Page 25 of From This Moment (After We Fall 4)
We were silent, both of us taking a sip of wine.
“Do you ever feel guilty about those things?” Wes asked. “Like the things you didn’t ask him that aren’t really that important big picture, but things you wonder about?”
“All the time,” I said. “For example, I’m not even sure what his favorite color was. Is that horrible?”
Wes cocked his head. “Was it blue?”
I threw my hands up. “I don’t know. I don’t think I ever asked. He had a lot of blue shirts, so maybe?”
“Maybe.”
“What’s yours?” I asked.
“I like blue. It reminds me of the lake.”
Both of us glanced out the windows toward the water. “Did you miss it?”
“I did. Africa is beautiful, though.”
I sighed and took another sip of wine. “I’d like to go there someday. I’ve never been anywhere.”
Wes took another drink too, his brow furrowing. “What do you mean?”
“Well, I’ve never been anywhere far.” I lifted my shoulders. “Drew and I never quite made it to Europe like we planned, and I didn’t have the money growing up. The farthest I’ve been is probably Florida.”
“Where would you go? If you could go anywhere.”
“Hmmm. Maybe Italy? My mother is Italian and I really do love Italian food and culture. I think it would be cool to explore my roots. Or something.” I laughed, a little embarrassed. “That sounds silly.”
“No, it doesn’t. Not at all. I’ve been having those same kinds of feelings lately. Maybe because I’ve been away from home for so long. And even though it was by choice, there’s still something to be said for that feeling you get when you come back.”
“Yeah. I get that.”
A whoop of laughter made us both look toward the great room. Wes spoke softly. “This is so great for my mom. She loves Abby so much.”
“I know.” I stared into my wine. “I haven’t been that good about making Abby…available to her. I don’t know why.”
Wes didn’t reply, but his silence didn’t feel at all judgmental. I remembered that about him. His silences, and the way they invited confidence.
“My therapist said I might be punishing her.”
He tilted his head. “What do you mean? Punishing who?”
I took a deep breath and another gulp of wine. I’d never talked about this with anyone outside therapy, not even Tess. “My therapist thinks that I might be unconsciously trying to punish Lenore by keeping Abby from her, because I never felt fully accepted by her when Drew was alive. It always seemed like we were in this, I don’t know, competition for his affection. It sounds stupid and he always said I was crazy, but it was how I felt.” I met his eyes. “Do you think I could be doing that?”
He didn’t answer right away. He held my gaze, then dropped his to his wine, which he swirled in his glass. “I think,” he said, “that you’ve suffered a lot. And that it’s only natural to want to keep your daughter close to you.”
I took another drink and let that sink in.
“We’re not perfect, Hannah. And grief is overwhelming. It makes you feel helpless, like everything is out of control. Since time with Abby is something you can control, maybe you sort of cling to that as protection.” He paused before going on. “I think it’s why I threw myself into my work—along with being a distraction from grief, helping people made me feel more in control. Like I wasn’t powerless against death.”
“I hate that feeling,” I said, shivering. “The fear that no matter what we do, death is just coming for us when it wants to and there’s nothing we can do about it. Do you know I still hate the sound of my doorbell, because every time it rings I think it’s the police coming to tell me someone else is dead?”
He nodded. “I have nightmares a lot. Where I’m trying to operate on someone’s heart and I don’t know how to do it. I can’t save them. In the end, the person is always Drew.”
“Oh God, I hate the nightmares,” I said. “You wake up screaming and sweating and frantic, and then there’s the moment of relief when you realize it was just a dream, except it’s taken away from you the very next second because you look around and realize he’s still gone. You’re still alone.”
