How Much I Love by Marie Force

Chapter 23

MARCUS

Rehab sucks. All we do is talk, talk, talk all day long about our problems, our feelings, our addictions. I’m so sick of talking and listening to other people I don’t care about go on endlessly about shit that doesn’t matter.

In the meantime, I’m acutely aware of time getting away from me where Dee is concerned. It’s been more than a year since I fucked it all up, and that’s a lot of time for someone like her to build a new life for herself that doesn’t include me.

Desperation, the likes of which I haven’t felt since I first came to in that hotel room in Vegas and learned I married the wrong woman, has overtaken me in the last two days. I have to get out of here. And I have to get out now.

After another group session, I return to my room and get my wallet from under my mattress. I jam it into my pocket and go to the front office to request my daily allotment of five minutes with my phone.

I sign for the phone and go to the main lobby to check my messages. There’s one from my sister, another from my mother and two from friends, all checking on me, letting me know they’re thinking of me, etc. I appreciate the support from the people in my life, but the only person I truly care about is the one I haven’t heard from in far too long.

I wait for my opportunity, and it appears in the form of a UPS man arriving with two big boxes that distract the receptionist and give me the chance to walk out the main door without anyone seeing me go.

Once I clear the parking lot right outside the facility, I take off running for the main road, stopping only to summon an Uber that will take me to my sister’s. I need someone to talk to, and Bianca is my first choice.

In the Uber, I vibrate with tension. The desperation is so intense that it makes it hard for me to breathe or swallow or do anything other than stare out the window at the familiar city. Where is she? Home with her parents or back in New York?

All at once, I remember that we used to be able to track each other’s phones. What if Dee never turned that off?

I find her in my contacts and click on the info button, waiting with breathless anticipation for it to tell me where she is.

What the fuck is she doing in Scottsdale, Arizona?

Because I can’t wait the fifteen minutes it’ll take to get to Bianca’s, I call her.

“Marcus? How are you?”

“Why is Dee in Arizona?” Her long pause sends my heart rate soaring. There’s an excellent chance I’m going to stroke out any second. “Bianca! What is she doing there?”

“She’s met someone else, Marcus.”

“No, she hasn’t. There is no one else for her but me.”

“You have to listen to me.”

My head begins to pound, and my mouth goes dry. “I don’t want to hear this, and how do you even know that, anyway?”

“Maria posted something on Facebook.”

I put the call on speaker and fumble around on my phone until I find my Facebook app. I search for Maria and click on her name. Sure enough, the first post is a picture of Dee with some dark-haired guy, the two of them smiling like fools.

So happy for my sweet sister, Dee, and her new love, Dr. Wyatt! You two are so cute together! No one deserves to be happy more than you guys do. Xoxo

I’m having a heart attack. Dee has got someone else. The guy’s a doctor, and even someone who’s not into guys can see he’s a good-looking dude. But more than anything, the blissed-out expression on Dee’s face is what hits me the hardest.

I’ve never seen her look at me the way she’s looking at him.

“Marcus.”

I’ve all but forgotten I was on the phone with Bianca.

“Are you there?”

“I’m here.”

“Did you see the post?”

“Yeah.”

“What can I do for you?”

“I’m on my way to your house.”

“Marcus! What’re you doing? You can’t just leave rehab.”

“I just did.”

“I’m not at home, but Tara is there. She’s staying with me for a while. I’m in the Keys for Destiny’s bachelorette.”

Fucking great… Bianca’s best friend from forever has always had a massive crush on me that I couldn’t do a damned thing about because my sister would’ve neutered me if I so much as looked at the girl.

Tara is the last thing I need right now, but since I can’t very well hide out at my place until I figure out my next move, I don’t redirect the driver. I’m such a fucking mess that I’m sure Tara will feel only pity when she sees me for the first time in a couple of years.

Besides, she’s probably moved on, too. Everyone does.

“Do you want me to come home, Marcus?” Bianca asks.

“No. Don’t do that.”

“I’m worried about you.”

“I’m okay.” I say what she needs to hear because I don’t want to interrupt her good time.

She promises to check on me later, and we end the call.

I’m sure she’s texting everyone we know to let them know I’ve busted out of rehab and am not in a reasonable frame of mind. There was a time I would’ve cared about people knowing my business. That time is long in the past now.

I stare at the picture of Dee and her “new love,” Wyatt. I hate the guy on sight. What right does he have to look at her that way? I want to call Dee and tell her she’s making a huge mistake with him, but I can’t do that because I’ve still got the presence of mind to know she isn’t the one who made the huge mistake.

And then I’m sobbing in deep, gulping wails that has the driver watching me in the rearview mirror, probably concerned for his safety.

The worst part of realizing your life is a fucking disaster is knowing you have only yourself to blame for the wreckage scattered all around you.

“You all right, man?” the driver asks.

“Yeah, sorry. Got some bad news.”

“Condolences.”

“Thank you.”

The bad news is the love of my life, the one whose heart I shattered by marrying a woman who meant nothing to me, has found someone else to love. I’ve been blessed not to have much experience with grief in my life, but that’s the only word I can think of to describe the awful feeling that’s sunk its claws so deep inside me, I might never be able to rid myself of it. You don’t move on from this kind of pain. It’s permanent.

I’m sadder than I’ve ever been while I continue to stare at the photo of Dee and Wyatt as if I don’t already have every detail memorized.

Dee has someone else. Dee is in love with someone else. She’s never coming back to me. There’s nothing I can do or say to fix things with her, and suddenly, there’s no point to rehab. It was all for her. Everything was for her.

What does it say about how fucked up everything is that even in the fog of grief and despair, I’m able to recognize this as the lowest point in my entire life? This is worse than everything that’s come before. Knowing I have no hope with Dee is a kick in the gut that takes the breath right out of me.

As long as she was out there somewhere, I had hope. But now, knowing she’s moved on and is happy with someone else…

I’m done.

The Uber drops me at Bianca’s complex, but I lack the energy to walk up the two flights of stairs to her place. I fall onto a bench out front that has no protection from the blisteringly hot sun that beats down on me. I can’t find it in me to care that I might be getting badly sunburned. What does that matter?

What does anything matter?

I have no idea how long I sit roasting on that bench before someone says my name. I pull myself out of the pits of despair and look up at Tara gazing down at me, brows knitted in confusion. She’s holding a brown bag, and her light blonde hair is up in a bun.

“What’re you doing here?”

“I, uh… I don’t have anywhere else to go.”

“Does Bianca know you’re here?”

“Yeah.”

“Do you want to come in?”

I don’t. Not really, but what else can I do? Broil in the sun until I have a third-degree sunburn to add to my litany of problems? “I guess so.”

She extends her free hand to help me up. “Come on.”

I take a good long look at her hand before I raise mine to take it, hoping I’m not replacing one set of problems with another by letting her, of all people, help me.