30. Home #2
The water pours over rock, loud and constant. “Thank you for sending her back to me.”
My voice breaks on that.
I breathe through the ache that is trying to rip open my chest.
“Ellie. I’m sure you know, but I wanted to tell you that she’s okay.
She really is, Honey. You’d be so proud of her.
She’s making friends and doing great in school again.
She’s incredibly frustrated with the crutches, but she’s milking the rescue story when it suits her. You’d laugh and be horrified.”
I close my eyes and breathe a couple more times.
“Okay, the elephant in the room, right? Beth, I’m in love with Annie.”
There. Band-Aid ripped off in Beth’s favorite place and where my daughter went to be close to her mother.
I’m either crazy or going to burn in hell. Maybe both.
“She isn’t you. She’ll never be you. She couldn’t. You’re Ellie’s mother. You’re my wife. You’re the first home I ever had and ever wanted.”
“I’m not leaving you behind, Babe. I would never. I’m taking you with me. In Ellie. In everything you’ve poured into me and shaped me with. In all the years we had together.”
I stop to clear my throat and wipe my eyes.
The words come easier after that.
“I want Annie in our lives. Mine and Ellie’s. Not as a replacement for you. As herself. Sharp. Stubborn. Brave. Too bossy. Mine, if she chooses it. I know you know all of this already. But I needed, for me, to come here and say it out loud to you.”
I close my eyes one last time, hoping to feel her, too.
“I’m scared out of my mind, Babe, but I’m not going to be afraid of living anymore. I’m going to embrace it and make you proud.”
I kiss my fingers and then blow the kisses into the waterfall.
“I’ll love you forever, Honey.”
***
Ellie is at the kitchen table when I get home, homework spread everywhere.
She looks up and sees I’m all wet. “You went to the waterfall?”
“Yes.”
“You okay?”
“Yes.” I hang up my coat. “You have a minute?”
She puts down her pencil. “Am I in trouble?”
“No.”
“Are you?”
“Maybe.”
That earns a tiny smile. “Okay, talk to me.”
“Sweetheart, I don’t know how to say this to you, so I’m just going to say it fast.”
I sit down beside her. “I’m in love with Annie.”
Ellie looks at me, waits one second, then says, “Finally.”
“That’s your response?”
“Dad, I have been through a lot and I may be a kid. But I’m not blind. Heck most of the town knows how you feel about Annie, I bet.”
I laugh and kiss her forehead.
“Have you told Annie?” she asks.
“Not yet. I wanted to tell her tonight.”
“Good.”
“I want to ask if you would mind going over to Erin’s. I’ll come get you later. But I wanted to make a romantic dinner for Annie.”
“Awww.”
“And, if you say it’s okay, I want to ask her to be part of our lives.”
That wipes the teasing off her face.
She looks down at her pencil, then back at me. “Dad, I’m pretty sure she already is.”
My throat gets rough. “Yeah?”
“Yeah. But you should ask anyway. Adults need words for everything.”
“We do.”
She nods. “I’ll stay at Erin’s.”
“Thanks, Kiddo.”
“But you have to text me after.”
“I will.”
“No vague dad updates. Real information.”
“I’ll tell you what she says.”
“And if you cry.”
“I’m not reporting that.”
“So you think you might.”
I stand and kiss the top of her head again. “You’re impossible.”
“I learned from the best.”
***
Annie knocks at six-thirty.
I open the door and lose my train of thought. She’s in a pink dress. Simple. Soft. Trouble.
“Hi,” she says.
“Hi.”
Her eyes narrow. “You okay?”
“I’m editing the first three things I thought.”
“Tell me the fourth.”
“You look beautiful.”
She smiles. “Excellent choice.”
Dinner goes better than my nerves expect. She likes the food. I accept the compliment with too much pride, and she tells me so. We talk about Ellie, the clinic, and I tell her more about my brothers, the Thirteen guys.
After dinner, I bring wine into the living room. She sits on the couch, watching me too closely.
“Wine? On a school night?”
“Settle down. I just thought it would be nice. And I have something to talk to you about.”
“All right.” Her face changes.
“It’s nothing bad.” I sit beside her, close enough to take her hand. “At least I hope it’s not bad.”
My nerves are making me froth at the mouth.
“Doc,” she says. “Take a breath. What has gotten into you?”
“I went to the waterfall today.”
“Oh.” She looks down and doesn’t speak.
I lift her chin. “I needed to talk to Beth.”
Annie’s eyes soften, but she stays silent.
“I love you, Annie.”
Her eyes fill with tears.
“I’m telling you, so you understand where I’m coming from. I’m not confused. I’m not running from grief or anything else.”
Her fingers close around mine.
“I love you. I want a life with you in it. Ellie, Coupeville, the clinic, the ordinary days, all of it.”
“I want to build something with you. Your life, my life, Ellie’s life. Our clinic. This town. Whatever the cannery becomes.”
She lets out one shaky breath and lifts her hands to my face. “I love you too.”
Everything in me gets quiet for one perfect second. Then she kisses me.
I pull her into my lap, and she comes willingly, the pink dress sliding over my knees. Her arms wrap around my neck.
“I love you,” she says again against my mouth.
I hold her tighter. “Say it again.”
“I love you.”
I kiss her until we’re both out of breath.
Then I lean back. “Ellie. I promised to text.”
“We’re calling.”
I pull out my phone and put it on speaker. Ellie answers instantly. “Well?”