The Carrero Heart - Beginning (Friends to Lovers)

Arry doesn’t come back, he texts from the airport and says he needs time to cool off and will call me when he lands. I don’t bother replying and he doesn’t text again to see why I don’t.

Heartbroken that he went and did the one thing he never does; walked out and left me when we are fighting the worst kind of fight. It feels like a betrayal, that he’s broken a promise and the way I am feeling, I want to hate him. Hating him for four days will be easier than missing him.

I go to the kitchen and grab the ice cream from the freezer, eating so much I make myself throw up and then lay on bed feeling about a thousand times worse. I despise that he can make me feel this desolate, that when we argue he becomes the one obsessive thought in my head, and I cannot function beyond it.

Love sucks.

I lay my hand on my stomach and flinch when I do, like an internal guilt filter kicks in and I find myself peering down the length of my body.

“I didn’t mean it.” I say loudly, looking at the flat expanse of stomach and then look away again refusing to acknowledge that I am even talking to it. I feel dumb, but I can’t shake the regret at telling it that Arry leaving was its fault.

I know what it feels like to have someone who’s supposed to love you, hate you instead. I’m nothing like them. Even though I don’t want it, something in me feels like a shitty human for telling it this is it’s doing.

I get frustrated with myself and try to shake the conflicting confusing thoughts out of my head and sit up. Still tear stained, still sniffing and ache for him, even though I hate him.

I try to push down the nausea which swirls around me whenever it feels like it is peeking out and banish all thoughts of something growing inside of me away harshly, like I do every time my mind strays there.

Don’t think it exists and it won’t be real. Ignore it.

I notice my phone is lit up across on the bedside table and realize I left it on silent after I got his text. it’s been a long time since he left. An hour maybe. I don’t even know what time his flight was going out, so it might be him if he is sat in the departure area waiting. I get up slowly and wander over to it, seeing the list of missed calls and one text. All with little ‘Arry xXx’ symbols in a row.

Despite myself I pick it up and open his text, bracing myself for a lecture or something harsh and inhale quickly to suppress my anxiety.

I’m sorry. We need to focus on coming home, everything feels like it’s hanging in mid-air and suspended while we are stuck there. I love you, Sophie. More than you know. Both of you. Don’t hate me, baby, I’ll call you later. Xx A

makes me

to my insides. Tingly, weird feelings that make me feel instantly sick and I push it away. I put the phone down and rub my eyes in a bid to remove the overwhelm

If I reply we will end up fighting, if I leave it

thing inside of me that is already growing. I have no clue how big or how much it resembles a tiny person yet. I know nothing of pregnancy other than how crap I have been

all on me. Arry tries so hard to be what I need, to take care of me; it’s not his fault everything is falling apart inside of me. My dreams and hopes were pinned on Paris. It turned out to be

be a nightmare, I know him. I remember what Jake was like over Emma and as much as I want to say that

and controlling if he thinks he knows best. It will be another round of fights and for what? A couple of months before the school say

out is like wiping the slate clean and I would be as well starting all over again. My Career won’t get off the ground at all. Before I get a chance, I’ll be elbow deep in diapers and bottles and

mom? About giving love and

suffering and not give a shit about anyone else, that’s what I learned from my birth mom. My

is too reliant on him for everything. Can’t fend for myself, so how in the hell am I supposed to fend for

in me, like it’s done a million times in the past couple weeks and I get angry once more at how pathetic I am. I’m a mess, a failure of epic proportions. A woman who can’t even get her head around something women are meant to do and have naturally, apart from me. I’m

cold unfeeling woman who kept her child at arm’s length and didn’t bond? Who screws her kid up as bad as Emma was messed up before Jake? She’s told me extensively of the affects her mother had

and unable to love anyone properly except Arrick. He’s the only one I ever let close, ever let under my skin properly in every way. Emma, I see as a guardian,

or let it love me? What if I am so emotionally fucked up that

out her mind to endure being raped by her father repeatedly. She shows up when I am low when I am angry or upset.

hurt my baby?

sense of impending doom and choking paralyzing terror grips me again and I can barely breathe. This is how it’s felt from day one, as things go around in my head. This is why I won’t stop and face the fact that there is a baby inside of my womb. I can’t let a baby have me as a mother. I can’t destroy an innocent little human that way. Arrick would dismiss this, tell me I am overreacting, but this is how I feel. This is what I believe

to buy, while I am treading water to stay afloat. We don’t talk because it goes one way and that’s exactly like this morning did. It’s too raw, too upsetting, and too depressing.

me self-soothe and catch my breath. I need to stop thinking and let it go. Go to bed and sleep because I’m shattered and haven’t slept much in days. I’ll feel better. I’ll be saner and less emotional if I sleep it off. Then when I wake up, I can text him back and try to not kill each other while half a world apart and get my shit together for him coming home. I need to give him a reason to come home to me. I want him

out, switching on the TV in our room for some atmosphere. It’s too quiet when he’s gone and Janetta won’t be up

***

day away. I must have needed it more than I realized, and I sit up groggy and lightheaded. I feel weird. Hot, but not like flushes hot. I’m feverish