AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I’m scheduled to go on vacation next week anyway. Hopefully, I can leave a few days early. I can’t think of anything I want more at this moment than to escape my life. My parents rented a house in a small mountain town less than a day’s drive from the city, and we are going to meet there. It’s a little slice of heaven. The perfect way to break free from the madness of my reality and career for a short time each year. Two weeks away from it all. It’s become a tradition; we’ve traveled there every fall for the past six years. It’s a seven-hour drive from the city I’m living in now. But it feels like it’s worlds away.
There’s an awkward silence as I stand to leave even though nothing is resolved. It’s clear neither man in this room expected me to figure out their plans before they had a chance to fully execute them. But they should know me better than that by now. I’m perceptive. I pay attention.
I close the door behind me, knowing they’re going to stay a while to talk about what just happened without me here. I walk down the hallway, manufacturing fake smiles and empty platitudes with office staff that I might never see again, feeling nauseous the entire time. My feet carry me to the area where we see patients on clinic days. I’ve spent three days a week for the past few years in this office space. The other time was spent in the operating rooms, rounding, and taking calls on nights and weekends.
I grab my stethoscope and my bag and pause to look around. The hallway is empty, much like the space inside my chest.We finished seeing patients about thirty minutes ago, and our medical assistant is already gone for the day. I stand in silence, even as the floor is falling beneath my feet.
I guess life is funny like that. It can change in the blink of an eye. This morning, I arrived, ready to work a normal Monday at the office. And now, I’m leaving, and I no longer know where I’m going to spend the rest of the week or the days following it. I don’t know where my next paycheck will come from. I turn to leave before the panic fully sets in, strangling me with the unknown.
I call my mom on the drive home and let her know what happened.
“I guess I just got fired,” I explain, though things were left hazy and gray so it’s difficult to relay.
I don’t know if Dr. Cooper and Jeff want me to return for a few weeks after my vacation to work or if this was officially my last day. Toby doesn’t graduate until the end of the year, so that would leave my doctor without help for a few months. But I’m unsure if he wants me back, knowing what I now know. I have no idea what the future holds.
I can tell Mom’s phone is on speaker, and I’m sure my dad is listening in the background. She’s silent for a bit, digesting the information. Both my parents are. But they’re steady and solid. They tell me everything will be fine, and I know they are being sincere. They talk about God and His will for my life. That’s where the steadiness comes from. I grab on to that strength with both hands. Moments like this call for it.
I hang up the phone, drive to my house, and walk inside, stripping out of my clothes to take a hot shower. I stay under the faucet until the water turns cold, letting it soothe my tired muscles and the aching in my chest. I use the cold tile-coveredwall to hold me up. I don’t think the enormity of what just happened has fully hit me yet because I still feel mostly numb.
I don’t sleep much. And the next morning, plans change again. My dad was rushed to the hospital for an emergency appendectomy overnight. My mom cancels their plans to go out of town now that she needs to stay home and help him recover. But she keeps the reservations intact, telling me to use the house they rented for the next two weeks on my own. She wants me to get out of town, saying it will be good for me to clear my head. And I agree.
I call ahead and discover the rental is free now, so I accelerate my plans to leave tomorrow instead of next week. I spend the day visiting my dad in the hospital. My numbness shifts into unease as every bit of the major change starts to soak into my consciousness.
And the life I once knew completely shifts.
CHAPTER TWO
WILLOW
The next morning, I rise and load my SUV, moving on autopilot. With a carafe of coffee and the radio turned up, I drive the seven hours to the small mountain town of Sullivan’s Way alone. It’s a popular vacation spot for people from the city since it’s less than a day’s drive. But the magic of the place is that it feels like a different country. It has small-town charm and borders a national park. There is everything a mountain lover could want. Scenery. Quiet. Wildlife. Dry air. Any outdoor adventure you can think up. Hiking in the spring, summer, and fall and world-class skiing in the winter. Escape. That last asset is the thing I’m seeking the most right now.
I pull up to the office across the street from the housing addition where I will be staying. The tires scrape along the gravel as I park next to the only other vehicle in the lot. My muscles are stiff when I exit the SUV from the hours spent sitting in the same position. I stretch, and my neck cracks. The air smells of pine, and the breeze is cool. I take a deep inhale, breathing in the clean, crisp air. The smell alone conjures up images of past vacations spent here.
It takes me less than ten minutes to check in and receive the keys. My parents—bless them—prepaid for the house. All the arrangements have been made. All I need to do is move myself in and relax.
It’s a short jaunt into the addition. The roads are winding, and the houses are nestled inside the pine and aspen trees. There’s a creek across the street, weaving its way along the road with me.
The place we always rent is a three-bedroom, two-bathroom cabin with a cozy living room at the front that faces the mountain peaks. It’s a million-dollar view from a modest-sized house. There’s a small pond sitting in the backyard. I’ll never forget the year we watched a mama moose eating shrubs and twigs as her baby played in the water. The calf stomped around in the pond like a lanky kid, making noise and causing a ruckus while the mom quietly looked on and ate. Both animals knew we were there, watching from a distance. But they didn’t care.
After parking, I pause on the porch to fumble with the keys and gaze at the mountains, a couple of bags slung over my shoulders and in my hands. The peaks are so majestic.
I don’t think I’ll ever get sick of this view.I feel the stress seeping from my pores already.
The house looks the same inside when I enter. There’s a cozy couch and two chairs facing the windows. A fireplace and television are mounted on the wall to the side, taking second place to the mountain peaks perched like a photograph through the double-paned glass. The kitchen is attached to the living room and has been remodeled and updated along the way. And there’s a dining table to complete the open concept space.
I drop my bags in the master bedroom since my parents aren’t coming this time, claiming the space with the attachedbathroom. It’s oddly quiet, being in this house alone. It’s even stranger to ignore my phone.
My cell has become an extra appendage over the years. I turned it off on the drive up, knowing I was bound to get calls from nurses on the surgical floors and in the hospitals because I’m sure word hasn’t spread that I am no longer working there. Let Dr. Cooper deal with it all. Let him remember what it’s like for me to be gone. Then, maybe he’ll appreciate everything I did for his practice daily. When I don’t respond, coworkers will probably think I’m just on vacation for the next couple of weeks. Most of my work friends knew I was planning to come up here anyway. They just didn’t realize my two-week vacation would turn into a permanent one. Neither did I.
I unpack some of my things, leaving other items in my suitcases. I pull a hoodie overhead. Then, I grab the keys and lock the place up, bypassing my SUV for a short walk into the square, where the shops are located. It feels good to stretch my leg after the long drive. Right off the main area is a grocery store, where I can buy some food. I’m sure I’ll eat out most of the time I’m here, but I still need some essentials for the house.
I’m inside the grocery store, perusing boxes of cereal when I hear a squeal to my right.
“Willow! Is that you?”
I glance over to see Chelsea Simpson pushing a shopping cart down the aisle, her long dirty-blonde hair swinging down her back. Her family usually visits around the same time as mine. They rent a house on the same street. She’s in her early thirties, too, and we’ve been friendly in the past, though we don’t know each other well. But our families had dinner together once or twice before in town during our previous stays.
“Hi,” I say with a smile. I wonder if she can see the weight of the world on my shoulders or if I’m hiding it well.
