Keep Bleeding Love

1|| THE FACES OF REGRET- THE ONE WHO LET GO

MARC

"Hello!"

"Hello! May I speak with Marc Andrews, please?"

"This is he. Who's this?"

"Hi, Marc! My name is Rick Williams. I'm calling on behalf of Mrs. Aya Waldon. Is it a perfect time to call you now?"

My heart stopped when the voice from the other line mentioned Aya. I've been desperately wanting to contact her. The last time I saw her was five years ago in the cemetery. I deserved the reaction she gave me after that night I left her ten years ago. The night I made the greatest mistake of my life.

"Mrs. Aya Waldon, you said?" A piercing pain crept into my chest, repeating an unfamiliar name for the Aya I know.

"Yes, Mrs. Aya Waldon. She was the Aya who lived with you when her parents died when she was ten. She informed me the last time you guys saw each other was in the Brooklyn cemetery five years ago?"

"Yes, yes. I know, Aya. Is she okay?"

"She is very well. Thank you. She has a message for you."

***

I immediately said yes when Rick told me over the phone that Aya wanted to meet me. However, anxiety replaced my excitement when I agreed to this meeting a month ago. Rick asked permission to leave our table after receiving a message on his phone that Aya was on her way to meet us.

Reality sunk into me. It is my chance to ask for her forgiveness. If she allowed, I would like to explain to her what came to me that night. The night I left her alone, in tears, begging me to stay. That night kept on haunting me up to this day. The night I made the mistake of letting go of an exceptional woman. A mistake I will forever regret. How can I tell her that the fear I felt when I heard she was pregnant was so intense? That I didn't get the chance to think right. Instead, I acted on impulse. I let my fear of being 19, an undergraduate, and a dependent asshole to my parents overpower my love for her. It was too late when I realized what I had done. She was gone when I returned a day after sobering up from deep drunkenness.

There was no trace of her. I kept driving around the same area where I had left her for one month. Hoping to find her, wishing to get her back and bring her home with our child, my child. There was never a day that I didn't think about them. Finally, a year after, my parents told me she had called them. She apologized for leaving without saying goodbye. She thanked them and assured them she was okay.

"Aya called. She just wanted to let us know she was okay. She found an aunt that took her in." These were my mom's exact words. I cried in my room that day. My tears were both sorrow and joy. Grief knowing that she took my words to heart, left and moved away. A confirmation that she was okay gave me great joy. At that moment, I challenged myself to better my life so I would deserve her when we saw each other again. I promised myself I would be the best father Aya could give our child. I lived the succeeding four years of my life, fuelled by that desire. 

When I am better, I will find you and our child. 

Five years later, I got a call from the gardener I contracted to maintain my parent's and her parent's burial site. "A woman is visiting; she is crying." My heart leaped with excitement and eagerness to reach the cemetery in a flash. For the whole 20 minutes that I drove from my office to the Brooklyn cemetery, I only thought of her and imagined her face.