The Gamble, Book 3

Chapter 10

Soundtrack: So far away by Avenged Sevenfold

Reid

My eyes scanned the article that had popped up on my newsfeed. One about the girl's having arrived in London ready to record their new album and taking a moment to look back on their tour. I was about to close the screen when my eyes caught something in small writing at the bottom.

Click here to read our other story. Payton Corbett and Mark Rowe have split?!

My heart stopped as I read that last line. I blinked, rubbing my eyes, barely believing what I was seeing. They'd split up? No, surely the link was pure clickbait, most were especially regarding relationships. I'd lost count how many times they had used our relationship as clickbait, same with Lydia and Hannah's. It was something that came with the territory, but I took the bait and clicked.

I stared at my screen for what seemed like hours, to the point words blurred together. Statements in the article from both of them confirming their split, saying how they cared for each other but agreed it was for the best — a mutual separation with no hatred or resentment.

With the article was a handful of pictures of her and Mark during the tour. In the images, they looked so happy, the way we used to be. But equally, I knew a picture was just a snapshot. They could speak a thousand words, but it would never give you the full story.

I had no intention of asking her to take me back right now, but it certainly made me feel easier about calling her to talk through things. And it gave me a little hope that the talk may lead to the possibility of a future for us.

My sessions with Dr. Booth had been going well. We'd hit the subject of the miscarriage a couple of weeks ago, and he'd doubled up my sessions for that. It was hard, dredging it all up to the surface again, having to relive it all and beyond what I'd told Caleb.

I was slowly healing from it, the best you could after something like that. We'd gone through an exercise where I wrote a letter to our would-be boy, before sealing it up. I tucked the message into a small blue box, with the Iron Man symbol on, and buried it. It was like a funeral, a chance to say goodbye properly and Caleb had popped over for a couple of days to help me with that. He had also offered to call Payton for me, but I asked him not too. I had to say goodbye in my way, and she had to say goodbye in her way. Eventually, maybe we could say goodbye together.

I still wanted kids, but it scared me. I realized when I'd told Payton we could try again, I'd said it for all the wrong reasons. I said it because I thought it would ease the grief and fill the void. I felt I could hold on to her because it felt like having a baby was the only way to keep her home. I realized that was wrong, and the decision to have another should be one discussed by both of us, calmly, not during an argument where emotions ran riot.

And that's where I realized where Payton and I had gone wrong the most. We stopped talking. We just argued. We ended having those brief conversations where we asked how the other was and spoke honestly. We didn't cry together, laugh together, or comfort each other. We started lying, saying we were okay and moving on from it. All the emotions bubbled up to an argument, coming out at the wrong time, in the wrong way.

I stared at my phone, her number open on my screen. She'd of been in London for five day's now, it was Thursday evening, and they got here Sunday night.

I didn't want to disrupt her focus, but equally, sitting here waiting was slowly killing me. Before I could stop myself, I was hitting the call button. I couldn't wait anymore, especially as I knew she was a mere half-hour drive from me. It was almost like I could feel her near me.