Fool for Love

Disclaimers: These characters were created entirely by me. Please do not use them or repost this story without permission. This story features dark themes, mildly naughty language and a loving and sexual relationship between women.

Do you believe in miracles?  I never did before, but now I’m not so sure.  I’ve searched my brain over and over and I can’t come up with any other rational explanation for the direction my life has taken recently.  I wasn’t looking for a miracle.  I wasn’t expecting it.  I sure as hell didn’t deserve it, but there it was, all the same.  So call it what you will --- destiny, fate, kismet.  For now, I’ll stick with “miracle.”

It was just another New Year’s Eve when it happened.  Like I did every year, I had made plans to hang out at my friend Ron’s place.  We would play a few hands of poker, drink a few pitchers of margaritas, and watch Dick Clark ring in the new year on television.  I had hoped I would have plans with someone special this time around, but that was before I had gone and trashed the one good thing in my otherwise sorry life.

Faith and I hadn’t spoken to each other in months.  We hadn’t even laid eyes on each other since she drove away and left me standing alone in a gloomy, grimy parking lot.  I was certain that our relationship had ended that night.  After everything I had said and done, I didn’t think there was any chance Faith could ever forgive me.

One day, when I knew she would be at work, I had gone back to the little house we had shared.  All of my stuff was exactly where I had left it, but none of it seemed to belong there anymore.  Everything looked so foreign and alien that it was hard to believe I had ever lived there.  As quickly as I could, I packed up everything I owned.  It didn’t take long to fill a couple of suitcases and a few boxes.

My favorite photograph of the two of us was still on the nightstand next to my side of the bed.  It was a picture of me and Faith, taken when we were very much in love.  My arms were wrapped around her waist and we were squinting into the sun while the vast, blue Pacific stretched toward the horizon behind us.  We were smiling.  I couldn’t remember the last time I had smiled.

Sadness and regret nearly overwhelmed me as I stared at the happy couple.  How had it all gone so wrong?  How could a love that had seemed so true grow cold and die so quickly?  Oh, I still loved Faith with all my heart and soul.  Make no mistake about that.  But I didn’t even dare to dream that she might hold even a flickering memory of love for me.  No, I had already seen that light go out in her eyes and it killed me to know that I was the cause of that. 

I was surprised she had kept the picture.  Actually, I was surprised that she hadn’t disposed of my stuff in a great, big, cathartic bonfire in the backyard.  It looked, though, like she had kept everything just as it was before.  It almost looked like she was half-expecting me to come home at any moment.  I just knew that wasn’t the case.  I figured she was too disgusted with me to even bother touching any of my junk.  I’m such an idiot sometimes.  Looking back on it now, the scene in the house probably should have been my first clue.

Still, I was determined to move out of her home and her life.  I was going to excise myself from Faith the way a surgeon might cut out a cancerous tumor.  With a heavy sigh, I laid the photograph face down on the nightstand and left my key on top of it.  My jaw ached from clenching my teeth so tightly, but I knew that I wouldn’t be able to hold back the tears if I relaxed for a split second.  I grabbed my bags and my boxes and got the hell out.

I stayed with a co-worker for a few weeks until I could find a place of my own.  It wasn’t the first time I had resigned myself to sleep on someone else’s couch.  Hopefully, it will be the last.  Eventually, I found an apartment downtown that I could afford.  It was in a crappy, depressing neighborhood, but I was in a crappy, depressing mood.  I figured we were made for each other.

I never even bothered to unpack.  My bed was a sleeping bag on the floor.  My dining room table --- a board balanced across a pair of milk crates.  I existed in that dark, dank apartment for several months.  Notice I said “existed” and not “lived.”  I doubt what I was doing could be considered living.  That was okay with me, though.  The monotony of my life numbed the pain.

Christmas came and went.  My only nod to the holiday came in the form of a drooping poinsettia that I had picked up at work.  Then, before I realized it, it was New Year’s Eve.  Like I mentioned earlier, I had planned to drive up the coast to spend the weekend with an old friend.

My car keys were in my hand and I had one foot out the door when the phone rang.  I almost didn’t answer it.  No one ever called me, so I didn’t think it could possibly be important.  Most of the time it was just someone who had dialed a wrong number.  Apparently, my home number was very similar to the number for a nearby adult video store.

The phone continued to ring.  I thought it might be Ron calling to tell me to pick something up on my way to his place, so I decided to answer it after all.  That turned out to be one of the most fateful decisions of my life.

“Hello,” I said, lifting the receiver to my ear.

No one answered me.

“Hello?” I repeated, a bit peevishly.  I was about to tell my silent caller exactly where to stick his or her phone when a familiar voice spoke.

“I’m sorry.” Faith’s voice was husky, as if she’d been crying.

I was stunned speechless.  I didn’t even know how she had found me.  Before I could recover my wits, she went on.

“Kara, please don’t hang up,” she pleaded.  “I love you.  Meet me at our beach.  If you’re not there by midnight, I’ll know it’s over.”

She hung up without waiting for my reply.  It was just as well.  I was completely incapable of uttering a sound.  Actually, I was completely incapable of a single coherent thought.  Dumbfounded, I stared at the buzzing receiver in my hand.  My head spun as I tried to process what had just happened.

Faith had called me.  My Faith.  And she loved me.  Even after all these months, even after all the incredibly stupid things I had done, she loved me.  A thought began to poke insistently at my scrambled brain.  What if there are things that aren’t up to me to decide?  What if some things just are, no matter how hard I try to screw them up?

I was a fool.  A complete, utter, bona fide fool.  I had jumped to the conclusion that Faith wanted nothing more to do with me.  Then, based on that obviously incorrect assumption, I had decided that we were through and there was nothing I could do to save what we had.  And because I had been too busy wallowing in my own self-pity, it had never occurred to me to ask Faith what she wanted. 

The nasal whine of the dial tone jerked me away from my epiphany and reminded me that I still had the phone in my hand.  Carefully, I dropped the receiver back in its cradle.  My mind kept replaying Faith’s words over and over again.  She wanted me to meet her at midnight at our beach --- the place where we had met.  I checked my watch.  It was just after 7:30.  I called Ron and told him I wasn’t coming, that I had to go find my angel instead.  I think he thought I had finally gone insane.  Who knows? Maybe I had.

With more hope in my heart than I had ever felt, I dashed out of my apartment and jumped into my car.  As I entered the freeway and headed towards the beach, I fervently prayed that I wasn’t dreaming.  Traffic was a nightmare.  All of the real nuts hit the road on New Year’s Eve, but I didn’t care.  Faith was waiting for me and no force on the Earth was going to keep me from finding her before midnight.