He sighed again. There were way too many of those in this conversation. “I saw a doctor, and, well… I’ve had to make some decisions. For my health.”
Before I could respond, he muttered, “Hold on.” His voice grew muffled as he talked to someone else for a few seconds. “Listen, the realtor set me up with an app to open and close the gate. I don’t know how to use it, but Jillie says she can open it for you.”
“Realtor?” I asked, gripping the phone tightly.
One last sigh. “Go inside, Addy. I have to get to an appointment.”
“Okay, Pops.” My voice was small.
He hung up, and a minute later, the gate swung open.
Once I got myself into the beautiful A-frame cabin, which definitely looked staged for viewings, I sank onto the couch and pulled the embroidered Bigfoot pillow onto my lap, hugging it tight as I faced some truths.
Everything was changing.
Delly had been at college for three years and only stayed with me and Cole during school breaks, and those would probably stop soon as she started working and interning. I was proud that she was busy building a life outside our little bubble, a life that we’d both dreamed of for her for as long as I could remember. But even before the accident, I’d been feeling more and more like the life I’d pieced together in the meantime didn’t quite fit anymore.
I applied to the local fire station straight out of high school. It was the quickest way to get a reliable job and the schooling I needed to care for Delly, to keep her safe. Plus, they covered my education, so no debt. My sister was nearly ten years younger than me and had always been mine to look after.Always.
But now, especially post life-flashing-before-my-eyes crisis, the thought of going back to my apartment where Cole and I were on opposite schedules and carrying on as usual seemed even less appealing than taking the four-wheeler back to the ravine and reenacting my epic fall.
Because to everyone else, that’s what it had been. A moment of clumsiness. A fall.
My co-workers had even razzed me for it in their “Get Well Soon” cards.
Thankfully, Pops hadn’t ever contradicted my story—not that he needed to—but because of that, I’d held on to the hope that he didn’t remember exactly what’d happened.
But I remembered.
I remembered waking up on the four-wheeler as he drove us back to the cabin. I could easily recall the panic in his eyes when they’d met mine. The pain. The realization that he’d pulled me from a ridge in the ravine I’d landed on badly.
That there was dried blood on my face.
Pops had been nothing but clear minded since. Or that’s how he’d seemed when he actually answered my phone calls.
The only person who knew everything was Cole. I’d blurted out every detail that I could remember to him the first moment we were alone in the hospital room. Cole had listened intently, putting on his professional face—he worked as a public-school counselor—and asked a lot of follow-up questions about Pops that I mostly had the answers for.
“It could’ve just been a trauma response, dude,” he’d finally said.
“Don’t call me dude,” I’d said automatically even as he gave the answer I’d been hoping for.
It was the best-case scenario of a terrible situation, and one I’d drawn based on my own experience as a medic for the past decade.
But then Cole’s expression turned grim as he added that it could also be early signs of memory disease, and my hope deflated.
I’d known that. I just hadn’t wanted to acknowledge it.
I hugged the pillow closer to my chest as I thought of going back to work. Whenever I’d be allowed back, that was. To twenty-four-hour, sometimes forty-eight-hour, shifts spent helping people through their worst moments.
I’d hated being on the other side of that.
Dropping my head back against the cushions, I studiedthe intersecting wooden beams of the ceiling before closing my eyes and taking several deep breaths.
When I opened them, I didn’t see a rustic cabin that’d been my refuge.
I didn’t feel the hurt of being left on the outside by its owner.
There was only another ravine, filled with uncertainty and unknowns, and I had no choice but to navigate it.
