Home Again

Julia sidestepped quickly. If she’d be touched right now, she’d fall apart. She might never put all the pieces back together.

Gwen stopped. “It’s not your fault.”

“Thank you. I … guess I’ll take a vacation.” She tried to smile. It felt heavy and wooden on her face. “I haven’t gone anywhere in years.”

“It’d be good for you.”

“Yes.”

“I’ll cancel the flowers and call the building manager,” Gwen said. “Let him know you’ll be gone for … a while.”

I’ll cancel the flowers.

Funny how that, out of all of it, broke the skin. Julia held on to her composure by the thinnest strand, as she moved Gwen toward the door and said good bye.

Then, alone in the office, Julia sank to her knees on the expensive carpeting and bowed her head.

She wasn’t sure how long she sat there in the darkness, listening to the strains of her own breathing and the beat of her heart.

Finally, she got awkwardly to her feet and looked around, wondering what she would do next. This practice was the very heart of her. In her pursuit of professional excellence, she’d put everything else on the back burner—friends, family, hobbies. She hadn’t even had a date in almost a year. Not since Philip, in fact. She went to her phone, and stood there, staring down at the speed-dial list.

Dr. Philip Westover was still #7. She felt an ache of need, a bone-deep desire to hear his voice, hear him say It’ll be okay, Julia, in that lilting brogue of his. For five years, he’d been her best friend and her lover. Now he was another woman’s husband.

That was the thing about love—it was unreliable.

With a sigh, she pushed the #2 button.

Her therapist, Dr. Harold Collins, answered on the second ring. She’d been seeing him once a month since her residency, when it had been required of all psychiatric students. In truth, he’d been more of a friend than a doctor.

“Hey, Harry,” she said, leaning tiredly against the wall. “Did you see this morning’s paper?”

He sighed heavily. “Julia. I’ve been worried about you.”

“I’m worried about myself.”

“You need to start giving interviews, tell your side of the story. It’s ridiculous to shoulder the whole blame for this thing. We all think”

“What’s the point? They’ll believe what they want to, anyway. You know that.”

“Sometimes fighting is the point, Julia.”

“I’ve never been good at that, Harry.” She stared out the window at the bright, blue skied day and wondered what she would do now. They talked for a while longer, but in truth, Julia wasn’t listening. Treating patients was all she had; all she was good at. She’d given it all she had, and now, without it, she felt empty. She should have built her self a life instead of just a career. If she had, she wouldn’t be alone now. And talking about her emptiness wouldn’t help. She’d been wrong to reach out to Harry. “I better go, Harry. Thanks for everything.”

“Julia-”

She hung up the phone and walked around her office. When she felt tears gathering again, she stripped out of her suit and put on her workout clothes, then headed to the treadmill she kept in the next room.

She knew she’d been on it too much lately, that she’d lost so much weight she was down to nothing, but she couldn’t seem to stop.

Staring into the murky darkness of her beloved office, she stepped on the black pad and set the incline button for hills. When she was running, she almost forgot her pain. It wasn’t until much later, when she’d turned the machine off and driven back to her too quiet home, that she thought about what it meant to run and run and have nowhere to go.