Chapter 142 - Best of Times Become Desperation

"Maybe we should have seen the sign on the day we got married?  Maybe we should have seen that we were destined for trouble, hell, we couldn't even get married without incident."

"That was a fluke, Monica." he states, seeing where she's coming from, "That is no way to base what our marriage will be like."

"How has our marriage been since then?"  she simply asks, "And I want you to think about that."

Looking into her eyes, he can still see the hurt that he's caused, but he can also see a deeper hurt peeking through, "It's been tough, to say the least."

"Tough?" she sarcastically asks, "you call that tough?  Jon, for the most part, it's been hell"

"We have good times babe.  Think about those."

"No Jon, we're talking about the bad.  The car accident, the miscarriage, our feuding over my project, the bullshit about the song - so tell me, what's really been good?"  

"Our wedding was beautiful.  Your recovery was beautiful, a miracle and our careers are right where we want them to be." he states, smiling.

Monica inhales deeply, "Careers that are about to go in different directions, and I mean in a hurry."

"What do you mean?"  he scoots in a little closer to her, taking her hand in his, tucking them both between his legs.  "We're on our way to the top."

"Yep, I have to go get back on the Springfield tour and you need to get your album done and support it.  We're going to be on opposite sides of the world over and over again."

"He's supporting a greatest hits album, how much longer can he milk that cow?"

"JON!" she snaps, "That is irrelevant at this point.  You were gone for almost 2 years with Slippery"

"It was an original kick ass album, not out hits played over and over every night."

She bolts to her feet, "that's not the issue her and you know it."

"Than what is?  Tell me what you're trying to tell me, Monica.  I'm done trying to figure out your riddles!"  he barks right back and jumps to his feet.  "I'm sorry that I cheated on you, but will you just tell me what you want to?" he stop and faces her, "If you can't forgive me, then just tell me!!"

She stands there and looks into his eyes.  She can see the anger, the remorse and the heart breaking.  His eyes are truly the window into his soul and she's got an unobstructed view.  But her heart means more to her than his, at this point in time.  "We have never been able to bask in our own successes, we've always had to prop each other up and I think that that has been a little detrimental to our success."

"What?"  he shakes his head like he has just listened to someone that's talking in tongues.  "What does that even mean?"

"I think we need a break and we need to get ourselves into the direction that we are supposed to be going."

"Bullshit!' he yells.  "You are not giving up on us, Monica."

"Jon, you did that when you slept with my friend." she walks away, needing to not look at him right now.  She fights the burning in her eyes and swallowed hard to keep the lump in her throat low.  She can believe, herself, that he's done that to her; to them after all that they went through and all that they achieved, albeit together or alone.  She gave it all some deep thought on the plane ride home back to the states.  She can't forgive him, not now.  Maybe never.  She starts to sob, kind of hiding in the laundry room.  

He follows her and puts his hand on her shoulder, he can feel the coldness, he can feel her tension, "babe, I swear to you, I never meant to hurt you and it was not my goal that night to sleep with trash.  I had too much to drink, might have been a little lonely but none of it was to hurt you."  He gently squeezes her shoulder, "If you can't forgive me, will you promise to try?  I love you to much to let our marriage, our partnership die as the result of an egregious mistake."

She takes a few moments before she turns around, but when she does she tells him, "I'm going back to Japan in the morning."  His heart hit the floor.  "I can't be here with you.  Just looking at you makes me slightly ill."

"Monica...." he tries to hold her, she pushes him away.  Her thoughts are just as bad as the butterflies in her stomach, but her head is telling her that this needs to be done.  "Please don't go?!"

She stands there and just looks at him, she loves him; she knows that she loves him with everything that she has, but everything that she has right now is broken.  She's livid with him, she's hurt by him, she's destroyed.  And she knows that the only way that she can even begin to process all of it or even begin to heal, begin to forgive; she needs to be away from him.  "I have to Jon.  I can't be around you right now." her demeanor statue like and unwavering.

"I didn't leave you when you were at your worst, when you were a shell of a person, don't walk out on me, babe."

Monica needs to run that through her mind for a moment, "Are you talking about when I was in the hospital?"  she can't hide the disgust in her voice.  She knows that he's comparing the two.  His adultery to her coma.  "When I was practically lifeless, it THAT what you're referring to, Jon?"

"Yeah.  You needed me and I was there, never once thought about leaving your side, never once thought about walking away."

"HOW CAN YOU COMPARE THE TWO?"  she blasts him, not giving him the opportunity to respond.  "You chose to cheat on me, your chose to make love to another woman......"

He interrupts, "I didn't make love with her." He's so tense, he has his hair pulled pack and is slightly pulling on his ponytail.

Monica doesn't skip a beat, "You made choices that have put us right here, doing this right now."  she kind of chuckles, "Do you think I made the decision to go into a coma and lose our baby?  Do you think I did that on purpose?"  she can hear herself and the snarky tone that she's taking, and she doesn't care.  "Do you think I wanted to lay in that bed for weeks and slowly wilt away?"  deep inhale, "Well, I didn't Jon.  But you decided that you were going to put your dick in another woman and you want me to forgive you and go on like nothing happened??"

His head lowers, seeing how stupid his comparison was.  "I want you to forgive me and give me the opportunity to make it up to you."

"I want you to leave." she walks away from him, locking herself in the bedroom.  He follows her.  He knows that the love was still there, he knows that she still cares - it's going to take some time and some work.

He taps on the door.  "Monica, come on babe.  Talk to me."

From the other side of the door she quietly states, "I'm leaving in the morning.  Please go somewhere for the night."

Jon slides down the door and sits there, "I'm not leaving until you talk to me."

"I'm done talking, Jon."