24. W I L K S

TWENTY-FOUR

W I L K S

“Look at what you’ve done now, Mark!” Sarah abruptly stands up from her chair once Chelsie slams the door shut. “What’s wrong with you?” she cries out. “Why would you say that?!”

“I… I don’t know.” Mark stumbles over his words as he pushes himself away from the table. “I wasn’t thinking.”

“Yeah, that’s bloody obvious!” she snaps. “You weren’t thinking, and now look what’s happened. You went and opened up your big gob and completely spoiled the night.”

Mark stands up, rubbing a tired hand over the creases in his forehead. All the while, I’m left stuck in my seat, watching as this catastrophe unfolds in front of my very eyes.

“Tonight was meant to make things better between us three, not worse. You took it too far!” Sarah continues to egg him on. “Not to mention you were rude to our guest.”

This is so uncomfortable.

“I know… I know…” Mark uses his hands to soothe her until his remorse lands upon me. “Listen, Gary,” he says solemnly. “I’m sorry, son. I shouldn’t have spoken to you that way. That was wrong of me, and I?—”

“It’s alright.” I hold up my hand, cutting his apology short. Truthfully, I don’t need to hear it. I’m not mad or offended. If anything, I’m not hurting for me, I’m hurting for her…

Nothing pains me more than seeing my girl with tears in her eyes. It’s enough to light a fire under my ass as I push myself away from this table. “I’m going to go and talk to her,” I tell the two of them, making a beeline towards the door.

“No.” Sarah beats me to it, clutching onto the door handle with all her might. “I will.”

Huh?

“Nope. I’m the one that needs to go.” Mark stops her before she can twist it open. “Not you.”

“Excuse me?” She places both hands on her hips, visibly unamused by his choice of words— yet again . “I’m her Mum!”

“And I’m the one that made a bollocking of everything!” he counters. “Now, let me go!”

Without skipping a beat, the two begin arguing simultaneously, so much so that I can hardly understand a single word coming from their mouths.

This is ridiculous—this fighting is doing nothing. Nothing while she is out there, hurting, alone .

I have to put an end to this.

“Oi!” My captain's voice comes out of nowhere, silencing the two of them in an instant as they jolt back in surprise. “Like I said…” I clear my throat, making way to step in front of the door and clutch the handle. “I’m going to be the one that talks to her. Alright?”

Frantically, they look back at one another, weighing up my remark, though it’s Sarah who’s the first to jump back in. “I’m sorry, Gary, but I really think that we should be the ones to?—”

“ Go ,” Mark interjects, gesturing with a tilt of his chin for me to go through the door.

“Mark!” Sarah hisses.

“He’s right. He should be the one to talk to her. Not us. Chelsie has probably had enough of us for the night. So let him, Sarah.” He looks down at her for a sense of reassurance. “ Please .”

It feels like it takes forever, but after a moment, receptive to the plan, Sarah nods, settling on Mark’s simple word of “ go ”.

I’m quick to rush out of the house with the syllable, and without a jacket, the brisk outdoor air sends shivers down my spine.

“Shit.” I rub along my arms in an attempt to warm myself up, yet it does absolutely nothing to appease me. Instead, I pick up my pace, weaving through the largest garden known to man—known to England. Mark wasn’t joking when he said that this was the epitome of Windsor Castle in Hull. It is.

The Windsor family property is astonishingly large. It’s hard to believe that Chelsie grew up here. That this was the place she called home. There’s nothing humble about this place, but everything about her is.

I use the moonlight that beams down from above to help guide me through the grass and toward a quiet hill. I don’t blame Chelsie for running off. A part of me wanted to as well, though I never would’ve. I made a promise to be there for her no matter what. And so even if her mum and dad wanted to spend the whole night belittling me, I would’ve let them because it wasn't them that I showed up for, it was her.

It’ll always be her.

The girl that now comes into view, sitting beside a quaint pond with her knees brought up towards her chest while her head rests on top.

“ Chelsie !” I shout, picking up my pace, this distance between us slowly killing me by the second.

“Gary?” She turns over her shoulder, surprise ridden all over her face. “I uh… was just about to come back.” She attempts to stand, wiping away her tears with the backside of her palm in the process. “I swear I was coming. I was?—”

“No, you weren’t.” I see right through her little white lie as I plop myself beside her, bringing her back down with me in the process. “But that’s okay, baby girl.” I help to wipe away a few stray tears. “No one expected you to come back.”

There’s a sense of calm between us as she exhales and stares up at the night sky. I’ve never seen her in this light before. I’ve never seen her cry like this before. Everything in this moment feels new— different .

“I shouldn’t have left you alone in there,” her voice is quiet and full of remorse. “I’m so sorry, Gary. I just didn’t know what to do.”

“Hey.” I tilt her chin in my direction, drawing her in close. “It’s okay, baby. You don’t need to apologize. Had you not run off, I wouldn’t have just gotten a front-row seat to both of your parents panicking like headless chickens.”

She sniffles, though a faint smile aches to break free from her lips. “Headless chickens?”

“Precisely. Would you like me to demonstrate?” I ask. “ Oh my gosh. We upset Chelsie. We need to apologize. What did you do!? ” I’m left obnoxiously mocking her parents before she can even agree in an attempt to force a laugh out of her.

It does.

God. I want to hear that every hour, every day, forever.

“Would you like me to continue?” I laugh along with her, brushing away her tears one by one.

She shakes her head once more before resting them back onto her knees. “Why are you always such a goof, Gary Wilkinson?” she asks with wide eyes.

I reach for her face. “Because being a goof makes you smile… and your smile, I’d do anything, be anything for, baby girl.”

Her face softens under my touch as I’m compelled to find the strength to keep going.

“Which includes your boyfriend. You do know that, right ?”

Chelsie swallows—hard. It's as if she knows exactly what I’m about to bring up. You know, the troubling question of why, when we were with my family, we weren’t a couple, but now that we’re with hers, we are?

I don’t get it.

I don’t understand it.

I’m trying to let her guide the way, but Christ, I’m being spun in a million and one directions here.

Are we together? Are we not? I can’t play this game anymore.

“Gary,” she stumbles as she says my name. “I… I’m sorry, I just?—”

“Do you like me, Chelsie?” I cut her off, taking the liberty to ask the blunt questions for a change.

She looks at me as if I’ve just grown two heads. “Like you?” she sputters. “That's a silly thing to ask, don’t you think?”

“Not really,” I protest, leaning back onto my hands. “I mean, it’s quite a simple question. Do you like me, yes or no?”

She narrows in on her stare, raising her voice ever so slightly. “Why would you even ask me that, Gary? Of course I like you. I wouldn’t have brought you here if I didn’t.”

“Fine then,” I straighten my spine, ready to rephrase the question. “Answer me this instead. Do you want to be with me?”

“Be with you?”

“Yes, be with me,” I repeat. “And no, I don’t mean to be around me. I mean be with me, as in my girlfriend. Like, be with me because you can’t stand being without me. That’s what I want to know, Chelsie. That’s what I need you to tell me. Do you want to be with me?”

With a slow, controlled shake of her head, she stands up, dusting off the grass that clings to her dampened skirt. “You make it all sound so simple.”

I’m quick to my feet, stopping her before she can walk away.

“It’s because it is simple,” I debate. “I want you, Chelsie. I want everything about you. I have from the moment I first laid eyes on you. See how simple that was? It’s simple because it’s how I feel. It’s you, Chels. It’s only ever going to be you. How do you feel about me?”

She aches to break away from me again, stumbling backward. “I… I can’t do this. I really can’t have this conversation. I’m sorry.”

For a moment I let her go, allowing her to turn around and make her way slowly back up the hill, but my patience wears thin as I shout out, “I don’t want to keep doing this, Chelsie. I can't keep doing this.”

She comes to a stop and slowly, she turns around. “Keep doing this? What do you mean by that?”

“I can’t be in this in-between with you anymore,” I admit. “I want to work at your pace… I’ve been trying to work at your pace, but Christ, I feel like I’m giving all of myself to someone who won’t give me that in return. It’s killing me.”

“And don’t you think it’s killing me too?” Chelsie stomps her way back down the hill. “I don’t want to keep doing this to you either, Gary. It makes me feel terrible!”

“Then talk to me!” I tell her. “Tell me what’s holding you back!”

“What’s holding me back?”

“Yes! Tell me, please, because I’m dying here for just a slither inside your mind. One you won’t seem to let me into?—”

“I'm broken, Gary,” she cries out, cutting me off as she rubs her face in distress.

Everything around us goes silent.

“You want the truth, then there it is. I’m broken. I’m so broken that I’m afraid of committing to you. I’m afraid because the last time I trusted someone, I…” Her voice breaks down just like the tears as they come streaming down her face, and all at once, she struggles to breathe.

“Chelsie…” I’m left soothing her body as she trembles in my arms. I’m kissing her hair repeatedly, but she doesn’t stop. Instead, she pulls back, forcing herself away.

“It had been going on for months. Months , Gary, and I didn't know what to do. I thought that he loved me, he told me he loved me! But then something in him would switch, and suddenly, he’d become this different person. I was so afraid of him, and the last time it happened, it…” she can barely finish her sentence. “It… it was here… it was right here.”

There’s an absolute hole in my heart as her eyes guide me toward the greenhouse at the end of the lot, where I can’t help but notice a single shattered pane.

The hole is no bigger than that of a fist, and as I watch the fear fill Chelsie’s eyes, I’m taken back. Taken back to a moment in time, where I knew something was wrong—the day I walked in on her and Simon.

Simon.

“He hurt you,” I can hardly say the three words without feeling completely sick to my stomach, though nothing pains me more than the way Chelsie doesn’t deny them.

It breaks a part of me watching her so broken. Watching the way the tears she’s trying so hard to fight against pool down her face and soak her neck. I would give any part of me if it meant that it’d make her whole, though I fear it goes way deeper than that.

All I know is this, and this, I can’t hold out on any longer. “I’m going to fucking kill him,” I say between clenched teeth, fists bawled up so firmly that my knuckles have turned stark white. “I’m going to find him, and I’m going to fucking kill him.”

“Gary, no!” Chelsie attempts to pull back on my arm as I charge my way forward, but she’s unsuccessful. I’m on a mission. I’m going to find this son of a bitch and completely ruin him for ever thinking to have laid a hand on my girl.

He’s dead .

The world goes mute with each step up the hill. My mind tunes out her pleas until, all at once, she shouts, “ I want you, Gary !”

I halt.

I stop.

I turn back around slowly, where I’m met with a desperate look on her face. “ Please ,” Chelsie whispers. “I—I want you, Gary. I do, just… don’t go,” she cries. “You promised you’d be here for me. You promised.”

It only takes a matter of a few steps before I’m back down the hill and wrapping her into my arms, whispering a promise that I’ll stay. That I won’t go.

She’s all that matters .

“My parents don’t know, Gary,” she hiccups. “They don’t know that that’s what's why I left him… why I came to Crawley… why I?—”

“Took a break from school.” Everything starts to make sense—her truth unraveling in front of me. All the discourse leads back to him.

“Yes.” There’s a look of shame ridden along her face. “That’s why. I thought leaving would mean he’d leave me alone. But he found me, and now he’s tormenting me any way he can. I’m scared he’s going to tell my parents where I am and?—”

“Hey.” I kiss her forehead, cutting her spiraling thoughts short as I pull her safely into my arms.

Seeing her like this makes me go weak in the knees. How could anyone do this to her? There’s no one more perfect in this world, and seeing her crumble beneath me is what a stab wound to the heart must feel like.

“You’re okay now,” I murmur into her hair. “You hear me? I will never, and I mean never, allow anything to ever happen to you again. Do you understand that, Chelsie?” I pull back but steady my hands on her arms, looking her directly in the eyes as I repeat an unbreakable promise. “I will never, ever hurt you. You can trust me. Please tell me you know that. Please, baby girl.”

“I know, Gary. Trust me, I know.” She continues to wipe away the residual tears. “I’ve always known. I just… have been too afraid to admit it.”

“You’re safe with me,” I whisper, pulling her back in tight. “I promise that you’ll always be safe with me.”

For a while, we stay together. It takes some time for her tense frame to settle, her breathing to relax, and her face to free itself from all the redness it once possessed, but eventually it does, and the feeling of her soothed heartbeat brings a smile to my face.

“I want to be with you, Gary,” now she’s the one to look into my eyes as she whispers, “ I do. I want you. All of you. I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to finally tell you that, but it’s true. It’s you.”

Hearing those words come from her mouth is like finally receiving the one thing you’ve been waiting for your whole life—a gift. My girl . It’s like after all this waiting, I’m getting the one thing I’ve always believed in— love , and just like I suspected, it came when I least expected it…

“Kiss me.” Chelsie guides my lips downwards, dragging me in close. I melt into her, kissing as if we’re one because, somehow after this conversation, we are.

“Take the lead, Gary,” she murmurs into my mouth. “ I want you to take the lead .”