The Persistence of Memory

Chapter Twenty Two

"I can't, Aidan." I push at him again but feel weaker and more exhausted by the second. His fingers stroke me as his mouth kisses me, his voice whispering promises between kisses that make me weaker still. "Aidan, stop, please, I can't." I sob harder and I feel pathetic for it.

When he comes round in front of me and pushes his body into me I feel completely powerless. If he picked me up and carried me out of this house with him I'd let him. I feel boneless. Spineless.

He grips my face and pushes his mouth onto mine, his tongue seeking mine in deep desperate kisses that melt me against him, that pull me inside him, licking, scraping, tasting. He consumes my as his fingers milk my body, heating me, wetting me.

"Don't do this, please," he groans. "I need you. I can't lose you, not again." His words are quiet and mumbled and I don't understand them all but when I hear the sound of him unbuckling his belt my mind comes alive again. Oh, dear god. No.

"Aidan, stop. Stop it. No." I push him as hard as I can and he steps back from me the look on his face betrayal, as though I've hurt him. But he's breathing hard and is undeniably aroused. I feel guiltier still for wanting him. Right here and now.

I wipe at my eyes and nose and fold my arms across my chest. "Please just go now. He'll be back soon and you can't be here, Aidan, please. I need you to go."

He looks at me with such betrayal then I feel suffocated from it. "That's what you need?" He asks, cold. "For me to leave you alone?"

I bite back another wave of pathetic tears. "I need to talk to my husband, Aidan. Something I should have done long ago. For that, I need you to go. Please."

He says nothing for such a long time. Hours of us staring at each other. Hours of thick silence punched through with pain. Finally, he nods, running his hand over his mouth and beard as he looks around the room.

When he looks back at me he looks stronger. "Then I'll do what you need me to do, Eloise. I'll go. I'll leave you alone."

He lets out a breath before walking back over to lift his bags. He slides on his sunglasses and glances back at me, obviously waiting for me to say something more. I don't even know where to start. If I started I'd never stop.

"I'm so sorry." Is what I say. A fresh set of tears squeeze out of my eyes as the words leave my mouth. He's leaving. I can't breathe. I feel like I'm suffocating. Choking on tears and guilt and heartache.

"Me too. Me fucking too," he says simply. He hooks his bags over his shoulders, turns from me and then he's gone.

The second I hear the door close I collapse onto the floor and cry my eyes out for ten solid minutes. When I'm empty (or emptier) I stand and go upstairs to shower, dress and wait for my husband.

I lose track of how long I sit there. Picking at the skin around my fingers until it stings and throbs. It's comforting. Though the pain on the outside doesn't come close to what's inside. I feel like something heavy and black is lying at the pit of my stomach and if I tried to stand it would be a struggle. It started the second Aidan left this house and seems to have been slowly gaining mass.

I feel like I'm being pulled in a thousand different directions; back to London, back to New York, some yurt in Outer Mongolia where I'd never need to think about any of this again. There's a clock ticking somewhere in this massive wooden room but I don't know where. He's been gone too long. Hours definitely. Perhaps he decided he didn't understand after all and that he was done with me. What would I do then? I know exactly what I'd do then. I'd go to Aidan, fall on my knees and beg him to forgive me.