Page 85 of Loving Wild

“And so are you. That’s what you don’t get, Lauren, you’re beautiful inside and out. Stunning, you always have been.”

My phone vibrates in my hand, and when I open the text from Gabe, there’s a link. I click on it, and it takes me to YouTube, and a video with the lyrics to Chicago’s ‘Hard To Say I’m Sorry’ starts to play along with the song.

I let a long breath out of my tingly nose as I read and listen to the lyrics.

It would be so very easy to open the front door and put an end to this, and I will do that, just not yet. He fucked up, and I’d be letting down the sisterhood if I failed to make him suffer just a little bit longer.

My phone vibrates again with another link, this one takes me to ‘I Won’t Give Up’ by Jason Mraz, and I grin stupidly while wiping the instant tears from my face.

The next link comes through straight after, The Fatback Band’s ‘I Found Lovin’’.

Despite the tears and my now runny nose, I love what he’s doing, the thought he’s put into picking out these songs and the meaning behind the lyrics. I’m going to save each of them to a playlist called ‘Wooing Songs’. There needs to be more wooing in the world because, let’s face it, what woman doesn’t want to be wooed? Personally, I think there should be an international day of wooing, say around late September or early October, when there’s not a lot else happening.

My phone continues to vibrate as Gabe sends me links to song after song.

Adele, ‘Lovesong’.

Elton John and Blue, ‘Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word’.

Sinead O’Conner, ‘Nothing Compares to You’.

John Lennon, ‘Woman’.

Grover Washington, ‘Just the Two of Us’.

I don’t listen to the songs, I don’t need to. I get that he’s sorry, and that he loves me, but those aren’t our issues.

“Ren,” his voice sounds quietly through the door, and I tilt my head back to see his forehead pressed against the frosted glass. “Please, baby. Please open up and talk to me.”

Still needing the glass and wooden barrier between us, I text my reply.

Me:You’ve had all week to talk, why now?

Gabe:I’ve been a fucking mess all week. I didn’t want to come to you in the state I’ve been in. I needed to sort my head out first.

Me:What sort of a mess?

Gabe:A drunken mess.

“Gabe,” I whisper as I read his message. This is another thing we probably both need to address, using alcohol as a coping mechanism.

Me:Is your head sorted out now?

Gabe:I don’t know. I just know that I love you, I miss you, and this is fucking stupid.

“We’re not thirteen, Ren. Open the fucking door.”

I hear a car pull up outside and Gabe mumbling, “Shit,” as a door slams.

“I thought I told you not to come here,” I hear Cooper say.

“Fuck off and mind your own fucking business,” Gabe replies.

“You told me you just wanted to know she was safe. I would never have checked . . .”

“I told you to mind your own fucking . . .”

“Are you drunk?”