Tenn and Lark

Epilogue: Serious Promises

Ten years later...

When I plunged Lark into darkness, my only goal was to do whatever I could to bring her light again. One of the hardest things in the world was proving to Lark that I did, in fact, love her despite what my actions had shown. I'm not certain why it sometimes takes facing the loss of the person you love to slap the shit out of you and make you take a long, hard look at your life.

Sometimes, even all these years later, I missed the early years of our marriage, the innocence and purity of it where I hadn't yet betrayed Lark, where we hadn't faced the darkness, fought our way through it and come out on the other side. It had been so perfect, so easy that I hadn't protected it the way I should have. Taking our marriage for granted had been the worst mistake of my life and had opened the door for me to betray my wife. 

After Lark had said she was ready to share a bedroom with me again after a year apart, I'd realized something as I held her close and whispered I love you to her over and over again.

She hadn't said it back.

Taking her into the bedroom we'd be sharing, I sat her on the bed and knelt down in front of her so I wouldn't be towering over her while we talked.

"Lark, you know it makes me happy as hell to have you in the same room, the same bed with me again." I'd smiled at her and held onto her hands. "I love you so much, sweetheart."

She returned my smile and squeezed my hands, but she didn't say the words back.

"And that is why we'll be sharing a room, but that's as far as it's going right now. Not until you're ready."

"Tenn." Her face fell, so I reached up and pressed a quick kiss to her lips.

"We're not ready for that quite yet, and that's OK. I'll wait as long as it takes, until you can look me in the eye and say those words to me. So when you're ready, we'll go there. But until you're one hundred percent sure, I'll just be fucking happy you're next to me in the bed. We've got time, sweetheart. I'm sure as hell not going to rush this."

It had taken Lark another six months after we moved into our new home to tell me she loved me. I'd continued to express my love for her both verbally and in quick texts to let her know I was thinking about her, but I knew she was fighting demons. The last time she'd said it to me was the morning I'd walked out of our old house and, later that day, she'd seen me with Trisha on the couch. Those demons were very real for her, understandably so, and I wasn't surprised that overcoming them was taking time.

But the day she conquered them, the morning had been a day just like any other when it started, and I'd had no indication that it'd soon turn into a momentous one. Just like always, I'd gotten up before Lark and started the coffee before I took my shower. When I'd walked back in the kitchen, ready for the day and my coffee, I'd poured a cup when Lark stumbled in. A morning person my wife was not, and she pointed at the coffeemaker, hair hanging in her eyes and over her face, and made an incoherent noise that I took to mean pour me a cup or I'll be forced to kill you.

After pouring the brew into her favorite mug, I held it out to her. She took it and sipped at it for a few minutes, but she stayed where she was, looking at me, her eyes actually open and focused.

"I love you."

Had she just --

"You know I love you," her sleep-raspy voice continued. "I woke up thinking about it, and I knew it was time to tell you. So I'm telling you, Tenn: I love you."

"Lark," I said in a voice that was as raspy as hers now, but for much different reasons. "That's the best -- I love you, too. So much."

She'd given me a look as she plunked her mug on the island. "I think we've established that while words are nice, actions are needed, too. So, I'm going back to bed in case you have any actions you'd like to share."