But to say what?
I’m moving to Pittsburgh at the end of the summer and like he said…he still hasn’t forgiven me. Even if I was good at intimate relationships, it’s not like we have any kind of future.
We make even less sense than E and August Brandt.
In the end, I pull my suitcase up the stairs. And before dumping it out in my room, I place my biological mother’s second letter in the box unopened.
I’m no princess and Rhys is no prince. And that fantasy we were living in the back house? That’s done. Back to real life now, and it’s time to unpack.
Chapter Nineteen
Just as I suspected, the two weeks spent in the back house with Rhys are just a blip. Life returns to the way it should be. Rhys goes back to his practice and I go back to the taking care of the twins.
The good news is that I don’t have to worry about E violating any more stay-at-home orders sneaking out anymore. After her outburst, E not only stays in the house but throws herself into her homework with more focus than she ever has before. She also takes a sudden interest in cooking all our family dinners and anything I’m watching on TV.
We laugh our way through Never Have I Ever on Netflix, marveling at the California version of teenage life before the pandemic. Then we nod along with Sweet Magnolias, which features a small town and teenagers much more like the ones in Guadalajara. By the time we’re done binging that series, E says, “You know, I’m going to miss Guadalajara.”
I nod, understanding her lament. Here in Guadalajara we don’t all go to the same church and make nice with barely a whiff of racism. But there were a lot of things the series got right about life in a small town. It is nice to know nearly everyone who lives within a twenty-five-mile radius of our house. And no, we don’t get along all the time in Guadalajara, but people come together here to help each other out in ways they never did or would back when I was living in St. Louis.
The process of getting our house ready to sell has proven that. I went to high school with our realtor, Carrie Marie. And when she heard about my job loss, she pushed our house right on to the front of her priority list and worked with A to set up a virtual home tour.
Thanks to her, we were all set to go to market in just a few days. And with everyone around town spreading the word that we’re looking to sell to their family and friends, Carrie Marie thinks there’s a good chance we might move the house before it’s time for us to leave for Pittsburgh in late August.
So other than losing my job, everything is technically going as planned. Which is great. So great…
I’m sure the funny ache I get when I think about leaving Guadalajara again will go away soon.
Along with the bittersweet sadness that hits me whenever I think about the hypothetical pregnancy that never happened. Had he really been upset about my not being pregnant or had all that “my baby” stuff been about him trying to win the fight? The only people who like to be right more than nurses are doctors.
And the weird urge I sometimes have to knock on Rhys’s door to see how he’s doing and defend myself against what he said.
I imagine myself telling him that he was wrong about me. I do want a baby of my own. I’m not clinging to the twins. I’m trying to do right by them after they lost so much.
He doesn’t understand me or the situation…mostly because I literally find it easier to attend to patients on the worst days of their lives than actually open up to someone. Superhero ER nurse, no problem. Stepsister needed for mother duty? Sign me right up. Talking about what I might possibly be feeling to the bitter ex living in my back house.
That just feels impossible.
Which is exactly why I have no business knocking on his door.
So I don’t. And life goes on ….
I decide to give E back her phone in two weeks as opposed to the four I’d been planning on when I first took it away.
I slide it across to her fully charged at the breakfast table. “Since the stay-at-home order’s being lifted on Monday anyway…”
E seems more stunned than happy as she picks up the phone she hasn’t had access to for two weeks. And her eyes darken with an emotion I can’t quite label when she sees the same thing I did after I powered it up for her last night. A screen filled with messages with someone labeled The Lacrosse Asshole. Someone I can only assume is August Brandt.