His face was on your screen, and you could hardly believe it. You scrolled through his Facebook page- a new one, considering he deleted his on your anniversary the year-and-a-half before if you recalled- and saw only one picture. Your heart was pounding.

"In a relationship with..." Some girl. A girl from Galway... He'd told you he was moving to the States back to his family after his mother was diagnosed with cancer. What a great excuse to keep you from stopping him.

Who was this girl? You clicked on her name and her page popped up. You felt sick to your stomach when you saw a post from Valentine's Day the year before. "Happy Valentine's Day, babe! Thanks for cleaning up the apartment, what a nice surprise to come home from work to that!"

He'd only left the December before that... Ghosted. He told you one night that he still loved you and wanted to be with you any way he could. Then you woke up the next morning to find that he had blocked your number and deleted his Facebook account. He was gone. Nowhere to be found.

And it was so easy... Why was it so easy? How could you plan a future together, only to have those plans cast aside for some other woman? How could you be so good to him, yet so...

Replaceable..? 

"Is that your ex-fiance?"

You looked over your shoulder as John leaned over you to look at your computer, a cup of tea in-hand. "Oh... Yeah, I... Um... I didn't mean to..." You clicked away to a different tab. "Sorry, it was a mistake, I-"

He kissed you to quiet you. "It was just a question, not an accusation," he said. John stood up and walked into the kitchen. "There's tea in here if you want a cup."

Yeah. Tea. Maybe that would take your mind off of things.

It was dark when John came into the bedroom. He carefully opened the door, making sure the light was out so he didn't disturb the peaceful shadow of night enclosing the room. You had gone up to bed early that night, and though he was somewhat concerned about you, he figured a little rest might do you well. He drew back the sheets and settled himself into bed with you, cradling you close. 

You hummed sleepily and turned back enough to give him a peck on the nose. He smiled and kissed your lips, then your cheek, and finally your neck. When you pressed back into him, he squeezed you tighter. You rolled over and he pressed his face into your bosom, urging a relieved sigh from you. His fingers glided over your soft skin, stopping at the small of your back. He leaned up to kiss you on the mouth again, and he could feel his heart beating wildly.

When you kissed his neck, he slid his hands up your body to your shoulders, then down your arms to grab your wrists, pulling them so your hands were above your head. The movement made you shutter and you looked up at him with glittering, doll-like eyes. God, he loved it when you looked at him like that.

He was starting to show through his boxers and he moved one hand down to pull off your panties. When you were both undressed, he pressed into you, gasping a little at the velvety grip around his manhood. John moved slowly at first, but as passion overtook him, his hips moved faster and faster against yours. Your eager pleasure cries made his head swim with ecstasy and his strong muscles tremble, excited by the feeling of satisfying his lover.

You suddenly tensed up, curling your legs up and frantically pulling against his hands holding you down. "Baby... S-stop... Stop, I-I can't, I can't..."

"Your safeword with me is 'no' or 'stop.' You understand?" he recalled you saying before. John pulled back and you shrunk away in a fetal position. He tilted his head at you, his brows curved up in a sad expression. "Hey..." he murmured. "I'm sorry... Are you okay?"

You covered your mouth as you were suddenly choked with tears. Damn it, why was this happening? John was a good man, better than your ex had ever been, so why wouldn't your mind rest and let you enjoy this?

He came up and sat beside you, watching helplessly while you cried in near silence. Every time you took a breath, he felt another sharp pain in his chest. John never said anything, though. He simply sat next to you and let you cry, his hand beside you in case you wanted him to touch or hold you.

After you finally cleaned up, you were putting your pajamas back on; John was kneeling on the bed behind you. You looked back only once, but quickly looked away when you could see his brows settled low on his eyes, his mouth turned down in a frown. 

"I'm sorry I'm like this..." you whispered. "I know it's hard for you."

"I'm not mad at you..." he growled quietly. 

You looked back, though didn't meet eyes with him. "But you are mad."

"Yeah, I'm mad," he said, voice rising a little. "I'm mad at him because he took a beautiful, strong, sweet woman and broke her into tiny pieces without even saying goodbye. I'm mad at him because whenever I try to be intimate with you, you can't give me the same sincerity back because you're scared to death that I'm only going to leave you." You turned back to him, eyes round. "Don't think I haven't noticed you holding back this whole time. How could I not?"

You felt the knot in your throat coming back and you desperately tried to swallow it. "I'm sorry..."

"Stop being sorry!" he cried. "For God's sake, it's not your fault, so stop apologizing like you did something wrong!" He locked eyes with you, and you could see tears of his own glinting in the soft light coming through the blinds. "He hurt you, and it makes me angry, not just because you didn't deserve it, but because I'm trying to show you how you should have been treated this whole time and you don't even believe me." John felt a trickle down his cheek and wiped it away, sighing in what you could have sworn sounded like defeat. "... I love you so much... Please, just tell me how I'm supposed to show you that I mean it."

By then, you were tearing up again, and he came back to him, wrapping your arms around his neck and resting your cheek on his shoulder. "I love you too," you whispered past the lump in your throat. "You're doing everything right, just... Don't give up on me? I'm trying to be better too... It's scary to start over with no idea how this will end."

John held you out in front of him so he could look at your face. "I'd never give up on you... Not when it took me this long to find you." He smiled and when you smiled back, he pulled you into another hug, kissing your cheek. 

"I love you."