AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Ben
So this is where I’ve landed.
Graduated top of my class at UW med school where I completed my residency and was immediately offered a job in one of the highest rated hospitals in the country, where I worked with and treated people day in and day out, and now here I am…
The most socially incompetent idiot on the planet.
How did I get here?
Don’t answer that.
After losing my shit and hightailing it out of the salon the other day, I spent the first day and a half barely sleeping, because sure enough, the usual nightmare where I relive Jamie being wheeled into my place of employment on a gurney, her face barely recognizable with blood and swelling.
Becoming a different person and living in a different place never got rid of the memories or dreams of course, but it kept them down to a dull roar.
The lack of sleep left me kind of frazzled and wired, but a quick trip to the nearest liquor store and a few shots of McLellan got it back on track. I spent the next couple of days laying on Matt and Melanie’s couch and zoning out to the NBA playoffs.
I thought about doing what I do best and running from the feeling by jumping on a plane back to Bali instead of dealing with it, but for some reason, I just couldn’t. I guess five years and hindsight made me pause just long enough to realize it wasn’t the right thing to do, so I’ve spent the last few days trying to figure out what is.
So after warring with the PTSD and taking the next few days to reflect on the matter, I’ve come to the following conclusion: I’m an idiot, and if Jamie could see me right now, she’d scoff and roll her eyes before picking up a magazine and pretending to read it while she ignored me.
“You remember me too well,” her voice says from the easy chair in the corner. I glance over and find her curled up just the way I just envisioned her, and though she has her brown eyes cast down to the magazine open in her lap, her face wears an expression of mocking disdain. “And you’re right, you’re an idiot.”
Great. Now I’m hallucinating.
“You’re not hallucinating, you’re imagining me,” she reads my thoughts as she flips a page before looking up with a quirked eyebrow. “Hallucinating means you’re going crazy. Imagining is more deliberate.”
“Alright, smartass teacher, why am I imagining you?”
“That wasn’t very nice…” she looks down again, this time looking disappointed. “Running out on them like that. She and that little girl? They’re nice people.”
I nod, more to myself than to her.
“I’m trying to figure out how to make it right before I go back,” I sigh. “I don’t want to leave it like that.”
“You’ll figure it out,” she says with quiet encouragement as she looks to the game on the screen, just as one of the Piston’s players sinks a shot before turning back to me. “I love the hair by the way.”
And then she’s gone.
And she never answered me. Why in the fuck after all this time am I imagining her now?
It has to be because I’ve taken myself out of my cozy little ignorant bubble of blissful solitude, there’s no other explanation.
But it doesn’t matter. Imaginary Jamie, no matter why she dropped by, is right. It wasn’t nice what I did, and though I never would have cared that much before, I care now. And as I look back to the game on the screen, I think I know what to do to fix it.
Chapter Twelve
Kasey
“This sucks.”
“Language, young lady,” I quietly scold my child as I stick my key in the lock of the salon and let us in.
“But it does suck,” she half sighs, half whines. “This is my summer.”
My turn to sigh.
“I know,” I stop and turn to her after flicking on the lights. “I’m sorry, kid. I wish you didn’t have to spend it stuck here either.” She drags herself over to the corner table by with window and heaves her backpack on top of it while I start the process of opening the place, getting the music app going on the speakers, making sure the guest Keurig station is stocked, and the register is ready to go. Luna colors, resting her chin on her hand, the poor thing looking bored out of her mind while I check the messages on the phone and try to set up the requested appointments.
