*~The Dream Of A Lifetime~*

Valondra cleared her throat and began, “I guess you can say my change started when I first saw Bridgett. Here was this beautiful bleach-blonde girl, your ex, who came back to take you away from me. For the first time in my life I was jealous and mixed with that jealousy was anger. Anger towards you, our friends, Bridgett, and even God, because he left it happen. I wanted nothing more than to squeeze the very last breath out of her. I was afraid you would choose her outside beauty over me and my inside beauty. I was afraid she would take you from me and I’d be all alone.” Nickolas shook his head. “I felt threatened by her. I wasn’t sure how I could compete with her. I didn’t want to, but I thought I had to. I was so afraid of losing you and then you proposed.”

“Is that why you said yes?”

“Yes; although I was and still am scared shitless out of my mind of marriage, I thought I had to. I loved you so much and I wasn’t going to let this girl take you from me. I wasn’t going to let that happen. I finally found a place where I thought I belonged and I didn’t want to lose it. I wanted to keep it and hold on to it for as long as I possible could. Nothing else mattered, but holding onto the one true thing in my life…you.” She wiped her eyes. “After you proposed I thought everything was going to be fine. I thought Bridgett was going to go away after seeing how happy you were with me. I thought she did until I seen you two together. I got scared and thought I lost you to her. I felt so unloved and I felt like shit. I thought you were guilty of breaking my heart and I hated you. I figured that if you could do that to me then other guys could do even worse.”

“I would never hurt you purposely, Princess.”

“I know.” She took a deep breath and sighed. “I then decided I wasn’t going to marry you. Even though you told me the truth. A big part of me didn’t believe you because I saw you two. I was angry, because I didn’t understand why God would let Bridgett take you from me and end a great thing between us. I didn’t understand why he would let me get my heart broke and I didn’t want to understand.” He just looked at her closely. “I didn’t want you to finish breaking my heart so I decided to do the next step and break the engagement. I didn’t want to spend a lifetime with you if you were just going to cheat on me. I didn’t want to be second best to Bridgett…to your ex. I thought she had won you back and I didn’t want to be with you and spend each passing moment wondering if you were with her or not. Each time I saw her after that it took all I had not to hurt her and put her in the hospital.”

“I’m glad you didn’t.”

“So am I. All I saw was you and how you would react each time I thought about pounding her face in. It wasn’t worth it then. I loved you and I didn’t want you disappointed in me. I wanted to show you I was completely under control when it came to her. I wasn’t though and I still ain’t. That whole time I was afraid. I was afraid of everything. I didn’t want to deal with it and I tried not to. So I went out clubbing with Trace and drank. I wanted so much to hide my fear, anger, heartache, pain, sadness, and everything else. I didn’t want people to see I was breaking down. I wanted everyone to see that I was ok and that I was getting over you. I actually thought it was working to until Trace said he really liked me. At that moment I realized I was just being stupid and fooling myself. That was when we kissed. I stopped it because I realized my stupidity. Nickolas looked at her thinking about the whole Trace thing.

“Damn, Nick, I wasn’t being fair to you or to myself. You wanted me back so bad and I hated you. I wanted my revenge against you, but I didn’t know how to do it. Hell I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t hurt you, because I loved you too much. It wasn’t in me to hurt the man I love even if he hurt me. But hating you was in me until I kissed Trace. I knew at that moment I was wrong and wanted to do anything to make it up to you. I didn’t know how to or what to do. Not until Brian and Rachel’s wedding.”

Nickolas smiled while remembering putting the garter on her leg and seeing the love in Valondra’s eyes. She looked at him and he took her face in his hands. He gave her a kiss and wiped her eyes, then kissed her again.

“Nothing’s going to tear us apart,” Nickolas promised.

“You sound so certain,” Valondra said.

“It’s because I am. I love you and plan on spending the rest of my life with you no matter what.”

“Don’t you want to hear the rest?”

“I think you cried enough for tonight.”

“But I want to finish this.” He just looked at her. “Please, Nick. If I don’t do this all now I might not want to finish it later. I know you don’t want that.”

“No.”

“So let’s finish tonight.”

“Alright.”

“Thank you.”

“I’m doing it because I love you, but you’re welcome.” She grinned. “I don’t want to go through anymore.”

“Me either.”

“So let’s not.”

“She nodded. “So…so at Brian and Rach’s wedding I decided to try my best in getting you back. I didn’t know what I was going to do or how I was going to do it. All I knew is that I wasn’t going to let Bridgett win after all. You meant too much to me and I wasn’t going to give you up just like that. I didn’t want anyone else to have you. I wanted you and I wanted you all to myself.” He smiled. “I was kind of hoping that me being at the wedding with Trace would make you jealous.”

“Yeah it did actually.”

“Good.” They chuckled. “Anyway, I was still afraid that Bridgett would take you from me. I needed a reassurance that it wasn’t going to happen. I couldn’t find it though. Not even from you telling me repeatedly that you loved me and wanted to marry me. I could never find it and I hated it. I wanted to talk to you, but I couldn’t; so I just left all my fear, anger, and hurt build up inside me for the past year and a half. I thought I was going to be fine, but she was always there. She was there trying to get you back and ruining my life. I tried so hard to not let it bother me, but it didn’t work. I was even going to tell you everything from the whole thing with Bridgett to not being ready to get married. And then you were in your accident and it scared me. It scared me to death because I could’ve lost you. I didn’t want to bother you with my problems then. I was so concerned over you and that’s all that mattered to me. So I just pushed my problems aside yet again. It was just going to be for a month until you recovered but that month turned into two and then three and then so forth and so on until now.” Nickolas nodded. “I didn’t want this to be your problem.”

“Any problem of yours is a problem of mine.”

“I wanted to deal with it myself. I didn’t want any help from anyone. I thought I was doing so great, but then I would see Bridgett around town and I would just go crazy. I kept thinking she was going to take you from me and you wouldn’t do anything to stop it. Nicky, I was leaving my fear of losing you to Bridgett take over my life. I knew I had to get away from hear for while and that’s why I went and did the movie with Justin. I knew it was going to take me from here and I was fine with that, but I wasn’t fine being away from you. The movie didn’t help though because I spend the whole time wondering if you two were together. My fear was ruining my life. I’d call you and each time you didn’t answer I was afraid that you were with Bridgett. I wasn’t satisfied until I came home and saw that she was no where around. I was happy for a few hours until I saw her and she tried to say she was having your kid. Damn it, Nicky, a part of me actually believed her and I finally realized I had a big problem. If I could believe that Bridgett was going to have your kid then I didn’t have enough faith in us…in our love. I hated myself for that and I still hate myself for believing that.” Nickolas wiped her eyes again. “I didn’t trust you enough not to cheat on me and I’m so sorry, Baby. I never meant to doubt your love for me.” He hugged her.