Page 26 of Unfaithfully Yours

EIGHTEEN

Ryan

It felt like something heavy and immovable was resting on my chest.

There was the shock over what had happened to Melissa, but then when the doctors were working on her, Kamran had randomly went outside, pulled out a pack of cigarettes and smoked three in a row without saying a word to me.

I had known he was under stress but apparently he had been handling it even worse than I’d thought if he was smoking again.

From the start, I’d wanted to be a comfort to him but now, sitting in Melissa’s room with her unconscious in the bed, the truth was glaringly obvious; all I had done was complicate things even more.

Kamran was sitting at my side, but he wasn't really there. His gaze was fixed somewhere far away and he was pale. He looked like he was going to be sick and for once, I couldn't think of anything to do or say to comfort him.

Normally, my touch was what he needed, but when I reached for the hands he had clasped in his lap, he didn't react. He didn’t take mine in his own the way he was supposed to.

I didn’t give up though and after a long time, he seemed to notice what I was doing in an absent sort of way and he unclasped his hands so that I could take one of them. I held onto it tightly but he didn't squeeze back. He was so far away.

“It wasn't your fault,” I tried to reason.

“Yes it was,” he said at once, his gaze still fixed elsewhere.

Then he frowned, looking so confused that my heart ached.

“But Ryan,” he said, finally looking at me, turmoil in his lovely eyes. “She was cheating on me. She didn't want me anymore… right?”

I didn't know what to say because the same questions were rolling around in my head.

The way Melissa had reacted wasn't right.

It didn't add up with all the other info that I had—info that Kamran had given me. He said that she was cheating on him more and more openly and that she had been pretty much avoiding him for weeks on end. But I hadn’t seen the messages that started all this.

Why had she acted so betrayed by the sight of Kamran kissing me?

Understandably, it would be a shock to see your spouse kissing someone else, let alone their male best friend.

But she had known that Kamran was trying to end things.

Why else had she not wanted to talk to him yet?

Why had she been so hurt that she’d run into the middle of the road without even looking where she was going?

I didn’t doubt Kamran but something felt off.

“What exactly did that message say?” I asked gently. “The first one you read, that made you think she was cheating.”

Kamran looked like he was going to puke but he shook his head in confusion.

“It said, 'When are you going to tell your husband about us? I'm tired of waiting. ' He sounds like a bit of a dick if you ask me, but it was pretty clear, right? And that was before reading the other messages.”

“What were those ones like?”

“Less obvious, but setting up meetings after work hours. In one of them, he said if anyone asked, to blame him and say that she was working late. In another, he said he ‘ really enjoyed her company and wanted to see her again soon ’ and she had reacted to it with a heart. I mean, am I missing something?”

I shook my head, now equally mystified.

“No, no that's exactly what I would think too. I mean, what else could it mean?”

I squeezed his hand and for a moment, he squeezed back but then a doctor entered the waiting room we were sitting in, zeroing in on us, and Kamran dropped mine like a hot potato, practically jumping to his feet.

“Is she okay?” he demanded.

The doctor slowed to a stop in front of us and nodded, smiling.

“She'll be okay. We were able to set her leg bone and put her into a cast, and it doesn't look like she'll need surgery. She has one broken rib and bruising on her right side, but over all, she was very lucky.”

I let out a breath of relief and Kamran ran his hands through his hair, suddenly looking exhausted.

“Oh, thank god,” he sighed. “Thank you. Thank you so much. Can I see her?”

“Yes, she's asleep but you can sit with her.”

He turned to lead the way and for a moment, I didn't know if I should follow.

Kamran went after the doctor without even looking back.

But he probably thought I was right behind him, so I forced myself to hurry after him, aware that this really wasn't the time for me to be putting my own fears and needs on the table. He was in shock. We all were.

Trailing behind them, Kamran was in the room, taking a seat by the time I went inside and the doctor left to his other business.

Melissa was reclined in the bed, looking relatively peaceful in her morphine induced slumber, but there was something about seeing your friend laid out in a hospital bed with a drip into their arm that made them seem delicate and ill no matter how they were.

Especially when you were partially responsible for her ending up there.

Sadness overwhelmed me looking at her. We were supposed to be there so that we could talk to her like adults, instead me and Kamran had acted like teenagers, unable to resist making out right where we would be caught.

Kamran braced his elbows on his knees, looking at her face in what could only be described as despair.

Silently, I went and sat in the chair on her other side.

“I have to call her family,” he said after a long while. “They're going to kill me. Michelle will have me castrated.”

I smiled at the weak joke but Kamran wasn't looking at me. He hadn't torn his gaze from her sleeping face once.

“I fucked up,” he finally whispered, his voice so low I wouldn't have heard it if I hadn't known it was coming.

Call it intuition, but something told me, Kamran was looking for someone to blame and he couldn't take all the blame himself. We had both been on that couch.

“Yeah, maybe you should have told her sooner,” I said, hoping to remind him. “But you were trying, Kam. That was the whole reason we were even there. And she kept prolonging the inevitable. You know that.”

To my surprise, he nodded resolutely.

“Yeah, I know,” he agreed and finally, his eyes sought mine out and I didn't think I liked what I saw there.

“Kamran—”

“What the hell have we even been doing to begin with?” he asked hopelessly. “What have I been doing?”

My throat closed up in fear. I couldn't say a word.

“I was— am married, Ryan... I—I've never been a cheater. I hate shit like that. Why did I do it?”

“Because,” I choked and I wanted to take his shoulders and shake him until he remembered telling me that I was the person he loved .

“We love each other,” I managed but my voice trembled. “Don't take it back now.”

His gaze dropped to the floor.

“It's not that,” he said, quietly. “I just...”

He trailed off, seeming to search for the words but they didn't come.

After a while, he just sighed and reached out, resting his hand over Melissa's where it rested limply on the covers.

I couldn't take my eyes off of him though, and Kamran must have known it because he didn't look at me for ages. When he eventually did, there was a sureness there that hadn't been before.

“Melissa was my first really serious girlfriend,” he said. “We met when I was like, twenty-two.”

I nodded, wondering where he was going with this.

“I know. I was there,” I reminded him.

He shut his eyes.

“Yeah,” he breathed. “You were there too. I met the two most important people in my life at around the same time and just ran with it. I didn't want to let either of you go, to be honest.”

I swallowed.

“Kamran, just tell me what you're thinking,” I begged.

He licked his lips and ran a hand through his hair, looking so conflicted.

“I'm thinking that... maybe it was foolish to rush the way we did,” he finally admitted.

“I was in a relationship for eight years, and then I went straight into another one before the last one was even over.

I know being with you wasn't a mistake, just... the timing was. I should have ended things with her properly first.”

I stared at him for so long my eyes started to water.

I wanted to argue. But he didn't regret our time together, just that he was still married while it happened.

How could I argue with that? He was right.

I had wanted that too. I had wanted us to be real.

Instead, we'd been hidden behind closed doors for the most part.

“You're right,” I said, although it hurt to admit it.

His attention turned back to Melissa's prone form and he sighed.

“I've got to call her mom,” he said, pushing to his feet.

“Do you need moral support?” I asked but he smiled wryly and shook his head.

“No, I should probably learn to do some things on my own,” he said.

Snorting, I pushed to my feet, feeling itchy. I needed to get out of here, to breathe fresh, non-hospital air.

“Call me when you're ready,” I said and went around the bed to him.

At the last second, I was afraid he would push me away, but forced myself to offer a hug. To my relief, he sank into my arms for a long moment, returning the embrace.

But he broke apart rather abruptly, his gaze flying to Melissa as though afraid she may have woken up in that short moment and received another shock.

Chuckling, he pushed me gently.

“Okay, go so I can deal with the in-laws.

“You're going to tell them what happened?” I asked.

He shook his head.

“I don't think so. Not everything. Me and Melissa need to talk, before the whole family gets involved.”

I smiled, leaned in and then thought better of it at the last moment, looking at Melissa with the creepy feeling that she actually had woken up.

“Okay, not in front of her,” I agreed.

Kamran chuckled softly.

I settled on squeezing his shoulder because it sucked not being able to touch him. Then, when I got outside I realized that it sucked even more not being able to be at his side at all.

His words kept swirling around in myhead on repeat and it was probably for the best that I stayed away while I processed the reality of it all.

Mistakes were made. Big ones.

I had no doubt that our love was real but we had both gone about it all wrong.

And Kamran might blame himself, but I was the one who should have held him back and told him to wait instead of caving at the opportunity to selfishly take what I had always wanted.