Page 44 of One Vow

“Maybe being married to me won’t be so bad.” Her sigh was long and deep. “Really? Finn, come on. She let you leave. She wanted you to go. I love that you still love her. It’s probably the most endearing thing about you, but I will be a good wife.”

Of course, she would. Beth Cooper didn’t do anything halfway. There would be dinner on the table every night at seven. We would have the right friends. We would have kids who would be the smartest and best behaved. There’d be sex at regular intervals, enough to be satisfying, but not too much because why bother? Life with Beth Cooper wouldn’t be a hardship, except for the fact I was going to love Felicity Fields for the rest of my life.

And I lost her. Not like the last time when I thought I was doing something for her, when I had a plan to come back and be the man she needed me to be. But then life happened, and I never made it back to Maine. And at some point, the dream of us faded.

Until Beth came around. Until being engaged to Beth made every minute of my day and every thought in my head filter back to Felicity.

“Beth, do you really want to be married to someone you don’t love?”

She chuckled. Actually looked into my eyes and chuckled. “Where has love gotten you, Finn?”

She waved her hand in front of us. “Tell me how good you feel about love right now. You’re here with me instead of with her, a her who signed the divorce papers. A her who let you walk out of her life with another woman driving the metaphorical car that was taking you away. Tell me how loving her has made your life complete.”

Like the sarcastic smartass she’d always been, Beth checked her watch. When I didn’t speak, she added an eye roll and dropped her wrist to her lap. “That’s what I thought. Now, go shower off the ex and get gorgeous because we are going to get dinner.”

I didn’t feel like eating dinner. I didn’t feel like doing more than climbing into bed, covering my head with a pillow to mourn the death of my relationship with Felicity. But I showered and changed because I had to play Beth’s game until I could figure a way out that would not result in those videos resurfacing.

One Decade Ago

My apartment was every shade of blue in the color palette. Pillows, the sofa, the walls, the carpet. Whoever designed this place also has a mad love for denim. The sofa fabric, a rag rug, and the curtains all looked like someone has taken pairs of old worn jeans, sewed them together, and covered my cushions and windows. It was a lot of blue. Especially when counting the backing on the divorce papers sitting on the table.

Irreconcilable differences. Whatever the fuck that meant. Not that I didn’t understand. It didn’t fit was all.

I still had the money, most of it anyway, and I could pay her father back. I would lose my scholarship. Could kiss medical school goodbye. But I’d have Felicity back where she belonged. In my arms. With me. In my bed.

Or…I could finish school. I could become a doctor, pay back the money her father gave me, then go to her and show her I’m a man who had to be enough to deserve her before he came back. And if not enough, at least more than he was when he left.

Neither option gave me the warm fuzzies. So, like the best of all good decision makers, I flipped a coin. Heads: back to Maine. Tails: get the degree, then the girl.

Tails.

Then it was “two out of three.” Then “three out of five.” And “five out of seven.” I flipped tails so many times I thought to check the very ordinary quarter to make sure it wasn’t some rogue two-tailed mistake that hadn’t been caught by the US Mint. Nope. Nothing radical in the coin.

It didn’t stop me from flinging it at the wall, embedding it in the sheetrock.

I tried that damned coin, one like it since I couldn’t get that one out of the wall, every day for a month. After class. Before class. When I awoke from a particularly wet dream about Lis. If I said heads signaled that I would go back to her, I always threw tails. If I said tails, I threw heads. Finally, I gave up.

If the universe, her dad, and an entire college chancellery didn’t want us together, not to mention the woman herself who’d sent divorce paperwork, who was I to argue?

I pulled the papers off the top of the refrigerator where I’d outta-sight-outta-minded them and took a bottle of cheap vodka from the freezer then sat at the table in front of my second-hand Xbox. I was 22 and divorced. Kicked out of my choice of college. And a coin toss that didn’t give a shit about my broken heart. I took two long swigs from the bottle before I could open the envelope. Another before I picked up a pen. Then with both eyes, I signed on the respondent line. Initialed each page. Signed again.

Then I curled into a ball and cried like I’d just lost my best friend.

By morning, I was ankle-deep in feelings. And hanging so far over, my chin had road rash and if I had to look into a light, my head would’ve exploded. And, of course, I had my Human Structure and Function class, then Clinical Skills Foundations. First, learn the body then learn how to treat it. And because I lost the girl of my dreams and the only chance I would ever have of getting her back was to become a doctor, I downed a Gatorade, stuffed my books into my bag, and left for class. Some day, I’d be able to look at Lis and not see disappointment. The alternative was unacceptable.

On the way to class, I stopped by the bank, had the papers notarized, dropped the divorce papers into a mailbox, and sent them back to Felicity. I’d let her go for now, but one day…

14

Felicity

The brisk cold air bit me as I walked, maybe stomped was more accurate, to my dad’s. I rehearsed what I would say, the angry words, the accusations, I planned to hit him with. The how could you’s and the why’s and the are you freaking kidding me’s.

He’d done it out of love. I knew that. Everything my dad had done in my entire life had been out of love. From the pony at my fifth birthday party to taking a job at my dream college so I would be able to get the education we both wanted me to have.

I flung his front door open as much from anger as because it was nine degrees outside and I’d just walked what felt like a thousand miles against the wind and I needed heat. I didn’t just want to sit in front of his fireplace to give him hell, I needed to sit in front of the fireplace so I could warm up enough to have the discussion we needed to have.

“Dad!” Not in the kitchen, living room, office, or bedroom. Not home at all. “Shit.”