saying, Denny?"
He sniffed and a couple tears fell from his heavily glistening eyes. "I took the Australia job. I'm going back home in a couple of weeks, once I know you're going to be okay. I'm going back home alone, Kiera."
Then I couldn't control it anymore. Then I did sob. Then I let every emotion I had about Denny and our darkening relationship seep through me, and I knew...I knew that he was right. He should leave. He should find happiness with someone, since he'd never truly find it with me. Not with the turn our relationship had taken. Not with how I'd betrayed him. Not with the fact that even while I was listening to Denny say goodbye, I was wondering where Kellan had gone.
Denny's arms carefully came around me and he swept me up into a tight hug. He cried against me, as I cried against him. He promised that he still loved me and that he'd stay in touch. I'd never lose his friendship, we had too much history for that, but he couldn't be near me. Not as long as I loved someone else. I wanted to assure him that I didn't. I wanted to tell him that I only loved him, and I only wanted to be with him. But it was a lie, and I was done lying, to others and to myself.
I don't know how long he held me. It felt like days. When he pulled away, I tried to hold him tight, but the pain meds had kicked in enough that I was too weak and sleepy to really have much hold on him. It was sort of symbolic and I sort of hated that. He kissed my head as my fingers drifted weakly down his skin.
"I'll be back to check on you tomorrow, okay?" I nodded and he kissed me one last time before turning and leaving.
I watched him stop at the doorway and talk to someone standing where I couldn't see. He looked back to me and then back to the person. He spoke a few soft words and then reached his hand out. He looked to be apologizing. I scrunched my brows, confused, and wondered if the meds were making me loopy as well as tired. Denny gave me a final smile then, and turned away from the person he'd been talking to.
I watched him disappear and my chest seized at the vision of him leaving. I knew this was just the first of many painful breaks he and I would have, the last and most painful, being the final one, when I'd have to watch him leave on a plane again, but permanently this time. I closed my eyes, grateful for a moment that he hadn't done something so stupid that that future would be closed to him. If anything, at least Denny would have a great job that he could find solace in. And I knew that eventually, he'd find a great woman too. God, I hated that thought. But he was right, I'd been holding onto him for the wrong reasons.
A light touch along my cheek roused me from my troubling thoughts. Thinking Denny had returned, my breath caught when I saw Kellan's deep blue eyes gazing at me. His face was a mess - his lip was cut, but pink from healing, his cheek had a pink line across it with a nasty blue/yellow bruise surrounding it and a couple of thin strips of surgical tape holding the healing skin together, his right eye had a taped, healing cut above it as well, and his left eye was so bruised, it was almost black. Between all that and his casted arm, and I'm sure a few taped together ribs, he looked like he'd been put through the ringer...twice.
But my heart still skipped a beat at the sight of him. Literally, I heard it on the annoying monitor beside me. His smile was warm and soft as he sat in the spot Denny had just vacated. I realized then, that he'd been outside the room the whole time, and he'd talked to Denny as he'd left. I wonder if he'd heard our talk, if he knew Denny had broken it off with me.
"Are you okay?" he asked softly, his voice low and husky, and warm with concern.
"I guess," I mumbled. "The pain meds kicked in, and I feel like I weigh a thousand pounds, but I guess I'm going to be fine."
He smiled a little more and shook his head. "That's not what I meant. Believe me, I've talked to about every nurse in here, I know your situation...but, are you okay?" His eyes flicked over to the door and I knew that he did indeed know about Denny. He may have been listening, maybe not, but never the less, he knew.
A tear rolled down my cheek as I looked up at him. "Ask me again in a couple days," I said quietly.
He nodded and bent down to kiss my lips softly. The stupid monitor beside me increased a tad and Kellan looked over at it and laughed softly. "I suppose I shouldn't do that."
As he pulled away, I grabbed his cheek lightly and ran a finger along the bruise under his eye. "Are you okay?"
He grabbed my hand gently and pulled it away from his face. "I'll be fine, Kiera. Don't worry about that right now. I'm just so glad that you're...that you're not..." He swallowed and looked unable to say anything more than that.
He held my hand in both of his and I stroked the skin of his wrist, where it disappeared under his cast. "You and Denny were both here?"
"Of course, we both care about you, Kiera."
I shook my head. "No, I mean, you were both here in the same room, talking calmly when I woke up. You weren't trying to kill each together?"
He smiled wryly and looked away from me. "Once was enough." He looked back to me. "You've been out of it for a couple days. Denny and I...have had several talks." He started to bite his lip and then stopped when that seemed to hurt him. "Those first few talks weren't so...calm." He reached up to stroke some of the hair away from my face. "Our concern for you eventually tempered those conversations and we talked about what to do, instead of what was done."
I started to say something, but Kellan beat me to it. "He told me he took the job in Australia, and when I asked if he'd take you with him...he told me no." He stroked my cheek as more tears flowed down them.
"You knew he was going to break up with me today?"
He nodded and his eyes looked very sad. "I knew he was going to do it soon. When you woke up and he looked at me...I figured he wanted to do it as soon as possible." He looked away from me and his voice got very quiet. "Rip off the Band-Aid...."
His eyes turned speculative as he examined a spot on the floor for a long time. I started to reach for his face again, when he spoke, eyes still on the floor. "What are your plans now, Kiera?"
I startled and dropped my hand. My head suddenly felt like the blow was nothing, my heart was hurting more that that wound ever would. "My plans? I don't... I don't know. School...work..."
You. I wanted to say it, but I knew how horrible it would sound.
He seemed to hear it anyway, and when his eyes turned back to mine, there was a coldness in the blue depths. A coldness I'd seen many times before when I'd hurt him. "And me? Do we just pick up where we left off? Before you left me...again...for him?"
I shut my eyes and willed my body back to unconsciousness. Like always, my body didn't listen. "Kellan..."
"I can't do this anymore, Kiera."
I opened my eyes at the heartbreak in his voice. His eyes were watering now as he gazed at me. "I was going to let you walk away that night. I told you I'd let you go, if that was what you wanted, and when you said...."
He closed his eyes and sighed. "After that, I couldn't even find it in me to lie to Denny when he found us." He opened his eyes and looked down at our hands, his thumb still stroking my skin. "I knew he'd attack me when he heard the truth...but I couldn't fight him back. I'd hurt him so badly, I couldn't find it in me to hurt him physically."
I wanted to hold him so badly it hurt worse than my head. "What we did to him..." he shook his head lightly, his eyes still unfocused as he remembered that night. "He's the nicest guy I've ever known, the closest thing to real family I've ever had, and we turned him into my..." His eyes closed for a moment as pain flashed over his features.
"I think a part of me wanted him to hurt me... " His voice was soft and spoke volumes of where his head had been that night, his guilt and his pain. His eyes came back to mine. "Because of you, because you always chose him. You never really wanted me, and you're all I've ever..."
He swallowed and looked away. "So...now that he's left you, now that the choice isn't yours, do I get you?" He looked back to me and the fury was there again. "Am I your consolation prize?"
My mouth dropped wide open as I gaped at him. Consolation prize? Hardly. He was never second place, I was just scared. Oh god, I was just scared...
I tried to open my mouth to speak, to tell him that everything I did was out of fear. That I pushed him away so many times, because the level of love between us was terrifying to me, trusting him was terrifying, letting go of Denny's comfort was terrifying. I couldn't though. My heavy lips couldn't form the words. I didn't know how to tell him that I was wrong...that we never should have said goodbye in that parking lot.
He nodded as he took in my silence. "That's what I thought." He sighed and dropped his head again. "Kiera...I wish..." He raised his head and looked at me, the anger earlier in his eyes replaced with sadness."I've decided to stay in Seattle." He closed his eyes and shook his head lightly. "You wouldn't believe how much crap Evan gave me for almost leaving the band." He opened his eyes and searched my face, his eyes lingering on the tender spot by my ear. "I never even thought about my band in this whole mess. I hurt them, when they found out I was planning on ditching town." He shook his head sadly and sighed while I struggled with something compelling to say.
Eventually, he sighed softly again and whispered, "I'm sorry." He leaned down again to softly brush our lips together. Exhaling lightly, he kissed along my cheek to my ear. The monitor betrayed my body's reaction to his nearness, to the smell of him, the feel of him, and he sighed as he kissed the soft spot below my ear. Pulling back some, he rested his head against mine. "I'm so sorry, Kiera. I love you...but I can't do this. I need you to move out."
Before I could react to that, before I could sob and tell him no, that I wanted to stay, I wanted to stay and try and work things out, he stood and left the room without a backwards glance.
For the second time that day my heart broke, and I cried so hard, I lulled myself back to sleep.
When I woke up later it was dark outside and my small room was a pale, peaceful green under the softly lit lights. A painting on the wall depicted geese in a V formation, flying south for the winter maybe, and a whiteboard next to it let me know that my night nurse's name was Cindy. I attempted to stretch my body and got both a pleasant relief from my long rested muscles and a dull ache from my head. I finished the cup of now lukewarm water on the table beside me and tried to stand. My muscles at first refused to cooperate. I was stiff and sore from being in the same position for so long, but eventually I won out and ignoring the protest in my brain, stood, unplugged the beeping machine tracking my heartbeat and made my way to the bathroom, dragging the IV bag attached to its movable stand with me.
Once in the bathroom, I was sorry I'd moved. I looked atrocious. My wavy hair was a mess of curls and snarls, and the right side of my face from my eyebrow to my cheekbone was a horrid black and blue color. My eyes were bloodshot from what felt like days of crying, and my face had a permanent look of desolation.
I'd done it. I'd successfully pushed away two wonderful men. My desire to hurt neither of them, ended up hurting them both. I'd pushed Denny into doing something that was so out of character for him, I could barely contemplate it. The look on his face as he'd struck Kellan repeatedly... I'd never have guessed that side of him was in there, buried deep, waiting to explode one day. I suppose we all have our buttons, our triggers that pushed hard enough, would make even the calmest person flip.