‘I have to go Melissa.’ Oliver’s voice is tight and controlled, he’s staying calm but he doesn’t look at her when he speaks, his mind is made up and there isn’t anything she can say to change his mind. ‘I have something that I have to do, and I cannot do it here.’
‘That doesn’t explain why you’re not coming back!’ She yells fiercely, continuing the fight they’d started inside the house.
‘I don’t know how long I’ll be gone.’ Oliver counters trying to get away from this conversation, he’s craving silence, he’s only just got back from New York, after spending two weeks with his mom who was sick, but was now recovering, but he was still feeling a little stressed.
‘Ok so you have something to do, but one way or another you should be able to come back, in a month or two, or a year, but you should be able to come back! You can’t just write us all off, what were these months here? Just some little experiment for you?’ She snaps venomously.
‘What more do you want from me? I’ve worked as hard as I could at the clinic and at the shelter, which by the way wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for me, I’m giving the house to the town to keep open as a shelter, so really what else do you want me to do?’ Oliver yells, he can’t even remember the last time he really yelled, he usually keeps his tone level even when he’s mad, but this time Melissa just won’t let it go.
‘I want you to realize that the people here rely on you! That you can’t just walk away and forget all about us.’
‘Really the people rely on me? Because you’re the only one who is making such a big deal about this, people move on all the time, they leave and don’t look back; most of them don’t leave a house and $10,000 behind for the people in the town they’re leaving. I’m doing what I need to do, because my mother is getting over a serious illness and I want to move closer to her, and I need to do something for myself before I go back to New York.’ He slams the door of his truck closed and turns to her, ‘So it isn’t the town who want me to stay, so why don’t you stop hiding behind them and say what you really mean.’
‘Fine,’ she yells shrilly, ‘I don’t want you to leave, you’re mother’s a grown woman and she has people around her, and you’ve already said that she’s getting better, you don’t need to uproot yourself and move to New York. Just visit her again in a few weeks and then come back, because I don’t want you to go!’
He stops dead and stares at her for a few minutes, there it was, the truth of her reaction to his news that he’d be leaving, he’d seen it coming a mile off, she had been getting more and more clingy recently, hanging around him all the time, childishly begging for his attention even when he was busy working, she’d seemed like such a level headed woman when he’d met her, but she quickly began to show her other side, the side Melissa’s father had warned him about, cautioning him that she can become obsessively attached to someone, he’d seen it happen before and was seeing it happen with Oliver, and so he’d warned him about it, because he could see that Oliver didn’t have any interest in Melissa beyond being friends, but when Oliver had spoken to Melissa, telling her that he wasn’t interested, she became even more obsessed, begging for his attention all the time.
‘I need to go back for my mother’s sake; I’ve got a job in the city at a busy ER and I’ve got an apartment. You can’t ask me to stay because I can’t.’
‘But you can come back.’ She clings to his arm, ‘This doesn’t have to be permanent, you can come back and things can go back to normal, please you don’t see it yet but we could be good together.’
‘No we couldn’t I’m sorry.’ He shakes her arm away. ‘I won’t be coming back Melissa, my mind is made up.’
He’d already said his goodbyes to the rest of the town, at a leaving party they’d had for him the night before, so now with one last glance at the house he’d called home for months now, he got into his truck and drove away, heading back to live in the city he’d left a few months before, the city he never thought he’d live in again, and yet it wasn’t worry or anxiety he was filled with, it was excitement and hope. He hoped that his mother would be ok, she was recovering now from a long illness, but she was weaker and she could relapse, which is why he was moving back. He was excited to see his family again, and to properly make things up with Amanda, because after River’s letters, he couldn’t stay angry at Amanda any longer, and so they’d become closer again, but there was still a little way to go. Most of all he was excited to be starting a new chapter in his life, and glancing over at the full set of River’s letters on the passenger seat, he smiled and knew that he’d always have a part of her with him, no matter what happened.
Chapter Thirty Three
River 2
She could do this, it wasn’t so hard, and that’s what she was telling herself. It was the first day of college and her parents had just left after helping her unpack into her new dorm. She was looking around her in awe, the building was old and beautiful, and the grounds were beautiful, trees scattered around all the paths, plenty of green grass where students could sit and study in nice weather, and then there was the library, which she’d already decided was going to be her favorite place.
She felt calmer the longer she was here, this place just felt right, it felt like she was supposed to be here learning all this new stuff, and taking on this new challenge, but there was one thing that wasn’t quite right yet, something she’d been nervous about the entire drive to the college. Her eyes scan round again, and then she sees what she’s been looking for, or rather who. Leaning against one of the many brick archways is Oliver, smiling over at her the way he always used to smile at her, lovingly. She smiles brightly and runs over to him, jumping into his arms. He immediately wraps his arms around her waist and spins her around.
‘You came! I didn’t know if you’d get the message, I didn’t put it in very clearly, I wasn’t sure.’ She holds onto him tightly.
‘You told me you’d be starting here in September in your last letter; I had a time and a place. There is nowhere else I would be right now.’ He’d picked up on her reference the second time he’d read through the bundle of letters, in the very last one she’d said she needed time to get to know herself, and then she’d told him she was starting at this college in September, he’d figured that it was her way of asking him to come, and so he’d hopped in his car and drove to her.
‘I wasn’t sure; oh I’m so glad you’re here. I’ve missed you.’ She pulls away, ‘Coffee? Uh do you want to go for a coffee?’
‘Yeah sure,’ He takes her hand in his, lacing their fingers together as they walk towards a coffee shop. ‘So how are you? Really how are you?’
‘I’m good, I’m brilliant.’ They walk together happily hand in hand, finding a café and sitting outside at one of the metal tables. ‘I’ve gotten so much healthier; I’m good now, really good.’
‘I can tell you look good, you look healthy and happy, you are happy?’
‘I’m happy now.’ She assures him. ‘How are you? How are things? How’s New York?’
‘I’m good, things haven’t been better since I last saw you, and I’ll let you know how New York is when I move back.’
‘Move back? You moved?’
‘Yeah well so did you.’ He laughs, ‘It’s a long story.’
‘Then tell me, I like long stories.’ She laughs, and they sit together filling each other in on all the news of their time apart.
Three hours, seven coffees, and endless conversation later he was walking her back to her dorm.
‘Ok so I’m going to be in town for a couple of days, I know you’ll be busy but I want to see you, a lot, and then I’m going to move into my new place, but I’ll be close by. You’ll keep in touch right? We’ll see each other?’ He faces her outside her room, ‘I can’t lose you again.’
‘You won’t, we’ll see each other all the time. I already told you, I’m good now.’ She holds his gaze.
‘So – we’re equals?’
‘I think that would be a fa
ir assessment.’ She nods.
‘Good because I really love you.’
‘I was hoping you’d say that.’ She laughs shyly.
‘Oh yeah, why’s that?’
‘Because,’ she looks at him seriously, ‘I really love you too.’ She smiles; he leans in and kisses her softly. Finally they both feel like they’re ready to move on with their lives, together.
How I Got Here Page 22