Lessons From the Professor

“Sutton? Is that you?”

“Umm, yeah, how’ve you been?”

“Not too bad, I gave your Mom my number, but I didn’t expect you to call. You were pretty adamant about never speaking to me when you left.”

“Can you blame me?”

“No. I’m man enough to admit what I was doing was wrong.”

Her eyes widened with shock. It looked like he’d done some growing over the years.

“I didn’t call you to rehash the past or place blame. I just wanted to know where we started to go wrong, and how I missed it?”

“You were young and naïve, and I was reaching the height of my career and arrogant.”

Hearing him so humbled softened the bitter anger she’d kept directed at him.

“I won’t say you’re wrong , but there are two people in a relationship.”

“Don’t get me wrong. It’s good to talk to you, and I had hoped you would call. I just can’t help but wonder why you have the sudden need to talk to me about this.”

“I think five years is long enough to carry something around without gaining closure, don’t you?”

“Is that what you really want? Closure?” His voice deepened, and she rolled her eyes.

“Yes, Jackson. This wasn’t some sad attempt to reconnect with you. I just wanted to hear your side of things.”

“I was stupid, and didn’t realize what I had, Sutton. You were an excellent girlfriend, a little too focused on school and your career, but if I had mentioned it to you we could’ve reached a compromise.”

“Why are you being so … accommodating?”

“You aren’t the only one who needed closure over this. After you left I compared every girl I ever dated to you, and most of them came up lacking. I spent a year pretending the random woman lying beside me were you.”

She cleared her throat, uncomfortable with the direction their conversation was being steered to.

“Thank you for being so candid with me,” she said.

“We were happy there for a long time though, weren’t we?”

“We were, Jackson. The problem was it was all based on a lie.”

“It really wasn’t.”

“Are you going to tell me you weren’t cheating on me the entire time?”

The silence that fell said everything she needed to hear.

“Thanks for being honest with me, Jackson. I’m going to go now.”

She disconnected and breathed a sigh of relief. He was her first love; it was natural to think of him from time to time. But the spark that had existed between them was gone now. His decision to cheat was his alone, and nothing she could’ve done would’ve changed that. Sutton had repeated that sentence a million times in her head. This time she truly believed it.

Chapter Seven

Sutton’s cell phone rang for the second time in a row, and they both sighed as she tensed in his lap.

“I should get that. It might be the hospital.”

“I know you love your job, pet, but sometimes I find myself wanting to smash that cellular of yours to smithereens.”