“I won’t be falling, Noah, because my mom is going to be fine.” Her fists ball at her sides and her lower lip quakes. “I don’t know what romantic notion Dayton put into your head, but I don’t need you to catch me.” Her eyes flash, filled with thunder and lightning. “Besides, you’ve met Matt. What is he going to think about you showing up here?”
“Probably nothing.” I lower my voice. “You reduced us to friends from high school.”
Ember crosses her arms. “I told him after you left.”
“Everything?”
She glares at me. “Enough.”
“What does that mean?”
She takes a step back and rolls her eyes. I hate that she’s keeping distance between us, and I don’t want it there anymore. I want to press her body against mine, hold her, and whisper to her that I’ll be here for her, no matter what happens. I can’t do any of that, because I need fucking help fucking standing. Like a goddamned toddler.
“Ladies?”
We all turn to the door. A nurse in purple scrubs looks from Sky to Ember. “Your mother’s doctor will be here soon.”
“Okay,” Ember whispers, and the nurse walks away. At once, the fire in her has been snuffed out. Her shoulders droop with the weight of it all. She stands rooted in her spot and presses two fists to her eyes.
“Ember?”
We all turn to the confused voice. Red colors the surface of Ember’s cheeks. Sky looks like she doesn’t give a shit about anything that’s happening right now. I don’t know what I look like, but I’m guessing if my expression reflects what I’m feeling, I want to punch Ember’s prick of a boyfriend for not staying the night with her when she needed him the most. If she was mine I never would’ve let her go last night, and I would have come here with her this morning.
Matt and Dayton stand beside one another. Matt stares at me. Dayton stares at me.
I don’t do a damn thing. My chin might be raised a fraction. I might be thinking about the nearest exit I can point Matt to.
He strides in, Dayton behind him, and pulls Ember into his arms. I look away. They exchange a few hushed words and he leads her over to a chair a few seats away from me.
Dayton sits down beside me. “What happened to flying in this morning?”
“Wasn’t soon enough.”
His head tilts as he watches me. “What did arriving in the middle of the night do for you?”
“It put me here first.”
Dayton crosses an ankle over the opposite knee and leans back. “I’m glad you’re here,” he says under his breath. “Matt proposed.”
28
Ember
Matt’s grip on my hand is starting to hurt. Instinctively, I pull it away, but he only pulls me back. Why the hell is he holding me so tightly? My eyes find his, but the question stays stuck in my head.
The lights in the waiting room are bright, the sharp smell of astringent fills my nose. I wish I could close my eyes and make this all go away.
My mom. In the ICU. How can this be?
A morning ride on a friend’s motorcycle, she’d told me two nights ago when I called her. Not a normal mom thing to do, but when was my mom ever normal? So I told her to have fun, and wear her helmet.
When I woke up yesterday morning, before I knew what had happened to my mom, I felt sorry for myself. Thoughts of Noah filled me. Was he okay? Did he have surgery? Would he crash my wedding, confess his love, and refuse to allow me to marry anybody but him?
And then the guilt came. The wretched, consuming guilt. Could I get any more pathetic?
Matt proposed.
He went the whole nine-yards. On one knee, his eyes shining, the ring box teetering on an outstretched palm.
My first thought was Why didn’t he propose while we were in England? That would’ve been more romantic. My living room wasn’t exactly exciting. Maybe that’s why I didn’t see it coming. Then came the second thought, but I guess it was more of a feeling. Crushing sadness. Not what I was supposed to experience during a proposal. So this is how we will finally end.
It had to end someday. Noah was never to be my forever.
It was time. Move on with your life. First loves are not last loves.
I swallowed the pain, pushed down the denial, and said yes.
A few hours later, it all stopped mattering. My mom was thrown from the back of the motorcycle. The friend she was riding with broke both legs. The helmet I told her to wear? She didn’t. I was in my backyard finishing up a yoga video when Matt came outside to hand me the phone. Stress over the proposal consumed my thoughts until I put the phone to my ear, and my sister’s teary voice spoke.
Then everything else fell away.
It’s awkward. Not the waiting room in the ICU, but the assortment of people in it. The knots in my stomach are tied into their own knots. Dayton sits beside Noah. My sister is on my left, Matt on my right.
Noah looks awful. His eyes are bloodshot and sunken.
“Did you sleep here last night?” I ask him, no opening sentence or casual conversation to start.
Sky's shoulders jump at the sound of my voice. It’s the first sentence anyone has spoken in a while.
Noah looks up from his phone. He’s been typing on it since the nurse asked us to wait in here for the doctor. His lips twitch. He looks unsure.
“Well?” I press.
He nods.
I look back down at my hands. My bare hands. One very bare finger in particular, and I hope Matt doesn’t take that to mean anything. Leaning my head back on the chair, I close my eyes, and think of bridesmaids dresses. Sky looks amazing in light blue, and purple, and magenta, and red. All colors, actually. It’s that blond hair of hers, it goes with everything. I’ll let her choose her own color. I don’t want a big ceremony. I’ll wear flowers in my hair. Not a flower crown, maybe just one pinned behind my ear. Understated.
This is how I distract myself for the next thirty minutes, while Dayton plays a game on his phone. Twice, Matt steps out to take a call. Noah has his eyes closed and his head tipped back, but I know he’s not sleeping. The rise and fall of his chest is uneven. Sky sits like me. Lost in thought.
Finally, the doctor walks into the room. He’s a smaller man, almost my height, and the bald spot at the crown of his head is close to converging with his receding hairline. He strides past the first two rows of chairs, and Sky and I get to our feet.
“How is she?” Sky asks first, her voice anxious.
“I’m most concerned with her brain swelling. She’s on medication to reduce it, and we’re using additional methods to assist. We’ll be monitoring her closely, and I hope to see improvement. If her brain continues to swell, she’ll need a decompressive craniectomy.” He speaks the words in an unaffected tone, but to me they sound big and scary, and it’s still unbelievable that it’s my mom he’s talking about.
“Yes, yes. Okay. What is that? A…decompressive cranie…cranie…” Sky drops her head into her hands instead of finishing.
“A decompressive craniectomy means a section of her skull is removed to allow her brain to swell without being squeezed. That is a last resort though.”
Sky begins her rhythmic breathing while I rub circles on her back, and try to get ahold of my own emotions.
“Your mom was in a bad accident. She may have a long and difficult road ahead of her. Physical therapy, speech therapy, maybe even behavioral and emotional struggles. Traumatic Brain Injury is very serious.”
Sky breathes deeply, and I count with her in my head. Inhale one, two, three, four, five. Exhale one, two, three, four, five.
“She doesn’t have insurance,” I whisper. Why, in this moment, is that what comes to mind?
The doctor eyes me. “I’ve been told all her expenses will be fully paid by someone who prefers to remain anonymous.”
Sky lifts her head, clearing her throat as the tears begin to slide down her face.
“What?” she asks, looking to me for knowledge I don’t have. I shake my head.
“N
ow what?” I ask the doctor.
“We wait, and we watch. Closely.” He nods to all of us and walks out.
The air in the room is tense, thick, and full of questions nobody wants to ask. My mind runs over everything I know, over and over without end, until I have the urge to scream.
My mom is in the hospital.
My mom is in a coma.
My mom might need a surgery that will remove a piece of her skull.
I ball my hands into fists to hide the shaking. Dayton and Matt stand, their arms outstretched, waiting for me to fall into them. Noah’s crutches make protesting noises against the linoleum floor in his frantic attempt to grab them.
I don’t give him the chance to get up. I don’t fall. I climb onto his lap, fold myself into his big, warm front, and dissolve.
29
Noah
I’m wrecked. Ravaged. Someone has reached inside me and yanked, turning me inside out.
I cannot subdue Ember’s guttural sobs. My whispers into her hair are met with more tears. The stroke of my hand on her back does nothing to soothe her. I’ve never seen anyone experience pain so deeply. So openly. Ember has never shied away from emotion. With her, everything is felt in its entirety. Her highs are mountaintops, and her lows are underwater caverns. Even when it hurts, she allows the emotion to sweep her, to have her thoroughly, to run its course.
I’ve always known this, but to see it in action, to feel it alongside her, reminds me how much I love it.
So I hold her. When Matt stomps from the room, I hold her. When Dayton releases Sky, and she blows her nose, I tighten my hold on Ember.
Softly, Sky calls Ember’s name, and only then do I ease up on my grip. Ember nods, acknowledging her sister with almost imperceptible movements. She climbs from my lap, her eyes locked on me. Red-rimmed and swollen, swimming with more pain and fear than I’ve ever felt in my whole life.
Fiery anger burns across my chest with the injustice of it all.
Ember drags the back of her hand under her nose and wipes it on her jeans. Sky winds her fingers through Ember’s, tightening until both their hands grow pink. She whispers something in Ember’s ear, and they walk out of the room together.
I stare at the space they left behind, and Dayton plants himself in the chair opposite me. He looks despondent, and I probably do too.
“Noah, we need to talk about something.”
I swing my gaze back to him. “What?”
Leaning forward, his elbows come to rest on his knees. “Ember will be pissed, but I can take it. One day she may even thank me. I don’t like Matt.” Dayton pauses, holding up one finger. "Correction, I don’t like Matt for Ember. He’s not a bad guy. The real problem is that he’s not you.”
I’m stunned.
Dayton leans forward, his elbows resting on his knees. His eyes are earnest.
“Ember is settling. She might not even know it, but it’s true. Matt is not the guy for her.” He flashes me a bitter look. “Hell, maybe you aren’t either.”
I send him a fuck you with my eyes. There is nobody better for Ember than I am.
Dayton holds up his palms. “But maybe you are. I don’t know.” He sends me a second bitter look. “You left her twice.”
My lips become a hard line. I know what I did. I know what I chose. And if I could go back, I would choose differently. I’m here now, and I want to keep showing up for Ember.
“Why did you ask me to come here?” I ask Dayton.
“You came here on your own, Noah. Remember? I didn’t ask you. You showed up the second you thought Ember needed you. And she did. She chose you, Noah.”
In a moment when emotion ruled, Ember chose me. She settled into my arms. Not her boyfriend’s, not her best friend’s. Mine. Doesn’t that say more than anything else could? Accepted proposals be damned.
Wait.
“Is she engaged?”
Dayton lets out a loud, obnoxious stream of air and throws up his hands. “Details.”
I glare at him. “Kind of an important one.”
“But is it really?” Dayton scrunches his face, answering his own question with a shake of his head.
“I’d say so.” Matt’s voice filters in behind me, and Dayton stares over my shoulder to the entrance.
I twist, watching as Matt stalks into the room and stands between our seats. He leans over, clapping Dayton twice on the shoulder. It’s hard enough that Dayton winces.
“Thanks a lot, buddy.”
He straightens and pivots on one heel so he’s facing me. He bends and puts his face way too close to mine. A snarl pulls his lips from his mouth. I don’t think he’d be this aggressive if my leg wasn’t hamstrung. The fumbling guy who took a picture with me in the airport is long gone.
“You’re not going to win,” he says slowly, as if that’s what I’m here for. Competition.
Dayton’s phone dings loudly. He looks down at it and back up to us. “It’s Ember.”
Matt’s body swings around as Dayton scans the screen. He glances between Matt and me. “She wants you both to go.” Matt walks out, muttering, and I look at Dayton. He shrugs. “She said this is stressful enough, and she wants to wait alone with me and Sky.”
I nod. I don’t want to add to Ember’s stress level. I tell Dayton where I’m staying as he walks with me to the elevator. Matt is long gone. “Tell Ember,” I pause, not sure what to say. “Tell Ember I’m here for her.”
“I will.”
We say goodbye and I step onto the elevator.
It takes fifteen minutes for Miranda to arrive once I text her and ask her to come get me. While I’m waiting, I watch Matt march his haughty ass right over to his car and drive away.
When Miranda pulls up I get in, tossing my crutches in the back. I avoid her concerned gaze, but there’s really no point. I’m stuck in this rented SUV with her for the next fifteen minutes. The stifling air is thick with her questions, glutted with my thoughts, and saturated by my confusion. It’s a bitch trying to breathe in here.
“How did everything go?” Miranda asks tentatively.
How should I answer that? I almost want to laugh at the insanity of it all, the complete unfairness.
“Do you ever think that maybe there’s no reason for all this?” My hand flies out to gesture at the world around us. Restaurants, a bus stop, people in cars going different directions as they navigate different lives. What is it all for? What is the point of any of it?
“What do you mean?” She’s still using her tentative voice. I can’t blame her. She’s never heard me talk like this. I don’t know if I’ve ever even thought like this.
“We work hard, we make plans for our lives. We love, we hate. We win, and we lose. We do things in the present to make up for the past. We do things in the present to control the future. But why? What is the point of any of it? What are we living for?” My hands drop to my thighs, where I can feel their clammy heat. I stare out the window and wait for my breath to slow.
“I don’t know,” Miranda answers quietly. Her thumbs tap on the steering wheel as she slows to a stop at a red light. Her gaze swings to me. “If you ever find out, will you tell me?”
I nod.
“Was she happy to see you?”
“She was relieved, I think.”
“And the boyfriend?”
My blood boils the second I think about Matt. How could he have left? He should have stayed in the big waiting room next to the entrance, even after Ember asked us to leave. If I were her boyfriend, there’s no fucking way I would’ve listened. Even just the chance to be there for her again would’ve been enough reason to stay.
“Miranda,” I say abruptly. “I need to see my dad.”
I spend the rest of the drive giving Miranda directions to my parents’ house, and her question about Matt goes unanswered. A few minutes before we get there, I call Sutton House and get Miranda into a tasting.
She drops me off at my front door, and heads down to the guest center at the entrance to
the vineyard.
I find my dad in his office, which is thankfully on the first floor. He’s bent over his iPad, squinting. His glasses are on the table beside the tablet, but he refuses to wear them. I think he keeps them there so he can throw them on if my mom walks in.
“Hey, Dad.” I swing myself in.
My dad’s eyes bulge when he sees me. He stands and hurries to me. We can’t really have a proper hug, so he settles for patting my back. “Noah! What are you doing in town?”
My mouth opens to respond but shuts again when I see realization dawn. I close the office door with my foot and hobble to one of the two chairs in front of his desk. Dad sinks down beside me.
“Ember’s mom was in a motorcycle accident, but you know that already.” I’m going for nonchalant, but it’s hard.
“I—”
“How long have you been cheating on Mom?”
Dad holds up his hands, trying to pacify me. “Whoa, Noah. That’s not what’s going on.”
“Then why were you at the hospital this morning? I was in the waiting room, Dad. I saw you.”
My dad sighs, swaying his head slowly from side to side. “Maddie is an old friend.”
Bullshit.
“Why didn’t you ever tell me you knew Ember’s mom?”
“I didn’t know for certain that Ember was her daughter, but I suspected. That red hair had to come from somewhere.” His lips twist into a half smile. “The past can be murky. Sometimes it’s best not to re-visit it.”
“Until today, you mean?”
“She’s an important piece of my past. I couldn’t not go see her.” His eyes shine as he speaks.
“Does Mom know you went to see her?”
“It was she who insisted I go.”
What?
“Why didn’t Mom go with you?”
He shifts in his seat, crossing one leg over the other, and then dropping it back to the floor. “Maddie wouldn’t want your mother there.”
I nod, my head spinning. “Are you paying her medical bills?”
Dad leans back in his chair. His belt cuts into his mid-section, and his white undershirt peeks out from the top of his denim button-up. It’s what he wears when he walks through the vineyards on his own. I’ve always thought of him as young, but for the first time I’m seeing his age. It makes me uneasy, knowing he is susceptible to time.
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