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I looked like a fool walking around with my phone in the air, and I felt like one too. I’d let myself trust Donal, and look what it had gotten me. Exactly what I’d always known it would: disappointment.
It was just like that basketball game when I was fifteen all over again, with me trying to find Donal to get the ride he’d promised only to realize he’d left without me. Forgotten about me. Abandoned me.
Shaking my head, I tried to stop the memory spiral from dragging me back there again. This was a completely different situation. There was no way Donal could have forgotten about today. Even if he’d lost track of time, Debra would have reminded him. Which meant something else had happened.
He knowingly stood you up, a voice whispered in my head.
Somehow that felt worse than being forgotten. He’d known exactly how much today meant to me and how anxious I was about it. We’d been planning this for weeks. He knew damn well I couldn’t do it without him. And despite all that, he’d prioritized something else over keeping his commitment to me. Decided there was something more important, more deserving of his time and attention than I was.
Tears blurred my vision, and I stopped pacing and lowered the phone. Wiping my eyes, I stared at the screen, mentally willing some kind of message to come through. Something—anything—to explain why Donal had done this to me.
Just in case, I tried calling him again. The call actually managed to connect this time, but it went straight to voicemail and his outgoing recording kept cutting in and out. I left him a message anyway—or tried to. I wasn’t sure it’d be intelligible on his end.
Damn phone reception. You’d think in this day and age we’d at least have decent coverage in the third-largest city in the U.S. I’d asked one of the nurses about it once, and she’d shrugged and said it just happened to be a dead spot for my particular carrier, but if I changed cell phone companies it’d be fine.
I dearly wished now I’d changed cell phone companies. Not that it necessarily would have made any difference. I didn’t actually know that Donal had tried to call or get a message to me. Maybe he was ignoring his phone because he was sitting in some work meeting he’d decided he couldn’t get out of, despite all his assurances to the contrary.
Well, shit.I certainly wasn’t going to stand around crying in a parking lot because my boyfriend had stood me up.
It had turned out to be a beautiful afternoon, and I had the rest of the day off. As long as I was here, I might as well take advantage of it and spend the time with my dad. They’d gone to the trouble to get him dressed and ready to go out. I could at least take him for a walk around the grounds in his wheelchair, even if I couldn’t take him to the ball game. Maybe I could even borrow a portable radio so we could listen to the game outside. It wouldn’t be the same as being at Wrigley, but it was the best I could do under the circumstances.
Swiping the rest of my tears away, I typed out a final text to Donal.
Never mind. I guess we’re not doing this after all.
CHAPTERTHIRTY
DONAL
“I’m so sorry, Dad.”
I looked over at Maddy’s tearstained face and pulled her into my arms. “It’s okay, baby. I’m just glad you’re all right.”
A slow trickle of cars cruised past us on the residential street, rubbernecking as they maneuvered around the accident scene still blocking part of the intersection.
Maddy clung to me, sniffling into my chest. “But the car…”
“I don’t care about the car,” I said, turning my head away from flashing emergency lights. The tow truck driver was cinching Maddy’s crumpled Honda up onto the bed of his truck.
A woman had run a stop sign and T-boned Maddy. The driver’s door and front fender were a crumpled mess. She’d had to crawl over the passenger seat to get out of the car. Thank God the woman who hit her hadn’t been going that fast, or it could have been so much fucking worse.
The thought of it made me feel sick to my stomach, and I hugged Maddy even tighter.
“Mom’s gonna care,” she mumbled into my shirt. “As soon as she gets over the initial shock.”
“No she won’t. Your mom cares about you and your brother more than anything else in the world—definitely more than she cares about a car.”
Maddy had tried to call Wendy first, but she’d been in a meeting with her phone silenced. I was just glad Maddy had called me next, and that I’d been able to race over to help her deal with the aftermath of the accident. She could have called her boyfriend, but instead, she’d called me. It felt good to know I’d been her second choice. Even if getting a tearful, semi-incoherent call from my teenage daughter had nearly given me a heart attack.
Not to mention that I’d had to bail on Tess after promising I wouldn’t let her down. But I couldn’t let myself think about that right now. One crisis at a time.
Maddy squirmed out of my hug and blinked up at me guiltily. “Thanks for coming to my rescue, Dad.”
I used the cuff of my shirt to wipe the tears from her cheeks. “I’ll always come to your rescue, kiddo.”
“Mom would have had tissues in her purse.”
“Yeah, she would. But you got me instead of your mom, so you’ll have to suck it up and make do with my shirt.”
