Was she everything
that you were looking for,
To feel like a man?
I hope you know that,
You can’t come back,
Cause all we had is broken like shattered glass…
~Shattered Glass by Britney Spears
There was only silence. Shocked silence perhaps, but silence all the same.
“Leigh, are you there?” Brian asked. “Please don’t hang up.”
Her voice broke through so suddenly that it almost made Brian jump, but there was relief present underneath the initial shock and nervousness, “And why shouldn’t I?”
“Because I need to talk to you.”
She let out a laugh, “Oh now you need to talk. Now. Of course when it’s convenient for you. Not me, oh no, never me. When has it ever been me? Just you. Mr. Perfect. Well forget it! I’m not wasting anymore time on you than need be.”
“Leigh! Wait! Please,” Brian burst out, frantically hoping she wouldn’t hang up. He knew she was upset, but it didn’t cross his mind that she would be entirely unreceptive to talking to him. He couldn’t blame her, but he wished something would just go right for once.
There was silence again. Seething silence. He could imagine the look on her face. Her lips firmly pursed into a straight line, her brow furrowed, her eyes glaring. Leigh was a scary woman when upset. He had been on the receiving end of her wrath on a few occasions. He did his very best to do everything in his power to keep that vindictiveness away, but his current situation blew that whole defense out of the water. Blew it so sky high that it obliterated into nothingness.
“Please,” Brian pleaded.
Leighanne sighed, “What could you possibly say that would change anything?”
“Well I don’t know until I try right? Give me a chance, that’s all I’m asking.”
“This is a waste of time,” Leighanne stated flatly.
“Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. But I can’t leave us on this note. We have too much history for it to just end this way, and the baby...”
“History?” She laughed lightly, interrupting him immediately. “You talk of this so called history like it meant something to you…”
“It did!” Brian called out in defense. “It did Leigh. More than you know.”
“That’s a bunch of bullshit and you know it. If it meant anything to you, you wouldn’t have done what you’ve done!”
“That’s not true. I tried. I tried so damned hard for so damned long but-“
“But what? There’s no buts here Brian! There’s only you and your fucking selfish weak mindedness!”
Brian flinched. “You don’t understand,” he replied softly.
“No one does! Least of all me. We were getting married,” the lack of sympathy in her voice was striking. Brian didn’t respond and Leighanne continued on, “The wedding was planned, the invitations were sent out. It was done. And then you decide to sleep with some slut-“
“Leslie’s not a slut,” Brian interjected. His voice was a bit harsher than it should have been. He was already treading on thin ice. To make Leighanne upset now would mean no reconciliation could take place. Ever.
“But she is! What kind of woman sleeps with her boyfriend’s best friend!?” she yelled.
“And what kind of man sleeps with his best friend’s girlfriend?” Brian shot back.
“A man that has forgotten the morals and beliefs that he was brought up with,” she said harshly. Her words pierced his heart.
He felt the color drain from his face, “You don’t know the entire story Leighanne.”
“What’s there to know more than what’s obvious? You cheated on me! You betrayed Nick! You betrayed everyone! How could anything justify that!?”
“I’m not trying to justify anything Leigh! I’m trying to make you see that this wasn’t something that was planned. It wasn’t something I wanted to happen. I was going to marry you, yes. And I wanted to marry you, at a time. But I wasn’t happy and you knew it, but you pushed on anyway. Why? Because you weren’t the same woman you were when I first met you. I was stressed, I was upset, I was unhappy, and as a result, I turned to someone that made me feel whole again.”
Her voice lowered. It wavered slightly, “So what? It’s my fault you cheated on me?”
Brian rolled his eyes, quickly putting his head in his free hand. This was turning a corner he hadn’t expected, “I’m not saying it’s anyone’s fault!”
“But you’re implying it! You’re saying I changed, but how does that make it okay for you to cheat on me with another woman!?”
“I didn’t say it was okay. I know it wasn’t okay. I know I wronged you, and I’m sorry. I’m sorry for not ending it with you before things got so far-”
“What did you just say?” she breathed out.
“I said I’m sorry for not ending-“
“You son of a bitch!” she screamed, not even allowing him time to finish. Brian flinched, not expecting her sudden outburst.
“You bastard! How dare you! How dare you think that I had no choice in this! What makes you think that you had any control in our outcome!? I could have ended it with you just as easily as you could have ended it with me! But I didn’t because I had faith that we would pull through!”
“Leigh…” Brian said softly. She was choking up and it was making him feel bad all over again. He realized he had sounded a bit pig-headed. He didn’t mean to make it sound like she could be discarded so easily, as if she didn’t mean anything to him. She did mean something to him, but he didn’t know how to get her to believe that.
“Just shut up! I thought that you were just going through a phase! That you would snap out of whatever crazy crisis you were going through and come back to me! But after months of trying, you still weren’t snapping out of it! You were still seeing her, even if it wasn’t to fuck, you were still seeing her. In your dreams, in your song writing, in everything!”
Brian looked up as Leighanne ranted, her words peeking his interest immediately. She had just implied something he didn’t think possible. He had never once stopped to think that she had known about his affair with Leslie before that night in New York City. Could she have? But how? She was gone on her movie shoot for the first half of the tour, and when she had come back, he and Leslie had quickly stopped seeing each other, so how?
Leighanne was babbling, “Don’t for one second think that I didn’t see that song you wrote. Unsuspecting afternoon or whatever. You left it laying out for the whole world to see! It was obvious who it was for! It’s insulting! It’s trash!”
His heart lurched. He ignored her jabs at him, but instead focused on what she initially said. She had seen the song he had written the day he had first slept with Leslie? Impossible. No one had seen that yet. He was still working out the kinks. Leighanne had nosily looked through his journal on her own time, but that was beside the point. That didn’t matter right now.
When she took a breath to keep going, he slipped in what he so desperately needed to say, trying to get the conversation focused, “You knew?”
“Of course I knew!” she yelled, completely unfazed by this new found revelation. “I’m not stupid Brian! You may have fooled Nick, but you didn’t fool me! You didn’t fool a lot of people on the tour! Everyone suspected, and when I found out, and I saw you two together, I knew.”
Brian was speechless. She knew? “Oh God,” he breathed out. He felt sick to his stomach.
“No God is listening to you now Brian. Not after what you’ve done,” she spat out.
Anger flared suddenly, “You have no right to speak so Leighanne. Don’t speak as if you know. And if you knew about us, why didn’t you say something? Why didn’t you leave me?”
“Because I thought you would stop! I thought that you would throw her aside when you figured out whatever the fuck it is you needed to figure out!”
“But it wasn’t like that,” he stated, trying to keep his cool. The world around him was becoming foggy with anger and confusion. Confusion over the fact that Leighanne had known and had let him continue on thinking he was still holding the darkest secret that would forever plague his life, and angry because she was now throwing it back at him, making him feel like he was the only one in the relationship that had done wrong.
“Oh no, it’s not like that, because you love her,” she hissed. “But what about me? Huh Brian!? What about me!?”
“I loved you Leighanne, but that love faded. How am I supposed to help that?” Brian could barely focus. His heart was hurting, his head was pounding. It was now more than ever that he missed Leslie. He needed her. Needed to hear her voice. Needed to feel some reassurance, some hope.
“How can love fade!? HOW!?” she screamed. He noticed that she was crying. She sounded like a broken woman. A desperate woman. A woman that had tried long and hard to fight for her man, but had in the end lost terribly.
He thought of her words, trying to find an answer that wouldn’t hurt her as much as she was already hurting. How does love fade? Could it really? He thought of his love for Leslie and wondered if that would fade too, given time. It wasn’t possible. This was different. What he felt for Leighanne then and what he feels for Leslie now are so incredibly different. There was no comparison. He shook his head, closing his eyes as he spoke, “Love fades if it isn’t true.”
A shaky breath greeted him, “Fuck you Brian.”
He flinched once more, allowing her to continue, “Fuck you and your little slut whore. What you two have isn’t true love. It’s an infatuation that branched off of emotional stress. We were together for years. You haven’t even known her a year yet, so what kind of love could come from that? True love. True love my ass! I spit on your love! It’s false and cruel. It’s selfish and vindictive. You’re a blind idiot and so is she. I hope she was worth it. I hope she was everything you were looking for, and if she was, then I feel sorry for you, because she’s nothing. She’s a nobody. A lowlife. So fuck you Littrell. Fuck you both!”
Brian’s eyes were welling up with tears as she spoke. The fact that Leighanne was saying these words was hard enough. He had been with her for years, but he had never heard her say such spiteful things before. Not only that, but she was tearing to shreds something that he held so close and dear to him, something that he considered to be the only innocent outcome to all that he and Leslie have been through. She was ripping apart his heart, the heart he had given to Leslie, and she was jack hammering it into the ground.
He realized with her words that he and Leighanne would have never worked out regardless if Leslie had never walked into his life. The shame and guilt he felt was overshadowed by sadness. He was a blind idiot, that much was true. Blind to her. He had no idea she was capable of such hate. Why hadn’t he seen this sooner? He knew she was irrational, he knew she had a hot temper, but this was the cherry on top. How could he foolishly believe he could work with someone like this?
Brian’s mouth had gone dry, “There’s nothing more to say to you.”
“To me? I’m doing you the favor Brian. I’m allowing this conversation to happen right now. You’re lucky I’m in a good mood.”
Lucky? Hardly. Good mood? Is this what she called a good mood? He’d hate to see her otherwise.
“Well then I’m done with your favors. I see now that talking to you is fruitless. I’m sorry for hurting you Leighanne, I really am. I’m sorry for changing you even more so than you already had, for making you believe that we could work. I’m sorry for cheating on you. I know that means nothing to you, but I just wanted you to know that. At least I put it out there.”
“You’re right Brian, your apologies mean absolutely nothing to me,” she stated matter-of-factly.
He thought those words would sting, and he was slightly surprised when they didn’t, “Alright, so be it. All I ask is that you let me help you through the rest of the pregnancy. I want to be in our child’s life, even if we aren’t together. I don’t want you to have to go through this alone.”
Leighanne laughed harshly. Brian grew immediately puzzled. Nothing he had said was even remotely funny, literally or sarcastically. He felt embarrassed by her sudden outburst.
“What’s so funny?” he asked.
She continued to laugh, “How can you be so stupid?”
He felt his cheeks flush, “Stupid how?” Was he wrong to think that she would allow him to be in their child’s life? He thought it a reasonable request. He figured she’d be at least happy for that, especially with child support.
Her laughter was beginning to make him angry all over again. He didn’t understand it. He tried to speak over her giggles, irritation clear in his tone, “Leighanne, what is so damned funny?”
“You want to help me through the rest of the pregnancy? Pay all the medical bills, stay around, and be daddy of the year?” she asked snidely. God, how had she grown to hate him so much?
“I thought you’d be happy,” he said quietly.
“Sure! I’d be happy! Happy if it were really true,” she let out another series of giggles. His embarrassment quickly ran cold. His face turned a papery white. A huge lump was forming in his throat.
“If what were true?” his voice was barely above a whisper.
“The baby silly,” she teased. “The baby’s not true. It’s not real.”
His stomach twisted painfully, his heart dropped in his chest. He felt cold, “What?”
She sighed. The laughter was finally gone from her voice. She now sounded exasperated, as if she were annoyed she had to waste her breath explaining herself, “I’m. not. pregnant.”
The room spun violently. Brian clenched his eyes tight, putting his head in his free hand once more. His mind was running a million miles an hour. His thoughts were screaming at him. It took all his strength not to drop the phone. He stumbled over his words, finding it difficult to form any sort of coherent thought, “Wha… but… no…”
She sighed again, annoyance evident, “I’m not pregnant. I never was. There is no baby. It was my silly way of trying to get you to stay with me. I knew you were going to leave me, and it was the only way I could have kept you. I know you too well Brian. I knew what you would have risked anything for. I manipulated your weaknesses.”
With each word she spoke, the sicker he felt. He didn’t even notice the hot tears streaming down his face until he tried to speak, the salty tears running into his mouth, “Leigh… how could… how could you?”
“You can’t say that I didn’t try right?” she asked smugly.
The night she had told him she was pregnant came rushing back to him. He was leaving her that night. Leaving her for Leslie, to start a new life. Things would have been bad then, but they would have been better. Nick would have been upset, but he wouldn’t have been publicly humiliated in front of friends and family. He wouldn’t have to endure the rejection that came with his proposal. It could have been handled privately. It could have worked better. It would have had to work better.
And Leslie would be here right now. She would be with him, beside him. She wouldn’t be avoiding his phone calls, she wouldn’t be out of a job, she wouldn’t have ruined her reputation as much as she did. But because of Leighanne and her knowledge that Brian would never leave a child behind, Leslie was gone. His friendship with Nick was, as of then, beyond repair. His career was quickly falling into the abyss.
He saw the path that would have happened if Leighanne had just sat there and heard what Brian had to say that night. He would have seen her tears, would have held her, told her that he would always care for her, would always be her friend. He would have found Leslie, would have kissed her and told her things would finally be alright. He would have made love to her like he had done that unsuspecting Sunday afternoon, gently and with passion. With the hope and optimism that came with starting something new.
But instead he had broken Leslie’s heart. He had gotten his kiss, but it was filled with her tears. It was filled with sadness and rejection. She had pushed him away and though she had begged, he had left her there. He had left her alone, her sobs echoing after him, haunting him. He had left her for a lie. A fucking lie.
All that he had been through. All the pain, all the suffering, all the heart break, all the restless nights, all the worrying, all the humiliation and the guilt, all of it - all of it was for nothing.
Nothing.
This very fact was crashing down on him. It was cutting him, punching him, scratching him, tearing into him, slicing him.
His voice trembled with a fury he had never before felt before that moment, but mixed in with that fury was an undeniable sadness. He was heart broken all over again. His teeth were clenched, but he forced the words out, “I never want to see or talk to you again Leighanne.”
As he closed his cell phone, he could vaguely hear Leighanne yelling at him through the receiver but he didn’t care. He threw the phone to the side and immediately buried his head into his hands. He unleashed a torrent of sobs. They ripped through him with such ferocity that he thought he would burst open at the seams.
He couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t think. He couldn’t do anything but cry. Cry for a love he may have lost, cry for a friendship he may have ruined, cry for his own life that had taken such a drastic and horrible turn.
He was completely nauseated, and through his tears he had to propel himself off the couch to the bathroom, where he only barely made it to the toilet to throw up his sorrows. He felt foolish for reacting this way, but he knew that if he didn’t cry, he would destroy anything he’d touch.
He collapsed to the floor, resting his head on the cool marble floor. He relished the coolness against his heated skin. He took a deep breath, trying to calm himself. What was he going to do? Did it even change anything? He didn’t think it did. Leslie deserved to know, but it was too soon to bother her with something so drastic. She was dealing with her own hardships. He couldn’t bear upsetting her even more. Even if he did call her, the chances of her answering were slim. There was no way in hell he would leave her a message explaining what he had just found out. She deserved to know, yes, but not like that.
And the guys? He would tell them, but not yet, and not all at once. AJ immediately sprang to mind. AJ would understand, AJ would help him feel better. He would find him as soon as he got a hold of himself.
As he sifted through his thoughts, he began to doze off. He didn’t fight it. He didn’t care that he was on a bathroom floor - all he wanted was to escape the world that had hurt him so terribly. And escape it he did. Escaped to a world where he was with Leslie again, happy and content. Escaped to where he was safe, for at least a little while.
Either by fate or by some unseen connection, unbeknownst to Brian, some 3,000 miles away, the girl that he had risked everything for was lying in her bed, tears drying on her own cheeks, dozing off into her own world where things were different. Where things were safe. It was in their dreams that they met. It was in their dreams that they were able to carry on.
At least for a little while.
