At least they gave fair warning. I assumed they didn’t like to deal with prosecuting people smuggling drugs in to the patients but still wanted to make sure it didn’t happen.
After I went through the security check—during which my nerves ramped up to eleven, even though I knew I wasn’t carrying anything illegal—the guard directed me to a waiting area with big windows, thin wire criss-crossing to form tiny diamonds between the panes.
Neil was here, somewhere in this building. I was closer to him than I’d been in weeks. That made me even more afraid. What if he decided, now, now that I was here, that he didn’t want to see me, after all? I couldn’t imagine walking out with any kind of dignity. I would be a wreck.
I wished I would have checked the time on my phone or the clock on the wall to know how long I’d been waiting, because what had felt like hours had probably only been minutes. I fiddled with my wedding ring, twisting it back and forth.
If you do this, we are over, do you understand? I’ll file for divorce in the morning!
“Sophie?”
His voice jolted me out of the horrible memory, and I looked up to see Neil standing in the doorway.
In the past, I would have launched myself at him for a crushing hug. But he seemed like a stranger, now. He looked like the same old Neil, standing there in jeans and a t-shirt as though he’d just come inside from a morning walk on the beach.
I stood, but a force field of nerves held me back.
“You look…” I shrugged. “I thought you’d be wearing a uniform or something.”
“No, no uniform, as such,” he said, looking down at his clothes. “Though, I do usually wear sweatpants. I got dressed up for your visit, so you could tell Rebecca that I’m wearing real pants.”
It was meant to be a joke about my mom’s fashion criticisms, but neither of us laughed. Silence fell between us like a guillotine’s blade.
“You’re looking well,” he tried. “I like your dress.”
“Thanks. I’m trying to impress this hot guy I know.” I smoothed down my skirt. Every word made this somehow easier, but it felt like we were taking the first steps in a marathon. I couldn’t fool myself into believing that we were going to feel “right” together any time soon.
He played along with casual lift of his shoulder. “I’m certain he’s quite impressed. But it might help if you described your underwear for him.”
“I think it’s better to leave that a mystery. That way he could imagine that I wasn’t wearing any.” I was, but I’d let him suffer. “Seriously, though. Do I still look good? Because I’ve been eating nothing but trash lately, and my skin has been breaking out like crazy. I fell asleep with my cheek on a Pop Tart last week.”
“Yes. You still look good. And not just because I’ve been locked up here for a month.”
“You’re not locked up,” I reminded him. “The involuntary hold expired. You could come home whenever you wanted to.”
“No, I can come home when I’m ready,” he corrected me gently.
I took a breath. “And you’re not ready, yet.”
“No, I’m not.” He gave me a small, sad smile. “That’s not what you wanted to hear.”
“It’s not,” I admitted. “Look, I knew that this was just a visit. I didn’t come here with any rational expectation that you would see me and remember how much you missed me and that would be that, you’d just be all better.”
“But your heart did,” he said for me.
He took slow steps toward me, and I swayed a little on my feet. I wanted to go to him, but I couldn’t move. I waited, my breath held, until the toes of his shoes were just inches from mine. He took my hand and held it between his own. I had to steel myself against the rush of relief I felt at his touch, because I knew with that relief would come the pain of loss again when I left him today.
“Sophie…” he began, pausing as though he struggled with the words. “I do miss you.”
“You wouldn’t take my calls. I thought—”
“I didn’t take your calls because I was incapacitated by my homesickness. I want more than anything to be at home with you, with Olivia—is she walking, yet, by the way?” he asked nervously.
My joy at being able to share the news with him, finally, burst like sunshine through my face. “No, but she did stand up all by herself!”
He smiled but faded into seriousness again, quickly. “I want to come home. But I can’t do that until I’m well. If I left here just because I missed you, I would have come home the very first night I was able to.”
“The very first night, you threatened to divorce me.”