The Arrangement

The Arrangement_30

{{Lila}}

I had let myself into the apartment, I figured Dixon and Kevin would have been done showing the place to the buyer. But as I heard footsteps I knew they must still be busy.

As soon as Dixon walked out of the spare room he put his hand down and zipped his pants up while a very pretty older woman fixed her top and buttoned her sleeve shut.

What the hell?

"Thank you," the woman said without even acknowledging that there was a new person now in the apartment. "It surely was a most memorable showing. I will be in touch."

Memorable?

I waited for the woman to get out of earshot before I began letting Dixon have it.

"Baby I swear it was nothing like that, her shirt got stuck to my pants."

I rolled my eyes, was this really the best he could come up with?

"Lila I wouldn't lie to you, have I given you reason to not believe me?"

I scoffed "did you really just ask that?"

He gave me a blank look.

"So I guess your threesome the night before our wedding doesn't count as a reason for me not to believe you?"

"I meant since then!" Dixon yelled.

"I don't know Dixon, I'm not with you every second of the day, I don't know what your doing when your saying your at work." I snapped back.

"I'm working, and when I'm not at work I'm at home with you or at my parents house with you, or out on a date night with you."

I rolled My eyes again, he was being a jerk now.

"You know what Lila, don't believe me. Fuck it, I don't even care. Right now I have to go pick up my dad so that we can watch my little brother walk the stage." He said much more calmly.

Without so much as a goodbye he left.

I stood there a while and finally left as well, his unwillingness to fight for us was proof that maybe we shouldn't be together.

Cheat on me once shame on you, cheat on me twice shame on me.

I got to our house and packed a bag.

There was no way I was going to be staying here knowing I would have to see him, so I went to the one place I knew I could always go to without judgement.

Elise's place.

She offered me her sofa and That night i broke down, I sobbed and told her everything.

"Lila, why didn't you say anything?" She asked hurt at my secrecy.

"I don't know?" I admitted as I wiped my eyes.

"But you love him now so it hurts more." She said.

"I don't love him!" I sounded, "we never even said that to each other." I admitted.

Days passed and he didn't even try to contact me, I had to admit that I had hoped he would and it sucked really bad when he didn't.

"Just call him." Elise said over dinner one night.

"I can't."

"You need to, I love you but you can't live on my sofa forever." She pointed out. "You two need to figure things out."

I sighed, she was right. I picked up my cellphone and went out into her balcony.

I pulled up his contact profile and looked at the screen, it was now complete. His full name, "hubby" as the nickname, and a random picture of us I had snapped during one of our lazy Sundays was set as his caller pic.

My eyes teared up as I looked at the picture and I pressed the screen while i put the phone to my ear and squeezed my eyes shut to keep from crying.

"Lila where the hell have you been, everyone's been worried sick." He sounded angry.

"You must be so worried you forgot to call me then." I countered. "My parents too huh?"

"I told everyone you went out of town on business if your parents didn't call you that's y'all's beef."

"Then why didn't you call?" I asked.

"Can you blame me for not calling Lila?"

"Yes, considering what you did, if anything you should've called and apologized that same night."

"Lila, I told you exactly what happened."

I rolled my eyes as I recounted his lame excuse, "and you expect me to believe that?"

"It's the truth." He said "Lila since the beginning I have NEVER lied to you. And the one time I tried to lie you called me out on it and I owned up to my mistake like a man. Why would I lie now? Even more so why wouldn't I own up to it? Lila there was no motive, why would you think I would do that? We were in a great place, we were happy."

His words made me think.

"So what you want to end this?" He asked flatly.

"I don't know Dixon." I said my throat thick with tears.

"The fact that you have to think about it answers the question. I told you the truth and you don't believe me and when I state my case you still don't believe me, I guess there's nothing left to say then."

"So it's over?" I asked.

"Seems that way."