Selective/Memory: The "Depth of Emotion" Book 2 (The Depth of Emotion) (4 page)

“Okay, I’ll go first,” she said. “I had a clinical nervous breakdown. There; I said it. My central nervous system could no longer support my daily functions. To hear my doctor explain it, I had gone through two very emotionally traumatic events, within a very short period of time. One was the illness and death of my father. The other was witnessing the physical annihilation of someone I loved by a piece of machinery, and feeling that I was to blame. Two
very
heavy events. My dad wasn’t here for me to share my feelings with, and I didn’t want to burden my mom. Declan couldn’t share conversation with me, and certainly not feelings other than blame and resentment. I bottled up all the emotions of those two events. The day that Paige saw me on the beach was the afternoon that Declan had let loose on me. I thought that I had squelched all of those emotions. According to Dr. Sumner, eventually emotions find their way out. My day of reckoning was that afternoon on the beach.”

Aimee, usually their most outspoken, but also their most tenderhearted, was the first to speak.

“Do you miss him?” she asked.

“Aimee!” Paige and Katherine said in unison.

Aria put her hand up to indicate that she didn’t need their protection.

“Yes…” she answered.

Mercifully, the waiter delivered their drinks. Everyone was silent for a few moments while they sipped. The chocolate was a welcome, if momentary, diversion, and she savored the flavor as it fed her sweet tooth, as well as the craving in her brain for something that she once compared it to.

Paige was the next to speak, taking an authoritative air over the group.

“We won’t speak about him for the rest of lunch. There are many more topics of discussion.”

Although sweet of her, Aria felt she no longer needed anyone’s protection.

“Yes, there are, but he’ll always be the one topic you’ll wonder about if we don’t discuss him, so let’s do it now. I’m stronger than you realize,” she said, taking another sip of her drink. “I may have another one of
these
, so I’ll speak freely and one of
you
can drive me home.”

She laughed at them, and they seemed to lighten up a bit.

“Now, let’s order,” Aria interjected, taking control of the conversation…

…and she purposefully relaxed into the alcohol…

“Declan…”
she quietly whispered. Her familiar face came before him in a mist of memory. The terror in her eyes was unmistakable.

Declan both wanted and attempted to reach out for her. Frustrated within his subconscious capacity, he knew it was an impossibility of space and time. The impotence of helplessness overcame his mind and body. Arms weren’t long enough, feet not swift enough, and mind not clear enough within the dream, he was failing in a mission he had taken to his heart—her safety. Although he had protected her,
she
had always been his strength. In his mindful visualization, the space and time between them was a frustrating hindrance to her safety. The parameters of delusion dictated his movements and he found himself opening his mouth to speak. Only one word came out, and its sound was relayed in slow motion. Impossible, forceful physical energy was expended and it all but slayed him as he stared toward her in terror. A voice that sounded foreign to him ripped from his throat as every minute reserve of air abandoned his lungs.

“AAAA…RRRIII…AAAAAA!!!”

Cognitively paralyzed at the sight of her standing on the black and mucky tar street, he telepathically willed her actions. In what seemed an eternity, his eyes shifted downward. He saw the slight motion of her steps, one delicate foot after the other, liquidated and floating in his delusion. Her legs transformed before his eyes back to solid form as she placed them onto the curb and out of harm’s way. The nightmare, an incessant source of agony, continued until he was content with the sight of her protection. Momentarily, he felt peace.

Declan’s eyelids drifted closed in relief and peaceful contentment, and he began to sail away, knowing she was safe. Then, and only then, for a fraction of an instant, did his taut and tensed body permit him to fill his lungs with a supply of oxygen, and he knew that all would be well…

“GO!”

Immediately, the excruciating effects of the impact registered in his low back, causing him to rise tortured from the bed. The torment traveled as hot as searing coals from the middle of his spine, remaining hot and jagged as it flowed throughout his spinal cord downward into his sacrum. The agony fired into recessive voids and spaces where a whole and healthy limb once resided. As the misery claimed him for the hundredth time, the nightmare ripped into his mentality, victimizing him once again.

Forces beyond his control commanded his eyes to fly open, anguished, causing his breath to come in short, desperate gasps. In his semi-conscious state, Declan’s hands gripped at the bed sheet for something—anything—to hold. He wouldn’t acknowledge that he wanted—and needed—Aria to fill the space beside him on nights like these. This imperfect state between the real and the unreal drove him insane to see her safe.

As the moments of mirage faded, and reality settled in, his eyes tried to focus on the bare ceiling of the bedroom. Slowly and purposely, he filled his lungs with deep breaths of air, as he had many times before, remembering that this simple function would soon return to normal if he just followed her instruction…

“Three deep breaths…just three…deep…breaths…”

He could almost hear her sweet and lyrical voice if he concentrated. The feeling of comfort that accompanied his memories of her voice also brought with it the pains of loneliness.

Aria would say that innocent instruction to him after the surgery, when his panic and anxiety attacked. She said it was her mother’s remedy for focus and calm whenever she, herself, was feeling distressed. He was embarrassed for her to see him as anything other than strong. His fear emasculated him.

“It’s okay, Declan. I’m here. I’m not going anywhere. Right now, all you have to do is breathe. Look at me…”

“Aria, stop! I can do this myself. I don’t need your help. I’m a big boy.”

“Stop being so stubborn! I never said you weren’t, but right now, you need to calm down because your blood pressure is up. Just look at me, please, and breathe with me…”

Memories were a place where both torture and treasures took residence. Necessary pain medication caused him to meditate on her and offered him the excuse he needed for his mind to reminisce. He used it as an excuse, but he didn’t care. Everything of her was in his mind. Never had a woman carved herself so intently into his life. Her face, the curve of her jawline, her long curls, and her petite hips molested his thoughts. His fixation detailed a mental map of her and overwhelmed him in his obsession as thoughts made their way upward toward her face. The momentary mediation of her softly blushed cheek, and he could imagine running his thumb over it as he held her chin in his hand.
His
Aria was beautiful beyond measure. The climax of his mental journey was when he remembered her eyes.

Sparkling like diamonds and tumultuous as a rising storm, he’d never have success in purging them from his consciousness. Oblivious to everything at his renewed thoughts of them, he felt himself letting go of a long sigh. The mere memory of Aria’s eyes brought his breathing down to a normal pace and placed a brilliant, warm light into the most recent black moment of terror. He was foolish enough to lose her, but genius enough to push her toward a life far better without him.

As he momentarily indulged in his self-imposed pacification, he felt jiggling movements beside the bed.

“What are you doing here?” he asked, breaking the silence with his deep baritone.

Slowly turning his head toward the large, jubilant bundle of soft fur, Codygirl shook Declan’s resting place with her monumental tail wagging, acknowledging her love for him. He leaned over toward her and sunk his big hands deeply into Cody’s soft fur, stroking and hugging her, much to her delight.

“You know she can’t resist a man’s touch,” came a voice from the doorway.

Carter made his way into Declan’s room, bed rumpled and disheveled, holding a cup of coffee for himself. He handed another to his brother.

“You look like hell. Another nightmare?”

Declan shrugged in avoidance of the subject. His continued attention to Cody allowed him to avoid Carter’s obvious discovery.

“You’re drenched in sweat, Dec. Unless you were having a hot dream about Aria, I’m going to go with the nightmare.”

Declan glared at him. “Why do you have to go there, Carter? It pisses me off when you make her sound like something foul.”

Carter shrugged. “So then, tell me. Was it the nightmare again?”

Body language speaking volumes, Declan’s shoulders slumped in surrender to the line of questioning.

“Yeah…”

Shaking his head in acknowledgment, Carter addressed the source of his brother’s distress.

“Maybe you should talk to somebody about it.”

The mood that fell in the room indicated that resistance would be the tone of the conversation.

“Don’t tell me what to do. I’ll figure it out,” Declan said, stiffening at the suggestion.

“It’s been months, Dec. Let’s be honest. You’ve tried to drink her away more nights than I’d like to count. Even when I’ve poured you into your bed, I’ve heard you cry out Aria’s name.”

Trying to hide the true source of his drunken cries, Declan lied, “It’s just the accident. I’m always screaming for her to get out of the street. It’s in my head. Obviously, we know she did, and that she’s safe.”

He handed the coffee back to his brother. As Declan shifted himself so that he was sitting on the side of his bed, he held onto Cody for leverage to balance himself. It was a maneuver that didn’t escape the notice of Carter.

Settling himself in a chair across from Declan, Carter hoped he was as open to conversation as he was to their recent arguments. “The accident was still traumatic, whether she got out of the street or not. Maybe you’re still, subconsciously, trying to protect her.”

Dropping his guard, Declan’s response came quickly, “I must be.” He dipped his head into the cup he had taken back. “I still find myself yelling
“Go”
to her, and that’s what wakes me up; hearing the word
“Go.”
Somehow, I don’t think she’s safe.”

Carter gave him an understanding glance. “Yes, she is, but maybe you should call her.”

Declan scowled over his coffee cup. “She’s better off without me.”

“Who said, Dec? You? Did you ever ask her?”

Carter’s raised eyebrow was a verbal challenge, and Declan knew an argument would soon ensue.

“I didn’t need to. She doesn’t need dead weight. She’s young, beautiful, smart…and I’m a pain in my own ass most of the time with this…” he said, directing Carter’s attention to his leg.

Carter shook his head. “No, I don’t think so, about whether you would be dead weight to her. As far as the pain in the ass goes? Yeah…you are just that.”

“It’s done, Carter. She’s better off, like I said. She can move on.”

“Really? So what you’re saying is that you don’t love her?” Carter challenged.

Declan didn’t look up from the coffee.

“Yeah…that’s what I thought…” Carter said, standing to leave the room. “C’mon, Cody.”

The fluffy girl rose and turned around in circles to follow her master.

Carter issued one last challenge to his brother.

“If you really are done with her, but you do love her, then ask yourself this—how are you going to feel when you see another guy with his hands on her—kissing her? With his hand on her hip, or even her ass?”

The flush of anger began to creep up Declan’s neck as his jaw clenched, though he tried to keep his composure.

Watching his brother’s response, Carter nodded, noting that they were impossible to hide.

“Yeah…again, that’s what I thought. I hope you can hide your reaction from her better than you’re doing right now. Good luck with that.”

The stretch took the torturing tightness away from her back and neck muscles. It felt deliciously sinful to contort her body in such creative postures and derive such pleasure. This was the activity in which she’d found some unexpected peace since rebuilding her days without Declan. She hadn’t thought of Yoga as something in which she would have found an interest, but as she concentrated on elongating and lengthening the strained muscles, Aria relished the new-found diversion. It had become an effective way for her to maintain her focus, calm her mind, and make her feel stronger.