Never Too Late

by Ana Balen

  If I had that, the two of them belonged to me, I would die before leaving them.

  I would rather pull out my own nails before doing that.

  “Listen, Sophie,” he started but I didn’t have the energy to withstand another of his demands of me leaving. Not ever again, but especially not now when he looked as if he stepped out from one of my dreams because that was exactly how I pictured he would look like twenty years in the future when we were together.

  And I was right.

  “Don’t worry, you won’t have to put up with me much longer. I’m leaving after Christmas.”

  His head jerked back, his chin tucked into his throat and his hands balled.

  “What?” he whispered, barely moving his lips. His hand released and went up to his face, tugging his shades and pushing them up into his messy hair.

  Even though I got his magnificent eyes, I still missed the shades almost instantly. They looked that good on him.

  “I’m leaving. I just want to have one last Christmas here.” I tucked my hair behind my ear, the bag rustling against my body, bumping me.

  After his eyes went back to mine from tracking my hand, he swallowed. “So, you’re doing it again?”

  “Doing what again?” I tilted my head.

  “You’re leaving Hopeful, not caring who you’re leaving behind.”

  I didn’t get it. Wasn’t this what he wanted me to do? He actually demanded me to leave.

  “What?”

  “Just like you did all those years ago,” he finished, ignoring my what.

  “You broke up with me, you demanded me to leave like you’re doing now,” I said out loud, not caring that there were people standing and listening to us.

  “Yeah, and you couldn’t wait for me to do it, you were gone two days later.” His hands were at his waist, he was leaning toward me, and his voice was gaining volume also.

  “Because you demanded me to do it.” I assumed the same posture. Mine wasn’t as effective as his since I was shorter than him and I had my bags, which were messing with my style. Still, I ignored all of it and carried on. “And my grandmother had enough of me being closed in my room and crying. And then Mrs. McConnell came and said it was for the best. I should just go and give you some time to get your head out of your ass, so I did.” All this brought back the old pain that never really went away. I had no choice but to rub my chest, hoping it would help. “But, you never did.”

  It was his turn now to ask softly, “What?”

  “I came back twice a month for a year, but you were never here. And I couldn’t find you,” I whispered. His image danced in my eyes, but I powered through. “In the end, it became clear I never would. So, yeah, I went away, giving up my home just so I could live a resemblance of a normal life.”

  “It didn’t look like you had to try very hard.” His words were dripping with acid.

  When he saw the shocked look on my face, he gave me a menacing smile. “Yeah, Soph, I went for you. I hauled my ass to Boston to get you back. And what did I find?” he asked, but didn’t wait for me to give him the answer. “My Soph, was living the life. Laughing and smiling with all those stick-up-their-asses people. Surrounded by guys. That was the moment that I knew I chose right. That you didn’t belong here.”

  “You came to Boston?” I could barely hear myself my voice was so small.

  “Yeah, Sophie, I did.” He nodded. “And I’ll repeat, you were living the big life in that college and didn’t need me or Hopeful. I only wish you didn’t demand your grandmother to haul her ass to you whenever she wanted to see you.”

  “Has it occurred to you that it was too hard for me to come back?”

  “I don’t see why since you got over me or this place so easily so fast.”

  “And has it occurred to you that it was all fake?”

  His eyes were hard and he took a step away from me. “I know that every moment we spent together was fake, you don’t have to rub it in my face in it now. I got to see it with my own two eyes.”

  “Then you’re blind even though you can see,” I shot back, not giving him a chance to turn his back now and not let me explain. But I needed to know something first. “Tell me, why did you break up with me in the first place? Even now, I still don’t get it. We were able to continue with us even through college, but the moment I started preparing for med-school you started pulling away, and then just a week before I was set to go, you cut me loose. Why?”

  “Because I didn’t want you to end up like my mother,” he roared in my face.

  This time I took a step back. Not because I was done with this conversation.

  No, we were nowhere near being done.

  It was because I couldn’t believe how stupid he was.

  “Look at how she ended up, taking her own life after my pop got killed, couldn’t stomach the idea of living in this town and not living to her full potential.”

  “You cannot be this stupid,” I said, still not believing what he was saying.

  “You know I’m right. She could have had a big life, just like you. She could have made something of herself and not be stuck here. And after he was gone, she saw that and instead of going away, she decided to end her life,” he continued with his false belief.

  “You really believe that, don’t you?” I asked softly. “You really think she regretted her choices in her life and that’s why she chose to do it?”

  “What other explanation could there be?” His chest was moving up and down harshly, his face appeared to be made of granite and his Adam’s apple bobbed up and down like he was fighting against throwing up.

  It was the same look he wore when he crushed me.

  “It hasn’t occurred to you that even after three years living without your father, the grief still had her in its clutches and wouldn’t let go even for a little bit? It hasn’t occurred to you that she loved your father so much she couldn’t bear the thought of living another day without him? That she missed him so much, that she loved him so much she wanted to find a way to be with him? And that all the counseling she was in and all the meds she was taking wasn’t helping one bit?”

  I lost count of how many times his mom came to my grandmother and cried, of how many times Mrs. McConnell talked to her, how both of them urged her to go to therapy. How his mom went all the way to Denver to get help. But the monster of depression was too strong, her grief too big. And in the end, all the help was useless, his mom just gave up. It was devastating, she was loved by many. But we all saw the depth of her pain, the struggle she had. It was hard to understand why she chose to do it, but not impossible.

  How could he not know this?

  “And how would you know?” he threw the question in my face.

  “Because I felt exactly the same,” I screamed. “Every day after you threw me away was a struggle. Every day I prayed I would get better. Every day I hoped the pain would be less painful. And all through those days, I slapped a smile on my face and faked my way through. And every night I fell asleep in tears, wishing the next day wouldn’t come. Because even the thought of you not being a part of it ripped me in half.” The tears were now streaming down my face, my throat burned and spasmed. Still, I pushed through. “Suffering and depression doesn’t have a universal look, Dylan. With enough time, you become a master at hiding it.”

  And with that, I shouldered my way past him.

  Which in normal circumstances wouldn’t be possible, but he was much too shocked to notice.

  He didn’t deserve more.

  He didn’t deserve how in the end I had no choice but to lock everything down so I could try and live. How I had years of therapy which did absolutely nothing to help. How in the end my grandmother and Mrs. McConnell came to Boston, moved me to Seattle, and spent over two months with me making sure I was finding my way in the new city and trying to live.

  It was only after I demanded to never talk about Dylan or come back to Hopeful that they sighed a sigh of relief.

  And only after I
got into the cardiac program that they were sure I snapped out of my grief.

  They were wrong.

  It took me three more years to be able to wake up and not dread the day before me.

  And seventeen of them were not enough to get over him.

  I still loved him.

  I always would.

  By the time he came to, I was already secure on my way.

  And by the time he bellowed, “Sophie, wait!” I was in my car, ready to go.

  As I passed him on the street going the opposite way of my house, I saw him running but he was too late.

  The damage was done.

  I didn’t go back home that night.

  I hid in Mrs. McConnell’s house, making her swear to me she wouldn’t tell him I was there.

  And for the next three days, I gave my all to avoid him.

  7

  Dylan

  “Daddy, can I get this one?” Zara asked in her usual shriek, holding up a glowing glass ornament. It was a rare moment when I was grateful she was back at her normal ear piercing volume.

  The last three days were brutal.

  For my girl and for me.

  Thankfully, the vomiting stopped completely the second day, just as Sophie said it would. The fever gave a good fight, but I managed to break it when I relented, threw my pride out of the window, and started doing as Sophie instructed.

  Lots of fluids and light clothes.

  None of that sweating it out nonsense.

  For the first time, I actually considered giving in to Cindy’s demand of meeting Zara and taking part in her life. But then Zara would get worse and all that bitterness and resentment of her deciding that she didn’t want a husband and a daughter after all, would swarm back in. I couldn’t understand how she could leave her only child behind and just go. While wiping Zara’s sweat off her forehead, all I wanted to do was hold her and somehow make it go away. And Cindy did the opposite. She left her child and never even asked about her until recently.

  Usually, I didn’t think about it. Her actions were her own, and I knew there would come a day when she would regret her decision. I just didn’t think it would come that soon. I always thought it would be Zara’s decision if she would have her in her life.

  But watching my baby girl struggle and in need of help, I was torn. And I was almost at the door to hunt her down and bring her back after all those years, just so Zara would feel her mother’s arms around her while she was sick.

  It was almost funny, one phone call and I was ready to drag the woman back for my girl.

  It wasn’t like Zara was never sick before.

  It was just something in me that was hurting more than usual while I was forced to watch her going through all the miserable phases and she only had me to help her.

  Only the fact that Zara never once mentioned her mom stopped me from reaching out to Cindy.

  Or Sophie.

  All she wanted was to cuddle with her dad, which I was more than happy to oblige. And once she had her strength, talk Mrs. McConnell’s ear off over the phone.

  I did, however, relent and called asking her to come and spend Christmas with our girl. I made it painfully clear I would be with them the whole time. There was no way I would leave Zara alone with her. I wanted everything to be perfect for Zara. I needed to make up for my bad mood lately.

  “Um… I can’t. Not this year,” was what she said. “I have something planned already.” I knew the invitation came out of the blue, but after weeks of hounding me to see Zara, I couldn’t believe she would say no to spending Christmas with her.

  To say I was enraged would be an understatement.

  “You need to reconsider your choice.” Mercifully, that was all I said. I didn’t know where I found the strength to shove the words that were swirling up my throat to get out, down.

  As was my fucking luck, it was right then I bumped into Sophie and it was impossible to swallow everything down. Most of all, the bitterness of my choices in women, the one that stood in front of me right then, in particular.

  And I let loose on her.

  It wasn’t pretty.

  It was downright ugly.

  And I regretted it as it was even happening, but there was no going back.

  Still, I had to suck it all up and pretended everything was great. For my girl. And on some level, for me. I needed to or I would lose my sanity.

  “Yeah, baby girl,” I said softly, trying really hard to teach Zara not to be so loud by example. To my despair, she still hadn’t picked up on my hints. She just gave me her signature toothy smile that was one tooth less than usual since we had our first visit from the Tooth Fairy a month ago.

  “Thank you, Daddy,” Zara shrieked, right as my phone started ringing, and turned to examine the rest of the ornaments hanging around. I pulled my phone out of my back pocket, gave it a look, and felt my own lips stretch in a smile when I saw the caller ID.

  I touched the screen, put the phone to my ear while paying for the ornament Zara chose, and said into the phone, “Please, tell me you’re not calling to cancel on me.”

  “Not on your life. You know I’m dying to see your hometown during Christmas time,” Vivian said through her throaty chuckle.

  In another life, I could see myself going for a woman like Vivian.

  Not only was she insanely beautiful. She had a deep, velvet, hot voice, the kind every man wanted to hear first thing in the morning or deep into the night when she used that voice to moan his name into his ear. She was also wickedly smart and scarily brave.

  Unfortunately, I lived this life and not only I never felt not even a trace of attraction to Viv. The thought of anything happening between us never crossed my min. She was like a sister to me. She was also not only a wife of an ex-team member from when I left the town to join the Denver force, she was also his widow. And one thing you never did if you were any man at all. You never, ever touched your partner’s wife or a widow.

  I stayed in touch over the years with most of the guys, but the bond Viv and I formed meant she was standing next to me while I married my ex-wife and was a godmother to my daughter.

  Cindy was crazy jealous of her and no matter how much I tried to explain things, she wouldn’t listen. That should have been the red flag. It wasn’t.

  It was funny. When things fell apart with Sophie, all I wanted to do was to leave Hopeful and never come back. But once I settled in Denver, all I dreamt about was coming back home.

  “I take it that means you’re still coming tomorrow?” I asked, just to be sure. It wouldn’t be the first time Viv canceled on me. I understood why. I was her dead husband’s partner. I knew him almost as much as she did. And missed him all the same. And the holidays were especially brutal when it came to missing a loved one.

  “Yep.” Hearing her say the word, I let out a breath I wasn’t aware I was holding in. “I just wanted to know if my goddaughter needed me to bring something from civilization,” she teased.

  “Shut up.” I chuckled and trailed Zara while she bounced from vendor to vendor on her way to the well. “I’ll see you tomorrow then.”

  “Bright and early.”

  I could actually hear her smile. God, how long has it been since I heard it the last time?

  This was going to be a good Christmas, I decided. And yes, it made me a dick to proclaim something like it, even if it was in my own mind, but I didn’t give a fuck.

  I had my girl with me, and she was healthy and happy. And a friend was coming, and I was grateful to hear her laugh and smile even over the phone.

  And I had Mrs. McConnell. The woman drove me nuts on a good day, but she was the best mother and grandmother to Zara, even though we were not blood-related.

  So fuck yeah, we were going to have a great holiday.

  The only thing that plagued me during the night were Sophie’s words she said on the street that day. And the look on her face.

  Christ!

  Whenever I gave in and allowed the memory of the devastat
ion that marred her stunning face to invade my mind, it ripped me apart.

  I wanted to know if any of the things she said were true. Or was it all just some kind of a game for her.

  I knew I hurt her seventeen years ago. I just had no other choice. If I didn’t, she would stay and eventually she would resent me for it. So maybe she came back to get her revenge now.

  If I was honest, I knew they were.

  She was right, the reason behind my mother’s suicide wasn’t wrapped in cloak and dagger. Why I spewed all that nonsense in Sophie’s face, I still couldn’t understand. I should have been a man and owned up to what and why I did.

  But her confession caught me by surprise.

  And I couldn’t stand the thought of her feeling that way, even for a second.

  Let alone years.

  I needed to do something about that.

  I also needed her to leave Hopeful and me, so I would have some semblance of a normal life.

  I knew if I gave her even an inkling of hope, she would suck me in and after she had her fill of me, she would spit me back out and laugh in my face.

  But I wasn’t just me anymore.

  I had someone that depended on me and I wouldn’t go down the road my mom did.

  I refused to do that to my daughter.

  And I also knew I wouldn’t get the answers I needed if I just stood there and did nothing.

  “Fuck.” The words exploded from me. So much for my example of talking in normal volume. But I gave myself a pass that time. Because when I looked up to the tree vendor, I saw Zara standing and waving her arms around while looking up and smiling at Sophie.

  8

  Sophie

  Seventeen years ago

  “Sophie, my darling girl, is that you?” I hadn’t even fully closed the door and already I knew my grandma and Mrs. McConnell were having an impromptu girl’s night, which meant that that bottle of gin that was in our freezer was no more.

  “Yes!” I took my coat off and walked into the living room. Sure enough, there was almost an empty bottle of gin on the table along with an empty plate that had Christmas cookies before I left.