Chapter Twenty-Eight Cole
I’m sitting in my truck outside the gym, waiting for my daily check-in call with Tyler. It’s become part of my morning routine—coffee, a brief meditation exercise Tracey taught me, then an accountability call before I work out.
My phone rings at exactly seven forty-five. Tyler’s nothing if not punctual. And he always starts talking before I say hello. It’s slightly irritating, but I’m getting used to it.
“Morning. How are you feeling going into the day?”
“Good,” I answer, and mostly mean it. “I slept six hours straight for the second time this week.”
“That’s good. You’re starting to level out. Any urges?”
This is the question he asks every morning, and every morning I have to be honest about the answer. Mostly.
“I thought about her when I was lying in bed.”
“How long?”
“Maybe two minutes. I got up and brewed coffee instead.”
“Good. Two months ago that same urge would’ve lasted hours and you probably would’ve acted on it.”
“Yeah.”
“And her stalker?”
I’ve been expecting this question. He asks it every few days now, and I’ve gotten good at the answer. “Haven’t thought about him. Haven’t looked.”
That part is true. I haven’t looked. The app is still installed on my phone, sitting in the folder I buried three screens deep, the icon muted so it doesn’t push notifications.
I haven’t opened it in over a month. Tyler doesn’t ask whether the app still exists.
He asks whether I’ve used it. That’s the hair I keep splitting.
“Good.” Tyler’s voice doesn’t change. He either believes me or he’s decided to let me get away with believing myself. I can’t tell anymore. “What’s on your agenda today?”
“Applying for more jobs. And I’m writing another letter tonight.”
“To Hailey?”
“Yeah. Not to send this time, just to process. It helps me work through my thoughts.”
So far, I’ve written seventeen letters. Some are hand-written apologies while others are typed out.
Some are updates on my recovery. Some are just me missing her, working through the grief of losing my entire world.
They all sit in a folder on my computer, password-protected and titled Recovery Work.
I’ve only sent one of those letters because Tracey thought it would be a good idea and peer pressure from the group talked me into letting Tyler deliver it to her.
That was three weeks ago. She hasn’t responded.
She isn’t going to respond. Tracey told me from the jump not to expect a reply, and I told myself I wouldn’t expect one, yet I still hold out hope every morning, like a kid who really believes that this year, he’ll catch Santa coming down the chimney.
False hope is a hell of a drug.
Tyler and I talk for a few more minutes, going through the motions of making sure my day is set up for success.
“Call me if you need anything. Same time tomorrow?”
“Same time tomorrow.”
I tuck my phone away and head into the gym, nodding to the receptionist at the front desk.
After my workout, I’m just finishing changing out of my sweaty clothes when my phone rings. It’s Emma.
“Hey, Em. What’s up?”
“Cole.” Her voice is shaky. “I need you. I’m in the emergency room.”
Every protective instinct I have springs into overdrive, but I force myself to breathe. I force myself to listen. To ask the right questions instead of taking over.
“What happened? Are you okay?”
“I fell down the concrete stairs outside of work and broke my arm.” Her voice wavers. “It’s a bad break, Cole. They’re saying I need surgery.”
“Are you alone? Where’s Matt?”
“He’s at work, but he can’t get here for another hour or two. The doctor wants to talk about surgical options and I don’t… I can’t think straight with the pain medication they gave me.”
I take a deep breath and apply the techniques Tracey’s been hammering into me.
“Emma, I’m sorry you’re scared and in pain.” I sit straighter on the bench in the locker room. “Tell me what would be most helpful right now. Do you want me to come to the hospital? Do you need someone to call work and check in? What do you need?”
“I thought you’d rush over here and try to take over,” Emma says, surprise evident in her voice.
“I’m going to support you however you need me to,” I clarify. “This is your choice. I’ll help with whatever you want, but you’re in charge.”
“Oh.” I can almost hear her thinking on the other end of the line. “Um, I think I would like you to come. Just to sit with me until Matt gets here. And maybe help me think through what the doctor is saying? My head feels fuzzy from whatever they gave me.”
“Of course. I’m heading out now.” And then my heart sinks into my stomach. “Which hospital are you at?”
Don’t say Memorial. Don’t say Memorial. Please, don’t say Memorial.
“I’m at Riverside. An ambulance brought me here.”
I close my eyes and breathe through a sigh of relief as I head out the door. “I’ll be there soon.”
“Thanks, Cole. I’m glad you’re coming.”
…
At the hospital, I’m hit by memories of Emma in the emergency room after what Shitbag Steve did to her.
With her left arm in a temporary splint today, she looks like she did the night he beat the life out of her.
It’s immediately triggering, and I can feel the scalding rage that wants to consume me.
It’s pounding at the gates of my mind, begging to be let out. Begging to take control.
But I don’t let it. I can’t afford to lose control now. I force myself to breathe through it.
This isn’t Steve. This is a concrete staircase. The staircase didn’t do this to hurt her. My job right now is to be her brother, not her bodyguard.
“Hey, Em. How are you feeling?”
“Better now that you’re here. And the pain meds are helping.” She gestures to her arm. “The doctor said the break’s clean, but it’s in a spot that needs pins and a plate. Surgery tomorrow morning, I think.”
“Did they say anything about recovery time?”
“Sounds like a few months in different casts, then physical therapy. I’m worried about my classes and work.”
The old Cole would have immediately started solving these problems for her. I would have called her professors myself. Arranged meal delivery. Maybe hired someone to take notes in her classes, because why not? She’s my sister, and she shouldn’t have to worry about anything.
Instead, I ask, “What feels like the most urgent thing to figure out?”
“Probably my job. I can’t lift boxes with one arm.”
“Okay. What do you want to do about it? Do you want to draft an email to your manager together? Call her? Or we can just practice what you’re going to say, and you can give her a call when you’re feeling better?”
Emma’s eyes fill. I almost panic, thinking I’ve done something wrong. Then she laughs, which makes her wince, which makes her laugh harder, which makes her wince again.
“You’re being so weird right now,” she says. “In a good way. Weird in the best way possible.”
“Thanks, I think.”
“I can handle it myself. But will you sit with me while I do?”
“Yeah. Of course.”
We spend the next hour talking through how she’s going to get through the next few months, and how I can be a functional part of her larger support system without being the whole thing.
She drafts an email to her manager. I read it over her shoulder.
I don’t rewrite it. I just tell her it’s good, because it is.
When Matt arrives, I update him, hug Emma carefully, then step back and let him take over.
“Cole?” Emma says as I’m getting ready to leave. “Thank you for being here.”
“Thank you for telling me what you needed.”
She studies me. She’s my baby sister, but sometimes she looks at me like she’s thirty years older. “You’re different.”
“I’m trying to be.”
“I can tell. Just—don’t beat yourself up about who you used to be, okay? You’re allowed to have been someone else once. You don’t have to hate him.”
“I’ll work on that.”
“Good. Go home. Eat something. Call me tomorrow.”
“Love you, Em.”
“Love you back.”
I don’t go straight home. I sit in the hospital parking lot for a few minutes first, letting myself come down from what’s still running through my system. Triggers don’t vanish just because you don’t act on them. They hang around, looking for a back door.
I don’t look up Shitbag Steve.
I haven’t in months. Sometimes, deleting that tracking app feels like the biggest thing I’ve done with my recovery. Most nights I don’t think about him at all, which I guess is the actual point.
I sit there long enough for my hands to stop shaking. Then I drive home.
My apartment feels the same as it has for three months. Quiet. Too quiet. I’ve cleaned it so many times, I’m starting to run out of things to clean.
After I’ve eaten leftover chili and showered, I sit at the kitchen table with my laptop and open the folder titled Recovery Work.
Letter number eighteen.
Hailey,
I sat with Emma in the ER today. She’s okay. Broken arm, surgery tomorrow. The thing I wanted to tell you is that she made me laugh, and for a second I forgot to be sad. Then I remembered, and it hurt, and I came home and now I’m writing you a letter you’ll never read to make myself feel better.
I wonder how many of these I’ll write before I stop. I’m starting to think the answer is infinite. Which is maybe fine. My therapist says not everything has to be a problem that gets solved. Some things you just carry.
Cole
I save it, then close the folder and my laptop.