by Kelsey King
If I go back to Ireland, that future won’t happen. But I can’t help but wonder if Hunter will really still love me a year from now. If that future could be real outside of my dreams.
Hunter comes down for lunch at noon, on the dot. I’m pretty sure he’s set alarms to remind him, as he’s worked straight through lunch a couple of times in the first week I was here. He whistles his way down the stairs. The dishes are done, and I’ve made a stew the way my mother used to, with plenty of onions and potatoes and a hearty amount of meat. This is something I’ve been promising I’d do and now seems like as good a time as any.
Especially since, depending on how this conversation goes, I’m not sure how much time we have left. My gut twists—we should have forever, shouldn’t we? That’s what we promised each other, but we’d done so quickly, rashly even. Hunter dishes up the stew, and I twist my wedding ring—a simple band of gold in the shape of a braid—around and around on my finger.
I don’t want to leave, I realize. Yes, it’s true I would never have come here if Sam had found me earlier, but it feels like a happy accident, not an unfortunate one.
“I hope you don’t mind, I made a call to Ireland,” I say.
Hunter smiles. “Of course not. Who did you call? Your friend who has your things?”
I’d been meaning to contact Anna, but hadn’t been able to figure out how to word an email to communicate that I’m now married and not coming back without it sounding like…well, like precisely what it is.
“No. It was someone who emailed me. A cousin I never knew I had.” I keep my tone light though I’m nervous as hell.
Hunter raises his eyebrows. “A cousin. I thought you didn’t have any family.”
“So did I,” I say, though that’s not entirely true. “I mean, I suppose I knew there were probably living people who were related to me, but my mother never wanted to have anything to do with her family, and I guess I never thought to question her.”
Hunter sets the bowls down on the table, but he doesn’t touch his. “What did this cousin have to say?”
“That my grandmother left me an inheritance,” I explain.
Now only one eyebrow goes up.
“I know, I know. It sounds like a scam. But it’s not cash. It’s a business that I technically have partial ownership in, exporting perfume.”
Now Hunter looks impressed. I wonder if he has been second-guessing the commitment to support me, now that his mother’s seen him married. It really does seem like a huge thing to do for someone he only really needed in his life for a month or two, just until his mother passes.
“Really?” I can hear the surprise in his tone.
“Yes. He’s going to send me all the paperwork, and we can check up on it, make sure it’s real. But it sounded true, and he wasn’t asking me for money or anything.”
“Wow,” Hunter says, and he looks down at the table top like the implications of this are just hitting him that I wouldn’t be here if I’d known this. I’m not at all sure he’s going to come to the same conclusions that I have about the happiness of the accident. “That’s something.”
I sigh. Hunter is wonderful, but sometimes I wish he’d give me a bit more to go on. “There’s more. To claim the inheritance, I’m expected to go back to Ireland and work for the company. There’s supposed to be salary and dividends and all that, but my grandmother apparently doesn’t believe in handouts, so I’d have to go be involved in the business operations.”
Now Hunter looks like he’s seen a ghost. “So you’d leave. You…wouldn’t need a green card anymore.”
I stare at him, stunned that this is his first response. I wasn’t here for the green card—that much I hoped had been clear. I’m Irish, and I have a home to go back to. Yes, things were hard there, but this wasn’t my only way out of that situation. There were other reasons I came here. I was looking for adventure, for something special I couldn’t find back home. For an escape, yes, but the possibility of an escape to something wonderful that could only be found by taking such a chance.
Really, I was looking for him.
Hunter stares at the table, past the stew, which is really best eaten hot but is cooling as we navigate this. I’m waiting, which I’ve found is sometimes the best tactic with Hunter. He may be terse, but given enough time, he’ll find the words for what he means to say.
“Do you want to?” he asks finally. “Go back, I mean?”
I have no idea what he wants me to say, and I feel like I need to know more before I can give him an honest answer. But I’ve had all morning to think about this, and perhaps he needs some time to decide if he really wants me here, if he’d rather I go back.
So I open my mouth, and I say the scariest words I’ve ever uttered in my life. “I don’t know.”
10
Hunter
For the next few days, Sophia and I orbit around each other, neither of us sure what to say. I want more than anything to beg her to stay with me, but the more I think about it, the more I know how selfish that would be.
She came here, when it comes down to it, for money. She was alone and afraid and being evicted, and she was desperate for someone to bail her out. At the time it felt like a fair transaction, but now I wonder if I haven’t taken advantage of her. Yes, I gave her those things that she wanted, support, and company, and a comfortable place to live. But she’s given me what I needed—peace of mind for my mother, and I couldn’t be more grateful for that.
I’m also sure that if she knew she had a billion dollar business waiting for her in Ireland, she never would’ve made a profile on that website. I’d never have heard of her, and someone else would be here in her place. The idea guts me—that I might never have met the most beautiful person I’ve ever known, inside and out. The thought of being here without her makes my chest ache.
She’s out on the balcony when I finish work—I should be spending every second I have left with her, but I’m afraid to be near her, waiting for the moment when she says she wants to leave. She’s watching the stars appear one by one through the branches of the trees, and I wonder if she’s wishing on them for one thing or the other. I join her, leaning against the railing, and Cocoa beats her tail against the wooden railing in greeting.
“I want to say there are more stars here,” Sophia says. “But they’re the same stars, aren’t they? Passing over Ireland, and here. They just can’t be seen in Dublin with all the lights.”
I nod. “It’s the same in American cities. Too much light pollution. Not enough stars.”
She continues to stare at them, and I can see them reflected in her eyes. “I never knew what I was missing, before,” she says. “But now I’d hate to go back to not being able to see them.”
My stomach drops, and I clear my throat. “Have you heard from your cousin?”
She nods. “We’ve been emailing. Did you check on that information I sent you?”
“Yeah. The business checks out. All the names are correct, everything matches.”
“He sent me a picture of himself with my grandmother,” she says. “She looked so much like my mother.”
I swallow the lump in my throat. I want to make excuses, tell her there’s no way to be really sure it’s not a scam. But I deal with scams in my line of work, and I’m satisfied this inheritance thing is legitimate.
“Have you decided to go?” I ask.
Sophia looks over at me, her face dark, her profile illuminated by the lights inside. She’s quiet for a long moment, and my palms begin to sweat despite the chill in the air. “Do you want me to stay?” she asks.
“Yes,” I immediately say. I want to leave it at that.
We haven’t discussed it, but I’m pretty sure that Sophia will take our vows seriously, even if she only entered into them out of desperation. But as I watch her staring up into the dark, I realize what that would be asking of her. She’s alone, here, with only Cocoa and me for company, and while Cocoa is a damn good dog, in the end, she’s the only other compa
nion she has here. In Ireland, she has a family she never knew, not right in Dublin, but not across an ocean in a foreign country, either. She’s got a job waiting for her that will make her more money than I’ll ever lay claim to, that will give her opportunities to stretch and grow and be fulfilled in ways she could never have hanging around here all the time, waiting for me.
As much as I desperately want to, there’s nothing I can offer her that even compares.
I take a deep breath. “But I think you should go.”
She looks at me, and I think I see hurt in her eyes.
“It’s a great opportunity,” I quickly add. “And it’s family, real family, which you said yourself you’ve never really had besides your mom.” My voice is getting thick, and I need to stop talking before I lose my resolve and fall on my knees and beg her not to leave me. To tell her I want to be her family, that if she stays with me, I’ll make sure she’s never sorry.
The truth is, I can’t promise that. I can try to make her happy, but I can’t guarantee that if she stays, she won’t someday regret giving up this chance. She’s my wife, and I need to do right by her, even if it means I end up all alone.
“Is that really what you want?” she asks.
I want to say no. “It’s the least I can do,” I say. “After what you did for me and my mom.”
Sophia nods, slowly, still looking up at the stars. “And if I don’t like it? This business? Those people?”
I shrug. I find it very doubtful that she’s going to go over there and wish for this emptiness when she could be involved in all of that. But I understand the fear of the unknown.
I tell her the truth. “You can always come back. I’ll support you, whatever you decide, Sophia. This is ultimately your decision.”
She nods. “Alright, then.”
And we continue staring into the dark for another long while. For once, I have a million things I’d like to say to her, but I’m not sure I can trust my voice to say any of them without breaking, so instead, I leave the words unspoken.
I drive Sophia to the airport three days later; once she made the decision, she didn’t want to waste any time. I understand that. She must feel at loose ends, hanging around my house, now that she has someplace else to go. I’m at once dreading her departure and counting down the minutes. Each one is so painful as I wonder if this is the last time we’ll laugh together, the last time I’ll put my arms around her, the last time we’ll make love? I want to stretch out the minutes into years, to remember every detail, but I also know that when she’s gone, it’s going to hurt so bad that I’ll wish I could forget.
We’re both quiet on the drive to the airport, which I suppose is about par for the course. We haven’t talked about what’s going to happen now if we’re going to stay married if we’re going to get divorced. She hasn’t asked me to come with her, and I think deep down she knows that I couldn’t go. I like the quiet, living on top of a mountain with a thirty-minute windy dirt road between me and anyone who might want to talk to me. I took a lot of pains to get as far from people as I possibly could when she’s ready to be wrapped in the arms of a family that’s waiting for her.
If I went with her, I’d only be in the way.
I don’t bring it up now, halfway because I don’t want to hear the answer, and because I know she’s treating me as a safety net, a comfortable place to go if this inheritance thing ends badly. I don’t mind because of what she did for my mom, and because I want her to feel safe. I don’t want her to suffer, and if she needs to leave this unfinished, so she knows she has a soft place to land, well then I’ll give her that. It is, truly, the very least I can do.
When we get to the airport, I park the car and walk her up to the security line, wheeling her luggage along. She’s taken everything, which I suppose makes sense. People go away for a week and take more than she came here with.
Still, I can’t help but remember that when she left Ireland, she left some of her life behind with a friend.
I put down her bags, and then hug her, burying my face in her hair, which still smells of wildflowers. I try not to think about all the things we talked about—children and our future together. I try not to imagine what it will be like to return to the house and find it empty. Cocoa whined when Sophia stepped out of the truck, and I know it’s because she knows what’s happening. I wish I knew how to explain it to her.
I wish I knew how to explain it to myself.
“Well, travel safe,” I say. “And let me know when you arrive.”
“I will,” Sophia says.
I take one more look into her beautiful blue eyes, and then turn away before she can see the tears brimming in mine.
I don’t cry.
I don’t beg.
I don’t tell her that when we got married, I wanted us to be forever. I mean, I’m not an idiot. I know divorce is a thing that happens. Maybe this would be easier if we had broken up because we couldn’t live together if the time we had together had been long enough to be anything but perfect.
I return to my truck to find Cocoa lying sprawled across the bench. She hops up and looks around for Sophia, and then lets out a soft whine. “I know. She’s not coming back,” I tell her with a soft pat on the head.
And even though Sophia says she’s not sure yet, I taste the truth of it.
When I get home to the empty house, I break out a fresh bottle of whiskey, and I let myself cry.
Two months after Sophia leaves, I get the call about my mother. Come see her now, the doctor tells me. She may not make it until Sunday. This time I put Cocoa in the car with me to drive down to the hospital. It’s not a warm day, and I already know I’m going to need the company on the drive back.
My mom drifts in and out of consciousness, and from the way her body winces, I know she’s in pain. But she’s there enough to look at me and hold my hand. I tell her I love her, that I’m here for her, that everything’s going to be okay. I tell her Sophia went home to Ireland to take care of some things, but she’ll be back, and I’ll send her love.
She dies at nine am the next morning, and that very afternoon, I realize I’ve run out of whiskey. I meander through the house, aimless, Cocoa trailing along after me, sniffing me cautiously as if she can smell the sadness and death on me. I wander into Sophia’s room—I still think of it that way, even though she didn’t sleep here for long. That’s when I notice, on the dresser, she left my mother’s pearl necklace behind. I pick it up, holding the single stone in my hand.
And then I go into my office and open my email. We’ve been corresponding, Sophia and me. She sends me pictures of her family and tells me about what she’s learning and signs all her emails with love. They’ve been less frequent lately, possibly because I always have so little to say back. Cocoa is fine. The house is fine. I’m fine, which is a lie, but a kind one. I don’t want to lay guilt at her feet, make her feel like she owes me something when the opposite is true. She gave my mother the peace that I wouldn’t be alone, and now that I am, I understand why she wanted that for me.
My mother passed away this morning, I write. I told her I’d send you her love, and also that you wished you could be here. I hope all continues to be well in Ireland.
All my love,
Hunter.
I double-check the bottom drawer of my desk, already knowing there’s no alcohol there. I could drive into town for some whiskey, but my body feels heavy, and I’m not even sure I can get myself to the truck.
I stare at the email, realizing the truth of those words. I love Sophia. I was happy while she was here, for the first time in a long while, and I’m completely, utterly lost without her. But she says things are good where she is, and she has stability, security, family, love, all the things she came here looking for, and all things considered, she’s found them all now in a much more likely place than an international dating site.
And this is why I finally stop emailing, send her future message to a folder buried deep in the archives of my inbox, and res
olve once and for all to let her go.
A month later, I’m out chopping wood with my newly sharpened ax. It feels about a hundred degrees—rare for this elevation—and I’ve taken off my sweat-soaked shirt and thrown it over a nearby tree branch. Cocoa is lying in the underbrush, looking at me like I’ve completely lost my mind and just need to join her in wallowing in the shade.
She’s not wrong, but these past few weeks, I haven’t been able to stop moving, to stop working, to stop running. Every time I do, I feel it again. The emptiness. The longing. The pathetic need to get wasted and dwell on what might have been.
I set up another log, heft the ax over my shoulder, and bring it down with a satisfying crack. I don’t even go into town once a week now. There’s no reason when once every three or four weeks for groceries will suffice.
Tires crunch on the road and I put down my ax. I expect to see the ranger come to tell me about a fire warning, or a lost hiker, but it’s a shiny, new sedan that comes rolling up the road and stops beside my truck. Cocoa stands and stretches then gives a token bark and lies back down in the dust.
“Some guard dog,” I say to her.
Then the door to the sedan opens, and I take a step back.
Sophia is standing there, her red curls pulled up in a messy knot on top of her head. “Hey,” she says.
Cocoa leaps to her feet again and bounds toward her, throwing herself bodily at Sophia, who laughs and bends over to pet her.
“Hey, Cocoa. I missed you.”
I realize I’m still standing there, staring at her, and when Sophia fends off Cocoa with a rawhide dog bone—a good choice—she looks up at me.
“What are you doing here?” I ask.
She hesitates. “I’m home. I hope.”
I shake my head. “But you were at home. You were happy in Ireland, with your family and—”
“And my family is wonderful,” Sophia says. “But I was miserable there. I tried to be happy, I really did. But when you stopped answering my emails, I—”