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“It’s not you, it’s me.” She knew straight away it were the wrong to say. The look on his face told her as much the moment the words left her mouth. She weren’t trying to be cruel but she hadn’t really had much experience on this side of the fence before.
“Audrey…”
Her statement was the truth though and she knew this as well she knew the back of her hand. It was her. She had no right being a woman of her position being stuck between two fella’s but here she was. “It’s for the best.” She then added.
It was a vain attempt to end a conversation that hadn’t even really started. How could it have done, when the first words to leave her mouth after stepping over his threshold were, “Gerald, it’s over between us.” It hadn’t been gentle in the slightest, but sometimes it was better just rip off the bandage whatever be the pain that followed.
“I don’t love you like I should do.”
She winced at herself for saying that. Apparently now she couldn’t even shut up and leave it as was.
“Audrey…”
Her name again. Is that all he could muster up? Is that all he had to say? Was there no other come back from it he wished to respond with? She wondered if she wanted an argument? Had she been angling for one? She’d expected some sort of backlash that was for sure and all he could say were her name?”
“I can’t help the way I feel.”
She couldn’t. Not in the slightest. It was an unknown power that was pulling her away from Gerald’s ‘steady as she goes’ to Siegfried’s ‘shot across the bow’ but she wasn't complaining - not in the slightest. She liked chaos, even thrived on it some might say.
What she did know was that chaos would be a thing of the past if she stayed with the man standing in front of her right now.
“Skeldale’s me home.”
“Audrey…”
“It’s me home, and where my family are.”
“But we could have…”
No.
Absolutely not.
“That’s not what I want… with you, I’m sorry.”
“Oh.”
“Like I say, it’s not you, it’s me.”
There was silence then, which she was grateful for, she supposed. Part of her wanted to walk right out the door and back across the village square but then that felt rude. Instead she watched him sit down like a lead weight on his armchair and sigh loudly.
“Is it him?” She finally heard him ask. “Farnon?”
It was a question and half that was for sure and not one she’d reckoned on answering. She didn’t even know herself. The way she’d left Skeldale, in such a hurry, she hadn’t really had time to figure that side of it out.
“Possibly.” She answered, surprising herself. “It’s complicated.”
She reckoned ‘complicated’ was a good way to describe it.
“What do you mean Audrey? Do you love him?”
Truly.
Madly.
Deeply.
“I’m… not… it’s hard to string a name tag on it,” she said as gently as she could.
There was silence again for a good while after that. Or so it felt like.
“Does he know? How you feel about him?”
No. Yes. The kiss that still stung her lips probably said as much. She weren’t going to tell Gerald that though. That was private between her and Siegfried and the four stone walls of Skeldale.
“He’s aware that I’m here now, telling you this.”
“Right.”
“I’m sorry.” She said finally and after what felt like an age. Because she was if she was being truthful. “You’re going to make someone a lovely caring husband one of these days Gerald but that person's not me. I’m not the one.”
She noted he couldn’t even look at her now. Especially after that statement. It might have been worse than the ‘it’s not you, it’s me one’ in all honesty.
“You should go.”
“Probably.”
“I’m not going to wish you well though.”
She hadn’t really expected him too. She had no right to even receive that sort of kindness considering she had just broken his heart. “No… that’s okay,” she replied with a pause. “We were good, for a while Gerald-.”
“-but I’m not him am I?”
Audrey shook her head.
He wasn’t.
She’d never broken a man’s heart before and maybe she’d been a bit harsher than she should have been but when Gerald’s front door slammed closed behind her, she felt herself practically run back to Skeldale faster than she ever had before.