by White, Karey
I straightened one of my legs and kicked him. “You’re a lot of help.”
“Yeah? Well, I didn’t ask for the job of Angus and Charlotte’s therapist. You two were supposed to be taking care of that on your own.”
“We’re hopeless.”
“I don’t know about that.”
Will stood and reached for Emily. “I’ll put her to bed.”
As soon as she was out of my arms, she squirmed with sleepy eyes and reached for me. “Shuck. Shuck.”
“And this is why you should have stopped calling me Chuck a long time ago.”
Will laughed and handed her back to me. She snuggled in and closed her eyes. “I guess someone loves you,” Will said.
“Thank you, Emily.” I kissed her forehead.
Angus
I stared at the rolled paper Christmas tree on the door of the refrigerator. Even though it said “Love Braxton” at the bottom of the paper, it hadn’t made me think of my little patient. It made me think of Chuck. I mean Charles. I groaned and opened the door to get the milk.
It made me think of Charlotte.
“What’s the matter?” Mom sat at the counter eating a piece of toast. Dad was showering after a morning workout at the clubhouse.
“Just having a bowl of cereal.” I poured milk into the bowl.
“Do you always groan when you have a bowl of cereal?”
I laughed. “Only when I’m working through problems.” I sat down at the counter beside her.
“Problems you can share? I can tell something’s been on your mind since we got here. Maybe it would help to talk about it.”
“There’s nothing to talk about.”
Mom finished a bite of toast. “Are things okay with your residency?”
“They’re fine. I like the doctors I’m working with. Maybe not quite as much as Dr. Fickland, but they’ve all been very nice.”
“Are you wishing you hadn’t come?”
“Not at all. The fellowship is a big deal. It’s good I’m here.” I took another bite of cereal, wishing Mom would be satisfied talking about the weather or politics. Maybe I could steer the conversation. “Are you and Dad still wanting to go to the Mennonite store tomorrow?”
“I’d like to. That quilt auction sounds fun, although I’m not sure why they wouldn’t have tried to sell their quilts before Christmas. Maybe we can find a little gift for Charlotte to thank her for letting us stay in her apartment.”
Dad had been looking online for activities and had found a Mennonite store about fifty miles outside the city. The store itself looked interesting, but tomorrow they were auctioning off some of their handmade quilts.
“The weather looks good, so the drive shouldn’t be a problem,” I said.
“I don’t mind the drive. And maybe if we have you trapped in the car long enough, you’ll finally tell your dad and me what’s going on with you.” Mom smiled to let me know she wasn’t fooled by my attempt at a subject change.
I sighed and shook my head. “You think you’re smart, don’t you?” She shrugged and took a sip of her orange juice. “Fine. It’s Charlotte.”
“Charlotte? Who’s that?”
We laughed.
“I don’t think I’ve ever heard you call her Charlotte. It’s always been Charles or Chuck or Charlie. Poor girl. What about Charlotte?”
“I want her to move back home. She shouldn’t be here.”
Mom nodded but waited for me to continue.
“I didn’t even know she was coming until she was here. She left a good job. She left her family. I can tell she misses them. She should just go back home. But she’s so stubborn, she won’t listen to me. Every time I bring it up, she shuts down or takes off. Mom, she left a dream job to babysit.”
“And you feel guilty?” Mom asked.
“I guess. But I didn’t ask her to come.” I pushed my stool back and put my dish in the sink a little rougher than necessary. “The main reason I came was to get away from her.”
“That’s what you want?” Mom looked genuinely innocent. “To be away from her?”
“How am I supposed to move on if I have to worry about her?”
I felt defeated. I leaned against the counter and dug my hands through my hair.
Mom’s voice was calm when she spoke. “Has she asked you to worry about her?”
“No. But if she’s here with no one but me, how can I help it?”
Mom was quiet for a moment. “Angus, can I ask you a hard question without you getting upset?”
I had no interest in answering any questions, but I was curious where she was going.
“Sure.”
“For years you’ve dated girls but never really given them a chance.”
“That’s not . . .”
Mom put her hand up to stop me. “Now let me finish before you say anything. You’ve dated a lot of pretty, smart, charming girls. But you’ve never let them in. You’ve never let it go past a certain point. I’ve always thought it was because you were holding out for Charlotte, but maybe I’ve been wrong.”
“You weren’t wrong,” I admitted.
“Then why? Why when you finally have the girl you’ve been waiting for right there, ready to sacrifice everything for you, why are you turning your back on her?”
I should have told her I wasn’t taking questions. But since she had asked, I’d tell her.
“She left me hanging for years. And now, just because nothing else has worked out, I’m supposed to be ready to jump right in? She’s my friend. Her whole family are my friends. What happens when things don’t work out? Then I’ve lost them all. It’s not worth it.”
Mom nodded. “You’re right. There’s a lot at stake. I can see how you wouldn’t want to lose the Emersons.”
I turned to see if she was messing with me, but she looked sincere.
“Thank you, Mom.” She smiled at me, and I felt like finally someone got it.
“I never understood what happened with you two,” she said.
“I got carried away and told her I was in love with her.”
“And so she followed you?”
“First she followed that guy to Scotland.”
“Oh. That must have been hard.”
I sat down beside Mom and clasped my hands on the counter. It felt good to finally tell her what I had gone through the past year.
“It was. But now I realize it was probably a good thing.”
“That she went to Scotland?”
I nodded. “It let me know things would never be what I’d wanted them to be. It reminded me what I’d be losing if I wasn’t careful.”
“The Emersons.”
“Yeah. It made it clear I needed to move on.”
“And have you? Moved on, I mean.”
Mom’s face held nothing but love and concern. “It’s why I came to Kansas City. It’s why I want Charles to go home.”
Mom reached over and patted my hand. “Angus, have you ever pictured the future if you marry another woman?”
I shrugged.
“Perhaps you should.”
“What do you mean?”
“How will another woman fit in with your life? Will you still be close to the Emersons? How will it be to watch Charlotte marry someone else? Will you still feel comfortable at birthday parties if you’re there with someone else and Charlotte’s there with another man and their children? I think you need to play out every scenario in your mind as you’re deciding your future. If none of those things will be difficult, then maybe you were never really in love with her. If it sounds horribly awkward and uncomfortable, maybe you’ll choose not to stay close with the Emersons anyway. Just look at every angle and follow it to its conclusion. It might help you see things more clearly.”
“You think Charlotte and I should be together?”
“I’m not saying that at all. You need to do what’s right for you.”
Mom stood and hugged me from behind, kissing my cheek before she straightened.
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�My only advice would be not to give her false hope if you really aren’t in love with her.”
“I’m not,” I lied. “I’ve told her over and over that I think she should go home.”
“And then you shared her dinner and had Thanksgiving together and asked her to help you with a patient.” Mom ruffled my hair like I was a toddler. “I’m going to go see what on earth is taking your father so long. Have a good day at work, honey. We’ll see you when you get home.”
Mom picked up her keys and left for Chuck’s apartment—I mean Charlotte’s apartment—like she hadn’t just detonated a grenade in my life.
No. Not Charlotte’s apartment.
“Chuck. Chuck. Chuck. Chuck. Chuck.” I felt much better.
“Sold, to the man in the blue scarf.” The bearded auctioneer pointed at my dad.
This was the second quilt Dad had bought in the last hour. The first had been what they called a Cathedral Window quilt that Mom had fallen in love with. This was a small quilt, more like a throw. The auctioneer had called it a Log Cabin quilt, although I couldn’t see anything about it that looked like a log cabin. Maybe it was called that because it would look good in a mountain retreat, but that could be said about every quilt, couldn’t it?
“You’re sure she’ll like it?” Dad asked. He was talking about Charles since they’d purchased it to leave as a gift for her.
“She’ll love it,” Mom and I said in unison.
“I think we should go pay for this and then look through the store before we’re tempted to buy another quilt.” Mom stood and scooted in front of the people sitting on the folding chairs in the barn.
“Or before we freeze to death,” I said to Dad.
The Mennonite store was the front part of a barn. The quilt auction had taken place in the back. I don’t think they had ever kept animals in here because the overriding smell was sawdust. People around us were wrapped up in blankets. They must have known there was no heat. Mom was freezing and my nose and fingers were cold. Maybe it was a calculated move to make buying a quilt feel like a survival tactic instead of just a regular purchase.
The little storefront was warmed by a potbelly stove in the middle of the room. The aisles were filled with bags of homemade soup mixes and pastas, nuts and candies, and spices. Mom insisted on getting Charlotte a bag of chocolate covered cashews and me a few groceries even though I protested that I couldn’t do much cooking. It turned out to be an expensive adventure, but neither of them complained.
I pulled off the gravel road that led to the Mennonite store and onto the paved road leading back to the city. Deep snow covered the fields on either side of us, but the roads were clear.
“I’ve heard it’s beautiful here in the summer,” Dad said. “Lots of flowers and green rolling hills.”
“It was pretty when I got here. But I’ve heard the summers are hot and humid.”
“Maybe we should come visit again in the spring or fall.” Mom didn’t like humidity. Her grandparents had lived in South Carolina and every time Mom had visited them, the heat had made her sick.
“I think I’ll be able to come home for a week or so this summer,” I said.
“Good. I don’t like having you so far away.” Mom stared out the window and I wondered if she was crying. She wiped at her cheeks and confirmed my suspicion. “And you’d better take a job close to home once you’re finished. I want to know my grandkids.” Dad reached up and squeezed Mom’s shoulder.
“I’m sure he’ll do his best, honey.” Mom put her hand over Dad’s. “Speaking of grandchildren . . .” Dad continued.
I laughed. “I know. I know. You don’t have any.”
“But we’d like to. Your mom will make a wonderful grandmother.”
“Are you purposely ganging up on me?” I asked Mom.
She shook her head. “I didn’t even tell Dad about our talk yesterday.”
“What did I miss out on?” Dad asked.
“Mom thinks I should think through my future life with and without Charles.”
“Charlotte,” Mom said good-naturedly.
“Chuck,” I said and we laughed.
“It’s good advice,” Dad said.
“I know it is.” I glanced at Dad in the rearview mirror. I recognized his expression. I’d seen it throughout my life whenever he had something he wanted to tell me. He was measuring his words carefully. “You can say whatever you have to say, Dad.”
He smiled. “And you’ll listen?”
“You’ve got me trapped in a car. Do I have any choice?”
“I guess not.”
Dad took a minute. When he finally spoke, I was surprised at what he had to say.
“I hate to see you become a gambling man.”
“What?” I’d never had an interest in gambling so I wasn’t sure what he was talking about.
“If a man goes to a casino, he’d better be willing to do without whatever he puts on that table because most likely he’s going to lose it. You should never gamble with something you’re not ready to live without.”
No one said anything for several miles. Dad didn’t need to finish his thought and he knew it. We all knew it.
I was gambling with Charlotte, and I had to make a decision.
I’d tried so hard to convince myself that I was willing to live without Charlotte, but was I really?
I sat on the couch in my pajama bottoms and a t-shirt. It was my first day off since Dad and Mom had returned to San Francisco, and I felt a little lost. Through the window the world was foggy and gray, perfectly matching my state of mind.
I closed the medical journal and tossed it to the other side of the couch. There was no point in finishing the article Dr. Winters had suggested right now. Nothing was sticking anyway and I knew I’d end up reading it again later. I ran my hands over my stubbly chin and then clasped them behind my head, staring out at the milky morning.
My apartment was too quiet. The teapot-shaped clock on the kitchen wall behind me ticked off the seconds.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
It had to be slow. Seconds didn’t really stretch out that long.
I missed Dad and Mom. Was a twenty-eight year-old man supposed to miss his parents this much? Probably not. But right now I didn’t much want to be twenty-eight. I wanted to be young enough that Mom could tell me what to do or Dad could call me into the living room for a talk—the kind of talk that took all my confusion and put things in order, making my next move clear.
I’d had one of those talks when I was trying to decide what to study in school. Dad never told me what to do, he just asked all the right questions and when we were through talking, I had known I wanted to go to medical school.
I thought over the conversations I’d had while Mom and Dad were here. Dad had told me not to gamble with Charlotte unless I was prepared to lose her. Mom had said to look at my options and follow them to their conclusions.
I kept talking about moving on with my life, but that meant finding another woman to date. It meant not breaking up with her when things started getting serious. It meant commitment and eventually marriage and a family. Did I really want to move on with my life? Did I want to take those steps with someone who wasn’t Charlotte?
No. I didn’t.
The force of what I’d been doing hit me like a Randy Johnson pitch to the head. I had been pushing away the thing I had wanted most for the past eight years. Loving Charlotte didn’t mean risking my friendship with her and her family. Not loving her was the greater gamble.
I didn’t want a future with some nameless, faceless woman.
I just wanted Charlotte.
Charlotte
The freeway was a parking lot. I wondered if it was a sign that I shouldn’t be going. Maybe Angus was right. If I had listened to him, I’d be at Mom and Dad’s house enjoying one of my last evenings at home. Instead, I was stuck on the freeway, alone, and second-guessing my strange determination to attend the weddings of my ex-boyfriends.
I turned on the radio, hoping I could find out what the hold-up was and how long it would last. After about ten minutes of commercials and weather, and ironically a story about Senator Aldsworth, a traffic update let me know there was a four-car pileup at the end of the bridge. Emergency crews were clearing the scene and traffic would be moving again in the next half hour.
Annoyed by the chattering of the DJ, I scanned through the channels trying to find a decent song. Eventually I gave up, turned off the radio, and settled in to wait it out.
The clock in the car said six-eleven. Kyle and Wyatt were probably standing in the rotunda of the San Francisco City Hall, exchanging their vows. City Hall was a perfect venue for them. It was large enough to hold a few thousand guests, and the architecture was perfect for getting good pictures. Plus it provided a measure of civic loyalty and political clout. I wondered if Devon and Polly had helped select the site.
I wondered what they’d look like. Would Kyle’s hair be a little longer and wavier, the way it had been when we were dating? Or would it be shorter like it had been when he’d come to see me last spring? What kind of dress would Wyatt have chosen? Whatever it was, I knew it would be beautiful. Wyatt had impeccable taste. I fluffed the skirt of the navy chiffon dress McKayla had helped me find a few days earlier. It was a beautiful dress, but how would it compare with the finery of the other guests? This would certainly be the most extravagant wedding I’d ever attended.
Too bad Angus wasn’t in town to come with me.
But if Angus were here, he probably would have talked me out of going.
I didn’t want to think about Angus right now. Every time I thought of him, my future stretched out in front of me, hazy and uncertain. Was it a good idea to give up so much to be with him? He didn’t want me there. Was I making a fool of myself? Jayne had offered me my job. What if Angus never came around and I had given up my dream job not once, but twice? I didn’t want to give up, but at what point was it better for me to cut my losses and move on?
The lane of cars on both sides of me began inching forward but my lane didn’t move. It was a cruel metaphor for my life. A couple of minutes later, my lane moved a car length. And then another. I should have been happy to finally be making progress, but instead, a feeling of dread settled on me. I had never gone to an ex-boyfriend’s wedding before without Angus being around for post-wedding therapy. Why hadn’t I realized that before I bought a dress and drove into the city?