Page 99 of I Dreamt That You Loved Me

Eddie had a million stories, and he was a good storyteller so I always loved hearing about Gabriel in his teens.

“Did I ever tell you about the time I had a crush on a girl in high school?” I shook my head. Eddie leaned back in his seat. “Well, she wouldn’t give me the time of day. She was really cool, really smart. Into drama and poetry. So Gabriel said, ‘You should write her notes and leave them in her locker.’ But I’m no wordsmith so I asked him to write the notes for me and then I’d copy them and pass them to her in class.”

“Let me guess, she fell in love with you.”

“Yep. But it backfired. She was really into me until she figured out that there was no way I could have written those notes.” Eddie looked over at me. “You remind me a little of her. That’s what I told Gabriel the first time I met you. That girl fell in love with Gabriel’s words.”

“So did I,” I said.

Eddie nodded. “The notebook. He told me about that when I was still out in LA. He called and said, ‘Eddie, I found her. The girl of my dreams. Now I just have to convince her that we’re meant to be together.’ I told him to write some love letters and slip them in your locker.”

We laughed.

“He wrote the best love letters.” My smile slipped when I realized I’d used the past tense.

But maybe that was what I had to do. Stop comparing this new version of Gabriel with the old version. Everyone expected him to still be the person they knew and loved, and he was probably feeling the weight of our expectations.

None of this was his fault. He didn’t ask for any of this either.

When I took those vows, I promised to love him in sickness and health, good times and bad, for better or worse. So that’s exactly what I needed to do.

This was just a rough patch, a bump in the road.

In the greater scheme of things, five months was nothing. We just needed some time to get reacquainted, that’s all. We could do this. We could do anything.

We were Cleo and Gabriel.

Our story wasn’t over. It had only just begun.

In time, Gabriel and I would fall in love all over again.

When I got home, I felt lighter with a renewed sense of purpose. I walked through the front door and called his name then stopped on the threshold of our bedroom and surveyed the damage.

Photos and notebooks were strewn across the floor, some of the pages torn out and ripped to shreds.His memories.

I gathered up the scraps of paper and tried to piece them together as if tape and glue would fix everything. Fix him. Fix us.

I read some of the words from the scraps in my hand then balled them in my fist and tossed them aside. These pages were from the journal he kept when he was out in LA, “dealing with some heavy shit.” He’d written about driving around Laurel Canyon, searching for his mother. About his less-than-stellar relationship with his father. About Kat, the “cool chick” who had loved him. And about his stint in the psych ward.

Out of all the notebooks he could have chosen from the box on the shelf, he just had to choose this one.

I picked up the phone and called around, asking everyone if they’d seen Gabriel but no one had.

I grabbed my keys and headed out the door but stopped on the landing and looked over at the door left slightly ajar.

The roof.

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

My feet poundedup the stairs. I shoved the metal door, but it wouldn’t budge. The padlock was broken but you could still slide it into the latch. I pounded my fists against the metal.

“Gabriel! Open this fucking door,” I screamed, throwing my entire body against it. I stood back and kicked the door with the flat of my sole, over and over again.

I kept kicking and throwing my weight against the door until it creaked open, just a couple of inches, but it was enough to squeeze my hand through. I slid the ruby ring off my left hand and moved it to my right then shoved my hand through the crack, gritting my teeth when the metal scraped my knuckles.

I kept reaching and groping until finally, my fingers touched the padlock but I couldn’t gain purchase.

“Gabriel!” I screamed, still trying to maneuver the padlock.