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“I think you’re giving me too much credit.” The master’s degree application with the blank lines is proof.
“No one’s ever accused me of that before,” Maeve says with a smirk, and I laugh.
“Where will you go?”
“To wherever the universe takes me next. To the next town where I’m needed.” She shrugs, as if setting off with no plan in a universe with no safety net is something anyone can do. Unlike when I first met her, though, I see the loneliness in that small shrug. I see the fear and the hope too. I see Maeve as she is—a woman seeking her own answers the best way she can.
“I wish I’d had more time with you,” I say.
Maeve stands and braces herself against the railing. She tips her face up to the sky and exhales. After a beat, she spins around. “What about you?”
“What about me?”
“When I leave, what will you do?”
“I ... don’t know.” A crystal clear image of what tomorrow will look like forms in my mind. It’s followed by a series of identical images. Hospital. Home. Rinse, repeat. A life of moving, but never getting anywhere. “Maybe I’ll finally finish my school application. Get a place of my own.”
“That’s one choice. There are others too. Other doors you haven’t opened.” Maeve’s expression is free of judgment, free of that pity tilt. “Greece?”
Greece would mean breaking out of the box. No longer being defined by loss.
It would also be Greece. On the other side of the world.
Noah’s surprise party is coming up, Macy has a dance recital next week. Emma’s soccer team is probably going to make it into the championship tournament. Tessa roped me into training for the 5K in the fall. Will—
His name trails behind the others so inconspicuously I don’t realize he’s entered my thoughts until his image is fully formed in my mind.
For about a dozen reasons, he should not be a motive for me to stay or go. He never should have been part of the equation.
“Is that a yes?” Maeve steps toward me. Her eyes have gone a shade darker, which should make her appear more normal, but instead makes her seem more other.
I shake my head. “No, I think ... I think leaving now would be running away. It would be another form of hiding. I owe myself more than that.”
For so long I didn’t believe that.
Maeve puts a cool hand on my arm. “I know you don’t trust the universe anymore, Hope. But trust your instincts. Trust yourself.”
“Trust me,” Will said, and I did.
That didn’t work out.
But trusting myself—that idea shouldn’t sound so radical. My instincts were right about Maeve. They’ve been right countless times for my patients. Maybe even if I’d trusted my instincts and told Brandon how I’d been feeling, he’d still be alive.
Or not.
I have to stop blaming myself for things I can’t control.
Maybe all I can do is begin trusting myself. Maybe the only apology I need to give is the one to myself—for not trusting my own heart.
“I wish there was some way to fix this. So you didn’t have to leave.”
“Some things can’t be fixed. They can only be weathered.”
Like loss. And grief. And heartbreak.
“Have you spoken to Will?” Maeve asks, reading my thoughts as always.
“No.” My voice is hard, foreign. “It’s his fault all of this is happening.”
