The lift

Ally encouraged me to lie down after our moment in Chris’s office. She woke me up around half past one, with the kids’ lunch packed and even the laundry organized and folded.

“Rachel, do you need to prep for today’s meeting?”

Staring at the clock, it dawned on me that I might be seeing him for the first time in over four months. As if reading my mind, Ally added, “Not that you don’t always look stunning, but this pregnancy is giving you a glow. Never mind your hair, it’s like it’s ready for a shampoo commercial. You’re so lucky to have such a beautiful natural blond.”

Flattered and shaken, I could only respond in kind, “Thanks Ally. I was just starting to pick myself up, but today was a blow. Does it look like I’ve been crying all day?”

Ally shook her head, brushing my hair. “No, my dear, you look well rested.”

This far along, dresses are all that work for me. I’m bustier than usual, and the only one that felt appropriate was a flowing dress with ruffle straps.

“Oh yes, go with that one. It definitely says you’re feeling strong and bold. Don’t worry about the kids. We’ll handle homework and have a good time.”

Walking into the lawyer’s office for the third time should have felt familiar. The firm is in a large business building with who knows how many floors, but I know mine is 26. I made my way to the lift, and just as the doors closed, I saw Chris slip in. Just my luck, we end up together. I was hoping to use this moment to gather myself together.

Leaning against the elevator doors he stared at me as the lift climbed toward twenty six.

Not a glance or a polite acknowledgment.

We haven’t even said hello.

The air feels thinner with every passing floor. I became acutely aware of the hum of the cables, the faint sway beneath my feet, the reflection of us in the mirrored walls. Two people pretending not to be unraveling.

The doors slide open at twenty six.

I move to step out.

His hand comes down against the panel.

The doors close again.

He presses sixty.

The numbers begin climbing.

“Sixty?” My voice is steadier than I feel. “What for?”

He doesn’t answer.

His jaw tightens. His eyes don’t leave mine.

The silence stretches. Charged. Intentional.

The higher we go, the more my pulse betrays me. I tell myself to breathe. To remember why we’re here.

He steps closer.

Not enough to touch.

Enough to shift the air between us.

“Chris,” I say quietly, though I’m not sure whether it’s a warning or a plea.

That’s when he reaches for me.

His fingers brush my arm first, barely there.

And my entire body reacts because it still remembers. He doesn’t answer for a few moments. I try to steady myself, feeling a familiar pull between us. He reaches out again, and my body stings with his touch.

He moves closer towards me and without protest I know his look, that hungry dark intensity in his beautiful brown eyes, he locks his lips on mine and moves his hands to my thighs. I must be crazy to allow this with everything that is happening but I receive his touch and my body naturally welcomes him. As if thinking the same thing, he becomes more reassured, breathing me in, he draws me in tighter and tighter.

My hands try to keep up and move to touch his body. I can feel every muscle in his upper body slowly relaxing. I have always loved his strong back. I move my hands to his groin and hear his sweet sigh, we bang against the wall, this way and that way but his lips don’t stop moving over mine, his tongue constantly coming in full force, stroking mine, twisting with mine.

He stills suddenly, and the abrupt quiet makes me sway. I steady myself against him, both of us breathing harder than the small space can hold.

For a moment, neither of us moves.

Then his hands slide up into my hair, slower now.

He looks at me in a way that feels so tender.

Through me.

Like he’s memorising something.

He rests his forehead against mine.

I feel how much weight he’s lost with my hands on his shoulders. There is sharpness where there used to be ease and then I realise this has been hard on him too.

He moves to kissing me again, his kisses intensifying, kissing a part of me and then locking lips with mine, kissing a part of me and locking lips again. It’s like his hands are trying to touch every inch of me.

“You are everything I ever wanted.”

The words don’t feel soft. They land against my skin like sparks.

If that’s true, then why are we in this mess?

But I fail to say it out loud

While lifting my dress,

“I love you so much, Rachel.”

His voice breaks on my name, like it costs him something. I just take it all in, trying to keep myself together, trying to not ruin the moment. If I think too hard, I will fall apart. So I don’t think. I just feel.

“I love you too,” I find myself saying.

He rests his forehead briefly against mine, again breathing unevenly.

“Oh, Rachel… what am I supposed to do with this?” His hands tighten, then he hesitates, like even he doesn’t know whether he’s holding on or letting go. “I have always loved you. Even when I wasn’t allowed to look at you. Even when I knew I shouldn’t.”

There’s regret in his voice. And something else. Fear.

“You are everything I ever wanted” I hear him say, my body starts to feel like it’s stinging with his words.

While going on his knees, his hand already between my legs stroking me with his thumb. He knows how I get especially this far along, my hormones surging.

“Will you forgive me, Rachel?”

The question is barely above a whisper.

I look at him, hoping my uncertainty doesn’t betray me. I want to forgive him. Since the day we met, I have forgiven everything he could have ever done to me.

But this?

This is different.

Leaving me is one thing.

Leaving our family is another.

There are wounds you can stitch closed in private. There are others that bleed into your children’s lives.

My throat tightens. I don’t even know what I would be forgiving him for anymore.

The fact that he still looks at me like I am the only woman in the world while dismantling everything we built?

I rest my hand against his chest, feeling his heart under my palm.

“I have always forgiven you,” I say softly trying to believe the words myself.

He groans this time. “I told you not to waste your talent and looks on me Baby” Still doing what he was doing with his thumb.

Lost for words and trying to catch my breath I try to comfort him, saying how much I love him.

Still on his knees he locks eyes with mine as he lifts me and wraps my legs over his shoulders, his head moves between my legs, and holds my panties out the way with his other hand. I feel his tongue do wonders and let out my groans, his body receives them and I feel him make movements with more intensity. My body is shaking from all the love and desire that I have always felt for him, moving with his rhythm, feeling his tongue, I know I am reaching and know he knows too, he does his old time trick using a special rhythm. I start moving my hips and drawing my hands through his hair. I want to kiss him more, I want more.

He lifts his head for a moment

“Oh Rach, I don’t want this, please forgive me”

I want to pull his clothes off and make up for lost time. For more than these two months, more than all the time we have lost.

And I come.

I sink into his arms just as we reach the 60th floor almost at the same time.

“You still taste so sweet Baby.”

The door opens.

He leans over to the panel and pushes the button for the door to close again and then presses 26.

For a second I wonder if I should give back to him, if this should be equal. I reach for him, my fingers fumbling.

He catches my hands gently.

“Don’t,” he murmurs. “That was just for you, my sweetheart.”

There is something in his voice that stops me.

Finality.

We are still on our knees when the lift begins its slow descent back to twenty-six. The world outside this metal box continues as if nothing has shifted.

I sink closer to him instead, cupping his face in my hands. He keeps one hand on my belly, protective, almost reverent. The gesture undoes me more than anything else.

His eyes are different now.

Troubled.

I can see the war inside him. The things he is not saying. The decision he has already made but refuses to explain.

I want to ask. I want to demand answers while we are still this close, while he is still soft with me.

But I know Chris.

He only ever tells me what he believes I need to know.

Just before the bell rings he once again presses his lips against mine, his warm hands drawing from my neck through my hair, as if the air in me is the air he breathes, caressing his tongue with mine. We have always had a good dance when it came to kissing.

Too soon the bell rings and he is on his feet, helping me up to mine. We lead out, and as the door opens I see Jason standing there, he looks harder and more rugged than I remember. Yet he still gives me a look that he has always had when he looks at me. I see Chris tense, he has always hated that look. And there it still was, that old familiar quietness between the three of us, an unspoken understanding and a lot of history.

Trying to hold myself together, to not let the intensity of the moment overwhelm me I hear Jason ask,

“Hey Rach, you look stunning as ever. How have you been carrying?”

Chris interrupting abruptly. “We are not here for chit chat, Jason. We still need to be in a meeting in an hour.”

Shocked by the shift, I follow suit and ask myself “Oh damn, so we going through with this?”