Love Leaps: A Short Story by Karen Jerabek (new ebook reader txt) 📗

check my voicemail and my email and still no word fromGray. I just can't take it any more.

“How's it going with your self discovery?” Itext him as I crawl into bed. A few minutes pass and no reply. Howcan he just ignore me? I'm so angry, and in that moment I decideit's a good idea to send another text. “You know, I'm trying torespect your request for “space” but this is really hard on me! Ineed to know what's going on!!! Do you still love me?”

Still no answer so I sob into my pillow,feeling completely rejected, ignored and humiliated. I knew Ishouldn't text him and I feel so much worse now that I have.Everything I've read and everything people have been telling me isto not contact him. But how can you go from being in love withsomeone and talking and seeing them all the time to absolutelynothing? It's one thing if it's a break up and you know they don'twant to be with you, but how do you handle it when you know theylove you but they want space from you?

As I choke on my tears, my text messagealert goes off on my phone. I sniff, wipe the tears with the backof my sleeve and check my phone.

“Hey Babe. Are you home safe and sound?”

It's from Sam. Not Gray. I cry even harder.How can Sam be kind enough to check up on me and make sure I gothome safely when Gray can't even be bothered to return my text?

“I'm home safely, thank you. Night, night,”I reply to Sam.

“Sweet Dreams Beautiful,” he repliesinstantly.

I toss my phone on my nightstand, hug mypillow, and cry myself to sleep. Unfortunately, sleep doesn't staywith me for long. At 4am, I'm wide awake, exhausted but unable tofall back asleep. I grab my laptop and start googling more articlesand books on men needing space. I might learn to be okay with this,well at least a little bit, if only I could understand it.

I pour over articles mentioning John Gray,the love guru that writes the Men are from Mars, Women are fromVenus books. He talks about the “man cave” and how men need spaceand time to retreat in order to process their stress and figure outsolutions. He says, women on the other hand, talk about theirstress in order to feel better. Okay, so maybe I can buy into thistheory. But what do you do about it? From what I'm reading, hisanswer is to allow your man space and leave him alone. He says youneed to trust him to figure things out.

Great. Yet another person telling me to donothing. I'm not a “do nothing” kind of person though. I sigh andclose my laptop. Trying to go back to sleep, I toss and turn foranother hour, watching the clock tick closer to the time I have toget up for work.

The alarm sounds so obnoxious and loud whenit goes off. I've barely slept, I'm still in a bad mood and I don'twant to go to work. I slam my hand on it to turn it off. I don'thave much sick leave so I grudgingly get myself out of bed and intothe shower. I check my text messages and still nothing. I say swearwords I've never said before and think even worse things as I brushmy teeth.

I'm still grumbling in the shower about whatan ass Gray is, when I hear my cell phone text message alert gooff. Shampoo is in my hair and I'm dripping wet but I still jumpout of the shower to check my phone. I catch my breath as I seeGray's name on the screen.

“My phone was off last night and I wasasleep. I'm really sorry this is so hard for you. I don't want tohurt you. I don't know how else to deal with this though.”

What the hell? Is he waiting for a damnepiphany? I just don't get it. I don't get him. We were happy andeverything was going great in our relationship. We were practicallyliving together and he'd started talking about our future. Ithought we were on the right track. I thought we would be the nextone of our friends getting engaged and married. I certainly didn'tthink he'd have a break down and we'd be on the brink of splittingup.

There's so much I want to say, but all Itype back is, “Good luck.” He doesn't respond. I'm dripping watereverywhere and I'm shivering from being out of the shower for a fewminutes. Damn him, I say as I climb back into the tub. Tears streamdown my face, mixing with the spray from my nozzle. I try to stopcrying because I don't want to have swollen puffy eyes at work. Idon't want to answer questions or have people look at mesympathetically. I just want to be left alone.

An email from Jessica is waiting for me whenI get to work. She had called last night but I didn't call her backand now she's wondering if my clothes indeed, did fall off and Ispent the night rolling around with Sam.

“No, my clothes stayed on,” I email back.“We had a really nice time and he's still as sexy as ever but Irestrained myself. ; ) He said he wasn't ready to seriously date mewhen we were together but now he's ready and wants to be with me.This is everything I wished he would have said over a year ago andI'm not sure how I feel about it now though. We had a lot of funthough, and it felt like we'd never been apart but I still don'tknow what's going on with me and Gray. I broke down and texted himlast night. I wish I hadn't. He sent me a text this morning that'sstill vague and ambiguous. I honestly don't know what kind ofepiphany he's waiting for but I don't know how much longer I can dothis. I'm stressed out beyond anything I've ever felt. Advice?”

“What a mess!” Jess writes back. “I'm sorryyou have to go through this but I do have some great advice foryou! Forget about both men and go out