Total pages in book: 75
Estimated words: 76592 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 383(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76592 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 383(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
Then a voicemail icon pops up. My phone is still on silent.
My stomach drops before my brain catches up.
Could be a pharmacy, a reminder, spam. Could be…
No.
No, because he’s not in my phone anymore. Though he could still call me.
Without looking at the number, I tap voicemail.
“Ms. Haynes, this is Dr. Landers’s office confirming your slot in next week’s skills lab. Please bring your sterilization log and sign the cadaver agreement if you haven’t already.”
Disappointment whirls through me.
Seriously, did I really think it would be him?
I chose the seminar. I chose me.
He took the fucking hint. Just like I took his.
What do I truly expect? Henry, a few weeks post-brain surgery, careening down the mountain on one of his gorgeous horses with an engagement ring and a lifelong promise?
No. This isn’t a fairy tale. It’s real life. And sometimes people have to make hard choices.
He made his, and I made mine.
Period.
Full stop.
By the time I get home, the sun has turned to late-afternoon gold. I drop my bag, toe off my shoes, wash my hands like I’m scrubbing in for the rest of my life.
I head straight to the shower and make the water as hot as I can stand it. I strip off my clothes and step under the pulsating water and stand there. Just stand there. Will the water to burn the memories away, help me home in on what I truly want. A successful career as a surgeon. Nothing more, nothing less.
After a few minutes, I scrub my hair, my scalp, my face, my body, harsher than I need to. Maybe, if I scrub hard enough, I can erase all thoughts of that night I was nearly attacked…and of Henry Simpson.
Right.
It doesn’t work.
Now I’m haunted by memories and my skin hurts.
I dry off, put on sweats and that damned Steel Vineyards T-shirt because I’m a masochist, apparently. I head to the kitchen in bare feet and open the fridge.
Nothing appeals to me, but I make a ham sandwich anyway. A surgeon’s got to eat, after all, even when her patient is a practice pad. Next week, a cadaver.
It’s Friday. I don’t have to study. Two weeks until the final, so I’ve got time. I could binge watch a new show, read a book for pleasure, do any number of things.
But I end up at my desk again, looking through notes, flashcards, cases.
It works until it doesn’t. The ache sneaks back in. I stop pretending I don’t know its name.
Henry.
The barn. His mouth. The way slow knocked me out harder than hard ever did. The way he said he was broken like it was a fact printed on his forehead.
I should have gone when Marjorie called. I should have walked out of this apartment and kept walking until the Western Slope swallowed me.
But I didn’t. I chose the seminar, the knots, the clean language of muscle memory over the messiness of love with a man who said we had no future.
Angie said it was okay to choose myself.
Did she mean it?
Henry’s her brother, after all.
Then, as if the universe can hear my thoughts, my phone buzzes.
Angie.
“Tabs.” Her voice is all breath. “Tell me you’re okay.”
“I’m fine. You should be enjoying your honeymoon. Not calling me, Ang.”
“Jason and I are coming home soon. To Boulder, not the Slope. I can’t wait to see you.”
I clear my throat. “You’re not going home to see Henry?”
“Oh. Well, yeah. Of course. At first. But we’ll be back in Boulder before your seminar is over. Jason has surgeries scheduled, and I… Well, you know. Fall semester is starting.”
“Of course,” I say.
“So…do you want to know anything?”
“Uh…sure. I want to hear everything about the trip.”
She lets out a humorless laugh. “You’ll hear that when we get home. I have lots of pictures, plus some goodies to bring back to you. But you know very well I’m talking about Henry, Tabs.”
Henry.
Of course. She said I could choose me, but he’s still her brother. I get it.
“How is he?” I ask.
“Physically? Good. Stubborn. He’s back at work and driving short distances.” A wry half-laugh. “Emotionally? He’s pretending.”
I press my fingers into my temples, not sure what to say. “I had the seminar. Orientation. Then labs. I couldn’t pass up the opportunity.”
I’m making the same damned excuse, and she knows it.
I swallow. The truth hovers on my lips.
“Tabs…”
“Angie, here’s the thing.” I draw in a breath. “I was afraid. I was afraid that if I left, I wouldn’t come back.”
No response.
Until—
“Maybe not right away,” Angie says. “But you would have. Because you’re you.”
Silence. My kitchen clicks and hums around me.
“Tabs,” she says, “I have an idea.”
I sigh. “What kind of idea?”
“My family has this cabin in Dillon. It’s closer to you than to us, and it’s fully stocked and managed. You should go there this weekend. Take a break.”