BURN, BABY, BURN (Pain & Toxicity)
Karen Osaghae@karenosaghae547304
3 months ago
Stephanie looks at me with her tear-filled eyes. I can’t, I just can’t. She’s going to leave me. If I tell her the truth she’d leave. She cannot leave, I love her. What will become of me if she does? Has the truth ever helped anyone? NO!
“Just tell me the truth, goddamnit! You owe me that much, Teddy. Who the hell is she?”
“Who? For the sixth time, Steph, there is no one here.” Denial. Yes, denial always works.
She rolls her eyes as she tries to move past me to go to the kitchen. By my calculation, Brie should have left by now. I follow her into the kitchen just to be sure. She checks the inner store, checks behind the doors, then she opens the door leading to the back. When she sees there’s nothing and no one out there, she walks back to the living room, fuming.
“I saw a woman here when I was entering, Teddy. She was naked. I know what I saw.”
I shake my head sadly at her. Brie, please be gone. “You saw wrong, baby. I have been home alone. As a matter of fact, I feel offended. Does it mean you don’t trust me? All the times you come home late from work, all the times you go to dinners with your colleagues, all the times I leave you home when I travel, not once have I ever accused you of being with someone else. Know why? Because I trust you. And because I love you. When you love a person, you automatically trust that person.”
Another trick in getting out of this kind of situation….guilt tripping. It has always worked for me. Don’t get me wrong, I love Stephanie with everything in me. We have been in love since high school, and it has always been our dream to get married and build a family together. Everything was going great and going as planned until I started getting bored. I guess that is what happens when you’ve been with someone your entire life. I mean, we are practically married, living together and all. Everything bores me out of my mind. I don’t know what went wrong. The late night conversations we used to have that we always looked forward to, is now like a chore. Due to our work schedule, we hardly have free time in the evenings to go out. When I’m free, she’s not….when she’s free, I’m not. It feels like the bond that was there has slowly faded away, and we are holding on to the ghost of what was once there. But I cannot let her go. She’s everything to me.
“Teddy, I am telling you that I know what I saw. Stop trying to gaslight me. A woman was here.”
“Where’s your proof then? Where’s your proof that I am cheating on you?” I shake my head sadly again to further buttress the mood. “After all these years, you don’t trust me. It is indeed sad. Since you are so sure I was with another woman, why don’t we hold off on the wedding while you take time to decide if you still want to get married to me and build a family like we’ve always dreamed of.”
Her eyes widens as she stares at me in shock. “You want us to break up?”
“We cannot live without trust.”
Tears start dropping from her eyes. “No, baby. Stop it, please. We cannot throw away all these years just like that. I admit that I saw wrongly, I was wrong. Forgive me, please.”
Do I feel bad doing this? Yes. But I’m doing this for both of us. She can’t live without me, just as I cannot live without her. We are meant and made for each other.
“But if you continue to doubt me, this relationship will be over before we know it.”
“I promise, I won’t doubt you anymore. You have never given me a reason to mistrust you before now. Forgive me, babe, I had a really stressful day at work so I think I’m just exhausted and seeing things. Forgive me?”
Excellent. I smile widely at her, opening my arms for a hug. “Come here, come give me a hug.” She moves to enter my embrace. “I love you, baby. Don’t ever doubt that.”
“I love you too.”
To be contd📝……
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