Chapter 21
I was in my painting shack, sitting on my stool staring at a blank canvas. It was late at night and I should probably have been in bed right now, trying to fall asleep, but I'd found myself walking over here.
And now I was just sitting down, staring at nothing.
I'd been thinking about painting all afternoon long.
Lexi had given me her art as a birthday present. So I'd been thinking that maybe I should give her mine too.
But what should I paint for her?
My chest? That would probably make her happy. But then, I didn't think that would be something she could hang anywhere.
At least, for the good of my own mental health.
It also felt like if I did a six feet tall portrait of her as a present, she would not be happy. It didn't feel like she was the kind of person that wanted to see her face staring back at her every time she turned a corner in her home. She didn't draw herself. At least, I hadn't seen anything in the art work she had shared with me.
People often did self portrait, but hers were nowhere to be found. That was another thing interesting about her. I was pretty sure Doctor Boseman would have a very psychoanalytic response as to why she did that.
I didn't do auto portraits either. I was aware that I was good looking. But I'd hated myself for so long that I didn't really care about that. Anyway, I had no powers over my looks, so it felt vain and futile to be proud of that or to boast yourself because of that.
So, I was still at a stand still. What was I supposed to paint for my girlfriend that would be a suitable birthday present?
I really didn't want to have to resort to painting my chest.
I swivelled a few more times on my stool, staring at the ceiling, hoping I could find an answer there, when my phone rang.
I smiled before even looking at the caller ID. I knew who was calling me in the middle of the night.
I answered, "Missing me already?"
"Always."
I had been about to say something silly, but her tone stopped me.
"What is it Pumpkin?"
"Nothing..." she trailed, her voice soft.
"So, you're just randomly calling me at two in the morning because you miss the sound of my voice?"
"Yes," she replied feebly.
"Pumpkin," I pressed.
She sighed, and finally explained. "I was putting stuff back in my closet and I found a box with old pictures in it and... I just miss my mom."
"Oh, Pumpkin." My reply was automatic, my heart aching.
We'd talked about this during our date, about memories and her missing her family and how things were before. She tried to tiptoe around mentioning her mom, but the hurt was still evident.
"It just sucks. I wish I could just be angry with her, you know. I wish you'd get like one emotion, and the one I pick for her is anger. I don't want to miss her."
"But unfortunately, you're not Tinkerbell."
"Unfortunately," she answered, chuckling just a tiny bit, but the hurt was still clear in her voice. She'd been crying. Maybe I should have gone over her place tonight. She wouldn't have been alone. "I wish I could just call her and talk to her without feeling like I somehow lose if I do that. Like, if I talk to her, then I forgive her, and if I forgive her she wins," Lexi added.
"There's no winning and losing in this situation though. Just a lot of hurting," I pointed out.
I understood the way Lexi was feeling, but I also understood that sometimes the price to pay for fixing things was to step on your ego.
But Lexi was always the one making the first steps. She'd done it with me too after our... well break up really.
I wished her mother would be the one approaching her first this time. I wished Lexi wouldn't have to be the one extending the olive branch. She'd done it enough.
"I shouldn't miss her. I should be over all of this," she said softly.
I smiled sadly. "Pumpkin, it's barely been two months since your mother left. That's nothing. That's absolutely not enough time to grieve over what happened."
"It just feels like she wins again, you know. Just by missing her, she wins."
"I don't think she thinks she's winning either. You know, regardless of her mistakes, or the decisions she's made, I'm sure she misses you too. I'm sure it's not easy for her either."
"But it was her own decision, so she has no right to complain. She wanted this," she said, the hurt so evident in her voice.
My poor Pumpkin. Still hurting so much. She'd been really good at keeping it in lately. Sometimes I almost forgot how fresh her scars were.
She was much better than me at dealing with loss, whatever she believed.
"I don't think she wanted to destroy your relationship with her. I think you were just collateral damage in her quest for a life that felt more satisfying for her. You said she'd been different ever since she turned forty," I reminded her.
"You're not suppose to take her side, you're supposed to take mine."
I shook my head, uselessly. "I'm not taking her side, I'm just stating the very obvious fact that no one in their right mind would want to lose you and not have you in their lives," I replied and added, "I do sympathize with anyone that had Lexi Grayson in the lives and then lost her. I felt it for like a couple of weeks and it was brutal. I would not recommend."
"You and I, that was different though," she replied.
"Yes, you're right. Because we ended up actually talking things out. You still haven't really talked things out with your mom, I mean, without having it turn into an argument," I reminded her. I was pretty sure the last time she'd talked to her mother was the time I'd been at her house and she'd yelled at her over the phone.
It had not been a pretty conversation.
"Sometimes I'm tired to have to forgive all the time, you know," Lexi said, letting out a soft breath.
"I'm sorry," I answered, feeling like a bad boyfriend.
"Oh, it's okay," Lexi replied automatically, like she'd just realized what she had implied and regretted it.
"No, no, it isn't. You do deserve better cards than the ones you've been handed honestly. And I should have been the one to come up to you an apologize. It's been added to the very long list of things I regret."
"It was the price I was ready to pay to keep you in my life."
"And I'm very grateful that you did it," I told her, though I still felt like I didn't deserve such an honour. "And who knows with your mom. Maybe things will get better in the future. Not tomorrow. Not next week. But eventually."
Lexi sighed. "I wish I could go back in time, but then what could I do? What could I say to make her stay? Nothing. So I'd just want to live in a constant loop of my life before she left."
"Playing the what if game never ends well because there's no what if. There's just what is."
I knew firsthand how useless it was. I'd done it so many times with my brother, blaming myself. Blaming everything and everyone around me.
Thinking about ways things could have gone completely differently.
But all these scenarios never made me happy. They just made me more miserable.
"Uuuuugh," Lexi whined, "All of this really, really sucks, and I wish I hadn't opened that stupid box. I was fine."
I just wish I could do more right now. "Want me to come over?" I asked her.
She sighed again. "No, it's better like this. If you were there I'd get distracted by your chest and completely forget that my mom abandoned me."
I chuckled. "Glad you can still make jokes about my chest in these circumstances."
She chuckled too. "Your chest is my anchor."
"It's the best compliment I've ever gotten."
"Thanks for listening to me," she said, her voice sincere.
"You don't ever have to thank me for that. I'm here for you. Always. Anytime."
"Thank you, Blake," she said, and the added, like an afterthought, "Do you think you can read me something to sleep"
I smiled alone. I wasn't in my room so I didn't have a lot of options here. "I have a book of anatomy for drawing. In French."
"Perfect, that'll be boring enough."
"You think the anatomy of the human body in French is boring?" I replied, trying to feign being appalled.
"Just read, will you," she said, the sound of her tossing in her bed, probably getting more comfortable.
So I complied and started to read.
Half an hour later, all I could hear on the other side of the line was her soft breathing. I didn't dare hanging up.
Instead, I just laid on the small bed, closing the lights, resting my phone beside my ear on the pillow, like it was Lexi there.
In the dark, I found myself thinking about what ifs.
About Lexi and Blake, before everything. Before Lexi's mother left her and before I lost my brother. When we were just two kids that didn't know any better.
How different would things have been if I had grown up here. If this house had felt like home.
If we'd moved here sooner, Jayden would still be alive.
And my life would be completely different. I wondered if I would have loved Lexi just as much if we had met when we were even younger, and if we'd been close friends earlier.
I wondered if I would have taken her for granted the way her own friends seemed to do sometimes.
It was silly for me to think about this. Hadn't I just told Lexi that playing the what if game was useless? But it was easier to tell people what to do rather then do it yourself.
The thing was, I'd wish so many times for us to have been closer earlier. It felt like I'd wasted so many years without her. And with my ticking bomb of a head, I had no idea how much time I still had left.
If only we'd been closer earlier...
I sat up, opening the lights again, and took my phone, putting it against an easel, on speaker mode so I could hear Lexi breathing and stirring on the other side of the line.
I looked at the canvas.
Lexi and Blake before everything.
I could paint that.
_________________
Happy Monday my little Pumpkins! :D
Hope you enjoyed this chapter. Lexi and her mom's relationship is something we never really had a true resolution for, so it's definitely something I plan on exploring here. There are still a lot of things we need to go over with these characters, even after all these years. XD
In other news, this has not been my best writing week. I've been busy. And tired. I had stuff to do almost every evening, so that cut my writing time. So yeah. I'm gonna have to do some catching up if I want to finfish NaNoWriMo. And upload more stories. I don't think I have any plans this week though, aside from working, so that should help.
Yesterday, I went back home with Ève to see one of our best friends. He and his girlfriend just had a baby. Which is like wiiiiiild to me. It's a little girl. That's karma for his hoe years. She's adorable and I already adore her. But it was so fun, because our other best friend and his pregnant girlfriend came over at the same time, and it was just the six of us together, and we share one brain cell when we're together. We always joke that the real love story is between these two boys. The reason why I have so many bromances in my story is probably partly their fault. But yeah, it's just wild because we're all adults now, yet it feels like it was just yesterday we were all together pulling pranks, and going out and making bad decisions. I'm just really really grateful sometimes that I'm this lucky to have such amazing friends. I know not everyone gets that. It makes me think about the moments that inspired this story and these characters. I'm really grateful also, that you guys still enjoy reading about these characters.
Anyway, enough with the mushy stuff and the walk down memory lane. XD
I'll go back to writing now. LOVE YOU GUYS! See you all next week! <3