25. Evie
Evie
From: Denver Dispatcher Academy
To: Evie Ellington
Thank you, Evie Ellington, for enrolling in the Denver Dispatcher Academy. Your application has been received. Please remain patient while we look over your details. We’ll be in touch shortly.
I’ve never been so nervous to hit submit in my life. I wasn’t even this much of an anxious mess submitting college applications. Now the worst is to come—waiting.
Filling out the application took me around two hours.
Double- and then triple-checking every question will delay things like that.
Finishing around one p.m. left me with time to busy myself, so I cleaned the apartment top to bottom.
That was easy considering Matteo has kept this place spotless, so spotless in my brother’s absence that I wonder if he’s been sneaking a cleaner in here while I’m asleep, or while I was bed bound for a week.
Cleaning then led to me staring at my unopened boxes filling the hallway by my brother’s room.
I’m ashamed to admit I stared at them for far too long.
It felt like if I opened those boxes, I’d be unpacking more than just physical items, I’d have to face the emotional baggage that’s been crushing me.
And today is not the day for that.
Today is for new and exciting energy only.
Hence why I spun on my heel, headed downstairs, and began envisioning what I wanted my new life to look like. That’s what this is—a new beginning, one so fresh that it aches with everything I’ve lost. But sometimes, people and things have to be removed from your life to fill it with something new.
That’s how I’ve been forcing myself to look at it, at least, and what better way to map out a new life for yourself than scrolling Pinterest for hours?
Except this isn’t a two-a.m. scroll where you promise to wake up at five o’clock and suddenly take your health seriously with the ten-step routine you wrote out for yourself. This is a doom scroll that I’m likening to the question, what the fuck do I want to do with my life?
My savings are dwindling every day, despite Matteo refusing to let me contribute to anything around the apartment. When I curled into a ball and ignored life, the world unfortunately continued to spin around me, not giving me a reprieve or the break I so desperately needed.
My phone bill still arrived despite me throwing it out the window, and the internet payment that I need to transfer into Carter’s name.
Then there’s the car insurance on the vehicle I haven’t driven in nearly a month, streaming services that are climbing in price, a gym membership that I also haven’t used recently, health insurance…
The reality is, I can’t live off my savings without a job for long, but something deep in my gut tells me that I’m on the right path. That perhaps all of this happened so I’d be pushed to change careers and move into a field where I’d help people every day.
I have to believe that everything happens for a reason, otherwise I won’t be able to get out of bed in the morning.
Scrolling, I start a new board and save anything I see that catches my attention.
Locations I want to travel to, team sports I want to join, hobbies I want to try.
Because I don’t want to be held back anymore.
I don’t want to be ninety in a retirement home looking back on my life filled with I-wish-I-did-that moments.
I want to say I was scared but did it anyway.
“I can do hard things,” I murmur to myself.
That will be my life motto.
And one day, when I have kids, I want them to be able to look up to me and say I’m inspirational and how cool I am for the experiences I have had.
That is what I want.
Experiences.
Slowly but surely, I’m going to start living again.
My phone buzzes beside my laptop. A smile tugs at the corner of my lips when I see who it is. Hitting answer on the video call, I lean the phone against my laptop.
My brother’s face fills the screen a second later.
“Hey, hey, hey, mini Ellington! You finally answered!”
A laugh bubbles up my throat. My brother seems happy and drunk, incredibly drunk based on the glazed look in his eyes. “Hi big Ellington, how is Greece treating you?”
A wobbly smile is aimed my way before the phone pans behind him to show an infinity pool, sun loungers, and a view that steals my breath.
Talk about experiences.
I’m adding Greece to the list when I get off the phone. I want to travel everywhere.
“My god, Caleb, it’s fucking beautiful.”
His face comes back and I scoff, waving him off. “No, I want the beautiful view, not your hideous face.”
My brother just rolls his eyes and that’s when I hear a soft feminine chuckle in the background. Quirking a brow at him, I lower my voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Seems it’s treating you really well.”
“You could say that.”
Wrinkling my nose, I fake a gag. “Just don’t be making me an auntie yet.”
Now it’s my brothers turn to gag. “Don’t worry, sis, I’m safe.”
“Please tell me you’re doing more than just partying and…”
“Fucking,” he supplies.
“I was trying to avoid that word, you moron, but yes.”
Running a hand through his shaggy blonde hair, he gives me a lop-sided grin. “For sure.”
“I’ll take that as a no.”
“I’m just living life!”
At least one of us is.
As if he heard my thoughts, his expression sobers. “How’s everything going? Matteo’s taking care of you, right?”
Leaning back on the couch, I dip my chin, tucking a lock of hair behind my ear.
Maybe I should cut my hair. Hair holds memories, right?
“He’s taking care of me. Everything is good here. I actually applied for a new job.” The last bit is rushed out in an exhale.
Caleb’s brows shoot up into his hair line. “No shit. Another financing gig?”
Biting my lip, I murmur, “Not exactly, no.” Sighing, I avoid his gaze, that nervous flutter in my stomach appearing once more. What if I fail the academy? “I’ve actually applied for a training position in the dispatcher academy.”
Caleb stops, searching my gaze, and he must see how nervous I am, or perhaps takes it for excitement. Because in the next breath, a smile stretches across his cheeks, and I’m not ashamed to admit I feel relief as he hoots, “Fuck yes! That would be sick, V! When do you start?”
“I’m not sure if I got into the academy, and I’m not entirely sure what their process is for selection, but I should know within a few days if I start training next week.”
Whistling low, the smile remains on his face. “I’m proud of you.”
“Yeah?”
He nods, the view of Milos in the background making me yearn to hop on a plane. “Of course I’m proud. It’s no easy feat starting a new career in your late twenties, never mind that you’re kind of…well…”
“Starting from scratch in everything?”
His lips flatten. “Yeah, which I’m really sorry about. I don’t think I’ve said it enough. What happened wasn’t deserved.”
And he doesn’t even know the half of it.
Shaking his head, Caleb goes on. “Nevertheless, you’re taking life by the balls and starting over and you should be proud of that. Not a lot of people could do it.”
“Well, took me a bit of time to try and stand again.”
“At least you’re standing,” he points out.
I smile, a blush creeping along my cheeks at his incessant compliments. God, I missed my brother.
Carter hated him with a passion, and that’s because Caleb saw right through his bullshit and called him out on it. Every time we saw him, it would be hell for me after. Not that I’d ever be able to tell Caleb that—the guilt would eat him alive.
And not only that, he would interfere.
Text messages and missed calls suddenly disappeared off my phone. Opportunities to see my brother that I had no idea about would be relayed to me weeks later. It took me a long time to realize Carter was deleting incoming communication from Caleb.
All along, I thought he was turning his back on me. Little did I know, it was Carter isolating me when I needed my brother the most.
“When are you coming back?” I ask, not able to keep the longing from my voice.
Caleb hears it, of course. “Want me to come home?”
“No, I’m fine. I want you to stay in Greece. I just miss you is all.” I pause a beat before confessing, “I missed these FaceTime calls.”
His smile is a sad, knowing one. “Me too, V. Which, speaking of missing me, I was thinking, especially now knowing you’re going to be studying for…what, how long is the training course?”
“It’s seven to ten weeks in-class training and then twelve weeks on-site training.”
Caleb blows out a breath. “Shit, yeah, okay, then you absolutely need to stay at our apartment while you study and train.”
“I can’t keep staying here rent-free, C.”
“Why not?”
“Well, because…it’s wrong, and I’m not a freeloader.”
“Never said you were, and you’re not freeloading.”
“I’m pretty sure the definition of a freeloader is someone who stays for months without paying rent,” I drawl sarcastically.
Caleb just rolls his eyes. “You’re my sister, and I’m assuming the training wage, if any, is horrendous so end of discussion, you’ll keep staying there.
And if you’re so hellbent on paying rent, you can pay it in the form of coming to watch me play.
” He pouts, and he looks oddly adorable, like a puppy who got caught digging a hole. “I miss you coming to my games.”
I point at the camera. “Watching you play is not the equivalent of rent, but fine, I’ll start coming to your games again.”
I only stopped because I thought he was ignoring me. For months when I thought I was texting and calling my brother, I was actually dialing a burner phone Carter bought.
Fucking psychopath.
That same feminine voice calls out my brother’s name in the background. Now I’m really smiling. “Go on, have fun. We can talk later when you’re not so…preoccupied,” I tease.
Caleb winks. “See you, sis.”
“Don’t make me an auntie!” I call out right as he ends the call.
And just my luck, right as the front door opens.