Page 210 of Sing with Me

“You’re the strongest woman I know.”

“Is that good or bad?”

“It’s good. It means if something happens to me, you’ll be okay.”

Skye felt alarmed. “What are you talking about?”

“I mean that if we break up or something, you’ll be okay.”

Skye shook her head. “No, I won’t be.”

“Then stop compartmentalizing your emotions,” Diehl said.

“What do you mean?”

“I believe that if we don’t see each other for a while, you’ll be sad. We’ll both be sad. But you’re trying to put your emotions in categorized boxes—like labeled spice containers—so that you’ll go on day by day,” Diehl explained. “If you don’t face your emotions, then someday the floodgates will burst open.”

“Face my emotions?”

Diehl nodded.

“Well, Dr. Diehl, how come you know so much about my heart?”

“Because I’ve seen it. You’re kind, generous, compassionate. You don’t judge me or tell me what to do. You care more about where I am spiritually than how I’m doing temporally.” Diehl paused. “And yet when it comes to your own self, you’re tense and you don’t show.”

“Show what?”

“Your feelings for me. I need to know where I stand with you.”

“I think I’m where you are?” Skye said quietly.

“I want to hear it directly from you, in your own words. I don’t want to heardittoorsame here.”

Voices outside the apartment interrupted Skye’s thoughts. Keys jangled as the front door unlocked.

“My brother and Em are home,” Skye said. “Let’s talk later.”

Diehl sighed and nodded. “Okay.”

Chapter Fifty-Five

The next few weeks were busy times for Diehl that he had no time to continue his conversation with Skye.

Let’s talk later.

It had been the last thing Skye told him that Friday night when she was still in Athens, Georgia, visiting her brother and sister-in-law.

The weekend zoomed by with Diehl back at the office on Saturday—something he needed to stop doing if he were to have a semblance of life outside the office—and with both of them attending churches in different cities on Sunday.

After church at Midtown Chapel, Diehl left his kids with Mom while he and Dad returned to the office to hammer out the details of how they were going to split the profits for Brooks Transportation. Dad wasn’t about to hand the subsidiary over to Riley a hundred percent.

And on and on.

The first week of July was busier than any other week because of the day off in the middle of the week, thereby causing Diehl to have to work extra on the other days when potential buyers of Brooks Manufacturing came to call. Everyone was relieved they were getting rid of that subsidiary.

By the end of that week, Diehl was beginning to feel sapped of strength. No amount of gym was going to regain that. Something was missing in his life.

He had God now. Didn’t that mean he had everything?

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