We ate breakfast quietly. The time that we spent together at the breakfast table felt so natural; even though it was evident that we both were lost in our own thoughts about what was looming in front of us. It's like he sat beside me and things just felt right. I took a glimpse towards him and I could picture myself spending eternity having breakfast with him every morning of every day of my life. There was nothing strange about him being in the picture despite our circumstances and despite that was the first time he was ever inside my apartment. It felt like he's supposed to be there all along.
At times I felt like my mind playing tricks on me. Though I felt that he has become a big part of me overnight; sadly, I am a pro in the matter of the heart. I should say I am a pro in dealing with a broken heart. Through my past experiences breaking my own heart, I wouldn't let myself drown in the melancholy of what's not going to happen. It took a lot of years and many gallons of tears to know how to keep an expectation in check. Yeah, sadly I had too many runs on this matter.
Despite of what I wanted all along with Nigel, I also knew all along that he wasn't mine to have. Though he told me that his heart belonged to me, in reality - it didn't really matter, did it? I made him mine for one night and it was one night more than I had expected. At times, I didn't know where did I get the strength to live up to all the rules. At times I hated the fact that my mom and dad's noisy chatters about "doing the right thing for the greater goods exceeded your own well-being" still resonates in my ears to this day. Do I know how to sacrifice something for others? Sadly, that's what I am good at. I'm better at doing things for others than doing things for myself. That's me. That's Sabrina Gilmour, the fool who thinks that being a nice girl is okay and she won't finish last.
Nigel looked beautiful sitting there reading the Sunday paper as he sipped coffee and ate the fritata. One thing I loved about him was he didn't shower me with compliments for my food. In fact, he didn't say a word. He chewed and enjoyed it, and he went for more and more. That made me smile. That totally earned brownie points with me. Man, God really made this man for me but gave him to the wrong person.
"How's the fritata?" I asked him as I was curious of what he would say. He kept on chewing and he just nodded and nodded as he read the paper. I chuckled a little.
"Good?" I asked. He nodded again, but this time he turned to see me.
"Terrific." He said. "Reminds me of tortilla de patatas."
"Same thing." I said and smiled. He nodded and kept on chewing enjoying his meal.
"Good job." He said nonchalantly as he took another sip of his coffee.
"Look at this.." He said as he showed me an article on the newspaper. It was a review of the Don Quixote ballet.
"Bobbie is in the cast." I said and smiled. Nigel nodded. "I know..I met her yesterday briefly."
"Isn't she pretty? You have to see her in the show... breathtaking." I said and smiled.
"She must be very good to be playing Dulcinea."
"Is that what she told you?" I asked. "She is playing Sancho Panza."
Nigel laughed out loud. "Sabrina, that is not very nice thing to say about your friend." I laughed too.
"You don't know Bobbie very well, but she would consider it a challenge if she was offered Sancho Panza role."
"That would indeed be a challenge." Nigel said as he laughed.
"Nuh, Bobbie can do anything." I said and smiled.
"You have quite a close knit circle of friends." Nigel said.
"I am lucky that way. I can't imagine life without them."
"Who are you closest to?"
"Mh... I can't say one person in particular." I said. "They all have their own specific function in my life." I said. "I know Victoria the longest and we work together, so I see her the most." I said.
"How about Emma?"
"Emma is like a big sister to me." I smiled. "Though she's about the same age as me." I laughed. "She likes to give me advice because she thinks I'll screw things up."
"Like with you and I.." Nigel said as he nodded his head.
"Yep." I said. "You know."
"Emma and I go way back." Nigel said.
"Does Emma know Marcy well? That's probably why she's so hard on me the other day?"
"Emma hates Marcy." Nigel laughed.
"How come?"
Nigel shrugged his shoulders. "Ask Emma." Nigel smiled.
"You won't tell me?" I asked and poked his stomach.
"Nope. You have to ask Emma."
"Fine, I will."
"Okay... Bobbie and Xandra I only have met them yesterday." Nigel said.
"Bobbie and I get along well. We're more friend in a true sense." I said. "We talk a lot and she's my coffee buddy." I said. "Xandra likes to eat, so she's my foodie friend. We go out to eat and spend a lot of money on food together. See.. everyone has their own function." I said. "But we get along like sisters. All of us. They keep me sane. I'm the ugliest of them all and they still love me."
Nigel laughed out loud. "Darling, you never have to cut yourself down to get a compliment out of me."
"I didn't!" I said defensively. "I feel out of all of them, I'm the ugly duckling."
"Sabrina, I know you are a little crazy, but you really are insane, sweetheart."I laughed and hit him softly.. "Hey! Watch it." I said. Nigel was still laughing in disbelief.
"I can't believe you just said that about yourself."
"Uh, you're biased because you like me." I said.
"I like you? I love you." Nigel said. "I'm madly in love with you and going practically out of my mind because of you."
"Why, Nigel?" I said and shook my head. "I'm not beautiful like Victoria. I'm difficult too on top of everything else. You could have any girl in the world who would put out and didn't give you grief about morals and all those bullshits nobody else seems to care about. You found the one woman that does care to fall in love with." Nigel let out a laugh like he meant to stress that he didn't have any clue as to why either. He then said confirming my hunch, "Beats the hell out of me too, Sabby." He said. "All I knew, you held my hand...our eyes met, the rest is history. You have had me ever since"
"Why didn't you go for Victoria to fall in love with?"
Nigel frowned.. "Why Victoria?"
"Every man wants her."
"I'm not every man." Nigel said. "I wasn't looking for a particular trait on a woman when I fell for you." Nigel said. "I wasn't looking, period." Nigel said. "I just found home in you." I smiled a little. He held my hand over the table. and said.. "You're so beautiful, Sabrina...you have no idea." He said as he kissed my hand.
That was one of the sweetest things a man could ever say to me. Nigel made me feel so beautiful and perfect. The feeling was so terrific. It was just so damn terrific.
We spent a couple more hours talking on the couch as we cuddled. He held me tight inside his embrace almost the whole time. We talked about everything and nothing. There was a time when we didn't say a word to each other and we just savored the moment. If I didn't have this rule, this weekend would have been filled with so much steamy passionate earth shattering sex that would be repeated many many many many times. I imagined the two of us would have utilized every waking moment to inflict all types of euphoric carnal sensation onto each others' bodies. If I didn't have the rule, Nigel and I wouldn't be just laying here on the couch to watch the day fade away. We would have been entwined together, naked as could be. He would have kissed every single inch of my naked body from my head to my toe. His tongue would have been making little circular patterns using my skin as its canvas. I would have grabbed his throbbing expanding manhood by the hand and felt how hard he wanted me. He would have teased my nipples with his kisses until they peaked for him, longing for yet another kiss. If I didn't have the rule, Nigel would have shoved himself inside me over and over, over and over again, pushing crazy thing we called love into me. If I didn't have the rule, I would have screamed his name when I couldn't hold on anymore. If I didn't have the rule, Nigel and I would have laid here sweaty, sticky, and naked for the umpteenth time this morning. If only I didn't have the rule...
Instead, the man that I love was perfectly happy laying fully clothed, next to me. His eyes were bright and clear watching me as he occasionally landed a tiny soft kiss on wherever part of me closest to his lips.
"I want to stay here forever." Nigel said. "Just like this." He said as he snuggled me closer.
"This feels so good, baby." I said. "I don't want this to ever end either."
"God, Sabby... I want you so much." He said as he caressed me and closed his eyes.
I held on to him so strong as we were both shaking from the passion that just spurted out from inside.
After awhile, I couldn't suck it up anymore. My tears fell and I let him go. I got up and I left him there and went to the bathroom and let out a cry.
This has been so hard. This has been so so hard. How could heaven be hell at the same time? Nigel knocked on the bathroom door. I didn't want him to see me cry again. I didn't want to make it even harder for him. Yet when I was sitting on my bathroom floor I knew what we needed to do. We just couldn't torture ourselves like this anymore. We shouldn't continue on with the insanity.
"Sabby...please open the door." Nigel screamed from the outside as he knocked. "Sabrina...please.."
I finally opened the door. Nigel stood there and he just knew. He hugged me and didn't say a word. He didn't ask for an explanation. He did not utter a single word, like he just understood what happened.
I held his hand and led him back to the couch. "We gotta really talk, Nigel." I said.
He nodded..."I was hoping that we could postpone it." He said. He looked out the window slightly.."I had been dreading the sun to come because it means this will end."
I nodded. "Yeah... me too." I said. I looked down at the floor. Nigel sat next to me, and he lifted my chin.."Don't be sad, beautiful." He said. "I'll find a way."
I shook my head. "I don't want to do this anymore." I said. "It felt good but we are torturing ourselves. I feel like I'm torturing you." I said. "I knew you had no way to make it work with what I want. So you need to make it work with someone else that will make it work with you."
He shook his head. "But I don't want someone else."
"But I can't give you what you want." I said.
"What I want is not sex, Sabby." Nigel said. "I want you. If I wanted sex, I want sex with you."
"Nigel.." I said his name in pain. He grabbed my face and looked deep into my eyes.
"Don't you get it?" He asked.
"We can't keep doing this. We're hurting ourselves, and this is still wrong what we are doing."
He exhaled... "What would you have me do?"
I shook my head.. "I don't know."
We dazed for a little bit. I started to laugh thinking about this scenario we were in.
"It's really funny. I get the humor totally." Nigel said sarcastically.
"Hahaha... I felt like I'm Anne Boleyn." I said. Nigel cracked a smile.
"Yeah, pretty much." He said. "You're about to make me annul my marriage and denounce the church."
"Hahaha..." I laughed. "And you would behead me in no time."
"That, I wouldn't do." Nigel said. "Killing is not my game." He said.
"I'm just saying what's in line with history." I said. I changed my expression almost instantly.. "But, Nigel... I am really pulling an Anne Boleyn on you." I said.
Nigel looked at me and his mouth gaped a little.
"Sorry." I said. "I can't do this until you really are available."
He kept on looking at me with his mouth gaping open. Then he closed it and he nodded a couple of times.
"Will you wait for me?" Nigel said.
I sat there and didn't say a word. How could I wait? She wouldn't divorce him and she may live till she's ninety. How would I know?
"Ok." Nigel said. "What can't you do? Can we stay like this and not do it?"
I shook my head. "No... I can't do this. You can't do this." I said. "I saw you. How much this is taking tolls on you."
"I'm happy, Sabby."Nigel tried to convince me. "Why can't we just be happy?"
"Because you're married to someone else." I said.
"Marcy is sick."
"It doesn't mean she doesn't need her husband!" I said stern. "If I were in her place, I would kill myself if I knew my husband is doing this." I said. "I can't... I just can't." I said. "Make this right for me and for her, and don't make me do things I'd hate myself for." I said. "I beg of you to understand."
"You must not love me." Nigel said.
"I love you so much that I want you happy."
"I am happy now, with you."
"With all the things you may lose if we do this, believe in me when I say I do this for you. Because I love you." I said.
Nigel shook his head. "You didn't have to do anything for me, Sabrina. I could take care of myself. This is not me. This is you. This is all you. I'm willing to sacrifice anything I have to be with you."
"Divorce her then." I said.
Nigel looked at me dumbfounded.
"Don't say anything you don't mean, Nigel." I said. "Just don't."
"I'll find a way, Sabby. I don't know what it will be... I'll figure something out."
I shook my head. "You need to go, Nigel. It's almost 1. You have a plane to catch."
"That's it?" Nigel said. I looked up to see him as I exhaled.
"Give it time, and think about what I said." I said. "We don't have to do anything now. But in the mean time, we need to be good."
"You're so goddamn righteous." Nigel said as he wiped his face.
"You're being selfish." I said.
"I am just being true." Nigel said. "Why fool ourselves? We did everything in between and we were both happy. Why cheat ourselves from having each other?"
"Because I want to sleep at night."
"You slept quite soundly last night, darling.."
"No, I dreamed about my vegetarian friend eating meat. Now you know how wrong that sound??"
Nigel stood up. He looked angry. He wasn't happy anymore. Now it was his turn to go to the bathroom, except I didn't come after him. I just let him be. He needed time to digest what I threw at him. When he came out, he looked a little bit better put together. He looked so tired however. His green eyes weren't shining as they were before. He approached me on the couch and he just grabbed me and put me in his embrace. We held on to each other for the longest time. I closed my eyes, savoring the last minutes I could have with him, smelling him, and feeling him. He turned me and he kissed me so hard I felt the skin on my cheeks were raw from it going against his scruffs. He held both of my hands, and he kissed it. He kissed my hands for the longest time. My eyes were wet at that point. He smiled at me softly as he caressed my cheek..
"Don't cry." He said. "Don't you cry."
"I'm so sorry I made this so difficult." I said.
"You're one stubborn woman." He said. "And I'm stupid for loving you for it."
He walked towards the door. I followed him. Oh God, he's leaving. He's really leaving.
He turned to see as I stood by the door. We still held each others' hands. He kissed my forehead.. and he said to me.. "Bye, love."
Then off he went.
I closed the door and I sat on the couch in disbelief of what I did. I didn't know what would happen next. Would he really be out of my life? How could that be? We still work together. What would we do at work? Pretend that nothing ever happened? Man, I just hope he wouldn't hate me and turn on me. I hope he meant it when he said he loved me.
I felt so awful yet relieved. I felt so sad yet I was justified. The only thing that put a damper on thing was that I may have lost the one man I love the most. I grabbed my phone for the first time since last night. Boy, I had 12 missed calls from Victoria, Emma, Bobbie, and Xandra combined. I had 485 lines in my whatsapp chat group with them. Holy cow. They must have been worried about me.
Right now though, all I wanted to do was soak myself in a tub filled with soapy hot water so I could wash away the sins and scums I had on me from what I did. Yeah, my Hindu mother had to raise me Catholic, didn't she? The guilt I felt was permeating all over my body. If we went with the Mahabharata, Nigel could have been Pandu, and had two wives. I could have been Draupadi and married to all five brothers of the Pandavas. Unfortunately, my life is not an epic. It's more of a sad story of being south of the middle of happiness almost constantly.
