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I was different.
My work was still important, but it wasn’teverything. Hell, right now it barely registered on my radar, despite being so close to reaching my goal.
And I had to think about why.
I also had to think about who.
Not just Boone, but the friendships I now had, and more than anything else, finding balance going forward. All work and no play had left me emotionally bankrupt. It had me rethinking a lot of the things I thought I knew.
And it was time to figure it out.
* * *
I spenta restless night tossing and turning, so I groaned when my phone rang at eight thirty in the morning.
Grandma G.
I momentarily panicked but then remembered she’d been great about checking in. She was the only person who knew what was going on, but she’d always been there for me and this was no different.
“Hi, Grandma.” I tried not to yawn in her ear.
“How are you, sweetie?”
“I’m okay.”
“You know you’re a terrible liar.”
I chuckled. “I’m as okay as someone with a broken heart can be.”
“Have you talked to him?”
“No. I’ve been doing some soul-searching.”
“And?”
“Some things have to change once I finish with my PhD. I love my work, but it can’t be theonlything.”
“Thank god,” she muttered. “Been hoping you’d figure that out for years.”
“Sorry. I guess I’m slow sometimes.”
“Have you had any epiphanies?”
“All I know for sure is that I need friends and family and all the things I somehow deprived myself of all these years while I’ve been in school. But I’m not ready to talk about it yet.”
“Are you ready to talk to Boone?”
“What’s there to say?”
“How about some of what you just told me?” She paused. “Did it ever occur to you that he was going to ask you to go with him?”
“I don’t think he was.”
“How do you know?”
“I don’t know for sure, but he had months to bring it up. He never did.”
“You’re about to get your doctorate. You have a job offer here in St. Louis and an important interview in New York City. If he cares about you at all, he wouldn’t just assume you’d be willing to give all of that up for him.”
