He kisses me, and in the end, we both end up being late.
My CV is clutched tight between my hands as I step into the York hospital for the second time in a month.
The day after I returned to Cape Weston, I had a long call with Sariah where I explained where I was at in my head. She was understanding and said she’d started expecting it. With Emily who’s decided to follow my lead and apply for the open ER position, Sariah isn’t in the best position with an already-understaffed team, but she didn’t make me feel too bad about it. When that call ended, I felt like I’d broken away from a net that’d been cast over me. While my week back hadn’t been so bad, it wasn’t great, and I wanted to believe I could learn to love my job again. Maybe changing hospitals would be a step in the right direction.
I follow the same steps I took the day Keira called me in labor, although much calmer, this time. I’ll need to bring my CV later to the HR department, but I want to first talk to the nurse manager who’s on today and see whether they do have nursing positions tofill.
“Excuse me, miss!”
I do a double take, not sure whether the older lady sitting in the cafeteria chair is talking to me, but since there’s no one else in another ten-foot radius, I guess she is.
“Can I help you?” I ask as I step closer. The pale, white-haired woman is facing two other elderly women, all three in powder-blue hospital gowns.
“Yes. You can prove my point by telling these two ignorants that whippets are true beauties.”
“I’m sorry?” I say with a small laugh as the plump woman with her arm in a cast rolls her eyes.
“You know,” the dark-skinned woman next to her says, “those long-legged, skeletal dogs that run fast and look like large rats?” Her voice is raspy, and she breaks into a coughing fit when she starts laughing. “Those are what Lois means,” she chokes out.
“Oh, um…” The white lady looks at me expectantly, her lips pinched. Her arm is hooked to an IV drip beside her. I actually find these dogs so ugly they’re cute, but I don’t think I want to give my stance on this debate. “I’m not sure I know what those are. But are you ladies okay? Do you need help returning to your unit?” Most of the cafeteria is empty, and no one seems to be checking over them.
The feisty one—Lois—rolls her eyes even more intensely than the previous one did. “We’re old, not dead yet. We can go get a coffee by ourselves if we damn well want to.”
I know it’s not her goal, but her remark makes me smile. I get the feeling if Ruth had still been around in ten years, this is exactly what she would’ve been like.
“Thank you for worrying, sweetie,” the woman with the broken arm says. “We appreciate it, but we’re just in this unit right there. Not far to walk back to.”
I look to where she’s pointing. The sign in front of the door readsGERIATRICS AND PHYSICAL REHABILITATION.
“Well, if you’re not helping, you can go now,” Lois says, brushing me off with a hand motion.
“Lois, stop being rude,” the two other women say at the same time.
I can’t stop smiling, even when Lois throws me a dirty look before resuming her argument for the cuteness of whippets. These three really do remind me of Ruth and her group of girlfriends.
I leave them and head for the glass doors of the geriatrics unit. The last experience I had on that kind of unit was in nursing school. I remember liking it, mostly because I enjoyed talking with the patients, but other than that, it’s blurry.
Through the door, I see a dozen or so patients spread out through the hallways, some walking with a walker and a physical therapist by their side. Others are sitting in plush chairs, reading magazines or making puzzles. The nurses and doctors sit in the pod in the middle of the unit, chatting and looking to be having a good time.
I look back at the three ladies in the cafeteria, now smiling at each other like their previous quarrel is a thing of the past. Then, I glance down at my CV and back at the unit, still grinning. Somehow, it almost feels like Ruth played a role in bringing me to this exact place at this exact moment.
I take a deep breath, then open the door.
Chapter 44
Now
Sometimes, the man thinks back to the boy he once was. The one who accepted he would never be truly happy again. The one who liked to believe in shooting stars.
And then he looks around him at all the love he has, and he realizes maybe he was right to believe in their magic, after all.
Epilogue
One Year Later
The party is a success.
For her seventh birthday, Zoe wasn’t sure whether she wanted a pirate or a princess theme. So, we did both. She also requested to pull out the insane costume from her nana’s lakeside cottage, which means Eli is now laughing with Keira’s new boyfriend—who she still only refers to as a friend, because God forbid she acknowledges she likes him—with a princess hat on his head.
