My Last Read online

  My Last: Yes, I do

  Stefania Gil

  Translated by Annette

  “My Last: Yes, I do”

  Written By Stefania Gil

  Copyright © 2017 Stefania Gil

  All rights reserved

  Distributed by Babelcube, Inc.

  www.babelcube.com

  Translated by Annette

  Cover Design © 2017 La Taguara Design

  “Babelcube Books” and “Babelcube” are trademarks of Babelcube Inc.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  My Last: Yes, I do

  Reality...

  My life before James...

  With the appearance of James...

  Two years later, to my surprise, | James was still in my life....

  And a few more years passed...

  Back to reality...

  Several months later...

  Epilogue

  Stefania Gil

  Other titles of the author:

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  The characters and events described in this novel are fictitious. Any similarity to real people, living or dead, is a coincidence.

  To you Alee, for appearing in my life and deciding to remain in it.

  Love you.

  Reality...

  The tears came gushing out of me.

  I felt like I couldn’t breathe.

  I decided to leave the man I stupidly loved for not taking what I offered seriously. And why? Ah! Yes! There were other men in my life whom I hadn’t done well with.

  It’s for that reason, I refused to accept falling in love again.

  Which was ridiculous, because I knew I was madly in love with James.

  I punched the steering wheel, trying to calm down since I was in no suitable state to drive.

  I couldn’t see through the tears and my anger wouldn’t allow me to control my foot on the accelerator.

  I stopped on the side of the freeway and clung to the steering wheel as if trying to save myself from some type of world apocalypse.

  At that moment, I imagined the steering wheel was my best friend and prayed for a pair of arms to appear to hug me tightly comforting me in my pain.

  I cried hysterically, uncontrollably, almost out of breath.

  I began to hate all mankind, even if it was not their fault for my strange behavior and resentment of love. Otherwise, truth being told, I couldn’t complain.

  I had always done very badly with love and when at last, a man appears who values, respects and loves me, I flee in terror.

  All due to stupid fear making me think loving someone was synonymous with suffering.

  I had wasted a lot of money on Dr. Rose. My therapist. She had also wasted a lot of time with me. At the moment, I realized the therapy sessions had not been useful. I remembered all the times the good doctor had insisted I see things from another perspective. Not all men were bad and not everyone wanted to play with my feelings.

  How stupid!

  I never wanted to admit it, and there I was, in a beautiful dress, sitting in my car in the middle of the freeway, with something like a flood streaming down the windshield.

  Only it was not a flood, it was my tears.

  And James, invading my thoughts.

  I had lost it all by being an idiot. I deserved all the suffering I was going through.

  Tap. Tap.

  Due to not being able to see who was on the other side, I lowered the window.

  A police officer. Great!

  He blinded me with the light from his flashlight and an insult almost escaped me. Surely the bastard didn’t know what it felt like to cry hysterically, with contact lenses in his eyes by the way he illuminated me as if I were a criminal. My pupils constricted like the obturator of an old unused camera, due to the sudden flash of light. It made my eyes burn like hell.

  “Good Evening,” the officer said, checking my appearance and the inside of the car.

  “Good, ev ... ev ... ening,” I said, sobbing.

  The officer looked at me with concern.

  “Did you have an accident?”

  I shook my head.

  He tilted his head, watching me curiously.

  “Did your car break down?”

  I shook my head again.

  “Get out of the car, please.”

  I did as he asked.

  When I got out of the car, I could see the officer a little better. He was a handsome man.

  Blond, blue-eyed. He was so similar to...

  James.

  I started to cry again but this time, I did not cling to the steering wheel.

  I threw myself into the officer's arms as if I had known him all my life.

  The officer stiffened.

  “Madam, what's wrong? Did someone hurt you?” He sounded rather worried.

  He tried to pull away from me, but I refused to release him and continued to cry uncontrollably.

  “You look so much like him. I lost him. I lost him because I’m an idiot.”

  The officer shook off me as gentle as he could. I must admit he was good considering the resistance I was putting up.

  “Have you consumed alcohol or drugs tonight?”

  I shook my head.

  “Blow here, please.”

  He put a straw in my mouth and I did as I was told.

  After the beep sounded, he turned the power off again. He was doing an alcohol test. How low I had fallen. And all for refusing to be loved!

  Well deserved, Jen. Even in your teenage years you had not been through this shame. Now look, at almost 50 years old, you’re making a fool of yourself.

  “I'm sorry, ma'am. I'm going to have to take you to the station. I can’t leave you here in your present condition.”

  I nodded resignedly. After retrieving my bag, I walked toward the patrol car.

  The night couldn’t get any worse.

  My life before James...

  My love life was like the protagonists’ love life on a soap opera. A tragedy. Always deceived, emotionally hurt and devoid of all hope of finding a loved one.

  Once you lose your hope, you become a kind of witch.

  Like Maleficent, for example. After believing in love and putting all your trust in another person, they betray you.

  When that happens, you find yourself in need of locking yourself away and not allowing —not even God— to enter into your feelings.

  Imagine what happens when you are betrayed several times.

  That happened to me.

  Could it have been bad luck? Yes, maybe. I was convinced I had a magical eye-not technically-to select men who only made me suffer.

  And a lot.

  By this I don’t mean there are no good men in the world.

  Please!

  My best friend since childhood, Holly, always enjoyed the pleasure of wonderful men. Starting with her father, whom I adored as if he were mine.

  Holly met Sam. A more than wonderful man. He was perfect and an exemplary father. Unfortunately, life had other plans for them. Sam died in a traffic accident. However, my dear friend, met another man: Steve, with whom she is happily married.

  Steve is great with Holly and her kids. He’s someone special. He loves Holly's children as if they were his own.

  Anyway, either it was luck, or Holly had run into the only good men there was in life.

  I suppose my love chaos begins with my father's absence. He was an idiot. He ran away as soon as my mother told him she was pregnant.

  My mother, a woman like few, played both roles and did fine. However, I would have liked to meet the man who gave his contribution to create me.
>
  They say a girl’s first love is their father, perhaps which was why I had gone so wrong in my relationships. I hadn’t met my first love.

  I was always a girl of very dreamy ideal love. She had to admit it.

  During adolescence, I could spend days inventing stories of how I would meet my prince charming and we would live happily ever after.

  I met some guys who stole my breath as well as my thoughts, but it always ended for one reason or another. Life changes, parental separations, studies.

  No cheating at the time.

  At University, I decided to be better, more selective. I ended up married to my first ex-husband.

  Aaron Williams left me speechless since the first time I laid eyes on him. Each time he approached me, I thought I would have a heart attack the way my heart raced.

  He wasn’t the most athletic or handsome guy at the university. Not even the most famous, but he was enchanting. To me, he had a wonderful smile. It was a wonderful quality. He made me laugh endlessly.

  The first time we had sex, he told me while looking me directly in my eyes that he loved me. I assumed he had his life in order.

  I had found my prince charming and would live happily ever after with him.

  I couldn’t have been more wrong!

  The first year of marriage was a honeymoon. The sex was great and we did not stop laughing.

  The second year, we began to get a little more serious and sex was not so frequent ... nor so great.

  The third year, I received my first blow in love.

  One day, I came home from work and found Aaron rolling around in”our” bed with a blonde who looked like Barbie’s twin sister.

  That was the day I discovered I harbored a Mr. Hyde inside me.

  I erupted into tears, crying, drama, and closing with a flourish: I burned the mattress inside the apartment causing the firemen to arrive. I had to pay an astronomical fine in order to stay out of jail.

  I returned home to live with my mother. She was everything to me.

  I took refuge in her arms as my emotional wounds healed.

  When I felt like I was healed and had ‘forgotten’. I moved into an apartment to start living my adult life.

  I was always responsible about everything. Even sex. I didn’t want children, but I wanted to have a healthy and fun sex life, so I took care of protecting myself from diseases and unwanted pregnancies.

  I was not a statuesque woman. I had to be objective with myself.

  I was a woman with pretty brown eyes, dark hair and a wide smile.

  I had ‘something’ that made men go crazy. Some claimed it was my eyes; others, the sway of my hips and others, claimed I had a sensual mouth.

  I thought it was big.

  I didn’t want serious relationships, so I took any show of affection lightly. If I believed the affair was becoming dangerously affectionate, I would just disappear from the life of the candidate on duty.

  Until my 33rd year. I met Carl.

  ***

  Carl and I work in different departments at the same company.

  He was almost 40, with gray beginning to populate his dark hair. It made him look sexy.

  In addition, he was like a gentleman straight out of a fairy tale.

  I let myself be dazzled by both his charm and gifts. He said women were princesses and should be treated as such.

  At the time I didn’t pay special attention to the ‘pluralism’ he always used in that statement.

  I was blind. That was all.

  Although, I was completely in love, I decided to behave as the responsible person I was. I didn’t want to rush things with Carl. I wasn’t a twenty-year-old who could go through life recklessly anymore.

  I had matured and needed to take it easy.

  Carl was special. During the two years of courtship, I felt like I was on cloud nine. There was not a day he didn’t court me. He always had a compliment ready for me and lucky for me, sex was more than phenomenal.

  After two years in such a relationship, when he asked me to marry, I could do nothing except jump and cry with joy.

  He asked me one night, after sex. We were still recovering from the pleasure. He was still inside me. He stared into my eyes, kissed my lips slowly and asked me to be his wife.

  At that moment I was convinced things would finally be different. I had come across my wonderful prince charming. He had confessed how he loved me and wanted me to be his for the rest of his life. At that moment, I didn’t realize I was reliving a similar scene from my past.

  It's just, I was romantic and stupid. For real.

  We were married. We had a beautiful ceremony with many guests, Carl's family belonged to Chicago’s upper class and thus, we began our life as husband and wife.

  In my wonderful new house, I discovered my passion of decoration and flowers.

  I started to take care of the garden along with taking courses to learn how to make flower decorations. In a short time, I had a garden to envy. On two occasions, it was portrayed in an important national decoration magazine.

  What more could I ask for?

  I had a wonderful husband who showered me with devotion, money, a great house and a unique hand at taking care of plants.

  Carl wanted to give me something special for my 40th birthday. Since I was entering my 40 year crisis and my job at the time was very stressful. He decided it was time for me to start my own business.

  Considering I was so passionate about flowers as well as decorations, he gave me a florist.

  My life was perfect, or so I thought it was at the time.

  There was a neglected shop in a good spot downtown. Carl bought it to set up our business there.

  The shop was great. Vintage, with a fairly large central courtyard. That was what made me fall in love with it. I could imagine a lovely natural garden as an exhibition for the clients.

  We hired a small remodeling company because we didn’t need major changes. Shortly after the necessary work was completed, we opened our doors to the public.

  The business was ours. I was in charge of the commercial and decoration element and Carl, legal and administrative matters.

  The best moment of my life began due to my surprise. I began to be very successful in the market.

  Soon I was recognized. I received a visit from the mother of one of the city's most famous women. She was someone, who reported to the press about parties and shows. I knew we would reach the top very soon.

  In the workplace, of course.

  The day Mrs. Harris hired me to be the official decorator for her daughter's wedding; I received my second blow in love.

  Mrs. Harris had spent the whole morning talking to me about the details of Bridget's wedding. When she left, I was so excited, I only wanted to get home, kiss Carl to the point of fatigue and celebrate our glorious new customer.

  Why wait until nightfall to greet my husband at home and give him the great news, if I could buy lunch and surprise him at his office?

  That's what any woman would do, right?

  I stopped by our favorite restaurant, ordered takeaway. Then I went to the supermarket and bought the best bottle of champagne along with two glasses.

  I was happy, singing as loud as I could while planning everything I would do to my husband before we ate lunch.

  I wanted to celebrate and have sex in Carl's office. It was very tempting.

  Upon arriving at the office, his secretary was not at her desk.

  I was not surprised. It was lunch time.

  Carl's office door was locked.

  Before I could knock on the door, I heard panting from inside the office.

  Yes, pant. In plural.

  My husband didn’t exercise in his office. To think maybe, he was burning calories on a treadmill.

  No.

  My blood pressure dropped drastically.

  My hands began to shake and I felt off balance.

  She panted again and I listened to my husband say, “Turn around; I want to p
enetrate you from behind.”

  Another pant.

  It was as if a very evil thousand year old demon took possession of me.

  The blood rose to my head in a matter of seconds and flames were about to burst from my ears.

  I opened the office door and the first thing I saw was my husband’s flat naked ass. The bastard had his pants and boxer briefs around his ankles with his shirt half unbuttoned.

  He spun around and the scene grew even more disgusting. His erection pointed straight at me.

  “It's not what you think,” he said, raking his fingers through his hair, as if I was bothered by his unkempt hair.

  I lifted my eyebrow.

  Could he really be so brazen as to say “it's not what you think”?

  I was at the point of exploding.

  The woman leaning on Carl's desk had her skirt around her waist and her panties by her ankles.

  Surprise! It was his secretary.

  “Let me explain.”

  I heard Carl say in an attempt to apologize. The secretary got up quickly, pulled up her panties, and lowered her skirt. That was not why she was already dressed. She wore a black corset that went to her waist, exposing her chest. She adjusted it and picked up the jacket laying on the floor before leaving the office without saying a word.

  “Close the door,” Carl said cautiously. “We need to talk.”

  I placed my bags on the floor, pierced Carl with a glare and said,

  “From now on, you're only going to talk to my lawyer. You and I, we have nothing to discuss.”

  “Please, Jen. Let me explain,” He pleaded, coming over to take my arm.

  I jerked away.

  “You disgust me.”

  I left his office.

  Before entering the elevator, the secretary crossed my path when she came out of the bathroom fully refreshed.

  I stared at her icily, from head to toe.

  She lowered her head as she hurried away.

  “Thank you for showing me who my husband is,” I said in a loud voice. I wanted everyone to know what my husband —the boss— of the entire company had done.

  I didn’t give a damn about his stupid reputation or his wealthy family.

  The secretary stopped, giving me a sideways glance.