Joni Mitchell: Both Sides Now
"Josh I don't know what to tell you, he hasn't been home for a week. Not even to see Kaya, although Niall keeps asking for pictures of the baby so I guess he is missing her... you know better something than nothing.", the babe was asleep and I was back to moping at the kitchen island. A recurring sight in this household.
"I'm coming to London, Thea. I will be there for you during this, it's not something you'll go through alone, whichever way it ends.", the amount of relief I felt upon hearing Josh's news was overbearing.
"That's so kind of you Josh, really. I won't even object, not that it would make a difference. I think my old flat is empty so I'll check with the owners and see if they'd be willing to rent it to you.", when I hung up with Josh I realized that I didn't have any friends in London. At least not friends of my own... every single one of the people I relied on here was somehow connected to Harry. Josh was the only one I could talk to about the mess I'd suddenly found myself the center of. The door opened and scared me to death because I wasn't expecting anyone to come, let alone Harry.
"I came for a change of clothes, but we also need to have a word.", as I watched him climb the stairs to the bedroom I thought about how his voice didn't sound like his, it seemed foreign to me.
"I was thinking we should come up with a schedule for Kaya. Maybe I could spend weekends with her and you have her during the week.", we hadn't been separated for a full week and he was already talking about visitation rights... it didn't make a bit of sense to me. It wasn't like Harry to do something like this.
"That's it? We're just going to give up on us?", he turned to face the floor and I lost all hope of having a proper discussion about this.
"I don't know what to do Thea, this is a new situation for me as well. This hasn't been the way it's supposed to be for a while now and I feel like a bit of time apart could do us both good. Maybe you can go to Niall's for the weekends, and I'll try to find a place to stay during the week, so we both don't impose.", his words hurt more than a ton of bricks smashing into me at once could ever hurt me.
"I'll stay with Josh... he's coming to London this week to help out. Niall is your friend and this is your house so I think it's best if I just look for a place of my own, that could fit both Kaya and I.", Harry shook his head lightly and it was obvious that this wasn't easy for him either, but none of this was my idea to begin with so I couldn't really wrap my mind around him just giving up.
"This is our house and you don't have to do that. You and Kaya will stay here. I didn't mean for any of this to happen, teacup. Believe me.", hearing him use that fucking nickname broke me on the inside and I knew that one more word would be enough to fall apart in front of him.
"Kaya's about to wake up from her nap so you need to go.", I walked over to the front door and opened it for him.
"Love, don't-", a tear rolled off my cheek, "Don't, Harry. Just go.".
I couldn't understand how things changed between us so fast. One minute we were happy and in love and the next we were barely talking and he was setting up weekend visits with our daughter. What the hell did I miss? Was it really possible to go from loving someone so deeply and intensely to quitting cold? Was I a fool to believe what we had would last a lifetime? After I put Kaya down I cracked open a bottle of wine and climbed up to the music room, the room that reminded me of all the good times as well as the bad ones. Harry always gravitates towards music, when things are going swell he writes because he's happy and when things go sideways he writes to release his emotions into the world. There was a record that he forgot to put back into its cover, Joni Mitchell. I sat on the floor, by the piano and let Joni's voice consume me. 'I've looked at love from both sides now / From give and take, and still somehow / It's love's illusions I recall / I really don't know love at all', she sang as tears fell down my face. Did I know love? Kaya wasn't a mistake, I wouldn't think that in a million years... but, did I dive head-first into a sea of emotions so strong, ignoring the fear that was essentially there to stop me from making mistakes that would hurt me? I'd do whatever it took to provide my baby girl with a childhood she wouldn't want to forget, that was something I was certain of. I didn't want to do it alone, I never imagined myself a single mother and no amount of time would make that fact sting any less. My hand reached for the old wooden table, in hopes of helping me get up from the floor and try sleeping the day off. The drawer opened after a simple, unintentional, pull and I noticed an envelope with Harry's writing on it. A letter addressed to Kaya. Would I go to hell if I read this? Who am I kidding, I don't even believe in hell!
'Dear Kaya, my baby girl.
You've not arrived into this world while I write you this letter. You're currently in your Mummy's tummy, growing your lungs and becoming stronger by the minute. I don't even know how to start this without telling you how much I already love you. This letter will hopefully be something nice for you to read in a moment of need.
Let me begin by telling you about me and your Mum. We met one Christmas Eve, a while ago. She walked through a crowd of people wearing a beautiful red dress. She wasn't very comfortable in it, since she kept tugging at the ends, trying to make it appear longer. But, darling, she looked fantastic. As soon as I saw her I knew I had to come up to her and start up a conversation, somehow. Luckily, Uncle Josh left her at the bar alone and I made my move. She had the most angelic voice (unlike the one she'll use to yell at us when we're messing up the living room with your toys or the one she'll probably use on you when you become a rowdy teenager) and her smile immediately mesmerized me. I got pulled away by someone that knew me and I lost sight of her... what a terrible moment that was. Just when I'd thought I lost her; I spotted a tall blond woman – your Mum – staring at her phone screen intently. She was watching Love Actually, my favorite film, at a party filled with hundreds of people that danced and laughed. 'This is too much to be a coincidence', I thought. I managed to convince her to let me watch it with her... we talked and we laughed, we even cried during one of the scenes (guess which one, sugar) and it was the loveliest Christmas Eve I could've had while away from Gran and Auntie Gemma.', I was already in tears and I hadn't even made it through the first paragraph.
'The next time I saw her was when she and Uncle Josh came over to a house I owned in California (it wasn't far from where we went for every one of your spring breaks growing up). We spent the entire evening laughing and talking about our musical favorites... you know how much I love to talk about music, don't you? That was the night I decided I needed her to stay in my life. You see, it was quite odd for me to take a liking to someone I met by chance, but your Mummy was so captivating I couldn't let her slip away. We became really good friends even though we lived on opposite sides of the country. We'd talk on the phone every day and we'd send each other cute messages, she travelled to Los Angeles to see me a few times. Every time she'd leave I kept thinking about how incredible it felt to make her laugh, to see her happy. One of my most brilliant ideas (don't listen to what Mum has to say about it, trust your Dad on this one) was to take her to New York to see U2 in concert. Oh, Kaya, she absolutely loved that! You should've seen her face when Bono greeted us, priceless! That was the night I knew I'd started falling in love with her. There was nothing I could've done to stop it. We had a bit of trouble with finding each other and confessing our feelings, but when she moved to London we got together and we've been together ever since.', saying we had a bit of trouble was putting it mildly, but I guess not even Harry could've seen this coming... not even mere months ago.
'You'll probably get mad at your Mum sometimes, which is okay. When people love each other it's quite normal they get upset with each other every once in a while. Never let it be longer than an hour, please. You Mum is the most incredible person I know, besides you. Mum loves with her whole heart, even though it takes her a while to say so. Mum adores dancing in the kitchen, but she'd never admit it. Mum is kind and gentle, you don't remember all the times she worried about you and nursed you back to sleep when you were just a tiny baby. Let these words be a reminder that she deserves your love more than she deserves your anger.', my soft cries turned into loud sobs... I'd never felt this desperate in my life.
'I remember the day she told me you were in her belly... just a little Blob (that's how we called you until we picked your name). That was the happiest day of my life, knowing we created a new life, someone that we'll get to see grow, that we'll raise and help become a wonderful human, someone that we'll love forever. Always remain true to yourself, my dear Kaya, and remember to treat everyone with kindness and compassion (just like your Mum does) because you never know what someone's going through.
I love you, forever and always,
Dad.'.
My crying only stopped after I realized I'd wake the baby if I continued sobbing in my bed, with her sleeping over on Harry's side. Reading his letter to Kaya was maybe wrong of me, but it made me certain that I would not be giving up so easily. Not when my entire life was at stake, not when I knew there was nobody I could love more than I love Harry. Not after I got a glimpse into what life without him looks like and it shook me to my core. I may have been timid about my feelings in the beginning of our relationship but I grew out of my shell and I learned the importance of sharing. What I said to Gemma when we first met, that every relationship has three sides: mine, his and the truth, echoed in my mind. My side was that he shut me out, pulled away and kept to himself without considering my feelings or the fact we now had a daughter. His side was probably that he was struggling and didn't know what to do with all the negative emotions running trough his body so he followed the first instinct that kicked in – to run away. Now the truth was a bit more complex: neither of us was to blame but, at the same time, we were both guilty in terms of only thinking about ourselves in this equation. I should've insisted he share what was bothering him the moment I noticed a shift in his behavior. I should never have let it go that far and I definitely should not have blown up on him like I did. Harry needed to start practicing what he used to preach to me, back in the beginning. There was no way for me to know what was going on in that head of his and his mistake was not allowing me a look inside. It wouldn't be perfect, but we couldn't keep making the same mistake. And we certainly couldn't give up on the love we built and worked hard on.
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A/N: this was heartbreaking to write, and there's more where this came from!
Quarantine updates: I watched Collateral, a British limited series on Netflix and I *highly* recommend it. Also, I've been super into The Good Doctor lately. What have you been doing? Lots of love from me!
TPWK, always.
T.