Tobias
I looked down at the amber fluid that was filled in my tumbler, I swirled the drink around with my hazy sight. I knew I was on the verge of being drunk, my chest was heated and I was losing control but right now that's what I needed. I needed a moment to not have to feel anything, I couldn't go on feeling the brokenness in my heart from losing her.
She'd left me.
The woman I loved more than life itself, the woman I thought I would never have to go a day without, the woman I craved with every fiber in my body and the woman I would have given the world to if she asked me to.
The pain I was feeling was like nothing I had ever felt before, it was torturous and I felt myself completely breaking. The world around me was collapsing and there was nothing I could do about it. She left me already and I couldn't do a thing to change it.
My heart was shattered, my mind was running, and my whole body was breaking at the seams. It hurt and the hurt wasn't stopping.
The last few drinks were supposed to slow the pain, it was supposed to decrease it, it was supposed to make it all go away. But nothing could stop the heartache filling my whole entirety. She's gone and I can't get her back.
I replayed every word she wrote in that letter, I felt the tear ridden pages on my fingertips as if my fingers couldn't forget the way that they felt and I remembered the look of the pages, the tears that smudged each paragraph. But I couldn't understand it, if it hurt so much to write the letter then why did she leave? Why is she putting me through this? How can I believe the words she wrote and the tears she cried if she still left me?
All these questions swarmed my mind as my head fell into my unoccupied hand, my elbow was rested on the bar and I could see a figure to the left of me but all my body was in tuned to was the sounds of my heartbreak. Nothing else around me mattered, I didn't even know how I found myself here with a sixth glass of whiskey, maybe eighth who knows at this point, I had lost count. I just knew that every time a tear-filled my eye the bartender brought me another drink.
I wouldn't talk, I wouldn't tell him my darkest of secrets, I wouldn't look to the bartender to be my therapist for the night. How could I? How could I speak the words that I never wanted to say out loud? The love of my life has left me and I don't even know why.
Saying it out loud makes it real, makes the feeling in my heart real, makes the feeling in my chest real and makes the glass in front of me filled with this liquid poison real. She was really gone.
How didn't I see it coming? How didn't I hear the words she never said? Why didn't I listen to the goodbyes she was telling me? Why didn't I realise that her persistent I love you's were a goodbye? Why didn't I really hear her when she said promise me you'll never forget?
Fuck the promise. She doesn't even love me, if she did she would have told me, we would have talked it over and got to a conclusion. We would have dealt with it together. That's what love is right?
Or maybe I just have this twisted idea of what love is, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe not having a mother around to show me what love really was made me think this way. Maybe having a father and brother that hate me for being born did this to me. Maybe I'm the problem, no-one ever loved me or showed me how to love so how could Monroe love me if my family couldn't?
I felt the tears begin to pool in my eyes once more as I finally took in the sights around me, I was alone at a bar with a few of the locals sitting in their booths, the only person around was the bartender. He looked at me with an unreadable look on his face as he continued to clean the glasses, I gave him a non-verbal plea for another glass as I shot back the last of the amber coloured liquid.
He put the glass down and walked nearer to me, he leaned over the bar and looked around to make sure no-one could hear him. "You really think you need another one?"
I looked down at the number glasses sitting in front of me before he skillfully picked them up in two hands and moved them from my sight. I knew what he was doing, he had left them out for me to see my own self-destruction.
He walked back over to me, his hands were now free. "I know every local that comes in and out of those doors, and you definitely aren't one of our regulars. So, either you came here looking for someone, or you came here to drink your sorrows away. And from those tears in your eyes, I assume it's the latter. Word of advice, talk. You probably won't ever walk through those doors and will ever have to see my face again, what have you got to lose?"
"I've already lost everything."
I can't even look him in the eye but I can tell he isn't showing any pity, he's just listening and right now that's probably what I needed most.
"I don't know what happened. One day we were so in love and the next she left me. I went away to Rome for four days and I come back to find her gone. I've never felt a love live this before and maybe if I did things differently she would still be here. Maybe, I pushed her too hard. Maybe, I was believing that I saw all these feelings from her that weren't really there."
He continued to listen as I spoke to no-one in particular, I was just speaking my mind, my cold hard truth. "I love her, I really love her and I don't understand what happened. I mean, we didn't meet in the most conventional way but the way she looked at me -" I scoffed.
"The way I thought she looked at me, I thought I saw love in her eyes. She left and she's never coming back. She left me with all of these memories of the two of us and a broken heart that can only be fixed by her. I feel like I'm missing a part of my soul that I'll never feel again."
I felt a tear threatening to escape my eye but I quickly wiped it away with the back of my hand. "I have all of these questions that I may never have the answer to."
I shook my head feeling the hurt bubble in my chest as the drinks began to wear off. "Was I not enough? Did she ever love me? Did she go back to him? Why did she leave me?"
I looked up at the bartender and I saw the sunken look on his face, he really was listening to me as I poured out my deepest darkest thoughts.
"I think I can answer those questions for you, Tobias."
Both our heads whipped to the sound of a familiar voice and immediately I felt anger rile up within me as I saw who it was. I had only ever seen him once, heard him once but I knew enough about him to know that this was the man that Monroe was fearful of, the man that broke the final parts of her that were already cracked by her parents. He broke my Monroe and I hated him with everything.
"What fuck are you doing here, Chase?"
He walked over to me in his crisp three-piece navy suit and a long black jacket over the top. I felt my blood boil and my hands curl painfully into a fist as he walked closer with a smug yet venomous look on his face.
He nodded over to the bartender and then the bartender looked at me with a quirked eyebrow as if he had already put the pieces together. "Bartender, please get me a scotch. We're celebrating."
He said with a smug sing-songy voice and the bartender - whom I still didn't know his name - looked over to me with a look on his face that said is he fucking serious?
"First of all Mr. Bigshot, this is my bar and I serve whoever I want to serve. So, either you keep it down and let the locals enjoy their night or pipe down."
He chuckled animatedly before nodding his head and sitting next to me. The bartender rolled his eyes before looking to me again. "You okay over here, buddy?"
He looked me dead in my eyes telling me that he had my back all the way, and I had just met the guy. "Yeah. We're all good."
I said before he started walking away, he paused and looked back over to me. "If you need anything, I'll be right over there."
I could tell by the fierce look in his eyes that he meant every word. I nodded my head before turning back over to the man that I felt every bit of hatred for. "Now. I'm going to ask you one more time. What the fuck are you doing here?"
My voice was angry with everything that I was already feeling. I needed someone to blame and it was definitely him. I could tell by the words that had already come out of his mouth and the smugness on his face that he had a hand in Monroe's abrupt absence.
He smirked at me before shaking his wrist to expose the Rolex sitting snugly around his wrist and then looking back up at me. "I'm here to answer your questions, Mr. Wrexler. As Monroe doesn't want to be near you anymore, she decided to tell me to deliver a few messages."
He tilted his head to the side, and I knew from the cocky grin on his face that he was lying, I scoffed at his words. "Why are you really here?" He began to maniacally chuckle.
"I told you I want to answer your questions about my wife. I think you deserve some clarity on what's been going on. I mean, me and her, we talked about it and I'm willing to forgive her misstep, well - her mistake as she called it. She wanted to get back at me for all the hurt I put her through. Hence, you."
I scoffed once more. "She wanted to get away from you. She told me everything about you, your cheating, your manipulations, the abuse. I know everything about you, Chase Bishop."
I spoke in a venomous voice as I spewed the poison, I knew I shouldn't have been speaking those words but I needed something to hit him with.
"But those weren't the only things she told me. We talked about anything, and everything. That's what you do when you love each other. I know she loves me."
I spoke so confidently as I tried to push the doubts out of my mind. "Is that what she told you? Because she told me that you said it first and she felt obligated to say it back to keep up with the charade."
I felt my anger begin to rile up again as I went through the memories of our time together and recollected the moment I told her. The only way he could know that I told her first was if she told him but he's lying, right? He has to be lying.
"She told me how manipulative you can be and how you twisted her mind. I know everything that you're saying is bullshit and you're just trying to get into my head, Chase."
He puts his hands up in surrender with a shocked look on your face. "Look, Tobias honestly, I'm just here to clear things up."
His voice began to soften as he slowly put his hands down and his head slowly bowed with him as he began to play with his wedding band. He began to look downcast.
"I know, I hurt her in the past, even in the present I've done things that I will never forgive myself for. But when I heard that she had someone new, my heart broke and I had never felt a pain like that before in my life.
But then she came back to me and I promised her that I would do everything to make this right again and she's forgiving me. I just don't want you to hate her, because she never meant to hurt you. I mean, I was in your position -" he puts his hand on my shoulder and I find myself listening to him as he looked up at me in grief.
"- feeling my heart tear completely through my chest. I needed her back and I was doing everything out of anger and hurt. I just wanted my wife back, I even broke up with Luxe to get her back."
He leaned back on his barstool and looked over at the drinks with a sad look on his face. I almost felt sorry for the guy but then he immediately showed me why I shouldn't.
"As I said, I just don't want you to hate her but she was never serious about you."
His demeanor began to change once more, as I began to see his manipulations. The smirk began to grow on his face as I watched his shoulders rollback. It was as if the curtains had been closed and his performance of a lifetime was over, he looked at his watch once more.
"I can see the doubt on your face, and I know it's crazy all of this being told to you by me. But honestly, she doesn't want to be near you. I want you to see the truth, that she never loved you. So, maybe you can get some closure. Neither of us deserved the pain she inflicted on us."
I felt my blood begin to boil once more as I tried to block out all of his words, I hated him with everything. He took the woman I loved from me and I just couldn't understand it, she went back to him.
In all of the theories I had, my main one was that she would never go back to him but she did. She went back to the man that cheated on her, mentally abused her, forced her into the shell of the woman she is today, and physically hurt her. She went back to the man that never ever loved her, not like how I did.
"I don't want your fucking closure. I know you did something to her to make her come back to you and I will find out what it is and you'll pay for everything that you have done to her. And she'll be back where she belongs, with me. With someone that knows how to love her in the right way, treat her in the way she deserves and give her the life that she's always dreamed of. Fuck. Your. Closure. Don't come near me again."
He begins to smile once more as I begin to storm out. "Oh, bartender." He says in that smug sing-songy voice once more. "Could you put on the TV, please? And pass me the remote kind sir. There's something I want to watch, I think your buddy here needs to see it."
I slowly turned back around feeling my fists clench once more, I watched as the bartender cautiously handed him the remote to the flatscreen sitting in front of us. And then I saw her.
My eyes went wide and my breath hitched as I saw my beautiful woman, on the tv in front of a well-known entertainment reporter. I slowly walked towards the TV, she looked so damn beautiful and I couldn't take my eyes off of her until I heard their conversation begin.
"We were together for three years, then married for five. And to answer your next question, well I'd like to say that I let him be him. I'm not a controlling wife and I let him do what he wants, because we are our own people even if we are in a marriage."
"You let him do what he wants? I'm sure the people in the audience and the people at home want to know exactly what you're talking about so could you clarify it for us. Because, we have sources that say you are in an open marriage, is that true?"
"Well, I'm not sure who your source is but they might want to do some more digging."
"So, I take that as a no then?"
"Chase and I don't believe in sharing our significant other. There are loads of people who do it but our marriage isn't like that. We may have had problems in the past but infidelity wasn't one of them. He's my one and only and I am his."
I felt a blow to my heart as she spoke so confidentally, I couldn't even see any faults in her eyes. She didn't falter, she didn't cower, she was telling the truth.
"Okay okay, so you guys are proving to be the most perfect couple we have come across. But we have one more rumor we need to clear up." I began to hear my ears ring as the audience chanted my name, I walked closer to the TV in a complete trancelike state.
The TV host began to talk to someone off the stage, but I had completely blocked her out until I heard.
"...we were told by a very good source that there was a solo photoshoot where he took very candid photos of you and the sparks were exploding between the two of you. We wanted to hear the words from the woman herself."
I gulped as I felt my heart race a little faster. Please tell them baby, please tell the truth. Tell them you love me, baby. Tell them that we love each other.
I felt a single angry and desperate tear fall down my face as the host spoke to someone off stage. My ears continued to block her out until the cameras panned onto my beautiful Monroe. Tell them, baby I'm begging you.
And that's when I heard it. My world came crashing down around me and I felt a world of hurt plummet through my body.
"He's an amazing photographer but I don't even know him."
My heart was broken, my head was spinning, my anger was taking over my body and I felt every emotion take over me.
I needed to hit something, I needed to smash something, I needed to numb the pain in my chest that was spreading through my body like wildfire.
Then I saw his smug fucking face, he had a devious smirk on his stupid face and I knew he was my target. He took everything that meant something to me away and he deserved all of my anger.
I stalked back over to him and his hands went up once more in surrender. "I told you she never loved you."
And that was all I needed to surge adrenaline through my body and pull back my arm before swinging my arm and crashing my first into the side of his face.
His face whipped to the side as a bruise immediately grew on his cheek and he fell straight to the floor holding his face. His face began to swell, he started to spit out blood before I stood my body over his.
I grabbed ahold of his collar, winding my arm back before punching him in that same cheek once more. I didn't let go of his collar. I lent down closer to him before finally speaking the lasts words I ever wanted to have to say to him.
"She's so much fucking better than you. She deserves better than you."